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mike and will met on the swings 48 years ago today and mike asked will to be his friend and it was the best thing he’s ever done btw

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i hate how fast i give up on shifting. like now i'm super motivated, there's no chance that i wont shift, 99,99999% that i'll succeed ok bye everyone. after literally 5 minutes: oh, nothing happened, guess i failed ok i'll try later. and so again and again and again.

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Why Will Byers?

An analysis and theory on why Henry/Vecna targeted Will first in season 1 and his plans for Will in season 5

‼️Contains The First Shadow (TFS) spoilers so please proceed with caution.‼️

This is going to be a little long but I’ve tried to give as much context as I can without actually being able to show snippets from the stage play. This is my interpretation of everything that went down as a member of the audience and not as someone who has read up any theories about TFS before. To understand why Henry took Will first in 1983, we have to start with -

Henry and Joyce

From all the times I’ve watched TFS, the one thing that has stuck with me is the final conversation Henry has with Joyce. It’s just before his last confrontation with Patty Newby and before he joins Brenner for good. Joyce is the last person (who doesn’t know about Henry’s powers) that he canonically talks to.

Throughout the entire play Joyce, Hopper, and Bob are investigating the animals dying at the hands of Henry and come to the conclusion that Victor Creel has been the one doing the killing. They get so close to solving the case. In her last conversation with Henry, Joyce tries to comfort him by saying that Victor will pay for his crimes - which makes Henry laugh because she’s so close yet so far from the truth. He gets a little frustrated and says “You don’t get it. But someday you will.” The next time we see Henry make a reappearance in Joyce’s life is during -

The Vanishing of Will Byers

Will is taken into the Upside Down (UD) by Henry. It’s not even a question anymore. All of the context clues from 1x1 lead us to believe that Will’s kidnapping was not by a demogorgon. Will - a 12 year old - miraculously survives a week in the upside down with no food or water. Will is even around the demogorgon a few times in the Upside Down. (Joyce communicating with Will through the lights and then the demogorgon coming after her immediately).

Barb dies the night she is taken but Will stays alive and also somehow manages to talk to Joyce through the wall. Joyce is led exactly to where Will was held at the end of s1 and he makes it out alive. It’s almost as if Henry knew all along that Joyce was the most capable of never giving up on finding her son. Like Henry took Will Byers because he was Joyce’s son. And like he was giving her just enough to know that Will was alive. Even when Joyce and Hopper find him at the end in a state of near death, he’s not injured by a creature. He was being prepared for the next stage of Vecna’s plan -

The Possession of Will Byers

The origins of Henry’s powers happen as such - As a kid, he is transported into the UD for a few hours because he touched something he wasn’t meant to touch. During his time in the UD, he came in contact with the Mind Flayer (MF). According to TFS this is the point in his life when he started getting “corrupted”. Brenner’s dad - who was one of the first people to enter the UD - had mutated blood after but no powers. Henry was the first person to come in contact with the MF and it’s highly likely he got his powers because of this (This would also track considering how most of the party has been in the UD now but show no signs of having powers). The MF controls Henry for the rest of TFS and Henry grows more power hungry the more he kills.

In S2, Henry presumably sends the MF after Will - who has now had a year to heal from the events of 1983. Will is the only other person in all of ST to have had direct contact with the MF and survived it. Henry didn’t hesitate to kill Billy in S3, but he always gives everyone just enough to keep Will safe. Will himself tells Owens in S2 that the MF wants to kill everyone except him. Will once again survives the entire ordeal and is given a “break” for the next 2 seasons. Except I don’t believe he’s been just given a break. I think Will is -

Henry’s Sleeper Agent.

Ready to awaken in s5. I undoubtedly think that Will is going to have powers. And I don’t think they’re going to be the same as Henry and El. El and the other lab kids get their powers directly from Henry. Will’s powers will be directly from the MF like Henry. I believe this has been Henry’s plan all along and it’s further affirmed by what he tells Will in the recent VR game. That Will will be the key to Henry being able to infiltrate his friends’ minds. Jamie Campbell-Bower also mentioned during the S4 press that to get in character, he set up a display with all of Henry’s victims and targets’ faces on his wall(?), and Will was in the center.

Henry is going to use his connection with Will sneakily and midway through S5 he’s going to awaken Will’s powers (maybe in ep4 - which is said to be titled ‘Sorcerer’ and has young Will in it). Henry is going to try and manipulate his way into making an ally out of Will, and it’s not going to work because -

Will is the Perfect Character Foil.

Will is everything Henry could have been if he had a better support system. He is the perfect character foil. Unlike Henry, Will has a mother who loves him unconditionally and more importantly, believes him. Unlike Henry, the person who Will loves the most (the Patty to Will’s Henry: Mike) is going to love him back and stay by his side all season. No one is going to force them to be apart the way Henry was told to stay away from Patty. Will is not going to be easily swayed even though Henry has spent years crafting him into the perfect soldier. Sure, Henry has seen him heartbroken and sad, but that comes nowhere close to the amount of love and support Will is going to get from his people next season. And they’re going to quite literally defeat Vecna with the power of love and friendship. After that, Will Byers is getting the happy ending that Henry could have gotten.

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📄 🖊️

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sick to my stomach

please come home

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you know what i find fascinating?

in essentially every interview since season 4, whenever asked about wills feelings/byler, finn has a nearly identical response that’s quite telling. he always says the following: “mike’s clueless” or something along those lines.

this even extends to press he did for other movies like wyfstw (i believe it’s in the finn wolfhard goes undercover on the internet video).

it’s fascinating because its a clearly scripted response — if you’re at all familiar with the stranger things press from each season, you’ll know that the cast has a SHIT TON of media training. they are very well instructed, even specifically coached on what they can say and the language they can use.

consider for instance the difference in the way noah spoke about byler and will’s sexuality in the gap between volumes 1 and 2. pre vol-2, he got a lot of shit for saying that will’s sexuality was “up for interpretation” — people took it as the duffers erasing queerness from their storyline when in fact he was INSTRUCTED to say that to avoid spoilers. the moment vol2 dropped, all of that went away and he actually did a full (variety?) interview where he confirmed will was gay and in love with mike.

what i’m really trying to say here is the language of calling mike clueless is a deliberately strategized response to avoid both spoilers and the potential for more questions surrounding the more intricate parts of mike’s storyline, which have very obviously been saved for season 5 — they seem to be building up to revealing his perspective. with that said, my personal belief is that he’s not as clueless as these scripted responses make him out to be — this is a tactic to avoid spoilers.

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media and most people so much talking about peculiarity of romance relationship, that i for years thought that that is only way to describe special relationship between characters. i'm so done i want to eat my bones. like, you know, it's possible to write amazing connection without romance?? WITHOUT FUCKING SEX?? i'm in furious.

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"How do you write such realistic dialogue-" I TALK TO MYSELF. I TALK TO MYSELF AND I PRETEND I AM THE ONE SAYING THE LINE. LIKE SANITY IS SLOWLY SLIPPING FROM BETWEEN MY FINGERS WITH EVERY MEASLY WORD THEY TYPE OUT. THAT IS HOW.

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to me, bugs are like sex/romance

i like the idea of bugs and sex/romance but in reality i am absolutely terrified and freaked out by both.

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why it's so felix coded.

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i'm nothing in my soul if not obsessive.

© Donna Tartt.

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this is either a "i know what you are" conversation or a "our little sister's in terrible danger" conversation there's no in between