#st2 spoilers

[isorottatime]

“max is a lesbian” takes are actually kinda icky to me. idk i feel like devaluing the single main relationship with a poc by saying “oh she doesn’t like him really” is just kinda gross? especially since lumax is finally getting taken seriously this season… lucas has always been undervalued by the fandom, and lesbian max takes really just conveniently pivot away from his feelings, to instead focus on a white girl.

[three-possums-playing-human]

I honestly don’t… understand people who ship Billy with Steve. Not just in a “oh it’s toxic way!” but like genuinely, I don’t get it. Billy was racist, abusive, and all around shitty in the season he was introduced. And sure, we get a reason as to why, and he saves El and them in the end, but he didn’t actually get a redemption. Every scene with him and Steve, he was hurting Steve. In the last scene they actually have together, he beat the shit out of Steve. They didn’t have any actual interactions in season 3, and they didn’t have any interactions post “redemption” (if you can even call his one scene of being the good guy as a redemption)

Like, what Billy dealt with sucks, but I don’t get why the ship began. I get most of the other ships in the fandom, just not this one in particular. Maybe someone could explain to me the appeal? (I doubt I’ll ever ship it, but I’d still like to… understand why people do. It doesn’t even read as enemies to lovers to me, not when one of them is just… such a horrible person to everyone around them, at all times)

Also please don’t say “well you ship steddie so you’re just trying to hate on billy x steve.” Just because i disagree with a ship doesn’t mean I’m hating on it, I just genuinely don’t get the appeal.

[iamahouseonfiresblog]

The Byler - Stancy parallels are strong 💖

[chaosdue]

all i gotta say is i’m not a stancy shipper, but “‘like we’re in love?’” made me sob

[owlish-decisions]

Say it with me folks 

understand and empathising is NOT the same as validating and justifying

billy hargrave from stranger things is a piece of racist abusive shit.  billy from stranger things also got abused. no one deserves that. but no one deserved billy being abusive either

[krunchycrispy]

Jim Hopper is an absolute chad, pass it on

[lengthofropes]

- This kid's gotta get his ego in check. - It's his tone. Right?

#anz12kparty

July 28 prompts: Family / Dustin and his dads

[timeladyshit]

do you ever think about how Joyce has had to watch Hopper almost die the same way she almost lost Will AND the way she did lose Bob

[stevesnailbat]

you can let it go, you can throw a party full of everyone you know, you can start a family who will always show you love, you don't have to be sorry for doing it on your own

matilda - harry styles

[smile-files]

okay okay i just finished watching camp cretaceous and i gotta talk about ben. like as a character is he just so funny

ben starts out polite and shy and sweet and afraid of literally everything. like all the other campers have no idea why in god's name he's here (which is completely fair, as he doesn't seem to want to be here either) - but then he befriends an ankylosaurus, which he names bumpy blongy scimbly scromplo. and then he gets taken by a pterodactyl :)

i think one of the strangest things to me is how you have apocalypse shows like this and of the main cast only one will realistically react to almost being killed. like ben almost gets killed by a carnotaur after being separated from the group and the second he finds cover he just instantly starts crying and like. finally. the fact that i should consider that cathartic is ridiculous lmao

no but seriously it's so funny he's gone for a whole season i think and the second he comes back we get an episode about every new trauma he's unlocked. now he's paranoid and jaded and really disconnected from his friends (and people generally)... this boy fears death. this boy will poke death in the eyes. this boy's first best friend is a dinosaur. this boy will commit arson in self defense. this boy thinks everything threatens him and so will continuously commit arson unprompted. this boy has just screamed for the first time ever and is now startled by how loud he was. trauma catharsis boy! get beaten up by the narrative and then beat up the narrative in revenge! let's go!!

it's been a while so i don't remember how this was addressed right after he rejoined the other campers but anyway his friends are so shocked and so concerned and ben's like shut up i need to blow something up or i'm gonna have a panic attack. y'know eventually he eases back into the group and gets to be an absolute dork again but he's always trauma catharsis boy from here on out. even if he gets barely any screentime later on lol </3

um but yeah it's sad how in the later seasons (especially the last) we don't get much ben-centric stuff... like there was the thing about him not wanting to leave bumpy on the island but besides that it's mostly ben being a dork who knows way too much about explosives.

it's hilarious, ben is like... gay with no gaydar (in a general sense). i'm skipping ahead a bit but yeah when yaz comes out to him - not to say that cishet people can't understand or sympathize with queer experiences altogether but idk his response is so earnest and thought-out that it just seems to me that this boy is queer in some way himself (trans icon? trans icon). and then it's really funny because in the season before ben completely missed a social cue (autistic icon? autistic icon) and thought that yaz was into him when she was just trying to third wheel for someone else. like ben do you even know what flirting is? are you sure?

y'know actually ben is scared of everything for the whole series, it's just that now he chooses fight over flight. if you cover his eyes to play "guess who" he'll shriek, and immediately turn around and stab you. ben surprise party incident 5 dead 13 injured. that's really funny to me because it's taking the timid -> brave pipeline to the logical extreme: still terrified, but now with weapons lol

ben is so funny. my beautiful, disturbed, beautiful boy (to quote darius). my guy who starts a battle whenever he makes eye contact with someone. my scrawny kid with a giant dinosaur. my will byers kinnie. my boy who's better at combat than conversation. ben really carried camp cretaceous and you better admit it

[isorottatime]

i’m gonna need b*lly stans to actually watch season 2

[counting-stars-gayly]

Mike Wheeler analysis: his trauma responses and how they pertain to his relationship with Eleven

At first, I thought it was really out of character for Mike to dehumanize El so much in season four, since he did the opposite in the three previous seasons, but man…I get it now.

Mike is a protective person and not just over his loved ones — right after he met El, he sought to protect her.

He took complete responsibility for her. He gave her food, water, clothes, a “bed,” and a place to stay. She rode on his bike whenever the kids went on their little missions, and he vouched for her, defended her. That’s one of the reasons why he got so angry when he thought she’d lied about Will and when she hurt Lucas. He’d trusted her to keep his friends safe, and he felt she’d not only hurt them but also betrayed him. Just as she relied on him for safety and comfort, he relied on her for the safety of his loved ones and comfort in knowing that they would be okay.

As long as he protected her—

—she could protect his friends and family.

(Obviously, he also looks out for her because he cares about her.)

El is someone who can ensure everyone’s safety when he can’t (ex: when she helped them save Will in season one and when she showed up to kill the demodogs and save Will in season two), which actually ended up leading to his insecurities in season four (but I’ll get back to that).

When Mike made that unnecessary comment, “She didn’t look fine,” at the dinner table, in season four, it had to do with his idealized view of her. El is “supposed” to ensure safety, yet she hurt someone without good reason. Though she immediately regretted hitting Angela, Mike still couldn’t get over how this action of hers contrasted so heavily with who he wanted her to be. In reality, she’s short tempered and prone to physical violence because it’s all she’s ever known; she’s learned to see violence as the answer, and Mike, without meaning to, fed into that big time.

However, for all his concern with acts of service, Mike’s not too worried about who’s taking care of him. He has a history of hiding his trauma and bottling up his emotions until they explode (ex: when he fought with Hopper in season two and when he yelled, “I love her, and I can’t lose her again,” in season three). He tends to be there for others when they confide in him but not confide in them. As far as I’m aware, there are three scenes where he opens up to someone about how he feels in regard to a serious issue (and each time, that “someone” is Will), yet in the first two scenes, he doesn’t actually share much.

The third scene shows a lot of growth in Mike’s character because it shows him opening up to an extent that he never has before. And his prior sit-down conversations with Will in season four were all building up to it, emphasizing its importance.

(This scene is also the climax of Will’s season four arc, but he’s not really the focus here.)

Mike usually tries to be “strong” so that he can make sure everyone else is okay — probably because his parents weren’t there for him much growing up.

(I can’t find a gif for it, but there’s also that scene where Mike tries to call El in episode one of season two, Dustin asks him why he’s on that channel, and Mike lies.)

When El disappeared in season one, he couldn’t get over it. He blamed himself because she had been “his responsibility.” So when she came back to save the day in season two, not only did he feel that his other loved ones were going to be okay, but he finally knew that she was okay and that she was alive. Finding out that Hopper had been hiding her the whole time triggered such an emotional reaction in Mike specifically because he’d been bottling up his trauma, guilt, and worry for almost a year.

After that, he didn’t want to let El out of his sight. Throughout season three, he’s attached to her at the hip because he’s afraid of losing her again (and because of comphet). It’s something that none of the other character pick up on (because he doesn’t talk about it), so his conflict with Max holds so much weight. She was right that El needed to be in charge of her own powers; she was wrong that El didn’t have physical limits. Mike was right that if El pushed herself too far, she’d reap the consequences, which she did, but he was wrong to disrespect her agency. Max thought El was invincible because she’d never seen her at her lowest, like Mike had. The two didn’t understand each other because Mike never explained this to her. He never opened up about what made him so afraid.

The first three seasons are filled to the brim with scenes of Mike humanizing El, and one of the ways in which he does this is by reminding others that she’s a human first and a hero second. But he still always looked up to her and saw her as a heroine. He also never really got to know her (because it’s easier to use someone as a beard when you don’t know much about their personality), just as she never really got to know him (because she went along with everything he did and assumed it was normal). This caused their relationship to be based solely on trauma bonding. In other words, the foreshadowing for what happened between them in season four was there from the start.

When he started reducing her to only her powers in season four, he wasn’t doing it because he doesn’t see her as a person. Rather, he was doing it because his favorite thing about her (and one of the few things he knows about her) is her protectiveness. He depends on her being protective. “I don’t know how to live without you.” Yeah, no shit. She is the only thing keeping this boy intact because she’s the only thing giving him a sense of stability.

His insecurities about not being good enough for her have to do with the fact that she has proven to be an effective fighter while every time he physically fights back, things don’t go as planned, and she often has to save him. He doesn’t feel like he can protect her anymore — because he can’t. He protected her throughout most of season one only to fail in the end. He had one scene in season two and one scene in season three where he was able to protect her, and he didn’t protect her at all in season four. He feels like he isn’t good enough if he isn’t taking care of someone. Not to mention, in his eyes, if he no longer has the ability to protect her, he has no control over any dangerous situation, and that, understandably, terrifies him. If something were to happen to her, he’d lose not only one person he loves but likely everyone else he loves, too.

His fear of losing El also ties into why he’s so afraid to admit he doesn’t love her in a romantic way. He’s worried that if they break up and if she finds out he’s queer, their friendship will be over as well.

We’re talking about a boy who’s grown up in an emotionally distant family and had two of his loved ones taken from him and presumed dead when he was only twelve years old. No wonder he’s afraid of ending up alone.

[multiverseoffandoms-blog]

Billy Hargrove walked, so Eddie Munson could run. 🤴🏻

[bramb]

Kali will ALWAYS be a better foil to Eleven than some fruity guard

[bisexual-cryptid]

wait. i’m rewatching some of stranger things and why did kali (number 8) have different powers from el in season 2, but now in season 4 all the other kids at the lab had the same powers???

[sunflowerharrington]

You Can’t Win Without Fighting - Steve Harrington X OC, Eddie Munson X OC, slight Billy Hargrove X OC

i couldn’t wait any longer to begin posting whatever this trainwreck is

slowly but surely i’ll get this fully posted onto tumblr

EDDIE X ORIGINAL CHARACTER

STEVE X ORIGINAL CHARACTER

CONTAINS MASSIVE SPOILERS (including in chapter one)

@taecube @wzrlds @xxlangdon @evan-peters-is-the-rat-king @quickiesgirl @langdon-cumslut anybody else wanna be added to my ycwwf taglist? let me know 💛