cannot-decide-on-a-fandom

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

There's something unbelievably funny about the Stranger Things fandom spending literally years joking about the 2025 release date for the show being the 31st of December, only for the first official trailer to quite genuinely announce the finale will release on New Year's Eve

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

With the exception of Bobby being dead, the Madney baby, and Buck being single again, has anything even significantly changed for the characters between like 7x09 and 8x18? *Any* lasting character or story development at all for anyone?

Mara was taken away from Henren season 7, but now she's back with them which is obviously great but that story wasn't touched on for over half the season. She's adopted now, but since they didn't put any focus on that, functionally the situation is the same since before she was taken away from them

Chris moved to Texas in 7x10, but now he's back and we didn't at any point see them actually address why he moved there or have Eddie and him explicitly resolve the core issues. They just went with "Well, they missed each other, so that's all fine now"

Buck's only major storyline this season was revolving around missing Eddie, only to then not really have a proper resolution to that because evidently, he had no impact on Eddie moving back. I guess he's flat hunting again if that counts as character growth

Athena is once again without a home, despite that being the setup for her season 8 story arc

Bobby was going to be gone from the 118 after season 7. He still is, except now in a much more awful way, done really badly

There are storylines from seasons ago that impacted this season in a lasting way more than the actual things set up in season 7 and earlier in season 8

It's like everything has been reset but slightly worse

The only thing we've gained this season is loss for everyone involved and a baby that was born in the background

This was so stupid. What is even leading into season 9?

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Well would you look at that...what a surprise

Madney naming their children

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Lots of things I get being mad about, but being upset that Buck is looking for a new place is a little funny to me.

Did people really think if Eddie came back, one of them would stay on the couch forever? Especially if they aren't yet in a relationship, in a 2 bedroom home? With a teenager in the house?

How would that work?

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Tim Minear, circa season 3: Hey, here's a scene between Buck and Eddie, what do you all think? It's 2 guys talking, right?

Crew: Um....I wouldn't talk to my friend like that, not gonna lie, it's pretty gay

Tim: Perfect

Oliver: I'll make it gayer

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Madney naming their children

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Actually, going to add to this

When Eddie was on the team, it was 3 trained medics, their captain, and Buck just tagging along as a mascot or something

Evan Buckley I adore you, you really just follow your father and boyfriend wherever they go, don't you?

The entire 118 are the most codependent ass family ever. Why are 4 firefighters only 2 of whom are actually certified medics going on every single medical call?

Buck and Ravi were just at that dentist's purely to embarass that poor woman further, they did not need to be there for either of her emergencies

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

The entire 118 are the most codependent ass family ever. Why are 4 firefighters only 2 of whom are actually certified medics going on every single medical call?

Buck and Ravi were just at that dentist's purely to embarass that poor woman further, they did not need to be there for either of her emergencies

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

I mean this with all the love and affection I can muster towards the fandom but...some people need to learn what a parallel is

It's not just 2 scenes that showcase that a character is different with one person in behaviour than another, that's a comparison.

This doesn't matter too much but there are legitimate parallels in this show and for some reason the word is losing its meaning and people are starting to use "this parallel is wild" when what they really mean is "man, the contrast of how these 2 behave around each other compared to these other 2 people is interesting"

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Maddie's kinda iconic. If someone asked her for her body count, 2 would be the answer by both definitions of that term

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

I'm very glad we got to see the Buck and Chris reunion on screen, but still upset we didn't get to see either the Eddie and Chris or Buddie reunions on screen

Seriously, why does the show treat Eddie like a mere observer of his own life half the time?

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Eddie Diaz is the funniest motherfucker on the planet

He realised he had been a bit of a dick to Buck the night before, so he got up earlier than the active firefighter, and decided his solution to an apology was "I'm going to make him think I'm an even bigger dick. For a surprise"

The character of all time

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

There are canon, fully in love couples in this show who do not look at each other the way Eddie looks at Buck with Chris here

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

This is going to sound weird, but on a very unimportant and personal level I felt a little annoyed during Athena's breakdown (not that it took away from Angela's fantastic performance) because somehow the script was almost exactly like a scene I wrote in an original piece of work I've been working on for the last 5 years, and now I know I'm gonna have to rewrite it because the way my brain works, even though I wrote the scene like 4 years ago, I will convince myself it seems like I'm copying the show if I leave it in

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Low-key though, if anything, this episode confirmed to me that everything they did that led people to believe Bobby was alive was indeed intentional. Just for the most messed up reasons

The storyline with Athena and the dead child and the way it was so specifically about believing someone is not dead when they really are makes no sense unless the audience believed that Bobby isn't dead. And since the episode was filmed a month ago, it's not like there was any way for them to know for certain that the audience would react that way, unless they in some capacity engineered it.

So yeah, they fully formed the entire season around misleading the audience, only to then proceed to mock said audience for falling for the misdirection. And in the process of making the point "you can't grieve until you accept this" they ruined the grieving process for the fans who genuinely believed the writing meant something

I'm sorry, but that's actually insane, holy shit

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Wait so...the entire plot of the episode as well as them almost deliberately leading us into believing Bobby was alive (buried alive script, the song choices, Hotshots coma, etc) was specifically done that way...so they could then successfully pull an uno reverse card, playing the exact opposite and calling the audience out for falling for it?

That's...actually a little bit impressive, I must admit, but what in the fuck?

[cannot-decide-on-a-fandom]

Theory(that I don't even know makes any sense)as to why Tommy is carrying the coffin-He was put forward as another one of the involved firefighters due to Chimney being out of commission after his infection, but obviously he insists on carrying it, there's no way he doesn't.

After that there's also a reason for Eddie to be carrying it despite not being in the 118 nor a firefighter anymore (presently)

So they just all end up doing it