#elmike visual parallels

[gayofthefae]

Mike Wheeler - Exactly Like Their Parents (23s)

@best-thing-at-this-party this is the one i mentioned @your-local-bi-guy @imatotallynormalteengirlok @throne-of-crows

[gayofthefae]

Literally everything about those reunions.

mike don't get paralleled to one of el's dad figures challenge (impossible)

[sylvianightshade]

I’m going insane. I’m GOING INSANE.

This is how Mike and El react when Hop sorta catches them, right? This is them pretending to be innocent like they weren’t just making out. This is what they look like when Hop busts quite angrily through the door. Both holding comics that they’re seemingly pretending to read. 

So, later on after some break-up shenanigans, El and Max are hanging out, oh, in this same room. Being besties. Being gal pals. Enjoying each other’s company, falling over each other on the floor laughing. Very them.

And then. AND THEN.

They hear Hopper’s car pull up outside. We see them both whip their heads up in acknowledgement of this approaching noise. This potential interruption. 

And what does Hop find when he busts into El’s room again?

Same shit, but with a ginger this time.

I am not implying that Max and El were making out pre-Hop entrance. But WHYYY do we have this clear narrative and visual parallel between these scenes WHAT WAS THE REASON and why does Hop’s reaction read like a dad who just found out his kid is a lesbian and is “really cool” with it???

I know that Mike and El’s relationship is heavy with familial coding but why do El and Max keep paralleling the supposed “romantic” Elmike moments specifically? But high-key doing them better?? Why??? If not Elmax????

(To highlight that El’s relationship with Max is way healthier than her relationship with Mike? To demonstrate how Max is better for her? Yeah, that’s still comparing Max to El’s literal canonical boyfriend. I refuse to get off my bullshit. They cannot keep getting away with it.)

[tsugarubecker]

El and Choice

Byler/platonic Elmax/platonic Elmike analysis below the cut (extensive)! You ready for 🤯? 🔻🔺

How much of El’s life has really been choice? I’d argue not a lot of it. In the above scene with Brenner, Brenner even mentions Henry manipulating El. Probably most of us watching that scene thought “wow, pot calling the kettle black much?”

But it’s not just those two. Most of El’s life has been other people making choices for her. It is the times when she takes control into her own hands and makes her own choices when she is at her most authentic and most powerful, as seen above. (Other examples include when she escaped the lab, ran away to meet her mom, left Kali to go rescue her friends, chose to go get her powers back, chose to stay with Brenner, etc. Moments of growth for El are often linked to moments of choice!)

I want to call attention to choice as it relates to El and her relationships - and additionally, as it relates to Mike and his relationships, too.

I made a diagram! 🤪 Sorry, I had a lot of coffee today lol. This diagram isn’t perfect and there are some errors in it (for example, I strongly believe that platonic Elmike is very important to this whole story but I didn’t represent that well in the diagram…. oops) but do you get the idea/my intention at least?? 😅 Take your time looking at it, it’s a bit convoluted. Feel free to come have another look after you’ve read on.

Throughout especially seasons 3 and 4, we see a couple triangles involving El and Mike. In season 3, we see the El / Mike / Max triangle almost as prominently featured, I would argue, as we see the El / Mike / Will triangle. But, the former is a platonic triangle. The latter is a romantic love triangle.

In S3, Mike and Max are constantly shown visually as a triangle with El, constantly pitted against each other, and constantly shown as the two “options” for El. Who will she agree with? Who will she side with? Which of these two will she prioritize?

Same in S3 in regards to Mike needing to choose between El and Will. Y’all probably don’t need me to extrapolate on this one (think of their “breakup” scenes being contrasted visually with lighting and mood, etc).

Then in season 4 this theme continues. Most of volume 1 is focused on the El / Mike / Will love triangle, right? But in volume 2, especially right at the end (as we go into season 5) we begin to see a big focus again put on the platonic triangle between El / Mike / Max. I don’t think I need to explain the love triangle, but I do want to talk a bit about the end of volume 2 and the resurgence of the El / Mike / Max platonic triangle.

We get a parallel between S2 and S4. In S2, El goes into the void, sees Mike in danger, and leaves her “jedi training”. In S4 she goes into the void, sees Max in danger, and leaves her “jedi training.” Mike and Max are being put back into a triangle.

As soon as the Pizza Gang rescues El she immediately says they need to go to Hawkins to rescue their friends (Max). When that plan doesn’t work she figures out a way to save Max from Nevada.

El then spends the rest of volume 2 fighting to save Max. It’s all about Max after this!

S4 V2 even ends with El not really talking much with Mike, going into her bedroom and thinking about Max. The end of V2 is very platonic Elmax-centric. El is beginning to truly prioritize her friendship with Max over her romantic relationship with Mike. She is beginning to make her choice about what she wants - and it’s based on what feels more real and authentic to her.

Others have written a million hours of analyses about Byler - check my pinned post for some excellent examples of those analyses - so I won’t get into that in too much detail here. Suffice it to say, I believe that Mike is also beginning to lean into what feels more real and authentic in his love triangle - and that’s his relationship with Will.

If they both lean into authenticity, El’s narrative arc leads towards Max and platonic (friend/family) love. Mike’s leads towards Will and real romantic love. Both of their arcs necessitate acceptance of self - and learning to believe that their inner moral compass is not wrong, it is good and right.

Right now Mike and El need each other to affirm for one another that they are not monsters. El has believed for years that deep down she might be evil. Mike is gay and closeted - he also believes that deep down he is morally wrong. Their arcs revolve around discovering that they are not monsters - and truly believing it, on their own, without relying on each other to prove it 🤯!

So. What does this have to do with choice? I’m glad you asked!

El chose Max. Mike chose Will. El and Mike did not choose each other.

El and Mike did not choose each other.

El chose Max. Mike chose Will.

El chose the person who trusts her to self-determine. Mike chose the person who believes he is The Heart. They both chose to put someone in their life who can help them see that they are not monsters. Who can love them for who they really are, as they are.

Season 5, I am confident, will center on El finding a way to save Max - and maybe on Mike finding a way to save Will. In any case, I strongly expect to see El leaning into the person she feels the most authentic with - and same with Mike. I expect - or maybe hope - to see their narrative arcs come to a satisfying close as they each choose to trust in their own inherent goodness.

Something something forced conformity (choice being taken away) that’s what killing the kids

Thanks for reading!! 🤪😅😁

[gayofthefae]

Super sweet reunions in seasons where Mike was El's whole thing for the first three episodes only

and came at the end of episode eight (of nine), an episode which did not focus on each other at all with much more major focus on the actual points of their arcs with this scene only serving as fluff/relief from the plot-central angst we just witnessed as their relationship is very sweet and offers said feeling but is not in itself the actual central plot at all

but even their reunion when continued is somewhat one-upped by her reunion with somebody else

that is either played itself as bigger or was more consistently built up in the season.

Additionally, the reunion is a sweet moment but not the reason for her return.

[gayofthefae]

I'd like to distinctly note the episode 3 thing because with 2 9 episode seasons, that is exactly the end of the first act. A perfect point for a distinct inciting incident. She's angry at them so she leaves to learn more about her past and who she is. She does that then decides to come back despite people she went to encouraging her to stay. She doesn't need them, she wants them. "I know. But I can save them."

And she knows they can't give her what she originally asked for. Hopper isn't Mike. And Mike isn't in love with her. But she comes back anyways because that wasn't why she loved them and she can find those things elsewhere. It doesn't mean she wants to give up everything else they are to her.

So. Now that we're all finally on the "Mike Wheeler has been forced into a parental rather than boyfriend role for El" track...lets talk about THIS damn near direct parallel moment in (wait for it) both S2 and S4's Episode Three.

We start with the parentified male figure putting together an "eggo offering" and going to a moping El in her room in the hopes of getting her to open up after they've made a "mistake" in her eyes, which means she's stonewalling them, which they both comment on.

We then move into a conversation about an adjacent problem that both Hopper and Mike are trying to solve thinking it will get her to talk...which leads into a whole other issue that has been bubbling up (without her communicating it) in El's mind.

That's followed by El latching onto one word they say and then getting upset about how they don't understand her attempts to communicate her feelings...to the point that she moves into an argumentative position, puts them on the defensive, and demands (repeatedly) an answer to something that neither one of them can clearly give her (soon with Hop, love with Mike)—

—and we end with El shutting them out entirely...only to go off on her own to find the answers she wants by herself (her going to find Mama in S2...and (what turns out to be) Papa in S4).

We even get a clear marker that the S4 scene should remind us of something else with this line by Mike...and the fact that El is mirrored...while rebuilding her diorama of Hopper's cabin???

—like? besties. There is "on the nose" and then there's "we need you to notice this because it gives away a idea/framework you need to grasp to understand the wider narrative.” This one is definitely the latter.

Quadruple bonus points for the fact that this is what Hopper says about Mike in the S2 scene, when El says she wants to see him...because its what's most true about the parental role Mike has taken on in Hopper's place come season four.

[gayofthefae]

Never over the platonic Elmike parallel of El riding on the back of Max's bike to the Wheelers' in season 3 btw. That shot didn't really need to happen other than for that, they could have just cut and said they got there.

But nah, they really said to MILKVANS "not that deep, she just doesn't know how to ride a bike and she likes riding bikes with her bestieees".

[gayofthefae]

You know I love a good visual parallel (especially a reverse).

Mike did something wrong, she's grumpy, she slams the door, but the first time she went to Max and the second time she thinks of her and cries because she can't.

[gayofthefae]

"I thought we were friends, you know? But friends tell each other the truth. And they definitely don't lie to each other. Maybe you thought you were helping, but you weren't. You hurt me, do you understand? What you did sucks."

[gayofthefae]

@byler-alarmist

Wait I never thought of it this way but

Is an interesting concept

[The first picture is Francesca Bridgerton after kissing her husband for the first time, shortly before becoming smitten by a woman, for those who don't know]

The way he not only doesn't move until slightly at the end but also doesn't look down at her lips like she does at all