#i love el

[me1-atonin]

i don’t think i’ll ever be over the fact that mike literally jumped off a cliff at 12 years old because of bullies, el saw it and literally saved him, and then 3 years later she’s like “you don’t know what it’s like” when mike tried to open up to her about being bullied as well

[your-stranger-halfblood-things]

El, you tried dating Mike. A for effort.

I love you so much, but please dump Mike's ass again (he has a boyfriend waiting for him) (and El has a girlfriend and a boyfriend waiting for her)

Breakup m*leven and get the good, not toxic couples out on stage

[lottieishot]

me at a funural me showing up to the m*levens down fall

[lupon]

I feel like a big part of the reason people believe El can’t be happy without Mike is because of how poorly “The Lost Sister” landed with the audience. El’s s2 plot wasn’t about the supernatural, it was all about who El is, what she wants, and how she feels. It didn’t really do much to push the main plot and is kind of more of a side story. I’ll admit, I’ve skipped it more then once when I’ve rewatched, but now after s4, I’m realizing how much that episode actually did for her character. 

What El wants most in life is a home and a family. It’s brought up a lot throughout the episode, and is the main reason why she runs away. She feels like she’s missing a family, which is why she leaves to find Mike, her mom, and then Kali. She’s looking for somewhere that feels like home. We get the parallel of Mike, Hopper, Becky and Kali all offered her a home, which was exactly what she wanted. Mike at the end of s1 said she could live with him in his house, and specifically mentioned his mom, another thing El wants. When Hopper first brought her in, he said the cabin would be her new home. Later, when he’s telling stories about himself, El asked if she had a mom, and started crying when he said she was gone. Then El finally finds her mom, and runs away to see her. Becky then shows her the room that was supposed to be hers, and says this would be her home. Even with Kali, she kept saying that their meeting was what her mom wanted, and also claiming she was home. 

Hopper betrayed her by lying and taking away her TV, she ran away. Becky betrayed her by calling the police, and she ran in search of a different family without a seconds thought. Kali betrayed her by trying to force her to kill someone, and by getting in her head and showing her Brenner. So she ran back to the first family she ever knew. El didn’t trip Max out of romantic jealousy, it was her feeling replaced and betrayed. That’s why the moment comes back when she’s thinking of things that make her angry when she tries to move the train. Every other memory in that scene is one of her feeling like she had her life taken from her, which is exactly what she felt when she saw Mike with Max. This also lines up with how Mike feels, he didn’t want Max in the party because he felt like he’d be replacing El. 

Also worth noting is the reason why she didn’t kill the man in the apartment. She saw a family photo on the ground. She was looking at the kids. She realized that if she killed him, she’d be taking away their father. Despite how much she hated him for what he did, she knows how much it hurts to lose a parent, so she refused to let Kali kill him as well. 

Then there’s the whole monster theme. El was watching Frankenstein on Halloween night, specifically the scene were a small girl is asking the monster if he wanted to play with her. El isn’t the girl in this scene though, she’s Frankenstein’s monster. Robin in Surviving Hawkins talked about the Frankenstein book, and it’s really cool how it parallels El’s story. Robin says the quote: “He (the monster) was scared and confused and left to fend for himself, which doesn’t excuse things but I think the whole point is that pretty much everyone behaves in monstrous ways” Similarly, El has hurt people whenever she gets scared or angry. Like Lucas in s1 right after he claimed she was a monster, he and Mike started fighting, so she threw him out of anger. S4 she hit Angela after she ruined her day, and later called herself a monster. Mr. Hauser then asked Robin who she thinks the monster in Frankenstein was. Robin then states: “Well, Frankenstein for starters, the doctor I mean, playing God like that pretending that scientific innovation is more important than humanity.” This is clearly talking about Brenner, as we see El face him and say she wasn’t the monster, it was him. Brenner pushed aside his humanity for the sake of innovation, stealing kids from their homes, numbering them, imprisoning them, and often hurting them when they disobeyed. All for the sake of making them stronger. 

Kali understood that others saw people like herself and El, as well as her band of outcasts, as monsters. Instead of trying to prove herself to anyone, she embraced it. Like El, she had been betrayed and lied to by people she called her family. She explained to El that no one would see her as anything other than a monster. Kali believed the only people who wouldn’t, were other people who society viewed as a monster. Which is why Mike saying she wasn’t a monster despite her throwing Lucas, and despite the fact that she opened the gate which took Will away, was such a profound moment in her life. For the first time in her life, El was treated like a person. That moment was a big part of the reason why she decided to go back. Because of that, she realized Kali was wrong, that there were people out there who would love her and see her as a person rather than a monster. Her last line in the episode was: “I’m going to a friends house. I’m going home.” Her whole s2 plot was her looking for a home, and she found it. 

This is why she doesn’t need to be romantically with Mike in order to have a happy ending. El’s goal in life was never to find romance. It was always about family, which is why she asked if Mike would be her brother right before he kissed her. If anything, him kissing her diverted her from the life she truly wanted. All she ever wanted from the start was a home. A mother. Friends. Family. To be normal. To feel like she belonged in the world. She wandered the Wheeler house envious of Nancy's life. She wanted to be pretty like her, with big family and close friends. The end of s4 is the closest she’s been to having all of that. She’s back at the cabin, her first ever home. Hopper is alive and is officially dating Joyce, her mother. She’s surrounded by friends and family who love her. The only thing missing is Max, the person who told her she could take control of her own life, and was the only one that made her feel normal. Mike may have been the one to tell her she wasn’t a monster, but Max was the one who told her she was human, hence the “Am I your pet?” line. Max showed her the world, how to discover what she liked, how to let go of all the stress and pressure and simply have fun, and most importantly, that El shouldn’t have to be afraid of what everyone else thought. They could be silly and weird together, simply because it made them happy. No one could control who they were or what they did, because they made their own rules in life. Max showed El that there was more to life than what everyone had been telling her. 

This opened the door to her realizing she didn’t need Mike. Mike was the first person to ever show genuine love and care for her (excluding Benny since he died so quickly) and she was attracted to that love. She spent her whole life being abused and scared of people, and couldn’t remember a time when she knew kids her own age. So to feel like she was loved and safe for the first time ever, of course she’d want to stay close to him. She spent that whole year thinking Mike was the person for her, because she wasn’t allowed to go out and discover who she was. Mike was all she really knew, other than couples she saw in soap operas and romance movies. Max was the very first person to say she didn’t have to be with Mike. We even saw El looked at a picture of Karate kid, showing that she was starting to show interest in people other than Mike. Her world was expanding outside of him for the first time. This was progress for her. Seeing the world outside of Mike meant she was discovering new interests, such as Wonder Woman, photo booths, shopping, games, and dressing up. She was learning about herself without him because she couldn’t do that while she was with him. 

El needs Mike in her life in order to have a happy ending, but they don’t have to be together for her story to have a satisfying end. El can have everything she ever wanted out of life without dating Mike, or anyone. 

[eternalpassions]

I think Mike is fond of El but he loves Will. I think he has gotten the two emotions confused and a lot of the audience has too. Seems he confused fondness for love. Being fond of someone means you respect them as a human and you cherish them but loving someone is more deep and complex and it makes you need the person

Hopefully the Duffers go along with this plan cuz that would be some brilliant and nuanced writing you don’t see in tv nowadays

[deancaslover]

I can't be mad about El lying to Mike to make him believe she had friends. I totally understand her behavior because I used to do it when I was younger. I had a best friend in my neighborhood but we never studied in the same school together. I was bullied and ignored at school all those years but I would talk about those other girls like we were besties, just to pretend I was as normal as my only friend was. I was just autistic. It really felt like having a double life and I felt bad the whole time.

So yeah mleven has real issues but don't blame El for lying about that, she' was just trying to create a fantasy for herself.

[maybebitterxox]

“Omg you ship byler? Me too!! El is so annoying, I-“

You scream in pain as I swiftly snap every bone in your body. You insulted my girl. Nobody insults my girl.

[kaiculus]

OH MY GOD OK

first post here obv has to be something byler/stranger things related but first i just wanted to say that i rly enjoy analyzing stuff so i think ill prefer to post on here rather than twitter since here its nicer or smth IDK BUT IF U WANT u can go follow me on twt @poloplopnko

ANYWAYS

I wanted to make an analysis on how I realized something after making a joke tweet on how calling El 11 was like calling her a slur or something since she isn't something to be numbered and is her own person. I realized that in I think every scene especially during their fight scenes Mike always calls El "Eleven," and I found this odd. You'd imagine that her boyfriend, someone who she is supposed to be comfortable around, wouldn't call her a name that may remind her of her past.

I mean everyone else calls her El or Jane, so why?

Well, I had an idea that maybe it has something to do with Mike's attachment issues and his people pleasing.

Now hear me out.

I believe it's shown many times in the show that we can safely assume that Mika has a fear of being "nonuseful" to the others around him. Many people have different opinions but I feel as though that Mike is the type of person to believe that if someone doesn't find him useful once they know him they never will. This is why I think he's so afraid that El won't need him anymore, platonically or not. He's afraid she doesn't need him after believing she did after so many years.

This is why I think he calls her Eleven.

Maybe it's to bring them back to how it was before when she was just a girl who escaped a lab. To be able to send them back to when El wasn't her own person just yet, just so Mike can believe that she does need him.

I know Mike doesn't always call her Eleven but I think he calls her it much more than the others, and not really in the "oh a special name for you" kind of way.

I LOVE MAKING ANALYSIS' SO THIS WAS ACTUALLY RLY FUN TO MAKE I MIGHT POST MORE AGUSHRVF lol have a nice day :]

[fandomfoundmyart]

dissing m!leven>>>>>>

rip to the shippers

[mikewheeleronlyfans]

i live for el’s messy hand writing. they did such a good job with that because regardless of whether she grew up in a lab or not, i know her handwriting would suck so bad

[immeya]

I was rewatching Stranger Things and I just thought about… what if Eleven does actually sacrifice herself in season 5 and there’s a parallel to the “goodbye, Mike” scene??? Like it’d be so perfect??? And heart wrenching and so sad and I’d cry so much

[acheemient]

Banana Shenanigans. Bananigans.

[iszapizza]

various supersons doodles

[eledsart]

griddlehark, in bed the kiss

[astralpenguin]

self care is writing a fic that you’re literally the sole target audience for

[nicktoonsunite]

misc NU doodles part tres

last comic is based off off my nasb 2 clip