Shadowing practice: Stranger Things | The First 8 Minutes - Series Opener | Netflix

This clip is the first 8 minutes of the Stranger Things pilot on Netflix: a basement Dungeons & Dragons battle that spills into an argument about screen time, then a slice of pizza handed around at a teenage party. It runs 149 lines at 124 words per minute, faster than only 6% of the catalogue, so the pace gives you real room to catch each word before the next one lands.

The level is rated B1, and the cast is American, four boys yelling over each other at a table, then a mother, father and older sister talking at home. If you want American accent training on ordinary household speech rather than a news anchor reading a script, this scene is closer to what you will actually hear in a US kitchen.

Once the D&D game ends, the dialogue turns into the kind of daily English conversation practice that is hard to find scripted anywhere else: a teenager complaining, a mother setting a bedtime rule, a sister offered pizza. Three lines carry the interesting sounds.

• "How was I supposed to know it was gonna take 10 hours?" (line 87). The reduced "gonna" sits mid line, and the whole thing rises into a genuine complaint. Say it with the stress on "supposed" and "gonna", not evenly across every word.
• "Are we gonna stop?" (line 54). A second "gonna" in this recording, four words, and the pitch climbs on "stop" because it is a real question shouted mid game, not a calm one.
• "She's got a stick up her butt." (line 107). An idiom about someone being uptight, said flat and fast between two teenagers, no pause between "got" and "a stick".

Work the clip in the order the scene actually shifts, not front to back mechanically.

• Start at line 23, "Something is coming.", and line 24, "Something hungry for blood." The dungeon master narration is slow and deliberate, a good entry point before the boys start talking over each other.
• Move to line 87, "How was I supposed to know it was gonna take 10 hours?", and repeat it until the "gonna" and the stress on "supposed" come out together, not as separate words.
• Practice line 90, "I think you should listen to your mother.", said calmly by the father. Match the flat, low delivery rather than the kids' shouting from earlier lines.
• Take line 76, "Mom, we have to go.", and line 78, "Wait, just 20 more minutes.", back to back. Say them as the same short pleading exchange the two speakers actually have.
• Finish on line 103, "Hey Nancy, there's a slice left if you want it.", an offer said casually with no gap between "there's" and "a slice". Repeat it five times before moving on, that single line is worth more than watching the whole clip once.