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tsugarubecker · 2 years

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M*****n will not be endgame

(I’m censoring that ship name all to hell in hopes that it won’t show up in y’all’s tags. If it somehow does please tell me & I will find a way to remove it! The last thing I want to do is disrupt someone else’s tag with a take that they would not be interested in reading, or that would disrupt their peaceful browsing. 💞 Please comment on the notes of this post if this is showing up where it shouldn’t be & I’ll fix that asap!)

So! Hyperfixation go brrrr, I am having some epiphanies about the overarching messages pertaining to romance/healthy relationships in Stranger Things.

I am now positive beyond a doubt that M*****n won’t be endgame. Why? Because their relationship is, in every single way conceivable, the exact antithesis of the thesis statement about romance that the Duffers are delivering, which can be summed up as something like this:

A healthy, real, flourishing, fulfilling romantic relationship is not one that two people fall into by accident or by circumstance, or because other people assume that their interest in each other couldn’t possibly be platonic since they’re “opposite sexes”. Romantic relationships with good solid foundations include things such as: choosing to enter the relationship with intention. Telling the truth to each other. Establishing trust in one another. Consistently demonstrating the willingness to be open, vulnerable, and emotionally available. Choosing each other at each fork-in-the-road moment.

The reason I give many of those specific examples as part of what I understand to be the Duffer Brothers’ thesis statement about what a good romantic relationship looks like is because we see examples of those dynamics - kind of in bursts here and there - between various couples (or people who aren’t couples yet) in the show. I’m sure you can think of instances/examples.

But to go back specifically to why M-ship-name won’t be endgame: the Duffer Brothers do plan to end this show within the next couple of seasons. Probably at S5. They do not have time to develop all of those dynamics between M & E - on the contrary, they explicitly worked, in season 3 especially, to show that M & E exhibit the opposite of many of the dynamics that the Duffers see as integral to healthy & flourishing romantic relationships.

But on the flip side (even ignoring aaaaall the extensive queer coding of these two characters for a second) - who shares many dynamics with Mike that can be said to line up with the Duffers’ thesis statement of what healthy romance looks like? Will!

Mike & Will chose to enter their relationship with intention, not just circumstance. (“I asked. And you said yes.”) They tell the truth to each other, or strive to. (“It was a seven.” “I guess I did. I really did.”) They establish/have trust in one another. (“You’re like a super spy.” “If anyone can find this thing, it’s Will.”) They demonstrate willingness to be emotionally available and vulnerable. (“Will, I’m sorry, I was being a total asshole!” “Sometimes I feel like I’m going crazy.” “Well if we’re both going crazy then we’ll go crazy together, right?” “Yeah, but. What if you want to join another party?”) They choose each other repeatedly. (“Not possible.” “Are you okay? I couldn’t find you!” “Will is alive. Will is alive!”)

The way that these two embody - or are always working towards embodying - the ideal dynamics of a healthy, loving romantic relationship with true connection, is something that the Duffers have worked to show with painstaking detail over the course of 3 seasons. (Season 3 in large part showed them fucking it up because Mike was trying really hard to follow heteronormative tropes of what romance is, instead. Which clearly went super well for him Which means Mike and Will will have soft, emotionally vulnerable moments of working to fix their bond in S4, because character and plot development are necessary as we move towards the end of the show - yayyy I’m excited for them to get back to their genuine connection! - but I digress.)

What I’m saying at the end of the day is that this show could have been about M and E falling accidentally into romance but then needing to back up and be intentional. But it’s not. Stranger Things is actually already exploring that dynamic - with Jancy, Lumax, kinda Jopper, maybe Stancy, etc.

The reason that M*****n is different is that both the elaborate queercoding and the build up of ideal relationship dynamics exist between Mike and Will. And the Duffers simply do not have time to flip the whole story direction on its head now - not without it being rushed and therefore poorly executed. Nor would it make narrative sense after the intentional build up/showing of the good dynamics between Mike and Will and the not-good dynamics between M and E.

And that is why M*****n won’t be endgame - Byler will. Byler is an example which supports the Duffer Brothers’ thesis statement about what real romance is, and Byler being canon is what this show has been working toward the entire time. Exciting!

(With all this said, if there are any M-ship-name folks still reading - I’d be hella down to read an alternate version of Stranger Things where everything went differently! You know? M and E had possibilities in S1, it’s just that the story went in another direction pretty quickly - or, rather, was planned to go that direction from the show’s inception. So, I’d be down to read an AU where things were set up differently between M&E from the jump, and they were the main ship of the series who were allowed to approach their relationship with a lot of intentionality. I think that might be lovely to read. Just putting that out there!)

#seriously i watched a couple ST S1 eps today and my brain has been brrrrrrrr ever since #someone let me sleep *cries*#also sidenote duzie is the superior-est ship in ST #i will not be elaborating or taking criticism at this time. thank you #byler #stranger things analysis #stranger things theory #stranger things prediction #stranger things

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