With a third season confirmed for Netflix's hit sci-fi show
Stranger Things, there's plenty of speculation in terms of story that the Duffer Brothers can explore. And even though the show's stars don't quite know what the new season will entail, actor David Harbour, who plays Chief Jim Hopper, has revealed what he would like to see happen with his character.
"I’ve been pretty vocal about how I love the dynamic between Joyce and Hopper, which I don’t feel like we got a lot of time to explore in Season 2," Harbour told Variety. "I just love that dynamic of these two lost people. I equate it to Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway in “Chinatown” or Indiana Jones and Marion in “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” These great, throwback, they hate each other but love each other kind of tropes. It’s done so sophisticatedly by the Duffers, and Winona is really game for it, too. We love playing scenes with each other. I would love more stuff with her."
Harbour also shared that he'd like to see more one-on-one screentime with Hopper and Steve, or even Dustin. Fans were delighted to experience the unexpected pairing of Steve and Dustin for much of Season 2, and were even treated to a few episodes where Steve took on a sort of babysitter role to the kids. If that doesn't happen, Harbour also expressed interest in uncovering more of Hopper's intriguing backstory, though he admits he's not sure how much is feasible.
He elaborated, "That’s a feasible one — and then there’s stuff that I don’t think is feasible, but I do think the internet knows my love for Joe Keery. I would love to see a Hopper and Steve get-together, but I seriously doubt that’s going to happen. I’d love to work with Gaten. I want to get into the backstory of Hopper more. When Eleven goes into the basement, she sees a bunch of boxes, one of which says “Hawkins Lab.” “Dad.” “Vietnam.” “New York.” There’s a lot of story we can get into around Hopper’s time as a cop in New York, Hopper’s time in Vietnam. I would love to see more of that, but we have a ton of great characters, so I don’t know how much they’ll be able to do."
On the potential of exploring more of Sara's backstory, Harbour said, "There’s a lot of timeline stuff to explain with Sara as well. Sara dies theoretically five years before our story. In terms of the timeline, we say in the first season that I moved back to Hawkins after that experience. And we have me calling my ex-wife, who is remarried and has a kid. There’s a lot of rich material there, and with secrets around Sara and that whole event, which I hope we’ll get into in future seasons. Maybe not in the way you think. But there is a lot more complexity to Hopper’s relationship to Sara’s death. I would love to see them go further into that."
Point being, there's plenty of potential material for the Duffer Brothers to play with in Stranger Things Season 3. As for when we can expect the new season to hit Netflix, Harbour predicts some time in 2019 based on the previous seasons' schedules, though he couldn't confirm.