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aemiron-main-backup · 9 months ago

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Henry Creel, Seizures, The Exorcist, and Roland Doe: Did Henry Creel Have Epilepsy?

So! I’m wondering if Henry had epilepsy. And before we dive into it, a few things to note:

Not all epilepsy is photosensitive epilepsy/triggered by flashing lights

Not all seizures are grand mal seizures (the ones where people are laying down jerking). Absence and temporal lobe seizures are far more subtle & can just look like staring into space.

Some people have a combination of grand mal seizures and other more subtle types of seizures.

So, first of all, “The Exorcist” is namedropped regarding the Creels:

And we also have Will’s S2 seizure on the field where he has SO many Direct exorcist parallels during both that scene & his cabin scene “exorcism”

Which, those Will exorcism parallels made me think “well what if Henry had a seizure during his exorcism- but what would cause it? he’s not possessed the way Will was” but then it hit me: what if its the other way around and the seizures caused the exorcism?

And we’ll come back to Will’s seizure later, but focusing on The Exorcist for now, Reagan, the girl in The Exorcist, has a seizure.

And historically, exorcisms were frequently done on kids who had epilepsy/seizures, which were mistaken for demonic possession. But rather than speaking about history in a broad sense, let’s look at a specific example- Roland Doe, the boy whose story literally inspired The Exorcist.

And hell, The Exorcist was specifically inspired by the NEWSPAPER ARTICLE about Roland's exorcism, which has me staring DIRECTLY at the Weekly Watcher article that talks about the exorcism at the Creel house.

And get this-

This is EXACTLY what happened with Henward- his parents hoped that moving to Hawkins/a change of scenery would cure him, but it did not.

And after all, what were they trying to cure him of? What symptoms was he exhibiting? They never actually tell us what was “wrong” with him. Like, sure, he’s autistic, but there’s not many “symptoms” of autism that Henry displays as a child that are disruptive enough to have him sent to doctors & moving to an entirely new town in the hopes of curing him.

What actual event/symptoms made Virginia and Victor go “okay, yeah, this boy needs to see a doctor” AND also had them move to a new town (JUST like what happened with Roland Doe as a result of his seizures) in hopes that a change of scenery would cure Henry???? I wouldn’t be surprised if it was seizures.

And his powers don’t seem to have activated until he was in Hawkins, so it likely wasn’t those.

And also, Henward says that all of the teachers and doctors claimed he was broken:

Which, epilepsy can cause issues with learning and retaining information, and if Henry was having something like absence seizures in class, too, that would also likely freak teachers out/have them see him as “broken,” because he would seem outwardly fine/just be staring into space, but wouldn’t be able to respond to them calling his name/asking him things.

And going back to the talk of being “cured,” Epilepsy is also referred to as The Sacred Disease, which would also tie into all of the religious imagery with the Creels.

And we also have the auditory and visual hallucinations that can often be part of epilepsy. Starting with the auditory hallucinations, those are often likened to sounding like radios- which would be an interesting connection to all of the radios in the show, especially the radio with the Creels.

(And this is speaking from personal experience, but, it definitely does sound like a radio like not just “a radio is the closest comparison” but instead “i genuinely believed it was the sound of a radio/sounds like what we heard with the Creel radio malfunctioning where you can't quite clearly make out any of the channels”. I was actually scared of the sound of radios/radio static as a kid because I used to hear this sort of stuff all the time as a result of having epilepsy.)

And there’s also these drawings of visual epilepsy hallucinations, which James @ henrysglock pointed out to me.

And when we look at Henward’s shadow monster drawing and all of the elder brain/brain imagery in the show and the mindflayer being named, well, a mindflayer, and DND mindflayers being controlled by an elder brain & the whole "cutting the brain off from the body"/directly referring to the mindflayer as a brain.... the vibes are definitely very similar.

It's also very interesting to me that the drawings of the tunnels that Will draws before having a seizure/draws as a result of what was CAUSING his seizures are directly paralleled to Henry drawing the mindflayer (Henward's mindflayer drawing style & the medium he uses actually resembles the tunnel drawings more than it does Will's own mindflayer drawing, especially with Will's frantic scratching during the tunnel drawings and Henward's frantic scratching during the mindflayer drawings).

And like I said, Will's tunnel drawings were caused by the same thing causing his seizure- so many Henward's mindflayer drawing was caused by the seizures as well- was Henward seeing epileptic hallucinations that would later inspire him to shape the mindflayer/shadow monster the way that he did?

And again, this part is personal experience, but as a kid, part what I would hallucinate was silver spiders hanging down from door frames (and also spiders crawling all over me but those only happened at night whereas the hanging spiders were throughout the day/constant and yes, I'm 1000% sure they weren't just nightmares). Which, of course, the Duffers aren't inspired by me/don't know about what I saw, but I'm not the only person with epilepsy who's reported seeing spiders (here and here and here), which makes me wonder if it was something they came across when researching seizures/epilepsy for the show & may have influenced the decision to include all of the spider imagery with Henry.

And going back to Will’s S2 seizure, we also have Will's "now memories," which, interestingly enough, they chose to have Mike ask Will if he sees anything in his "now memories" RIGHT before Will has a seizure. Which is interesting because strong feelings of deja vu tend to precede seizures, and "now memories" are very similar to deja vu/feeling like you've seen something before but can't quite place where/aren't really sure if it's Your memories.

El also has a seizure in NINA (this is before her cardiac arrest scene) and in Surfer Boy Pizza, which are both paralleled to Will’s seizure (and yes, El was also choking, but her body did seem to be having a seizure, and it's shot with the same sort of pose and rotating camera movement as Will's seizure and El's NINA seizure).

And we also have the stroke imagery with El and the fact that strokes can cause epilepsy AND people with epilepsy are at a higher risk for strokes.

Which has me staring at Henward’s “it almost killed me” scene and how his fainting scene is paralleled to El fainting in 1979 & then El waking up without her memories/with the sort of stroke stuff that Brenner talks about.

And the focus on all of the flashing lights in the show too?? NGL, I would laugh a bit if Henry’s powers started flashing the lights during his exorcism & that triggered a seizure. It would also tie into him just. Staring sometimes/being seen as weird for that because that’s also often a part of epilepsy/absence seizures.

And even if I’m wrong about the seizure thing (which again, it’s not smthn I’m super firm on), the Duffers DEFINITELY know about Roland Doe. Roland DEFINITELY inspired Henry- that bit about what happened to Roland with his family moving towns to cure him isn't in The Exorcist but IS identical to what happened with Henry, so it's not even something that the Duffers could've just pulled from The Exorcist, because it's actually one of the parts of Roland's story that didn't end up in the Exorcist movie.

And speaking of movies, we also have One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest on the S4 board. And in One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest, Sefelt has epilepsy and has a seizure:

And also, we have Henward’s straitjacket, which I talked about in this post.

We literally see him wearing the straitjacket on screen- but why was he wearing it? Why not just drug him if they wanted to keep him under control? And what good would a straitjacket do against a child with psionic powers anyway? It wouldn't have even worked to keep him under control! UNLESS the powers weren’t a concern (because he was unconscious/seizing) but the flailing/jerking from a grand mal seizure was making him difficult to transport/deal with.

And this is more of a minor sidenote, but something that's interesting to me is how quick Victor is to picking up Henry, almost like it's a habit. We see him pick Henry up in the dining room AND the foyer, and it's not something we ever see him do with Alice, so it's not just something that Victor Does With His Kids. But if Henry was prone to seizures and fainting, it would make sense that Victor is used to picking him up/carrying him around.

And Victor was also told that Henry was in a coma after fainting and then died- and again, speaking from personal experience here (and research), having a seizure can put you into a coma which may result in your death. So, I wonder if that's the explanation that they gave to Victor/if that was the official cause of death for Henry. Which would also make sense if, like I said, the straitjacket was put onto Henry because he was seizing, and Victor saw it happen.

I also wonder if Victor saw Henry still just sitting at the table staring & thought he was having another seizure (an absence seizure rather than a grand mal one, which would mostly just look like blank staring/exactly what Henry does in this scene) & grabbed him, especially since stress can trigger seizures, and well, watching Virginia die would've been stressful. I'm not saying that Henry was having a seizure in this scene persay, but rather that Victor may have believed he was/may have mad the connection that Henry's "fits"/moments of blank staring are connected to stress.

And the jerking motions and rolled back eyes during Vecna visions/his attacks are interesting considering how they resemble a grand mal seizure. Like, look at how Fred is posed the same way was Will was during Will's seizure:

And the same gaping mouth imagery:

And then the jerking motions:

Long story short: I won't be surprised at all if Henry/Edward had epilepsy and experienced a mixture of various types of seizures.

Henry Creel, Seizures, The Exorcist, and Roland Doe: Did Henry Creel Have Epilepsy?

So! I’m wondering if Henry had epilepsy. And before we dive into it, a few things to note:

Not all epilepsy is photosensitive epilepsy/triggered by flashing lights

Not all seizures are grand mal seizures (the ones where people are laying down jerking). Absence and temporal lobe seizures are far more subtle & can just look like staring into space.

Some people have a combination of grand mal seizures and other more subtle types of seizures.

So, first of all, “The Exorcist” is namedropped regarding the Creels:

And we also have Will’s S2 seizure on the field where he has SO many Direct exorcist parallels during both that scene & his cabin scene “exorcism”

And we’ll come back to Will’s seizure later, but focusing on The Exorcist for now, Reagan, the girl in The Exorcist, has a seizure.

And get this-

This is EXACTLY what happened with Henward- his parents hoped that moving to Hawkins/a change of scenery would cure him, but it did not.

And his powers don’t seem to have activated until he was in Hawkins, so it likely wasn’t those.

And also, Henward says that all of the teachers and doctors claimed he was broken:

And going back to the talk of being “cured,” Epilepsy is also referred to as The Sacred Disease, which would also tie into all of the religious imagery with the Creels.

And there’s also these drawings of visual epilepsy hallucinations, which James @henrysglock pointed out to me.

And we also have the stroke imagery with El and the fact that strokes can cause epilepsy AND people with epilepsy are at a higher risk for strokes.

And speaking of movies, we also have One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest on the S4 board. And in One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest, Sefelt has epilepsy and has a seizure:

And also, we have Henward’s straitjacket, which I talked about in this post.

And the same gaping mouth imagery:

And then the jerking motions:

Long story short: I won't be surprised at all if Henry/Edward had epilepsy and experienced a mixture of various types of seizures.

#stranger things #henry creel #creel family #edward creel #henry creel epilepsy

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aemiron-main-backup · 9 months ago

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talking about victor being found on the side of the road again except this time ft edward

the fact that the indianapolis gazette talks about victor being found along the side of the road lacking fine motor skills makes me insane.

“The bodies were discovered early Sunday morning, after Creel was found wandering aimlessly along the side of Highway 49, south of Hawkins. Deputy John Snow from Hawkins police department intercepted Creel and made the discovery upon returning him home.”

“Creel at first told authorities that he knew nothing about the things found at his home. He is described as 5 feet 10 (?) inches tall, weighing about 180 (?) pounds with light skin, light brown hair, and ‘appearing unable to perform basic motor functions,’- a condition likely brought on by the psychological consequences of committing the murders, said head psychiatrist at Pennhurst, Alexis McMurry.”

Like cmon, Victor was found missing his memory (as he had no idea what happened at his house), wandering along the side of the road, after being found by Hawkins police, on the south side of town, near the lab. That’s got HNL and Brenner written all over it. And lacking fine motor skills?? Like Terry??

Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if the road Victor was found on was Mirkwood, the same road that Will vanished on, but I need to do more digging for that.

This is also the paper that mentions Edward Creel instead of Henry Creel. Meaning that this Victor may very well not be the same Victor that we saw with Nancy and Robin at Pennhurst, as Edward Creel seems to have his own timeline, a timeline where Victor is 38 instead of 40 in 1959, where Victor’s wife is named Alice and his daughter is named Virginia, where the Creels lived in Hawkins for two years, and where there’s a ton of other differences too.

However, this is interesting to me because in this post, I talked about how we see Victor being arrested at night by state troopers (who were working for the lab in S1 with Will’s vanishing), and how those troopers likely took him to the lab that night and then the lab dumped him on the side of the road to be found by the Hawkins police. But if that’s the case, then that means that this shot:

Is a shot of Edward’s timeline. Which would mean that the guy talking about Victor getting arrested that night:

Is Edward. However, there’s still lots I need to dig through when it comes to sorting out Edward’s timeline vs Henry’s timeline and what happened in each timeline regarding the Creel murders. Both the Indianapolis Gazette (Edward timeline) and the Weekly Watcher (Henry timeline) have different dates for the Creel murders too. Edward’s the one in the timeline where the murders happened on Will’s birthday, which could also tie into Edward being vecna.

There’s also something else that’s been gnawing at me regarding that scene of Victor being arrested, because look at Henry/Edward’s dialogue:

“He” was arrested? It’s almost set up as if it’s a totally different monologue cutting in/as if we’re missing a line of dialogue, because there’s no establishing who “he,” is, Henry/Edward wasn’t talking about his father previously, because this is what he said previously:

And yet, it just suddenly jumps to this wording with “he,” there’s no dialogue between “and it nearly killed me,” and “he was arrested, blamed for the death of my sister and mother,” and that line is also interesting, because he specifically says that Victor was blamed for the death of his sister and mother, but a.) does not name the sister or mother, which is suspicious considering that Edward’s sister and mother have swapped named compared to Henry’s sister and mother and b.) he doesn’t say that Victor was blamed for the death of Henry/Edward, which is odd.

Also jumping back to that last newspaper clipping, I’m staring at the wording of “the things,” at Victor’s home (the bodies) and all of the imagery with The Thing and what I’ve been talking about with Virginia’s eye goo and regenerative healing and goo from The Thing.

talking about victor being found on the side of the road again except this time ft edward

the fact that the indianapolis gazette talks about victor being found along the side of the road lacking fine motor skills makes me insane.

Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if the road Victor was found on was Mirkwood, the same road that Will vanished on, but I need to do more digging for that.

Is a shot of Edward’s timeline. Which would mean that the guy talking about Victor getting arrested that night:

There’s also something else that’s been gnawing at me regarding that scene of Victor being arrested, because look at Henry/Edward’s dialogue:

There’s just. So much to think about.

#stranger things #victor creel #creel murders #victor creel analysis #creel newspapers #creel family #st newspapers #edward creel

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aemiron-main-backup · 9 months ago

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I FUCKING KNEW IT! THE LAB WAS TOTALLY INVOLVED WITH THE CREEL MURDERS!

WOULD LOVE TO KNOW WHY VICTOR CREEL WAS APPARENTLY FOUND WANDERING ALONG THE HIGHWAY THE MORNING AFTER THE CREEL MURDERS. WOULD LOVE TO KNOW WHY HE DOESNT MENTION THAT. THIS HAS BRENNER AND LAB FUCKERY WRITTEN ALL OVER IT!!!!!!!

This part of the article, as far as I can tell, reads:

“The bodies were discovered early Sunday morning, after Creel was found wandering aimlessly along the side of Highway 49, south of Hawkins. Deputy (name here bc i cant quite read it) from Hawkins police department intercepted Creel and made the discovery upon returning him home.”

I’m telling you guys- that shot in Henry’s memories that Nancy sees of “victor” holding Henry the EXACT same way that Brenner holds El WAS BRENNER, Henry’s memories have been messed with. And so have Victor’s.

And so, let’s go back to that scene of Victor supposedly getting arrested that night- those “cops” weren’t cops at all. Those were Brenner’s lab employees. Victor was then taken, likely had his memories tampered with, and was released onto the side of the highway. I thought maybe this scene was Victor getting arrested the next morning but a.) it’s dark outside and b.) the newspaper article specifies that a HAWKINS POLICE DEPT officer intercepted Victor- but in the show, we see STATE TROOPERS arresting Victor- “state troopers” who then took him, messed with his memories, and dumped him on the side of the road, where he was later picked up by the cops. And need I remind you of the state troopers who kept interfering with Will’s fake body in S1? The state troopers who are shown here ARRESTING VICTOR?

Not only that, but the same article states that both children were found eyeless- which doesn’t make any sense because as we know, Henry didn’t lose his eyes. It was a FAKE BODY found by the Hawkins Police Dept officer the next morning, planted by the lab. And is it not strange that Victor makes no mention of his arrest- almost as if it’s missing from his memories? And is it not fucking STRANGE that, like I’ve been SAYING, so many shots that play during Victor’s retelling are from HENRY’S POV, through HIS EYES, whereas many shots in Henry’s memory sequence are through VICTOR’S EYES? It’s almost like their memories got swapped around- swapping places, and all that. And what’s really weird about this is that Victor claims that Henry slipped into a coma and then died a week later- and yet, Victor was being charged with THREE murders, not two murders and an attempted murder, THREE murders, and again, the article claims that BOTH childrens’ bodies were found eyeless. How the hell did Victor know about the coma? Well yknow who DID know about the coma? Henry. But then “a week later, he died.” Victor seems to have been under the impression that Henry was alive, and then accepted that he had died- which would explain the fact that the article kept caling Victor “defiant,” and acting as if they weren’t dead. Why would the lab tell Victor that Henry was in a coma and then that Henry died? Because they wanted to sell the idea that Victor was insane. They wanted him to keep denying the murders, even though Henry’s “eyeless body” had already been found, even though somehow, miraculously, evidence photos of a “bloodbath” at the Creel house had been shown. A bloodbath that was staged by Hawkins Lab.

It’s almost like Henry was put into a medically induced coma by Brenner, like i’ve been saying, but that’s a topic for another time. Brenner was there that night. The lab was involved. The lab planted Henry’s fake body, Brenner killed Virginia and staged her death, just like Benny, Virginia and Henry were fighting with their powers at the table. Alice was killed by Virginia. This ties into another massive analysis I’m working on, so I have a bunch of proof specifically for the idea of Brenner pushing the Creels around via subtle manipulation, but long story short, but Brenner was pushing the Creels around like pawns on a chessboard too- Virginia was an abusive mother, but this tension between her and Henry was exacerbated by Brenner.

And is it not interesting that the lab hides behind “Hawkins Power and Light,” which is the vans they use in S1?

Yknow. Lights. Like the flickering ones in the Creel house. The exact sort of thing that would be needed to cause tension between Henry and Virginia, wondering who was causing the lights to flicker- the exact sort of thing that would make Virignia “somehow know’/suspect that Henry had powers?

I FUCKING KNEW IT! THE LAB WAS TOTALLY INVOLVED WITH THE CREEL MURDERS!

This part of the article, as far as I can tell, reads:

Keep reading

#stranger things #st analysis #victor creel #creel family #creel murders

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aemiron-main-backup · 2 years ago

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Good afternoon, anon! (or should i say evening now, because it was afternoon when I started this but it isn't anymore LMAO)

First of all thank you so much for the compliment AND for taking the time to read my gay Mike post (I'm super curious which one you read though because I have a LOT)! Also if I seem confrontational during this response, I'm not TRYING to be, I just am trying to get my points across, so just know that I totally appreciate the discussion & can accidentally sound more argumentative than I intend to! This is a long post, sorry in advance, because I wanted to make SURE that I was fully addressing everything. <3

Second, I have a lot to say about this! I UNDERSTAND what you're saying and I don't think you're 100% wrong with some of your observations (although there are definitely some that I do think are wrong/disagree with), but I actually think that what you're saying backs up gay Mike when we really look at it!

(I have also put this analysis into a Google Doc (link) for easier reading because this is a long post and tumblr kept cutting off my ability to add as many paragraph breaks as i wanted. There are still lots of breaks in here, it shouldn't be one wall of text, but the google doc has even more. THIS GOOGLE DOC IS NOT MY FULL GAY MIKE ANALYSIS GOOGLE DOC!! It's just a copy pasted reformatted version of this ask)

To begin, let's dig into what you've said here:

"although I think Mike being bi would make more sense narratively because there isn't exactly a moment where it's really shown that he is gay."

I disagree with the idea that bi Mike makes more sense narratively for a TON of reasons, (this post, this post and mostly this post) but instead of getting off track with the discussion of gay Mike vs bi Mike and the narrative as a whole, I'm going to address EXACTLY what you've said here in regards to "Mike being bi would make more sense narratively because there isn't exactly a moment where it's really shown that he is gay." So, well I believe that there is a LOT of reasons why gay Mike works better narratively, especially in regards to El's arc and narrative, I'm going to focus on what you've mentioned here, with "Mike being bi makes more sense narratively BECAUSE there isn't a moment where it's really shown that he is gay."

I'm going to focus specifically on the tie that you've made, and talk about how there ARE moments where Mike is shown to be gay, and how he's actually shown more explicitly to be gay than Will is, but that it's just shown in a DIFFERENT WAY because Mike is framed relative to a lack of attraction to women (which doesn't work if Mike is bi, but the imagery of him not being attracted to girls is CLEARLY in the show and in there more often for Mike than it is for Will), whereas Will is framed relative to an active attraction to men (something that bi people DO have, but we know that Will isn't bi, so why is he framed in a more possibly bi way than Mike if Mike is supposedly the possibly bi one?)

So, if your assertion that bi Mike works better narratively is based in the idea that "there isn't exactly a moment where it's really shown that he is gay," which it is, because that's what you said, then IMO, I can SHOW that bi Mike doesn't work better narratively in the context of that argument for bi Mike specifically, because that argument isn't TRUE, because we DO see Mike being shown to be gay, it's just shown in a DIFFERENT WAY than Will.

So, let's get into it!

"With Will, we know he's gay bc it has been textually there since S1. Joyce confirmed it to Hopper and thought Will got hatecrimed, the bullies talking about Will and behind his back about his sexuality confirmed that, the way the whole town treated it as some sort of a hatecrime and the way Jonathan thought Lonnie killed Will bc of Will being gay and Lonnie calling Will slurs etc etc... it's all textually there to understand that Will is gay."

So, I will say that we also still don't have an explicit 'Will is gay' moment in the show (which I think you agree with/know that based on what you've said here), but you're right that HAS been there textually! Absolutely! And like you've said, we can understand via the text that Will is gay! But I think that the same applies to MIKE and that we DO get that textual confirmation for Mike, just in a different way.

"There's no such a thing with Mike's character though."

You're not 100% wrong! I think you're partially wrong, though! Let's go with 50% wrong! Again, I think that rather than "it's not there for Mike," it's more that "it's there/shown in a DIFFERENT WAY for Mike"! So, HOW is it shown? What IS that 'different way' that I keep talking about? WELL!

Now, there IS a lot of evidence for Mike being attracted to men (his crush on Eddie, his feelings for Will, 1987497238 other things), which could indicate him being bi: but the thing is, you're right to an extent: they don't show us "mike being gay" in the same way that they show us will being gay. This is because with mike, they focus on his lack of attraction to women. His active attraction to men is less visible than Will's is (Season 4 is the season where we really start to see his attraction to men be shown OUTSIDE of his love for Will specifically), just like how Will's lack of attraction to women is less visible than Mike's is. It's not that Will is attracted to girls at all, thought, it's about the different ways that they've chosen to frame Mike and Will's gayness, which is tied to their characters, their families, the way that they've grown up, and what they're supposed to represent from a narrative standpoint.

Mike is more affected by heteronormativity and LESS affected by external homophobia than Will, whereas Will is less affected by heteronormativity but MORE affected by external homophobia. Both are still affected by both of these things. It's about the extent to which they are affected.

That's the thing. Mike's sexuality and attraction is framed differently than Will's sexuality and attraction. Like I've said before, if you really sit back and look at the evidence in the show without the context of Noah and the Duffers confirming that Will is gay, WILL seems like the possibly bisexual one! This is because while Will is bullied for being 'gay,' when it comes to how his attraction is framed, it's more centered around active attraction to men than it is around LACK of attraction to women. With Mike, though, it's very much centered around a LACK of attraction to women and him REALIZING that lack of attraction.

Being attracted to men and being shown to have an attraction to men is NOT the same as being shown to have a LACK of attraction to women. Will is SHOWN more often relative to his attraction to men, he isn't put in those situations with women by the writers in the way that Mike is. We are shown his active attraction to men and because they frame it relative to gayness explicitly via the bullying and Lonnie's comments, we can assume that Will isn't attracted to women because he is gay.

With Mike, it's about his LACK of attraction to women because due to the way that he's more impacted by heteronormativity rather than by external homophobia (again still impacted by external and internal homophobia but MORE impacted by heteronormativity), Mike's sexuality is framed relative to his attraction to women/lack of it, rather than being framed relative to his attraction to men. Like I'm going to talk about later with invisibility versus hypervisibility, Mike's sexuality is erased even when people acknowledge it! Because people like Ted, with the 'our son? with a girl?" comment, are STILL framing Mike's sexuality as a LACK of attraction to girls, erasing his ACTIVE attraction to men, even though an attraction to men is IMPLIED, it's about the way that it's framed.

Now, going back to what you said about "There's no such a thing with Mike's character though," like I've described here, it's because Mike is framed relative to a lack of attraction to women and is mostly STARTING to be framed relative to active attraction to men in Season 4 and a little bit in Season 3, although Season 3 is mostly focused on his LACK of attraction to women. We've seen him be attracted to Will throughout the seasons, but Season 4 is really where we start to see his attraction to men outside of Will.

So, I keep talking about how Mike is framed relative to a lack of attraction to women, but a.) what evidence in the show demonstrates this lack of attraction to women and b.) what evidence demonstrates that his sexuality is FRAMED relative to his lack of attraction to women?

To address part a.), here's a few examples of the many examples of Mike's lack of attraction to women being demonstrated in the show. I've literally had to cut some out because I was hitting the character limit of this post, but you can read this post and this post for an explanation of how even Mike initiating the S1 kiss still proves that he isn't attracted to El:

Mike doesn't lean in for the Snowball kiss in S2, El is the one who leans up to him and Mike just stands there.

Mike shows no interest in Princess Daphne at the arcade.

Mike and Will being the only ones agreeing on the fact that "girls don't play video games" in S2, and how games are used as a metaphor for love and therefore Mike and Will both don't think that girls are involved with love, and how like I talked about in this post, there's even more of an explicit tie via the soundtrack AND what we see in the show between 'games' representing 'romantic love/attraction' and 'playing' as representing 'being with someone romantically/being attracted to them'.

Mike taking El's hands off of him REPEATEDLY during their makeout session in S3

Mike just sitting there during the makeout sessions in S3, he's much much more passive compared to El who is grabbing his face and holding him

Mike makes an absolutely disgusted face when Dustin talks about how hot Phoebe Cates is: and it's not just that Mike doesn't like Phoebe Cates specifically, because he's making that disgusted face before Dustin says the name 'Phoebe Cates,' but as SOON as Dustin starts talking about attraction to girls/how hot Suzie is, and then his face gets even MORE disgusted when he's told to imagine Phoebe Cates. (let ALONE the way that this ties into S4 with Steve creating the narrative connection that people who like Phoebe Cates is equalto/representative of people who 'like boobies.' By that logic, which has been SET UP BY THE SHOW, because Mike doesn't like Phoebe Cates, it's implied that he doesn't 'like boobies.")

The scene in season 4, where Mike is standing in front of the word 'Women,' behind his head, and making a grossed out/upset face, and talking about 'bullshit media propaganda,' which, like I talked about in this post, and this post, has implications regarding the use of the word 'bullshit' specifically. Here's a shortened version of those two posts + the implications of the word 'bullshit':

So, “women” and “bullshit media propaganda” being put together in the same scene alongside Mike’s upset/disgruntled reaction seems to demonstrate that to Mike, women and bullshit media propaganda are connected. It's not that Mike hates women, but that it’s literally bullshit propaganda, which ties DIRECTLY into Mike's character and how the presentation of his sexuality is more tied to heteronormativity than it is to external homophobia, and how that's WHY his sexuality is framed around a LACK of attraction to women, rather than an ACTIVE attraction to men.

The use of the word “bullshit” specifically has ties nancy and steve’s relationship + her not being in love with him and calling their relationship "bullshit,", but more importantly, their relationship being based in appearances/trying to seem normal, just like how Steve talks about wanting to be “normal teenagers for the night,” the night Nancy dumps him/uses the word "bullshit".

IMO Mike is trying to seem normal, trying to seem like he’s attracted to girls via his relationship with El, but it’s bullshit, specifically “bullshit media propaganda,” which ties to a.) the way that Mike and El's relationship, esp in s3 is very based in appearances/trying to seem normal/things like mike trying to buy El an apology that everyone can see, rather than just apologizing to her, just like Stancy’s relationship in s2, and b.) the way that mike and el’s relationship is the result of heteronormativity and is literally “bullshit media propaganda,” especially considering that El literally learned about romance from movies and that Mike is trying to conform to the propagandized idea of 'normal' by being with her, rather than being with her because he's attracted to her.

Mike makes an absolutely confused and grossed-out face when El kisses him at the end of season 3 and the fact that he just stands there and doesn't even kiss back. This is not Mike's first time kissing. This is not Mike's first time being kissed BY EL. So why is he a.) so confused and looking grossed out and b.) why does the script have mike's thoughts saying 'what's wrong with me?" if he's not having realizations about the fact that he's not attracted to girls and can't change that part of him? I talk about this more in this post.

Mike couldn't kiss El at the airport in season 4 without wearing sunglasses.

The "pretty," scene in Season 1 was NOT meant to indicate romantic attraction, because they literally had El call Nancy "pretty," and then had Mike AGREE. I talk about this more in this post, but thinking someone is pretty does NOT equal attraction, and if you operate under the assumption that it does in ST, then you think that Mike is attracted to his sister. Sure, talk about other things that you think indicates Mike having attraction to El, even though IMO not a single one of them holds up, but this specific example is 100% not intended to indicate attraction due to the way that the show has set it up to parallel that scene with the photo of Nancy. This post also made a great observation backing up this fact.

The way that Mike looks at the womens' lingerie in the mall and how it's different from Lucas and I talk about that in this post and how it ties into him being gay but also still need to post my deep dive on it.

Something I've aluded to in my posts but am saving for my gay Mike analysis, with how the 'blank makes you crazy' Mike and El aisle scene TOTALLY parallels Robin's coming out scene, but how Mike and Robin are on opposite sides of the screen, indicating that they're on opposite sides of the topic: but if they're both gay/even queer or bi, WHY are the shown on opposite sides? Because the TOPIC isn't gayness or queerness, Robin doesn't say "I'm gay/I'm a lesbian!", Robin talks about her ATTRACTION TO WOMEN. THATS HOW SHE FRAMES IT TO STEVE. THE TOPIC IS ATTRACTION TO WOMEN AND MIKE AND ROBIN ARE ON OPPOSITES SIDES OF THAT TOPIC BECAUSE THEY'RE BOTH GAY BECAUSE MIKE ISN'T ATTRACTED TO WOMEN AND ROBIN IS!!

and how the SAME MUSIC plays during Robin's coming out scene vs the scene where El kisses Mike. (Robin is coming out to Steve, Mike is coming out to HIMSELF, finally internally acknowleding his lack of attraction to women in that scene, backed up with what I talked about before and how he's literally thinking "what's wrong with me?" AND how Robin's scene is about ATTRACTION TO WOMEN and it's tied via the soundtrack to the kiss scene, and so it's not that Mike is realizing his active attraction to men, but rather his LACK OF ATTRACTION TO GIRLS)

Now, I've talked about part a.), about some of the many instances where Mike's lack of attraction to women is demonstrated (let alone the INSANE amount of actively gay/rainbow imagery around him which is another point bc that ties into proof of active attraction to men and isnt exactly what this point is about and also i dont have room), but what about part b.)?

How can I demostrate part b.), how can I demonstrate that not only is Mike not attracted to women but that his entire sexuality is FRAMED AROUND to that lack of attraction to women? I can demonstrate it because Will also isn't attracted to women, but his sexuality isn't FRAMED AROUND it, it's not filtered through that same lens. Well! In addition to other evidence, such as what I talked about with Ted's comment earlier, we can also look at the fact that Will has fewer scenes demonstrating his lack of attraction to women than Mike does! This lack of scenes doesn't show that Will likes women: it shows that his sexuality isn't framed around attraction to women, and instead is framed around attraction to men! It's the opposite for Mike!

Mike's lack of attraction to women is highlighted more frequently, whereas Will's active attraction to men is highlighted more frequently, and vice versa, where Mike's active attraction to men is highlighted less frequently, and Will's lack of attraction to women is highlighted less frequently! They both equally dislike/are not attracted to girls/are attracted to men, but it's about the difference in how this is FRAMED for each of them!

And like I've said a few times throughout this response, this framing IS changing for Mike, because in Season 4, we begin to see him shifting more towards being framed with an active attraction to men in addition to that lack of attraction to women.

So, when it comes to Will, the times that we see him being repelled by girls are:

The scene about saying 'girls don't play video games,' towards Max, a scene that is also WITH MIKE where Mike does the SAME THING

The Snow Ball, where Will doesn't want to dance with the girl but Mike urges him to (Mike is AGAIN involved in the few scenes that involve girls and Will because again, MIKE'S arc is centered around lack of attraction to girls)

"A day free of girls." (Hell I'm going to talk about this below and how imo this is only PARTIALLY meant to demonstrate Will's lack of attraction to girls and is actually more tied to Will's upset of his friends ditching him for girls imo but even if we take this 100% as a 'Will isn't attracted to girls' scene, there's still FEWER of those scenes for him than they are for Mike)

Lenora, when he moves his foot away from that girl

We don't SEE Will's face during the Dustin talking about Phoebe Cates scene. They didn't show us the CONFIRMED GAY GUY being grossed out about it, but they did show us MIKE being grossed out about it. And it's because Will isnt' affected by heteronormativity in the same way that Mike is and therefore is shown more as APATHETIC towards women/they don't even SHOW his response because they're not putting him IN as many of those scenarios with showing him reacting to women because the framing of his sexuality is tied to his active attraction to men rather than lack of attraction to women. He's equally as non-attracted to them as Mike is, but it's about the FRAMING of it. Mike is put into those situations more often by the writers because it's part of his arc and ties to heteronormativity and the type of gay experience that Mike represents.

He also kind of has the lingerie store scene, but not in the same way that Mike does because like I talked about in the post that I linked in that part, Mike's expression in that scene is paralled to a later scene of fear and disgust towards the mindflayer, whereas that parallel isn't made for Will.

If Mike is bisexual/attracted to women, why does he look more put-off by women than the confirmed gay man does? Why did they show us his disgusted expression but not Will's? Will is excited and enthusiastic about going to meet Dustin's girlfriend, and HE'S the confirmed gay one! And so that's also why I feel that "A day free of girls," is partially related to Will's sexuality, sure, but I also think more than that, it's about the fact that his friends are abandoning him to go and hang out with the girls. Why do I think this? Because like I said, he's excited to go and meet Dustin's girlfriend.

So! WHY is Mike still kissing El throughout the seasons if he's gay and not attracted to women? I think there's two key reasons for this:

A.) In Season 4, I think it's mostly heternormativity and trying to seem 'normal,' and B.) Up until Season 4, IMO, heteronormativity and trying to seem 'normal' is still involved, in addition to El's more stereotypically 'masculine' appearance, resemblance to Will, and Mike's ability to subconsciously (NOT INTENTIONALLY) project his feelings for Will onto her, but even more than that, Mike is also still figuring out what attraction IS and how it's supposed to feel! And I literally don't have room in this post about all of the mountains of evidence that Mike was never romantically attracted to El in ADDITION to never being attracted to girls as a whole. But he IS still figuring out his attraction and what attraction even IS/what it's supposed to feel like thoughout the seasons.

Especially in Season 3! I've talked about this before, but that quote from El in the mall scene with Max where El says "How do I know what I like?" is DIRECTLY precluded by a scene of Mike not knowing what he's looking for and asking Lucas "What are we even looking for?"

Just like how El's scene wasn't just about figuring out what she likes in terms of clothes, but also as a whole in regards to relationships and personal taste and identity, Mike's scene is the same! He doesn't know what he's looking for! He doesn't know what he likes, he doesn't know how attraction is supposed to feel, and he's trying things out and figuring them out, just like how El is trying clothes on and exploring her identity!

But in terms of that AND in terms of Mike projecting onto El, and how he was never interested in her and his focus/attraction was always WIll, I suggest looking at this post and how Will/something representing him has been in the middle of EVERY SINGLE MIKE AND EL ROMANTIC/KISS SCENE AS FAR BACK AS SEASON 1. And in terms of Mike not loving El, I have SO much evidence and can't include all of it in this post, but something that came to mind was this post where I talk about how Mike CAN'T tell El that he loves her to her conscious face, how rather than that he WON'T, he CAN'T, because he's gay. Gay dudes can totally tell girls that they love them, people lie all the time, MIKE lies in his monologue when he says he loves her in a romantic context, and when he says it in the cabin in s3. Well, he sort of lies:

Mike doesn't like lying. But he does it all the time. But he still doesn't like it/feels bad about it. He's only able to say it in those two contexts (cabin and monologue) because a.) El isn't 'there'/he doesn't think or know if she can hear him, and he doesn't have to lie to her face, and b.) the romantic connotations aren't there in the same way that they are in other scenes where Mike is prompted to say 'I love you," (the bedroom scene or the s3 aisle 'blank makes you crazy,' scene), so Mike can justify it to himself because he DOES love her platonically, so can say it that way, even if he knows deep down that it's not what he's implying.

"As far as we know, Mike has never been bullied for being gay specifically. His sexuality has never been challened in the narrative. His being 'gay' doesnt actually have a focus or writing on the narrative."

Hard disagree with a lot of this, but also agree a little bit, but also feel that the part I agree with actually backs up exactly what I've been saying in this response and what I've been saying with gay Mike as a whole!

So, first off, Mike hasn't been bullied for being gay specifically! Even though the homophobic bullying starts being DIRECTED at him after Will 'dies,' it's not ABOUT Mike. I agree! But I think that this literally proves EXACTLY what I've been saying about how Mike's sexuality isn't framed relative to his attraction to men, he isn't bullied for it, because his sexuality is framed relative to attraction to women. Because he's meant to represent different experiences, because not every gay man has the same experience. As well, his sexuality HAS been challenged! All of the evidence for Byler is challenging the idea that Mike is straight, and all of the scenes that have evidence for his lack of attraction to women has been challenging his sexuality this entire time! Even Ted makes comments like "our son? with a girl?" So while like I've already said, it's not challenged in the SAME WAY as Will's is, but it IS CHALLENGED. And him being gay 100% has a focus in the narrative and is 100% part of the writing. What do you think season three was? Why do you think all of the evidence that I've laid out for Mike not being attracted to girls exists? And why his struggle with it was a focus during S3 esp with that end of S3 kiss, and during the ENTIRE SHOW.

Why do you think that Mike is surrounded by more gay imagery than bi imagery? And that the bi imagery, like I've talked about in this post, actually makes MORE SENSE in the context of gay Mike and when we analyze Mike's pov at rink-o-mania and how he was wondering if WILL was bi because he very much seemed to have a crush on Angela from Mike's pov, and how that ties into him going back into the closet (because being closeted isnt just acknowledging/being open about your sexuality with others, it's also more frequently defind as acknowleding/being open about your sexuality to YOURSELF), LITERALLY 'in the closet at rink o mania'?

Like did they just FORGET to show Mike being attracted to other girls besides El? They sure as hell didn't forget to show Mike being attracted to other MEN outside of Will (see: Eddie and Mike's crush on him).

Did a show with insanely intricate set design that has foreshadowed other plot points CONSTANTLY just forget to put more bi imagery in for Mike? Did their hand slip and they accidentally showed him being repulsed by girls more often than they show that for Will? Were they in a silly goofy mood and just closed their eyes and threw letters at the wall and the word "women" happened to appear behind Mike in s4 during a scene where he is upset and talking about 'bullshit media propaganda'? When writing, did they just pick that phrase for funsies with no consideration of the way that the word 'bullshit' has been used in ST? Did the Duffers and their team of professional writers just accidentally write the "El? Not interested." line? Do they just not edit their work and accidentally create narrative ties and associations between certain words (ie, crazy = love and the ties with 'bullshit')?

NO!!!!!!! NO THEY DIDN'T!! BECAUSE HE'S GAY AND IT'S INTERTWINED INTO THE SET DESIGN, THE CINEMATOGRAPHY, THE WRITING, THE ACTING, LITERALLY EVERYTHING AND IT ALWAYS HAS BEEN!! ITS JUST PRESENTED IN A DIFFERENT WAY THAN IT IS FOR WILL, RATHER THAN IT NOT BEING THERE!! AND IN ADDITION TO THAT, IT'S ALSO PRESENTED IN A WAY THAT'S LITERALLY MEANT TO DEMONSTRATE MIKE'S INVISIBILITY LIKE THE SURFACE LEVEL INVISIBILITY OF IT IS LITERALLY THE POINT, IT'S NOT AN ACCIDENT THAT THEY PORTRAYED HIM THE WAY THEY DID, THAT THEY MADE HIM GAY BUT DIDN'T SHOW HIM FACING THE EXTERNAL HOMOPHOBIA THE WAY THAT WILL DOES, IT'S THE POINT. I'm going to talk about Mike and invisibility later in this post and I know I've talked at some point in this huge response about Ted's comment and how even when people DO sort of acknowledge Mike's sexuality, it's STILL ERASED, and I've also talked about that here and here.

This is something that does frustrate me, when people say that I'm looking too far into things, or that the Duffers haven't made those patterns or connections in regards to gay Mike. Because they HAVE made them in regards to other topics, they DO think things through that much when it comes to the very evidence that people, including bi Mike truthers (not talking abt people with bi Mike headcanons but people who firmly believe that it is true and firmly believe that he is NOT gay based on analysis), have used to prove that Byler is endgame, so WHY is it suddenly getting ignored as soon as the same choices and patterns and depth point to gay Mike? This is part of why I didn't go into my analysis trying to PROVE gay Mike, I went into my analysis trying to figure out what Mike's sexuality is and came out with the CONCLUSION of gay Mike!

If we ignore a lot of the evidence for gay Mike, we ignore a lot of the evidence for Byler being endgame. (not DEBATE but IGNORE and claim that people are looking too far into it and going to be disappointed without bringing any evidence to back up that claim/dispute the gay Mike claims). If we ignore the connotations and associations of the word 'bullshit,' and the fact that Mike says it in front of the word 'women,' we then logically have to ignore 'crazy together and the connotations of crazy = love,' then we have to ignore the pro-byler set design choices like the fact that a drawing of Will the Wise is beside Mike's head when he's making out with El in S3 or the billion other Byler set design and narrative and writing and cinematography choices.

I'm NOT saying that you have said these things or that you've inentionally ignored anything after being made aware of it because you haven't, as far as I've seen from this ask! This is JUST me being frustrated and demonstrating how these narrative patterns and these set design patterns etc ARE there and how ignoring (again, not debating, or analyzing them with a diff perspective/conclusion but ignoring) them in favour of trying to prove a preconceived conclusion is foolish imo.

"''But he never shows interest in girls other than El'' and I get that, but dont you think they really would have shown it in a more appearent way if they intended to make Mike gay? Like the comment Erike made about Lucas and Justin's relationship felt more gay even."

Okay so this is interesting! To answer your question: NO!!!!!! I don't think they would have made it more apparent at ALL!!! I actually think that the setup for gay Mike only works the way they want it to as long as they DONT make it too apparent until season 5! I think that not making it more apparent is the PERFECT setup for gay Mike due to the way that we've seen his sexuality framed and set up through the seasons!

Because you have to keep in mind that a large part of the GA still thinks that mike is *straight*, let alone the distinction between him being gay and bi! They can't show their hand too soon, or else their twist of a.) byler being canon and b.) mike being gay is totally spoiled! They ABSOLUTELY would not have shown it in a more apparent way, because they've already been showing it in subtle ways (and imo its really not THAT subtle once you get into it, which im gonna talk about in my full gay mike analysis), so they've been building it up, but not enough to spoil their twist! Stranger Things LOVES to use 'show, don't tell' and the same applies to gay mike! They've been showing us this whole time!

And just to address this part specifically:

"Like the comment Erike made about Lucas and Justin's relationship felt more gay even."

I'm going to assume that you mean Jason, not Justin LMAO and that you're talking about the comment where Erica says that Luca has taken a 'step down from max'. This is what I'm talking about with SHOW versus TELL. They TELL US that comment because it's not TRUE, Jason and Lucas AREN'T dating. Just like how couples in stranger things who fall apart (see: stancy and milkvan) SAY 'I love you,' (mike says it partway through s3 el says it at the end), but they don't SHOW IT because they're not endgame. They can't TELL US gay Mike because it IS endgame and they would a.) spoil s5 and b.) it wouldn't align with their pattern of TELLING things that are false but SHOWING things that are true!

Stranger Things is a show rooted in trying to get the viewers to look past the surface, 'behind the curtain,' as Murray says, a show that literally makes fun of the GA for needing to be TOLD everything. For example, that scene with Dustin and Steve in the Creel House and how Dustin, a character who is often used to represent the Stranger Things writing team/nudge towards fourth wall breaks, and Steve, a character who is often used to represent the General Audience, is saying to Steve "Do you need to be told everything?" after Steve asks about the flashlights. This has a double meaning! It's not just about Steve needing to be told everything or told about the flashlights! It's about the GA needing to be told everything too, and how many typical TV shows treat their audience like they're stupid and just tell them everything and don't SHOW things, don't let the audience come to the conclusions on their own based on what they're shown. Stranger things is the OPPOSITE of this! They're all ABOUT 'show, don't tell,' and have so many scenes, especially with Murray that talk about the importance of drawing your own conclusions from the evidence that you have instead of waiting to be told things!

And like I'm going to talk about in my analysis and have spoken about before, Mike and Will don't have the same experiences in regards to their sexuality not because Mike isn't gay, but because they're two different characters meant to represent different experiences and themes! It wouldn't make sense if Mike's gay experience was a carbon copy of Will's because that's not how being gay works in the real world! And more than that, IMO, Mike and Will are representative of 'invisible' and 'hypervisible' gay men, and that's part of WHY their experiences are so different!

I think you need to re-evaluate what you consider to be 'gay,' and why the Erica-Jason scene feels 'more gay to you' and how that could play into your own biases and perceptions of stereotypes surrounding queer experiences, specifically those of gay men. That's part of WHY, IMO, the Duffers CHOSE to frame Mike and Will in these differing ways: because it forces people to reconsider their perception of what 'gay' is and isn't and what the experiences of gay people are. Because not every person is like Will or has those experiences like him. Gay men like Mike 100% exist. Why is Erica making a comment towards a straight man seemingly 'more gay' to you than Mike's literal lack of attraction to women? Than his obvious disgust with himself during the sauna scene? It's because you're looking at Mike's experiences and sexuality through a biased lens, through the lens of stereotypes and Will's sexuality (Will does align with many stereotypes and that's not necessarily a bad thing!).

But why is Will and his experiences the sole framework through which you judge Mike's sexuality in this ask? I think you need to ask yourself that while you read what I've written here, especially if you read all of this and still can't see how Mike and Will's different experiences/portrayals are actually WHAT makes Mike gay. We all have our own biased lenses that we view the world with, and like I said, I think that the Duffers are trying to get people to look past that lens. Just like how Mike's sexuality is portrayed in the show through a lens of heteronormativity and invisibility and portrayed through a lens that puts it relative to attraction to women rather than relative to attraction to men, just like how characters like Ted see Mike's sexuality through the heteronormative lens of Ted's own experienes, you're looking at Mike through a lens of Will's experiences and whatever your own experiences with gay men are, even if you ARE a gay man, you still have your own biases and experiences with being one! And that's not a bad thing at all! It only becomes an issue when you view others through that biased lens and try and make judgements/analysis on their sexuality through it.

If Will represents gay men who die by hatecrimes, Mike represents gay men who die by suicide (see: Mike jumps off of the quarry, the place where Hopper believed that Will was hatecrimed/possibly pushed off.) IMO that's not supposed to mean that Mike was also hatecrimed, it's supposed to show that his experiences as a gay man are different and that they're tied to suicide and isolation and being 'invisible,' because while Will's hypervisibility as a gay man brings more external danger to him, such as hatecrimes and bullying and active homophobia, it ALSO helps him in the sense that his family is AWARE of these things and are able to support him.

People actively hate Will for who he is, but that also allows Will's family to LOVE HIM for exactly who he is. When it comes to Mike, people don't actively target/see him for who he is, but they also can't LOVE HIM for who he is/his sexuality because they don't SEE IT, he's invisible in that regard!

The thing about the quarry and Mike and Will representing invisible versus hypervisible gay men is that their experiences have the same outcome but different ways of getting to that outcome. They both have the same outcome of being 'dead,' whether by murder/hatecrime or suicide, they're both 'dead' for the sake of this metaphor.

Just like how they're both gay but have different ways of 'getting there,'/different experiences/their sexuality is FRAMED in different ways, like again with how Will isn't MORE attracted to girls or how mike isn't LESS attracted to men, it's just that Will's sexuality is FRAMED less around lack of attraction to girls, whereas Mike's is FRAMED less around lack of attraction to men! Two different journeys, same outcome (gay).

But also, neither of them were actually dead in the end! Mike was saved by El! That wasn't Will's body, he wasn't dead he didn't get hatecrimed in the way that Hopper though he was (although he WAS still very very likely targeted by Henry for being similar to Henry as a child, and Henry is extremely queercoded, to the point where Joyce uses identical phrasing to describe Will being gay, decribing him as a 'sensitive kid,' which is EXACTLY how Henry describes himself as a child, so Will was likely, in part, targeted by Henry as a result of being gay).

So, the outcome is STILL THE SAME for each of them, even though they each weren't dead. And they're not dead because the Duffers aren't trying to tell a story that ends with gay suffering/bury your gays! So, they flipped it on its head and they each survived. They both survived, but again, they just took different journeys to get to that outcome.

So as a final conclusion (anon if you don't read a single word of everything else in here, READ THIS PART):

Unless Mike is gay, there is zero reason for them to show him not being attracted to girls, let alone show him being repelled by girls more often than they show it for Will.

One of your big questions in this ask/theme I noticed about your ask was "well if Mike is gay, why isn't he portrayed in the same way as Will?"

And my answer is: we can conclude that Mike is gay specifically BECAUSE he isn't portrayed in the same way as Will! If Mike was portrayed like Will, it would actually make him seem bisexual! If Mike had a girlfriend AND was framed around active attraction to men (which is how Will is framed) instead of around lack of attraction to women? He'd totally seem bisexual! And the writers DON'T WANT THAT. They are not trying to make him bisexual. They did not accidentally trip and drop repeated scenes of Mike's lack of attraction both to girls and lack of attraction to El specifically into the show.

Like I've said before, without the Duffers' confirmation of Will's sexuality, HE seems like the possibly bi one when looking at the objective evidence, because his sexuality is framed around active attraction to men rather than lack of attraction to women. (again, he HAS both just like mike HAS both but it's about how it's framed and presented for both of their characters)

"well, if Will seems so possibly bi, then why is so much of his bullying framed around being gay specifically?" Because it's POSSIBLY bi, not entirely framed as bi, because they put that in there to nudge the objective viewpoint of Will's sexuality away from "possibly bi" and more towards "gay" but still kept it opaque enough that compared to MIKE, Will is the possibly gay one. That's the thing. It's relative to Mike because Will DOES have scenes showing a lack of attraction to girls, but he has fewer scenes showing that than Mike does.

And if Mike didn't have a girlfriend and was portrayed in the same way as Will, then that would be boring and pigeonhole the gay experience into one stereotype instead of having the two diverse depictions of the gay experience that they get when they portray Mike differently from Will!

That's the BIG thing about addressing your ask, like the choice is either "mike has a girlfriend and his gayness is portrayed differently than Will's" OR 'mike has a girlfriend and his gayness is portrayed the same as Will's". You cannot have both: If you're trying to write Mike as gay, you can't have "Mike has a girlfriend and his gayness is portrayed the same way as Will's," because that would make Mike seem bisexual.

So, when you say that "if Mike was gay, we would see the same behaviours and portrayals that we see with Will," that is actually totally off-base, and is what would make gay mike IMPOSSIBLE, and the OPPOSITE is true, (the opposite being "if Mike is gay, we would see DIFFERENT behaviours and portrayals than what we see with Will" which is what IS true and IS what we see)

What you think would make Mike seem gay (him being the way that he is in the show, having a girlfriend but also his sexuality being portrayed in the way that Will's is) would actually make him seem bisexual, which clearly, based on what we see in the show, isn't what the writers wanted to do, because as you've said yourself, they DIDN'T DO IT!! THEY DIDN'T PORTRAY MIKE IN THE SAME WAY AS WILL!! WE AGREE ON THAT!! It's just the fact of what that difference in portrayal indicates that we disagree on, because as I've demonstrated here, especially in these last few paragraphs, that difference in portrayal is exactly WHY Mike is gay. Gay Mike doesn't work in SPITE of that difference: it only works BECAUSE of it, it RELIES on that difference.

And again, they could present Mike COMPLETELY the same way as WIll (no girlfriend, portrayed relative to an active attraction to men). But then that's boring and is literally just the same character and experiences copied twice.

Mike and Will are not on two opposite sides of their sexuality. They are not on opposite sides of the topic of attraction to women. They are not on opposite sides of the topic of attraction to men. If Mike was bi, they would be on the same side of the topic of attraction to men and different sides on the topic of attraction to women, but they AREN'T. They would be two different coins, so to speak, but they aren't.

But they ARE on two different sides of the same coin. They are both on the coin (both attracted to men and NOT attracted to women), but they're on different sides in terms of how they are portrayed (will is PORTRAYED on the 'attracted to men' side, mike is PORTRAYED on the 'not attracted to women' side, they REPRESENT each of those sides, but they're both still on the coin, the coin itself emcompassing having both a lack of attraction to women AND active attraction to men, you have to have BOTH to be on the coin, but because Mike is shown more with the 'not attraction to women' side and Will is shown more with the 'attracted to men' side, that's the side that they represent. The other side still exists for each of them, they're both still on the coin, they're both still repelled by women and interested in men, but it's about how it's framed and which side they REPRESENT).

They are hypervisible versus invisible. They are death by hatecrime/murder versus death by suicide. They are at the same destination but took two different roads. They are blue versus yellow. They are rich versus poor. They are artist versus writer. They are repressed versus open (Regardless of his feelings about his sexuality, Will has long admitted his sexuality to HIMSELF by now, MIKE has not/is just starting to and is still struggling with it in S4. Will may not be openly gay to people in his life yet, but he isn't repressed in the way that Mike is because Will has come to terms with/admitted it to himself.) They're nuclear family versus single mother. They're paladin versus cleric, not both paladins or clerics because that wouldn't work as well together! They are loud (Mike) versus quiet (Will, he has his snark but is def quieter than Mike).

(hell, the loud versus quiet thing is actually interesting relative to their invisibility versus hypervisibility: Mike is louder as a person because he's used to being invisible and ignored so he tries to compensate. Will is quieter as a person because he's used to being hypervisible and being targeted and in the spotlight.)

They represent so many opposite sides of things even beyond their sexuality, but that's what makes them work so well together. That's what makes them two sides of the same coin instead of the same side of the same coin (if Mike was portrayed exactly like Will, no girlfriend and framed around active attraction to men) or two different coins entirely (if Mike was portrayed in the way that you thought would = him being gay, anon, if Mike was portrayed as having a girlfriend but also framed around active attraction to men, he would be framed as bi and therefore on a different coin than Will, who is gay).

They complement eachother. Their dynamic only works BECAUSE of the different ways that they're portrayed, as I've said, Mike being gay only works BECAUSE his sexuality isn't portrayed in the same way as Will's, not in spite of that difference in portrayals, but BECAUSE of it. The Duffers love upending stereotypes. And Will does fit a gay stereotype in many ways! Which isn't always a bad thing! But especially since they love upending stereotypes, why on earth would they have both of their characters fit that stereotype? They wouldn't! Mike is when they upend that stereotype! Mike's gayness is their plot twist even more than Byler getting together is!

And when you think about it, gay people get together with the same gender, right? They're on the 'same side,' so to speak! But the Duffers even turn this on its head because Mike and Will are SO different as people despite being the same gender AND their portrayals of their sexualites are so different. But this is WHY they work together! They aren't so different that they don't get along, but they ARE different enough that they get along/fit together perfectly!

SO! There you go! Thanks for the ask, anon! I appreciate being able to discuss stuff like this, and a lot of my gay mike posts don't include as much direct scene by scene analysis/evidence as my actual analysis google doc will, simply because those posts are just me rambling to figure out my thoughts! :DD

You've brought up some points that definitely made me think, and I appreciate it, because it's made me need to think more about my own analysis and fill some more possible holes and make some more connections about how Mike being gay ties into the way that the Duffers have set up their show + their focus on 'show, don't tell'! Let me know if you have any more questions about this or if there's any part of your questions that I didn't answer fully and that you'd like me to elaborate on! I know I can get longwinded, so if there's stuff I've missed/wasn't clear just ask via inbox for clarification! I'm trying to finish my gay Mike analysis as soon ASAP too though, so that may also answer a lot of questions once it's done, because I explain everything right down to why the bisexual colours and imagery exist at rink-o-mania and how they're actually directly tied to explicitly gay Mike!

(and I support people headcanoning Mike and his sexuality however they want rn, however, my focus is on analysis and what's supported by the show, and personally, I don't feel that the show and the evidence in it supports anything other than Mike being gay. For me, it's not about what I want Mike to be because I'd love him for whatever he is! It's about what I think he's been shown to be and the conclusions that analysis of the evidence in the show has brought me to. I don't think headcanoning Mike as something other than gay is morally wrong, but I do think it is factually wrong from an analysis standpoint, if that makes sense! And people are free to disagree with that, too! It's not morally wrong to disagree with that! I support peoples’ right to interpret things however they want! I just may disagree with that interpretation!)

I read your gay!Mike post and you make great points although I think Mike being bi would make more sense narratively because there isn't exactly a moment where it's really shown that he is gay. With Will, we know he's gay bc it has been textually there since S1. Joyce confirmed it to Hopper and thought Will got hatecrimed, the bullies talking about Will and behind his back about his sexuality confirmed that, the way the whole town treated it as some sort of a hatecrime and the way Jonathan thought Lonnie killed Will bc of Will being gay and Lonnie calling Will slurs etc etc... it's all textually there to understand that Will is gay.

There's no such a thing with Mike's character though. As far as we know, Mike has never been bullied for being gay specifically. His sexuality has never been challened in the narrative. His being 'gay' doesnt actually have a focus or writing on the narrative. ''But he never shows interest in girls other than El'' and I get that, but dont you think they really would have shown it in a more appearent way if they intended to make Mike gay? Like the comment Erike made about Lucas and Justin's relationship felt more gay even.

Good afternoon, anon! (or should i say evening now, because it was afternoon when I started this but it isn't anymore LMAO)

To begin, let's dig into what you've said here:

"although I think Mike being bi would make more sense narratively because there isn't exactly a moment where it's really shown that he is gay."

So, let's get into it!

"There's no such a thing with Mike's character though."

Mike doesn't lean in for the Snowball kiss in S2, El is the one who leans up to him and Mike just stands there.

Mike shows no interest in Princess Daphne at the arcade.

Mike taking El's hands off of him REPEATEDLY during their makeout session in S3

Mike just sitting there during the makeout sessions in S3, he's much much more passive compared to El who is grabbing his face and holding him

Mike couldn't kiss El at the airport in season 4 without wearing sunglasses.

So, when it comes to Will, the times that we see him being repelled by girls are:

The scene about saying 'girls don't play video games,' towards Max, a scene that is also WITH MIKE where Mike does the SAME THING

Lenora, when he moves his foot away from that girl

So! WHY is Mike still kissing El throughout the seasons if he's gay and not attracted to women? I think there's two key reasons for this:

And just to address this part specifically:

"Like the comment Erike made about Lucas and Justin's relationship felt more gay even."

So as a final conclusion (anon if you don't read a single word of everything else in here, READ THIS PART):

Unless Mike is gay, there is zero reason for them to show him not being attracted to girls, let alone show him being repelled by girls more often than they show it for Will.

One of your big questions in this ask/theme I noticed about your ask was "well if Mike is gay, why isn't he portrayed in the same way as Will?"

#stranger things #gay mike wheeler

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aemiron-main-backup · 2 years ago

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GODDDDD THIS IS MAKING ME INSANE!!!! and also, I’m staring directly at the Becky-Terry handhold during that scene:

And where else do we see hand- holding?

Well, we see it during the Stancy sex scene:

Which then cuts right to Barb being tormented in the pool:

Which is paralleled to El crawling out of the Interestingly Shaped gate in the school:

And then we also see it here, with 010 and Brenner:

And then we see it during the tattoo scene, where Henward is grabbing Brenner’s hand (it’s easier to see in motion), and this is very similar to Becky grabbing Terry’s hand:

It’s definitely a Choice for all of the handholds here to involve either a.) a violent, rape-coded scene (Barb’s pool scene, not that the Stancy scene is rape, but Barb’s scene has a lot of Imagery in that regard), b.) a woman (Terry) having a miscarriage or c.) Hawkins Lab, and specifically, Brenner holding the hand of a blonde-haired, blue-eyed child (010), and then going on to hold Henward’s hand.

And when we mix A, B, and C, what do we get? The perfect conditions for creepy, non-consensual Edward mother weirdness.

THE FUCKING WATCH. DURING TERRY’S MISCARRIAGE. GOD IM ENDING IT ALL THERES A FUCKING CLOCK IN THE SCENE.

Edward’s the female black widow.

#henward mother weirdness #THIS IS SOOOO GNRNRNRNRMRMMFGMG. ENDING IT ALL #mothergate

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aemiron-main-backup · 2 years ago

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HEY SO WHAT THE FUCK HAVE I LOST MY MIND OR AM I ONTO SOMETHING

this might be a reach. i know it might be a reach. but i cannot fucking unsee it. LOOK. BEHIND. WILL’S. HAND. THE ONE THAT’S HOLDING THE PHONE. LOOK AT THE SPACE BEHIND HIS HAND AND FACE. we can see that one blank wooden wall where it juts out, right? and will’s face is just past that. keep that in mind.

Now look at that same spot in this picture. Look at the blank wall with the boxes in front of it and then look towards screen left, past it.

Okay, now look at the SAME SPOT in this image, look at the blank wooden wall and look left. This scene happens before the previous two scenes that i’ve mentioned. Take a very long, hard look at that spot past the woodern wall. The window is fairly close to the floor, right?

Take a VERY long, hard look at that spot next to where the flat wooden empty wall ends and where we can see the window. Look at that spot. Okay. Now that you’ve looked at the spot...

OKAY NOW PLEASE FUCKING EXPLAIN THIS TO ME IM BEGGING YOU TO FUCKING EXPLAIN THIS TO ME IF YOU THINK IM WRONG BECAUSE. JESUS CHRIST.

READY??? AGAIN, TAKE A VERY LONG HARD LOOK AT THE SPOT WHERE THE BLANK WOODEN WALL ENDS AND HOW WE CAN ALWAYS SEE THE WINDOW AS LONG AS WE CAN SEE WILL’S FACE.

HEY GUYS. WHERE THE FUCK IS THE WINDOW. AND WHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE THERE’S A GRANDFATHER CLOCK BEHIND HIM? IT’S DISTORTED AND VERY VAGUE BECAUSE THE BACKGROUND GETS EXTREMLY BLURRED OUT IN THESE SCENES FOR SOME REASON BUT UH.

LIKE LOOK!! LOOK BESIDE THE WINDOW IN AN EARLIER SCENE THAN THE SUPPOSED CLOCK ONE!! THERE IS NOTHING THERE THAT EVEN VAGUELY RESEMBLES A CLOCK!! THE WINDOW ALMOST GOES TO THE FLOOR!! BUT WE CANT SEE THE WINDOW ANYMORE IN THE CLOCK SCENE BECAUSE A FUCKING CLOCK IS BLOCKING IT. WE ARE GETTING CLOCKBLOCKED.

look at ANOTHER SCREENCAP OF THE CLOCK SCENE!!!!!

IT CANT JUST BE A DULLER VERSION OF THE WINDOW BECAUSE LOOK AT HOW WE CAN SEE THE DARKER BROWN ON TOP OF THE WHITE PART IF THE WHITE PART WAS JUST SUPPOSEDLY THE WINDOW, WE WOULDN’T BE ABLE TO SEE THE BROWN BC THE WINDOW IS WAY TALLER THAN WILL!!!

look AT THE SCENE WITH THE VISIBLE WINDOW!! NO WAY THATS THE WINDOW NOT AT ALL ITS A DIFF COLOUR IN THE WHITE PART AND DOESNT LINE UP. BUT IT LINES UP EXACTLY WITH WHAT A BLURRY GRANDFATHER CLOCK LOOKS LIKE

LOOK AT THE SHAPE COMPARED TO VECNA’S GRANDFATHER CLOCK. AT FIRST I WAS LIKE “OH WELL DAMN THIS CANT BE A GRANDFATHER CLOCK BC THE WHITE/NON BROWN PART DOESNT SEEM TO BE ROUND AND USUALLY YKNOW CLOCKS ROUND BUT THEN I REALIZED THAT I DIDNT REALLY REMEMBER WHAT GRANDFATHER CLOCKS LOOKED LIKE OR WHAT VECNAS LOOKED LIKE SPECIFICALLY.

AND LOOK. THE NON BROWN PART/GOLD AND WHITE PART ON VECNA’S CLOCK ISNT ROUND AND THE WOOD SPOTS ALIGN EXACTLY WITH THE DARK PARTS BEHIND WILL. IT’S THE EXACT SAME FUCKING SHAPE

WILL WAS SO FUCKING IN A VECNA VISION. HE ABSOLUTELY FUCKING WAS. THERE IS NOTHING IN THAT HALLWAY THAT CAN MAKE THAT SHAPE, NO FURNITURE BESIDE THAT BLANK WALL, AND THE WINDOW JUST. STOPS BEING VISIBLE DESPITE IT BEING THE SAME ANGLE.

HEY SO WHAT THE FUCK HAVE I LOST MY MIND OR AM I ONTO SOMETHING

Now look at that same spot in this picture. Look at the blank wall with the boxes in front of it and then look towards screen left, past it.

Like look, Will’s face is overlayed with the window to an extent. The window should be visible as long as we can see Will’s forehead/eyes. (this scene happens after the one right above but before the other two) Take a VERY long, hard look at that spot next to where the flat wooden empty wall ends and where we can see the window. Look at that spot. Okay. Now that you’ve looked at the spot…

OKAY NOW PLEASE FUCKING EXPLAIN THIS TO ME IM BEGGING YOU TO FUCKING EXPLAIN THIS TO ME IF YOU THINK IM WRONG BECAUSE. JESUS CHRIST. READY??? AGAIN, TAKE A VERY LONG HARD LOOK AT THE SPOT WHERE THE BLANK WOODEN WALL ENDS AND HOW WE CAN ALWAYS SEE THE WINDOW AS LONG AS WE CAN SEE WILL’S FACE.

look at ANOTHER SCREENCAP OF THE CLOCK SCENE!!!!!

AND LOOK. THE NON BROWN PART/GOLD AND WHITE PART ON VECNA’S CLOCK ISNT ROUND AND THE WOOD SPOTS ALIGN EXACTLY WITH THE DARK PARTS BEHIND WILL. IT’S THE EXACT SAME FUCKING SHAPE

#stranger things #vanishing of will byers #THE WINDOW ISNT VISIBLE BECAUSE ITS BLOCKED BY THE CLOCK #WE ARE GETTING CLOCKBLOCKED.

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aemiron-main-backup · 2 years ago

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“mother is god in the eyes of a child,”/“i can see your sin as clearly as god can”/“if i only could, i’d make a deal with god,” and why alice creel was the angel in the creel house and why virginia killed her.

I’m still working on my ST-Silent Hill analysis, but there’s a line in the Silent Hill movie (which has VERY BLATANT parallels to ST & Silent Hill is a confirmed inspo for ST) that I want to talk about right now:

“mother is god in the eyes of a child ”

If “mother is god” and Virginia is the mother, and “Running Up That Hill,” talks about “making a deal with god,” then the deal would be made with the mother to swap places- but the singer isn’t swapping places with god, the singer is getting god to let them swap places with someone else- someone else like Alice Creel.

Not to mention that Henry refers to the spiders as gods, and Virginia’s reflection (when Henry “holds a mirror” up to her with his powers) is a spider in the bathtub- her reflection is a god. Henry wanting to swap places with Alice- but not only that. Why would Henry make the deal with Virginia if he supposedly killed Alice? Because he didn’t kill Alice. Because Virginia did. Hence, why he would make the deal with her, hence why she’s the one paralleled to god, because she’s the one making the decisions about who lives and who dies.

Why would Virginia kill Alice, though? Well, Victor heard the voice of an angel. A voice that brought him out of a trance- and I’ve gotta finish the full analysis, but I suspect that there’s a solid chance that Alice also had powers and was messing with the radio, there’s one shot of her staring intently at it that’s super suspicious AND another scene where she literally flicks her head in time with the radio changing channels (plus some other stuff).

Here’s Alice staring weirdly at the radio.

And the nod is pretty subtle but when you watch the scene with sound, you can tell that it lines up right with when the channel flickers again.

And so, if Alice was turning on the radio, and thereby bringing Victor out of his trance, that would’ve thwarted Virginia’s plans, hence why she’d have motivation to kill Alice. I think Alice may have even turned on the radio in the dining room because she knew what was going on between Virginia and Henry.

This also explains why the “signals overlapping,” subtitle during the dinner scene is overlaid on top of a scene of Alice- the subtitle itself, IMO, refers to Virginia and Henry’s powers as “overlapping signals,” as they fight with eachother- and Alice recognized this, and likely turned on the radio as a pre-emptive salvation attempt- she may have already known that music worked against trances/against Virginia, after all, we do see a piano in the Creel house that Lucas plays while he talks about the idea that the piano might open a “secret passageway”.

And in “Alice in Wonderland,” Alice finds a secret doorpassageway into the garden- the garden, which seems to be where Henry was shown killing the rabbit. I think that might be the moment when Alice realized something was up with Virginia, but I need to think on it more. And also, in “Alice in Wonderland,” there were three secret passages into Wonderland: the tunnel, the well and the hall of doors.

And also, there’s the whole “painting the roses red,” thing in Alice in Wonderland, and the rose imagery in the Creel house- and if we look at the members of the family as roses, they were literally painted red with blood, which sounds like a stretch, but the “painting the roses red,” scene in Alice in Wonderland was a reference to the Wars of the Roses, which, interestingly enough, in addition to confirming the idea that the red is equivalent to blood, was a series of civil wars- civil wars fought between family members.

And it gets better with the Wars of the Roses, let’s look at an excerpt from Wikipedia:

“the modern term Wars of the Roses came into common use in the early 19th century following the publication of the 1829 novel Anne of Geierstein by Sir Walter Scott. Scott based the name on a scene in William Shakespeare's play Henry VI”

HENRY. And Henry VI himself was literally INVOLVED in the Wars of the Roses.

And now, back to in Alice in Wonderland, who ordered to have the roses painted red/ordered the deaths so to speak? The queen. Virginia. She was the one committing the murders.

Anyway, going back to what happened at the Creel dinner table that night with the radio- Virginia then started scrambling the radio, hence why it goes from music and starts flicking between channels- it doesn’t just go from music to static, it flicks back and forth between channels, almost like a tug-of-war.

And look at this- at first, it’s subtitled as “staticky signals overlapping,” but then as SOON as it goes to Alice it’s subtitled as “singals overlapping”- it’s because a.) she was making the signal clear by trying to turn it back to the music and b.) in a more meta sense, Alice, unlike Victor, is aware of what’s going on- her signal is clear, her understanding is clear.

And to top it all off, what line do we see in the lyrics of “Running Up That Hill?”

“come on, angel.”

Alice was the angel. With what I’ve said here, “Running Up That Hill,” would be from the POV of Henry towards Alice, wanting to swap places with her- and Henry would know that Alice was the “angel,” the song is directed at Alice, and refers to the person the song is directed to as an “angel,” thereby referring to Alice as the angel. And Henry is one of the few characters whose family has very overt religious imagery in the family itself, not just in the town as a whole, with Victor talking about demons and angels.

Alice had powers. Virginia had powers. Henry, of course, had powers. Victor, is there something you’d like to share with the class? (he doesn’t have powers dw- at least as far as i know.)

Virginia killed Alice. This is something I’m going to talk about in the full analysis, but it’s worth keeping in mind that in Carrie, Carrie’s mother tries to kill her (and Carrie, in the movie, looks quite a bit like Alice), and after Carrie’s mother stabs her, Carrie ends up pushed to the bottom of the stairs, JUST like where Alice was laying.

Even Virginia comforting Alice after her nightmare is a Carrie parallel.

And take a look at that painting on the wall when Carrie falls down the stairs. It’s crooked.

And what other paintings are crooked? The ones in the Creel house when the Hawkins gang investigates it. Specifically, the one right near the stairs (above that table on screen right), just like in Carrie.

And to conclude, @laozuspo has made some fantastic posts (part 1 here and part 2 here) about Alice and Henry and “Running Up That Hill,” and Henry wanting to swap with Alice and this sort of stuff but the Silent Hill and Carrie parallels and the radio stuff just all hit me like a brick tonight, esp since those shots of Alice with the radio were making me absolutely insane last night. Anyway. I’m being normal about the Creels as usual.

“mother is god in the eyes of a child ”

Long story short, the character who says this line, Dahlia Gillespie, is extremely Virginia coded. But why is it relevant? Well, for the sake of this post, it’s relevant because it also aligns with something in Carrie (and the mother in Carrie is very Virginia coded too and there’s a TON of confirmed Carrie parallels in ST):

“Don’t you know by now, Carrie? I can see inside you. I can see your sin as clearly as God can.”

Carrie’s mother talks about how she can see into Carrie’s mind as clearly as god can (which ties into my theories about Virginia being able to reach into Henry’s mind but that’s a whole other post).

So, we’ve got TWO separate pieces of media that inspired ST/that ST references that both have a Virginia-coded mother talking about how mothers = god. Now, let’s look at another reference to god- “Running Up That Hill”.

Keep reading

#stranger things #st music #st running up that hill #creel family #st-silent hill parallels #st analysis #st soundtrack #henry creel

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aemiron-main-backup · 2 years ago

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//POST BACKUP//

Huge agree, there’s so many times in the show where instead of showing/emphasizing an attraction to men for Mike (which could demonstrate him being bi), they go out of their way to instead emphasize a LACK of attraction to women, repeatedly.

And the thing is, like, this can’t just be explained by “oh he isn’t attracted to El specifically/it’s just because he doesn’t love her but he’s still attracted to women” because he DOES try and love her he does TRY and be attracted to her, he does like her!! He does want to be her friend and be around her!! He DOES care about her!!! But he’s not attracted to her because he’s gay. He does like her as a person. But their friendship falls apart the more they get into a romantic relationship because Mike isn’t attracted to because he’s gay. If Mike isn’t attracted to El just because she’s El, but is still attracted to women, then what woman would be possibly be able to love/be attracted to??

Because he can’t bring himself to romantically love/be attracted to somebody that he already clearly loves/cares about platonically, a girl that he DOES hold in high esteem, who he thinks is a superhero etc. if that’s not enough, then what girl could possibly be enough?? None of them!! Because he’s gay!!

Like what is it about El that he doesn’t like except for her being a girl?? Because El hasn’t gotten the chance to really develop her interests/identity pre-s3, Mike is able to project onto her more, which makes it easier for him to be affectionate with her like their s1 kiss. He’s projecting his feelings for Will specifically into her (El and Will looking physically similar but also all their other parallels) but also projecting his sexuality (gay) into her because she does look more stereotypically masculine in the first season!!! (Not that El is any less of a girl for how she dresses, or that clothes have gender, but operating within the framework of heteronormative stereotypes, El is dressed “masculinely” in s1)

Literally as El begins to look more stereotypically feminine, Mike is less and less capable of being physically affectionate with her. They kiss her at the snow ball when she’s all dressed up, but that’s still mostly El reaching up towards Mike and Mike standing there and vaguely leaning in and then having a blank expression right after.

And if we’re using the snow ball as evidence for sexuality, then clearly Will must be attracted to girls because he dances with one. And sure, Mike does more than dance with El, but again, like I’ve talked about before, i firmly believe that’s because of Mike being raised with a much firmer sense of heteronormativity than Will and Mike representing invisible gay men vs Will representing hypervisible gay men. Yes, Will was absolutely tormented by Lonnie and bullies for being gay because people could tell he was different- but that also allowed for people like Joyce and Jonathan to love him BECAUSE he is different. Just like how lonnie hates him for being different, Joyce and Jonathan love him for it, and so Will is able to break free from heteronormativity more than Mike is, even though Will still experiences homophobia (and heteronormativity but to a lesser extent than Mike- and even when we see Will display heteronormative behaviours, like at the snow ball, it’s because Mike literally egged him on and encouraged him to go dance even though Will was visibly hesitating/didn’t want to.)

So, Mike is way way way more affected by heteronormativity than Will is, and so, he’s TRYING harder to be normal. Imo, Mike is written as a gay man (again Will and Mike and heteronormativity and hypervisible vs invisible gay men like I wrote about in this post), not because they show him being into men/being into Will, but because they actively show him NOT being into women.

Even milkvans say that Mike “El-sexual,” because he doesn’t express interests in other girls!! And not to give the milkvans any credit, but they’re RIGHT to an extent, just not in the way they think they are- he DOESNT express interest on other girls because he is GAY, and El is so different from other girls/doenst have her own sense of identity early on, looks more masculine early on, and is easy to project onto, especially initially, before her friendship with Max, that she’s the only girl that Mike can tolerate being in a relationship with.

I’ve also always felt that Lucas saying “you’re just glad a girl isn’t grossed out by you,” has a double meaning- of course the heteronormative one that I’ve talked about before, but also I think that while Lucas’ logic is “El is the only girl who isn’t grossed out by you,” I think the reality is also that El is the only girl that Mike isn’t grossed out by. Because she’s so different. Because she isn’t typically feminine initially. And he does literally become more “grossed out” by her/struggles more with initiating and receiving affection the more feminine El looks and the less he’s able to project onto her.

Like circling back to the kiss in op’s post: if Mike isn’t gay, why is he reacting like that? As I expressed, it can’t be because he’s not attracted to El specifically, as a person, because she’s the only girl that we’ve ever seen him try SO HARD to be attracted to, the only girl he’s ever initiated any form of affection with (the s1 kiss), he DOES care about her. But as she starts to look more stereotypically feminine, he’s less able to be affectionate with her/attracted to her, but his care about her still remains!! So it’s not that he doesn’t like her as a person! Or that he thinks she’s ugly or something (again hes not attracted to women but that doesn’t mean he thinks they’re ugly). He even says that she’s pretty in s1! (which as I’ve talked about before, El not only says the same thing about Nancy, but Mike also agrees with El when she says that about Nancy, so if Mike calling El pretty indicates attraction, then Mike is attracted to his sister which is gross and not the case.)

Mike is not “grossed out” by El kissing him because of who she is as a person on the inside. He cares about her as a person. Mike is not “grossed out” by El kissing him because he thinks she’s “ugly,”/doesn’t like who she is on the outside. He says that she’s pretty! She is pretty! But Mike is “grossed out” by El kissing him because he’s not attracted to women, and that’s the thing. He doesn’t think El is ugly, but he’s not attracted to her. (Again if thinking someone is pretty = attraction then the writers are saying Mike is attracted to Nancy, which is gross and untrue, and speaking as a gay guy myself, I am TOTALLY capable of thinking women are pretty but I have zero attraction to them and zero desire to be affectionate with them.)

And the Mike-El make out scene at the beginning of s3 SHOWS that Mike is TRYING to love her, TRYING to be normal, TRYING to do what he thinks is the natural state of things. He still hasn’t realized his sexuality yet (which I talk about in the next section with how imo he realizes it and his feelings for will at the end of s3), he’s still confused, and even in the makeout scene, he still has a DRAWING OF WILL BEHIND EL and TAKES EL’S HANDS OFF OF HIM. So it’s not JUST wanting to be WITH will/staring at the drawing of Will, but also ACTIVELY not wanting to be with El/not attracted to her, taking her hands off of him even in a moment where he is trying his hardest to “be normal” by kissing her, in the moment where he is TRYING the MOST to be attracted to her, he still takes her hands off of him.

And despite their early s3 kissing, by the end of the season, he just stands there limply and confused and weirded out when El kisses him. It’s not like they haven’t kissed before!! This could be written off as “oh Mike is into girls but it’s his first kiss so he’s confused” but THEYVE KISSED REPEATEDLY!! IN THAT SEASON EVEN!!! Mike is realizing his sexuality at the end of s3- even though his sexuality has always BEEN there, influencing his actions, like I talked about with the stuff in s1 etc, he isn’t AWARE of it + what it means until s3 and then that’s also when we see him become more awkward around Will (s4). Because pre- end of s3, pre s4, Mike was still capable of being physically affectionate/caring in general with Will!! He was less affectionate, sure, but that’s because he’s struggling and questioning all through s3.

And I also think that he still questioning a bit in s4, and I may change my mind on thsi later when I do a deep dive for my gay Mike analysis, but in think in s4, the question is less “am I gay?” even though I DO think it still pops up from time to time in s4, and instead is more “am I going to choose to try and repress my sexuality for the rest of my life/try and seem normal/straight despite being gay?” He’s not TRYING to BE in love with El anymore, he’s not initating kisses anymore like he was at the beginning of s3 (which even then he was not very initative), he is now trying to ACT like he is, which is why it’s all falling apart even more. Mike is not trying to BE normal. Mike knows that he will never BE normal. Mike is trying to ACT normal.

This is why he’s so awkward in s4, in a way that he wasn’t in s3- in s3 he’s more reserved from will, sure, but he still gives him a proper, close hug at the end of s3, whereas we get that pathetically awkward airport hug in s4- because he has realized his sexuality and how that ties into his feelings for will (ie i think that mike always ‘felt’ a love for will, but didnt recognize what it was/didnt recognize that mike himself was gay), but now that he KNOWS what those feelings mean (gay) he tries to hide, and tries to act normal and ends up acting super weird around Will (again he was also trying to act normal in s3, but i think at the beginning of s3/up until that final kiss scene, it was less about active repression, which is what it is in s4, and more about trying to figure things out + not understanding WHY ‘normal’ isnt working for him, why he doesn’t like it).

This is why we get references to him being a ‘knockoff’ version of himself in s4, references that we didn’t quite get in s3. In s3, mike was trying to BE normal, trying to change himself, trying to change who he is, avoiding dnd, trying to change himself!! He’s not a knockoff version of himself because he is trying to fundamentally CHANGE who ‘himself’ is, because there can’t be a knockoff version of mike if the original mike doesnt exist anymore, if theres only one, changed version!! In s4, mike is no longer trying to CHANGE himself, he’s no longer trying to BE normal, he’s REALIZED that he can’t do that- he gets back into dnd, he accepts being a ‘nerd’ more, he’s realized that he can’t change being gay. but he IS trying ACT normal, he IS a knockoff version of himself in lenora, because the ‘original/real’ mike still exists, and mike isn’t trying to change that anymore, he’s just trying to hide it.

Mike isn’t trying to love El anymore, until s3 where he WAS trying to love her, he’s not trying to write that he loves her, he’s trying to hide the fact that he doesn’t, trying to gaslight and hide the fact that he DOESNT write it, that he doesn’t love her, despite claiming that he does. Mike is in front of a partially closed closet when El kisses him in s3. He is not in the closet yet. But he is GOING INTO IT. Mike isn’t coming OUT of the closet when we see his open closet door + one way sign in s4: he’s going INTO it, it’s one way, INTO the closet. Because in order to hide being gay, in order to be closeted, you have to know that you’re gay!! And mike didn’t know that until the end of s3!! Like this is anecdotal, but i am a closeted trans man in much of my life atm- i know i am trans, but i act as if i am not trans/gay in certain situations because i have to/feel that i have to atm. But the distinction is that i was NOT a ‘closeted trans man’ growing up, because I wasn’t aware that I was trans, i didn’t know it was a thing i didn’t know , i wasnt trying to actively hide it because I didn’t know it was there. The same applies to mike. Mike isn’t closeted pre-end of s3 because he doesn’t know he’s gay until the end!!

This also explains the “Just a little more time can open closing doors” that plays during the first s3 mike-el makeout scene. Just a little more time (the end of s3) can open closing doors (opens the closet door for mike to go into it). He’s in the closet now. Literally in the closet at rink o mania. The open closet door in the bedroom in wills’ room in lenora. Mike’s open closet in the beginning of s4. The closet is open because he went into it. He’s in the closet, but the door isn’t shut- before, the closet door was shut from the outside, he wasnt in it + he put El into his closet (which i will talk more abt below), because he didn’t know he was gay. But now, the closet door is OPEN, but he is IN the closet. The door isn’t all the way shut, though, thats why we can still have mike be closeted AND get open closet imagery- because an open closet is still a closet, you’re still IN the closet. It’s still restrictive, and confining, even if the door is open, you still have to choose to walk out that door.

Mike’s closet door isn’t closed with him on the other side of it/inside of it (whereas before he recognized his feelings, it was closed with him outside of it) because like i said, mike is still making the choice of “am I going to choose to try and repress my sexuality for the rest of my life/try and seem normal/straight despite being gay?” He’s not committed to being out of the closet. But he’s also not committed to being in the closet. He’s choosing. He’s still in the closet. But the door isn’t closed. This also explains mike’s lack of reaction to Karen’s s1 coded ‘you can talk to me’ scene- mike isn’t aware that he is gay. Aside from El, he doesn’t know that he is hiding anything. He’s not the one in the closet. El is the one in his closet in s1. He is trying to hide HER up until the end of s3, he is trying to change his lack of feelings for HER instead of trying to hide HIMSELF, instead of hide/change his active attraction towards guys/feeling towards Will, because he doesn’t KNOW he is gay. Mike tries to change EL initially, (the makeup and wig, projecting onto her) and then tries to change himself (s2 and s3) and then tries to hide himself in s4.

That’s the thing. I think mike has always been ‘aware’ of his feelings for will, aware of wanting to protect him, to be around him etc. But i think in s3, he realizes the implications of those feelings + realizes that while he may want to protect El and be around her as a friend, he wants to do those things for Will too, but the difference between his feelings for Will and El is that he not only wants to do the things he does with El with Will, but specifically does not want to do them with El. Even if he didn’t get together with Will, in s3, at the end, we can clearly see that he does not enjoy receiving that affection from El. So it’s not just about an attraction to Will/to guys, it’s also about a lack of attraction to El/to women.

Mike realizing his sexuality and the implications of his feelings at the end of s3 also explains how Mike can a.) be oblivious to Will’s feelings for him in s4, like Finn said, but also b.) have that response that he has to Will during the “what if they don’t like the truth” scene, where he seems to agree with will. Because the truth, in Mike’s mind, in that context, isn’t about mikes feelings for Will specifically- it’s about being gay as a whole and the truth of his sexuality. It’s not just about not being in love with El, because he already KNOWS that she won’t like that truth, but that truth also don’t something that he has to hide from Will. In Mike’s mind, where he doesn’t know about wills feelings for him, mike admitting that he doesn’t love El wouldn’t mean the end of his and Will’s friendship, Mike getting a new girlfriend that he does love wouldn’t mean the end of his and Will’s friendship- but Will finding out that Mike is gay and has feelings for Will might (in Mike’s mind) end their friendship. A

gain, there’s no way that Mike was referring to his lack of feelings/lack of romantic love for El during that scene, because that’s something that Mike doesn’t need to be afraid of telling Will!! That’s not a truth that he worries that Will won’t like!! His sexuality and feelings for Will are that truth. Hell, Mike, at the time, already KNOWS that El doesn’t like the fact that he doesn’t love her. They fought about it. Is there’s no “what if” about that.

And I think this explains his monologue too- he, like i said, is making that choice of “am I going to choose to try and repress my sexuality for the rest of my life/try and seem normal/straight despite being gay?” And now that he thinks that he KNOWS that his feelings are unrequited by Will, due to Will pushing him to confess to El, now that he thinks that will DOESNT understand him (i think he had hope not necessarily that will requited his feelings during the car roof ‘what if they dont like the truth’ scene bc mike is oblivious to wills feelings but rather that maybe will would understand being gay/understand mike’s feelings for him even if he didn’t feel the same way, because Will always seems to understand mike. But Will didn’t understand in the van, when mike was trying to say that he’s gay/doesnt love el. And that’s what makes mike worry.

That’s what makes him lose hope, rip off the bandaid, and confess to El.) And this also ties into what finn said about “mututal understanding” between mike and will in the end/in s5. Mike is going to realize that will DOES understand. And that will DOES reciprocate his feelings, in addition to understanding: because mike’s going to realize that Will understands mike’s feelings because Will feels the same way. That’s exactly how it’s going to be framed imo. In a parallel to how El tells mike in their bedroom fight that he doesn’t understand what it’s like to be different, Will is going to tell mike that he DOES understand what mike’s feeling/what being different is like for mike. He’s ACTING during the monologue. That’s what makes it genius and why the duffers said its some of finn’s best acting, because it’s layered because FINN ISNT THE ONLY ONE ACTING!! FINN IS ACTING OUT SOMEBODY WHO IS ACTING BECAUSE MIKE IS ACTING!! THATS THE COMPLEXITY OF IT!!

He’s not TRYING to love el, he’s trying to SEEM like he does, ACT like he does, and he’s now made the decision to try and ACT for the rest of his life. Choosing to try and ACT normal because he knows he can never BE normal, choosing to try and ACT like he loves El because he knows he never can. To stay in the closet. To close the door. But again, just a little more time can open closing doors!! This is why the monologue is full of lies but why i also don’t think that mike was lying for the sake of lying/lying to hurt anyone. Mike is acting. Mike is trying to seem like he loves El, instead of doing things that show that he loves her, he SAYS he loves her, he tries to ACT it out, he gives a MONOLOGUE (acting!!!!). This is why there’s the romeo and juliet references in that scene!! Romeo and juliet is a play!! And why the monologue scene is parelled to the bingham kids ACTING FOR THEIR HOME MOVIE!! BECAUSE MIKE IS ACTING!!!

ANYWAY this wasn’t meant to be a rant or anything, just me rambling my thoughts, because this topic has been on my mind lately ever since I noticed how often the show frames Mike’s sexuality as a lack of attraction to women rather than as an active attraction to men. The attraction to men is there, yes, but unlike Will who is mocked by people like lonnie FOR being gay, FOR being interested in boys, Mike is mocked for NOT being interested in girls.

Like circling back to mikes lack of attraction to women specifically, seriously imo when you pull all the evidence form the show and lay it out, it seems as if Will is maybe the possibly bi/not explicitly gay one because they constantly emphasize him being interested in boys/mocked for actively being interested in boys more than they emphasize him not being interested in girls (even though that IS brought up, it’s not to the same degree). The opposite applies to Mike. Mike is mocked for not being interested in girls and girls not wanting to be around him.

He is specifically framed around a LACK of attraction to girls rather than just HAVING attraction to guys, which on its own, without the emphasis on the lack of attraction to girls, could indicate being bi, but they chose to emphasize the lack of attraction. But we know Will is confirmed gay. And so, it stands to reason that Mike, who is portrayed repeatedly as having even LESS of an attraction to girls (ie, Will doesn’t get involved with girls at all, whereas Mike TRIES and seems to actively dislike it, just like I said before about how Mike is more affected by heteronormativity than Will is and is therefore trying to me normal), is also gay.

They could have written it as Mike not having attraction to El specifically and show things about her that he doesn’t like. But they didn’t. They could have written it to emphasize his attraction to men AND to girls, or if it’s because he’s “scared of growing up/romance,” could have him seeming equally intimidated/grossed out by both!! But he isn’t. They didn’t write it that way. It’s actually pretty genius because there ISNT really anything FOR Mike to dislike about El as a person. She’s kind, courageous, wonderful. It’s not about Mike just not loving El and loving Will more instead- it’s about Mike being gay and being unable to love her in the way that she needs to be loved, exactly like Millie herself said.

BUT YEAH SORRY FOR THIS HUGE RAMBLE ON UR POST I JUST HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS LATELY ON THIS TOPIC SO DONT MIND ME THE POST JUST SPARKED A LOT OF THINGS IN MY BRAIN

I think he just realized he liked guys.

#gay mike wheeler #stranger things

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aemiron-main-backup · 2 years ago

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analysis: imo ted wont be by the end of the show + also mike’s sexuality is tied into the meta/overarching narrative and metaphors in st.

SO! Again, this isn’t a full analysis, but here’s part of why I believe that Mike was written as a gay man + it’s tied into the overall narrative of ST. Mike saying “that’s just bullshit media propaganda,” in early s4, and then in the last episode, Ted is watching the news when it’s talking about hellfire club being a cult and opening a gate to hell, and goes

“are you hearing this?”

and then Karen says “just what we need, more hysteria,” and Ted goes “that’s the news for you. Indistinguishable from the tabloids.”

So, “women” and “bullshit media propaganda” being put together in the same scene alongside Mike’s upset/disgruntled reaction seems to demonstrate that to Mike, women and bullshit media propaganda are connected (ie not that Mike hates women, but that it’s literally bullshit propaganda (and need I remind you of the word bullshit and its use in ST specifically towards failing relationships where one person is not in love with the other?), that people are telling him he’s supposed to like women romantically, that the news is saying it, etc)

Just like Jonathan’s convo with Will about “you shouldn’t like things because people tell you to.”

And so, with the whole “aids is god’s will,” rhetoric that was going around in the 80s + how that scene is subtly not just Mike speaking out against the media propaganda regarding hellfire, but also narratively it’s regarding being gay + aids, vs the “hellfire club is satanic/against god” and how the two are linked and how hellfire club works as a metaphor for queerness + being outcast + the satanic panic vs the aids panic, then it also stands to reason that if Ted’s reaction towards the media propaganda about hellfire is the same as Mike’s then ted’s reaction to the propaganda about lgbtq people and the aids crisis will also be the same as Mike’s because the two topics are meant to parallel eachother and be linked.

Long story short: Ted might not be the best dad. He should’ve been there for Mike and Nancy more, should’ve been more emotionally open. But he’s not homophobic. He doesn’t hate his kids.

Ted’s arc isn’t about being hateful- it’s about being ignorant. It’s about ignorance and how that can also play a huge role in the rise of hate and misinformation. Ted is not the one putting out the media propaganda, giving speeches like Jason- Ted is the one listening quietly, or simply following along, the one not challenging people like Jason. Ted is a living representation of the bystander effect.

Ted throughout the seasons, is blinded by the media propaganda.

But over time, in s4, we see that start to change. He’s no longer blinded by the propaganda. He’s starting to question it. Starting to question the government (asking why nobody from the government’s intervening about the murders), whereas previously, we see him blindly following the government when Brenner and co show up at the Wheeler house. He makes his comment about the news being like the tabloids. He’s no longer following along, no longer just staring at the tv silently like he has every other season, but instead, he’s watching. He’s listening, now. He’s responding. He’s questioning.

And Ted is a reagan supporter- of course he’s aware of the media propaganda going around about the aids crisis, and likely believed much of it, believed a lot of that homophobia, not out of active hatred, but out of a lack of questioning- homophobic not out of direct action, but out of inaction, out of complacency.

Mike, like when he fell off the cliff and disappeared (which is PARALLELED to hopper saying that Will fell off of a cliff and implied that it was a hate crime/that his disappearance was a hate crime), is gone, he disappears, he’s not actively targeted, he’s invisible. Which isn’t any better than being viable in the way that Will is, because it means that people can’t help him. At least Will has people in his life who recognize that he’s different and love him for it (joyce and Jonathan), despite the hatred that this openness/outward queerness brings, it also brings love.

But with Mike, people don’t recognize that he’s different. They don’t love him or hate him for it- they don’t seem him at all. And that would explain Mike’s fixation with superheroes, and special people with powers, but also his desire to send normal. Deep down, Mike wants to be different. Wants to be seen. Wants to be able to be himself, wants to enjoy dnd (which is a representation of his relationship with Will). But he also knows how dangerous it is. He knows now, that being associated with Hellfire/dnd is dangerous. He knows that being different is dangerous, because look at everything that’s happened to Will for being different, and look at everything that’s happened to El for being different/being a superhero.

DND was also literally used as a metaphor for mike and will’s relationship, and also for mike being himself (ie, mike not being himself in s3 + his and will’s relationship starting to falter.

DND is representative of queer relationships in that regard. It was never just about the hellfire club or satanic panic related to DND. Past that level, it’s about queerness and otherness and being different, and the hateful panic of the aids crisis.

If Will is gay men who are tormented in their own home, or forcibly taken from their own home (his vanishing/kidnapping), then Mike is gay men who run away from home, or who disappear via suicide. (see: smalltown boy, finn talking about who’s going to leave hawkins and then also quarry scene).

If Will is a gay man who, as joyce said, gets picked and called queer for his clothes, then Mike is a gay man whose clothing choices are never noticed at all, even if theyre ‘as gay’ as will’s. (not that clothes are gay LMAO but that there’s specific things mentioned in the script that the bullies would pick out about will’s clothes, things like them being colourful, but imo, mike’s character, even if dressed the same way, or even MORE colourful, esp since will really isn’t that colourful, would go unnoticed by the bullies, but also generally unnoticed by everyone, because he’s about invisibility and the harm that it can cause).

It’s like how sometimes in ST, the characters need to run, need to hide, need to be invisible- like how Will standing his ground against the mindflayer ended up getting him posssesed. Will is good at hiding because he IS so visible, he has to hide because people seem to see right through him.

Mike is not good at hiding. He’s not good at acting ‘normal.' He fails at it in s4 (see: airport scene). Because Mike is invisible. He’s never learned how to hide because people have never really seen him before. He’s never had to hide in the same way that Will has, he’s never had to run in the same way that Will has (see: will running from the demogorgon but being able to use a gun in s1 vs mike standing his ground but grabbing the ineffective candlestick), he’s never been visible, so he’s never needed to hide, so, he’s not very good at it. He’s not good at acting normal. Will is. Will is good at acting normal (not that he IS normal, just better at ACTING normal, like the airport scene?? mike was way more gay and awkward and obviously in love tm).

This is also part of why Will gets so upset about people treating him differently/as if he’s a freak, whereas mike seems to WANT to be different deep down, seems to IDOLIZE people like superheroes, who are different. Will doesn’t want people to treat him differently because he HAS been treated differently his whole life, because he’s too visible, so he’s had to learn to hide and act ‘normal.’ Mike, on the other hand, wants to be treated differently because he’s been invisible his whole life, and so he never had to learn to hide or act normal, even though he eventually has to TRY and do so, he never learned how, because he never had to.

Because whereas Lonnie would pick up on any hint of oddity about Will, Ted would simply ignore things as strange as mike keeping a girl with telekinetic powers in the basement. Will was so visible that he couldn’t even breathe the wrong way lest lonnie notice, and was always actively pursued by things like the mindflayer and demogorgon and henry. Mike was so invisible that he could be screaming “i have a girl in the basement!!!” and ted would barely notice.

Mike and Will are two sides of the same coin. IMO, Mike was written as a gay man, and it is intertwined into the overarching narrative + meta of stranger things, and this is just one example among many. (like how ‘it’s not my fault that you don’t like girls’ only makes sense if mike is projecting and therefore doesn’t like girls, which means that there’s yet another reference not JUST to mike being attracted to men, which could indicate him being bi, but SPECIFICALLY to his lack of attraction to girls.) Again- ZERO hate to anyone with other thoughts, and this isn’t meant to spark an argument. But imo, there’s elements of the narratives and metaphors in ST that only click into place if Mike is gay. It’s not that bi or unlabelled people are less queer, or less targeted, or that they would have been less at risk at the time. Not at all. But rather, it’s the fact that ST has have chosen to intertwine gay mike as a part of demonstrating the link between hellfire club/satanic panic vs sexuality and the aids crisis.

This metaphor could still totally work if Mike was bi- but the evidence for it, things like the word “women” being behind him while he’s talking about “bullshit media propaganda,” using the phrase “bullshit” specifically, one that’s been used for heteronormative relationships/relationships where one part isn’t attracted to the other anymoree (see: stancy), and therefore tying that word to the word “women,” demonstrates that Mike being a gay man/not attracted to women is part of what builds that connection between hellfire satanic panic vs queerness and the aids crisis/homophobia.

That scene with mike is not the RESULT of the existing metaphorical link between the hellfire club and satanic panic vs queerness and the aids crisis- it is part of what BUILDS that link, and they chose to build that link in a way that demonstrates Mike not having attraction to women (and again, this is just one scene, not a full gay mike analysis by any stretch). They could have built it other ways! They totally could have built that link in ways that demonstrate bi mike, and the narrative and metaphor would totally still work- they could’ve had mike looking happy with the word ‘men,’ behind him. But they didn’t do that.

Instead, they specifically chose to specify that Mike lacks attraction towards women, and that his relationships with women (el) are the result of heternormativity and propaganda. Rather than just reinforcing that Mike also likes men, instead of having the word ‘men,’ back there and showing mike looking happy, or looking happy in front of the words women and men, or looking equally UPSET in front of both, they chose, instead, to demonstrate a lack of attraction towards women, and directly parallel the word ‘women’ to a phrase (bullshit) that indicates a lack of attraction + also indicates a relationship that was informed by heternormative standards and stereotypes (early stancy). So it’s not that bi people aren’t valid, or weren’t affected by the aids crisis, because that’s not what i’m saying- it’s that the show chose to build a link between mike’s lack of attraction to women, heteronormative standards/propaganda AND the overarching narrative about the aids crisis vs the satanic panic/hellfire vs queerness.

Barb is also tied to the aids crisis/homophobic panic, like i discussed in my yellow ribbon post. IMO Barb’s death, metaphorically, rather than being the result of aids, is the result of the sort of bigotry and rejection and self-loathing that came as a result of the media propaganda and homophobia during the aids crisis. And if we disregard the use of the word ‘bullshit’ and its connotations in the show, if we disregard the word ‘women’ behind mike in that scene, and dismiss it as “just a writing choice/random word choice/coincidence,” or “just a set design choice/random/coincidence,” then there is a LOT of other things that we have to disregard on the show as well (ie, the word ‘crazy’ and it being a stand-in for love), or things like all of the intricate yellow blue set design colour coding.

A lot of the byler evidence disappears if we ignore things like this + dismiss them, so why should we dismiss them when it comes to sexuality and the ST narrative? The word “women” didn’t just leap onto the set wall. Finn didn’t just choose to stand right in front of it and say “bullshit” and talk about media propaganda in relation to a topic (hellfire club and the satanic panic) that is very clearly a stand-in for the aids crisis and homophobia because he was in a silly goofy mood.

The sets don’t come pre-decorated randomly. The actors dont just close their eyes and choose where to stand, the directors don’t just let them do whatever, the editors don’t just trim a few clips and call it a day, cinematographers don’t just decide to set up a shot for shits and giggles, ESPECIALLY not in a show like stranger things where time and time again, the intricacy of the set design, the direction, the writing, the cinematography, of EVERYTHING, has been demonstrated time and time again.

If we ignore things like this and write them off as coincidence, then we ignore the panda drawing on el’s desk in s3 that foreshadowed Robin using the chinese restuarant “international panda” to crack the code. We ignore things like the fact that there’s always SOME representation of Will between mike and el every single time that they kiss, like i mentioned in this post (link), then we ignore tons and tons of other, clearly relevant details in the show, details that prove things like byler endgame.

analysis: imo ted wont be by the end of the show + also mike’s sexuality is tied into the meta/overarching narrative and metaphors in st.

this is not a full ted wheeler analysis nor a full gay mike analysis nor a full st narrative analysis (all of which im going to do at some point), however, it is an analysis as to why s4 made up my mind about whether or not ted would be homophobic in the end + why gay mike specifically is intertwined into the ST narrative as a matter of analysis rather than headcanon. SO! Again, this isn’t a full analysis, but here’s part of why I believe that Mike was written as a gay man + it’s tied into the overall narrative of ST. Mike saying “that’s just bullshit media propaganda,” in early s4, and then in the last episode, Ted is watching the news when it’s talking about hellfire club being a cult and opening a gate to hell, and goes

“are you hearing this?”

and then Karen says “just what we need, more hysteria,” and Ted goes “that’s the news for you. Indistinguishable from the tabloids.”

We know that in Mike’s scene, the guy he was talking to said that dnd/hellfire club was satanic or whatever, just like how in ted’s scene, the news is talking about how hellfire club is a satanic cult. And we know that in Mike’s scene, in addition to the other obvious gayness when he’s running around looking for people (the wrestling team?? REALLY, Michael??), there’s a very obviously placed cutout of the word “women,” beside Mike’s head when he looks disgruntled/starts talking about “bullshit media propaganda,” which to me, shows that there’s a double meaning (ie the bullshit homophobic media propaganda that was going around at the time esp w the aids crisis). So, “women” and “bullshit media propaganda” being put together in the same scene alongside Mike’s upset/disgruntled reaction seems to demonstrate that to Mike, women and bullshit media propaganda are connected (ie not that Mike hates women, but that it’s literally bullshit propaganda (and need I remind you of the word bullshit and its use in ST specifically towards failing relationships where one person is not in love with the other?), that people are telling him he’s supposed to like women romantically, that the news is saying it, etc) Just like Jonathan’s convo with Will about “you shouldn’t like things because people tell you to.”

Long story short: Ted might not be the best dad. He should’ve been there for Mike and Nancy more, should’ve been more emotionally open. But he’s not homophobic. He doesn’t hate his kids.

I’m always open to discussion, but imo, Ted Wheeler is not homophobic, not in the end, at least. And his arc is not about hate, it’s not about active loathing and aggression the way that Lonnie’s is and his dynamic with Will- it’s about ignorance. Ted Wheeler is ignorant, he ignores Mike. For better or for worse, he is the epitome of ignorance. But he’s getting over that ignorance, and beginning to see through the media propaganda that’s been put out about hellfire/about queer people/the aids crisis. And Ted is a reagan supporter- of course he’s aware of the media propaganda going around about the aids crisis, and likely believed much of it, believed a lot of that homophobia, not out of active hatred, but out of a lack of questioning- homophobic not out of direct action, but out of inaction, out of complacency.

If Will is a representation of lgbtq people who are actively targeted for their sexuality and hated by their parents (Lonnie in this case), whose parents see right through them and hate them for it, then Mike is a representation of lgbtq people who fall through the cracks, who are invisible, whose parents can’t see them no matter how much they want their parents to see and understand. Mike, like when he fell off the cliff and disappeared (which is PARALLELED to hopper saying that Will fell off of a cliff and implied that it was a hate crime/that his disappearance was a hate crime), is gone, he disappears, he’s not actively targeted, he’s invisible. Which isn’t any better than being viable in the way that Will is, because it means that people can’t help him. At least Will has people in his life who recognize that he’s different and love him for it (joyce and Jonathan), despite the hatred that this openness/outward queerness brings, it also brings love. But with Mike, people don’t recognize that he’s different. They don’t love him or hate him for it- they don’t seem him at all. And that would explain Mike’s fixation with superheroes, and special people with powers, but also his desire to send normal. Deep down, Mike wants to be different. Wants to be seen. Wants to be able to be himself, wants to enjoy dnd (which is a representation of his relationship with Will). But he also knows how dangerous it is. He knows now, that being associated with Hellfire/dnd is dangerous. He knows that being different is dangerous, because look at everything that’s happened to Will for being different, and look at everything that’s happened to El for being different/being a superhero.

DND was also literally used as a metaphor for mike and will’s relationship, and also for mike being himself (ie, mike not being himself in s3 + his and will’s relationship starting to falter. DND is representative of queer relationships in that regard. It was never just about the hellfire club or satanic panic related to DND. Past that level, it’s about queerness and otherness and being different, and the hateful panic of the aids crisis.

If Will is gay men who die by hate crimes, then Mike is gay men who die by suicide. If Will is gay men who are almost too visible (not by any fault of their own), whose families/the people around them have sensed their queerness from a young age, then Mike is gay men who are invisible, who receive no hate from their families, but also no support. If Will is gay men who are tormented in their own home, or forcibly taken from their own home (his vanishing/kidnapping), then Mike is gay men who run away from home, or who disappear via suicide. (see: smalltown boy, finn talking about who’s going to leave hawkins and then also quarry scene). If Will is a gay man who, as joyce said, gets picked and called queer for his clothes, then Mike is a gay man whose clothing choices are never noticed at all, even if theyre ‘as gay’ as will’s. (not that clothes are gay LMAO but that there’s specific things mentioned in the script that the bullies would pick out about will’s clothes, things like them being colourful, but imo, mike’s character, even if dressed the same way, or even MORE colourful, esp since will really isn’t that colourful, would go unnoticed by the bullies, but also generally unnoticed by everyone, because he’s about invisibility and the harm that it can cause). It’s like how sometimes in ST, the characters need to run, need to hide, need to be invisible- like how Will standing his ground against the mindflayer ended up getting him posssesed. Will is good at hiding because he IS so visible, he has to hide because people seem to see right through him. Mike is not good at hiding. He’s not good at acting ‘normal.’ He fails at it in s4 (see: airport scene). Because Mike is invisible. He’s never learned how to hide because people have never really seen him before. He’s never had to hide in the same way that Will has, he’s never had to run in the same way that Will has (see: will running from the demogorgon but being able to use a gun in s1 vs mike standing his ground but grabbing the ineffective candlestick), he’s never been visible, so he’s never needed to hide, so, he’s not very good at it. He’s not good at acting normal. Will is. Will is good at acting normal (not that he IS normal, just better at ACTING normal, like the airport scene?? mike was way more gay and awkward and obviously in love tm). This is also part of why Will gets so upset about people treating him differently/as if he’s a freak, whereas mike seems to WANT to be different deep down, seems to IDOLIZE people like superheroes, who are different. Will doesn’t want people to treat him differently because he HAS been treated differently his whole life, because he’s too visible, so he’s had to learn to hide and act ‘normal.’ Mike, on the other hand, wants to be treated differently because he’s been invisible his whole life, and so he never had to learn to hide or act normal, even though he eventually has to TRY and do so, he never learned how, because he never had to. Because whereas Lonnie would pick up on any hint of oddity about Will, Ted would simply ignore things as strange as mike keeping a girl with telekinetic powers in the basement. Will was so visible that he couldn’t even breathe the wrong way lest lonnie notice, and was always actively pursued by things like the mindflayer and demogorgon and henry. Mike was so invisible that he could be screaming “i have a girl in the basement!!!” and ted would barely notice. Mike and Will are two sides of the same coin. IMO, Mike was written as a gay man, and it is intertwined into the overarching narrative + meta of stranger things, and this is just one example among many. (like how ‘it’s not my fault that you don’t like girls’ only makes sense if mike is projecting and therefore doesn’t like girls, which means that there’s yet another reference not JUST to mike being attracted to men, which could indicate him being bi, but SPECIFICALLY to his lack of attraction to girls.) Again- ZERO hate to anyone with other thoughts, and this isn’t meant to spark an argument. But imo, there’s elements of the narratives and metaphors in ST that only click into place if Mike is gay. It’s not that bi or unlabelled people are less queer, or less targeted, or that they would have been less at risk at the time. Not at all. But rather, it’s the fact that ST has have chosen to intertwine gay mike as a part of demonstrating the link between hellfire club/satanic panic vs sexuality and the aids crisis. This metaphor could still totally work if Mike was bi- but the evidence for it, things like the word “women” being behind him while he’s talking about “bullshit media propaganda,” using the phrase “bullshit” specifically, one that’s been used for heteronormative relationships/relationships where one part isn’t attracted to the other anymoree (see: stancy), and therefore tying that word to the word “women,” demonstrates that Mike being a gay man/not attracted to women is part of what builds that connection between hellfire satanic panic vs queerness and the aids crisis/homophobia. That scene with mike is not the RESULT of the existing metaphorical link between the hellfire club and satanic panic vs queerness and the aids crisis- it is part of what BUILDS that link, and they chose to build that link in a way that demonstrates Mike not having attraction to women (and again, this is just one scene, not a full gay mike analysis by any stretch). They could have built it other ways! They totally could have built that link in ways that demonstrate bi mike, and the narrative and metaphor would totally still work- they could’ve had mike looking happy with the word ‘men,’ behind him. But they didn’t do that. Instead, they specifically chose to specify that Mike lacks attraction towards women, and that his relationships with women (el) are the result of heternormativity and propaganda. Rather than just reinforcing that Mike also likes men, instead of having the word ‘men,’ back there and showing mike looking happy, or looking happy in front of the words women and men, or looking equally UPSET in front of both, they chose, instead, to demonstrate a lack of attraction towards women, and directly parallel the word ‘women’ to a phrase (bullshit) that indicates a lack of attraction + also indicates a relationship that was informed by heternormative standards and stereotypes (early stancy). So it’s not that bi people aren’t valid, or weren’t affected by the aids crisis, because that’s not what i’m saying- it’s that the show chose to build a link between mike’s lack of attraction to women, heteronormative standards/propaganda AND the overarching narrative about the aids crisis vs the satanic panic/hellfire vs queerness. Barb is also tied to the aids crisis/homophobic panic, like i discussed in my yellow ribbon post. IMO Barb’s death, metaphorically, rather than being the result of aids, is the result of the sort of bigotry and rejection and self-loathing that came as a result of the media propaganda and homophobia during the aids crisis. And if we disregard the use of the word ‘bullshit’ and its connotations in the show, if we disregard the word ‘women’ behind mike in that scene, and dismiss it as “just a writing choice/random word choice/coincidence,” or “just a set design choice/random/coincidence,” then there is a LOT of other things that we have to disregard on the show as well (ie, the word ‘crazy’ and it being a stand-in for love), or things like all of the intricate yellow blue set design colour coding. A lot of the byler evidence disappears if we ignore things like this + dismiss them, so why should we dismiss them when it comes to sexuality and the ST narrative? The word “women” didn’t just leap onto the set wall. Finn didn’t just choose to stand right in front of it and say “bullshit” and talk about media propaganda in relation to a topic (hellfire club and the satanic panic) that is very clearly a stand-in for the aids crisis and homophobia because he was in a silly goofy mood. The sets don’t come pre-decorated randomly. The actors dont just close their eyes and choose where to stand, the directors don’t just let them do whatever, the editors don’t just trim a few clips and call it a day, cinematographers don’t just decide to set up a shot for shits and giggles, ESPECIALLY not in a show like stranger things where time and time again, the intricacy of the set design, the direction, the writing, the cinematography, of EVERYTHING, has been demonstrated time and time again. If we ignore things like this and write them off as coincidence, then we ignore the panda drawing on el’s desk in s3 that foreshadowed Robin using the chinese restuarant “international panda” to crack the code. We ignore things like the fact that there’s always SOME representation of Will between mike and el every single time that they kiss, like i mentioned in this post (link), then we ignore tons and tons of other, clearly relevant details in the show, details that prove things like byler endgame.

#byler #mike wheeler #mike wheeler analysis #st analysis #gay Mike wheeler #ted wheeler #wheeler family #stranger things #lonnie byers

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