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The Optimistic Curmudgeon is an interview podcast where Josh Herring interviews expert guests whose credentials and experience help listeners understand truth in a confusing world. We discuss issues under seven areas: economics, politics, education, philosophy, business, virtue, and leadership! May the best ideas win.
The Optimistic Curmudgeon is an interview podcast where Josh Herring interviews expert guests whose credentials and experience help listeners understand truth in a confusing world. We discuss issues under seven areas: economics, politics, education, philosophy, business, virtue, and leadership! May the best ideas win.
Episodes

Wednesday Apr 15, 2026
Stranger Things Series Finale, with Brad Birzer (10x7)
Wednesday Apr 15, 2026
Wednesday Apr 15, 2026
Dr. Brad Birzer of Hillsdale College analyzes the Stranger Things series finale. Birzer argues that Stranger Things is a mythology of the 1980s, and he thinks the finale episode wraps up the series well. The younger generations of kids, the older generation heading to college, small town life, the Upside Down, hatred of the military, music of the 1980s - we discuss it all! This is definitely a spoiler-ridden episode, so if you haven't watched the finale, do that first. We also get into the controversy around Will Byers 6-minute coming out scene. By the end of the conversation, both Birzer and Herring argue this is a show about friendship and coming-of-age in a certain era of American life mostly lost to the present.
Brad Birzer's Wall Street Journal article about Stranger Things (free on Substack): https://substack.com/@bradleyjbirzer/p-187969433
Josh Herring's book Sons of Adam, Daughters of Eve: C.S. Lewis's Images of Gender - https://davenantinstitute.org/sons-of-adam-daughters-of-eve

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