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Season 4 of Stranger Things tour in Vilnius
In June 2019, Netflix broadcast season 3 of Stranger Things with a cliffhanger worthy of the great series. Russian soldiers discovered Sheriff Jim Hopper (David Harbour) and referred to him as “the American”. While everyone thought he was dead after the destruction of the machine giving access to the inverted world, he was alive!
As shown in the first trailer of this new season, the Hawkins Sheriff found himself trapped in a camp in Russia. Hopper is then surrounded by Russian jailers who are not very reassuring. We also discover him participating in the construction of a railroad as a convict.
If the plot takes place in the 1980s in the former USSR, it was filmed in Vilnius, Lithuania.
A highly anticipated season
The Duffer brothers, creators of Stranger Things, have chosen Lithuania to film part of this new season. The filming took place in the capital of this Baltic country from November 2019 to 14 February 2020.
Production then stopped because of the Covid-19 outbreak on March 16. Part of the series was then to be filmed in Atlanta (like the three previous seasons) but for the moment it is also suspended. It should therefore not be released before the end of 2020.
This season 4 should be made up of nine episodes – like the previous one – plus a special issue, according to the rumours going around. The speculations of the specialists rely on an episode about the past and the career of one of the main characters.
If Season 4 were to be the last, the Duffer brothers would really like to extend the adventure of this popular series; perhaps by splitting it into two parts.
As for the first episode, if it’s still very vague, its title “Chapter one: The Hellfire Club” is an explicit reference to the X-Men Comics Club of the Damned.
In the former century-old Lukiškes prison
Lukiškių skg. 6, Vilnius 01108, Lithuania
Jim Hopper would find himself locked up in a Russian prison. For the purpose of filming, director Shawn Levy has therefore moved to the Lukiškes prison. Near the square of the same name, this building was commissioned in 1900. Closed since 2019, it was used as a prison for all the dictatorial regimes of the 20th century (during the Second Polish Republic, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union).
During the Second World War, the prison was used by the Gestapo but also by the Lithuanian Saugumas – the security police – as a detention cell for thousands of Jews from the city ghetto as well as Polish resistance fighters. In 1944, it was returned to the Soviet regime to lock up the partisans of the Armia Krajowa, the internal resistance army.
Not far from the beautiful Seimas Palace, which houses the Lithuanian Parliament, Lukiškes Prison is also home to the Orthodox Church of St. Nicholas, an integral part of this place of deprivation of liberty. At the time of its inauguration, the penitentiary complex was considered to be the most expensive one built in the region. Its cells were heated, very well equipped and ventilated. Its materials were non-combustible, except for the doors and windows.
Lithuania, land of filming
Will, Mike, Eleven, Dustin, Sheriff Hopper and the rest of them took to the streets of Vilnius for season four of Stranger Things. The Lithuanian capital and the country are not at their first shooting of series or films.
The cameras of the productions of the Last Czars, Chernobyl (HBO), Young Wallander (Netflix), War and Peace (BBC One) or Tokyo Trial (Netfix), but also feature films such as Hannibal Lecter: The Origins of Evil, Highlander: The Guardian of Immortality, Invincible or Sobibor have landed in the Lithuanian capital.
It should be pointed out that the costs are lower for producers, that the monuments strongly resemble those built in Russia – as we explained for Chernobyl – that all historical periods are present there and that a film department in Vilnius has been specially created for this purpose.
Everything was therefore in place to shoot season 4 of Stranger Things, a series with pharaonic records: 8.2 million people watched the first season in the first 16 days of broadcasting in August 2016. It is also the most watched streaming series in the world for the years 2017 and 2018. Season 3 was viewed by 40.7 million Netflix accounts.
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FUNKO DORBZ RIDEZ: Stranger Things - Hopper
From stranger things, hopper with Deputy vehicle, as a stylized Dorbz Ridez from Funko! figure stands about 4 inches and comes in a window display box. Check out the other stranger things figures from Funko! collect them all!
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By Anthony Thibault
From the "Casimir generation", Anthony has kept (in addition to a passion for Goldorak) a taste for inventive images, experimentation and curiosity. Passionate about travel and pop culture, he co-founded Fantrippers with Nicolas Albert to share his passion with as many people as possible.