#st3 rain fight | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

nadia-zahra · 1 year

Text

The Rain Fight and my new take on it

while rereading my analysis on st3 Mike and the rain fight I had a lil "oh shit I have a different view on this now" moment.

In my analysis, I said it was miscommunication, and to some extent, it is... just not in the way I've explained previously.

My og take was that it was Mike taking Will's, "you're ruining everything and for what? So you can swap spit with some stupid girl?!" as 'you're ruining everything because you like making out with El who is stupid' instead of what Will really meant: you're ruining everything because you're straight. And then I wrote off Mike's response of "El's not stupid and it's not my fault you don't like girls" as him trying to say 'it's not my fault you haven't grown up yet' instead of 'it's not my fault you're gay'

But nowadays I'm like 95% sure that this fight was in fact "you're ruining everything because you like girls" "it's not my fault you're gay".

First off, MIKE IS GAY (imo) and, atp in the show, he was battling against internalized homophobia. His response of "...it's not my fault you don't like girls" sounds like hardcore projecting; especially when we know it's in response to Will taking a stab at Mike's sexuality.

Here's where I think the miscommunication lies: neither Mike nor Will know they are both 1) in the closet 2) into each other. Both of them just think the other is straight, and are alone in their feelings for the other.

So when Will said, "You're ruining everything and for what? So you can swap spit with some stupid girl?!", he wasn't intentionally going below the belt because he genuinely thinks Mike is straight and into El. However, from Mike's pov that was basically getting called out for using El as a beard. Mike got so freaking defensive from Will's words because he wasn't ready to admit to himself that he's gay or selfishly using El.

Mike projects at Will, "It's not my fault you don't like girls," and also unintentionally hits below the belt because he thinks Will is straight and just hasn't gotten past the 'ewww cooties' stage of childhood. Will is canonically gay, so his reaction to this makes sense-- he takes it as 'it's not my fault you're gay' and becomes stunned by the fact his crush/bff (the guy who's protected him from homophobic bullies) is now spewing the same homophobic bullshit.

However, Mike's response to Will's reaction doesn't make sense... unless he's gay and still projecting his true desires, making them seem like ridiculous hypotheticals. *cough* Wanting to spend the rest of their lives together playing dnd and subtly saying they'd live together forever *cough*. And Will's response of "Yeah I guess I did. I really did" thankfully doesn't have any blurred lines to read through and he really is just stating, 'yeah, I really thought we'd be together forever'.

Second off, I think I had that initial perspective on the rain fight because the duffers said (back when this was still a hot topic) that this was supposed to be taken simply as Mike meaning 'it's not my fault you haven't grown up yet' because Will's sexuality was still in the dark atp in time and they've been known to bend the truth in order to not spoil anything. However, with hindsight (and confirmation that Will is gay) we know Will took it as Mike being a homophobe.

So, with that being said, Mike's pov on the rainfight is still kinda in murky waters-- no one fully knows why tf he said what he said or how he took Will's words.

The last thing I'm going to say in this unplanned analysis, so that way I can go back to prepping for my s4 Mike analysis is this: If in st5 when it's revealed Mike has feelings for Will and is gay (or some type of queer person), does this mean that with hindsight we'll be able to know exactly what was being said in the rain fight?

#byler #byler analysis #mike wheeler is gay #will byers #mike wheeler #will x mike #mike x will #st3 rewatch #st3

45 notes · View notes

positivelybyler · 2 years

Text

thinking about how after the byler fight in st3, mike immediately biked over to wills house in the pouring rain and started banging on the door to apologize. then when he figured he wasn't home, the first place he went to find will was castle byers, because he just knows will that well. and when he reached castle byers... it was in shambles.

i just know that mike was devastated about that because i'd like to believe that mike and will spent a lot of time there together. for him, it was a symbol of the loss of childhood just as much as it was for will. it was probably also a huge slap in the face for mike because he knew that will destroyed castle byers because of him, because of their fight.

it's kinda really sad how we didn't get to see mike's or anyone's reaction, really, to castle byers being destroyed by will. and the fact that it wasn't mentioned again in the show.

#imagine mike going to check out the remains and he sees a photo of the party ripped up in half #and the photo is split exactly between mike and will #no but seriously i refuse to believe that castle byers had no other significance in the show #it better be brought up in season 5 #byler #byler endgame #byler nation #mike wheeler #will byers #stranger things

72 notes · View notes

byerslvr · 2 years

Text

༉‧₊˚ just another small byler analysis:

I finished my rewatch of st3 and something that I can't get out of my mind is... well, let me explain.

do you guys remember when max told el "he'll crawl back to you begging for forgiveness?" or something among these lines?

during the entire season, mike looks for lucas as a source of knowledge (despite them getting girlfriends at the exact same time). he asks them about how girls minds "work", how to make it right, what approach to take after having issues with el and her breaking up with him.

it's kind of calculated, but still not that newsworthy. now, here's the thing.

when mike and will have The Fight, mike isn't playing a role here. he's actually being hot-headed and this doesn't seem like a performative lovers quarrel like the one outside of starcourt.

here, both say things to hurt each other, both are confused and angry and hurt.

so will runs away, destroys castle byers, everything we know. and you know what mike did? he went for him, he looked out for him even if it was raining, he went to his house to tell him he's sorry.

he didn't need to ask lucas "should we approach them? what do we do? should we call them?" no, no, with will he didn't need a confirmation or someone to give him a little push. it was instinctual, not what guys are supposed to do with girls. he didn't need someone to tell him what to do because "his girlfriend is mad", he just knew he had hurt his bestfriend and needed to make it right.

in the end, this shows pretty well how some of the things mike does are actually him trying to know what the role of a boyfriend in a heteronormative relationship is and trying his earnest to stick to it despite not being himself as we're shown in st4. but his real instinctive nature, the impulsive one we know that defines him, is with will.

with will, he doesn't need advice or guidelines. with will, if he's hurt, he doesn't need his mind to guide him. he just acts.

and before someone says mike has protected el before and looked out for her, of course he has! he loves her with the P letter. but we're talking about usual life situations, not life or death ones.

because in st4 we're also shown who awakes that need to go and make it right when he knows he's done wrong. and he does find the words he needs, figures.

in the end... yes, mike went crawling and begging for forgiveness. just not for the one others expected.

#byler #byler theory #byler canon #byler analysis #will byers #mike wheeler isn't straight #mike wheeler

51 notes · View notes

cleradinthealps · 1 year

Note

hi! when did you start shipping byler? what’s your favorite moment of theirs? and what’s your favorite part about being here on byler tumblr? have a good day ❣️

omg this ask made me smile sm!!

i’m not quite sure when exactly i started shipping byler. i was never a milebin so i was just kind of neutral to byler until around st3. i think the rain fight rly opened my eyes haha.

as for my favorite moment of theirs, i would have to say crazy together💕 my fav part about being on byler tumblr is definitely the community— for the most part, the people here are super nice and cool to interact with! there are so many amazing people who contribute to the fandom with different fanworks like art, gifs, fics, mood boards, analyses, etc. the byler tag feels different from lots of other tags (excuse me while i have my ‘not like other girls’ moment) bc it’s like we all live in a little town and knock on each other’s doors to offer them cookies or something. idk the people i’ve surrounded myself with on here are all super cool— byler tumblr makes me happy unlike most social media, so it’s cool to come on here and just exist you know?? sorry for rambling, but i hope you have a wonderful day!!

#ty anon!!#asks

0 notes

itsonlystrange · 3 years

Text

I’d like to point out that the “it’s all just a bunch of coincidence” argument is very poor. People say that about anything they don’t like. If we’re using this argument then I could say that everytime Mileven accidentally held hands or touched or any of that lovey dovey stuff that the Mileven fandom goes nuts over is a coincidence, but I have 0 evidence that it’s a coincidence, I’m just saying it is because that’s how I, a biased person on the side of byler, sees it. And I love the Milevens that actually respect us, it’s just the toxic ones that stomp on us or rain on our parade that irritate me.

So I ask skeptical Milevens, why do you think it’s all a coincidence? Because the Duffers have gone on record multiple times saying that nothing in their show is a coincidence, so it’s odd of you to assume that it is, when that goes against everything the duffers have said.

I see a lot of people claim that all of Bylers very romantic coded scenes are just coincidences with out any real evidence solely because they want them to be coincidences.

Reminder that the duffers had to write, revise, have Noah and Finn read at the table read, rehearse, and then film all of Bylers romantic coded scenes. And do you seriously believe that nobody stepped up and said, “Hey, I think some people will start to ship this if you make your two male characters hold hands and look at each others lips.” Like on paper, that sounds romantic. And on screen, it looks romantic too! If the duffers didn’t want byler to be shown as romantic they wouldn’t have put all of that effort into Mike and Will’s romanticly coded scenes in season two. And sure, one could say they were oblivious and didn’t realize that this relationship could be seen as anything more than romantic and that one of their 100 other writers and revisors and producers didn’t step up and say “Is this really what we want to be conveying in this show when they’re just supposed to be friends?” (Which I doubt. The duffers and everyone else on the writing crew knew exactly what they were implying. And if the duffers themselves didn’t, I HIGHLY doubt that someone didn’t step up and point out how romantic some of these scenes are, especially considering multiple of their writers are apart of the lgbtq community which makes it highly more likely that someone would have realized as I’m sure their gay senses are much stronger than those of the cishet writers on the squad. ) However, byler kind of blew up after season two, so if ST didn’t mean for Mike and Will’s relationship to be seen as more than platonic, then why did they continue doing it in season three? And the thing is, we’re not “delusional” for thinking this. Hundreds of thousands of millions of people have pointed this out across all platforms. It stops being a problem with us and “seeing what we want to see” when millions of people see the same, and it becomes the writers problem for even implying that in the first place.

Here’s an example: take Lucas and Dustin. Sure, there are definitely people out there that think or head canon as either as gay, but not nearly as big of a community as the Byler community. The reason is: Lucas and Dustin don’t have queer coding. They haven’t been painted the same way as Mike and Will’s relationship has. Or Jonathan, yeah, people may head canon as him as gay, or even think he actually is, but he doesn’t have any evidence that really points up to the fact that he is, or that he could be.

The duffers aren’t stupid. They wouldn’t have written byler this way if they didn’t want people shipping it. The official ST writer account has acknowledged byler multiple times, before st3 even started filming. They knew what they were doing. If their goal was to portray Mike and Will as a simple platonic friendship, and that all of their queer coded scenes in st2 were just a coincidence, why would they continue to do it in season 3? Queer baiting is real, yes. However like I said before, the st writing team has a lot of queer and lgbtq+ members themselves, not sure why they would want to queer bait when they’re gay/lesbian/bisexual themselves.

The truth is, byler would have never made it this far if it wasn’t meant to be shipped and portrayed like more of a romantic relationship than a platonic one. They would have shut it down awhile ago. They wouldn’t be so ominous about it. Noah and Finn wouldn’t constantly dodge questions about it unless they legally weren’t allowed to answer them. The duffers wouldn’t have been so vague in the ending of season 3 or in any interviews regarding season 3 about byler. Mike and Will wouldn’t have gotten a whole segment in the official ST book, they wouldn’t have held hands! Seriously! They held hands. Did someone seriously not point out how non platonic that was?———

And use the excuse all you want, “Will was just scared. That’s why Mike held his hand.” Okay, well Max and Lucas held hands when they were both scared in the exact same episode but I guess that doesn’t count because they’re a boy and a girl and Mike and Will are two boys. ———-And it’s funny because you KNOW that if Mike promised to go crazy together with El, that would he in every Milevens Instagram bio, it’d be on merchandise, it’d be everywhere. If Mike said meeting El was the best thing he’s ever done, people would be going bat shit crazy over how romantic that is and how they’re so in love. If Mike and El fought and he ran out in the middle of the rain looking for her when he couldn’t even apologize to his real girlfriend who dumped him just hours prior, people would say that Mike was in love with El and how much he cares about her yadda yadda. But that’s the thing. It’s two boys, so apparently it has to be platonic. Because that’s just how it works in their cishet minds. ——I’d like to see a better argument then “it was all a coincidence.” Because that’s not valid. Why? Why do you think it’s all a coincidence? It’s all just fake? Please. Elaborate. Because if these romantic scenes involved Mike and El instead of Mike and Will, then they’d see. Because they didn’t have Finn and Noah rehearse all these romantic coded scenes multiple times for nothing. They literally wrote, revised, edited, rehearsed, and filmed ALL of these scenes and still went through with it. And even in season three when people really started shipping byler, they STILL directed Finn and Noah to look at eachothers lips. They still filmed the rain fight. KNOWING byler shippers existed and KNOWING this would only heighten the amount of byler shippers there are.

The duffers aren’t stupid. This isn’t a surface level show. Everything they do is intentional, they’ve said it themselves. And yes, I agree that some byler proof COULD just be apophenia, but stuff like this? Crazy together? Looking at eachothers lips? Holding hands? I’m the only one that cares about Will? Mike keeping his eyes open in the final Mileven kiss, those aren’t small little things. You’re telling me that they couldn’t find another take for that final Mileven kiss? No. Finn kept his eyes open because he was directed to do so. The duffers are writers and directors for a reason. They went to school for this. So please, I’d like to see some actual argument against byler other than “they said they loved eachother!” “It’s all a coincidence!” I’d like to see people actually counter my arguments with actual evidence. Not just “Finn says they’re in love” not just “Millie ships it!” Because interviews are not evidence. They’re instructed to create hype for the show. If David can lie about hopper being dead, Finn and Millie can lie about Mileven being in love. I don’t want the argument of “it’s been built up for 3 seasons so they won’t destroy it now.” Stancy was built up for 2 seasons and see how that turned out. And Mileven fell more in season three than it went up.

Anyways,, if you’re a polite Mileven, this isn’t for you. I love you with my whole heart. If you’re just vibing, I love you. Ship what you want to ship! Feel free to counter my argument! However, If you’re someone who calls us “delusional”, leave. The doors right there. The cast has talked about how much they hate the ship wars in our fandom, so if you’re just gonna say how stupid we are, don’t let the door hit you on the way out:)

Sorry for long post lol. Love you all

#stranger things #byler #will byers #mike wheeler #st4 #byler is endgame

122 notes · View notes

erectionsandtea · 3 years

Text

OKaY GuYS, listen, I'm sorry to do this but I need to get this out bc I can't sleep bc it's bugging me so much, okay?

I want to say a few things to people who claim that mileven is fake/not in love/toxic in ST3 (and I don't mean byler/byeler fans specifically, jsyk), things that have probably been said before but I'm going to say them again anywah

Sorry in advance

1) I DON'T CARE if you think 14 year olds can't be in love. I'm not watching ST for its realism, I just want my babies to be happy

2) "mike and eleven's break up was so colorful and upbeat, so clearly they don't love each other" pREpARE tO BE TOLd

Eleven knows next to nothing about relationships, and most of what she DOES know (if not everything) she learns from max in those moments when max is convincing her to dump mike. Max tells el that she's dumped lucas like five (5) times, and he has always come crawling back. With how little el knows, she's probably thinking that's what will happen with Mike, she will dump him and he will come crawling back and all will good and whatever

"mike doesn't love el cos he didn't cry when she dumped him, also he just sits around in the basement eating cheetos and burping at lucas" while true, it could very be because MaYBE This dumping came out of NOwHERE, literally nowhere. They hadn't fought (yet), everything was fine (or so mike thinks), and then out of nowhere he just gets dumped?? Maybe he was just so shocked and confused that he wasn't registering it at first, mAYbE he was in denial, idk!!

Also I'm sure mike doesn't love el bc he doesn't spend the entire rest of the season trying to figure what he did wrong ,what's wrong with her, and trying to win her back, oh and also caring for and about her even tho they are still broken up Oh WAiT-

3) "mike doesn't love el, he loves will bc" etc, other stuff in s3 -> are we just ignoring that fact that mike is literally ignoring will a lot of the time bc he's stuck on el, I'm sorry but of our boy loved will maybe he would have stopped to play dnd with him

4) pleaSE zTOP comparing mileven's breakup to mike and Will's fight outside castle byers in the rain. They are not the same and shouldn't be compared like they are (and I am NOT saying that mike doesn't care about will at all or anything bC OFC He DoES)

5) mike literally does that cliche movie trope thing where he blurts out his feelings for el without even thinking or before he realizes what he's doing "I love her and I can't lose her again!" You can see the shock on his face after he says it, that shit isn't planned, it was spontaneous which often (THO NoT AlwayS I AdmIT) means it's true/real in tv and movies

6) "if mike loves el, why doesn't he say it back at the end of the season?"

*ahem* fIRST of all, because he already said it! SeCOnD of all, when she says it, she says "I love you too". You don't say it back to the person who is saying it back after you already said it once. It would just sound awkward. It doesn't matter that they both said it at different days/times, they can still both mean it

7) "why does mike avoid saying his feelings when el confronts him at the end?"

Picture this: you blurted out your feelings to the world, and then you find out mAYBE the person for whom you feel has heard it, but you don't know for sure, and they don't say it back. Then that person confronts you about saying it. AND you're a fuckin teenager!! You're probably going to be awkward and weird about it, and you might try to pretend you have no idea what they're talking about bc maybe if they don't feel the same way, you can just brush the whole thing off as a joke or pretend it never happened

8) "mileven's relationship is toxic/unhealthy, all they do is make out" -> they. Are. Teenagers. They're probly horny as fuck, aLSO who's to say they didn't talk and get to know each other over the MaNY mONthS separating seasons 2 and 3? You can't say, I can't say, we don't know, not to mention they did get to know each other (EVEN IF JuST A liTTLE bIT) during season 1, remember? You honestly expect me to believe that horny teens won't be all over each other at every fuckin opportunity?? Please

"well max and lucas weren't making out all the time" well max and lucas could be at a different stage of their relationship, couldn't they, they haven't know each other QUITE as long, haven't been through QUITE as much trauma together...see what I'm saying?

"neither mike or el spend any time with anyone else, their relationship is so unhealthy" um yes they do, after they break up their time together gets quite limited okay, and I will agree with you that I think they needed some of that

9) and maybe, MayBE mileven won't be endgame, okay, it is possible, but I will not sit here and pretend that the reason they are not endgame is because they don't care about and love each other

EDIT: 10) "el isn't ready for a relationship" maybe so but y'all think will is?? (Okay this one may be directed at byler/byeler)

Will basically went from pre-pubescent to puberty without properly transitioning between the two, because he was either missing, possessed, or suffering from ptsd for like two years!! And when he's finally okay (mostly), all he wants to do is pretend things are how they used to be. He's not interested in relationships or love or whatever, poor boy just wants to play dnd and not worry or think about stupid grown-up stuff

The last thing he needs (imo) is MORE drama from a relationship. What he needs is someone to just be there for him.

I know, I'm a bitch, byeler/byler shippers will hate me (if they don't already) or maybe everyone hates me

But

I'm just tired

You can't just claim a ship is real or not but at the sAME TIMe ignore crucial details or facts okay ? (I mean okay, I guess you can, but like why??)

I am going to bed now, of I think of anything else to say, I will add it in the morning, and I am ready for the hate

❤️

#stranger things #mileven #once again will not tag byler/byeler #im not that fuckin cruel to push it in their faces like that or something #ship who you want #im just trying to say you cant ignore details and then claim truth #also i need to rewatch s3 so lmk if i got anything wrong #❤️#goodnight #are watching the same show i feel like we're not #st3 #me trying to counterpoint every single pro-byler argument i see lol #im terrible

41 notes · View notes

panharmonium · 4 years

Text

stranger things 3, a visual summary:

more coherent thoughts under the cut, because wow.

......okay. that was a Trainwreck. an absolute mess.

i remember when my coworkers were watching S3 (and still urging me to start season 1) and they were saying how amazing the latest season was, and honestly i think there must just be a difference in people who watch tv just to be entertained and people who watch tv and automatically evaluate the story (aka fandom veterans and English majors, lol - cue Me twice), because WHO could watch this critically and praise it that way?

it's honestly hard to know where to even begin; i've been sending frustrated notes to @brambleberrycottage ever since episode three and now that i'm done with episode 8 there's just......so much more to say

first, good things:

erica is a great character. she's what max should have been (aka, uh.......interesting!) i liked the realization moment where dustin was like "you're a NERD!"

that entire sequence where will is so upset with lucas and mike for not being engaged with the dnd game was very well done, especially the conversation he has with mike out in the rain. i loved that moment where mike asked him "did you think we were just going to hang out in my basement playing games forever?" and will said, "yeah. yeah, i guess i did." i really felt that. [edit, now that i've finished: this was never resolved. will giving away his dnd books at the end was not an actual resolution to this conflict.]

steve is still a good dude, and robin was pretty cool. i'm down for them being super friends. but i'm still mourning the steve+nancy+jonathan trio that was a thing for like 5 seconds and then never returned.

i loved how genuinely excited steve was to see dustin when dustin came back from camp. that was adorable. "HENDERSON!!!!" "how many children are you friends with?"

and uh. yeah. i had more problems with this season than praise-bestowing moments, so. here goes that bit.

OVERARCHING PROBLEMS:

1. keep it simple, stupid

remember in the office when dwight quoted the above advice to ryan as michael's rule for making a sale? the same advice applies to storytelling.

season 1 of stranger things is so simple. there is One Monster. that is the danger. and somehow, that single monster manages to be a thousand times more terrifying than all of these new "bigger, scarier, more epic" threats crammed into the second two seasons.

how goofy is the stranger things season 3 plot, seriously? russians are blackmailing a small-town mayor so they can buy up land to steal power from the town while operating a secret lab under the mall to open a gate to the Upside Down (WHY?), while simultaneously a remnant of the malevolent force that was "defeated" last season has reanimated itself and is making people scarf chemicals (WHY?), and then it possesses one of them and uses that person to possess a bunch of other people in order to build itself a body made out of melted people, in order to kill el, whose only story this season is breaking up with her boyfriend, and we have to infiltrate this russian base in order to close the gate (same endgame as last season - BIG NO-NO) to kill the goo monster, except last time the "mindflayer” survived the gate being closed, so why would this even WORK, and -

the fact that there are so many "round-up/info dump" scenes where characters summarize what's going on and make implausibly accurate connections/guesses about what it all must mean is a red flag. the characters shouldn’t have to tell your story to the audience. if it's too complicated for us to keep straight on our own, it's too complicated.

the amount of energy that goes into trying to lash together a Chaos Plot with too many shaky legs leaves nothing left over for nuanced character development or mood establishment. you're constantly running to catch up to your own flimsy story before it collapses on top of itself.

2. the horror!

S1 of stranger things was the scariest thing i'd ever seen.

granted, i don't watch a lot of horror, because i don't like it. i get scared too easily and then i legitimately can't sleep. i watched a horror movie five years ago that i still think about every time the lights are off in my house. but still, ST1 was something i had never experienced before.

it wasn't creature horror, and it wasn't just suspense. it was the UNSETTLINGNESS of it all. it wasn't really about the monster. it was about the Upside Down.

the reason ST1 is so successful is because of how much we don’t know. it's the horror of not understanding what is happening, and the terror of knowing that nobody thinks it’s real. feeling like you're going crazy and being cut off from all assistance. the conspiracy and the cover-up. and the sheer unsettlingness of the whole parallel worlds things just tipped me over the edge - the idea that you can take one wrong step and then be suddenly and without warning completely off the map, simultaneously right next to the people you want to get to and also utterly beyond their reach. that was fucking scary!!!!

and they do it all with so little. i have literally never been more scared in my life than when i would see those christmas lights start flickering. and they're just LIGHTS! yes, we see the monster later, but it's the uncertainty that's most frightening. we don't understand how it arrives in our world, and we don’t know where it will show up next. it could be right next to you - on the other side. you could be standing on top of it. you just don't know. it’s like what jonathan says to nancy in her bedroom - “it can’t get us in here.” and she says, “we don’t know that.”

the later seasons of stranger things, by comparison, did not scare me at all. season two was like a zombie movie - hordes of weak enemies that you can just shoot with a gun. and season 3 was even less frightening - upping the ante and making things gorier, more explosive, and bigger just isn't the vibe they set in S1. i'm not scared of that giant goop monster. it's like godzilla. it's not horror; it's just a lot of noise.

the unsettling, "creep" factor that made season 1 so effective was gone. it just turned into a regular old monster movie, and i didn't find that particularly interesting.

3. illogical, captain

a while ago there was a wave of pushback against people complaining about plot holes, but you know what? there is, in fact, an appropriate place for us to talk about plausibility, as well as the point at which our suspension of disbelief collapses.

ST3 is a bona fide plausibility disaster. i did not believe half of the story, because it was not unfolding in a believable way.

half of the plot points in this season would not have happened if the characters had been behaving with any kind of sense. it is absolutely impossible for me to believe that none of these children IMMEDIATELY went to joyce or hopper the minute they knew something weird was going on. it makes no sense. after the shit they've seen? it makes sense in season 1, because the kids are still so young that they have that kind of magical thinking that makes all of this seem kind of like an adventure. but they're teenagers now, and developmentally, they’re past that stage. they know the evil creature is back and they're pretty sure it's possessing billy? for some unfathomable reason, they don't go to an adult, but try to trap billy in the sauna and just see what happens. the other group has actual proof that russian soldiers are up to something shady in the mall? they don't tell an adult; they send a TEN YEAR-OLD in through the AIR DUCTS to investigate the secret room guarded by MEN WITH GUNS.

this is ridiculous. none of this should have happened. none of this WOULD have happened. it breaks the boundaries of disbelief. it completely sabotages the audience’s engagement with the story - joyce and hopper's whole detour with alexei and murray is so dull, because its entire purpose is to bring hop and joyce up to speed on something that we, the audience, already know. the other characters already found out this stuff, but did not communicate it - the gate is being opened again in a russian lab underground. there's no suspense for us. nothing new is revealed. we're just waiting for them to hurry up and finish finding out so we can move on to the next thing.

moreover: there are so many other problems besides just "these characters would have talked to each other." why on earth would murray, whose sole characteristic is extreme paranoia, take alexei wandering around the festival for hot dogs and carnival games. why would hopper be so virulently against the possibility that weird shit might be happening again? does he remember the past year or what? how on earth would the kids be able to fight off that massive monster with an ax and a hunting rifle? it's made out of dead guts and bones; why does it care if they shoot it?! how in the WORLD is this russian facility so penetrable? i'm sorry, it's just - beyond believable. it doesn't have cameras? the russians guards really can't tell that murray isn't a native speaker? they don't check his id when they don't recognize him? joyce and hopper really just got that lucky, to be asked a question and have “smile and nod” be the right answer? nobody ever got shot? it's silly. it's just silly. so many things - erica uses the "Open" button to open the elevator door in order to let steve and robin and dustin inside, but once the elevator is at the bottom of the shaft, robin explains the door's inexplicable non-opening because......you apparently need a keycard to use the buttons???? THAT MAKES NO SENSE; ERICA JUST USED THE BUTTONS A SECOND AGO.

even the entire endgame of this season is a contradiction! if the mind-flayer survived el closing the gate last time, it doesn't make sense that closing the gate this time would kill it. literally the entire plot of last season was "we need to get this thing out of will, because the creature will die once the gate is closed, and we want to make sure will doesn't die with it." but apparently the creature didn't die upon closing the gate; it just got trapped in our dimension. but now apparently it WILL die upon closing the gate. for whatever fucking reason.

i'm sorry, but that’s a mess. that’s a bona fide mess.

4. watch your tone

i honestly think the tonal change is the thing that made me the most frustrated about this season. it's possible to have a terrible plot and still stay relatively true to your characters - you'll still have a bad season, but at least you didn't bastardize your characters in the process.

i had issues with S2 and i definitely was not as impressed with it as i was with S1, but at least in S2 joyce and hopper were recognizable. in S3, i felt like i was watching strangers. the tonal shift was bizarre and off-putting, more so with hopper than joyce, but it affected both of them.

even as early as the very beginning of this season, i was feeling weird about how often hopper was being used for comedy. and as the season progressed, this trend only became more pronounced. almost every scene we had of him felt silly - and not like there was just something funny in the scene for me to laugh at, but like the audience was almost being asked to laugh AT him. like he was constantly the butt of the joke.

this really bothered me. from that incredibly sincere and heart-wrenching portrayal of him in season 1, when they kept him rooted in the trauma of losing his daughter and the breakdown of his marriage, and then how that same trauma made him so driven to save will and protect the kids - what a change. even in season 2 i was frustrated how the throughline of his daughter wasn’t touched again until the very last episode, and now in season 3 we’ve left that part of him so far behind that he's just there for us to laugh at. we're supposed to laugh at scenes of him being drunk and a mess. every scene he's in is either him arguing with joyce for comedic relief or being way over the top with alexei or the mayor. he was like a caricature of himself, and i didn't recognize him.

joyce suffered from the same thing, just by virtue of proximity. she spent almost all of her time in this season with hopper, and virtually all of that time was taken up with silly shenanigans or comically overblown arguing. what a departure from the desperate mother of season 1, who was maligned by everyone in town and only taken seriously by the audience. now it’s the audience who are supposed to be chuckling at her.

i dunno. the tone shift was very dramatic, very obvious, and it impacted the entire season. are we supposed to be taking this seriously or is it supposed to be a joke? a little bit of humor to break tension can be a good thing, but when it's constant, it confuses the mood.

and i personally don't think it was appropriate or respectful to either of these characters, in this case.

SMALLER THINGS THAT BOTHERED ME:

this show has 100% hit maximum character saturation. by the end of this season there were 13 core characters onscreen at the same time, in the same scene! it’s too many people! they cannot reasonably develop that many people in the space allotted.

i still am not interested in max. i don't feel anything for her. she doesn't feel real. i don't hate her, but she's just an empty vessel, and i really do think she's superfluous to this show. i think you could remove her with very little reworking and the show would be stronger for it. (they TRIED to do something interesting with billy, and i might have cared if we had been given literally any reason to care about him previously, but there was no investment earned there. they didn't do the front-end work to make him somebody we were interested in.)

weird relationship sunderings from previous seasons. i felt very strange about jonathan barely even seeing will this entire season. i felt very strange about steve having almost zero contact with nancy. i felt very strange about joyce hardly ever interacting with her kids. all of these were core relationships - the characters were BUILT on those relationships, and they don't feel real outside of them. not seeing these characters devote time to these relationships makes it feel like i'm watching a slightly different show.

the VIOLENCE. apparently this is a beat-em-up now??? i really felt like every other scene somebody was getting beaten to a bloody pulp. there was SO much smashing and bashing and throwing people into walls and fistfights and head trauma like - first of all, i find that stuff pretty boring, and second of all, all of these people should be in the hospital.

the GORE. other people’s mileage may vary, obviously; i just didn't like that. i looked away at the scene with the rat, and all this...goopy dissolving human shit, and the stabbings, and just...general grossness level - season 1 managed to be bloodcurdlingly terrifying without any of this stuff.

i know this borders on nitpicky, but yet more medical malfeasance - another example of someone receiving an injection via the mysterious 90 degree angle neck route, plus - was anyone else losing it at the fact that steve and robin “puked up” a drug they received……..via injection?????? IT’S NOT IN THEIR STOMACHS, FOLKS! THEY CAN’T PUKE IT UP! IT DOESN’T WORK LIKE THAT!

the complete lack of follow-up to last season. the whole S3 plotline (such as it is) feels like a weird side quest. last season seemed to be furthering the mythos and setting us up for "there are other children like el/brenner is alive" - but this season, that fact appears to have been forgotten by everyone (even el!!!) and has nothing to do with the story that we're given, which is a goofy and redundant story about russians opening a secret lab under the mall which requires us to solve the exact same problem as last season (closing the gate).

this show's inability to keep certain throughlines in its headlights/keep things visible on the periphery instead of dropping them completely and then bringing them back whenever they feel like they need it again. i already talked about hopper’s daughter as an example of this (done well in S1 and poorly in S2 and S3). another example is that scene with nancy and her mom - it’s such a good scene, and yet it misses out on so much resonance, because they completely dropped the plotline of karen feeling locked out of her kids’ lives and desperately wanting to connect with them. if they had continued to reference that throughout season 2, then this scene would have been so much more powerful. as a third example, season 3 starts with a clear context/premise, and it’s INTERESTING - the town landscape changing because of the mall, business slow to non-existent, small town discontent over big corporations moving in, hopper pressured to break up the protest against mayor kline when he should have let it proceed - and then the show just drops that entire context. you expect season 3 to stay rooted in the "our small town is being strangled by this mall" and then to eventually deal with the revitalization of hawkins, but nah. it's never mentioned again.

LASTLY:

i'm not really gonna get into hopper "dying," because he's, like...clearly not dead. but the whole situation was stupid and contrived (i was so sick of that arnold schwarzenegger lookalike by the last episode, god that whole thing was so dumb) and it's even cheaper knowing that he'll obviously be back.

what i AM gonna say is that i was livid that they brought back that peter gabriel cover of "heroes" to end this season. their use of that song in S1 blew my mind - it had me stunned with how GORGEOUS it was and just, the way it worked in that particular scene - absolutely incredible. floored me. gave me chills. to recycle it at the end of such a poorly constructed season made me so mad. yOU CAN'T MAKE ME FEEL THINGS JUST BY REUSING THIS SONG. I REFUSE TO HAVE EMOTIONS JUST BECAUSE YOU PULL OUT THIS BEAUTIFUL TRACK THAT YOU ONCE USED TO GREAT EFFECT; YOUR STORY WAS STILL TERRIBLE THIS TIME AROUND; DO NOT TRY TO TRICK FEELINGS OUT OF US THAT HAVEN’T BEEN EARNED.

and that's it. i’m sure later i’ll think of other things i neglected to mention here, but...yeah. i was not impressed.

#i finished yesterday #holy moly #interdimensional babysitters club

4 notes · View notes

allonzy · 2 years

Text

there’s something so excellent about the byler rain fight happening at the exact same spot where will last talked to mike before vanishing into the upside down… the parallels, the fact that in both the cases will is the one who goes away from the wheeler house, except in the first incident he says “see you tomorrow” but for the latter they had a huge fight and will thought he’d never have a chance romantically with mike and was no longer even sure if mike and him were best friends anymore.

something about how in 1983, the weather was gloomy and the day after, rain was forecast. and how mike set off to find will in the pouring rain that night. and how during their 1985 fight, it was raining too. and mike had already lost will once, but this time? this time he rode after him, going out in the pouring rain yet again, making sure that will was safe. making sure he got to apologise and heal their friendship. because he couldn’t lose will byers, not again.

#i may be working now but i still think of them 24/7 #byler #stranger things #mike wheeler #will byers #byler rain fight #st3 #parallels #byler parallels

285 notes · View notes

will80sbyers · 1 year

Photo

#my gif #my gifset #mike wheeler #will byers #byler #rain fight #stranger things #st #st3 #st gifset #stranger things gifset #the car in the background makes this shot so beautiful with the rain I love it #the silhouette the drama the emotions #love it #still crying about it #but love it #byler is the best ship in the world #can't change my mind #will80sbyersgifs

174 notes · View notes

byler-alarmist · 10 months

Text

Wow I legit shed tears rewatching Will's D'n'D game and the Byler rain fight this morning......I know exactly how it goes almost word for word, and yet.....

#byler rain fight #byler s3 #st3 rewatch #byler tumblr #i'm not hWOOAAAHHkyAAAAyyee #byler #byler angst

33 notes · View notes

fangirlhaley · 5 years

Text

What Hurts the Most

Summary: Post Battle of Starcourt...Things are a little different in your apartment in Hawkins Indiana....But that doesn’t stop your memories of what used to be.

Pairing: Billy Hargrove x Reader

Word Count: 948

Warnings: Billy being his usual self so...also implied ST3 Spoilers!!

A/N: I broke my wrist so I’m typing one handed...sorry for typos!

What hurts the most was being so close And havin' so much to say And watchin' you walk away And never knowin' what could've been And not seein' that lovin' you Is what I was trying to do

7:30 in the morning and the rain beating on the bedroom window pulled you from your sleep. It was the same routine as every morning since the incident. A shower for one, coffee for one, breakfast for one...

Everything used to be done in twos but that was a time when Billy Hargrove was more than just a memory.

There were days when the quiet home didn’t seem so bad, but other days it was deafening. Mornings like this usually lead to deafening days. You rolled over, the empty space in the bed was a constant reminder of the events at the Starcourt Mall a month prior. You caught yourself reaching into the vacant space, not sure what you would find. A part of you hoped this was all a dream. A part of you hoped to roll over to see Billy standing in the doorway ready for his lifeguard shift at Hawkins City Pool. That wasn’t the case though and you caught yourself staring out the window at the droplets of rain on the glass. On a day like this the pool would be closed anyway.

After fighting with yourself for a good 30 minutes or so you finally sat up in the bed, running a hand through your unruly bedhead. A quiet sigh escaped your lips as you played with the hem of the oversize Hawkins City Pool Lifeguard shirt you found yourself sleeping in a lot lately. The walk to the tiny kitchen in the apartment seemed like a long one without the usual company in the house. On good days, Billy would walk up behind you while you stood at the coffee pot waiting for it to brew. His strong arms would wrap around your waist, causing you to squeal as he lifted you up. He smelled like a mixture of cheap cologne, sunscreen and cigarette smoke. Some days, while you stood alone at the coffee pot you swore you could still smell the smoke, you could still feel his touch, you could still hear his beautiful laugh.

He was Billy Hargrove though, Hawkins Indiana’s token bad boy. That being said, there were bad days with the good. You always knew when it was going to be a bad day. Instead of waking up to a hug from behind and a low chuckle, you would wake up to one of your possessions hitting the wall. Usually the bad mood was triggered by his father calling and asking if the two if them would watch Max. You never minded it and you never understood why it bothered Billy so much. He would throw the phone down and inevitably tear the whole thing off the wall.

“Billy, it’s not that big of a deal...,” you would mumble and gently touch his arm. His reaction was always the same though, a fist through the wall and him turning around to scream in your face about how Max wasn’t his responsibility. He never got physical with you which says a lot because Billy was physical with everyone else. The amount of times he came home bloodied from a fight were more than you could count. You would try to get the full story out of him but your questions were always returned with a grunt or two which simply meant he didn’t want to talk.

Max never really stopped by anymore but you couldn’t blame her after what happened with Billy. Even you had trouble living in the space you two shared. The images of his suffering at the Starcourt Mall replaying in your head like a broken record. You woke up in a cold sweat on numerous occasions to the nightmare that was the night Billy was taken from you and the sinking feeling only got worse when you would reach out for him in the bed you two shared. Instead of his warmth, you found empty and cold sheets which only caused the tears to flow from your eyes more.

Last night was one of those nights, you were reminded of it by your reflection in the bathroom mirror. Your eyes were red and swollen from crying and you shook your head at your reflection in disgust. If Billy were here he would have noticed. He always noticed little things like this when you were upset, but he would never admit to it. You always knew though, he would disappear from the apartment for a few hours while you sulked in the bedroom with a book. You would hear the front door open, the shuffling of feet and then the TV would turn on. Flowers were usually there to greet you, roses of course, but Billy never admitted to buying them or hoping they would cheer you up. They always did the trick though.

There was a vase of roses sitting on the coffee table in front of the couch but they were long forgotten. No water or love or care for months had caused them to wilt. They needed to be thrown out but you didn’t have the heart to do it. So instead they sat in the vase as a reminder of the past and what could have been. The thought of the neglected flowers caused tears to well up in your eyes again like the rain that built up on the window sill. There was no sunshine, no laughter from kids outside, no music from people driving with their windows down enjoying the August sun.

There was nothing but silence and rain beating down on the tiny apartment.

On a day like today, you decided, there was nothing else to do but lay in bed and think about what could have been...

#billy hargove x reader #billy hargrove #billy hargrove au #stranger things #billy hargrove fic

63 notes · View notes