Stranger Things without the scares: Films to watch to catch the 80s teen vibes

One of the world’s biggest tv shows is coming to an end - in trademark scary fashion.

Stranger Things – a global streaming smash – is concluding the adventures of Eleven, Vecna and the whole Hawkins gang, with the first episodes of the final season now released and the finale hitting screens shortly after midnight on New Year's Day.

But while some of the earlier episodes of season one were rated 12, the vast majority of Stranger Things is a 15 – and quite frankly, a lot of it is far too scary for people even two or three times that age.

BBC Bitesize comes out from behind the sofa and takes a look at five films full of 1980s fashion, music and teenage adventures – but without the major scares.

The Goonies

Quite possibly, the ultimate 1980s teen adventure – The Goonies has been a major influence on Stranger Things creators, the Duffer Brothers.

There’s a lot they both have in common. Both films feature groups of teenagers, supported by older, cooler kids – taking on a big bad to save their home town.

The Goonies sees the eponymous gang taking on a series of underground tunnels and avoiding booby traps in search of One Eyed Willie’s lost buried treasure – while being chased by the criminal Fratellis hoping to get their hands on the gold too.

The film is full of classic 1980s fashion and even features music and a brief cameo from singer Cyndi Lauper. Both The Goonies and Stranger Things share an actor in common as well. Sean Astin played Mikey in the 1980s classic as well as fan favourite Bob in the second season of Stranger Things.

E.T. the Extra Terrestrial

While Steven Spielberg didn’t direct The Goonies (he was credited with coming up with the main idea for the film, as well as being executive producer), 1982’s E.T. the Extra Terrestrial is classic Spielberg.

It’s clearly a film that the Duffer Brothers loved – and there are plenty of references to it within Stranger Things.

Both sets of children love playing Dungeons & Dragons and when the Stranger Things gang find Eleven for the first time, they choose to hide her in one of their homes away from their parents – just like Elliott, Michael and Gertie do in E.T.

The kids take E.T. trick or treating, they put a white sheet over the alien to dress it as a ghost – Eleven suggests doing the same thing in season two. And of course, both groups travel everywhere by bike.

While not a film full of pop culture references, E.T. the Extra Terrestrial serves up a realistic (if you ignore the alien part) snapshot of 1980s Americana in suburban California. The fashions and hairstyles scream 1980s as does the iconic Speak ‘n’ Spell toy E.T. uses to communicate. And there’s very little more 80s than a BMX.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off

If Steven Spielberg is one of the major film players of the 1980s, then Matthew Broderick can’t be far behind.

This is the first of two entries for him – for a film that completely sums up 1980s slacker culture.

In Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, released in 1986, the hairstyles and clothes are entirely in fitting with the era – as is the technology.

There’s no mobile phone for Ferris to call to fake an illness – it’s all done on a rotary landline phone.

And while his computer hacking skills to change his attendance record are certainly impressive – the technology isn’t by today’s standard. His computer is entirely monochromatic text-based.

One thing’s for certain – the film’s soundtrack definitely covers the 1980s vibes. You’d be hard-pushed to find a song that summed up the electronica era of the 80s more than Oh Yeah by Yello, a constant presence throughout the movie.

WarGames

If it looks as if the actor Matthew Broderick is an accomplished hacker in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, then perhaps his experience on WarGames, released three years earlier in 1983, helped.

Broderick plays David – a computer whizz, who accesses school records once more to improve his grades.

But after doing that – he challenges himself further with his hacking and somehow gets into a United States military system and inadvertently almost launches a nuclear strike against the Soviet Union.

The film taps into genuine concerns in the 1980s – over both the rise of computer hacking as more and more people bought their own home technology, and over the lingering threat of nuclear action during the Cold War.

The Duffer Brothers’ referenced the hacking trends in seasons two and four of Stranger Things – with season four’s character Suzie repeating the grade changing trick to help Dustin out with his Latin.

Teen Wolf

Think 1980s, think Michael J. Fox.

But while Back to the Future would likely be the first port of call – the majority of the film is actually set in 1955, with Marty trying to get back to the 1980s.

But 1985’s Teen Wolf definitely fits the 80s Stranger Things vibe.

Both Teen Wolf and Stranger Things blend the supernatural with high school, small town Americana – with the Netflix streamer even bringing in school basketball and the classic ‘Letterman’ jackets commonplace in Teen Wolf in later seasons.

Both place the principles of teenage friendship at their core – tightly knit groups who’d do anything for each other, with seemingly very little reliance on or involvement from their parents at all.

And when Fox’s Scott Howard transforms into a werewolf – not unlike some of the psychological transformations characters like Billy Hargrove undergo in season three – he fully keeps the 80s mood going. There’s still big hair and even in wolf-form, he still commits to the 1980s fashions but thankfully unlike Stranger Things, you don’t need to watch the whole thing through your fingers.

This article was published in November 2025