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willbyersabyss · 7 months ago

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This shot has been discussed extensively about how it hints at byler and El eventually figuring it out, but I want to talk about the drawing just before this one. And maybe even consider a different context for this drawing too...

The drawings are completely different. This one has a wider head and the thought bubble is skinny. These two drawings symbolize different things.

So what does this version of the drawing mean? Well just listen to what El is saying. She says that Vecna is going to be in someone's mind, but the thought bubble that represents the mindscape is above Will. This means that Vecna is already in Will's mind. But Will doesn't feel him until he gets back to Hawkins... why? And why would Vecna be in Will's mind during the finale, but we never see? Well... we did.

The Upside Down is Will's mindscape. This is hinting at that. Vecna has been residing in the UD the entire season, and we do in fact see this in the finale.

If that didn't convince you then the next thing El says will. El mentions Terry and Billy who both have a shit ton of parallels to Will. Terry's mind loop sequence relates to Will (see here). Billy's name is literally William, he had an abusive father, and he was possessed, all things that relate to Will. Interesting thing to bring up while the mindscape bubble is above Will.

Terry's mind is in a loop/stuck in time and so is the Upside Down. Billy's mind was stuck in the memory with his mom on the beach. The Upside Down is stuck because of a memory. Will's memory.

Let's bring El's drawing back into it's original context for a second. The girl in the middle represents Max. The two figures in the mindscape are Vecna and El. But they're above Will. So Max's mindscape somehow also collided with Will's. When did this happen?

When she travelled to the Snow Ball. Vecna and El are both in her mind at the same time during the Snow Ball. This is when El's drawing comes true! And this is when it connects back to Will!

This is the only time we see the California crew once El reaches the Snow Ball memory. Will is almost entirely out of shot! We don't see his reaction at all here. Very convenient that we don't see even a snippet of how Will is feeling during the Snow Ball sequence. We only see him again once they go into Vecna's mindscape...

OK! But how do we know the Snow Ball memory connected to the UD at all? When Vecna showed up, so did the spores. It started rotting and turned dark just like the UD. The only thing that's missing is the vines which we see in Vecna's mindscape later.

(I already have another post explaining how Max's Snow Ball memory links to the UD being stuck in time here!)

Robin says that Nancy's house is frozen in time, not the entire UD. We honestly don't even know if the entire UD is stuck on the same day. It's entirely possible that the Wheeler house is stuck on November 6th, but other parts of the UD are stuck on other days. Why? Because Will travelled into a memory.

When Will got kidnapped, he was probably trying to think of happy memories because he was scared and accidentally ended up in a memory. This transformed a once rocky smoke land into Hawkins.

What memory? This is where the other byler drawing shot comes in. El's drawing lines up with Mike and Will here to represent how Will chose a happy memory with Mike (and others) to hide in when he got kidnapped. Not just a memory Mike is in, but MIKE'S HOUSE! We only saw evidence of the Wheeler house being stuck. So I think Will thought back to the most recent happy memory of the party playing DnD just before he got kidnapped. This would place Will at the Wheeler house and explain why it's stuck on that day.

If the rest of the UD is on different days, it's possible that Will mastered this trick and continued memory hopping until the entire UD transformed to replicate Hawkins. But if the entire UD is in fact stuck on the same day, maybe Will wandered too far out of the Wheeler house memory and this triggered the rest of the UD to look like Hawkins.

BUT I’ve also been recently pondering another theory. The UD isn't just Will's mindscape, but multiple, or a meeting place for mindscapes. Perhaps Vecna's collection of minds completed the Hawkins puzzle being pieced together in the UD. Will contributed first, but so did other victims. Evidence? Max's Snow Ball memory was already seen in the UD at the end of s2.

The Snow Ball decorations are there. This along with Robin's comment proves that the UD might not be entirely stuck on the same day. The Snow Ball decor shouldn't have been there if that were the case because the dance wasn't until December, not November. As I said in the other post I linked, Max travelling into her Snow Ball memory influenced the UD version to replicate it. There's some time paradox stuff happening here.

So basically: El's drawing hovering above Will was not only to hint at byler, but also to link him to the concept of memory travel, implying that he has done this before, despite us never seeing this occur… or did we?

#i clickbaited with byler #evil laughter #will's mind theory #will byers #stranger things theory #byler #el hopper #max mayfield #mike wheeler

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strangertheory · 4 years ago

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I’ve heard so many different opinions on the Duffer Brothers. On one hand, I see the cinematic parallels point to a queer awakening for Byler and I see how their employees are supportive of the LGBTQ+ community (stranger writers), but I also hear people say how Maya had to “beg” them to make Robin a lesbian, and how they are “queer baiting” us, or that they are homophobic. It’s so confusing and conflicting to hear people refer to the Duffers as “homophobic” because it puts a damper in my confidence when it comes to Byler, even though I believe in it 100%. The way they are handling the relationship between Will and Mike seems like it could be a wonderful case of Good Queer Representation, and when you add Robin to that mix, it would be even better and make ST a show with healthy queer rep that I think we need more of. But they could easily queerbait us and chase popularity and comfort, and take the easy way out by making it one sided. They have so much power in their hands, and I am not sure if they’ve ever made it explicitly clear what their stance is on LGBTQ+ but I’ve heard some rumors of them being misogynistic on set, and it definitely makes me nervous. I’m so tired of being queer baited.

As with anyone famous that I am only familiar with through social media and PR and tabloid news: I have very little reliable insight into their personal ideologies. I treat most of what you've described as gossip and hear-say and as the variety of information that comes from tabloids and news sources that prioritize clickbait, controversy, and dishing out rumors about celebrities in order to increase the number of times their story is re-shared and engaged with on social media. I suspect that much of what you may have heard is embellished by unreliable fandom gossip as well.

Even if Maya used the phrase "begged" herself (I'm unsure — I don't have a source on hand, but that's irrelevant to my next point) the context of that is not inherently a sign that they are homophobic and could very easily be related to their originally different plans for Robin's character arc.

I have no idea what any of the cast and crew truly think on any given issue, and I think fans should remember that they don't truly "know" any of these celebrities either.

I do know, however, that the first season of Stranger Things features multiple moments in which homophobic characters are presented as the antagonists and characterized as clearly villainous: Lonnie is written as a deeply dislikeable character, as are Troy and James when they mock Will and then Mike (one of our obvious main heros in the story) shoves Troy to the gym floor in response to his bigotry. Neil Hargrove is also characterized as an abusive father figure who hurls homophobic slurs at Billy.

Consistently and regardless of whatever any individual involved in the creation of Stranger Things may think: the clearly written stance within the Stranger Things universe is that homophobia is offensive, villainous, and wrong. Additionally, as you mentioned in your Ask, I believe there is incredibly strong evidence that Mike having eventual romantic interest in Will has been foreshadowed in a variety of narrative ways in every single season thus far.

Regardless of what anyone involved behind the scenes thinks, the canon story itself has been very consistently pro-lgbtqa+ in both its text and subtext and combined with the consistent pro-lgbtqa+ messages from the official writers' room Twitter account I see no reason to fear that the team behind the important decisions in the making and promotion of the show is queerbaiting.

Yes, queerbaiting still happens far too often in popular media. But I think we do a disservice to not only ourselves but also to production teams that are working on unfinished series and who still might be planning to reveal plot twists to us in future seasons if we start treating them as though they have already failed us when the story is incomplete. I have seen fans literally cursing at creators of unfinished shows on social media and accusing them of queerbaiting rather than respecting that queerbaiting is, by definition, when a story does not deliver on intentional build-up and foreshadowing by the stories' conclusion.

Too many fans not only in this fandom but also in other fandoms do not understand the definition of queerbaiting. If a story reveals that two characters were in love or that a character is queer by the end of the series after a lot of subtext is established in the story prior to the big reveal: that is not queerbaiting, that is called foreshadowing.

I respect and empathize with the anxiety that some fans in the community have but I hope that they remember that the story isn't over yet and that not everything you hear in pop culture "news" or in the fan community rumor mill is always as trustworthy as you might think it is.

I hope that gives you some comfort. 😊

#byler #stranger things #stranger things theories

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