The final season of Netflix's global phenomenon, Stranger Things, has concluded, leaving fans with a climactic showdown that felt less like traditional television and more like a final boss battle ported directly from a console. This is emblematic of a significant cultural shift: where video games once solely aspired to be cinematic, the influence now flows powerfully in both directions.
The Structural Overlap: From Corridors to Cutscenes
Watching the finale, many viewers noted the familiar rhythms of a blockbuster game. The season's structure, with its prolonged exposition, tense exploration of eerie environments, and explosive set-piece confrontations, bore a striking resemblance to titles like Resident Evil. Long stretches where characters explain convoluted plans while navigating ominous settings are a staple of interactive horror adventures. As the newsletter Pushing Buttons noted, these sections are more tolerable with a controller in hand, creating a pacing challenge for passive viewers.
The spectacular fight against a gargantuan enemy in the finale was pure video game spectacle, evoking the scale and desperate combat of franchises like Monster Hunter. This is not an isolated case. Films such as Edge of Tomorrow, with its central 'die and respawn' mechanic, function as a live-action roguelike. Mad Max: Fury Road plays out like a relentless vehicular combat game, and the John Wick series, particularly its fourth instalment, mirrors the escalating challenge of a fighting-game boss rush.
A Generation of Gamers Takes the Creative Reins
This convergence is largely driven by a generational change. A cohort of Gen X and elder millennial creatives, raised on video games, now hold significant sway in television and film production. This is why adaptations like the critically acclaimed Fallout series, overseen by Jonathan Nolan, succeed where earlier attempts failed. The creative language of games—their world-building, quest structures, and visual grammar—is now second nature to these storytellers.
However, this borrowing is not always selective. The Pushing Buttons critique of Stranger Things highlighted that the show also imported some less desirable gaming tropes. The feeling of open-world bloat, with an ever-expanding cast of underdeveloped characters and a confusing multiplication of dimensions (the Upside Down, Vecna's mindscape, a new void), mirrored the overwhelming sprawl of some modern games. The lengthy, multi-part epilogue drew unfavourable comparison to the protracted conclusion of Red Dead Redemption 2, testing audience patience.
The Stagnation of Mega-Franchises and Cultural Permeation
This blending of media occurs against a backdrop of consolidation in the games industry itself. As discussed in the newsletter, player engagement is dominated by a handful of established mega-franchises. Data from Circana shows the top five most-played games on PlayStation 5 in 2025 were identical to 2024: Fortnite, Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto V, Roblox, and Minecraft. This stagnation pushes other creatives to seek new audiences and expressions through film and TV, further eroding the boundaries between the forms.
Interestingly, the era of cheap, rushed licensed game tie-ins for major films and shows has passed, partly due to soaring development costs. But as the article posits, when a television season like Stranger Things already feels so intrinsically like a video game in its structure and pacing, is a separate adaptation even necessary? The influence is already baked into the viewing experience.
The reciprocal relationship between games and screen media is now a fundamental part of modern pop culture. While it brings dynamism and a new visual vocabulary, it also carries the risk of inheriting pacing issues and narrative bloat. The challenge for creators is to harness the excitement and interactivity of gaming while retaining the focused storytelling that defines the best cinema and television.
