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#these overlaps create gates between the two worlds. the other world saw what we were doing during the colonial period and was like

hamliet · 3 years

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Chemical Weddings in RWBY

So once upon a time Hamliet said she’d write a meta about ships in RWBY, and then arrived months later without Starbucks.

The central tenet of alchemy is solve et coagula: dissolve, and then coagulate. The process (RWBY appears to be following Ripley’s 12 Gates) repeats, rinses, and repeats again and again throughout the steps, “each time at a more refined level.” The point of a chemical wedding is to reconcile opposites, which is something I touched on in my pseudo-quick meta here. Lyndy Abraham, the author of A Dictionary of Alchemical Imagery, describes the chemical wedding as:

a crucial operation in the creation of the philosopher’s stone. The alchemists were ultimately concerned with the union of substances, the reconciliation of opposites.

Basically, it unites opposites (fire and water, air and earth, sun and moon, passive and active, etc., etc., etc.) and then the opposites start to take on each other’s qualities, creating the “Rebis,” or a person both male and female.

The first chemical wedding is usually somewhat violent, primitive even, whereas the second one signifies the creation of the stone. However, characters can have more than two weddings, and chemical weddings do not inherently have to be romantic--Sam and Frodo aren’t, for example--but most often are, because it’s the most obvious way to show a union between separate people (the old adage “two become one” in marriage, for example).

If we look at George Ripley’s 12 Gates, chemical weddings tend to be focused on in the fourth stage of conjunction (which I wrote about here) and in the ninth, fermentation (which is probably going to be in volume 10--maybe a little in volume 9, but traveling between worlds seems to be a hallmark of sublimation in fiction so I’m guessing we’re stuck there for the time being). But in a lengthy series spanning eight years and counting, there is going to be overlap.

So let’s talk about chemical wedding imagery historically. It tends to involve dissolution (via water or fire--keep in mind metal was associated with fire in olden days, so stabbing with metal was considered liquid fire, or so it was believed to be by alchemists) and then coagulation (healing/coming together).

Four of the five ships--two of whom are definitely happening, one of which I think is happening and one of which I think has a good chance--reference historical alchemical artwork and symbolism in key moments. (RWBY does reference alchemical artwork; see here and here.) So let’s dive in and examine potential chemical wedding allusions in RWBY:

Lie Ren/Nora Valkyrie (Renora)

Let’s start with the most obvious couple: Ren and Nora. Their first chemical wedding occurs when they are children. In alchemical art, birds are often used to show the volatility/primitiveness of a first chemical wedding:

The raven is replicated in the Nevermore which forms a similarly threatening pose over Ren and Nora when he unlocks his semblance to protect her, thus honoring his father and mother’s legacies.

You can even see earth (trees), water (river), fire, and air (the bird flying) in the scene as it pans out. After this, Ren and Nora become “Ren and Nora,” as Nora herself says in Volume 8. They’re inseparable, because they’re on their way to becoming one. However, unification doesn’t mean that they’re literally the same person; in stories like these, it’s more like they become better versions of themselves through growing towards each other and adopting each other’s traits (like Nora’s courage for Ren, and Ren’s caution for Nora).

Their second, elevated chemical wedding is in the same place as their first, when in Volume 4 they return to the village and defeat the monster they were too young to defeat last time. This time, Nora is the one who protects Ren by telling him he could not sacrifice his life by pulling Ren back, in a reversal of his running to her in their first moment years ago.

Like the first, there’s water involved--Ren and Nora hide next to a river, watching as the Knuckelvee advances on them. I talked previously how I thought this looked like a possible allusion to this alchemical image (look at the moon symbol on the head of the aggressor):

The moon symbol actually shows up quite a bit in this scene, first when Nora and Ren discover the Nuckelvee is still alive in the cave:

And then in the moment when they defeat it:

While I am certain this is a chemical wedding, I’m not certain why the moon symbol is so prominent in this, though I do think it is possibly in reference to this image and how Nora and Ren are united now:

Yang Xiao Long/Blake Belladonna (Bumbleby)

Firstly, the alchemy image is somewhat of a creepy image, right? In this, Mercurius has united the two principles by beheading them (amputation is a Thing in alchemy), leaving them to putrefy and then coagulate.

Like the Nuckelvee for Nora and Ren, Blake and Yang have a somewhat antagonistic Mercurius who unites them: Adam Taurus. He doesn’t cut off their heads, but he does seriously injure Blake and cuts off Yang’s arm in a scene that is romantically charged (you have Blake’s possessive ex telling her he’ll target someone she loves and specifically chooses Yang).

While I have my issues with how Bumbleby is written, it’s hard to interpret that as anything other than him seeing Yang as a rival for Blake’s affection.

Their second chemical wedding also involves Adam. There’s no one direct image that seems to have inspired it, but it does take place in a place full of waterfalls (fountains and flowing water in general, like the ones in Nora and Ren’s village, are common elements of chemical weddings’ settings) and by the ocean (the “mercurial sea” is where the elements dissolve to make the Philosopher’s Stone, so it’s also a common hallmark for chemical weddings).

(To briefly address this: this is where my complaints about the writing pile in, because you can also make a damn strong case that Blake and Sun fighting on the ship to Menagerie is a chemical wedding, which it is, but I think it’s clear at this point that Bumbleby is endgame. Either both were written for a reason, like if they weren’t sure if they could do Bumbleby, or a narrative reason, in which case Black Sun should have been dealt with rather than hand-waved away, or they were just teasing, but baiting fans is never, ever good writing; it’s cheap. All that to say that while I think there’s a compelling case they were interested in pursuing Bumbleby from the start, Black Sun shippers have a right to feel tricked and not all criticism thereof is based in homophobia or a lack of narrative understanding, or even in a dislike of the ship.)

At the beginning of this scene, Adam makes it clear that this is a redo of their previous chemical wedding by reminding them of it:

Blake stabs Adam with a silver weapon; Yang with red. We have earth, air (clouds), water, and weapons as a stand-in for fire.

It’s still somewhat of a violent wedding, which makes me wonder if Bumbleby will have a third (and Renora as well). But it also parallels Renora in this: returning to a pivotal scene where they were traumatized, but this time being able to overcome it because they’ve become more like each other. Blake is in many ways Yang’s trauma stretching far beyond Beacon (Blake runs away, as does Raven, Yang’s mother who abandoned her), and likewise Yang for Blake (she’s hotheaded and holds grudges, like Adam). But Blake and Yang have been working on becoming better versions of themselves.

At the end of this scene, they even exchange quasi-wedding vows (since Blake’s promise is to not abandon Yang):

And the artists drive home the point by drawing Blake’s hair far bushier than normal (more like Yang’s), and Yang’s far tamer than normal (like Blake’s).

Jaune Arc/Weiss Schnee (White Knight)

Weiss and Jaune have had one chemical wedding thus far (possibly two but not sure) and I didn’t ship them at all until I saw this scene. Like Bumbleby and Renora, they have an antagonistic Mercurius: Cinder.

(This one I’ll be arguing a little bit about why I think it’s set up for romance as well.)

In this scene, Cinder directly compares Weiss to Pyrrha in regards to how Jaune feels about them (and we know Jaune and Pyrrha were romantic--you can also argue Cinder was an antagonistic Mercurius uniting Pyrrha and Jaune).

When Weiss screams, Cinder gets an idea and slides her gaze from Weiss to Jaune.

And then reenacts this:

As I also mentioned previously, Jaune then plays the role of the Prince to Weiss’s Snow White (which is an alchemical fairy tale). Like when Ren unlocks his aura to protect Nora, Jaune unlocks his to save Weiss. Weiss looks as if she is in a glass coffin that gets more and more golden, symbolic of refinement.

It’s also probably an allusion to this image of a chemical wedding presided over by Saturn (Mercury in this scene, since he’s there) and Death (Ruby and Qrow, who are also present in the scene with Jaune and Weiss). (For more on this image, see here.)

Weiss and Jaune also have some oppositional imagery and arcs: Weiss starts Beacon with a deep family legacy and an inherited semblance, she chooses to go to Beacon on her own and is the favored child (at first). Jaune too has a family legacy of warriors, but instead of feeling empowered because of this, he is insecure and literally cheats his way into the school. He doesn’t have a semblance until season 5. After this incident, Weiss and Jaune spend some time recreationally together (seeing a movie in vol 7); Jaune becomes more confident as a leader, and Weiss continues her arc in becoming more sympathetic to those from less privileged backgrounds.

Arguably, what happened at the end of volume 8 could be seen as having some symbolism of a chemical wedding for Weiss and Jaune too, but I don’t think it actually is one since they weren’t focused on as characters enough (if this was intended to be the start of one, we’ll get something next season, I’d imagine). The only reason I’m mentioning it is because it does function as an inverse of the previous one, which is the case for Renora and Bumbleby’s first and second weddings too. Cinder again almost kills Weiss (she falls in the exact same position as in vol 5), but Jaune saves Weiss when he screams after killing Penny. Instead of saving Weiss by healing, he kills. There’s also some distinctive red and white imagery.

And then Winter arrives with a six-pointed star and birds before telling them to run together:

But again, I wouldn’t really call this one; it just has some imagery of one and fits a pattern, so I’m including it as a potential lead-in to an actual one in the void or later.

Ruby Rose/Oscar Pine (Rosegarden)

Like with Weiss/Jaune, I’ll be arguing a little bit about why I think this one is likely to end up romantic, too (for example, Cinder most recently in volume 8 used Oscar to taunt Ruby in a callback to using Pyrrha and Weiss to taunt Jaune).

Also: oh look, finally a wedding that isn’t violent. They just... meet. Which is also normal for a chemical wedding but less dramatic.

Behold, the bird uniting the solar king and lunar queen:

(Fun fact: unless CRWBY came up with ship names which I highly, highly doubt, this is pure coincidence, but it’s a funny one: the art series this image is taken from is called Rosarium Philosophorum--which literally means “rose garden philosophy.”)

Let’s look at the scene where Ruby and Oscar meet for the first time. What makes this a chemical wedding is in part how obvious their markings are and the overall imagery is in the scene.

They are united by Qrow (who in addition to being named after a bird can literally transform into a bird):

Oscar asks about Ruby specifically (yes, I know because Qrow’s her uncle, but the writing is telling us to focus on his relationship with her):

And immediately notes/is in awe that she has silver eyes (i.e. the moon):

Qrow seems to realize he’s done something momentous in a way that almost doesn’t entirely work within the frame of the narrative (but he is drunk, so).

The scenery of this room is also telling. The table is literally an Emerald Table, the legendary foundation of alchemy itself.

Once they sit and talk, behind Oscar are the elements of earth and water, which he represents, and also the moon, which while traditionally associated with earth and water, he does not (at least not as strongly as he’s associated with the sun/gold):

Similarly, behind Ruby we have the elements of fire and air (like, if you zoom in, they actually drew air), which she is marked as, and the sun, which again, she’s not as strongly associated with as she is with the moon:

In Splendor Solis, which CRWBY has referenced before, the Solar King does eventually end up grounded in the moon, and likewise the Lunar Queen in the sun:

Oscar and Ruby also do have oppositional arcs and roles: Ruby starts the series in the very first episode by being invited to Beacon two years early because of her leaping into action to stop Torchwick. She’s scolded for her recklessness, but immediately picked out as special because of her silver eyes. In contrast, Oscar is reluctant to leave his farm once Ozpin inhabits him; he refuses at first, and then once he does leave, is nervous and timid.

Anyways I wouldn’t be surprised if Qrow arrives in Vacuo with RWBYJ in tow and this time reunites Ruby with Oscar in an inverse. We’ll see.

I do want to say that I also see potential for Emerald Sustrai/Mercury Black, in that they often act as one and share a theme song, but I haven’t seen any actual visual references to a chemical wedding for them... yet.

#rwby meta #rwby theory #rwby volume eight #rwby vol 8 #rwby volume 8 #rwby volume 9 #weiss schnee #jaune arc #ruby rose #blake belladonna #yang xiao long #lie ren #nora valkyrie #oscar pine #alchemy #rosegarden #bumbleby #renora #white knight

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kaypeace21 · 4 years

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Some of your favorite characters are Will’s split personalities (psych/narrative analysis)

This is part 2 of my DID analysis. Part 1 focusing on how the supernatural events of the series correlate to Will’s past with Lonnie. Before, I explain who I believe are alters of Will��s (previously called ‘split personalities’). I think I need to explain a crash course on what Dissociative Identity disorder (DID: previously ‘multiple personality disorder’) entails. And the supernatural manifestation within the show as well- Before explaining which characters I believe are alters of Will’s and why. So let’s begin.

There are 4 hallmarks of a potential dissociative disorder

“Dissociation is when instead of staying present in the face of stress you exit your thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations and zone out. . It’s as if your body is a computer that reaches overload for input then just shuts down.’ It’s considered a defense mechanism in psychoanalytic theory.”

‘An individual struggling with dissociation or a dissociative disorder may only experience one of the following or may experience multiple. Each individual’s experience with dissociation can be varied. Symptoms can last just a matter of moments or return at times over the years.”

1)“Identity confusion and alteration -When an individual forgets who they are or takes on a new personality unlike themselves.” (Aka his possession).

2)Dissociative Amnesia-”The forgetting of a major event, such as a childhood trauma or forgetting (traumatic) things happening in real-time.Many survivors of are able to “forget” until sometime later …when memories are triggered by certain events or when the body and mind are no longer able to conceal the memories.” (Aka Will’s ‘now memories’. The reason he refers to them as “now-memories” is because they are things he’s already experienced (as memories) but he’s only now remembering - because of his “dissociative-amnesia’

3)”Derealization-Feeling like the world is not real or is foggy.” (the upsidedown)

4) “Depersonalization-The sense of not being in control of, or not being connected to, one’s body.”

vocab and definitions (about DID) to keep in mind

CORE/HOST- “The core is considered by some to be the person first born to the body. The host is the alter who most commonly uses the body (which may or may not be the core).”

ALTERS - “are dissociated self states that can be highly differentiated from each other. They can have unique names, appearances, ages, gender identities, sexualities, memories (pasts), skills, faiths, political views, abilities, and ways of viewing and interacting with the world. Alters can even perceive themselves as different species, inanimate objects, or as members of a different race, gender, age, or ethnicity/race.No one can choose to have alters or what their alters are like. Alters' creation is entirely unconscious. Most alters have their own sense of identity. A host cannot actually control the alter.An individual with DID has one brain and one body. Dissociative barriers between alters are not literal boundaries, and knowledge, memories, skills, preferences, and traits may bleed through.Alters usually have a role or multiple roles in a smaller system- these roles may or may not appear contradictory.”

SYSTEM-”A system is a collection of alters within one body.Subsystems are two or more groups of alters that might have developed separately, and they may or may not be aware of the other group.”

INNER WORLDS-”it could be a house, to a city, or multiple locations-where alters go when not in control of the body. The innerworld is where alters can interact with one another and where there physical appearance is how they describe .Communication between alters may happen face-to-face (in each other's respective bodies, via the internal world). Expansive internal worlds can result when highly imaginative or dissociative systems use their inner world to retreat from the outside world and so play out entire stories within their mind. Alters may be perceived as having internal lives when not active in the outside world, and these inner lives may involve travel to other internal locations. Many internal happenings may be metaphorical or highly symbolic of the core’s past. Inners worlds may also have characters called "NPCs" (taken from the roleplaying term "non-player characters") that can interact with alters but they are more similar to imaginary constructs rather than actual alters (they can’t control the body and some are made consciously unlike alters-although that’s not always the case). These npcs can be background characters to make the world more real, and it’s not uncommon for parents, family members, or friends of alters to be NPCs.They can feel just as real as natural-born people . Different subsystems may reside in different locations in an internal world or may have non-overlapping internal worlds.”

INTEGRATION- This is essentially the closest thing an alter can do to die- but frankly I consider that comparison harsh. It’s “ when an alter permanently combines with the host or another alter.Fusion occurs when identities merge together and become a unified whole (retaining the memories and some traits of both merging identities.) Integration into a single, individualized identity IS the goal for some in therapy. But it is not, and does not have to be, for everyone. It is possible to achieve full healing by processing memories, establishing communication across the whole mind, lowering dissociative barriers, and showing aptitude in everyone working toward a common goal - all without actually integrating. Others may choose to integrate SOME parts, or "downsize", but still leave a small system to go about their life.”

“They may retain any number of independently acting alters. Reasons for choosing not to fully integrate can include: feeling that full integration is unnecessary; not understanding what integration actually entails and being afraid of "losing" their alters; uncertainty over how to navigate the world as one integrated person; being used to having alters around for company, entertainment, or support; alters having their own unique relationships that they're hesitant to lose; alters wanting to remain separate for their own sakes.”

SWITCHING-”Switching refers to one alter taking control of the body at the expense of another alter who was previously in control of body or ‘fronting’. Switches can be consensual, forced, or triggered.Switches can be slow, quick, or uncontrollably rapid. Switching can take seconds, minutes, or even days to occur.Stress (Will’s anniversary effect) or even a reminder of a trauma, can trigger a switch of alters. * I’ll talk more about this later

ALTERS DYING-“Even if mock deaths or temporary experiences of alters “dying” from old age (or other means) have been acted out in some systems, they aren’t actually dying. You cannot kill off a collective part of the conscious mind like you can a person. Their thoughts, memories, emotions will all still be there, so they must be as well. The part may have gone into extreme hiding/dormant, been momentarily immobilized, or merged with another part of the mind (integration), but they most assuredly did not and can not disappear entirely or “be killed”.

Next we’re on to the supernatural concept they chose to use for this disorder.

We see in the first episode. Will mentions x-men 134 which is about the dark phoenix . The show is litered with x men references like Dustin giving cerebro ( a machine belonging to professor x) to Will. Dustin also asks if El was born with powers “like the x-men.” And Mike also says El channels Will and Dustin once again says “like professor x.” Now- does anyone know who professor x’s son (David) and the ‘shadow phoenix”are ? Well his son is considered the most powerful mutant in the world and has Dissociative identity disorder (DID).At one point some of his alters literally escape his head and enter the real world as tangible people. The ‘shadow phoenix’ is also a sibling to the ‘dark phoenix’.And this ‘shadow phoenix’ (a ‘shadow monster’ if you will) terrorized David’s alters and forced them to integrate back into 1 personality .

In ‘scanners’ one psychic mentions how he “opened the door” to the people trapped in his own mind in order for Daryl to be Daryl again. While in ‘altered states’ the man (who saw flashes of another dimension) met his ‘unborn self in the crack in the void.’Similar to how Mr clarke and Alexi describes the portals of other dimensions being opened as a ‘door’. However, these doors were created before El- we see El created the one at the lab, but that doesn’t take into account the ones in the tree or the cave. There’s more portals we’re unaware of that allowed alters and npcs to escape and become part of the real world even before El opened the gate in s1. And unbeknownst to some of the characters and the audience we’ve already seen other ‘inner worlds’ of Will’s -besides the upsidedown . Which people (not part of the system) have interacted with . As Dustin in s1 said about the other dimensions / vale of shadows , it’s “ A dark reflection or echo of our world ...It’s right next to you and you don’t even know it” .

We see both mr clarke stab a pencil into a plate and Alexi a straw into a box to illustrate this. What’s interesting is the one other time we see this motion is when Lonnie says “someone should be held accountable” (referring to what happened to Will), as he hammers into the wall and it transitions to Mike mimicking mr clarke. Implying that Lonnie is responsible and will be held accountable in the future.

-There’s also the fact the ‘dark phoenix’ mentioned in the first episode of St is highly associated with fire- having pyrokinesis (like Will the wise) and who “had able to warp reality on a universal scale” . It’s like how the show talks about physics often, like in s3/1 (plank’s constant or Hugh Everett’s many worlds interpretations) - and Einstein who believed quantum mechanics wasn’t real said “God does not play dice with the universe." So since he was wrong , cause quantum mechanics is real , the quote should be “god plays dice with the universe.” Like Will does in the beginning of the first episode.Will is captured by the demogorgan (in the game) so he was captured in real life because he rolled a 7. I talked more about this more in the mf section.

- It’s similar to one of the Duffers admitted biggest inspirations for the series ‘altered states’. Who’s mental illness alters reality . He hallucinates seeing flashes of another dimension like Will.

We’ll talk about more evidence of this concept in the character breakdowns (mostly in the mf section). So now on to the alters (and Npcs) who escaped Will’s mind into the real world as tangible people.

Tr*gger warning now, because of how DID is caused. “The dissociative aspect is thought to be a coping mechanism - the person literally shut off or dissociated themselves from a situation or experience too traumatic, or painful to assimilate with their conscious self.As many as 99% of individuals who develop dissociative disorders have recognized personal histories of recurring, overpowering, and often life-threatening disturbances or traumas at a sensitive developmental stage of childhood (usually before age 6). It cannot form AFTER the ages of 6-9 years of age, aka 10 and up (though, once you have DID you can develop new alters at any time).DID is rarely diagnosed in children (and is usually diagnosed in adulthood or late teens), despite the average age of appearance of the first alter being 5.9 years old . ”

They’ll be brief mentions of dark subjects in this psych/narrative analysis because of this. I’ll also be listing movies said to inspire s4 of st (according to st writers), or mentioning movies name dropped by the cast, the Duffers , or in the show itself .

ALTERS

Max Mayfield & Billy Hargrove

When Max is first introduced - Mr Clark talks about “brain cells working together as one” (while talking next to a brain). Similarly, dustin/mike mention mr clarke when saying what’s essentialy a did system “A collective consciousness. this is the thing that controls everything. this is the brain.” This concept about Max , is mentioned again when mr. clark discuses phineus Gage saying he had “a total change in personality that even his friends called him no longer gage.” And emphasizes max and Will in this scene- showing one in clear focus, while another is blurry, and as they make eye contact Max turns away .

Both are poor, their bio dads aren’t around, both like horror films, comics and videogames. Both their bio dads left them . And both use bats in anger when emulating their abusers ,and both are heavily associated with rainbows. On Halloween she dresses up as a character who as a child dressed up as a clown on Halloween (Will’s fear/ what triggered him on Halloween) and whose surname is Myers (Byers?)

Billy, like Will , have nicknames for their real name- ‘william’. Both have abusive dads who called them homophobic slurs, and forced them to play baseball to man-up. Billy’s old baseball team is even tigers (the mascot of Will’s elementary school and matching Will’s tiger painting in his room in s1-2).The “it was a 7 “ vs “the wave was 7 feet”. Both hit with needles, into rock music , attracted to Wheelers ,and were the main subjects possessed by the mf. At one point the dark phoenix fails to merge with jean so goes to merge with her clone body as the next best thing. In this case the mf went to Will’s second alter William/Billy. And as Will states “another me.” And both say about the mf “I’m sorry, he made me do it.”

Neil and Lonnie both push Jon and Billy against a wall. And Jon tells of a time where his dad made him kill a rabbit . And Billy’s last name “Hargrove” means - “grove filled with rabbits" . While, ‘Mad-max’ her nickname is based on the male 80s film character ‘mad max’ a man being terrorized by a r**ist biker gang who attacks both men/women. It’s also possible that Billy’s appearance was based on Will seeing mrs wheeler’s romance novels?

In the film “don’t breathe’- the reason why the siblings are from California is alluded to in a flashback of Jon & Will. The older sibling (with abusive parents) takes care of the younger sibling like a parent and the little sibling says she wants to be a surfer despite living in a land locked state (without an ocean, like Indianna). Older sibling says one day maybe they can live in California together . And the Older sibling tells a friend about how their dad left them, and how they were thrown in a dark trunk by an abusive parent as kid . Which was alluded to in s1, when Jon checked the trunk to see if Lonnie put Will in there.And we see the mf (who is emulating Lonnie) doing the same thing to heather, and tom (hitting or strangling them and then throwing them in the trunk).

Certain scenes, are alters re-enacting past scenes of trauma. “The family dynamics will be played out in a variety of ways but will most obviously be noted in the way the survivor splits off their system.Some survivors will internalize their family into their own DID system. Some alters may reenact trauma and ab*se, sometimes reinforcing ab*sers’ lessons to prevent further ab*se but sometimes serving as a permanent component of an internal flashback.“The reason, Billy acts/is racist is because he’s emulating Neil (but more accurately Lonnie) who told Will not be friends with lucas and thus recreates that moment with Max .lonnie in the s4 films is very racist. Another example, is Will has shown a fear of doors opening (in s1-2) shown by how the demogorgan unlocks the door telepathically (like El does often).And the mf opening doors by themselves in the house and arcade. Neil demands Billy opens his door. And right after Max stares at Will-Billy yells to open the door and tells Max “I’ll cut you b*tch” if she doesn’t open the door. This is because Lonnie said and did similar things to Will if he didn’t open the door.

What connects all 3 is that they all have an absent parent and have baseball associated with them mimicking a familial ab*ser. Even the mf is associated with the sport.

Alexi

Some “ alters can even speak a different language than the host. Despite, the host personality not knowing a single word of the language.’

Similar to Will who won the science fair for 4 years in a row- Alexi is a scientist who has a child like disposition . Will has a fear of clowns (a clown even triggered him on Halloween), and we see that after he’s attacked by a lonnie-look alike he dies surrounded by clowns.

He also sees a friend strangled by the lonnie-look alike (using 1 hand) and die. throughout the season the mf who emulates lonnie strangle people the exact same way, with one hand (doing this to joyce, el, heather, and jon). probably cause Will either saw Lonnie strangle someone or was strangled in this way. There’s also the fact when we first see Alexi - lights flicker like in s1 (illustrating a supernatural element associated with Will and others).

And stangertheory pointed this one detail out, when watching woody the woodpecker he says “can we watch loonie toons, now?” murray: ‘no’/ “can we play d&d , now? crew:no.

Also, “woody in the cartoon is terrorized by Andy and PAPA panda. To Woody's surprise, Andy's attempts prevail, and Woody is taken away to the psychiatric hospital— but not before his captors prove to be crazier than he is” (cough s4 spoiler, but that’s a post for another day).We also have a scene where murray compares him to a child bringing shit in and tries touching his junk with a metal detector. And when Alexi says to stop, Murray says he’ll do as he pleases in his house. Probably a re-enactment . And Murray mistranslates what he says occasionally as being “n*ked or exposed”, “penetrating a hole”. Also ‘alexi’ may also be a reference to Alexy in russian folklore. A clever-minded priest's son (Lonnie is alluded to be a religious zealot in s4 movies) who wins by tricking and outsmarting his foes and defeating a dragon by trickery. This is another connection to Will who is heavily associated with dragons- for a huge spoiler related reason - let’s just say mf’s can create dragons, Will drew a dragon, has a dragon poster, read a dragon comic in a s1 flashback , was there for the dragon video game, and Dustin mentions a dragon in s3 because of foreshadowing.

**The mindflayer (previously known as ‘Will the wise’) -persecutor alter

“A child that is heavily into fantasy might have alters who present as certain fantasy creatures that the child sees as being capable of protecting them from being hurt again.All of the personalities begin as friends and allies…” We see this with Will’s first alter- Will the wise. Who Will described as having fire powers to attack smart bad guys. And who is based off the rules of d&d.

“ Persecutors are alters who purposefully harm the body, system, host, core, or other alters. Most of the literature on the development of these persecutory alters reports that they usually begin life as protectors and then, for some reason, turn on the host, becoming persecutory. Kluft, in 1985, describes the persecutors as initially "taking all the suffering for the others (alters & host). Persecutory personalities originate from the shame and anger related to the traumatic experience and to the perpetrator. “

‘It is usually during the transition between childhood to adolescence when childhood protectors becomes a persecutor.” And begin mimicking the ab*ser. We actually may have seen this transition at the end of s1- where WW became the mf. In d&d lore, mindflayers are created by inserting a tadpole into a human- like what we saw at the end of s1 where Will coughed up the slug from the upsidedown. Meaning all that supernatural stuff we saw Will do in s1 was actually Will the wise (ww) before he turned into the mf. While the flashbacks in s1 (and singing in castle byers) were of the Will we saw in s2-3.

Will says WW is a wizard ( writing on a music tape in s3 “will the wise-wizard mix’ and having his password for castle byers be ‘rhadaghast’- a lotr wizard.)The way they describe d&d Wizards matches Will/mf perfectly “Wizards are adepts and magicians . wizards are able to create spells of explosive fire, sparking lightning, subtle deception, and gross mind control. Their magic summons monsters from other planes of existence, predicts the future, and turns defeated enemies into zombies. Their most powerful spells can transform one substance into another, summon meteors from the sky, and open portals to other worlds”.

Nancy even accidentally calls the mf the “mind -flamer” (aka fire powers of ww ). Dustin says the mf “takes over minds using their highly developed psionic powers” (like wizards).We see Will the wise described as having fire/lightning powers and in the first ep we see him leave Mike’s house causing the lights to flicker, turn on his bike light with his mind (before being attacked by the demogorgan), blink once for yes and twice for no to communicate with Joyce, cause lightning to spark out of the phones twice, and be proficient in guns like Lonnie. We know the mindflayer is also associated with lightning/storms (but that’s only because it’s one of Ww’s abilities). When Hopper sees Joyce’s phone he even says “storm bq-ed this pretty good.“ And in s2 a scientist said the same phrase while in the upside down looking at the burned equipment the mf created. Showing a correlation between Ww and the mindflayer. CAUSE THEY’RE THE SAME PERSON. In the comic we see electricity come out of Ww’s hands. And in s1 he drew his wizard character with lightning (BEFORE) he went to the upside down. And in s2 WW was drawn with flames on his cloak.

Will in his cannon journal even draws the mind flayer with red lightning, and later uses red paper to sketch clouds/lightning and pastes a picture of himself on to it. Because deep in his subconscious (along with the memories of his father- he realizes he created the mf/ww). And Joyce even describes the tunnels he draws as “like lightning.” And note in s1 we are told Lonnie taught Will baseball (and this was when Jon told Will not to mimic him)- and suspiciously there is a baseball and baseball-mitt next to the ‘shadow monster’ (mf) drawing and a bat (next to the ww drawing in castle byers). Cause mf= ww. Will lies and says the mf is just a sketch for a story he’s writing- but even if that’s not exactly true. The mf is still something he unconsciously created.And of course Will is called ‘zombie boy’ and in s3 when Will watches a zombie movie and writes a d&d story about juju zombies- the mf creates zombies and creates a monster resembling the thing (because when Will was writing his d&d story he was next to the ‘the thing’ poster in s3. In s2 Will playing dig dug which is about underground mazes- so the supernatural underground caves are made. And it’s a callback to the s1 d&d game with “troglodytes “ (cave men). And in s3 the Russians had the underground lab too - sort of being the troglodytes in a way.And similar to s1, after Will watches poltergeist Will/ww is thrust into the same scenario as the little girl (being trapped in another dimension- where the mothers can only hear their voices and communicate to them through electronics ). Like how rolling the 7 in d&d caused him to be captured by the demogorgan in the game and real life. Nancy saying: “So this thing is like a brain that’s controlling everything.”Hopper then says “So how do we kill this thing shoot it with fireballs?”And Dustin says “ No, No, fireballs you summon an undead army.”But Mike actually nails it on the head when he says, “If the brain dies the body dies … closing the gate will kill him(referring to Will).Because it’s not the mindflayers’ brain - it’s Will’s brain- that both Will and the mf share!

In the episode after the mindflayer enters Will - the episode is literally titled “ Will the wise”. Here we see a ‘slow switch’ occur.”Slow switches are when two or more alters (Will and mf) are co-conscious to varying degrees and slowly blending and retreating to allow one alter (mf) to gain prominence .Some indicators that a switch may be about to occur include feeling "spacey.”

In this episode we don’t see A full switch but ‘blending’. “ A full switch is rarely necessary. Instead of an alter switching to front, they can exert passive influence on the alter currently at front (Will) . Passive influence can be described as intrusions from alters that are not currently prominent in the mind or using the body. This may manifest as ego-alien thoughts, knowledge, memories, feelings, emotions, opinions, preferences, urges, abilities, or actions. These intrusions may vary in strength and influence and may result in the fronting alter taking actions or voicing opinions that they can't explain or account for.”

We see this with Will’s ‘now memories’ the reason he refers to them as “now-memories” is because they are things he’s already experienced (as memories) but he’s only now remembering them- because of his “dissociative-amnesia’ . An example is Will fearing the tub, and yelling at his mom -confused at his own reaction. Because ww is the one afraid of the tub not Will.This is because this is one of the locations abuse often takes place. There’s at least 20 movies where a bad guy tries drowning someone in a tub. In splice, the cell, and the ring all incorporate an ab*sive father trying to drown his young child. In the cell the father would beat his son, burn him, called him homophobic slurs, and almost drowned him and causing a seizure.When Will tries to take a bath it’s overplayed with Mr Clarke saying (in front of a model of a human brain) - “Organisms instinctively respond to danger, expose a bacterium to a toxic chemical and it will flee or deploy some other defense mechanism. We’re very much the same.” As a flash of Will’s “now-memories” occur as he stares at the tub. And we see a zoom in shot of the back of his head (which Will said is associated with memories) . And Mike stares at Will’s empty desk.Meaning, Will’s starting to fear the bath as he’s starting to remember (subconsciously) what previously occurred there because of WW- Lonnie/tubs being the ‘toxic chemical’ in the analogy.

WW fully takes control/switches in the following episode ‘Dig dug’ when he wakes up from the nightmare of Hopper being attacked in the cave- this is indicated by zooming in on the drawing of ‘Will the wise’ before he wakes up. And explains his odd behavior- of being oddly quiet . Looking up surprised at all the cave/vine drawings on the walls. It’s common for alters to pretend to be the host when they switch. He displays being able see into the future (like Will describes WW him being able to do in s3- like when ww in s2 says Hopper will die), and he late tracks Hopper’s location by closing his eyes like the drawing of ww. Mike mentioning he’s a ‘superspy’ right after he finds Hopper- the next episode is even called “the spy” as Mike realizes he’s the mf and says he’s “the spy”. He initially tried to help until the soldiers burned him (causing a seizure like Lonnie previously caused) and later when they burn him again. He decides to kill them- similar to how El killed 2 men for putting her in solitary confinement multiple times.

However, I need to point out “ protectors are still and always protectors. What changes is the protective behaviors no longer look obviously protective and in actuality may be harmful and life threatening to the host.” He still acts as a protector saying he got upset when they hurt him/Will. And participating in a supernatural-extreme version of ‘thought snatching’.”thought snatching" (taking away your thoughts) can be caused by the actions of alters.” So he incorrectly tries wiping all of Will’s thoughts/memories to shield the body from past trauma.

Mf is also hinted to be under the category of a ‘ demon alter’- Will being handed the “devil’s baby” firework and in the background is a sticker of a demo(n)-dog . “Demon alters are often a form of protector known as a persecutor.Some people have alters which are supernatural beings. These are regarded as possession-form identities, if a person is consciously aware of the actions of the alter then the person may describe themselves as feeling "possessed" by an outside person, spirit, deity (god), or demon.”

“Attempts to banish them using religious techniques such as "deliverance" or exorcism do not work permanently, can be harmful and may prolong any internal war between alters and preventing healing .”

“Ignoring them, trying to shut them up or restrain them, punishing them, or any of the various attempts at “getting rid of them” will not only never work (their needs will only become greater and louder), they’ll become more and more traumatized as you confirm to them their every belief about the world.

“You can’t actually “get rid of them” anyway, so it’s far better to try and understand them. “

So yeah- our heroes literally did everything wrong to make it worse.And literally mimicked Lonnie who tied him to chairs in his shed (and like Brenner did to joyce/ Russians did to Robin & steve) or to a bed (like brenner to Terry/lonnie to Will) and hurt and burned him (like Lonnie). Also, FYI the person who was calling Joyce at the beginning of s2 and freaked her out, and later called during the excorcism was Lonnie- why WW freaked out over the call.Noah was even told to watch the excorcist for the burning scene at the end of the season. Even the movie implied it was all based on a similar trauma and it was in the girl’s head- she even while possessed had the male voice of the man who was implied to have ab*sed her and said phrases he said in the film. Similar to WW’s deeper non-human voice he used to try and tell them to ‘let him go.’

So in the next season he was worse than ever and wanted revenge on the people who tried to kill him. Because he fears they’ll come after him again and hurt him- similar to Kali who says the people who are still after her ( and burned her with a taser stick/nancy with burning stick) are still after them and will kill them.

We also see the mindflayer despite in the show and d&d lore be sensitive to sunlight pick the summer to come back. Now, why is that? The answer is simple it’s when Will started to realize his romantic feelings for Mike. Joyce at the beginning of the season says “You won’t think it’s gross when you fall in love”?But due to his ab*se - WW DOES! And Will just responds to Joyce , unconvincingly, saying “I’m not going to fall in love.” But he already has!

“Even non-ab*sive romantic relationships may provoke the protector’s vitriolic reaction if the relationship takes on a meaning which feels threatening. Simply feeling the possibility of closeness to another person may be the trigger because of the protector’s prior learning that trust and dependency lead surely and inevitably to ab*se and hurt.”(Mierendorf, 1993). EX: a persecutor alter who identifies herself only as "Me, Myself" was questioned about her anger and violence to the host.

" she began becoming interested in boys, and dates, and all that [she trails off], and I hated it and I didn't want any part of it. So I quit, I wasn't going to do any more ... nobody was ever gonna touch me ...And whenever that would happen with Gretchen [the host] it would hurt me and I would hate it and I'd hate her, and I'd hate her for letting that happen . i wanted to k*ll her”

Whenever the Mf is close and Will touches his neck it relates to his romantic feelings for Mike. 1st time it’s on one of their ‘movie dates’, 2nd time when Will is sad when Mike and El walk off together down the hill to make-out, , 3rd time right after he smashed castle byers after Mike says “it’s not my fault you don’t like girls”, 4th time (after the fight with Mike) when Billy is yelling to open the door (a trigger) and confides in Mike, 5th time when Mike asks him to go away so he can talk to El in the hospital waiting area, and 6th time when Mike says he loves El.

And in s3, Mike says on a rainy day “it’s not my fault you don’t like girls” (and similarly Lonnie called Will a “fag” and a “queer”). Then he leaves Mike’s house, tears-up all his sketches, comics, a pic of mike (things he loves). And uses a bat that Lonnie taught him to use -to destroy castle Byers (which was also built on a rainy day , after his dad left).He uses a bat, despite saying in s1 he doesn’t like baseball. He has a bat in castle byers (next to a WW drawing) and a mitt/ baseball in his room (specifically next to a picture of the mindflayer.) and Will looked at the Will the wise drawing and then destroys castle byers with a bat. Showing WW/mf are the same person and that WW (and even Will to some extent) is still not taking Jon’s advice about not mimicking Lonnie.He uses the bat (lonnie taught him to use) to try to “man-up” and destroy or even taint the things he loves- castle byers & Mike . And after this, he grabs his neck (which in s2 he said he associated with now-memories) and then says “He’s back” (aka Lonnie’s influence/mf). And then everything supernatural begins to escalate.

-“ another ‘threat’ the, the persecutor believes the host may pose in adolescence or adulthood is breaking the silence about the ab*se and/or the multiplicity. We then witness the protector’s desperate attempt to control the client, to “save him” from the expected dire consequences of revealing the secrets.”

“The persecutor frequently protects the host through scare tactics; through fear and intimidation. In order for this scare tactic to work the host must be convinced of the persecutor's capacity and willingness (even desire) to use the utmost in force and destructiveness. The persecutor must, in short, be viewed as Putnam described: "a fearsome, loathsome, deamon-like entity” .When the danger posed comes from outside the system the persecutor uses the same scare tactics, trying to impress the intruder (in this case the therapist, etc) with his or her ferocity and proclivity to violence.The persecutor therefore becomes increasingly loaded with hostility toward the host, to the point where the original protective function can be lost to their consciousness.Finally, it should be obvious that the persecutor who uses threats of violence to protect the host may be quite worried about either the host or others uncovering the underlying protective intent of their actions because it disarms the power of their threat.”

EX:” Susan was a 31 year old woman who came in for treatment when she started recovering memories of inc*st which had begun with f*ndling and proceeded to r*pe just prior to adolescence. Susan reported a host of dissociative symptoms as well as feeling as if she had a "monster inside me who wouldn't allow me to heal.”Before the next session the therapist received a letter from an ego state named Shadow. The letter detailed how big and fierce Shadow was and how she was supposed to be feared, have control, and all the power.In the next session Shadow revealed that she had been using fear to prevent Susan from disclosing the ab*se. Shadow firmly believed that Susan's father would kill them if the abuse were disclosed.”

“As Putnam notes, while the persecutor displays “extreme contempt toward the host,” paradoxically, “the dominant emotion of the persecutor may really be love” (1989, p. 207). In fact, it is this very love which propels the persecutor in the harassment of the host -feeling it is a way to protect them from perceived threats. “

“ They are NOT the actual ab*ser.They are just copying behaviors shown to them by bad people, not harboring the intent, sadism or immorality of the actual perpetrators. We understand this change ( from protector to persecutor) and displaying ab*sive behaviors does not reflect an underlying character structure.Instead we understand the change as demonstrating a past adaptive instrumental use of violence in an attempt to preserve the system in the face of a [perceived] threat.’

**Another words, for anyone confused- WW went from childhood protector to teen persecutor because of perceived threats. Will (the host) becoming aware of his romantic feelings for Mike and Will slowly and subconsciously gaining his memories of past ab*se - and WW fearing once he remembers he’ll tell someone. So he wants to prevent this by scaring Will and others .And does this by playing the role/character of a scary monster- mimicking the scariest things he knows Lonnie and the mf from d&d. It’s also possible like some persecutors he’s forgotten his original protective function or like other persecutors he’s simply masking how he’s trying to protect Will (because if anyone knew he cared for Will the threat wouldn’t be affective anymore).

‘Alters "should be treated with equal kindness," despite their behaviors.Persecutors are often "misguided protectors" which can be negotiated with. With ‘patience, persistence and kindness" they can be allowed to choose a different role once the person is safe from ab*sers. The persecutor can be "turned into a constructive force" (Watkins, 1978, p. 397) and become “one of the therapist’s strongest allies and can play a major role in the healing of the patient” (Putnam, 1991, p. 205) (*I’ll talk more about this in my s4 analysis) .With healing a non-human alter can even turn human again! "I have an alter who was a persecutor for a long time. A lot of people see persecutors as bad and sometimes even the persecutors themselves see themselves as bad. This alter saw herself as an ab*ser and carried an awful lot of self hate, but she wasn't bad really because her motives were to protect us even though she wasn't going about it in a very good way. She thought that if she punished us and scared us into 'keeping in line' then other people wouldn't have to hurt us. Eventually she learnt that hurting us wasn't necessary, so now she is trying to learn how to protect us in more healthy ways."

-Wizard

There’s also important inspirations for the show to mention that support this theory:

Montauk Project’- The original title for Stranger things was “Montauk”- in reference to the Montauk Project. It was about experiments conducted on psychic children, where the scientists would “break” them psychologically to strengthen their powers and to program them. Duncan who could “open portals to other dimensions- let loose a monster from his subconscious.”

‘A wizard of Eathsea’ (which suzie mentions in s3)- Is about a male wizard Ged (Will) who casts a powerful spell, but the spell goes awry and instead he releases a shadow creature! The new Archmage, Gensher, describes the shadow as an ancient evil that wishes to possess Ged. But the ‘shadow’ turns out to be a representation of the darkest aspects of his personality. And the only way for the chaos to stop is for ged and the shadow to merge.

‘the dark crystal’ movie poster in Mike’s room is about a race called urSkeks who inadvertently divided themselves into two separate beings; the violent, materialistic Skeksis, and the gentle, contemplative urRu. It was only when they merged back together as one could harmony and peace be restored to the world.

‘Long kiss goodnight’- both (’good’ and supposedly ‘bad’) personalities also integrate into 1 happy personality.

In d&d “it’s also possible, although rare, for an extremely powerful mind flayer wizard to become a true lich, also known as an illithilich. illithid's last desire upon death was to be rejoined with its elder brain.” ( Will’s mind/ he wants to integrate with Will).

Even the way the mindflayer/ ‘shadow monster’ functions is similar to the ‘shadow phoenix’/how integration in DID works. “They considered feeding on brains as a euphoric experience as it absorbed its victim's memories, personality, and fears.”

The dark phoenix (referenced in s1ep1) fails to merge with jean so goes to merge with her clone body as the next best thing. In this case the mf went to Will’s second alter William/Billy. And as Will states “another me”. Later Jean, Phoenix, and madelyn (clone) merge into 1 person- the new-jean now having the memories and personality traits of all 3.

in s1 Mr clarke describes the vale of shadows (later the upsidedown) as being created by “necrotic” (’dead’-zombie boy) and shadow (shadow monster) magic. In d&d the Vale of Shadows, is as a lush valley hidden in the mountains that holds a sacred pool with the power to make dreams reality. (In this case nightmares representing past ab*se). He even describes his ‘now memories’ as ‘like a dream’.

In ‘never ending story’ referenced in s3 - the land of Fantasia represents humanity’s imagination and is thus without boundaries. However ‘the Nothing’ (the physical manifestation of darkness) which has taken over Fantasia and it’s inhabitants is a manifestation of the ‘loss of hopes and dreams’.

Silent hill videogames/movies (duffers cited as inspo):. “The bad guys faked Alessa’s death. Kaufmann prepared a substitute body of alessa; and performed the fake "autopsy (like Will) .Alessa believed that their current world must be cleansed with fire (WW’s fire powers). Alessa had a very dark, violent, traumatic and ab*sive childhood: r*ped, beaten, tortured, and even burned , all by the age of 7- “it was a 7″). She had supernatural powers and was called a witch. She had precognition (future/intuition) and pyrokinesis (fire) which developed after her ab*sive mother burned her (like ww). It’s also implied Dahlia her mother would lock Alessa in their house's dark attic for long periods of time for any irreligious behavior (the trunk).Alessa was "always" sad, and Alessa only found respite when escaping to other worlds through fantasy to cope with and comfort herself in the face of her harsh reality. At times, Alessa seems to completely withdraw inward, perhaps as a result of years of trauma as there are many instances of her becoming unresponsive when questioned.Because of all of her ab*se Allesa’s soul split in 1/2 (becoming Alessa and Cheryl).Selfless at heart, she cared for her second half /reincarnation more than she cared for herself, wanting to spare them the hellish nightmare she endured at the hands of her ab*sive mother and her cult. For seven years (it was a 7), Alessa endured her suffering because she had not wanted to destroy whatever small happiness her other self was able to enjoy, but little by little, it became more than Alessa could bear. Alessa's latent psychic abilities are triggered and she shrouds Silent Hill in fog and an altered reality to prevent her mother's scheme from advancing. Many of the drastic changes that befall the town in the game, such as the horrific creatures that come to inhabit it, are conjured from her imagination and delusions. “ ( personally i think Lonnie went to the house offscreen in s1 and tried to take Ww- why when lonnie is at the byers house they zoom in on a bullet in the tv for some reason with no explanation on how it occurred). Cheryl and Alessa also later merge again .

mystic river-in the 80s, a young boy who plays baseball is r**ed by 2 men in a cabin in the woods and escapes and runs into the forrest . He imagines perpetrators as werewolves and vampires as a way to cope. And imagines he’s in a scary world that no one else can see (that disappears when he turns around). And he even has a split personality. He wishes he could turn into a undead monster so he doesn’t have to feel the pain of being human anymore.

other DID movies/show inspirations for St (some realistic /some more supernatural so resemble DID) : prince of tides,primal fear (realistic DID ,caused by childhood se*ual trauma).supernatural/ or non realistic DID: elfen lied, exorcist, and Audrey rose .

Now on to the next point- “chronologically, it is the persecutory alter personality who creates the first split. Helper alter personalities constitute the second split, and as such, constitute a defense against the first split. These two successive splits constitute the basic dissociation. Further alter personality formations are only of secondary nature. In order to cope with the first split, the host personality produces companions resembling [him] as a second defense.The alter personalities developing in the second phase originate from the desire of the host personality to regain her previous strength and from her striving to create alter personalities resembling herself who share the same aim with her.”

So to make it simple some alters are more based on Will in order to combat the alters more based on WW/mf (the 1st alter/. protector- persecutor). So let’s talk about other alters based on ww/mf.

Kali Prasad (avenger alter/ different race alter)

“The avenger holds the rage from the childhood abuse and may attempt to avenge themselves or seek retribution from the ab*ser.”

”Different race alters are generally created for the stereotypic or imagined qualities of that race, as experienced or perceived by the host personality. Fike gives the example of a Caucasian patient with a Native American alter personality who represented spirituality and other-worldliness. “ we actually see Kali who is the embodiment of her religious counterpart.Kali is a (Hindu goddess). And Prasad is a holy offering to gods and goddesses in hinduism.

Kali’s name means “destroyer of all evil forces” and in mythology she was considered “ a divine protector and the one who bestows liberation to her children”. However , the goddess Kali’s iconography is generally associated with death and violence and paradoxically (at the same time) “motherly love”. Kali is sometimes considered the goddess of death but more accurately she “brings the death of ego”. She only kills demons. She is considered one of “the most compassionate of the gods because she provides liberation to her children”. She is commonly depicted holding a sword and the head of a demon. “A latitude soul sees mother Kali as very sweet, affectionate, and overflowing with incomprehensible love for her children” (the numbers and her gang of misfits).She is called the Divine Mother & Mother of the Universe. And when talking to El the sign there’s a says ‘spiritual advisor’ behind her.

“ It has been suggested that a male child that is being ab*sed might create a female headmate because he needs a "mother" role in the attempt to soften what might be angry and aggressive behavior on his part as a male DID sufferer. “

we see other evidence of her being an alter as well. Her saying she feels ‘whole’ with EL around. And In the episode before Kali is introduced. Will describes his now memories as “spreading” “growing” and “killing”. Meanwhile, after this Kali describes her and El’s wounds (caused by their father) in the same fashion. Kali describes how El has to face her trauma or else, like it did with her it will “spread.” Kali later makes a imaginary Brenner to tell El the same words Will said earlier- saying she has to face her trauma or else it will “grow” and “spread “ and “kill” her. in never ending story (reffed in s3) Sebastian who unbeknownst to him created an imaginary mythical world with characters who’d copy phrases their creator Sebastian said.

She also says everyone sees her and El as monsters because of their powers- something ww/mf feels (literally becoming one because of this and his ab*se). And Kali and El say that people hurt them -so they should be allowed to kill them. Kali making the distinction (more aligned with the mf) saying the people who hurt her are still after her -so she’s just making the first move and killing them as preemptive self defense. Something the mf also does, saying in s3 El could have killed him, and targeting those that hurt him and said they wanted to “kill” him in s2 . It’s the same logic as Kali.

And before kali and El talk we see kali look up to el, as they pass by graphiti that says ‘barbelith” which in the comics ‘the invisibles’- is the connection between humanity and the holographic world that we see. Aka her and Kali interacting in what’s actually the innerworld. Like Dustin said about the upsidedown “it’s a parallel world existing right beside you, without you even knowing it.”

why the tv of Kali’s tormenter (who tased her as a kid) is watching a show about a kid having a nightmare about being held down and having a needle put in her arm that kept getting bigger and bigger. Like how WW was pinned down and forced to take a shot in the arm.

Even the butterfly she creates could be possibly connected to WW- because butterfly decorations are above the byer’s phone (WW electercuted). And similar to Kali’s description the ficitonal russians (npcs) are also very stereotypical based on what an american kid might hear about ‘evil soviets’. They also use the same tasers as Kali’s ab*sers in the lab. In some movies it’s implied Lonnie may have tased his kids so maybe that’s why? And we see like how the gang tied up the mf to a chair, and shot him with a needle needle- the russians do the same to robin & steve.We also see Kali and El attack a man at a gas station -similar to the russian hitman npc from s3.

And Kali rescues a girl (npc) from a mental health hospital -called ‘dottie’ which is a term for being mentally ill. Lucas also claims El may have escaped from a psych hospital. Personally, i think this is foreshadowing of Mike helping Will out of one (like how Dustin and Lucas bring up ‘myers’ escaping one), but I digress. in Kali’s place grafiitti also says ‘o’bedlam’a poem about neglected mentally ill beggers . And compares her crew (of npcs) to herself and El- like dottie (mentally ill) because she’s part of a did system. Axel with his knife (lonnie loves his hunting knives and used to threaten Will with them and thus did so to el). And El and Will share the same stuffed bear- ‘so there’s the care bear’, one of kali’s crew even wears a clown mask, and axel wears the mummy mask seen at Melvald’s where Joyce works. There’s also the connection of the ‘rainbow room’ (with a rainbow drawing) on the door - relating to Kali & El and Will’s rainbow-ship drawing.And kali also likes rock music like Will/Billy. And when El first sees her-she’s near fire (ww connection).

El (caretaker & gate keeper alter)

“A gatekeeper is an alter who controls switching or access to front, access to inside or certain areas inside, or access to certain alters or memories. The existence of a gatekeeper is highly stabilizing for a system because gatekeepers can to some extent prevent unwanted switching, failure to switch when necessary, or failure to switch to the correct alter. They can help to prevent traumatic memories from bleeding from the alters who hold them to alters who could not yet handle them. They might police the boundaries between subsystems.These alters help prevent traumatized alters from fronting. This can be important because there is a chance that the trauma holders may want to harm the body.” In case you haven’t realized ... el is a horrible gate keeper-opening the gate and leaving it open for a year, not sensing it being reopened in s2 or 3 (too busy thinking about mike in s2/ dating him in s3), and thus causing more trauma to Will (who started to remember old confusing and traumatic memories), and causing Billy, and Max to be traumatized.

she’s also most likely a caretaking alter-“Caretaking alters are a type of a protector, they help manage and care for other alters, and sometimes external people (for example children). “

“They are often motherly, and may be modeled on a real person (WW’s appearance- WW looking like Will except having brown eyes, and El looking like the female equivalent). “Caretaking alters lack awareness of self-care and become exhausted easy; they only have a limited role and have little capacity for play, exploration or socializing.” El fighting to exhaustion, being isolated for most of her life and being in the cabin for 9 months (s2-3), comforting billy/Will, and again only not abiding by this when Mike is involved -hurting Max out of jealousy.

Her inability to speak well could be from neglect and social isolation, but ‘Ab*sive groups are known to have created alters which appear either "crazy" or learning disabled, for example training alters to scramble or garble words so they can’t report ab*se.Alters may be disabled when the body is not, for example a mute alter may be created in response to abusers instructions, e.g. "Don't talk.”

El also shows the trait of ‘memory sharing’.

Memory sharing

“We’ve managed to create a system within us. In order to grant access to memories with each other we have to come to know each other and gain each other's trust. Caroline says “when the memory sharing happens- the best way I can describe it to a non DID person is by asking you to remember/think about a movie with Wizards or characters like from twilight where they have the power to touch you and let you see their visions and/or memories. Sounds crazy I'm sure— but that's as close as I can possibly describe it.The memories literally pour into me exactly like that. “

After Will disappears, El appears to the audience for the first time. Having similar sounding names and having a striking resemblance (and 1 syllable nicknames ending in L) . Troy, Benny, Hopper, and an eyewitness all initally assuming she was a boy. Hopper even tries to track down El, assuming it was Will who’s hair was shaved- asking “could it be Lonnie’s kid?” and the man responding “could of been the Byers boy”. Mike even says “Do you really think it’s a coincidence we found her in the same place Will disappeared?”The answer being No. The song “Alice” (from alice in wonderland) plays when El is at the restaurant -indicating El has entered a new world (our world). *Also, both Alexi and El are bribed with hamburgers to give the adults info they need.

El is an alter based on WW . Like WW she is afraid of the underwater sensory deprivation tanks her dad made her go into (Lonnie and ww with the tub). in s1 El used the pool/sensory deprivation to contact Will- the episode is even called “the tub” . And she thinks of this idea to talk to Will -after staring at the tub in the byers house and then remembering the deprivation tank. When in the pool or ‘tub’ at school the water slowly becomes dark as she enters the darkness- the void is a connection to the mf/ shadow monster.

She unlocks doors and it’s framed ominously just like the demogorgan does in the first ep. In d&d lore Mindflayers have “telekinetic abilities akin to mage hand (El was called a mage) and telekinesis.” I still think the mf may now have her telekenesis (which was originally his to begin with). We also see El fade away with the demogorgan as she and the demogorgan mimic each other’s body language. This was probably supposed to be El most likely integrating with the demogorgan (until the Duffers admitted to changing their minds). And In s1/2 she has black veins appear while not being possessed.

Dustin in s2 mentions the mf “doesn’t know it’s true home.” which is illustrated by El wandering around as Hopper, Becky, and kali try to convince her they’re her home. El saying she’s the monster in s1 is also how the mf aka WW feels about himself. And Will/ww was thrown in the dark trunk by Lonnie (perhaps after refusing to shoot an animal ) so for El it became Brenner throwing her in a dark room in solitary confinement after refusing to kill a cat. in s1 El draws similar to Will/ww and draws Brenner with a 3rd leg (cause even if brenner didn’t do so to her - the memory bled through from ww). Benny suspected El has been “ab*sed or something” and she didn’t seem to understand privacy -undressing in front of the boys.

El cries thinking of the time she killed a squirrel (typical hunting game) and eating it and somehow knowing how to make a fire (a Ww skill). El when re-enacting this forgotten experience of WW’s , spots a sketchy ominous hunter and throws a fired projectile at him and runs. Like WW who uses his fireballs to hurt the bad guys- in this case the hunters (Lonnie and his buddies). Similar to the demogorgan who killed 2 hunters in s1.

When she goes into the void and sees the demogorgan- we even hear a clock ticking in the background indicating this is associated with the past. When Will encounters the mf a similar thing happens- as the clock moves unnaturally. And similar to the mf she attacks her abusers and throws them into a wall (which mf did in s3). Throwing Nancy into a wall after she burned him.

Unfortunately in the ‘long kiss goodnight’ a girl with multiple personalities (Will/ww) was thrown and tied up in a trunk and when the trunk was opened the main villain tried to sell her for... you know . Then she escapes and jumps off a cliff into the water to escape the r**e (quarry flashback?) . This guy later tries to drown her too. While in skyfall, number-tattoos on the wrist were indicative of being sold into the s*x tr*de (El/kali’s tattoos- Will saw something?) . I really hope this isn’t the case - but this is the man who wanted to make money off his son’s death to to pay off his gambling debt. In one movie the bad guy sold his gf for a case of beer and some smokes, while playing a card game. And unfortunately, the fact Will was triggered to see the mf after Mike says “i’m not pr*stituting my sister?” may indicate something from the past as well (maybe Jon saying something ?). Along with El being chased by “bad men”. It’s possible those 2 hunters were pals with lonnie and got what was coming to them. On to the next point-

El - is the Cannanite (male) god associated with “salt water “ (pool filled with salt in s1) who “dwelled in a tent” (in s1 Mike’s blanket fort) . In s1 El owns a male lion doll and Will has a female lion . The fact El first appeared looking like a boy, is named after a male god, El in spanish translates to “he”, and she has a male lion toy could symbolize a few things. In ‘prince of tides’ when the boy cried the dad yelled for him to go put on a dress.In ‘the cell’ the ab*sive father beat his young son with a belt, burned, and drowned him (causing a seizure), threw homophobic slurs at him, and called him a ‘women’ multiple times while beating him. And said “I’ll teach you to be a woman.” Some specialists say one of MANY possible reasons a boy may have a female alter is cause they were “forced to cr*ss dress “ but obviously that’s not the only possible reason. (And no, this doesn’t apply to trans women- making sure no one tries putting words in mouth). I think of the moment where boyish-looking El runs away into the woods, and takes off her wig and screams in anger at the reflection of herself in the water -may be a recreated event from the past). The fact El [is a male god] and in spanish El (the way it’s spelled in the show means “he’) is also possibly intentional . In addition to the fact El is the only alter who physically resembles Will and is the only one with a buzzcut , unlike Kali (who in the flashback at Hawkins lab had all her hair) is something to take note. El could be an inverse of Will’s experience. El as a girl was stripped of her femininity from her papa. Because Will was a boy forced to dress girly cause of his dad . El having a male lion and Will having a female lion being used to symbolize this. WW was the one who went through this abuse and also had brown eyes like El ( unlike Will)- so in regards to physical appearence she is his ‘girl version’.Since like many ab*sers Lonnie gave Will mixed messages he could never abide by . In mad max furry road the villain named ‘daddy’ forced his sl*ve to shave their head and branded them with a tattoo like El (he also had 3 s*x s**ves)

-in s2 the song ‘don’t mess around with Jim’ plays. Upon character introductions of lyrics “Jim walker” pans to Jim Hopper and “boy named Will-ie Mccoy” (pans to El).

-Hopper in ep1 mention (El)eanor Gilipse-surname of girl in silent hill with powers/DID.

-the never ending story ref also alludes to how El was created by Will similar to another superpowered human (ww). El is atreyu and Will is sebastian. El is atreyu- who is said to be the chosen one. He falls from a great height and on to the beach shore, and comes across abandoned ruins, and then the villain gmork latches his jaws on to his leg (like El). It’s revealed atreyu isn’t actually the chosen one and everyone was wrong . And it was actually the poor human kid (Sebastian - who has a bowl cut and one parent and secretly had imagination-powers ) . Atreyu is told to look at the mirror of his ‘true self’ and is shocked to see Sebastian (his unknown creator) looking back at him. “turn around , look at what you see. In her face- the mirror of your dreams.”

-In the novel Sebastian even temporarily went evil when he lost all his memories except those of his father- similar to Will/ww. Sebastian created the whole fantasy story and it’s inhabitants (with their own sentience). So only he had the capability to remove the darkness from the fantasy world they inhabited. The darkness representing the loss of hopes and dreams.

-Elfen lied (another inspo for the series according to the duffers)- has a Super-powered protagonist/anti hero/ and tragic villain.”She has three split personalities due to past trauma . The three are Lucy, Nyu, and Kaede. Kaede : (childhood love/friend of Kouta) from ‘mapple house’ (cough- ‘mapple street’/ Will). Nyu: is mentally the age of a young child in the body of an adult, who can barely speak, and found by Kouta after she escapes the lab who experimented on her .Nyu is like a very sheltered child and has a very tiny outlook on the actual world and can only speak one word at the start of the anime (El).Lucy:Her violent personality, who has a distaste and hate for humans after humans traumatized her as a child. Although deep down she wants to be human (mf).”

We also see both the Will/mf and El called spies, have ptsd, described as ‘quiet’, and had their dads force them to kill animals. El growls like an animal after the mf growls at her first. And in regards to the supernatural Ww and El both have powers. They both could communicate through different dimensions using electronics. Both of their moms’ had “crazy aunts” . Both are called “schizos” in s2 because of their powers (did is most commonly misdiagnosed with schizophrenia which i do think that will occur initially- mrs driscoll not being believed about the supernatural because of her being a ‘paranoid schizophrenic’ is foreshadowing). Both Will and her had their brain waves monitored at the lab and their measurements were off the charts, plus they were being unknowingly recorded on video.They both tore through walls (with that pink gunk between the normal world and upside down). El even goes through the entrance covered in goo (like a baby) as a hint she was born from the upsidedown!

We see in Terry’s place (El’s room) symbols associated with Will- clowns and rabbits ( like how Lonnie made Jon kill rabbits on hunting trips). They even chose white rabbits- like those in Alice in wonderland and earlier associated with El.

El/ww can also both can track others when concentrating -Ww found Hopper, El found Will. Both communicated psychically by transferring their conscious- El to talk to Mike in his basement using the void (in s2) & Will to his mom in the living room (in s1). Also before Will goes missing , he asks Dustin for his X-men comic- later in reference to El, Dustin asks “Do you think El was born with her powers like the X-men?” And when Mike says El is “channeling him (Will)”. Dustin says “like professor x”-clearly hinting that they were both born with powers, like the X-men.

However, El is how Max described “her own person.” When Dustin says she’s “like a wizard (like ww) Mike corrects him and says “more like yoda.” And the longer she stays in the real world the more differences she has to Will/ww as she evolves into her own person. She doesn’t have many interests in common with Will :d&d, scifi, computers, science, horror movies etc. And like i’ve explained in other posts - she isn’t actually in love with Mike. And her obsession with mike not only inhibits her role as an alter but her own independence/personhood , along with Will’s healing ( which depends on Mike and other’s support). I think the main reason we never see Will & El interact significantly (despite the parallels) is because they’re growing apart as they develop as people and go on divergent paths. I feel like if someone doesn’t integrate it’s most likely El (and probably Max). While Kali most likely integrates- since she was brought to tears by seeing another alter and said she feels “complete” with El - hinting she’ll probably desire to integrate into Will/ww in the future. in ‘annihalation’ a poc woman with a 8 tattoo on her arm integrates with others into a god like creature too . EL may eventually go by Elle [in french means ‘she’] when she becomes her own person, and gains independence, perhaps?

demogorgan (fictional alters or ‘fictive’)

“Fictional introjects specifically are based off of fictional characters. These characters can be from television shows, movies, books, fantasy, and other forms of fiction.They don't have to think, act, look, or feel in the exact same ways that the fictional character does. Some fictional introjects can be ab*sive, and form as a way to continue traumatizing the system.”

“ One of the main purposes of a father introject is to control your behavior when you are away from the father with the same intensity as if you were right in front of him. The father may have a variety of parts that are loyal to him, his beliefs, his ways, etc.’

in d&d a demogorgon is a “demon from the abyss”. And are also called “the deep father” , indicating his connection of being based on Lonnie. We even see Lucas hand Will a ‘devil’s baby’ firecracker (and behind will is a sign that says demon-dog) to indicate that Will’s father is the ‘devil’. The demogorgan is also first referred to as “the man without a face” in the show. Steve suggesting he does have a face but he was wearing a mask. And when Lonnie first ‘comes back’ to Hawkins Jon says “mom, did that thing (demogorgan) come back.” And Lonnie cuts him off after the comment saying ‘that’s enough’. Lonnie also mentions to Joyce he explored the woods where Will went missing. And later Jon mentions how the demogorgan only ventures several miles from his house -like lonnie. Jon also tells Nancy about how his dad forced him to go on hunting trips and in s1 we see the demorgorgan kill a deer (typical game), attack hunters, and capture Will in the shed (which contained the riffle and sleeping bags for camping). We are also told in s1 Lonnie taught Will baseball, and when the demorgorgan knocks the bat out of Jon’s hand he gets on top of him- putting his face close like he was about to kiss him. We even see in s2 - the pic of the mf next to a baseball bat and mitt. And the demogorgan on multiple occasions was mistaken for a bear (which Will sketches and El also is into teddy bears) and bears symbolically represent “wisdom” (will the wise).

And Lonnie when closing the hole in the wall says someone has to be blamed for what happened to Will- and it transitions to Mike tearing a hole in paper and explaining what happened to Will with the demogorgan. Lonnie caused the ‘tear’ in Will’s psyche. Lonnie is even the one to mention how people ‘make things up to cope.’And how people in the city are “more real” (possible alter foreshadowing).

In d&d demorgorgons also have 2 heads with distinct personalities, one wanting to stay as one and the other wishing to separate (a hint at Will’s DID and the fight between WW wanting to integrate personalities and Will not wanting to do so).

~El ,Kali, and the demogorgon being alters is why we see the lights flicker when the demogorgan appears , and (sometimes) when El and kali use their powers- cause they’re based off ww who has lightning/electricity powers which we saw in s1. Causing the lights to flicker at Mike’s place, turning the bike light on with his mind, causing sparks of electricity to come out of the phone 2x , using lights telepathically to talk to joyce (blinking ‘once for yes and twice for no’, and using the lights to tell Joyce to “run”).

demodogs/dart (animal alters)

“In some cases, what presents as an animal is really a child alter acting as an animal. This is found in cases where the abused child was forced to act as an animal, usually a dog.”

In mad-max the r**ist biker gang - ties up one of their victims on a leash like a dog. In unleashed the adoptive father made his son where a collar and called him ‘his dog’. ‘Orphan’ the girl wore a collar and the bullies pulled on it calling her a ‘doggie’ and she starts screaming and having an episode in school. In s1 Hopper says he likes the book cujo , that one of the guards is reading, and at the end of the book they replace the dog Cujo with a dog named Willie. In ‘the cell’ the villain put dog collars on his m*rder v*ctims cause he wanted to ‘own them’. In ghost Busters, Mike -is Venkman- and Will -is Dana Barret. Dana finds a demon-dog in her fridge, and hires the ghost busters. And right before Venkman goes on a date with her she is possessed by the big-bad, Zuul, (who controls demo(n)-dogs). The s4 movies also allude to Lonnie possibly k**ling chester his dog cause when he was stalking Will (offscreen) chester would bark at him - like how he barked at the demogorgan - one of the only other times we hear a dog bark is when we see Lonnie (at his place).

*There’s also the parallels of Dart to El. Dart killed a cat. While El’s papa tried to make her kill a cat (which dogs stereotypically don’t like-Lonnie most likely forced Will to kill a cat. ).Heck the russians even reference cats -linking them to El and the demodog. El/Dart also both have sweet tooths (eggos and 3 muskateers). Both were called traitors and ran away- and initially caused a rift in the group. And dustin and Mike said they made “promises” to El/dart and that dart/el “trusted them” (mike &Dustin)”. Lucas in s1 also called El a ‘dog’ and El asked, annoyed, if she was Mike’s “pet”.

Jim hopper : Introject & adult alters

“System introjects are alters who are replications of a person from the outside world , who often believe they are the actual person (and not the replication). They may adamantly believe that they are a different person . These parts contain a lot of memories, factual information, emotional realities for how it was like to be near the outside person.Introjects can also be based off of figures that the dissociative child found strong, courageous, heroic, or otherwise worthy of being emulated and internalized and could theoretically protect them.”Jim even means to “supplant” (replace) or “supresede” (take the place of a person or thing previously in authority or use). Meaning, there was a Jim Hopper (Joyce knew in highschool) and a Jim Hopper alter based on him.

“older adult alters are created to serve a nurturing or parenting role, thus serving as a protector. (*protecting Will/el) . However, sometimes the age is related to taking on the identification of the ab*ser, and can therefore take on any of the other more hostile roles... Introjects which are mimicking ab*sers are trying to "keep you inline" in order to protect you from external ab*sers. They don’t dare relax their vigilance or let you fall away from the OLD RULES that were once so important.They are trying so hard to keep you safe. “

We even see the convo he has with El, is similar to Neil and his ex wife- a man berating the girl after coming home, calling her a liar, and asking about what man they saw. And El yelling and saying Hopper is “like papa” when he yells at her (the same season dr owens called him Will’s “pop”. Would not be surprised if Lonnie would berate Will about seeing Mike. There’s even a physical resemblance- blonde, blue eyes, and similar moustaches to him and Neil.And he also parallels Billy & Max in s3 with the ‘door’ imagery.

“Being an introject is a difficult and thankless task. This member of your system has spent all these years acting out a role that they dislike every bit as much as you do.” *(berating El about the rules- that were most likely initially Lonnie’s. A part of me suspects that cabin wasn’t Hopper’s grandfather’s but Lonnie’s secret cabin where he took Will. And berate Will about seeing Mike. He was shown in s1 fixing the hole in the wall. And Hopper says about the cabin “ A LOT OF HISTORY HERE’ ).

We see other alter hints too -He taught El morse code (which Will already knew). Murray says Hopper reminds Joyce of a previous “bad relationship” (lonnie). And the russians in order to get info, t*rture steve and threaten to rip out his finger nails , while, Hopper threatens to break the mayor’s fingers for info.

And when a Russian goes into the carnival game in a room with tigers and clowns, the speaker says “ if you dare enter the cave of horrors you may never know what you may find around the corner (clown laughs) . Don’t show your fear in the presence of the tiger or you may never escape this cave alive”.As he jumps out the tiger roars in unison with Hopper leaps out to attack.

The song you ‘don’t mess around with jim’ (from s2 and 3 that Jim dances and sings to ) is about a boy named Willie beating up a thug (who wears a hat) named Jim (representing resentment of father figures). We see Villains have zoom in shots of their cigareete trays- like the h*tman, Billy posessed by the mf, and Hopper before he yells and threatens El in s2.

In s1 It’s implied Hopper is addicted to pills , was an alcoholic (both him and Lonnie have many beer cans and cigareettes in their house- would not be surprised if Lonnie also had a pill addiction too) .

Introjects “ are NOT the actual ab*ser. They are a victim, a single part within a large beautiful mind, bred from the survivor's essence.They are just copying behaviors shown to them by bad people, not harboring the intent, s*dism or imm*rality of the actual perpetrators.”

“The introject in your system was there to help you when the stakes were very high and their job was deadly serious. It’s difficult for them to let go of that level of urgency. introjects represent how important it was, at one time in your life, to always be vigilant. Danger was always near you and you had to be careful of every move and every word, because your very survival might depend on not doing or saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.”

‘ introjects also represent the desperate hope that, if you could only do everything just right, obey all your ab*ser’s rules and anticipate exactly what was wanted of you, that it might lessen or even prevent some of the ab*se from happening. And gain approval or love from the ab*ser.”

We also see how he’s based on the mf/ww in a few ways: he describes his depression in s3 as being in a “deep dark cave” (the supernatural cave in s2/cave of horrors at the fair) and in s2 he says he thinks of himself as a “black hole” that will destroy everything around him including his daughter (the mf/Lonnie).

Now, cause people will mention it. We can’t take everything David says about Jopper seriously- he filmed s4 in advanced and lied constantly about the duffer’s not contacting him prior to this. I think he bs-es a lot and occasionally throws in hints. Like how in behind stranger things after mentioning Lonnie and Bob he compares jopper- to Jack and Evelyn from china town (who slapped her for lying -like Neil did to his wife. And we see duffers laugh hysterically and shawn exchange a look with them cause they know David is giving a hint that isn’t positive). And evelyn was also r*ped by her father (there’s at least 30+ st movies the Duffers have cited with that dad plot point, unfortunately . Along with about 6-10 DID movies). David said in an interview with total film : “ In terms of Stranger Things, you’ll be able to look back at season one and see a lot of things that happen further down the line that relate to that.I’ve had those discussions with them from the very first season. We were always interested in that idea of the Gandalf resurrection – Gandalf the Grey who fights the Balrog and then becomes Gandalf the White.” Well this is a lothr ref (Which Will is into) but i think it’s also just a Will and ww hint -since in silent Hill when Alessa and cheryl mege back into 1 they become a deity- a serene white-clad figure, even the dragon relates to Will. But, there’s also the fact David in multiple interviews describes Hopper as a ‘little boy’ . After s4 started he said about Hopper with Gold DERBY “ he’s also like a little boy who has been just so traumatized and so hurt that he can’t really have relationships with people that are full and that are honest... it makes it difficult for him to get close to people... all the joyce st-...There’s a lot to be revealed around the complexities of that story . Because when we know the ending you’ll be able to go back and watch it and see what we were planting in s3 , that paid off in s4 and s5. That will make those intimacy issues a lot more understandable.”

Since Hopper-alter thinks he’s the real-Hopper (Joyce’s old friend/ possible ex) he hits on Joyce.There’s the references to back to the future. Steve incorrectly saying it’s about alex keaton “trying to b*ng his mom.” And stobin’s exchange about the movie alludes to what Jopper actually is “I think that lady is trying to bang her son/ no, but, they’re the same age?/ He needs to get back to the future ,which is his time, cause he’s stuck in the past (trauma)/ W-What?”

And the season where Jopper was the most evident we see another alter (Billy) hitting on someone who is old enough to be/ resembles his mom. Her being a wheeler could also represent Will’s repressed feelings for Mike. Along with Illustrating his subconscious issues with parental figures cause of Lonnie. Dianne (Hopper’s ex wife) - even is a roman goddess of hunting.

In s2 Nancy asks Steve how his “grandpa’s time in the war is a metaphor for your life?” And steve compares the mf to the germans in the war. Dr owens mentions Will has ptsd like “ (vietnam) soldiers’, Hopper saying he had buddies like Will . “In the 70s there was a study that compared the post-traumatic stress symptoms in Vietnam veterans and adult survivors of childhood s**ual ab*se. The study revealed that childhood s**ual ab*se is traumatizing and can result in symptoms comparable to symptoms from war-related trauma.” Hopper isn’t actually in Russia -but in one of the innerworlds (after he jumped through the rift of the machine- into Will’s mind). We’ll see flashbacks but also present circumstances of his imprisonment echo Will’s past with Lonnie (if the movies indicate anything)- being starved, guards getting payed in order to let other prisoners r*pe a gay prisoner (than claim incorrectly because of his sexuality he wanted it) , as well as a gang of sadist men who r**e others and a warden using that as a threat to be compliant , being thrown in a dark room of solitary confinement and starved when they didn’t obey the warden, the warden being religious, etc. And the Anerican soldiers (in Vietnam) in the movies aren’t much better and do similarly horrific acts to civilians like r**e and bragging/ happily k*lling women, children, and the elderly. The drill sergant in vietnam calling them homophobic slurs & women, and chocking one of the soldiers with one hand, slapping one for not believing in christianity. Tying up a soldier in a bed , gagging him, beating him and saying “remember it’s just a dream.” Only praising them when good in fire arms.(movies : fullmetal jacket, papillon, shawshank redemption, platoon, welcome to marwen, etc ) . My assumption is while in solitary he has flashbacks of his life- and it’s more hints about him being an alter -the boxes in the basement are “vietnam” ,“dad”, and “ny” (and these are the memories of his we’ll see). And some of the bad characters in said stories will also parallel Lonnie . For instance in s2, Jonathan mentions Indiana writer Vonnegut- In his book ‘slaughterhouse 5′- Vonnegut begins the story of Billy Pilgrim, a man who has “come unstuck in time”. It accounts of Billy Pilgrim's capture and incarceration by the Germans during the last years of World War II, and scattered throughout the narrative are episodes from Billy's life with his dad, and his own wife and kids.Billy is forced to be part of the war and similar things against his free will. The moments start from his childhood when his father throws him in the water to teach him how to swim. He was unwillingly drafted into the war. Later, he is kidnapped by Tralfamadorians (aliens that are implied to be caused by his mental health issues/trauma) against his will. Therefore, he realizes that this concept is just an illusion.

We also see Hopper being violent/aggressive to Mike foreshadowing how Lonnie will treat Mike (difference is it’ll be played completely serious).

Sara : “littles “ also called a child alter (not based on ww)

“Child alters often talk in a child-like way, but unlike a biological child they can normally understand abstract concepts and long words. Some child parts may ... be playful and fun-living and have only positive memories. A child alter may also be an idealized representation of the "perfect child" from the "perfect" family, for example the "good boy/girl."

we see this in a few ways- Sarah winning the spelling bee (like Will winning the science fair) and Hopper describing her as very intelligent, but not knowing where she gets it from. She in the 1st episode is said to love science like Will (who won the science fair 4x) , and knows how to spell words like ‘odontalgia’. In s1, Joyce and Hopper pretend with Sara and Will to be a witch and an ogre eating them.And in s1 Will and her both own cat plushies. she has a tiger plushie (mascot of Will’s school, like with billy’s baseball mascott also being a tiger/ Will’s painting). And her hospital gown has clowns on it (Will’s fear). Hopper even pauses and has a flashback of sarah’s tiger when he sees Will’s lion plushie in the upsidedown .And when Will has a vine in his mouth imagines sarah with tubes in her mouth.We see despite the fact Hopper didn’t move to Hawkins until after her death- she appears to be at Hawkins lab?

And Holly’s drawing is similar to el’s in s1.And , in s1, like Will she has an episode alluding to her seeing the void as she turns her head scared seeing something no one else can.Then in s2, Hopper says Sarah became obsessed with blackholes - and latter says that blackhole (mf?) got her. It’s possible she saw the void or even the mf and misinterpreted it as a blackhole. And so she didn’t actually die of cancer - it was probably just symbolic of her integrating into the mf/ww (the blackhole ‘getting her’). Or it’s possible she’s just alive/in stasis in the innerworlds after her ‘simulated death’

Also can we mention how there’s lions, tigers,and bears (as plushies)- oh my. Along with the whole “home references”. Wizard of oz is on the movie list, and 2 wizard of oz movies shown in s3.

Robin Buckley

Robin Buckley (possibly an alter?)- Robin discusses with steve the legend of Prometheus , who not only gave human beings the gift of fire, and therefore civilization, but created them, giving them the gift of life. El watches frankenstein in s2 whose novel was titled “the modern prometheus”(another hint WW/Will created El). Steve when looking at Robin even says the biblical verse “let there be light” (the beginning of creation and human beings-i.e Robin).”And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.” (wow this doesn’t sound just like the black-watery-void in the upsidedown at all) XD. Robins were also considered holy birds by the God thor (the god of Thunder and lightning). She’s gay, into comics, rides a bike, and is afraid of drs just like Will is, and was tied to a chair for info like ww. She references surfing (billy) and has a spy storyline. She’s a smart, into rock music and wants to fit in . And makes fun of her friends’ love-lives to hide her own insecurities about her own romantic feelings and sexuality (that weren’t accepted at that time). And has feelings for a girl who can’t sing (mike) who pays too much attention to a person who didn’t even like them (Steve/El) . Buckley could be a ref to a ‘buck’ deer (like the one the demogorgan killed in s1/ typical hunting game). And another legend says that the Robins were red because it scorched its bre*st in the fires of Purgatory, mercifully taking drops of water in its beak for the lips of the parched souls in torment( the opposite of devil-lonnie).Robins also feature in the traditional children's tale Babes in the Wood, the birds out of kindness cover the de*d b*dies of the 2 abandoned children found in the woods with strawberry leaves (who had been k*lled by an abusive family member) . Not sure if mrs driscoll (being a strawberry name is a coincidence to that whole cherry/strawberry/heathers movie ref with alexi? Robin is also a unis*x/male name like most of the other gals on the list. While her crush ‘tammy’ (means ‘twin’. could be a clue about Robin being an alter?).

the rebuttal could be simply: buckley can mean ‘goat’ which would match her bff’s surname Harrington (’he-goat’). And just be a cute little nod to them.While Robin means ‘bright fame’ just like our fallen super-hero Bob ( since robin and bob are nicknames for Robert)- so could also be a simple nod to him.But her names could be both a nod and a deep ref- who knows.

Barb

Barb- Barbara means “strange” or “foreign” , while Barb means “stranger”. Her name could also be based on the saint Barbara- who was carefully guarded by her father who kept her locked up in a tower (like Hopper & Brenner to El/Lonnie to Will) in order to preserve her from the outside world . He later tries killing her. However, as punishment, he was struck by lightning on the way home and his body was consumed by flame (connection to ww who likes using fireballs against bad guys and who also has lightning powers). She’s best friends with a wheeler (although pictures show us unlike byler they’re not childhood friends). she may have been queer coded and had feelings for her bff (moping after Nancy leaves to sleep with Steve) . In a s1 flashback Will specifically watched ‘poltergeist’ with his mom- and is then thrust into the same scenario as the little girl (being trapped in another dimension- where the mothers can only hear their voices and communicate to them through electronics ). And barb’s pool scene echos the pool scene in the movie too-a women being attacked in a pool ( and could be considered similar to being attacked in a tub/sensory deprivation tank). And similar to El , she wakes up in the upsidedown and pukes up a white fluid calling for Wheeler- but gets no help. Unlike Will. For Halloween she also dressed up as a scary clown (Will’s fear) when Nancy dressed up as a bunny (an animal lonnie forced them to kill). She also is dragged away in a similar way to Billy -down stairs.

Her mom’s first name (Marsha) also has the same meaning as Martin Brenner- ‘war like’. A hint Lonnie is violent or maybe was a vet?

Other npcs

Besides the russians, we also have some of the americans who experimented in Hawkin’s lab: most notably Brenner and becky/terry Ives.

“Some survivors will internalize their family into their own DID system.“

Brenner and Lonnie have similar appearances (and in the original script he was suppose to be unshaved and wear plaid and jeans... prob too obvious to keep) . They forced their kids to kill animals, threw them in a dark places, submerged them into water, and also praised them when violent, and tied people to beds (yes lonnie did that - why mf and terry are both tied up there). Brenner even means- ‘someone who cleared forests by burning (showing his connection to ww with fire, and because forests is where hunting/ab*se took place).His collegue - the blond women’s name , Fraizer means - “of the forrest men” (the male hunters who terrorized Will/ww most likely).

Terry/ Becky Ives.Becky means “snare-a trap for catching birds or animals”. While Terry (Teressa means “huntress’) .While Ives means- yew wood (a tree).Terry’s backstory should also raise eyebrows when we see when going to Hawkin’s lab that the Byers’ car is there (a tip off this story isn’t reality but from Will’s subconscious).

Terry also turns in pain on the bed and sees sunflowers. And Will has a sunflower book next to his bed.

While Terry has an appearance similar to Jon’s (blonde and almond shaped brown eyes and Terry is a unis*x name) and both steal guns and drive a long distance in order to help rescue Will/el. This is the season of ‘mr mom’ after all (where Jon takes pics of Will on Halloween just like the other moms). Becky also compares Terry to Joyce too by saying Hopper would have been her type . And both joyce and terry/becky have a “crazy aunt” and were both deemed as ‘crazy’ when not believed about their children being kidnapped and indeed alive. we also see in El’s room (that Terry decorated) -bunnies (that lonnie forced the boys to kill) and clowns (Will’s fear). Along with fox’s which were in castle byers. We also see Owl’s in both the byers’ and Ive’s house (which also represent ‘paranomal wisdom’). And Winona mentioned the movie ‘prince of sands’ in an st interview. In that the psychiatrist interviews the older brother to fill in the memory-gaps of his sister (who has DID so can’t remember) he eventually admits both were r*ped as kids. And also tells a story in therapy about how their mom m*scarried and the dad threw the st*llborne in the freezer over night-so let’s hope throwing the demodog in the freezer and Terry’s miscarriage doesn’t have that traumatizing meaning. It’s also possible Terry isn’t an npc but a type of alter-given how her and El participated in ‘memory sharing’ and Terry’s power’s affected lights.”An alter may be stuck in an eternal flashback or refuse to accept that anything has changed since the period of time during which they experienced trauma“ (Terry being trapped in the time-loop after being tied to the bed/attacked).

Npcs ...but possibly other alters

I believe susie was a npc created because Will felt bad for Dustin - after the max/lucas situation. so he made what he assumed would be the perfect girl for him. She even has the same name as Max’s mom:susie vs susan. He met her from camp ‘Knowhere’ ( she’s from no where). The blonde american spy (who is also an npc) even mentions a science tech camp in s1 that dustin goes to in s3 .She has space related stuff in her room like sarah, wizard of oz poster (referencing Will), and she reads the ‘wizard of Earthsea’ -about a boy-wizard named jed who realizes the evil ancient shadow he’s been fighting is actually the dark part of his personality -and he needs to merge with it to bring balance. Everyone questions if she’s real or exists- similar to el asking Kali “are you real?”Stranger things instagram posted a fake movie poster- emulating ‘weird science’. A movie about 2 boys creating a ‘perfect women’ from scratch for them and comparing this created gal to susie (they aren’t endgame with this girl in the movie-despite her original programing). Like susie/dustin not being endgame.

Dustin on his canon spotify playlist even has the song ‘weird science’.Her appearance is based off what most boys liked, celeb ‘phoebe kates’. And it may be just a narrative device but in s2 Max lies about mormons at the door, the season before she appears.

And of course her song alludes to what’s happening in the narrative. “Make believe I'm everywhere Given in the light (demogorgan/ lonnie in shed) .dream a dream and what you see will be ( his nightmares based on his ‘memories’)/Rhymes that keep their secrets WILL unfold behind the clouds (mf on his clouds and lightning).And there upon a rainbow (Will/ his powers/ accepting his queer identity and healing) Is the answer to a never ending story.’

Similarly, Heather Holloway is most likely from Will’s mind (my guess an alter)-and her appearence is also based on Phoebe. In the show , they reference ‘fast times’ where Phoebe wears a red bathing suit just like Heather. Billy also mimics phoebe by slow-mo walking in a red bathing suit to the same song phoebe did in the movie.

After El and Max see the pic of Heather and her dad the lyric ‘loving you is a sin’ plays. And she shows an aggression mostly to her father- with her mom she simply dr*gs her but for her father she hits him in the head with a bottle and gags him with a rag and ties him up and throws him in the trunk after she was similarly tied up and thrown in the trunk (unlike the mom who was in the back seat). Billy and Heather were the ones with the most focus during their possessions - and Will said the mf would target “another me” ( another Will). She is str*ngled in the shower and later drowned in a tub into a dark abyss screaming for help before merging with the mf. Both susie and heather are names symbolizing flowers.Susie- means Lily. While Heather is also a variety of small shrubs with pink or white flowers which commonly grow in rocky areas.Holloway is a topographic surname, which was given to a person who resided near a physical feature such as a hill, stream, or type of tree. Also her dad (Tom- means ‘twin’ which could be another DID hint.like Tammy Tompson along with their names being associated with the nature/woods where ab*se took place).

Possible npcs or alters (BUT possibly just normal people from the real world) :

Murray Bauman (possibly an npc or alter?)- Between seasons Joyce mentioned going to Chicago with Will for therapy- where murray is from. Similar to Will who has a ‘do not enter” sign . Murray has a “keep door closed”. Both are proficient with shotg*ns . Murray drinks and smokes a lot like Hopper/Lonnie. He makes up a story about how what happened to Barb being a chemical leak. And next season the possessed are consuming chemicals and the npc russians are experimenting with chemicals. Hopper lied in s1 about having a friend from the times- and in s2 Murray from the times magically appears. He says Jon is easier to read than Nancy and immediately pegs his issues with his dad. He references Wizard of Oz by saying “people don’t like looking behind the curtain” (in the movie what was behind the curtain was a wizard-Will). He also has cameras everywhere like the american npcs. Also, it’d be pretty funny if he was investigating crazy conspiracies like aliens but never realized he was a part of one all along.

Erica-Not on the inspo list but she could be like Buffy’s sis from buffy the vampire slayer. The memories of Buffy and her associates were altered, along with relevant records, so that they believed Dawn always existed as Buffy's sister. Dawn is, however, a real girl, Buffy's biological sister, and has real memories of her fictional childhood. Erica has rainbows/sunflowers in her room in s2 (connected to Terry). And Erica is a plant that means “HEATHER”.

what all these possible alters /npc’s generally have in common is unlike ‘natural people’ they all have names associated with hunting or the woods (because that’s where a lot of the ab*se most often took place). name meaning : becky - snare (a trap for catching birds or animals). Teressa-huntress. Dianne (Hopper’s ex wife) - is a roman goddess of hunting. brenner- ‘someone who cleared forests by burning’. the blond women, Brenner worked with, Fraizer- “of the forrest men” (the male hunters who terrorized Will most likely). mayfield- open country (field) where madder (mæddre) grows', Hargrove-grove filled with rabbits" , Holland- wood land, Bruce (who was also possessed) - means WILLow lands .ives- yew wood (of tree) ,Bauman: comes from the German word "baum," or "boum" in Middle High and Old German, meaning "tree’. Bauman may have originally been a nickname for someone who lived by a tree. Holloway is a topographic surname, which was given to a person who resided near a physical feature such as a hill, stream, or type of tree. Suzie- lily flower. Susan (Max’s mom)- means lily, lotus flower or rose. Heather is also a variety of small shrubs with pink or white flowers which commonly grow in rocky areas. Neil -cloud. Buckley- buck deer. Rhadaghast (Will’s castle byers password)- is a wizard who protects the forrest and it’s creatures.

or an association with fire/lightning/god: robin- bird of the God Thor , sara- married abraham who tried to k*ll his son for god, barabara- saint who’s ab*sive father tried to k*ll her for not believing in his religion- so he was electrocuted and lit on fire by god. Kali/El are names of gods

the main exceptions being Hopper an interject . Although Hop could be a bunny pun, he even references bunnies in s3. And Jim meaning to “supplant” /“suprecede” ( replace/take the place of a person or thing previously in authority or use) hints at him being an interject.And heather’s dad Tom (who was possessed means ‘twin’) like Robin’s crush Tammy (’twin’) Thompson (’son of tom’) . And Marsha Holland (barb’s mom) & Martin Brenner both have first names meaning ‘war-like” (a hint at Lonnie being warlike, or being a vietnam vet perhaps?)

Ok, guys that’s about it- I hope you enjoyed. :)

#will byers #el hopper #billy hargrove #max mayfield #jim hopper #robin buckley #stranger things #kali prasad

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dontdowhatisayandnobodygetshurt · 4 years

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“What are your dreams like, Matt?”

Last night I was baby-Matt (around 5/6 years old) and I had an ability to unwittingly hop through dimensions, and had accidentally created a rip in multiple dimensional overlaps, unleashing terrifying monsters on the world.

My folks were hopping around the planet with me, taking me to safe house after safe house, ally after ally, trying to teach me how to control my powers while also keeping me safe from the: 1) humans who wanted to do experiments on me or straight-up kill me, 2) terrifying vicious monsters from other worlds that felt attached to me for no reason they could understand so they were just trying to kill me in particular, and 3) humans who had been influenced by either energy from an alien world or been taken over by an alien creature/parasite and were also trying to kill me, they were doubly dangerous bc they had human intelligence but a monster’s ferocity.

Anyway my folks and I got separated because my dumbass baby self hopped another portal and ended up in a world that was (thankfully) a mirror of ours, but with many key differences.

I was found by a young-ish brother and sister who were apparently the allies of baby-Me in that world (but Baby-Me had died over there so they saw this as a chance to redeem themselves.) They took me to a safe house I had definitely been in before. My parents had given me a journal with lists of the safe-houses in case we got separated (which is kinda dumb.... but then again, dream logic), but the script and language was actually very different from the siblings’ world, and since I couldn’t really read that well (and we didn’t know whether the safe houses even existed in that world) it took a while to find one that the brother kind of recognized.

(Also it was weird because I had actual memories of all the safe houses and people/allies that lived in them and helped us but I cant remember if I actually did dream about them like this dream was just really really long, OR if I just had the memories of them already in the dream, if that makes sense? It didn’t really matter because I was a little kid and I couldn’t remember them super clearly anyway, it was kinda like I had amnesia?? anyway)

The siblings decided to start preparations to leave, gathering rations and plotting routes and such, but I started getting a really bad feeling. I kept telling them we gotta go we gotta go now, but they didn’t listen to me because I was a dumb BABY who couldn’t TALK PROPERLY AAAAAA

Anyway the brother ended up dragging me out of the house because some Bad Humans had found us, they shot the sister in the chest and then stabbed her in the gut and shoved this weird slug creature into the wound and I was watching through the window and couldn’t do anything to help her. I’m sure that wasn’t traumatic for baby-Matt to witness.

By now you’re probably wondering, “Matt, who was the ally in the safe house you’re planning on going to?” WELL. GLAD YOU ASKED BECAUSE HE’S THE COOLEST CHARACTER MY UNCONSCIOUS MIND HAS EVER COME UP WITH. You remember those humans that got taken over by the inter-dimensional energies/monsters and turned into a kind of hybrid between the two??? He was one of those, but the monster that took him over was just smart enough to not want to kill me and instead be curious about its bond to me, and the man it took over was actually an old family friend that had known me my whole life, so the two kind of. co-existed. He did still look horrifying though, like a giant, semi-furred bat with wings and just. the ugliest features you’ve ever seen. I remember him having an actually really freaking cool name in my dream, but now I can’t remember it, bc all I can remember is the name my dumb little kid self gave this terrifying kinda-fluffy monster and that’s Hamster. I named him Hamster. HAMSTER. (But when I was telling my dad about this dream he named him Batman or Bruce Ward so that’s. something too.) He also lived in this weird fortress-y freaking port city in an abandoned LIGHTHOUSE on the outskirts so. YEAH. COOL GUY.

The brother and I arrived at the city, but for whatever reason we got discovered (I thhhink a monster sniffed us out?) and we were running around the city fleeing from humans and monsters and every whack job in between and I kept calling for Mr Hamster so he could lift us over the city walls since all the gates had come down over the entrances and we couldn’t get out, he hadn’t shown up yet but I still had hope.

And then I woke up.

Shit was wild.

#Hamster looked. kinda like Noivern from Pokemon??? obviously that was my brain's inspiration #but not exactly #also the portals looked really cool and trippy #they'd be like optical illusions #or just straight up like. a wall would have a chunk missing leading to another room that was in a different world #it was really cool #kind of a nightmare in places?? but enjoyable #some of my dreams are so goddamn detailed I stg.#Matt speaks #uhhhhhh #tw: body horror #tw: parasites #I guess?? oops??

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gotbts7fics · 4 years

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Positive | Four |

Three | May to June 2017 | Five |

The month began with you frantically arranging all the tasks you needed to accomplish. Jaebum had messaged you several times, each one left unanswered. You assumed he was just shaking his head at your stubbornness, not really assuming anything was wrong. That he would come home and make sure everything went back to normal. Except you wouldn’t be there when he came home. It was heartless, you knew it but you couldn’t figure out what else to do at this point. You had hidden a pregnancy, broken your own heart and were about to leave a country you called home for over three years.

“You should at least write him a letter. You’re going to break his heart anyways. At least give the dude closure so he can move on from your pathetic ass” Bree snorted through the screen. It was your weekly skype date with the two women who you loved more than anything. However, the conversation was not going in a positive direction as neither of them pleased with your actions and justifications at the moment.

“I also think you need to write him a letter, if not, text. SOMETHING! This is insane you just leaving him without thinking of the bigger picture.” Kassie stated as a matter of fact.

“Well what do you want me to do. ‘Hey Babe, I’m sorry, but I am kinda eighteen weeks pregnant. Sorry for hiding almost half a pregnancy….SURPRISE!’ Like really?” You bit out, face contorting in annoyance. It was the same conversation lately. Everyone was upset with your decision. They couldn’t believe you were actually going to hide this baby and run away.

“Well whose fault is that!” Kassie retorted with just as much annoyance. You huffed out a response to her.

“Ladies enough. Listen, we love and support you no matter what. We just feel like this was not the best way to handle the situation, but we support you. We just know how much shit you’ve been through and you deserve the world babe.” Bree insisted while looking intently at her screen.

“I love you both. I know the decision I made is selfish, but I didn’t know what to do…” You mumbled looking down to your lap, tears threatening to spill over any minute. These pregnancy hormones were killing you. “Hey, listen, I’m sorry. We got you. Everything will work out eventually. I promise” Kassie assured.

“thank you…” You replied. After several more minutes of chit chatting the girls said their goodbyes, having to get ready for work, and you needing to get ready for bed. Tomorrow you had another ultrasound appointment, and were excited to finally find out what the gender of the baby was. As if they knew you were thinking about them, the little human sent out a very hard kick. “Well, hello to you too, little bean.” You whispered rubbing your belly. You definitely were starting to show now, however still able to hide the small round belly with sweaters. Sighing, you stood up from your position and headed to bed. It was going to be a long day tomorrow.

The following morning after dropping Jaidyn off to school, you made your way to the clinic for your eighteen week check up. The clinic was busy on this particular morning, with many moms to be already in the waiting room. Upon registering for your appointment, you took a seat in front of the window, figuring to pass time you can watch people walking by as you read over different pamphlets on pregnancy and the first few months after birth. It was a painfully long 45 minutes with a full bladder, before you were finally called in by a nurse to a room.

The technician followed her in and began the vigorous amount of tests and scans of your uterus and the human inside. As the technician swirled the wand around your belly, you watched as the little human you had created twisted and turned on the screen. You were already hopelessly in love with this tiny being.

“Alright Ms Y/L/N, your baby is developing perfectly, everything looks healthy and on tract. Would you like to know the gender of your baby?” The technician asked as she rolled the wand around your stomach for a better view. “Yes please, if it is easy to tell” You replied with a wide smile on your face. The technician brought the ultrasound in between the baby’s legs. “Do you see?” She asked with a smile.

“Yes, yes I do” You smiled, as tears slowly fell down your face. You were looking at the newest member of your little family. After receiving the ultrasound pictures, you packed your things and headed to work. You only had a few more days until the end of your contract, which was a bitter sweet reality. You clutched the picture of your beautiful baby, thinking about how this tiny human was about to make your life so much sweeter.

Before you could even fathom it, you were days away from heading home. May went by seemingly fast after your last medical appointment, a combination of finishing work, and packing your life away and were getting ready to ship your belongings home, had left little time to dwell on the reality around you. You had the hard conversation with Jaidyn that you two would be moving home to Canada. Jaidyn was not happy, she had a life in Seoul that she loved, and moving home was not “a good choice” in her words. However, after much persuasion, you had convinced her that she was going to be happy back home, in your little town with her grandparents and friends. JB had continued to message you, but you refused to answer any of them. His last text had been almost a week prior, and as you reread it, your heart was breaking. You were causing him so much pain.

[3:16pm] Jaebum: Look, I am angry. You’re being a selfish frigging brat. I get it, you’re upset but to be so immature that you can’t even respond. I am trying here, but I will only give you so much. I need to think about myself too. You’re hurting me. I want nothing more than to hold you and love you, but you can’t even give me a text back. I miss my daughter and you won’t even send me pictures or answer the phone. You’re just… Wow… really. We’re heading to Thailand from Japan. I’m sorry, I wish I could see you sooner. I’ll be back in Korea on June 5th. So please baby, let’s talk this out. I hate this shit. I love you. I’ll be waiting.

“He’s returning to Seoul on the day I leave.” You said into the receiver.

“And you’re really not telling him anything?” The male on the other line asked.

“No, I’m not.”

“What’s so bad about this guy, that after what… three years, you can’t even be honest with him?”

“Nothing is wrong with him, He is perfect. But I won’t wreck his career. I can’t do that.”

“I don’t understand, you’re putting this guy ahead of you and his child… what type of man… You know what… whatever. I don’t understand. I just know that this guy doesn’t deserve you if you think that his career is worth more than this child. When you come home, you will have me to support you” Owen said, he was having a very difficult time with you being dishonest, but he was your best friend, and he would be there to pick up all the pieces when you came home.

“Thank you, I know you don’t get it. I know it sounds crazy and after everything you’ve been through… I just love him so much I need him to succeed” You were toying with your hands now, anxiety getting the best of you.

“Okay, I love you and because I love you, I will support your decision. I am also selfish because I want my niece and you home.”

“Will you pick me up in Toronto? I know you hate the city….”

“Of course. I wouldn’t miss this homecoming for the world.”

“OK, I’ll talk to you later. I am going to get some packing done. I can’t believe I’m moving home.”

“Me neither, I was against you abandoning me in the beginning anyways so I am excited to have you back, you jerk” He said right before he ended the call. You smiled to yourself, it was a little bit easier to go home to him. The man who had been your best friend since you were sixteen. The man who has been there non stop as the stellar uncle to your kid when her own biological father was a flop. You knew without a doubt he would be just as amazing with this new baby as he was with your first born. You went back to packing the apartment after that phone call. Time was running out in Seoul.

“Mom, can we get Starbucks?” Jaidyn asked as she wheeled her suitcase along the corridor to your designated gate. Why was this airport so big? You thought to yourself. You had popped in your opinion now, enough that if people knew you, they would be questioning your rounder belly. Still today, a very hot day, you wore a hoodie to hide the not so little bean growing rapidly in your tummy.

“Sure, hey… I’m going to get us a chair over there, you go right a head and get in line, can you see me?” Jaidyn nodded after your question.

“Good, you know what I like, get us both a treat baby” You said with a smile on your face. You were having cramps today and were anxious about flying. Your nerves intensified when you checked the flight schedule and noticed there was a huge possibility that Jaebum may arrive to Incheon prior to you actually being on the plane now due to a delay. You dreaded seeing him. Especially since you literally only texted him an hour before, well aware that he was in the sky and he wouldn’t get it until he landed. You knew what you had done was unbelievably heartless, yet you refused to take it back. Your phone chimed to notify you of a text message from your mom, wishing you a safe journey home. With your phone open, you went to the conversation you had with JB. Countless unanswered messages from him where he declared his love for you, for Jaidyn, telling you how he was miserable with you ignoring him. It all came down to your last message to him.

[1:15pm] You: I’m sorry. I’m moving home to Canada today.

It was a simple, yet devastating text message. The type the punches you in the gut and leaves you kneeled over and sobbing. And now you were silently praying that your flight wouldn’t hit a further delay and overlap the time you and him would both be at this airport, because if you saw him, if he begged, you would fall into his arms and tell him everything. If he asked you to stay, you would. You would ruin him.

“Mom, is Appa going to meet us here, I miss him so much. Will he at least say goodbye to me?” Jaidyn asked as she returned and placed a drink in front of you, drawing you out of your thoughts. Her seven year old self was asking so many questions lately. You were avoiding them at all cost until you arrived in Canada. You just didn’t want her to know about this baby yet, or know you had ended it with the man she saw as her dad. It was weighing heavily on you, and your sanity was slowly unravelling.

“No baby, he’s not home from Thailand yet. We will talk to him once we are home in Canada okay?” You answered, looking down at your drink. You had become a liar. Constantly avoiding the issues at hand to try and keep the peace within.

“Less than twenty minutes until we board the plane love, are you excited to see Uncle Owen and Gramma and Grampa” Asking to distract her.

“Oh yeah! Uncle Owen is picking us up!!! I can’t wait to see him!!!” She exclaimed as she took a sip of her drink. You guys sat in silence for a bit, just waiting for the agents to call boarding. That’s when you heard the screaming. Your breath hitched in your throat and you tried to make yourself small. You knew all to well those types of screams. Fans screaming. Oh Fuck, you thought. Taking deep breaths to prevent yourself from having a panic attack, praying it was some other idol group walking through the airport, and not the man you were desperately trying to avoid.

“Maman, who is that? Why are they screaming?” Jaidyn looked around from her chair. “I don’t know sweetie, lets not stare.” You replied, also while trying to be discreet as you looked around. Please, please, please.... You silently prayed. Ding. Your cellphone went off. Pulling it out of your pocket cautiously, like a bomb that could explode any minute, you opened to your messages.

[3:55pm] Jaebum: Are you in the airport?

[3:56pm] Jaebum: Please baby, tell me you’re still here.

[3:56pm] Jaebum: Baby, please. At least let me say goodbye to Jaidyn.

You took a deep breath, you knew he could see you had read the messages. You struggled with yourself. The internal battle waging on.

[3:57pm] Jaebum: Answer me. I will fucking find you in this airport so help me god!

[3:58pm] You: I’m sorry, I truly am. But I don’t think it’s best to see each other. Please think of your fans

His reply was instant.

“Good Afternoon Ladies and Gentleman, we are now ready to board Air Canada flight AC062 destination to Toronto. We kindly ask you have your photo ID ready and locate the zone number on the top of your boarding card. We will be boarding zone one momentarily” You exhaled as you heard your flight being called for boarding. This was it, you were finally leaving.

[3:58pm] Jaebum: I will fucking tell the world right now about you, I will do whatever I need to do to make sure you don’t leave me. Please baby, don’t leave me. I need you, I need Jaidyn. DO NOT GET ON THAT PLANE!

Your phone started buzzing, JB was calling you. You quickly rejected the phone call. You didn’t know how much willpower you had to keep yourself from answering until you were on that plane, seated and buckled in. JB was frantic at this point, you had ignored his phone calls, them going straight to voicemail. He had been so elated to see you had finally messaged him back after weeks of ignoring him. Only his happiness had been crushed when he read your message. He didn’t think you were serious about breaking up, he figured he could fix this like he always did. You were stubborn and bold, but you loved him. He couldn’t believe you were actually ending it, and moving across the world. Why, what had he honestly done to make you this unhappy to make you move back to Canada. You loved Korea, Jaidyn loved Korea. He was trying to engage you in what little conversation he could, buying himself enough time to find you. You were in the airport, a quick search of flights shown there was only one to Canada, which meant if he could get to that gate he could find you, and hold you. Hell. he was pretty sure he would tackle you to the ground at this point and not let you board that plane, not caring who witnessed it. He hadn’t even had time to let anyone know what was happening. He had just showed his phone to Jinyoung and prayed he understood. Jinyoung had stared at him with wide eyes and then told him to go, pulling out his own, JB assumed, to message the others. He was running now. Surprisingly he had managed to get away from the fans who had been waiting for them. Trying his best to get to you, where ever you were in this godforsaken airport. DING! Please baby, please he thought.

[4:03pm] You: I’m sorry JB. Goodbye.

JB stopped in his tracks doubled over, gasping for air. No. He couldn’t stop himself, staring at your text message, he began to cry.

You were anxiously in line, desperate to get on that plane, looking around cautiously. If he saw you, if he found you, it was game over. What felt like forever you approached the agent, handing her the passports and boarding passes to scan. You were just about to walk through the doors when you caught the eye of someone. Jinyoung was standing just off to the side, staring at you with wide teary eyes gasping for air, looking like he wanted to yell at you. You shook your head not even bothering to try and hide your tears falling. Ushering Jaidyn away and onto the plane. Jinyoung’s heart broke for his friend, for the loss of you and Jaidyn.

You watched as Korea disappeared before your eyes from your tiny window. Jaidyn had fallen asleep the moment the engines turned on leaving you in a self loathing, pity party. You left the only man who had shown you what love really was, because you couldn’t be honest with him. You left behind your home and your life our of fear and selfishness. You were a terrible person, well, that’s what you were telling yourself until you felt a swift kick in your bladder and a head falling onto your shoulder. You were a mother, and even if it was selfish, you were going to protect the three people you loved the most. You hoped one day the people you loved would understand the choices you made

. JB found his way back to his members after what seemed like forever after watching your plane take off, feeling numb to the pain that was in his heart. The members just looked at him cautiously, knowing that this loss would forever change him, would change them. You had become family, they had helped raise that little girl of yours. There was confusion and anger, unanswered questions that they needed clarified. This wasn’t you. You loved them all, you loved JB with your whole being. Something was wrong.

“Hyung, I am so sorry!” Jinyoung gasped, rushing forward and wrapping his arms around JB.

“I couldn’t find them, I couldn’t find them before she left.” JB buried his face into Jinyoung’s shoulder.

“I tried to stop her Hyung, but I was to late. I am so sorry, she was walking on to the plane when I finally found her” Jinyoung said, his own tears threatening to fall. “It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I asked so much of her, she tried to tell me how unhappy she was. She just wanted a normal life. I ruined everything” JB mumbled, tears still falling.

“Let’s go home and just try to figure out what to do next. We will get her back Hyung. There is no way she is gone” Jackson piped in. All JB could do was stay positive he would find you again.

#positive #got7 #got7 x reader #got7 pregnancy au #jb x reader #jaebum x reader #jaebum

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kyotakumrau · 6 years

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PHY Vol.13 - interview with Kyo

You can get the magazine on Amazon or TOWER RECORDS!

'The Insulated World', the 10th album released almost 4 years after the previous one, was a huge surprise. Well, it's not like their previous work was full of gentle feelings, yet it never crossed my mind that this will become a work that will bring the sense of unity/identification of the band. Granted that they had the chance to reexamine the band's path with the best album and tours revolving around the past works, the songs made as they lightly walked over the past self are filled with the love for the band held by 5 people and the relationship between the band members. Now, why is it that they moved along with one vector without even one break? We have talked to each band member investigating for this feature.

(kyotaku: I typed it on my phone so let me know when you spot any typos, mistakes etc.)

My self denial was strong originally, but it might be the first time so far that I feel like blaming myself -- You've just completed the album, what do you think about it? Kyo: Speaking about the message in DIR EN GREY's music this album has the most extreme content. But saying that, there are various vectors so as a rule I can't say it's extreme... I guess it's closer to hardcore. -- The lyrics are like that. But what do you think about the music? Kyo: What to say... I can't explain well, but the current DIR EN GREY is here, just that. We were lacking songs so I have the impression that it was hard on everyone. -- What do you think is different with the previous album 'ARCHE'? Kyo: We made ARCHE letting out the new us while we were returning to our origins. But this time we created this album while only looking ahead. Yet, this ahead is not what everyone imagined. There were some reactions like 'eh? we're trying something like this?' Both music and the lyrics wise. -- I see. It's probably super subjective, but I think the feeling of the band is very strong. Kyo: Ah, I think so too. -- That act of going against the expectations, it's something that this band continues to do. So this time as well it ended up as a work different than I thought, but I don't feel quite betrayed. Kyo: Yeah, it might be like that. I don't have a feeling that I found something very new and original this time. It's also okay to have an expression in the usual shape, but I'm not like that. Having said that, I'd rather die than do something that could be easily understood by anyone like 'aah, it's like that'. So if I was to say what's new this time, for me it's how frankly I let the ominous feelings out. -- You mean aggravating or provoking things? Kyo: I feel that I wanted to release such things from inside of me. For someone who saw positivity or the world of light in ARCHE, 'huh they're going there?' - they have such a surprise waiting for them. Afterall, I opened the gate of light with that album, but past it was pitch dark... I feel it was like that. -- I agree. Kyo: I have sang such positive feelings in ARCHE, but in the end nothing changes... I had such ominous feel. No matter how hard I tried singing it, in the end I cannot transmit/communicate it. And this time that feeling was directed at myself. -- Ominous feeling? Kyo: Yes. It was heading my direction from before, but I think now it got lodged in much deeper place. Like 'not changing until now is my own fault'. No matter how desperately I was singing, no matter how much I tried to stay positive, I wasn't rewarded/didn't feel rewarded. Why is that? Why didn't I feel rewarded? When wondering about that I opened that gate of light and what was waiting for me on the other side was a question 'isn't it your own fault?'. 'The things you are wishing for are not impossible. Yet, aren't you lacking strenght?' - that's what I felt. -- Why did you think that? Kyo: I don't know. My self-denial was strong originally, I'm someone who doest think I'm someone special, but it might be the first time that I feel like blaming myself until now. So that's why this time there's no changing theme for each song, there's no expressing things in a round about way in lyrics. Anyway it's okay with the theme staying similar, so I felt I really had to let out things I was thinking. It felt like if I don't do that I will die. -- I thought that it became an album with very consistent lyrics. The words yore using also overlap, same as your singing. In short, it's like there's only one thing you want to say in this album. Kyo: Yeah. Also, when deciding the order of songs on the album, I had to have 'Keibetsu to hajimari' as the first song. I wanted to make it the first song lyrics-wise as well. -- So those songs are rebuking yourself or are self abandonment. In phrases '笑えそして見下せ・laugh and look down on me' or in '俺さえ死ねばいい・it would be fine if only I'd die'. (kyotaku: the first phrase appeared on the screen during 'Omae song' which turned out to be Keibetsu to hajimari) Kyo: Well. And I wanted to have 'Ranunculus' as the last song. As in no matter how much I scream how tough it is, singing it all the time on the album, in the end I want to see the light... like that. -- So you're scorning and denying yourself, but in the end you want an affirmation? Kyo: You can't live otherwise. -- Why do you have so much self-depreciation? Kyo: There are many reasons... afterall, aren't concerts and music one type of amusement? No matter how much I will hollow myself out expressing myself, no matter how much time I spend creating good things, it will only be a small part of other people's life... -- People have many ways of interpreting/accepting [art]. Kyo: Just like some people might only see what I do as worthless. I do actually think about music of some other artists I hear or some concerts that they are boring. But those artists might be spending their lifeforce doing that. -- That's true. Kyo: Thinking that, even if someone thinks what I do is worthless, in the end it will all come back to me. Until now I thought that when I couldn't convey my feelings to the other person it was because 'they just didn't understand'. -- And you turned that against yourself. Kyo: But even so... it's like I can't convey [the message]. I was thinking I will be understood someday, I will be able to convey what kind of person I am, but nothing changed. They just think I'm moody. People create this kind of image [of me] and think like that. -- But I don't think we can ever remove misunderstandings from interactions with other people. Kyo: Yet I can't help thinking that as I'm singing so honestly, shouldn't I be able to convey more? So even as I'm doing this for so long, I don't really feel like I'm being understood. It would be about one or two people out of thousand. Other people mostly don't understand me. -- I think that's quite a low estimate. Kyo: But that's what I think. Like 'in a year everyone will make a fun of me', 'everything will be gone'. Those are the feelings I'm directing at myself in this album. Like 'it's your own fault'. That's why I think it's a very hardcore album. But for those two people out of thousand who will understand me, for them I wanted to write the 10th songa 'Followers'. -- From that point the trend in the album is changing, right? A song sang in a medium tempo. Kyo: It's only this song and 'Ranunculus'. The only light, the lyrics I wrote for those very few people. So... normally, as I'm only doing that for a long time, even as the thing I want to say is gone it wouldn't turn strange. But in my case it won't be gone. It's a nice thing for someone in such position. Always having something inside of me exploding, being driven by some impulses, somewhere there is myself who's relieved (who can relax and be at peace)... but in the end it's hard/tiresome. -- That's true. Kyo: But if it's not tiresome, it wouldn't be Kyo... can you understand? If it's not tiresome it's not Kyo. -- It must be very vexing. Kyo: It is. But, there are almost no times when I'm someone else than a person called Kyo. It's also like that when I'm eating with friends. And there are times when I'm feeling sorry to my parents. -- Really? Kyo: I wrote about that in one song... but I will not say which one. But if my parent(s) would read that part/message in the lyrics I don't want them to think 'this is my fault'. Comparing to my previous lyrics many things are said very clearly, so I would like to say 'this is not your fault. Writing those things is a conclusion that came from my way of life, the environment that surrounds me.' Don't we often see it on the news how criminal's parents are apologising? I don't want to be seen like that so I wanted to clearly explain this. -- It seems like eventually you are steadily cornering yourself. As if it's a destiny. Kyo: I think so, too. But if it stays like that I don't feel alive. As the years go by it starts to feel like 'I! I!... I!'. It's like if I don't do what I want, it's not me. If I quit there - 'why do you live? what can you do?'- questions like those will come at me. -- I think that unless you quit DIR EN GREY you will always feel like that. Kyo: No, I think it would be the same even if I quit DIR EN GREY. -- And if you had abandoned the band and the name Kyo... Kyo: I think it could be avoided by not appearing in public, but as long as it's not like that I will always carry this burden. But if that would come true, everything I have managed to do would become nothing... -- And you completely deny yourself. Kyo: Yeah. That's why... should I continue being in the band or dissapear from public? there are only those two choices. If I wanted to live. It's included in the album's message, but if I wanted to live I would want to leave something behind. I'd want to leave some proof of living. So I'm leaving a proof as I do various things not only with DIR EN GREY but also with sukekiyo. If I don't leave many proofs that we lived, putting effort, doing our best.... I wouldn't be able to move forward. -- The number of people who understand that Kyo is a person like that, I think there are more of them than you think. Kyo: Of course I don't mean understanding everything about me. I'm simply happy that there are people who can get something from the things I'm creating. But... I really hate myself no matter what. I can't like myself. -- But you do feel strong emotions like joy when completing a good album? Kyo: I do. The working on the album took a very long time this time. I thought that as we finished the 'mode of ~' tours band will naturally enter a new place, but unexpectedly everyone was looking for 'what's next?'. But in the end I'm happy that we were brought in the same direction. Even as there's only one chorus and there's not much of melodic singing, I was told 'isn't that okay?'. I'm happy about that.

#dir en grey #kyo #京 #phy #the insulated world #translation #interview

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ecotone99 · 4 years

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[HF] The Battle for the Western World

Nestor was awaken by all the commotion around him on that summer morning in 490 B.C.

He was already having a hard time sleeping, Nestor was used to his comfortable apartment in Athens. He was not used to the life of a soldier. Back home he worked as a teacher in the public school system. His days were usually filled with teaching the Athenian youth. Only days ago Athens found out that their city was going to be invaded and they called on all able bodied men to take up arms and meet the invading army. Nestor knew that standing up to the Persians would be no easy task. The King of Kings could draw men from every corner of his vast empire to fight for him. But, Nestor believed in what he was fighting for. He was proud of his city and its democracy, He had even been chosen by lot to represent his tribe (congressional district) in the Boule, the governing body of the city. Nestor enjoyed the privileges that came with Athenian citizenship and he was proud of his city and the democracy it had created only 15 years ago. There was no way that he would let himself become a subject of the Persians, he would rather die.

There was debate in Athens on whether to meet the army in the field or to man the walls and risk a siege. The Athenians had learned about the betrayal at Eretria, where a selfish citizen had open the gates for the Persians. Fearing that this would happened to them to they elected to meet the Persians in the field. Nestor, and about ten thousand other men, marched the 26 miles to Marathon. They set up camp in the hills overlooking the Persians with about 2 miles of plane between them. Nestor was Approached by his commander, Miltiades in the early morning before dawn. “Get ready for battle” Miltiades ordered. “I though we were going to wait for the Spartans” replied Nestor “No, we cant wait for the Spartans anymore, they wont finish their religious ritual until the full moon 6 days from know. “If you ask me I'd say that's a bunch of malaka, I'm sure if it was Lakonia or one of its allies under attack they would ignore those kind of religious duties. “Maybe but either way we can no longer wait for them. Last night Ionian defectors came to warn us. The Persians are loading their cavalry on to their ships to make a direct assault on the city” Nestor had a look of fear in his eyes as Miltiades explained the situation. His family is there and he knows what will happen to them if the Persians attack and no one is there to deffend the wall's but woman, the very old, and young men of Athens. “Then we must go back to Athens at once!” Nestor exclaimed.

“No, If we do that we will be falling right into their trap. They will be able to meet us along the road home to attack us from both sides as their army pursues us from marathon , we will be surrounded and slaughtered.” Nestor is scared not only for himself but for his city but he knows Miltiades is right. “What do we do then”? He ask. Miltiades then elaborated his plan to Nestor “we attack while their army is divided. As soon as the last ship leaves for Athens we will attack the remaining army,here, at Marathon. Without their cavalry we will tear through their lightly armored infantry. Their wicker shields can deflect arrows and slashing blows but can not stand against the penetrating force of our heavy spears. Then once we win the battle we will march to Athens at once and we should have just enough time to do all this before the Persians land their cavalry. Nestor is in stunned silence. He feels a sinking feeling in his gut. This plan is absolutely bonkers. In order for it to work he and his fellow citizen soldiers will have to first win a battle against an opponent that still outnumbers his own 2:1 and then out race a ship back to Athens after having just fought a battle. That's assuming they even win. The Persians are the undisputed heavyweight champs of the world and victory is far from certain. Nestor nods his head and begins to put on his armor. Its going to be a long day Nestor marched alongside his fellow hoplites, He had drilled his formation and movements with his fellow tribesmen many times. The Phalanx required discipline to maintain. Unlike the Homeric Battle stories he had been raised on this new kind of Greek warfare was all about working in unison. With each mans shield overlapping the man next to him, cohesion was key. Before they could get in formation though Nestor knew that they would have to close the distance with his his enemy. The Persians employed many archers in their armies. The Persians were famously said to be able to fire so many arrows that they block out the sun. To counter this the Athenians were going to have to make 100-150 meter dash to the enemy, then line up in formation and begin attacking. Nestor's palms sweated as he marched toward the Persian camp. It had started as a 2 mile march. They sang songs as they went but now they were only 250 meters away and things got quit. Each step brought Nestor closer to a terrifying reality. Across the vast plane Nestor could begin to make out figures. 200 meters away and he could begin to feel his heart beating out of his chest. 150 meters and Nestor began to see the Persians notching their arrows. At 125 meters Nestor saw the most incredible and most frighting thing he had ever witnessed. Thousands of arrows were flying through the air in front of him the sky darkened as the arrows hit their peak and began to fly back down to earth. At the same time Miltiades gave the order to sound the trumpet which initiated the charge and ten thousand angry hoplites stormed forwarded screaming at the top of their lungs

“EEEELLLLEEEEELEEEEEEUUUUUUUUU"

Nestor and the other hoplites screamed as they ran as fast as their feet would take them toward the enemy. Nestor raised his shield and herd ping ping ding as the arrows bounced off his heavy bronze shield. One of the men next to him fell as a arrow penetrated deep into his thigh. Arrows kept coming , Nestor could see them wiz by out the corner of his eye as he continued to charge toward the Persian line. As he got closer he could begin to make out the faces of the enemy. There were so many of them. For a moment Nestor wondered how they could possibly defeat such a large force, but he remembered what Heraclitus had told him and what he in turned taught his students: “Day by day, what you choose, what you think and what you do is who you become”. Nestor pushed the doubt out of his mind. Now, he thought only of killing the Mead.

Nestor and most of the other Greeks finally made it to the Persian lines. Nestor was exhausted after having just ran more then the length of a football in full heavy armor. He quickly positioned his shield to cover the left half of his body and the right half of the man standing next to him. He held his 8 foot long spear out toward the enemy and above the shoulder of the man in front of him. The Persian line was hesitant to advanced into this walking porcupine. Nestor and the men he was with formed the right side of the line. The right and left flanks needed to quickly destroy the enemy's flanks and envelop there center from the sides. To do this the Athenians made the length of their line long enough to match the Persians. To accomplish this the center was reduced from the normal 6 deep phalanx to a depth of only two. It was a risky maneuver but played to the strengths of the heavy infinity phalanx which was practically indestructible in a frontal confrontation, but became award and vulnerable when a more mobile opponent attacked from its sides. Nestor and the right wing set immediately into action. Nestor thrust his spear into the Persian line. Across from him he saw a sea of unfamiliar faces. The Persians wielded an army from far away lands and there manner of warfare was unusually to Nestor. His spear smashed through the wicker shield of the man standing across from him without penetrating into the body of the shield bearer. Nestor recoiled and as he did a stone bounced right off his temple and nearly knocked him unconscious. Nestor wobbled sightly before regaining his footing. He was glad he had his bronze helmet to protect him. Nestor thrust again and this time the spear impaled its target. Nestor stepped forward in unison with his unit. He could hear his commander yelling at the top of his lung “ Advance!!”. As the phalanx moved forwarded they literately began to push the enemy back. One of the Persians garbed the shield of the man in front of Nestor and pulled it down just enough to slip a knife over and into the Greek holding the shield before the Persian himself was taken out by the man behind Nestor. Nestor steeped into the dead mans spot and the Phalanx trudged froward. Nestor could see the tired look of the men in the center. We have to hurry he thought. If we don't route the Persian wings the center will collapse from exhaustion if nothing else. Nestor and the right wing steadily backed down the Persians and slaughtered any that tried to stand their ground. Then he saw something miraculous, one of the Persians had dropped his shield and ran. The Barrage of stones arrows and javelins began to decrease, and the Persian line got easier to push. then scared for their life's the Persians turned and sprinted for their ships The Persian Left wing was in full flight. With there backs were turned the temptation to pursue the fleeing enemy was strong but the disciplined Greeks stuck to their strategy and turned in toward the Persian center. Nestor was filled with vigor. He could see that the Athenian left wing had also beaten the Persians on their side and were turning in on the center as well. As they did the caviler of the Greeks pursued the Persians that were now fleeing to their ships. With both wings defeated the battle was all but over now for the Persians. Their center, seeing that the Greeks were beginning to surround them, broke and fled as well but many went down fighting valiantly before being attacked on all sides . When the last of the Persian center was finished, Nestor and the other Greeks turned toward the fleeing enemy. “Don't let let them get away” yelled Nestor as he stirred up his fellow soldiers. Nestor ran toward the Persians ships. As he approached the water line he dropped his heavy spear. The water felt refreshing as he trudged through it on the way to the Persian ship. All around him were body's of Persians killed while retreating. Nestor grabbed onto the deck of an impressive Phoenician ship that he Persians were using to invade Greece. He quickly pulled himself up and reached for his short sword as he did the curved blade of the Persian sword nearly cut him in half. Nestor smacked the assailant with his shield knocking him over and securing time to pull out his short sword which he then thrust into the downed man. On the deck of the ship Nestor had felt more frightened then at any other point in the battle. Here he could not line up with the other Greeks and the fighting was much more of a individualistic hand to hand style. Nestor stepped over the body of the man he had just slain. And raised his shield to meet another swing of the sword. BANG! The Persian sword bounced of his shield as Nestor guided his Xiphos into the heart of his unarmored enemy. Nestor watched as across the deck another Greek soldier got surrounded by three Persian soldiers and was hacked to death. He turned around and saw a Persian trying to climb on the ship he swung at the hands of the man and watched as he fell back into the waters. After some more chaotic fighting on the deck, the ship was finally cleared. Nestor was overjoyed we did it he thought we actually did it, we have even captured seven ships. Nestor watched as the reaming Persians vessels rowed as quickly as they possibly could into open sea. Nestor looked over the battle field. There were body's everywhere. As happy as he was to win there was no time to celebrate. There were ships on their way to Invade the city. Miltiades gathered the men so he could speak “We have won a Great victory, but the fight is not over. At Present the Persians cavalry is on its way to destroy your homes ravage your fields and take your woman. Men over 30 will take the long road that we came here over. The young men will take the shorter more difficult mountain pass. And we will leave the two tribes that fought in the center behind to honor those that have fallen with a proper burial and and treat the wounded. Form up and march out” Nestor was 32, an old man for his time. He grouped with the other senior members of the army and started on the long trip back to Athens. After just having completed a battle the men were exhausted but kept moving forwarded. Just like they had in the battle. Always moving forwarded never looking back. They truly embodied the spirit of aristeia that day. “I hope we make it in time” Nestor said to his long time companion. We will he replied with an uncertain smile. “We have to”. 13 miles in and the men were only halfway home. Nestor could feel his legs burning by now. The armor began to weigh heavy on him. After the spectacular victory that morning he was not afraid to face the Persians again. He was more afraid they would get to Athens before he could. As they came closer woman and children came out to meet the exhausted warriors. Nestor was overjoyed when an Athenian woman met him on the road to give him a jug of water. He wasn't sure if he was more happy that he had beaten the Persians in the race to Athens or to get the water but either way it was a relief to see that all was well

The soldiers lined up at the port of Phaleron. It wasn't long before the Persian ships could be seen. They laid anchor outside the bay. “What are they doing” said one man in the line. “Looks like they are surprised to see us” said Nestor. “ if they try to force a landing we will annihilate them. The ships remained for awhile but when they realize what had happened at Marathon they pulled up anchor and sailed away for Asia. It wouldn't be the last time they'd come to Greece, but for know Athens was secure. A great cheer went up on shore. As Nestor watched the ships sail away he couldn't help but feel immense pride, his eyes watered as he thought of all they had accomplished that day.

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martechadvisor-blog · 6 years

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Separating Marketing Hype from What Really Works

Navigating buzzy marketing trends can be a chore. Beckon’s VP of Marketing, Amanda Roberts, shares concrete data on what actually works

Taking stock of what marketing trends to adopt and which to ignore is a challenge. We go to marketing conferences and get bombarded with “smart, must-do” marketing strategies—full of perfectly formulated anecdotes to support them. We read the trade press and get the “top 5” ways to improve ROI and the “3 things” every marketer should be doing now.

But do these things actually work? If you want to know the truth, you have to look at the data.

Luckily, at Beckon, data is something we have plenty of. We aggregate marketing performance and business outcome data for hundreds of global brands, helping them see what’s working (and what’s not!) across all channels, in real-time. In total, we have over $20 billion in marketing spend flowing through Beckon, giving us an objective, industry-wide view of performance trends for some of the world’s savviest marketers.

Last year we published the results of our first Marketing Truth or Marketing Hype report in MarTech Advisor, which put several of 2016’s hottest marketing trends to the test—content creation, working and non-working media spend, programmatic ad buying and agile marketing—to see if they actually delivered the results their proponents promised.

This year we’re back, with another report leaning on 2017 data highlighting new trends, and a few updates from last year’s findings around the areas of media planning and pacing, content creation, and viewability. The report slices and dices aggregate performance data from our system so we can do a deep dive into these themes and separate fact from fiction.

Although the data points below are averages from across our 2017 sample, it’s a great benchmark to see how your performance stacks up against industry averages. For instance, if you’re unhappy because viewability of your online ads is only around 70%—since our findings show an average of 54%, cheer up, you’re ahead of the p

Let’s jump into this year’s findings:

Finding 1: Agencies aren’t delivering the visibility they promise in the media plan.

Actual media spend and impressions are, on average, within 1% of a plan by the end of a campaign. However, most campaigns see a four-week to five-week delay before actual impressions catch up to the plan.

So, by the end of the campaign, planned versus actual tend to match up, and agencies generally deliver the visibility they promise overall. But for most, pacing to plan is the underlying issue, which may explain why your agency keeps missing their weekly or monthly targets.

Although some brands see a burst of impressions right out of the gate (because consumer interest was strong and spend wasn’t capped), more often, there’s a rush of activity at the end to catch up. Both scenarios—a flood at the start or a rush at the end—stunt performance and brand growth.

Flooding impressions up front means we don’t have time to test, learn and optimize. Consequently, conversion rates will likely be lower than we hoped and we may we have to allocate more spend in order to hit our sales targets.

More commonly, impressions roll in later than planned, and it’s even more problematic. Similar to the first scenario, it hinders our ability to test, learn and optimize because we have limited impressions to work with early on. What’s more, missed milestones for spend and impressions likely mean missed milestones for sales and conversions. You may get the conversions eventually, but telling your boss the sales numbers will probably hit a month late is never fun.

So what causes delayed impressions and what can you do about it?

Impressions are largely a function of spend, but optimal spending right out of the gate isn’t always straightforward. It can take weeks to understand the factors that are helping or hindering performance. Beckon data shows that planning for spend and impressions to ramp as the campaign unfolds is the best way to make the most of every dollar.

And paying close attention to how spend and impressions are tracking to plan is also a solid recipe for maximizing ROI. Beckon found that campaigns with close alignment between plan and actual throughout averaged 117% of planned impressions and used only 73% of their planned spend. In contrast, campaigns that strayed further from plan fell short of their targets, hitting 87% of planned impressions, and spending 86% of their planned budget.

Some steps to consider:

Agree on planned targets with your partners up front. Some brands even establish a service level agreement on pacing.

Make sure media plans are delivered at a weekly or daily granularity so you can track pacing, not just actuals. Set up a routine meeting to review how performance is tracking to plan. Use this time to both review what’s resonating (and what’s not), and strategize how to right-size spend accordingly.

If your campaign involves new channels, audiences and/or messaging, build in a window to test and learn by planning modest targets for spend and impressions that ramp up later in the campaign. If you can’t afford a temporary drop in total impressions, keep a high-performing campaign running a few weeks longer, overlapping it with the start of the new campaign.

Finding # 2: Content is king! The more content you create, the more consumers will engage with your brand by liking, clicking, viewing or sharing your content.

If you read last year’s report, you know that we found that this trend is just a myth. In 2016, a mere 5% of content pieces generated 90% of total engagement, with the majority of pieces getting almost no engagement whatsoever. Our hypothesis for this discrepancy had to do with two factors:

1). Differences in content quality (namely, a lack of quality), and

2.) Not enough media behind the pieces of content.

We suggested, in order to drive higher engagement at lower cost, brands prioritize performance instead of volume. We thought brands could benefit by examining the content and associated media strategy for the pieces that dramatically outperformed the rest, while doubling down on brand standards and content quality in an effort to generate fewer, better content pieces.

And good news! Our latest data shows that many brands heeded our advice. Beckon data shows that in 2017, 20% of content drove 90% of total engagement—a big improvement because it indicates consumers are engaging with about 4x the number of content pieces than they were the prior period. More importantly, brands secured 15% higher overall engagement with roughly two-thirds the content volume (meaning they accomplished more with fewer content pieces).

Digging into the number further we examined some of the companies that experienced the biggest change. One global brand completely revamped its content strategy to focus on creating fewer content pieces managed for optimal impact, and saw extraordinary success: Compared to the previous year, it garnered more than twice as many engagements per post, while reducing cost per engagement by 64%!

A few recommendations to consider:

A quality-based, “less is more” approach to content is more effective and much less costly than throwing oodles of content against the wall in the hopes that something sticks.

Track engagement closely to see what customers are responding to and work with your agency to understand what formats, channels, creative and messages perform best. Use this criterion for all new content and allocate more spend toward top performers.

Pay close attention to content with a high earned-to-paid ratio. This means your message is resonating well with customers, and their amplification (earned engagement) is helping your dollars go even further.

Consider ramping up your commitment to user-generated content (especially if you are a consumer brand). Listening to your audience and putting their stories in the driver’s seat has been shown to boost engagement for many brands.

Finding# 3: Viewability is the new KPI.

We all know ads must be 50% in-view for at least one second to be considered “viewable,” and ads that aren’t “viewable” don’t generate awareness or move consumers toward a sale. The real debate in the industry has been around how many advertising dollars are being wasted on ads that are never even viewed.

According to Beckon, an average 54% of impressions are viewable. That means 46 cents of every media dollar spent is wasted on ads that no one sees.

Now, this number can vary depending on the factors at play—programmatic or traditionally bought, ad size, country, ad vendor or channel, and so on. Still, given the billions of dollars spent on ads each year, everyone agrees it’s a problem. No matter where you are on the spectrum, marketers would rather spend more money on viewable ads and less money on non-viewable ads.

The bigger surprise then, is that Beckon data shows that only 8.5% of brands are tracking viewability.

The good news is that if you do track viewability it is easier to increase the percentage of ads that consumers see than you may think. And the brands that do reap the benefits. Our data shows that brands that track viewability alongside their other KPIs and make improvement a priority increased viewability of their ads by 27.5% over a 12-month period.

Here are some ways you can improve your viewability and boost ROI:

Partner with a neutral third-party like Moat that audits and tracks the viewability of your online display ads (note: if you want to see this side-by-side with your brands’ spend and performance data, you’ll need a dashboard or other solution that enables you to do that).

Have candid discussions with your agencies and challenge assumptions about your ads.

Request viewability metrics from your agencies. Many ad publishers report on viewability but it’s often left out of the reports shared with brands.

Ask your agency to negotiate make-goods or credits where you see low viewability.

The more data you take ownership of—either form your agencies, execution tools, etc.—and aggregate into a central marketing data hub or repository, the more you can slice and dice your viewability data. This will allow you to look for trends surrounding ad sizes, placements, types of creative, and publishers that perform best.

When it comes to marketing trends, what worked last year won’t necessarily work today (let alone tomorrow) so it’s important to listen to what your own performance data is saying. If we understand our own data and compare it to what the data shows for others, we can establish a plan forward and learn what’s best for our unique business along the way. As we move into the second half of 2018, we’ll continue to track the trends above (and others that emerge). And we always love input on areas of marketing to dig into. Are you exploring new initiatives this year that you wish you had hard data for?

This article was first appeared on MarTech Advisor

#martech #marketing #technology #business #cmo

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blockheadbrands · 6 years

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From Overstock.com to the Cannabiz: Stormy Simon’s Big Pivot

Lisa Rough of Leafly Reports:

Stormy Simon has made a name for herself in business. She joined online retailer Overstock.com in 2001, when e-commerce was still in its early stages, and by 2015 had climbed to the position of president. Then she left her post and set her sights on the burgeoning world of legal cannabis. Armed with her experience and know-how, she’s jumped in feet first, consulting for cannabis companies and serving on the advisory board for CannaKids, which offers cannabis oils and tinctures for pediatric and adult patients.

Leafly chatted with Stormy about her decision to leave Overstock, what inspired her to get into cannabis, and what other projects she has up her sleeve.

8 Influential Women Leading the Cannabis Industry in 2017

Leafly: What inspired you to join the cannabis industry?

Stormy Simon: It still sometimes makes me speechless. I was at Overstock for 15 years, and I’ve always been a supporter of medical marijuana and the civil rights to use it. I’ve always been a supporter of the plant, even growing up and being in Utah, which, there’s not a large group of you, but there is a group of you. And I had been in an industry that started while I was there. E-commerce, when I began at Overstock, people were still hoping that it could take off. It was such a vibrant, exciting industry. So as years go by, a decade and a half that I’m there, we developed an industry and now we’re living an industry and it’s adopted and accepted, but it was through that growth and development phase that was addicting to me.

(Courtesy of Stormy Simon)

You don’t really know what you’re going to do the next day. When I started at Overstock, we were advertising on AOL and Yahoo, before search engines were big, before Google, way before Facebook. We were founded eight years before Facebook and Twitter. So very different worlds to grow up through and live through.

And as cannabis, as this industry has been developing and medicinal research is being done and the grassroots effort that is happening in different communities—50 states, 50 different ways they can do it, 50 laws, all the restrictions, everything that everybody has to do in order to move this plant. And being in Utah, Colorado is not far away, so it was close enough that I was following it and it seemed real and I started getting interested, and somewhat passionate about what the states were doing with their laws and what it could really mean.

You know, I love Overstock with every inch of my being but I’d realized, going from a temp to president, that there is a time when it’s OK to move on. It wasn’t something that I had to do another 15 years to make it real or to validate it, and I felt like it was time for me to move on, for the company to move on without me.

Are Women Taking Charge of the Cannabis Industry?

The cannabis industry and what it was doing, whether it was inspiration or curiosity or just a passion that I’ve had my entire life, I’m not really sure which piece of that triggered me to go. I think collectively, my boys being all moved out and bought homes, I’d been a single mom forever, and so that added pressure of taking care of the kids kind of slipped away, and it felt like it was OK for me to take a chance to explore something a little selfishly and just jump in. Without a lot of context and without a lot of insight into what it was really going to be like. I just jumped in first.

Do you see parallels between Overstock and your new cannabis venture?

When I first jumped into cannabis, I took a job as a consultant at a grow in Colorado with two medical dispensaries, so I spent six months with the plant, walking through this amazing facility. This beautiful plant was everywhere I went. I planted a couple of plants, got to follow their life cycle and everything that they went through—from cloning, to replanting, to measuring—the whole life cycle gave me huge insight into what the industry looks like. So at that point I did realize that I didn’t feel like me touching the plant or doing retail was something I wanted to invest long-term in, personally. But I did just get an amazing education there in a short time, which just catapulted me into knowledge which I’ll always be grateful for. And then, through that, meeting these people like David Dinenberg with Kind [Financial] and Tracy Ryan with CannaKids that are really dedicated to paving the way. CannaKids is named because her daughter, her nonprofit, Saving Sophie, is all about cannabis research because it’s helped her daughter so much so she created a brand. And David Dinenberg, really wanting to take on the banking complications and restrictions that we have, so they are two visionaries and they are doing something that can’t be easy and I’m attracted to that.

13 Fantastic Women-Owned Dispensaries to Support

I really like the hurdles, I want to be there to help them through the hurdles and learning along the way, but actually, doing it in favor of the industry’s goals that are risky and complicated, that most people don’t want to touch, the stuff that people don’t want to go in and fight for. A consumer brand of cannabis that is for children—that’s a big fight! So I feel really lucky to have found and been able to get involved with two people who look at one of the most complicated hurdles in the industry and each say, OK, I’ll do what I can to take it on. I love that. Taking it on their shoulders to be at the forefront.

Are there any cannabis companies that you’ve been looking at for inspiration?

I find them all inspiring right now, I really do. That sounds so cliché, but because they’re so new and so agile in what they’re doing and their ability just to adjust and create while everybody’s in the full marathon.

High Times is a brand that we all grew up with. So they’ve really over 40, 45 years, they’ve hung in there and they’ve stood alone for a long time, and so I guess I do look at them and keep an eye on them just because they’re so historic and such a timeline to the movement that started so long ago.

Overall I think any company that’s standing anywhere, if they have a booth even to give it a shot and get in? There’s a piece of success with that, right out of the gate. Because you’re trying and you’re doing it. It’s so fascinating and exciting and addicting! What’s going to happen next?

13 Classic ‘High Times’ Covers (and What They Taught Us)

I saw that you have your own line of jewelry. Can you tell me about Moonatic?

I got sidetracked from doing this, but I have a jewelry line called Moon and Moods bracelet line and collection that represents each moon phase. “Moonatic” [which rhymes with lunatic] is a term that I trademarked. I consider myself a “moonatic”—I love the moon, I love the phases, love when my energy is a certain way when I learn “Oh, it’s a new moon, no wonder I’m doing that.” I’ve loved that my whole life and I would, as a child, I remember learning that the moon controlled high tide of an ocean and I thought, ‘My goodness, we’re 60% water, what is it doing to me? There’s no way it’s controlling the tides and not doing anything to my body.” So, a few years ago, I bought Moonatic, trademarked it, and have a dream that it becomes a place where women who follow their passions, whether that be retail or other services, but a place we can all gather and create a community and a marketplace that the Moonatic lifestyle is celebrated.

Smoke and Mirrors: Designer Cannabis Jewelry to Elevate Any Wardrobe

Do you think there’s any overlap between Moonatic and the cannabis crowd?

There could be a cannabis crossover. There are plenty of women in the cannabis industry who would like a community of women to join forces. You place your three products next to my three products and then there are six products and then we’re no longer standing alone. We’d really like to figure out a way to make this a community where the people who do the products are the ones who get the richest.

What are you trying to accomplish in the cannabis industry? What are your goals?

I’m so bad at goals. I love the idea of just showing up and being open to what the world might bring next. Cannabis is so new and I know there are some skills I have that I can bring to the industry. I can see them sitting in many different arenas—e-commerce, brand-building, so many different things, even logistics—but as far as the goal, I hope that I continue to find and create relationships with people who have a bit of the passion in mind still. People think the green rush is just so full of money, it’s not! It’s full of really struggling entrepreneurs who are trying to make it, trying to do something with it. And so the green rush right now, I look at it as just full of passion. It’s all about this passion and that’s the green. People are ready. And hopefully the money follows for them.

What Cannabis Strains Do Women Want?

I could see myself wanting to do all of it, and it really is so unique so I can’t set goals because I’m surprised every day at what I learn or from someone I meet or somebody that’s figured something else out or found a little niche that they’re working on. I’m just so intrigued and inspired by them. I can see myself wanting to do all of it. So I’ve been really afraid of setting goals when I’m open to learning from everyone.

There’s not a conversation I don’t have that someone just opens my eyes about one thing, whether it’s a sickness or a state or an injustice or all of our forefathers in this industry who sit in prison today. You learn so much about what it is and the history and why we are where we are. The goal is to join a group of people that hopefully, collectively, we can make it happen.

TO READ MORE OF THIS ARTICLE ON LEAFLY, CLICK HERE.

https://www.leafly.com/news/industry/from-overstock-com-to-the-cannabiz-stormy-simons-big-pivot

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touristguidebuzz · 7 years

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Spirit Airlines Wants to Win Back Customers by Being Nicer

Spirit Airlines has long advertised cheap prices with its "bare fare" campaign. But it is changing its messaging to embrace value, and trying to give passengers a better experience. Spirit Airlines

Skift Take: Spirit Airlines spent years angering customers with shoddy customer service. Now it wants those travelers to return, promising they'll find a kinder, gentler airline with an increased emphasis on on-time arrivals. But will they come back, or will they opt for deeply discounted fares from full-service airlines?

— Brian Sumers

When Vietnam War veteran Jerry Meekins learned five years ago he was dying and should not travel, he contacted Spirit Airlines and asked for a refund for an upcoming flight. That’s against the rules — how many passengers don’t know what “non-refundable” means? — but brands often make exceptions to save themselves from public embarrassment.

Not Spirit. Its former CEO, Ben Baldanza, blamed Meekins, who would die four months later, for not buying travel insurance. “This is a country and society where we kind of play by the rules,” Baldanza said in one television interview.

Eventually, Baldanza apologized. But in the decade he led Spirit, until January 2016, Baldanza repeatedly criticized passengers who complained about poor service, late flights, and lost bags. Once, he accidentally replied to a customer’s email by writing, “Let him tell the world how bad we are. He’s never flown us before anyway and will be back when we save him a penny.”

Baldanza had a point. Until 2015, Spirit was in a class of its own. No other airline in the United States could — or would — sell one-way fares for $30 or $40 between major cities. Yes, Spirit charged for carry-on bags, drinks (even water), and advance seat assignments, but people who never thought they could afford airfare had an option, so long as they didn’t mind cramped seats that did not recline. In a cheeky web spot, Spirit advertised itself as a “cheap seat for a cheap ass.”

Passengers tolerated it, and Wall Street loved it. The airline’s stock price increased from about $12 per share on July 1, 2011 to almost $83 on Dec. 1, 2014.

The good times could only last so long. Spirit still makes money, but it’s under pressure from Southwest, American, United, and Delta. Now, in many cases, the Big Four sell discounted seats to match Spirit, meaning “cheap asses” have other options. Plus, Spirit has a new direct competitor: Frontier Airlines, which adopted Spirit’s ultra-low-cost model a couple of years ago, with the tagline “Low Fares Done Right.” Its CEO used to run Spirit’s marketing.

To win (or win back) customers, Spirit’s current CEO, Bob Fornaro, wants to create a kinder airline. It remains obsessively cost-focused, offers little legroom, and still charges for everything — because if it didn’t, it would probably go bust. Passengers paid about $53 in fees for each Spirit segment in the second quarter, only about $7 less than they paid for fares.

But Fornaro, who led AirTran Airways until it merged with Southwest in 2011, wants Spirit to stop angering customers. And when it does make them mad, he’ll apologize.

“We ran a very successful financial business, but we ran a very poor consumer business,” Fornaro said in an interview last week in Las Vegas, where he was speaking at the Boyd Group’s International Aviation Forecast Summit. “For the most part, you can only do that for a short period of time. We almost went out of our way to poke the customer in the eye. And once a business gets more competitive, you can’t do that anymore.”

Some wonder if it’s too late. Perhaps the Big Four finally have an advantage — something legacy European airlines never achieved against upstarts like Ryanair and EasyJet. Others suspect Spirit will be fine, but argue it should merge with Frontier, giving it better scale. Spirit has about 100 airplanes, more than 800 fewer than American, not counting American Eagle.

Spirit is not the only discounter emphasizing service — Frontier and Allegiant Air are also trying to improve — but Spirit may have more work to do than the others.

“The difference was, we didn’t treat customers well,” Lukas Johnson, senior vice president for commericial at Allegiant Air, told Skift. “But Ben was unapologetic about spitting in their face. And you can’t do that.”

Baldanza, who teaches at George Mason University and serves on the board of Wow Air, a Icelandic airline with a similar model, told Skift he does not regret Spirit’s service record. He noted customers agree to terms and conditions before buying tickets.

“When I was the CEO, we held firm to these rules in order to keep fares as low as possible for all,” Baldanza said in an email. “Waiving rules means that those who follow the rules pay for those who don’t. If asking people to follow rules they agreed to before buying is considered ‘spitting in their face,’ that seems completely wrong to me. If you are pulled over for running a red light, are the police ‘spitting in your face’ if you are asking to be let off even though you knew you broke the rules?”

Changing Market Dynamics

Spirit and Baldanza could get away with a lot because the airline had little competition.

For most of Spirit’s surge, American, United, and Delta were all in bankruptcy, emerging from it, or merging with another airline. Because big legacy airlines had high costs and other priorities, they rarely discounted as much as Spirit. And low-cost airlines, including Alaska Airlines and Southwest, had relatively little overlap with Spirit, so they let it grow.

Spirit’s strategy worked. Spirit entered American’s Dallas/Fort Worth hub in 2011, adding flights to many of American’s larger markets, including San Diego, Fort Lauderdale, Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston, New York LaGuardia, and Orlando.

For about four years, American chose to let its frugal passengers fly Spirit. American might charge a couple of hundred dollars for a one-way fare, while Spirit would want $40. But American, led by its then-new president, Scott Kirby, decided in 2015 to fight for everyone.

American’s strategy diluted its revenue, but the airline succeeded. Spirit remains in Dallas, but it’s no longer growing, with new management preferring cities like New Orleans that lack a dominant airline. Now, Kirby has moved to United, where he’s acting similarly. In July, on Spirit’s second-quarter earnings call, Spirit executives said they saw the most discounting in three United hubs — Newark, Chicago, and Houston.

United even has a new product to sell to price-conscious customers. This year, it followed American and Delta to introduce Basic Economy — a product that roughly mimics Spirit’s unbundled fares.

On all three major airlines, Basic Economy customers cannot choose seats in advance, nor can they change their tickets. They board last, and, if they’re frequent flyers, they’re not eligible for first class upgrades. On American and United, most customers may not bring large carry-on bags. (Southwest also often matches Spirit but gives passengers all the goodies — including two checked bags — for free.)

Even in their worst seats, the Big Four offer about two more inches of legroom, with seats that recline. They also give passengers free drinks and light snacks, and unlike Spirit, often have in-flight entertainment. There’s Wi-Fi too, though passengers pay for it.

“The problem is, customers do not want to fly [an ultra-low-cost carrier] if they can get the same price on a different carrier,” Kirby said at the Las Vegas conference. “As United or anyone else starts to get more price competitive, the business just doesn’t work in my opinion. It’s not because of United or what anyone else is doing to them. It’s because they have created a product that people don’t want to buy.”

A gentler Spirit

Perhaps Basic Economy isn’t beloved by customers either, but it makes United, American, and Delta better competitors, so Spirit is focused on improving its product and softening its image.

Spirit no longer charges military members for bags. And passengers who forget to pay for a carry-on in advance are no longer hit with a punitive $100 fee at the gate. It’s now a more manageable $65 — enough to persuade passengers to pre-pay at a cost of roughly $35 but not so much as to be ridiculous. And when passengers tell Spirit they need to postpone a trip for a medical emergency, the airline works with them.

The old hard-ass routine is over. “That was just part of the way the company wanted to portray itself,” Fornaro said. “It wasn’t necessarily good business. There wasn’t a whole lot of money in it. We just got rid of those things.”

Meanwhile, the airline is emphasizing personal touches. Flight attendants attend service training — something that never happened before. And Spirit recently turned over its Twitter feed to humans. It had been run by an irreverent robot, who shared witty responses but couldn’t help irate customers.

Advertisements evolved, too. Before, Spirit often ran tawdry ones, like one coinciding with delivery of the airline’s 69th plane. “It’s our favorite number – ever since we were 12 and found that magazine under our brother’s bed (the one with the fantastic articles),” the copy read.

Now, when adds a new plane, Spirit is more likely to use it as an opportunity to tell customers it has one of the world’s youngest fleet, a positive message the company rarely communicated before. “It was almost as if they were almost ashamed of saying something nice,” Fornaro said.

On-time performance had also lagged. Spirit is now in the middle of the pack for timely arrivals, after regularly finishing last or near the bottom a few years ago. A few years ago, frugal passengers might have tolerated tardiness for huge savings, but not anymore.

“The company got away with it very nicely, but the world doesn’t stay the same,” Fornaro said. (In his email to Skift, Baldanza said: “I applaud Bob Fornaro for improving Spirit’s operational performance.”)

More changes will come. Wi-Fi, which Spirit hadn’t installed because of its cost, is on its way, since many frugal millennial customers the airline wants to attract demand it. It’ll support video streaming.

Next, the airline will improve its website — Fornaro called navigating it “painful” — and its mobile app. As for why the airline didn’t invest in digital tools sooner, he said, “We were satisfied. Maybe we thought were were living in a world that wouldn’t change that much.”

The emphasis on improvement, Fornaro said, has improved employee morale, which may spur better service. “No one like to be last in every service category,” he said.

One outlier is Spirit’s pilots, who seek a new contract and a major raise. In April, pilots staged an informal work slow down, forcing Spirit to cancel about 850 flights. Spirit obtained a court order requiring pilots to work normally. Things have improved, but the issue still looms. Fornaro said he is hopeful a deal can be reached soon.

Investor Concern

Spirit’s stock is now about $34 per share, less than half its price in December 2014. Analysts generally like the company, but not as much as a couple of years ago.

After Spirit’s second quarter earnings call in July, when executives said other carriers were undercutting them on price, Hunter Keay, an analyst with Wolfe Research, wrote: “In that regard, things may only get worse for [Spirit] unless [it] finds new places to grow.” Keay has said he favors a Frontier merger.

Jamie Baker, an analyst with J.P. Morgan, said in a recent report that Spirit probably must “strike a balance” between competing in big cities and adding flights elsewhere. Baker has also recommended Spirit raise fares, arguing it probably wouldn’t lose customers, since other airlines would increase prices, too.

There’s some question about where Spirit should fly next. Under Baldanza, Spirit was obsessed with adding routes in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Dallas/Fort Worth. But it’s now expanding in markets like New Orleans, Hartford, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore.

Lukas Johnson, of Allegiant, said he suspects Baldanza would still favor big cities — if only to prove a point. He said he wonders if big airlines will be more aggressive since Spirit has shown weakness.

“They drew down Dallas last year with the pressure from American,” Johnson said. “Guess what? Once you pull down when somebody pressures you, it’s going to happen again and again and again and again. To me, that’s different. Ben wouldn’t back down. Right or wrong, he just wouldn’t.”

Spirit has one major advantage: Its costs are considerably lower than the competition. Not including fuel, it costs Spirit about 5.83 cents to carry one passenger one mile, about five cents less than American. That means Spirit can make money more easily at lower fares than other airlines.

In his note, Baker said Spirit’s model is viable.

“We believe the U.S. airline industry will continue to take steps to ensure profitability and continued balance sheet repair,” he said. “We believe that this environment is generally more favorable to the large legacy carriers, but Spirit’s ultra-low-cost business model is compelling in its own right.”

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rollinbrigittenv8 · 7 years

Text

Spirit Airlines Wants to Win Back Customers by Being Nicer

Spirit Airlines has long advertised cheap prices with its "bare fare" campaign. But it is changing its messaging to embrace value, and trying to give passengers a better experience. Spirit Airlines

— Brian Sumers

Passengers tolerated it, and Wall Street loved it. The airline’s stock price increased from about $12 per share on July 1, 2011 to almost $83 on Dec. 1, 2014.

But Fornaro, who led AirTran Airways until it merged with Southwest in 2011, wants Spirit to stop angering customers. And when it does make them mad, he’ll apologize.

Spirit is not the only discounter emphasizing service — Frontier and Allegiant Air are also trying to improve — but Spirit may have more work to do than the others.

Changing Market Dynamics

Spirit and Baldanza could get away with a lot because the airline had little competition.

United even has a new product to sell to price-conscious customers. This year, it followed American and Delta to introduce Basic Economy — a product that roughly mimics Spirit’s unbundled fares.

A gentler Spirit

Perhaps Basic Economy isn’t beloved by customers either, but it makes United, American, and Delta better competitors, so Spirit is focused on improving its product and softening its image.

The emphasis on improvement, Fornaro said, has improved employee morale, which may spur better service. “No one like to be last in every service category,” he said.

Investor Concern

Spirit’s stock is now about $34 per share, less than half its price in December 2014. Analysts generally like the company, but not as much as a couple of years ago.

In his note, Baker said Spirit’s model is viable.

0 notes

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