#<- owner's of the spaces ig. don't know what to tag this as lmaoo

[bugsbenefit]

the Creel attic/the Wheeler basement

okay i'm still thinking about the fact that Mike's basement and the Creel attic are major narrative foils because it's driving me insane. they have so many parallels and are such a clear antithesis of each other

for 1) the parallels between the two alone are already so much to think about:

both are the respective "hubs" and planning locations of the two opposing fractions (Henry and the Party)

both are repurposed storage areas and not usually rooms that are considered to be an active part of a house/used as a normal living area

both are also not frequented by the general household at all and just get assigned to one person in the house. Henry hiding from his family and society at large in the attic constantly and Mike spending so much time in the basement his entire family comments on him being down there all the time, even in the earlier seasons. the rest of the family stays away. Victor only goes up to attic to check the demonic happenings out and Karen only sticks her head in the basement when Mike doesn't respond to her shouting for him. (the actual first time a another family member enters either space for no greater purpose is when Nancy makes plans with the party in s4, which Mike also isn't present for)

both of them are safe spaces on top of that. the party consistently hides in the basement throughout all seasons. both emotionally, like when Mike thought he saw Will's body in s1 or when him and Will think they're going crazy in s2, but also physically, when they use it to hide El from the "bad men" or when Max is actively cursed. and Henry not only retreats in the RSU attic to draw and explore his powers but also chooses the UD attic as the place to motionlessly and defenselessly suspend himself from the ceiling

and from a visual perceptive: both are only accessible by de-/ascending a narrow wooden staircase, include multiple vertical wooden pillars supporting the ceiling, and have walls covered in wooden panels

but 2) the contrasts are literally just as wild to be honest:

the basement being a communal hangout spot, it's Mike's basement in actuality but often gets treated as the Party's basement. people even feel comfortable going there while Mike is on the other side of the country. while Henry's attic on the other hand is only for him and the one time someone else enters it is when his father looks for what's wrong with the house and gets spooked horribly

and how the basement is exclusively Mike's space in the house filled with his belongings, Will's drawings on the walls, games and dnd intended for the whole party all over the place, with no typical "basement clutter" to be seen - it feels homely. while the attic is filled with junk from the whole house, a true storage space, with only a small clear area Henry can keep his own stuff in and later also suspends himself above in the UD

also the attic being on the top floor of the large family house and a basement on the lowest

and the attic being illuminated by a single light-bulb as the only light source that gives dim and eerie lighting. while the basement Also doesn't have very strong light sources and looks glum at times but is filled with a ridiculous amount of lamps that are usually ALL turned on, making it seem warmer and cozier than it actually would otherwise (i tried to count them at some point and it's at Least 9 separate lamps which is genuinely overkill)

and then 3) there's also just some really out there events that contrast each other so much it's uncanny:

Henry spends his time in the attic studying spiders, drawing MF designs and tormenting his family with visions. while Will in s2 seeks comfort in the basement after seeing the MF and suffering now-memories which manifest themselves in the form of inescapable visions

Max seeks refuge in the basement and tries to sort her thoughts out via the letters after being targeted only to ultimately die in the attic the same day

and Max in general: writes her letters on her own terms in the basement, sets boundaries and tells her friends not to stare at her, and overall takes charge of her fate as much as she can by deciding to hand the letters out in the first place and do it herself. when later on, in the attic, she becomes helpless, Vecna ripping her deepest fears out of her, making her belief Lucas hates her, putting her in the center of attention and turning literally all eyes on her (including taking her own eyes in some awful twist of irony), and ultimately taking all her agency

the two locations are incredibly SIMILAR at times but also INVERSES of each other. they're the two main locations and safe spaces the pro-/and antagonists use. they're the two center locations in general:

the basement is a literal heart, lively and the pulse of anything happening plan-wise. people meet here, bond, feel safe, and come by for a breather. Will called Mike the heart but Mike's basement is the physical manifestation of that. the location is a shared comfort space, and literally keeping the party together if you want, which gets all the more obvious when we see everyone still using the basement to hang out even when Mike isn't in town

on the opposite side, the attic is Vecna's central location. it's his main planning hub, and he uses it to keep safe and spy on the RSU Hawkins. but even the visuals play into this as we have vines connecting to a suspended Vecna, like veins or neural pathways, that then proceed to spread over the entirety of the UD with Henry's attic is the center of these vines where he connects to the hivemind directly -> because of this connection you could interpret the attic as the brain of the UD OR a heart, it's either another contrasting theme or another parallel (we're either looking at two hearts or a heart and brain a la classic heart vs. head, depending on how you want to approach the vines. i'm personally leaning more towards calling it a brain? but it's open for interpretation)

and i want to know what that means for the story SO bad

but i actually think it's probably not very god news for the basement in all honesty. there's a whole trope of taking safe spaces, or familiar locations away in final installments to make the threat and sense of being lost and overwhelmed all the more real. and given that the two locations Are paralleled so consistently, the fact that the attic already got "destroyed" as Henry's safe space doesn't really bode well (because not only did the gates rip the attic open. any safety it gave Henry is also gone after he was shot at and set on fire in there on top of that)

they already started ripping people's safe locations away from the characters. the basement is still holding up by the end of s4, but given general writing methods and the fate of it's insane antithesis in form of the attic it's... not looking too good for it honestly

a real question would be how they would go about it though. if they'd choose a physical approach by damaging or destroying it or making it inaccessible with the witch hunting townsfolk going after the Hellfire members and making it impossible for them to get to the Wheeler house at some point. OR if they'd chose a more emotional angle and HURT someone in the basement. which really hasn't happened until now. the narrative, until now, consistently only made Vecna attack or target people shortly before entering or shortly after leaving the basement, starting all the way with Will's disappearance in s1

but if it was an actual person getting hurt or getting their feeling of "safety" in the basement taken from them it would most likely be Mike himself. after all, it's still all around acknowledged to be Mike's basement in the first place, and a lot of other character like Max or Will actually already Avoided a BadEncounterTM in the basement so they're in a bit safer territory. Mike having some bad experience in the basement would also close the parallels of the attic/basement with both "owners" of the locations having them ripped away against their will

i'm not sure if they'd fully destroy the basement but what i can absolutely see happening is them twisting the "safe feeling" into fear or horror, either by something Really bad happening down there or it possibly being the location for a vecna vision to corrupt the "happy memories"

but whatever path they'll continue on with the basement, the chance of something seriously Not Fun happening there in s5 is insanely high with the way the story and narrative developed it and now majorly paralleled it to the Creel attic, and i need to SEE