I finished it in two sittings and thought it was amazing.
It's one of the most well crafted shows I've seen for some time. The care and attention can be seen in everything from the characters and the way they relate to each other (emotionally and in terms of plot), to the delicate balancing of the different story strands, to the framing; the lighting, sound design, ambience is all extraordinary. It's almost as if people sat down and wrote an entire script, like actually thought about this stuff.
I thought all the acting was great. The boys do a brilliant job playing off each other, the friendships felt completely believable. No doubt the direction of the actors played a huge part in getting those performances too. The daughter character is so tightly written, and the performance is note perfect. The early scene in which the boyfriend replies that she is beautiful and the camera lingers on her face, conveys such soul crushing vulnerability I could have cried. I liked that the kids feel like real kids with real sensitivities and not the precocious self aware arsehats that modern tv writers (and fans?) think they should be. Winona stole the show like it was a Gucci handbag. She should have been one of the greats. That Heathers reference was so bitter sweet.
But this is more than shallow pastiche, it feels like a genuine love letter. It's not all reference for the sake of reference, or a simple duping of snapshots from other stuff. It's a show that breaks down, extends, subverts and reinterprets themes and ideas. And it clearly has it's own voice that isn't Carpenter (less worldly cynical) or Speilbergo (less hopeful) or Craven (less arch) or Lynch (less dancing midget) - unless of course it's all Stephen King which I haven't read.
The scares and atmosphere hooked me. The upside down pool scene in particular really creeped me out. Yeah as always the thing doesn't work once it steps out of the shadows (a clever genre reference perhaps?) and it seemed a mistake to overexpose the bads given their rather shallow, generic construction. But these are small gripes in what was a very satisfying show.