#flashback vision coded

[strqyr]

gut feeling but chatterbox feels very hidden message-y

like. . . . so close to closure. . . . underneath a monument with a dedicated plea. . . . intercept the messages that you left just for me. . .

[the-most-humble-blog]

🛐 HOBBIT INTEL REPORT — ADDENDUM: WHEN FRODO HEARD THE CALL, HE DIDN’T HESITATE.

Let me make something brutally clear while I still got breath in my lungs and this vision of Frodo pacing the damn horizon stuck in my frontal cortex like a flashbang flashback:

You still don’t get it.

Y’all keep reducing Middle-Earth’s most efficient kill squad to tea drinkers and pipe-hitters in waistcoats.

“Oh but they had Gandalf the White—”

Shut up.

That wizard was the alarm clock. The Hobbits were the goddamn fire.

⚔️ Sauron Didn’t Avoid the Shire Because It Was "Too Cute" — He Avoided It Because Even Evil Knows Better.

You think orcs ever invaded the Shire? No.

They redirected. They took the long way. They looked at that quiet little farmland full of laughing curly-haired midgets and said,

“Nah. That’s a trap. That’s death by teacup.”

And they were right.

💣 Sauron was waiting until he hit 100% power just to think about pulling up.

Because deep down he knew…

“If I step into that high-grass paradise before I’m fully charged, I’m not coming back. I’ll end up flipping omelets for Rosie Cotton’s daycare while Frodo critiques my seasoning.”

🔥 Frodo didn’t "accept the mission." He saw the smoke and got his walking stick.

No briefing. No rousing speech. No PowerPoint from Elrond.

Just:

“Sam. Grab the pans. Get the rope. We march at dawn. We’ll be back by the harvest.”

That wasn’t a quest. That was a cleanup job.

🧠 You want to understand Hobbit psychology?

They didn’t fear Mordor. They didn’t respect Mordor. They just clocked it in, like an unpaid internship from hell.

“What’s the mission?” “Escort Satan’s wedding ring into his house and toss it in his fireplace.” “Cool. Pack a lunch.”

🩸 Y’all keep forgetting Frodo wasn’t alone.

There were hundreds of them back in the Shire. Hundreds of stone-faced tea-guzzling assassins who could’ve taken his place.

Every Bilbo was just a Frodo in retirement. Every Frodo was just a Sam in waiting. Every Sam was just a Rosé-holding, full-strength tank with a trowel and trauma-based loyalty issues.

🧤 They didn’t need Gandalf to lead.

They let him think he was leading. Let the tall folks feel important. All the while knowing:

“He’s useful. But if he falls, we keep walking. The job’s the job.”

🏔️ And when Frodo said “Mount Doom,” Sam didn’t ask “why?” — he asked, “when?”

No knightly codes. No sacred scrolls. Just:

“I made bread. I packed extra. Let's go.”

🧬 Here’s the truth:

Hobbits didn’t win because they were brave.

They won because they were unbothered. Unimpressed. Undeterrable.

You ever try to tempt a man who already had everything he wanted before the journey began? That’s who Frodo was. That’s who Sam was.

The Shire wasn’t just their home. It was their origin point. Their why. Their endgame.

That’s why they were dangerous. Because they weren’t chasing glory. They were just out handling problems so the party back home wouldn’t get delayed.

🛑 BOTTOM LINE:

You can mock their size. Laugh at the cloaks. Disrespect the bare feet.

But if one ever steps toward you with purpose in his eyes?

It’s already too late.

🍷 FIELD-TOAST STATUS: RAISED

To Frodo, who walked into Hell with a limp and a lantern. To Sam, who would’ve carried the mountain if he had to. To the Shire, where legends are born barefoot and return home full.

To the Hobbits. The smallest gods Middle-Earth ever feared.

⚔️ CALL TO ACTION:

🔁 Reblog this if your soul answers to old magic and small warriors.

🧠 Save it if you know true strength walks quietly.

📜 Send this to someone who still underestimates the soft-spoken.

Or simply:

🩸 Reblog to confirm you would’ve followed Frodo into the fire too.

⚖️ LEGAL DISCLAIMER: This is not satire. This is not fanfiction. This is Blacksite Literature™: Weaponized cadence. Mythopoeic trauma therapy. Historical reframing through blood-soaked reverence.

If you're confused: You weren’t meant to survive this post.

Check out the below record-breaking post for more:

🛐 SHOUT OUT TO THE HOBBITS, YO

[periwinkle-the-11th]

TORN BETWEEN DOING THAT AND TELLING BENTEN'S PART OF THE STORY AS A SPREAD OF FLASHBACKS SORTA LIKE IT IS IN CANNON

the urge not to kill benten is so strong bc i love him but its a cannon event :(

STRETCH OUT HIS ROLE ALIVE AS LONG AS U CAN😞😞

[doublel27]

Look, Pathapi gets to be a bitch to Tamtawan for quite awhile over the manner of breakup (text as you were about to get on a plane my guy—real bad)

But also in ep 4 we got a much bigger look at Tamtawan’s POV in a way we haven’t before. @maybe-boys-do-love did a wonderful post on SOTUS-S and the 4-Act story structure that is common in Asian media and it really has changed my brain in analyzing BL.

The second phase is for growth and expansion and deepening an understanding of the problem, setting up Ep 4 as a perfect place to begin expanding. We head out into filming the new series for Phi and it takes us to Phi’s home, but it lets us into Tam’s perspective. It’s made clear from the moment Tam sets foot outside of Phi’s house in both the past and the present how much he loves it. Tam adores Phi’s mom, Phi’s childhood home, the place Phi is from. And we also learn that Phi was chasing Paul while Tam was pining, in the past, and that it wasn’t a smooth road to love.

Although the twist feels very sudden to me as an audience member and Tam, there are hints that Phi cares deeply for Tam before. But it wasn’t until this trip and Tam supporting him through his heartbreak that Phi could see it. I could see this sticking with Tam. That one moment he was comforting Phi over this huge heartbreak and the next minute Phi tells his mom he wants Tam to be his boyfriend.

But also, we got a very interesting conversation about Phi’s mom not wanting to accept Phi’s bids for her to move to Bangkok between Phi and Tam, and I want to come back to it. Because Tam was telling Phi that Phi actually needs to listen to what his mom wants and not what Phi thinks his mom should want. And it just felt very coded considering how in all the previous flashbacks we’ve gotten Phi’s dreams and Phi’s perspectives and I’ve already been wondering how what Tamtawan may have wanted may have gotten lost and to find that Phi also overlays his own vision of his mom’s future over her vision of her future….

Smells like a pattern to me.

But you know, I said last week we hadn’t been let into Tam at all, and this week we went to a place he is nostalgic for and next week we are going to his house!! Literally inside Tam’s space! I can’t wait.

Also the symbolism at the end with the coals!!

[t3ch-wizard]

something i just realized! (small analysis)

(PROLLY not the first one to figure this out, but here my thoughts goo!)

Soo, we all know about the Turbo flashback we were shown in the first movie. Growing envious and jealous of the spotlight being stolen by that new RoadBlasters rolling in, Turbo goes turbo with the mission to TAKE over the new game, yadda yadda, he fails and skids the HELL outta there. But my big brain noticed something.

1- In comparison to the scene where Ralph and the other villains from Bad-Anon rode the carts from Pac-Man to GCS, the speed Turbo seemingly travelled at is ridiculiously fast!

Considering we see him sitting in his red kart before, this can only mean one thing. Turbo RACED HIS WAY THERE, literally! Even the carts of respective games go faster than the speed he went at, and no normal character such as short stack can run that fast (no, not counting Sonic). Hot shot was desperate for attention that badly.

2- It bugged me how there wasn't the notion of anybody trying to stop Speedy in his tracks. What about the Turbo Twins, didn't they get wind of Turbo's plans and attempt to hinder him? What about the Surge Protector, or ANYONE else in that manner?! Then, moment of clarity hit me.

It was opening hours when the RoadBlasters Incident had occured. This means that AT THE TIME, the Game Central Station was near to empty, spare the Surge Protector roaming around. Now keep in mind the "opening hours" thought, I'll get to that in a bit.

Basically, when Turbo maneuvered his kart shooting out of TurboTime STRAIGHT into RoadBlasters, no one stood in his way and in this short span of time, the Surge Protector wouldn't have been able to block him.

Poor man probably saw something red and white whoosh past his vision and not comprehend what was about to happen. Whoopsie to him I guess.

3- How Turbo escaped honestly had me on a chokehold here. Since the movie showed us the following three scenes after each other directly, I assumed it happened in the same moment RoadBlasters got busted.

But wait, this was Felix explaining to Calhoun/the audience the important chunks of Turbo's story, which means he left out anything that wasn't necessary for us to know! And because two workers (who didn't seem to be employees of Litwak) were rolling out the two cabinets, some time had passed for them to get there, which further then implies that TurboTime and RoadBlasters had to be unplugged sometime later on the same DAY.

What we see in the real world VS. what we see in the game world of an arcade game varies drastically. Although the screen of RoadBlasters was displaying a glitchy killscreen, we don't see what happens to Turbo and the RB racer exactly. Seeing the chaos he had inflicted upon RoadBlasters and the main character of it, Turbo would've abandoned his vehicle behind and scrambled to the exit, realizing there were no means of fulfilling his plan anymore. All that mattered to him was getting to safety under the wire to seek shelter elsewhere. Staying in RoadBlasters would've resulted in him getting unplugged along with the game. Going BACK to TurboTime was a (death sentence) confrontation with the Turbo Twins, escaping to ANY other arcade game would've arisen suspicion both to players AND to game characters. Turbo didn't have that many options.

--

What happened in the meantime on the outside, you may ask? Here's where we tread a bit into theory territory:

Remember that RoadBlasters was a FAIRLY new game that just came into the arcade. Litwak wouldn't have tossed it out as quickly as we'd seen it!

I believe he took the time to get the game's systems checked by a professional, see if it was just a minor memory problem or a tweak to be done on the system and then get it back working. However, due to the fact that Turbo jumbled up the game's code altogether when colliding with the RoadBlaster racer, repair seemed beyond reach after tinkering on RoadBlasters for so long. You can only do so much after hope dies for your new game.

As for TurboTime, I can imagine it this way. The kids who were playing RoadBlasters definitely told Litwak about the odd Turbo sprite dashing across the horizon before RoadBlasters crashed into oblivion. The second arcade cabinet was most likely inspected as well for any "issues" and truth be told, that cocky racer with that golden trophy was just not showing up no matter how many fixes you did.

The Turbo Twins? Oh, they had to endure the consequences. Had to hear Litwak being reality-checked by the technician that for all the popularity TurboTime had garnered over the years, the game had to go into retirement. Merely forced to stand in the black background, well-aware of the fact that they'd go down with TurboTime, without seeing Turbo's face one last time ever AGAIN. Tragedy, I know.

--

Now now, I DID say to keep in mind the opening hours aspect just earlier. Here it comes into fruition!!

4- Now, while we have gotten some explanation of how Turbo stayed in hiding for nearly ten years, it's not really clear how he managed to do that during all this time when video game characters were crowding GCS left and right after the incident.

As established in the movie/in this post, all characters of their respective games normally head to their game portals when the arcade is about to open. No bit was strolling to hit the rounds, you see. Everyone was occupied with their own game.

Though, the RoadBlasters incident was surely not a day anybody would forget anytime soon. Neighboring cabinets would've witnessed the horrors of RB unfolding between their eyes, the fleeting voice lines of "Turbo-tastic!" ringing in their ears a second too long. But even then, even WHEN everybody saw Turbo's deeds, how could somebody stop him? How could ANYONE in that matter step out and do the right thing? What if somebody had noticed a character missing from their title screen too? What if something went wrong?

What (presumably at the time) was Turbo's DEATH was no demise any other character wanted to go through. So, they had to stick to their programming. Act as if they were blissfully unaware of the falls of two beloved games in the arcade. Keep up the facade that somehow, everything was fine.

And so, with nobody knowing that hot shot was on the run, Turbo took the run for it. Dashing past the unaware Surge Protector, staggering left and right, he escaped into the bowels of GCS where nobody would find him. At least, until he came up with a new plan. A SOLID plan. One that would make up for the loss of a failure he took part in.

By the time the Surge Protector had partially pieced together the events at closing hours, it was far too late. The criminal was already gone, no trace left behind. Alas, the term "going Turbo" was coined, the act of game-hopping to a foreign game to your own in order to jeopardize and take control over it.

Once the new and flashy racing game Sugar Rush was plugged in, this gave the hiding ex-racer a chance for a comeback, albeit under a different name. With the arcade about to open, Turbo made his way to the new game portal, determined to get he what he had wanted back all this time..

.

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That is, BY A̸̤̥̓̿͌̾͋͐͠͝N̷̨̪͍̩̼͙̤͉̹͍̥͕̈́̅͛̅͊̂͋̆́̏̈́̊͜͜Y̵̮̘̠̯͍͒̇͒̔́̑̀̚͝ MEANS NECESSARY.

[ven0moir]

BYCHANCE TIMELINE - speculative theory

This goes by the hand of what I've shown before here. This theory is just a small part of a larger narrative, and whereas Will's arc is central, his relationship with his friends and family will be crucial this season. So what you're seeing here is me trying to narrow down what I believe his arc with Chance, specifically, will entail. I see this as one of the loops Will needs to break to Be Free--one storyline ingrained into a larger narrative--its not what the season will focus on entirely, but an important aspect of it.

ACT I. Bychance introduced in EP1

Full circle moment as Bychance joins the narrative pattern established through Stancy, Mileven & even Joyce and Lonnie--which I'll be calling Jonnie for short. They start off with Will reading a note [ left in his locker ], with a time and place to meet. Then we see them together. This rattles the audience a bit--some will actually approve ( like they did Mileven & Stancy ), some might cheer bc it means their ship's endgame now that Will has an 'official love interest' ( Milevens ), some might question if this is real/a vecna vision or something, and others ( Bylers ) question it and are taken aback bc this might feel ooc of Will to them. Which it is, yes, but that's kind of the point.

He's conforming half-way. He refuses to date a girl and lie about who he is, yes, but at the same time he's sneaking around with a jock/bully, who is part of the group that tormented Hellfire in S4, nonetheless. And, just like Nancy did Steve in S1, makes excuses for his behavior. ( callback to S1 )

"He's a good guy deep down, he just needs some time to come to terms with who he is. It's not like I have options, anyway. What are the odds of meeting someone else like me in this town?"

In Will's case, the van scene was a metaphorical self-sacrifice. A part of Will, a very important part of him, died in that van--not to mention the whole forgotten birthday thing. So he's now trying, forcing himself to move on and find coping mechanisms.

However, I really do think the point of Bychance is to serve as a lesson, yes, but also to give Will a little bit of a 'vacation' and allow him to live a little, damn. He surely deserves a break.

ACT II. Flashback to their first meeting

The details of their first encounter remain to be seen but we either see them get together in real time ( aka this happens before we see them kiss ) or we see a flashback of their first meeting, which might be similar to Mileven's ( it happens by chance--pun intended--in a way that feels cold, it's raining, there's danger looming, etc ). However, Bychance might mirror BenChar from Heartstopper more than Mileven's first scene. The reason being that it is widely accepted within the town that Will is queer and we even have bullies in S1 talk about Will's queerness ( potential S1 callback here? ), so it might be safe to assume that Chance is aware of the possibility of Will being queer and at some point the opportunity presents itself, and the two exchange words. I expect coded language being used, reinforcing one of the show's themes.

"Is it true what they say about you? That you're ... yknow. Different."

I'm putting BenChar here as a very loose example, because I don't think Will would get outed like Charlie--the truth is he never even had the luxury of hiding to begin with. As far as we understand, everyone just knew. I also assume the show would show us moments of Will trying to connect with Chance/talk to him but Chance doesn't seem interested in that, like Ben with Charlie, and then the reality begins to sip through--this isn't real, Will is just looking for a replacement for Mike. Sound familiar? Because if we see S5 Bychance paralleling S1 Mileven ... yikes.

Another theme that BenChar has in common with Stranger Things is the idea of secrecy--which is basically what Mike had to do in S1, hide Eleven and therefore his relationship with her. Not out of malice, but for safety reasons. Chance and Will would be in the exact same spot. Again, if there are noticeable parallels ... yikes.

However, I'm not sure what exact vibe Chance brings to the table, but he definitely cannot come across too intense bc it'll spook Will. So he needs to be stealthy, like a ninja. ( Like yknow, how Steve said as he crawled through Nancy's window in S1 that he was 'stealthy like a ninja' and like in S2 when he said to Dustin that some girls like you to be aggressive like a lion, but others like you to be stealthy like a ninja ).

To Chance, Will is a conquest, but he might be like Ben as in he's not totally unredeemable--and if subtextually he's supposed to be this personification of Will's trauma, then we can expect he reminds Will of Lonnie, Vecna and ... Mike. Just like how Mike reminded El of Brenner, Hopper, etc. Yay, more WillEl parallels.

Lonnie = father figure--he's in Joyce's S1 shoes here. He feels like he's losing his mind. ( Either due to old UD trauma, new UD trauma recall, irl trauma, or bc of the van scene. Or everything. It depends on how much angst the Duffers want S5 to have. )--so when Chance comes knocking at his door, he lets him in, initially thinking he's making a choice for himself. Vecna = someone who used his mind and body for his own purposes. Mike = an illusion, a lie/fantasy. ( as per s4, this is what Will currently believes ).

Similarly to BenChar, Chance might act out the tough and roudy bully in public, and pretend Will doesn't exist, but then be sweet in private.

This is also in a way similar to Stancy, where Steve offered something more surface-level and encouraged Nancy to suppress her feelings instead of expressing them, even if that wasn't his intention. And similarly, El didn't show interest in Mike's hobbies when he tried to introduce them to her--not El's fault, she simply wasn't interested.

ACT III. Bychance getting caught ( by either Mike or Jonathan? ) 

Mike/Jonathan is investigating something related to the supernatural, or going some place and sees Bychance by pure chance ( this stops being funny after a while ), connecting with: Jonathan seeing Nancy with Steve in S1 Jonathan finding Jonnie in an uncomfortable position in S1 And thus helping the narrative come full circle. If we want to say it is a combination between these two, then my bet is, it is Mike who finds them. Mike sees his Will, with someone else ... yikes. But also, he sees him .. with another guy. In a compromising position. I'll ... talk about Mike later since he's the most puzzling to me, but for now I'll just say I think it's a VERY different thing if he'd seen Will with a girl. If he had, total drama queen tantrum, but with another guy?? Oh boy.

But back to Will--The implication of bychance paralleling or being contrasted with Jonnie is the idea of returning to a toxic place out of desperation & for comfort--a coping mechanism. i,e Will's relationship with Chance is the consequence of and is shaped by Will's UD + irl trauma. This dynamic gives Will a false sense of control and perpetuates what he began in the van scene--he's still Will, but is making the wrong choices. Gotta love consequences.

I also don't know how far the show will go depicting this dynamic--my guess is worst case scenario it goes all the way like Stancy, but it could also be like Jonnie where it falls apart before it goes too far. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

ACT IV. Roles reverse--Chance sees Mike and Will sharing a tender moment after Will has a traumatic experience?

This moment with Nancy was right after her encounter with the tree, so maybe something related to that tree we're seeing Will associated with? Also, I have no idea where this scene would take place logically--I have 0 clue where the Byers are staying after all. But somewhere where Chance could realistically go to. This scene with Stancy was after Steve wasn't too supportive of Nancy and went to apologize to her house, but then saw Jonathan and Nancy together--his reaction was to break Jonathan's camera. So this could maybe have something to do with the scenes surrounding the bullies that we have seen. If Chance at some point is an active participant in a force that hurts the party to get back at Mike/(Will) then this could be what sets Will up for the final Bychance act.

And I know that adding Chance to the mix might appear as just more drama for Byler but imagine the golden opportunity here to 'show don't tell' the audience through a third party that has stakes on the situation. Because it's not the same if Jonathan or Karen or anyone sees them together, there's room for plausible deniability there.

But the boyfriend of one of them seeing and getting jealous? Yeah that says he saw something there that the audience should be seeing too. Because what if it's like ... a combination between this scene and S2 Mike giving Will comfort and holding his hand?

Now this could technically be done through El too--and there's a parallel in S2 where she got jealous over Mike and Max even though there wasn't anything truly there. But quite frankly I think that was something that they'd have done with S4 El.

ACT V. The break-up ( the closing & breaking of the cycle )

So, I'm not entirely sure about the flow of this yet bc part of me also wonders if they'll just kill off Chance like they did Bob in the middle of the action or something. Yikes. Hell, maybe Will gets possessed by Vecna and kills Chance himself, who the hell knows. This could go SO MANY WAYS.

But I do hope we see a moment of catharsis for Will where he chooses to reclaim his self-worth. That feels more to me like the point of Chance as well.

My current guess is perhaps the energy of this scene is a combination between BenChar and Jonnie, with Will being angry and hurt and finally realizing he deserves, and wants, better than this. More than this. Chance is a test he must pass before he's ready to face off against Vecna AND get together with Mike ( which will probably happen towards the end for sure ).

And perhaps the Duffers will go with the concept of 'chance' in its metaphorical context, and I'm way too attached to the pacing and tone of S1, but considering all of the S1 callbacks we saw in S4 ... there's just something so compelling and powerful to me about Will having a previous romantic experience before getting with his One True Love. Otherwise Byler risks feeling too ... perfect to me in a way that feels ... stiff. But maybe I'm wrong and they have a better way to do it than Bychance!

I just honestly cannot shake these:

Our first impression of Chance being him wearing the number 22. Lucas saying 'I'm tired of feeling like a loser, so now we have that chance' with a poster that says "MEET AT"

Tigers ( jock + cheerleader ) making out next to an INVITATION to a GAME with a day + time.

Jason asking if Mike Is Somewhere, "by chance". It's giving Deadpool level of self-awareness & meta, it's giving Shawn Levy. Who worked on that movie, btw. And is the dude who said this:

"Without getting into where we go later in season 4 [Volume II], I guess I'll just say that there aren't many accidents on Stranger Things," Levy tells EW when asked about Will's sexuality. "There is clear intention and strategy and real thought given to each and every character. So, if you came away from Volume I feeling those bread crumbs of plot and character, it's probably no accident." source

Oh, so you mean me perceiving the tigers are heavily queercoded might've been intentional, strategic and really thought out? And sure, that might not really mean anything Bychance related, or it might just mean something else. But the scene of Lucas in Hawkins and Will in rink-o-mania being connected through music ...?

And then we just saw Chance on the scene, inviting people over to party, and a Chance/Mike lookalike extra behind Will with a shirt that says 'I love contact sports'? Really?

Really?

It's giving 'happy belated birthday, Will!'

I know I'm delusional af atp I do not even trust myself, it's 6.00am and I just needed to get this out before the self-doubt crept up on me again, but it is becoming clearer to me how Bychance fits into the narrative--and it is so seamless to me that im over here like LET'S GO TIGERS, LETS GO TIGERS

I don't know, man. I don't know. But either way, this is fun as hell, which is the point of analysis, no? Regardless of whether or not this happens, or does so in a metaphorical way, we'll see!

[thats-slightly-raven]

PTSD is so funny & camp to me like I’ll be living my life completely fine and then on a random Tuesday at 10:03am some random scent forces my brain into having thats so raven style psychic visions of flashbacks from 2013 like I’ve been a sleeper agent waiting for its activation code like hngngn babes it’s not that serious move on ☠️☠️

[sunshine-jesse]

do you have any thoughts on what nemlei said about the decay route and the burial route in the q&a because 👀 i find it a very interesting insight as to the core of decay and burial (also im in love with you and your essays)

I think that Burial will end up being a coming of age story where Ashley has to explicitly reckon with her own sexuality/womanhood/adulthood.

I think Burial will be about growth and Decay about change because nothing has debunked my prior assessment that Burial retroactively shows us that their relationship wasn’t quite as toxic as some thought. There will probably be little in the way of flashbacks in Burial because Andrew and Ashley don't have to reckon with their past to fix anything. They're more or less okay with everything that happened in their past (putting it simply) and don't have to reconcile with each other.

In Burial, Ashley's main problem is in fact her relationship to sex and womanhood, because she's never been shown that she had anything else to offer. All she thinks she can offer is sex, because in her mind, there's no reason anyone else would stick around with her if she no can no longer maintain their childhood dynamic. If the incest vision was Andrew's vision- since it was contingent on him being present- it could mean that giving in to his desires and having sex with Ashley would prevent her from growing past her conception of what womanhood is. I'd suspect that Andrew might have the same kind of arc because it's hard to come to terms with your own sexuality when you keep thinking of your sister every time you're about to nut. It's pretty clear that neither of them have a healthy relationship to their own desires regardless of how healthy their own relationship is.

The incest vision, as hot and funny as it is, is also incredibly juvenile, with both of them cracking low brow jokes instead of displaying the relative emotional maturity and consideration of each other's feelings (Andrew more than Ashley) they did towards the end of Burial. That's not to say that sex between emotionally mature adults can't be like that (healthy BDSM is inherently clown-coded, send tweet), but I don't think the demon would show it as a warning if it isn't indicative of what sex would look like to them if they didn't grow up and develop a more mature and complex relationship dynamic.

In other words, it's possible that in Burial, the incest (sex) end will be a bad one, but the incest (romance) one will be good. That might run afoul of a few of Coffin's aroace (I'm ace but not aro, for the record) readers, but I think it's about time that Ashley stopped being Walter White for mentally ill queer women anyways. The two of them CANNOT have a healthy relationship dynamic entirely based around sex when both of them have so many hangups around it.

Decay is a different beast entirely. In Decay, the two do have a toxic relationship dynamic that's actually deleterious to the emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being of both of them, so they have to reckon with why they've done what they've done to each other in order to heal. Their relationship has to change or they'll either die, kill, or fuck each other, maybe in that order. There is much more pressure to understand the other rather than themselves, although there will probably be a bit of a self-understanding arc too.

I also still have the sense that both visions are in some way canon to both paths, but I have a lot less evidence backing this up. Just intuition.

[toobusybeingdelulu]

I want to talk about the young kids in s5, and the role they might play as vecna’s main targets this season.

We know by now that Holly will be one of Vecna’s main goals, maybe because of her connection to the wheeler family, but could she be the only one? The answer is most likely no.

I think Erica might be targeted too.

This scene right here seems… off, to put it lightly. Her outfit is very 50s coded, and may I add, kinda “Alice in wonderland” (the bows, the pin, and also look at the attention to the food). Holly has been seen in a blue gown too, which is once again very reminiscent of it (and let’s also not forget the poster in Ross duffer’s insta dump)

Anyway, this right here is a scene posted by Netflix and it’s most likely from the first episodes, but can you notice something else too?

This is red hair. My assumption is that this might actually be a vision of some sort, since Erica witnessed Max dying in her brother’s arms, and vecna might easily use that trauma to his advantage, puppetting Max’s soul (which is still trapped in his mind) just like he did with Billy’s in season 4, in order to scare Erica.

In this other scene Erica is wearing a similar outfit to the one in the “vision”, but it’s still not the same. In this one, the dogs are all black and seen facing the same direction, while in the previous photo they are all scattered, and there is a white one. Apart from the costume choices, she looks worried. Perhaps she went to lucas and the others with the intention of asking for help with the visions , and maybe the kid next to her has been experiencing the same thing.

There is also that script posted by Maya on her story a while back (and that people came to decipher) which saw Mike and Robin talking to some kids, or at least trying to reassure them about something.

It would make sense for the last season to revolve around young kids, considering that the very first scene of the season is a flashback to Will Byers trapped in the upside down.

It all started with them, after all.

[carolkinopf]

been thinking about posting some unfinished/unpolished stuff that i'm pretty sure i won't go back to work on, they are just sitting on my folders and it makes me a little sad

this is gonna be a long post (because I feel like I can't post it without explaining what they were meant to be), I decided to just make a single one with all of them so yea !

This is my Novo Amor propaganda that I never finished. I think this song is very felds-coded, and the animatic was really just to illustrate the lyrics since I think they fit very well.

So it shows feldspar reflecting about their poor choices and mistakes, and wanting to just. give up. But then hatchling shows up, somehow, to rescue them. And with coming back to timber hearth, reuniting with their friends and family, with time they eventually start coming to terms with everything that's happened and readjusting to life in timber hearth.

That entire segment that repeats "but I'll breath, I'm bored of how, bored of now" would be of scenes of that, starting with them reuniting with slate, gossan, gneiss, then being taken care of/patched up from living in poor conditions in dark bramble to then finally enjoying life with others (I ended up only adding rockettrio but I wanted to have them fishing with spinel, going for a hike/walk in the woods with tektite and maybe arkose, playing with hatchlings, joining the orchestra with everyone.... those things)

Slate is also there, because I thought it would be fun to have the transition with the museum photo to feldspar making their way to giant's deep and then dark bramble. And I like some slate angst (shocking)

This is like the most finished one from the post, so it's going first on the list.

(If you like the song i cannot recommend Novo Amor enough. They have many songs with OW vibes imho. And some that are just plain great. If you're curious which ones I associate with the silly aliens feel free to ask)

---

...this is a rather silly one. Not much to talk about it, I had the idea on a random morning of slate fixing one of their model ships (that feldspar accidentaly broke) in a scene analogous to a surgery shdjd

They are young teenagers here (13-14) so that's why slate is using the little cap (which is an accessory I borrowed from process_analog's young slate drawings thank you)

---

This was an experimentation of sorts. The idea was to reference those flashing lights in parties that makes it looks like you are living in a low fps world. Very trippy. But instead of black between "frames", it alternates between slate and feldspar dancing and the moments they had together, from the begging as kids, to teenagers, to young adults working on the OWV and to the final breakdown aka, a fight that led feldspar leaving in a rush and anger to never to be seen again, leaving a helpless slate behind (this was inspired by the first chapter of awanderingmuse's fic Find Your Buddy which I highly recommend!)

Since the song kinda talks about dancing instead of talking your feelings out, I feel like it fits with the fight being drowned out by them dancing in a different moment.

Fun fact: I got hit with The Visions for this animatic the same day I got hit with The Visions for the neujauciu meiles animatic. Which was not fun for my brain, I spent one hour staring at krita not knowing which one to start

cobalt is the one who showed me this song so kudos to him

i like this frame :) huggies

This is a version of only the scenes, I think it's a bit easier to see them progressing. During the fight scene, both slate and feldspar get flashbacks to good times, in poses that mirror their current ones. I thought it'd be a fun addition :)

---

......yet another sad slate (and feldspar) animatic. I was driving home listening to the song and got hit with The Visions once more. I like the colors changing on this one, the very first frame of them as kids is my absolute favorite. Even if it's just a rough sketch.

<3

---

Honorable mention to this one that I sketched an incredible amount of 3 frames

(I'm only putting this here as a cue for you to listen to Years On by Novo Amor. It's good I promise. I wanted to make an animatic for it, with the first half of the songs showing slate/the founders dealing with feldspar's dissapearance, and the second half with riebeck/hatchling - i never decided which one it'd be. But I had just done the Guestbook animatic, and this would be the exact same mood. And I wanted to do something different lol)

---

So, that is it, thank you if you checked all of it! And extra thanks if you did read all my ramblings

Here's a doodle for you:

I always have a lot of thoughts about these, but I don't talk about it because I find it's kinda irrelevant/redundant (plus kinda takes away attention from the actual video on the post). So I hope you enjoyed a little dive into some of them along with the videos !

so yeah, bybye! have a good day

[ratwithhands]

Haha concept art dump go brrr anyways I had a vivid flashback to Burst AU and remembered an idea I wanted to draw.

Since Emmet fuses to Nihilego directly through Burst rather than attaching to it as a host, he is still able to use its parasitic abilities to latch onto someone. This is the dual pilot vision for Ingo and Emmet using Nihilego together.

This was an idea I could see happening at the final battle for that AU, and honestly it might replace it because this teamwork concept is much more interesting than the OHKO that happens in the original (though ig that means Durant is out of a job plot-wise). Guess I might end up scrapping Celebi after all ^^

Alright so for design notes,

There's more limbs because there's two people running the show, also though it'd be funny to colour code them

Since Emmet is partly Nihilego in Burst, he comprises the actual body that Ingo is suspended in/connected to. In Lusamine's form, Nihilego has a section at the back that has more limbs connected. Emmet is fused to that at the hips, and as such has to lean or hold onto Ingo to reach him/see what he's seeing

Since I have Lusamine's picture here, the twins have a different shaped bell. It's like two bubbles intersecting, since it has a rounded section around both Ingo and Emmet. It's a bit bigger in the back though

The joints are more angular!! They actually have a triangle pattern both on the edges and holes, and the limbs will match a specific orientation

They can hold hands :) (they pilot different sections of the body)

I am verrrrry tired (It's quite late when I'm writing this) and I can't think of too much else to say. Have a good day and see you later ^^

[glitter-stained]

Hear me out because I have a vision:

Barbara- centric hacker movie. (Barbara-centric, not Birds of Prey for this one.) Like not a dc adaptation, a hacker movie that's an AU. Fair warning: I understand nothing about how hacking works.

Barbara is a thirty-five years old bisexual overqualified librarian. Every time someone asks her why she works in a library and if she's never bored she replies she likes the quiet and the books, but we see, on her work computer, that she's always reading like one science article one philosophy book and news article etc at the same time to stay stimulated; she also has several degrees and on screen we see notes of her working on p=np because it'd be funny. On a date, we see her hint that she likes that the library is calm because she gets excitement from her nightlife.

The nightlife in question: Her hacker name is of course Oracle. At first, she learnt how to code because she was bored, and then she got invested in the secrets she could unravel, but her real entry into cyber activity happened after she hunted down the identity of the man responsible for the stray bullet that paralyzed her during a shootout and framed him for tax evasion. This isn't like, the heart of the story or anything, just a little flashback to explain her motivation and how hacking helped her regain her self-confidence and grow around it. That part was cut in the final version of the movie because it was very very long but Barbara's actress and those who have seen the director's cut agree it's an important context for her characterization.

The movie is about her uncovering a fucked up ploy by the government to cover up an industrial catastrophe that's already killed hundreds, and continuing to poison people because they're burying the proof so that the industry can carry on for profit. It becomes even more complicated when she finds out not only is this a corrupted government officials issue, but the cia is involved because of the potential interest of whatever chemical is being produced in this factory as a weapon, so it's one woman against the giants of this world.

Thankfully, Barbara isn't truly alone in everything. She has or builds close relationships through the movie, such as:

-Dinah: her old highschool friend with whom she had lost contact, but Dinah doesn't know that at first: she's down on her luck (lost all her money+ scum boyfriend after scum boyfriend, etc.) and Oracle calls her and offers a sketchy job. (She cuts into the funds of some billionaire to do this, highjacking the dumb algorithm he made for tax evasion.) She calls Barbara her conscience and Jiminy (her own conscience is perfectly efficient and still she says that). Barbara is always calling her on an old kind of phone because she doesn't like technology. Barbara calls her "My hands, my eyes, my heart". Around the last third to fourth of the movie, at the start of the build-up to climax, we have the famous "Barbara...call me Barbara moment", except after that the scene continues and they fuck, like you don't see everything but it's not fade to black either, Dinah's mouth on her neck, hands untying clothes, fingers trailing across the other's skin drenched in water from the pool, the classic cliche fingers intertwining, dramatic music, and then we can fade to black.

-Dick: a 25 years old bartender with an inability to keep the same job for more than a couple of months who is haunted by the death of his parents in a circus accident when he was a kid. They start to date because she's investigating his parents' involvement in her case (they were killed to stifle down whistleblowing), I don't want them to kiss in the movie just they're clearly starting dating and then he wakes up alone in her bed and thanks to some adequate plot excuse Dick finds the file about his parents and falls to his knees. I want a scene where he's kneeling at her feet, devastated (idk if crying or not, director's choice) and she's trailing her fingers in his hair and asks him if he wants to help her get him his revenge and he looks at her with so much grief and devotion and says he'll do anything. After that moment they don't really break-up (esp since they weren't officially together) but their relationship has shifted, there's a form of affection/care/devotion but it's less romantic than the cute dating from the beginning (but no less weirder or intense). The music for them is not when she brings him back to her apartment but when he's kneeling at her lap because that's where the climax is.

> I'm not sure who more to include but I'm considering versions of Cassandra Cain, Helena Bertellini or Selina Kyle. Keep in mind that these are civilians in a hacker movie, more than having meta abilities or insane hero skills they need to be smart, brave, motivated af with a bone to pick, trusting in Oracle and generally normal people (though a reasonable measure of Selina's b&e skills certainly wouldn't hurt.)

> They find help in allies amidst doctors/scientists trying to study the apparent epidemic (but the research is being pushed down), maybe Talia al Ghul and Barry Allen?

> In any case I want Barbara to be badass and flawed in a way that's like kinda a bit morally grey, but it's not in a "everyone's a bit of a villain here"; there's a scene in the movie where Oracle is blackmailing a corrupt guy into double-crossing the cia for her and he's like 'you think you're so much better than me" and Oracle is like "oh, it's terribly easy to be better than you, I don't even have to be good."

Anyway the scandal is released and there are protests and justice stuff and they win. I'm not sure how the story ends for Barbara, maybe the last shot is her at the library working on her equations as if nothing had happened but with a tiny floating little smile, maybe she disappears mysteriously from everyone's life leaving a shadow and they're all wondering what she's up to now and why she left (leaving ground for a potential sequel that might never live up to the original) Dick is reflecting about how she changed his life forever and the last shot is Dinah thinking about the way she's missing the part of her soul that was whispering in her ears, etc.

The movie gets released in the theatres etc for a little less than one week before it's cancelled and forbidden forever because of some concerning similarities between the plot and some existent factories that somehow made it to the big screen without anyone noticing, however the movie is already circulating, it's all over the internet, grainy footage from the theatre, leaked bits from the director's cut (not the final cut remember), alleged snippets from the original script appearing on forums, etc. It's too late.

Idk, just- Barbara centric hacker movie. "Any similarities to real life circumstances is purely accidental" type of stuff.

[lsunstreakerl]

alralr the race is starting but im not gonna be able to watch it so im gonna spend the last 20 mins or whatevr i have on yapping abt the fmf design for max 🙏

first, this is explicitly for the northern kingdom soo like the first chapter when he was still living there, this is what he would've looked like. ofc after moving he had to adapt to verhoeven's dress code so !!

last time i yapped a lot abt material and worldbuilding, this time around i wanted to focus a lot more on the actual design and what it means.

so cloak colour change, bc the other one didn't really give what it was supposed to give and i was able to put a lot more meaning into this one. dark inky blue cloak, and a pop of orange somewhere unexpected. the idea is, in an animation sequence the cloak could be affected by the wind revealing the striking verstappen orange. this type of instance would ofc only happen in situations like high up on a podium giving a speech, fight sequences etc. spaces where the show of power from the royals r required, the patriotic orange also showcases specifically on max's character the entirety of his person that he hides behind a heavy coat for the sake of his kingdom.

briefly back to material for a moment but the fur lining the cloak is mixed in an effort to have affordable distribution of resources. the standard quota would be for royalty to have refine. materials while the civilians can get mixed but max insisted on his being just like the ones of the people. his guilt could never.

the undercloak is black, inky like a single brush stroke and it effectively obscures his figure underneath the heavy cloak on top. the whole outfit is an illusion. and it'll only become apparent once we look at his red-cheeked, ruddy young face.

the layers, the fur, the cloak that swishes around his rather thin legs all serve a purpose and it's to obscure his silhouette to make him seem more imposing than he actually is. this young verstappen is the one that harshly trained those trainees and made them men. and he was angry. the orange underneath the sea blue tells many stories and his boyish overgrown winter hair (people r dying there's no time for style) paired with his rosy cheeks tell us an even fuller one.

his hands r hidden beneath his cloak, his knives r tucked in his belt right next to where he rests his palms. sometimes he thinks that he can move the knife as if it were his own head. his whole silhouette looks like an arrow. he's a weapon first. sometimes he forgets where the blade ends and he starts.

hshsj soo those r my thoughts. if we ever get some sort of ficlet or flashback chapters maybe a prologue on max in his hometown then i suppose this design would be relevant lol. i think first establishing who he used to be is important to establish who he became, so even if it's irrelevant rn, the teenage-young adult design would be quintessential to his development as a human methinks.

i loveddd the softness of chapter 6 !! very cute i can't wait to see where it all goes ur writing's beautifulll mwah xx

AHHHHHH OH MY GOD. please know I'm going insane about all the little pieces of this. off my rocker, they're peeling me off of the walls.

his fluffy hair!! and the blush!! hiding behind all the fur I need to squish him.

I love the way you showcased his need to not be seen "above" his people. he uses the same materials they do, he lives in similar conditions. he heats his own water, he hunts for his own furs when necessary, he goes out to the villages to assist however he can. he's a member of the community before he's a verstappen, and that's what's earned him their fierce loyalty.

THE ORANGE I LOVE IT. I see your vision about it being an incredible visual cue, and I think it's also very inspiring, seeing how they don't have bright colors all that often. it makes max easily identifiable in a fight if he wants to be, either to draw attention away from others or serve as a rallying point.

max having to "hide" himself behind those layers, to present an image that's older, larger, more of a figurehead— you get it!!

always having his hands near his weapons, constantly being aware, all of that is an important part of max. survival can be v harsh up north, and when it comes down to survival of the fittest, then it's rightfully assumed that the leader is the most adapted to the environment.

I do actually have a prequel ficlet in the works for him! it'll probably be a tumblr exclusive thing for right now, but it's in progress :)

once again I am going feral about this it's BEAUTIFUL and I'm absolutely obsessed, you've done an absolutely incredible job 🤍🤍🤍

[kandadze]

FoF rewatch ep 4: or, I wanna hold your haaaaand! (gifs and loose thoughts)

Well, this one took me much longer... We all know how insanely gifable this show is, right? Somehow it really stood out to me in this ep, and of course I know that it's only going to get worse better lol

Ep 4 is the first to really pick up the pace after the core team was built in the previous eps; we have even higher stakes, betrayals, epic flashbacks* and fights**, and in general more shenanigans than you can shake a stick at. At the same time, I think it's the ep to really establish the fact that alongside the earth-shattering events, this show will also pay extra attention to simple intimacy, acts of care, and tender moments that make the fabric of life.

ZYZ and LL swearing an oath at the creation stone (vow stone, altar stone, whatever, you know what I mean) was definitely an epic moment, but along the insane visuals opening the ep we also get this:

We get ZYZ oh so gently removing the Truth Eye from WX's vision:

We get ZYC, instinctively if not quite consciously, stepping into a role of big brother and protector to Bai Jiu (I will forever refuse to abbreviate the kid's name, for reasons):

We get team bonding between PSJ, ZYC and Bai Jiu:

We get this tiny moment where PSJ actually reaches out to WX first:

We get ZYZ oh so gently (if not taking no for an answer...) healing ZYC's hand:

And ZYC holding onto the demon's hand in the end:

We get WX and ZYZ staying close to injured ZYC (in his inner robe!) while roasting each other at the same time (and making the boy laugh):

And of course let's not forget ZYZ's (not so gentle) hands-on method of teaching ZYC the Bingyi Clan water-freezing technique:

Speaking of this scene, I love how they showed us that ZYC could probably be quite a menace as a pupil. He learns fast, and the first thing he does after? Prank the teacher XD

Which as far as we can see, ZYZ quite deserves, as he remains a slippery bugger throughout this arc, keeping his secrets, following his own agenda and in general making it seem like he can't be trusted. (All this, of course, while looking like a renaissance portrait:)

Speaking of the demon though, let me just circle back to the very beginning, because ZYZ's demonic form makes me damn feral. Just look at him!

While we're at it, let's look at LL, too:

The opening sequence, presented to us with no explanation whatsoever, does suggest quite a lot just with positioning and color coding. On the first viewing, we can assume that these two were - are - equally powerful, and that they did this enormous thing that we don't quite understand yet, together. The flashback ends - and now they're on opposing sides.

And I don't know about you folks but I could listen to them growl at each other all day... (while completely agreeing with someone's comment that most of the male cast needs throat lozenges...). LL's whole demeanor screams "jilted ex". His look when ZYZ mentions his blood contract with WX. His look when ZYZ removes the Truth Eye from WX's vision:

Even without the flashback and on the first watch, just these two looks establish very firmly that LL and ZYZ have history; and on the second watch we know that "it's complicated" is an understatement of a few millennia.

All the funny scenes remain funny on the rewatch, and I laughed just as hard as the first time when WX basically Li Lianhua'd their way out of the honey trap.

Their little trot just kills me:

Not to forget PSJ's own flavor of badassery that was happening around the same time:

Other random thoughts... ZYC asking "Who's Li Lun?" while bandaged up and recuperating sure hits differently on the rewatch. As does Bai Jiu's promise that as long as he's alive, ZYC won't die!!! ;__;

Also, it just occurred to me that PSH is shown with these strikingly blue eyes as he's "reintroduced" to us in PSJ's nightmare... knowing what we later find out about him I think that that hint was so blatant we just completely missed it... as in, who else in this show has blue eyes? And what happens to him?

(I wish I looked so aesthetically pleasing while in a nightmare:)

Traumaaaaa, here we come!

One last thing, ep 4 is where we hear this song for the first time:

For maybe 20 seconds, but it was enough. That voice, that melody. That cello climb at circa 1 min mark, which did unspeakable things to my brain on the first listen of the whole song and continues to do so every time I play it again (you can hear it even better in the "karaoke" version, which I also listen to on a regular. Because I'm normal like that).

Here are some gifs of the aforementioned flashbacks and fights:

* https://www.tumblr.com/alipeeps/767702535144357888/the-divine-tree-of-jianmu-and-the-white-emperor?source=share

** https://www.tumblr.com/kandadze/768909203908722688/still-on-ep-4-so-have-some-gifs-to-celebrate-our?source=share

[cnidocyst]

they forgot to make the punk hazard body swap stuff about franky Specifically . for me

[ID: Doodle page focused on Nami being body swapped into Franky's body and Franky being body swapped into Chopper. The main drawing is of Nami in Franky's body, freaking out as she timidly raises her hands up in front of her chest. Her knees are creaking and her hands keep clicking. A speech bubble containing only Nami's head making the same frightened expression is drawn over her head. The notes are: "-Going through the onslaught of losing more nuanced muscular movements, half of organs being replaced with mechanical parts constantly whirring, using cameras for eyes and the stark change in vision/color quality that comes with that, and a rubbery tongue. All while having to adjust to a body three times her size and constant soreness of the knees and spine having to support all of that. Scared of accidentally shooting bullets and stuff". Right beside her is Franky in Chopper's body, who is sweating profusely and looking down with a frustrated expression as he frantically waves his right arm. His other hoof is covering his left ear. A speech bubble of Franky's head making the same angry expression appears above his head. He's only wearing a backpack and shorts. His notes are: "-Everything is too hot, too loud, and too much . smells. -No dexterity/clumsy movements. Going from mostly naked to full fur coat is overwhelming". In the top left hand corner is a small doodle of Chopper in Sanji's body. He's just standing there with a big eye and a cat mouth. There's a doodle of Franky as Chopper nervously walking on all fours in brain point. He's thinking: "gosh i sure hope a hole doesn't open up beneath me and i drop into the ocean that i now cannot swim in. A truly frightening thought." as someone beneath the ground under him starts to saw a circle around where he's standing. There is a secret low opacity clip art of Wade from Garfield behind him. There's a sketch of Nami as Franky accidentally swinging one of her arms into the back of Luffy's head while she's talking. This drawing is captioned: "Dangerously clumsy". There's a drawing of Franky as Chopper talking to Nami as Franky. He tells her: "Nami i am just letting you know my flashback arrestor is not currently up to code and i haven't replaced it so i recommend you do not use any fire functions or you could blow up which would also blow me up . and i would not care for that". Nami starts quietly panicking. Lastly, there's a doodle of Robin sitting down while Franky in Chopper's body nuzzles up against her right shoulder like a cat would on all fours. He's looking up at her, smiling and wagging his tail, and says: "You can pet me if you'd like". Robin grips him by the abdomen with her right arm while lightly pushing him away with her other arm. She looks upset and refuses to look at him. She responds: "Stop talking." in a red horror type font. /END ID]

[coniangray]

St5 teaser breakdown

(cus im bored) (spoilers, duh....i think)

All these clips are from the first 2 eps cus ofc they wont wanna spoil more that early into production. Like imagine if this felt too much of a sneak peak, the season is gonna be HUGE and this will feel like the 0.00001% of what it actually is lmao.

The school scenes:

i think first scenes, all from episode one.

The boys will catch a signal from the radio the night prior, paralleling s2e1

but this time either will lives with the wheelers or hes at the radio station and they contact from there.

the signal might be near a military base OR

its henrys signal that needs decoding excactly like the scoop troops did in st3.

So, the dynamics here are gonna be reminicent of both s2 and s3e2.

some quotes like "what are you doing on this channel again" and ''I cracked it", "cracked what?","I cracked the code" are also gonna make the cut. This scene will be paralelled with either mike or dustin, since these two were the brain of the party.

BONUS:

And what did robin also figure out in s4? Oh, wait-

I dont actually know what this code is, but i know it needs all four of them to solve it. And what if, in the background of the signal they catch up on little dream of me playing in the background?

The daisy song being broadcasted was accidental; the russians werent planning on including it there or they just did it as a distraction (they might have recorded the code within the crowd of the mall in brought daylight.) So what if the music, even if there is one at the background, is accidental too? After all, this song is mentioned as victors safe space because he called ella fitzgerald an angel, not henrys.

It all has to do with vecna at the end of the day, given how will touches his neck and feels him. This is an early sign of the symptoms, given how later, after school, they grow bigger and wider, giving will his first vision of the day:

And i dont even need to tell yall what this scene paralels lol

same table, but not same tree.

The code solving talk still continues here, because of how convenient it is to have will see the clock, zone out, walk towards it while the rest of the group talks about vecna and him capturing his victims in manipulative ways. In this scene they will bring up metaphors and allegories, just like they did with chrissy and eddie "do you ever feel like youre losing your mind?","i feel like im going crazy right now, doing a deal with the queen of hawkins high".

Also, like eddie said, this place promises safety because no o ne ever goes out there. SO, my bet is, mike chose they go there since eddie mustve told him right before he died.

bet hell say sth between the lines of "We have to go somewhere private. Somewhere no one can hear us." and thatll be most likely during lunch.

And thats where the bullies come in.

In order to continue their scenes out there, they mustve been interrupted by andy and jasons squad, and teased as to what they were doing with the radio on the table, given the leaks we got back in january or mike and dustin being followed by them.

no i have a feeling that during this arguement (after lunch and before the table scene), andy will attack mike and dustin and will will hopefully give a punch, paraleling el and angela in s4 and joyce in s3. This is my guess here, but i hope its true cus poor boy needs to throw hands with sb.

Spoiler alert it might not happen that day cus all of them are safe and sound without a scratch in the table woods scene.

After the woods scene, dustin visits eddied grave with his bike, which vandalized to the gods and guess who did it; thats right the bullies.

which will probably paralel maxs scene on billys grave

I wanna believe we get a heartfelt speech about his and mikes relationship with eddie, warming the ground for more eddie flashbacks to come. No, he wont get vecnad here, but rather found and beaten up by andi and the bullies, cus he was seen with a bruised face later on

and yes, the projector scene is also from the same day.

Another interesting thing to point out here is how the duffers said that our characters will start the season in action, so all the el scenes fighting vecna in the upside down and all the lights flickering, theyre all from the first 2 episodes.

After school and after the graveyard, with propably a few new scenes taking place in the middle, they all go to the new station set, and as it seems the byers are doing a presentation??

Probably from their experience in the uspide down, or most likely explaining sth about vecnas connection.

Orrr its a group thing, idk.

The thing is, dustin is beaten up standing next to steve. My bets are that hell notice dustin is hurt and make a huge deal about it, argue with the party on why he was found like that in the first place.

This would also be a chance to bring up the dynamics from the previous seasons and their flaws, aka dustin being with steve more time than he was with the party or others.

The thing is, in the same scene we see this;

M4tt showing n0ah how to choke.

Things most likely get heated in this scene, and that triggers wills connection with vecna. The mindflayer activates, and he becomes like billy.

And who else flayed choked sb else prior to this?

LETS GO BABY WE ROLL !!

Will will attack someone, most likely steve, cus he was also shown beaten up later in the teaser, especially in the car scene with nancy n johnathan.

Which leads us to this leak;

Its night, right outside the radio station. My guess is that steve tries to escape but part of him stays cus hell its will that attacks, that boy is harmless, right? While will is just there, chocking him and bagginf him to run.

Its the perfect lead up imo; first he feels the mf getting closer, then he has the vision and then he gets activated.

i feel like this is the cliffhanger between e1 and e2, since it would be perfect to have us waiting for steves safety and wills sanity for the next episode.

Bonus bonus;

Nancys Candy striper outfit

Going undercover in ep 1 was not on mybingo card, so im guessing shes an actual vollunteer at the hospital, because shed have to gain trust in order to sneak in and steal files.

but then again, why from tyhe hospital? all this place has ws maxs condition, which was already known to her and the rest of the team.

Involving her with such type of environment is simply to create more paraelels from the hmh scenes in s3.

Now, we also got this leak from april, and its most likely for ep4

the vollunteer is obviously nancy, but for her to return to that outfit, shell have to wear it again. So that means what i said, she became a vollunteer to gain trust and steal the proper files from the turnbows mansion thats connected to the lab.

Wills outfit also indicates its from a later episode.

As for the hopper scenes, idk a lot to break it down. And for el, this must be in ep 1 since this is unfinished bussiness from the piggyback if u nthink abt it

Thats it, hope you enjoyed my brain fart and i hope im right.