#st 1

[will80sbyers]

STRANGER THINGS | Jonathan Byers

[robinsteve]

mike wheeler + open closets

[lemonycranberries]

honestly, if byler was a straight ship, people would've seen will x mike x el as a love triangle from s1. like, people would've seen mike and will as a possible ship from "it was a seven", and even moreso after mike spent the rest of the season like he did. if will was a girl, a single tender moment between them both alone would already be seen as an indication of a probable romance, and stuff like "i'm the only one who cares about will!" and the way he talks about will in general during the season, + the sheer desperation to find him and how he's singled out from the rest of his peers in that regard would most likely be seen as a confirmation of one. the story would 100% be seen as "this boy is obviously interested in his best friend, and suddenly a new girl appeared and he seems to maybe be interested in her as well. i wonder what will happen." (well, not exactly like that, because i genuinely believe mike was never really interested in el in a non-platonic way and that their entire relationship is built off others' expectations and mike's own internalized homophobia, which wouldn't exist in this case; but let's ignore that for now, since this is a hypothetical). s2 would make this even stronger, but would probably be seen as a case for people to root more for byler.

heteronormativity doesn't only make people expect straight romances where they aren't any, it blinds them to any romantic possibilities in pairings that aren't straight, when they would've seen them otherwise.

[its-steddie-time]

some of my absolute fav ST pics 👽

[musicalchaos07]

thinking about Jonathan Byers who cried himself to sleep, threw up seeing his little brother's dead body, thought his mom was going through an episode, planned a funeral, confronted his abuser, didn't want to tell his mom about monster hunting because she had been through enough, stole a gun, nearly shot a deer, pulled Nancy out of the upside down, stayed the night with her so she wouldn't be alone, went shopping for a bear trap & a pack of .48s to kill a monster and then wasn't confronted/checked on/ or asked about where he had been or what he had been doing until he was arrested for fighting Steve after he insulted the Byers family.

[withacapitalp]

A little piece of the WIP for the Steve is Seven AU. Flashback time Babey

“What are you doing?”

Seven turned around, giving the guard staring him down a soft smile. He kept both his hands behind his back, hiding his prize from view. 

“Just going to see Eleven. Papa knows,” Seven replied with the most innocent voice he could muster. Papa did know, and he was fine with Seven going to say goodbye before he left, but he hadn’t signed off on the gift Seven wanted to give his sister. 

The guard lifted an eyebrow, walking closer and holding his hand out expectantly. Seven kept his face blank and curious for a second before dropping the act. He sighed, bringing his arms to his sides and exposing what he was holding. 

“Just a gift. That’s all,” Seven insisted, glancing around the hallway briefly before giving the man a push. Not a heavy one, or one he should even be able to notice. Just a tiny little push. 

“It’s fine,” Seven whispered. 

“It’s fine,” The man repeated in a slightly dazed tone. He handed it back to Seven without argument, turning back around and beginning to go in the other direction. 

“You didn’t see me,” Seven said, giving the guard another barley there nudge as he walked away. 

He wasn’t supposed to use his powers on the guards, or at all without Papa knowing, but there were times where the rules had to be bent, just a little. The last thing he needed was the other kids getting jealous, or trying to steal this away from his sister while he was gone. 

“I didn’t see you,” The guard agreed, giving a tiny wave over his shoulder as he continued to leave, “It’s fine,”

Seven snickered behind his back. It didn’t hurt anyone to get a small push, they were still making their own choices, just with a bit of pressure. Seven was good at regulating how much force went into his pushes now. Papa told him that it was because he trained more than his siblings, that he worked harder than them. 

This was just a bit of…unexpected practice, that was all. 

@thosemessyvibes tagging you because you asked to be tagged for things with this au! Lemme know if you want me to take you off, or if you also want to be tagged on future updates and add ons I write

[allonzy]

like mother, like son

[ladyfromaspookyforest]

Wheeler/Byers Wardrobe Analysis

Season 1 Part 3

Part 1 Part 2 Part 4 Part 5

EPISODE 5

First things first, this episode contains Will’s funeral and everyone wears black and I’m not going to talk about all their outfits because that’s a waste of time. But why are Mike and Dustin wearing these colored jackets?

Dustin’s in a very dark denim jacket with accents of primary-colored plaid popping out. Mike is in green with blue and green plaid accents. Lucas is wearing all black. At this point, Mike is totally 100% convinced Will is alive and stuck in the Upside Down. Dustin is on board. Lucas appears to be the least convinced of the three that Will is still out there, so him appropriately dressed for the funeral in all black makes sense. I know this post is about the Wheelers and Byers, but I'm going to talk about Dustin for a minute because of how this jacket reflects Will.

Dustin cracks a joke about telling Will Jennifer Hayes was crying at his funeral, like he has no doubt they’ll have this chance. It’s cute. It’s a little naïve but it’s heartwarming. But Dustin’s light attitude combined with this bright pop of color is really fitting. But what stands out to me the most about this jacket is how the plaid emulates the outfit Will disappeared in.

Sometimes I wonder about how Dustin feels, having been the last person to see Will before he disappeared. Dustin asked him to race, then got exhausted and quit. And Will was taken into the Upside Down. It would seem only natural for Dustin to experience guilt over this, but it’s not something we ever see explored. I’d really like to see them finally talk about this in season 5, but that's a whole tangent. Maybe I'm reading too much into guilt we never see, but it feels to me like Dustin HAS to maintain this lightness, this ability to joke at his friend's funeral. Whether it be to cope with the guilt or to cope with the possibility that they might not get him back, I don't know. Regardless, this similarity of the plaid on Dustin's jacket to Will's last outfit visually demonstrates that Dustin is focused on Will's DISAPPEARANCE and not his death, as an appropriate black jacket would.

Mike is convinced Will is alive, but he remains pretty somber through this scene. Much more so than Dustin, so the darker shade is fitting rather than the bright pop of color. But Mike has still covered his black clothes with green (blue + yellow?) as a way of showing that he isn’t really here to mourn. His mind is on Will, but he hasn’t lost him yet, though he doesn't have this capacity to joke like Dustin does.

After the funeral, El’s still wearing this nasty dress and you know what else she’s doing in this episode? LYING. This dress (Nancy's) shows us that she is not being herself and she deceives the party. Mike’s in his little Byers-y coat again as they hunt for the gate to find Will, and beneath it, he’s wearing blue, red, and yellow stripes on a grey shirt. Sensing a trend.

OKAY! So here’s where things start to get really interesting with Nancy’s color scheme. It’s the same. It’s still red and blue but rather than the extremely diluted soft pink and baby blue she’s been wearing, she’s now in brick red and a darker blue. It’s VASTLY different from the way she’s been dressing and yet they’re still in the same color family. There was only one other time we've seen Nancy in these darker shades: the day after she slept with Steve. She wore a light grey sweater with stripes in these colors: brick red and darker blue. That outfit was the first hint at this one. She was already starting to doubt her choices, starting to feel guilty. And here, the guilt has completely taken over. She feels wrecked about what happened to Barb and so, like her mother in the previous episode, she darkens her color palette in an attempt to react with appropriate gravity to the situation.

On the other side of things, Jonathan is wearing not one but two patterned articles of clothing. For the first time. He’s still wearing his own color palette, but he’s got a striped sweater and a checked flannel on. This feels like a small nod to Nancy while her shearling jacket is a bit of a nod to him. Their style is very minutely reaching towards one another.

Let’s talk about STEVE again. He’s come to apologize. He’s wearing green and navy, darker colors than he’s been wearing around Nancy lately. He's been wearing lighter shades of blue, matching her, but here he's in dark shades. In my last post, I talked about the visual of Nancy/Steve and El/Mike dressed in pastel pink/baby blue and how overly gendered and domestic it was. Here, Steve has dropped that. The last time he wore a darker blue was the day of the party when he wore a teal sweater. This scene above is potentially the most likable Steve has been so far this season. And I would argue that the party was another instance of Steve being likable. He feels genuine in both of these situations. He doesn’t feel like he’s being influenced by his shitty friends or worrying about his parents. And the colors of his outfits in these scenes are similar.

Apologies everyone. Trigger warning: L0nnie Byers. So this ding dong showed up at the end of the last episode and now he’s hangin’ out, trying to comfort Joyce. I’ve included a shot of the two of them from this episode and one of Lonnie from his first appearance in episode 2 as well, just so we can take a peek at what he usually wears. Button-downs at least partially undone over a white tank is the norm.

But then later after the funeral, he dresses like this. Lonnie-styled Wheeler colors.

I was actually kind of taken aback by this one, but it makes sense. Lonnie is fixing up the house, talking about how their family has been ruined. He’s calling Joyce “babe.” He’s putting on a complete show of being part of the family unit. He’s wearing his white button-down from the funeral in this scene, unbuttoned in Lonnie fashion, but the outfit prior to unbuttoning and rolling the sleeves resembles the sort of thing Ted Wheeler would be wearing at the dinner table. Bland office attire/bland funeral attire. Then he showers, comes back, and is in pastel stripes. Joyce confronts him about the money and they argue about how Lonnie just wants to use it for Jonathan to go to college. Lonnie is putting on this I Care About This Family front and it’s extremely telling that he does it in blue pastel stripes. This says that while he’s behaving like he’s a family man, he clearly isn’t, and the Wheelers, constantly behaving like the perfect family, are in fact not all that happy or put-together either.

Joyce is wearing this maroon turtleneck this episode. It’s darker than what we’ve seen her in and it’s also the first time she’s changed her clothes since the first episode (funeral getup earlier in the episode aside). She’s falling a little bit for Lonnie’s manipulation here as she just sort of needs someone to help her pick the pieces back up and he was quite literally just there. She lets him talk to her about how this could all be in her head and up until now, we’ve seen her shut down anyone who makes this kind of suggestion, but she also tells him not to take down the lights. She hasn’t given up. She doesn’t fully believe Will’s gone, but she’s conflicted and she’s starting to seem a bit hopeless. This dark top is a reflection of that, as well as the fact that it has a lot less character than what she usually wears.

Then she and Lonnie fight. He tells her she’s a shitty mom and she’s crazy and she yells at him and kicks him out. And in the next scene with Joyce, Hopper comes over and tells her she was right all along.

Here’s Hopper this episode. He’s totally unhinged. This is peak Unhinged Hopper for season 1. He breaks into the lab, beats people up, threatens them at gun point, answers his door with a gun looking paranoid as all Hell, rampages through his house looking for bugs, then shows up to the Byers residence to do the same. The sweaty undershirt is a fantastic way to show us just HOW unhinged he is.

The moment when Hopper showing up at the Byers house to unscrew every single one of Joyce’s Christmas lights is meeting her on her level. The little exchange between his officers after they come to see him is really indicative of this.

“Is he off his meds again?” “He’s been spending too much time with Joyce Byers.”

So I love this scene of him coming to Joyce in general because he’s the first person to tell her he believes her. This is huge. And having it take place right after Joyce kicked Lonnie out for saying she's off her rocker emphasizes the difference between the two. It shows us: this is what Joyce does NOT need followed by this is what Joyce DOES need. And the clothes are relevant because what Lonnie is wearing does not fit into Joyce and her family's lifestyle. What Hopper is wearing does.

As Hopper goes hunting for the truth like a maniac, he’s in civilian clothes for obvious reasons. He can’t roll up to a bar trying to trick the guy who found the body into giving him info in his uniform. But beyond practicality, I think putting Hopper in civilian clothes signals to us that this is no longer a job for him. He’s clearly not on real, legal police business anymore. He starts trespassing and getting violent and going so far as to cut open what is most likely a child's body just because there is a chance he can save Joyce's son. It's not police work anymore. As for the outfits themselves, this screams I Live in the Woods Alone. I don't have a whole lot to say about it, but I will be coming back to it to compare with other outfits Hopper wears later.

*cough* Anyway, I swear the next one will be shorter. It's because I went on Dustin and Hopper tangents. I got too invested in the Jopper moment.

[danowh0re]

if you havent done it already S2 billy hargrove icons 👀?

Here :)

☠︎︎ 𝕭𝖎𝖑𝖑𝖞 𝕳𝖆𝖗𝖌𝖗𝖔𝖛𝖊

Stranger things 2

[purpleangelsele]

Okay so there’s this misinformation that I found quite telling of who’s actually paying attention to the show.

It’s been said or claimed that Mike was the one that easily lied about El being his second cousin but actually…

He came up with Eleanor yes. But Lucas and Dustin came up with the cousin thing.

Mike might be better at lying but he’s not that quick to come up with who she was.

Because really what was he gonna say? He’s also taking a bit too long to respond so they cover up for his thoughtful silence.

I know Mike was like “DAMN now she’s my second cousin to Mr.Clarke.” 😭😭😭

[fandoms-of-cb]

anyone else notice that, Mike does El’s makeup in season 1. Boy doesn’t even hesitate. That’s a little fruity friend.

[robinsteve]

30 DAYS TO STRANGER THINGS 4: DAY TEN

best dressed: nancy wheeler

[flecker-illustrates]

I rewatched the entire first season of Stranger Things as soon as I had the chance. No, I will not be held accountable, you'll have to suffer through some more art though

[stranger-chichka]

Currently rewatching the Season 1 and in Episode 5 El is spying on a Russian. Could you translate that too? I wonder if there is anything interesting in his monologue.

Thanks very much in advance!

And if you don't have time for it, still thank you very much for the whole alexei analysis.

No problem!!!!

"The rumours appeared that the American authorities had identified several of our spies on American soil. We checked them out, but it may have been deliberate misinformation designed to distract us from more important matters. Contact Evgenii, Sergei and Anatolii. Find out who contacted them and if someone didn't, report to me immediately. Although, no. Bring me Sergei right now. He was on duty when the data…the rumours…it's up to...[here smth is missing]...to catch them…I need to know where the rumours came from. If this is not disinformation, although I am sure of it, I do not want to think about the consequences. Go, what are you waiting for? Hurry. I need to know where these rumours came from."

These three names are mentioned so I also decided to google their meanings. Evgenii is "well-born, noble." Sergei is "servant; protector; shepherd." Anatolii is “sunrise, pointing to the east, eastern."

[alexandrast17]

lowkey I want somebody to write a fic what happened after they found el in the woods and I’m not talking like what happened in s1 ep 2 “the weirdo on maple street” I mean what happened on the walk home, Mike giving El his jacket, how they persuaded her too go with them etc all that fun stuff in between episodes 1 & 2

[withacapitalp]

Oh my god I love ur Steve is seven au sm! I've seen various aus where Steve is seven before, but your take on it is so interesting and his powers are so funky! I'd love to be added to any kind of tag list u have for this au 👀👀

I've got you added! Super happy to add whoever else wants, just mention it in the reblog tags or shoot me a DM or anything. I'm also going to write another bit here, because I need inspiration to write more for this series (I have the entirety of the ending for the first long fic written, but the beginning and middle are avoiding me)

After the disaster at the cabin, Steve runs.

He doesn't grab his jacket. He doesn't take his car. He just bolts. The woods are terrifying, and his wrist is burning, but he can't stop. If he stops, they might catch him.

Whoever they are. Steve has no reason to be this scared of Hopper, or Nancy, or even Eleven. They wouldn't hurt him. He shouldn't be scared.

But he is scared. Steve's fucking terrified.

Bits and pieces of the last twenty minutes keep shooting through his mind, along with flashes of memories that come and go faster than he can process them. Flashes of memories that sound like bees buzzing in his ears and make his head ache. Memories that he shouldn't have. Memories-

Not memories. Dreams. Nightmares. Just bad dreams.

Nightmares. That was all. Steve was entitled to a few, wasn't he? After meeting real life monsters, who wouldn't have bad dreams?

Never mind that these nightmares had been happening long before Steve learned about the Upside Down. He doesn't need to think about that. He can't think about that.

He just needs to run.

By the time Steve reaches the road, he doesn't have an ounce of stamina left. He falls to his hands and knees on the edge of the gravel, sucking in burning oxygen and coughing harshly. The last time he was this winded was when he was a freshman doing sprints.

Or maybe it was the last time he ran through these woods with someone chasing him.

No. I never ran through the woods. That's not real. None of it is real. It's a bad dream. Nothing real. Just a bad dream. I don't remember. I don't remember. It's just a bad dream. Just wake up. It's not real. It's not real. It's a bad dream.

Except, this time it isn't. It's not a bad dream, because Steve is here, and he's not waking up, no matter how hard he tries.

This is real, and he needs to hide.

Steve doesn't even bother to go towards his house. If they're chasing him, then they would go there. Even if they aren't, the monsters were at his house too. Barb died there. Barb's still dead in his pool, in some other dimension.

No, he needs somewhere safe to go, and his mind can only think of one place. Both people currently there probably hate his guts, but it's as safe as he can get right now. So, Steve forces himself back to his feet, and runs right past his house and down the street.

The light on the porch isn't on, and the windows are dark, but the car is in the drive, and Steve can hear the sound of a laugh track on the TV from inside, so he rings the bell, and rings it again when no one gets up.

The door is yanked open, and Steve stumbles back, blinking harshly from the sudden light shining in his face.

"Somebody better be fucking dying, Harrington," Tommy bites out, giving his former best friend a death glare.

Steve doesn't have a chance to say a word before his whole body goes numb. His legs give out, and he falls into Tommy's arms. Steve just catches him yelling at Carol for help, then everything is blissfully, blankly, black.

Taglist: @simpforsauron @thosemessyvibes @beenovel @silverysnake @blueskiesandstarrynights