Stranger Things: The Experience review – stepping into Hawkins has never been more explosive

AS a huge Stranger Things fan my ears pricked up as soon as I heard about an immersive experience arriving in the UK.

I loved season four and part of me feared Stranger Things: The Experience would struggle to live up to the hype, but as soon as I arrived those doubts quickly faded away.

Within minutes I was laughing and squirming in equal measure as some of Hawkins’ most shady scientists began grilling me about my sleep patterns and nightmares.

It quickly became clear that this was no ordinary sleep study, as advertised by the promotional material plastered around the entrance to the venue.

I’ll avoid major spoilers here but suffice to say, I soon found out I had more in common with Millie Bobby Brown’s Eleven than I ever could have expected.

With a whole host of very familiar faces helping us on our mission – virtually speaking of course- we truly felt part of the gang as we fought to escape the lab, pulling our weight by solving an array of different problems along the way.

Set in Brent Cross’ Troubadour Studios, I was stunned by the scale of the space, with multiple groups traversing the space at the same time. 

The lack of soundproofing wasn’t ideal, as it meant we could hear our counterparts shrieking and laughing in the distance, along with some eighties tunes blasting out from the bar, but in the grand scheme of things this wasn’t a big problem.

The mixture of jump scares, humour and striking visuals certainly kept us on our toes and was thoroughly on brand with the tone of the Netflix hit.

Once we’d fought our way to freedom we were rewarded with quite the treat in the form of Scoops Ahoy ice cream and Surfer Boy pizza.

We also made the most of some epic photo ops, including a huge statue of Vecna and recreations of some of the show’s most iconic locations.

A series of retro arcade games and the chance to pick up some swag from the gift shops didn’t go amiss too – I’ll be proudly rocking a Rink-O-Mania roller skate keyring from now.

If you’re a big fan of Stranger Things and not too far from London, I highly recommend the experience, but at £52 per ticket it would be wasted on someone who doesn’t love the show.

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The experience includes Scoops Ahoy ice cream and Surfer Boy pizza[/caption]

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Fans can step into Hawkins[/caption]

You can buy your own tickets here with the event running through to December 11.