Skialalia

Between the idea And the reality Falls the Shadow

[crazyjane13]

Does Tales From 85 have cursing? Random question I know, I’m just curious cause I know this is basically Stranger Things’ Teen Titans GO

I'd have to go back to be sure, but I don't recall any cursing, not even Dustin saying his usual, "shit, shit, shit" when he realises something scary.

Teen Titans GO is a pretty good way to describe this. TTG was a much better show, though.

[reticent-vampire]

literally

[crazyjane13]

Tales from '85 recap/view: Episode 3 - Evolution

(I'm sorry this took so long. There's only so much idiocy I can take in one sitting.)

When last we left our intrepid Party+Nikki they were being menaced by a … Pumpkin Flayer. Thing. Monster. With thorns.

And suddenly I remember why I do not care about this show. Why am I doing this? Who even am I? Does anything mean anything anymore?

The fight begins! The Pumpkin Flayer grabs El the exact same way that the Meat Flayer did in season 3. Maybe it’s a Flayer thing - no originality, just a pre-programmed set of moves. Or maybe these writers are just bloody lazy. I wonder which it might be.

The others leap into action! And are immediately snatched up by Pumpkin Tentacles of Doom! Except for Will who just stands there and mumbles, “No, not again.” No neck tingles. No screaming trauma triggers. Just the world-weariness of a veteran warrior in the body of a 12 year old boy.

I’m being generous. It’s not anything so noble. It’s just flat. Like Will just dropped his ice cream and is watching it melt on the hot pavement.

Wait, what is this? Will is being proactive? He takes on the Pumpkin Flayer singlehandedly, armed only with the mallet from the carnival strength tester in episode 2! How foresighted of him to think to steal the mallet before he even knew he’d be facing this fearsome enemy. 

Will hits the Pumpkin Flayer! Hard! The Pumpkin Flayer drops the kids! And … dies? The demo-particles waft off in a sudden and convenient breeze to become … something else, and Dustin’s arch-nemesis is rescued. You know, for a final boss that was pretty damn unsatisfying. 

And yet, apparently, these demo-particles are undergoing some kind of fast “evolution” that means they take on newer and more complex forms every time they grab someone and glomp them into their latest shape. 

Uh. No. This is not evolution. See, this is why Mr Clark should not have been allowed to go on “sabbatical”. (Do high school teachers even get sabbaticals, anyway?)

No no no no NO NO NO STOP IT STOP PUSHING THE WILL/NIKKI idea.

What would you call that ship, anyway? Wikki? Nill? Zombiepunk?

Faced with the failure of science to adequately explain why neon demo-things are wafting all over Hawkins, the Party+Nikki turn to more trusted sources. Like the Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual. Which, you know, at least is in keeping with the original show.

In spite of all evidence to the contrary, Dustin decides that the demo-pumpkin-flayer-snow-shark-plant-particle-thing is … an Aboleth.

Let me just say here, as a veteran D&D player and DM … no. This makes even less sense than the Mind Flayer. An Aboleth is an amphibious eel-thing with psionic abilities, who breathes mucus and uses its psionic slime to turn other beings into mindless zombies. 

Having given the demo-particles an apparently arbitrary name (and no, I won’t be using it, because demo-thing is much more satisfying), the Party+Nikki inexplicably decide that maybe they should think some more about this science stuff, and wonder out loud where oh where can they find a science teacher.

What a coincidence. Nikki’s mom is the substitute science teacher.

Oh god, and Nikki’s dad is the guy who works at the convenience store where Dustin’s been scamming for free snacks.

This is unnecessary. I mean, really unnecessary. The original show had no problem introducing random characters and never bothering to tie them into the main ensemble. It’s contrived to the point of annoying. Imagine if the guy at Bob’s diner who opines about Will’s disappearance was, for example, Dustin’s second cousin twice-removed. Or the school counsellor who talks to Max turns out to be Karen Wheeler’s long-lost childhood friend.

Nikki’s mom promptly demonstrates why she’s a substitute science teacher instead of one with a steady job, by explaining evolution in a way that is just - how can I put this - stupid. Insert thats-not-how-it-works.gif. The show has fallen into a fundamental trap, trying to explain what is essentially unexplainable, and rendering itself absurd. This is fantasy, not Science 101. We don’t need these tortured explanations that take us right out of the story. Just tell us “it’s unlike anything we’ve ever seen, and we don’t understand it”, and we’ll happily sit back and watch the monsters roam the land.

Or maybe not. There’s nothing about this show that could make me watch it happily.

Moving on from “evolution”, the Party+Nikki discuss the demo-thing’s need to use humans to build its various forms around, and liken it to the Xenomorph in the Alien movies. Especially the bit about the facehugger and how it shoves an ovipositor down Kane’s throat and lays eggs in his chest. It’s all very exciting.

And Will is … laughing.

You know. The kid who was traumatised by having an alien thing shove an ovipositor down his throat and lay demo-slugs in his chest, which he coughed up on Christmas Day, the kid whose trauma was massive even before he got possessed. The kid who is so racked with PTSD that he cries uncontrollably.

That kid. Laughing as his friends excitedly describe exactly what happened to him as though it’s a cool idea they’ve just discovered.

I remain convinced that these characters are pod people who replaced the actual Party.

Back to the pseudo-science. The demo-thing is, apparently, what happens when a few of those fuzzy spores that were floating around in the tunnels in Season 2 got stuck on this side of the gate when El slammed it shut. It’s terribly afraid of extinction, so its solution is to … super-evolve pumpkins and swallow the occasional person.

I mean, in terms of natural selection, these spores have got it going on. They’re the only things from the Upside Down that didn’t die when El closed the gate. (Yes, I know, I know, it makes no sense at all. Take it up with the Duffers.) They’re probably not in danger of extinction any time soon, right?

Keep that in mind.

Speaking of people getting swallowed, we haven’t seen Generic Bully Number 2 since the first episode. I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say he’ll be powering some sort of final boss.

Lucas and Max go back to the pumpkin patch, where they discover a bunch of dead demo-pumpkins “covered in dead spores”. Because, you see, the demo-particles die if they don’t find a host within 24 hours. Which implies that ever since the gate was closed, these demo-particles have been floating around the woods happily changing into various neon creatures until that rogue guy with the flamethrower showed up.

But wait. Didn’t we already learn that the demo-particles require a mind to build their forms around? What were they doing all that time, possessing random squirrels? And how about all those demo-pumpkins? Are there no field mice left in the entire land? Consistency? This show doesn’t know her. 

Please please please PLEASE stop this rubbish where Will gives Nikki smitten, admiring glances. Really, he’s looking at Nikki the way he looked at Mike in the original show. Let the boy be gay, for god’s sake.

In the course of this long discussion about the biology of demo-particles, we find out that Nikki’s mom has no stick-a-bility. That’s why they move from school to school, and, presumably, why they’ll vanish off the face of the earth before season 3. And not, you know, because the writers wrote themselves into a corner with these essential new characters who never appear again and had to find a good excuse to disappear them.

Honestly, just kill them. All of them. Have a demo-thing rip the entire family limb from limb. At least then we could get some satisfaction for having to sit through this terrible attempt at revisionist anti-queering.

And now the Party+Nikki decide to go visit the old sawmill. You know, the one we never saw in 5 seasons of this show. The one nobody ever even mentioned. But okay. Sure. There’s a sawmill. Which looks a lot like a Dead By Daylight skin, because why not. And the reason the Party+Nikki are going there is so that Will can ask an aggressive stranger if he’s seen weird stuff around lately.

Because sure. Will is obviously the person you send out to confront angry adults. Not, say, Dustin with his gift of the gab, or Max who gives no fucks about being respectful to adults just because they’re older. Send the traumatised kid who never raises his voice and hides behind Mike when threatened. Or he did, before Nikki the Wonder Het turned up.

The questioning proves futile, and the Party+Nikki wander off, leaving us to wonder just why the hell they went there in the first place. But wait! In a stunning coincidence, demo-plants appear to glorp the screaming sawmill guys, and turn into … a demo-aardvark? Two demo-aadvarks, in fact. A fight ensues!

Aaaaand … having established that if the demo-particles can’t find a human host they die, one of the demo-aardvarks lives on after its human host is rescued by El literally tearing him out of the thing.

Wow, that took five minutes to contradict its own internal logic.

Oh no! El is down! After displaying more power in one fight than she did in the entirety of season 5, she’s unconscious - not because she’s exhausted, but because she got smacked around. And Will seems to have lost his carnival mallet. What will the Party+Nikki do? How will they survive?? What a cliffhanger! I can’t wait to find out what happens next.

I’m lying. I can wait. I can wait forever. We know none of them are going to die, or even be seriously injured. This is only episode 3 of 10 (oh god). There are no stakes in this show. None at all. And, sadly, no stakes to stab into the hearts of the idiots responsible for this drivel. In Minecraft.

Episode 3 final thoughts: Look, I’m pretty generous when it comes to handwave-y explanations for weird, cool stuff. I’m okay with “it’s an alien thing” or “it must be something our science hasn’t discovered yet” or “it came from another dimension, who knows how physics/biology/chemistry works there”. What I’m not okay with is this show attempting to provide real-world scientific explanations and getting it utterly wrong. (I’m looking at you, season 5.) I’m really not okay with a show that contradicts its own world-building within minutes of establishing something. It’s just sloppy.

And if I have to see one more moment of het-washing Will I’m gonna … I don’t know. Scream. Throw things. Grab my Nerf gun and empty the clip at the TV.

[lynlynthewise]

Literally rubbing salt in the wound

[pointmetotheundertow]

Ewww- No- Just- FORGET ABOUT IT

[crazyjane13]

I'd say this is adding insult to injury, but no. It's just another fucking injury.

I don't know if Netflix is tone-deaf or just malicious ... but there is no allyship in a show that uses its lesbian character (Robin) to fuel a cishet man's self-acceptance arc, gives the audience a male-gaze lesbian kiss, has the lesbian couple break up off-screen, and erases Robin's edginess and individuality in favour of tradfem styling.

And there is absolutely no allyship in a show that subjects its major gay character (Will) to repeated torture, both physical and emotional/psychological, that queer-codes the torturer and makes his abuse of Will paedophilic, that uses Will's love and pain to prop up an extraordinarily toxic het relationship, that writes a forced coming-out scene that is nothing more than a ritual humiliation, and to top it all off, relegates Will to being a lonely, desperate gay picking up in bars.

To use Stranger Things to promote Pride Month is a slap in the face to every queer viewer. It's not allyship, it's just more shitty exploitation.

Fuck you, Netflix.

[crazyjane13]

Tales from '85 recap/review. Episode 2: Bad Harvest

(Here we go again - time for another recap/review of all the Massive Plot Holes (MPH) and Pointless Retcon Moments (PRM) in this piece of digital excrement. I considered also doing a count of all the out of character moments in this show - but there are Just. Too. Many.)

When last we left our intrepid pod people evil clones “heroes”, they were being menaced by a giant neon demo-bug that used to be a snow shark. Or a plant. Or something. I’m very confused.

The fight begins! And ends almost immediately as El again uses her powers in a massive effort. Without showing any real signs of fatigue or faintness, despite it having been established in season 2 that really strenuous use of her powers leaves her weak and exhausted. MPH #3.

Gasp! After El tears apart the demo-bug, it’s revealed that it … grew around the bully it glorped when it was still a demo-beanstalk. Which … okay, Sure. Why not.

New kid Nikki, despite being understandably a tad freaked out by being menaced by a giant monster escaped from a Los Angeles rave party, is extremely enthusiastic about finding out all about just what the heck is going on here. 

Mike, for most of season 2: Hell no, we don’t admit new Party members! (Unless it’s El, of course.) Max is not one of us, she has to go.

Mike, tales from 85: Okay, new kid, we’ll tell you everything about the Upside Down the second time we meet you. Incidentally, this is Will, let me explain in gruesome detail what happened to him because what’s a little thing like privacy when it comes to meeting complete strangers? PRM #6

Well, the demo-bug is dead, so everything’s cool, right? But wait! The demo-particles are indestructible! Whenever one of the various demo-monsters gets killed, the demo-particles float away on a sudden and convenient breeze and turn into something else (in this case, a demo … triffid? Some kind of moving plant, anyway). 

Funny how we went through two entire seasons that included the close study and destruction of numerous demo-creatures without ever discovering that this was A Thing. It’s almost like the writers of this dreck just decided to ignore all the established lore. (MPH #4)

Let’s just take a moment here to note that Will is behaving completely out of character. First there’s his inexplicable failure to get “goosies” when the demo-things are around (and can I just say UGH to that particular bit of nonsense from season 5 - way to trivialise an incredibly useful ability, Steve). Then there’s the fact that althought he’s a massive trauma survivor, repeatedly terrorised by the Upside Down and its various inhabitants - he’s apparently not fazed at all by the idea that the Upside Down is back, and probably about to target him again. Never mind that’s he’s shown repeatedly in season 3 to be twitchy, nervous, and often on the verge of tears. In this show, he’s just a minor character.

But back to the plot (such as it is). The Party+Nikki head to to the now deserted Hawkins Lab to see if the gate has opened up again. Which it hasn’t. And yet these demo-things are still alive. Erm. What. (MPH #5.)

OMFG if we get one more “something … (significant pause) … strange” bit of dialogue … I won’t be responsible for the screaming.

Also, what is with all the fond glances and little touches Mike’s constantly giving El? Where were they in season 3? (PRM #7)

Also also, since when did Dustin have a “nemesis”? Who is this girl who pops up out of nowhere to hang shit on Dustin and provide a really clumsy bit of foreshadowing? Do we know? Do we care?

We do not.

Oh look, a callback to season 2. It’s the pumpkin farm with the cowboy kid who scammed Hopper out of $20 in return for his trick or treat goodies. Just to make sure we know that, the kid is still wearing his Hallowe’en cowboy costume. I guess he hasn’t showered or bathed since then. 

Attack of the demo-plant! Oh no! Will cowboy kid and his sister survive? Will we find out? Do we care?

We do not.

The Party+Nikki now know that something dangerous, possibly deadly, is going on in Hawkins again. What will they do now? Will they tell Hopper and Joyce? Will they get their older siblings and Steve involved? Will they bravely attempt to fight this new threat themselves?

Max knows what should be done. Mike should take El on a date. Because he’s not treating her right, and Max has decided to give him helpful relationship advice.

Wait, what.

In the original show, Max barely knows El at the end of season 2. She also has what could generously be described as a prickly not-quite-friendship with Mike. She doesn’t even interact with El on more than the most awkward and standoffish basis until El goes to her for relationship advice in season 3. Yet here she is comfortable enough with Mike to give him non-aggressive advice on how to be a good boyfriend. And that advice is … desert the Party+Nikki while they investigate a real threat and potentially put their friends in danger? (MPH #6)

So Mileven go off on a date - to the Winter Festival, a public event. Which is, apparently, cool, even though El’s not supposed to go to things like that.

(Side note: at the Winter Festival sideshow, Mike wins - well, El cheats with her telekinesis so he can win - a stuffed raccoon for El that looks suspiciously like the one I had as a kid. I am triggered,)

Meanwhile the others, thanks to Dustin’s brilliant idea of putting up boxes all over town where people can report weird shit that’s going down, have leads to follow. Since they have an extra person now thanks to new kid Nikki, that means Dustin goes off on his own to meet someone out in the woods. Where he encounters the bully who they rescued from the inside of the demo-bug. Are we about to get an insight in exactly what’s going on here? Does the bully hold key information that will help Dustin solve this mystery?

Oh. He doesn’t. He remembers nothing after being glorped by an evil plant. Why did they even bother with this scene?

Back to the Winter Festival and - OMFG. Will and Nikki are also at the Winter festival. This is so obviously being coded as a double-date.

DID THE WRITERS FORGET THE PART WHERE WILL IS GAY?

Also, what is the fucking point of Will even being there? He’s had very few lines, and none of them have contributed anything to the story at all. He’s the one who’s actually BEEN to the Upside Down. He was connected to the hivemind and able to sense its movements and emotions. He had the spidey sense! (Except he doesn’t anymore.)

In gamer parlance, Will has been nerfed. Reduced to a useless tag-along. Even Nikki has more lines and more knowledge than he does. 

Will and Nikki have a heart to heart because of course Will would immediately confide his deepest fears in a stranger.

Nikki - “I am different and I know it. If anyone can’t handle that, it’s their problem.”

What’s this? Are we getting a coded “it’s okay to be queer” moment?

Oh. We’re not. Nikki’s just saying she’s fine with people being weirded out by her pseudo-punk haircut and apparently freakish strength. I really shouldn’t have got my hopes up.

Nikki then launches into a no-Will-you-are-awesome-really speech. You know, the sort of thing that was exclusively attributed to Mike in the original show. The sort of thing that only a best friend would be able to say, and only a best friend would be able to convince Will to believe it. Yet nerfed!Will pretty much has stars and hearts in his eyes as he hears this stranger wax lyrical about the virtues of a boy she’s just met.

i may throw up.

Oh, thank goodness. We’re leaving the Winter Festival to go back to the pumpkin farm, where Max and Lucas are investigating. The field is, inexplicably, full of ripe pumpkins in January. I’m no agricultural expert, but I’m pretty sure that if you left ripe pumpkins in the field in the dead of winter, they’d … you know … die.

But wait. All is not what it seems. What is this?

It’s a. DEMO-PUMPKIN.

A whole field of demo-pumpkins.

Okay that’s it, time out, everybody out of the pool. This show has officially jumped the snow-shark.

A terrifying fight ensues as the demo-pumpkins rise up and attack! What will our heroes do without El to save them? Bet you can’t guess.

Yes, you guessed it. Max hot-wires a harvester trucky thingy and drives it out into the field, splattering the demo-pumpkins.

Oh, you didn’t guess that would happen? 

So the demo-pumpkin threat is neutralised. Phew. But wait. The pumpkins in the field were just the leftovers. The rest had already gone to make pies for the pie-eating contest at the Winter Festival! 

(I swear I am not making this up. This is what passes for a plot.)

So we jump back to the Festival (along with Lucas and Max, who apparently have developed either super-speed or teleportation because how on earth would they get there so quickly), just in time to see Dustin’s nemesis (who is the undefeated champion of pie-eating) eat a demo-pumpkin pie. With predictable results.

The nemesis turns into a … I’m not really sure what to call it. Think of a demo-pumpkin crossed with the Mind Flayer, that snarls and spits giant thorns at people. That’s kind of what I’m seeing right now.

And attacks! Another cliffhanger! I am breathless with anticipation as to what will happen next episode.

Except I’m not. Honestly, I could not care less. The demo-pumpkin-flayer could eat the entirety of Hawkins, including the Party+Nikki, and I would not shed a tear. It would be a mercy killing. 

Second episode finale thoughts: The retconning continues, and gets more and more pathetic. Everyone is out of character - everyone. Nikki is shaping up to be the replacement best friend/confidant for Will, which makes no sense whatsoever. And there are clear signs of het-washing going on. It seems it wasn’t enough for the Duffers to completely exploit and humiliate their major queer character’s feelings in order to prop up a toxic het relationship - the writers of this rubbish seem to be determined to erase Will’s queerness altogether.

Hm, I think I’ll petition the nice people who bribed me with chocolate and pastries and alcohol to do this for more alcohol. I’m going to need it.

[crazyjane13]

Tales from '85 recap/review. Episode 1: Welcome to Hawkins, New Kid.

Hm. So our ‘return to Hawkins’ is, basically, all about trying to get us to like the new character they’ve shoe-horned into the Party.

It’s January 10. So, about a month after the events of season 2. You know, when Will got put through absolute hell again, where El had her heroic moment closing the gate, and where even more hapless Hawkins Lab workers discovered there’s no employee health-care for Upside Down-related work accidents. You know, trauma for everyone. Remember this because it will be utterly ignored by this show.

We open with an ‘exciting’ action sequence as a dude in a hazmat suit runs through the woods with a flame-thrower chasing a demo … something. 

Hang on. Where does this dude come from? Hawkins Lab was shut down. Is he an independent contractor? A former science guy who’s gone mad and is now patrolling the countryside as some kind of vigilante? Massive Plot Hole #1 (MPH).

Also, how is this demo-something alive? Didn’t everything connected to the Upside Down die when the gate was shut? MPH #2.

Hazmat dude burns the demo-something to ashes. Glowing green ashes that waft on the non-existent breeze and plant themselves into the snow and grow into a … demo-beanstalk?

A demo-beanstalk that needs to step away from the fluorescent makeup. 

Oh wait. The bright colours are a feature of this show? The title sequence is giving Cyberpunk 2077. This does not bode well for the overall tone.

But anyway. We’re getting re-introduced to the Party in an exciting getting-ready-for-school montage. Of course, we open with Mike. Because it’s all about him. He’s the Duffers’ self-insert, I mean main character.

And here we have the first Pointless Retcon Moment (PRM), as Mike pauses in his frantic scramble to lovingly caress a photo of him and El at the Snow Ball. Except it’s not the photo that was taken in Season 2. In that photo, they were standing awkwardly, not touching, and Mike was doing his usual scowl at the camera. Here in 1985, it’s magically turned into a cute, shy moment where they lean into each other and smile. 

[“Let’s just change the photo to really shut up the fans who said Mike didn’t love Eleven. They won’t notice, they’re stupid” - the Duffers, probably]

PRM #2. Mike is about to run off when his mom stops him by saying, “Haven’t you forgotten something?” To which Mike gulps, and replies, “Love you?”

What? Since when does the emotionally constipated Wheelers ever tell each other they love them? It’s okay. Mom doesn’t expect a declaration of love. She just wants to give Mike a bag of donuts for Hopper. Because, y’know, cops love donuts. And Mom Wheeler apparently knows all about Hopper and El and wants to help her son get into his prospect father-in-law’s good books.

Cut to a convenience store in Hawkins that exists precisely nowhere in the original show, where Dustin is getting in some before-school video gaming. And a little light scamming of the manager for free snacks. Which, you know, is so in character for Dustin.

Oh look, here’s Jonathan and Will. And Jonathan is giving Will a new mixtape. That’s nice. That’s brotherly love and entirely in charac - “Maybe now you’ll listen to more than just The Clash?”

I’m sorry, what??

The guy who introduced Will to The Clash - in a touching scene that beautifully established the bond between two brothers dealing with an abusive father - is now openly dismissive of the band? Jonathan? Mr weird-but-cool-taste-in music? 

What is happening here?

Now we’re at the cabin, and … El is not under lockdown? Hopper is an understanding and moderately temperate guy? El shuts a door in his face and he doesn’t blow his top?? (PRM #3.)

But at least Hopper still doesn’t like Mike. To the point where he actually threatens to kill Mike and disappear his body. This isn’t played for laughs. It’s deadly serious.

WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE? ARE THEY POD PEOPLE? DID HAWKINS ALL GET REPLACED BY STEPFORD ROBOTS?

Okay, here’s Dustin riding to school - and here are some random bullies straight out of Central Casting to menace him. Could it be that we’re actually about to get some plot?

Oh no! Random bully number 1 got glorped by the demo-beanstalk, who could have seen that coming? (Spoiler alert: everyone.) And exit random bully number 2, glorped by … a moving pile of snow?

Back to the kids. They’re biking to school. With El. She’s going to school with them?

Witty conversation ensues. El asks haltingly, “Deep dish? Will I like deep dish?” Oh El, what have they done to you? 

Seriously, what the actual fuck. She’s so infantilised. Even in season 1 she was more articulate than this. And Mike, especially, is talking to her like she’s an intellectually challenged toddler.

We’re about halfway through this episode, and still no new kid. Oh wait, here she is - rescuing Will from a bully.

Her name is Nikki. She’s huge. Like … huge. Hopper-sized. She has a deep voice, dresses in overtly masculine clothes. If I didn’t know this show was basically ‘queer people are just there to advance our heteronormative plot’, I’d think they were trans-coding Nikki - or at least butch-coding her.

Mike: “Will, you okay?” Finally, Mike giving us his super-protective self just like he has all through the first two seasons.

Will: PUSHES MIKE AWAY

What. This is Will? The kid who in season 2 screams for Mike’s help when he’s tormented by the Mind Flayer? The kid who tells Mike - and only Mike, out of all his friends - his fears? The kid whose bond with Mike was strong enough to allow him to break free of the Mind Flayer’s grip just long enough to communicate how to defeat it? And now he’s pushing Mike away after being terrorised by bullies and rescued by a GIANT STRANGER?

(PRM #4)

Oh look, they’re still pushing Mike-and-Will - as soon as El’s not around, Mike immediately attaches himself to Will. But it’s being made very clear that Will is just a substitute for El. (PRM #5).

Here’s a new science teacher. Who is clearly a plot point, because otherwise why get rid of a beloved character like Mr Clark? I do not care about this new science teacher. At all. Not one bit. Go away.

And now, wacky after-school hijinks as the Party decide to get involved in a snow-clearing scam, using El’s powers even though Hopper has made it clear that El’s not supposed to use her powers where the public can see them. But it’s okay, because Mike says no and Mike’s the boss of El.

Oh no! Here comes the unnecessarily aggressive snowplow guy upset that a bunch of kids want to make some money shovelling snow. But it’s okay. He gets glorped by evil snow.

And now the evil snow is after the Party! Quick, jump on all the cars, make witty remarks, and El can use her powers - in public - to save Max and Lucas!

The tone of this is all wrong … they’ve made it a fucking slapstick comedy.

The Party decide to set a trap for the evil snow shark (yes that’s literally what they called it). And oh what a surprise - here comes Nikki innocently wandering along listening to her Walkman and chomping on pizza, about to get glorped. Who could have seen that coming?

But wait! It’s not a snow shark! it’s a demo … thing. Giant bug. Thing. With neon markings all over its body. And Will’s spidey-senses never go off. Not once. (MPH #2)

And that’s the cliffhanger.

Final episode 1 thoughts: What the actual fuck. El’s been lobotomised. Hopper’s a calm and reasonable Dad (who also apparently likes threatening children with murder). Mike’s got all the personality of a piece of wet toilet paper. Will is barely there. Dustin is a budding juvenile delinquent. And Nikki is … entirely unnecessary. 

There are clear attempts to rewrite the history of the show, specifically to shore up the Mike and El relationship at the expense of little things like established character development. And absolutely at the expense of his friendship with Will.

Nearly as bad as the retconning is the extent to which previously established world-building is not only being ignored, but actually contradicted.

And the tone. Ye gods. 

This isn’t Stranger Things. It’s Scooby Doo with a Cyberpunk 2077 aesthetic. (Seriously. What is with all the neon?) And so far, I hate it. Not just because it’s a shitty attempt to rewrite the original show. It’s. Just. Bad.

I plunge onward to episode 2. Pray for me.

[crazyjane13]

I'm finally watching Tales from '85 - because I was bribed with chocolate and pastries. But I'm halfway through episode 2 and ... I'm not sure there is enough chocolate in the entire world to make up for the pain this is causing.

It's. So. BAD.

Extremely bad.

Skin-crawlingly, ultra-cringingly bad.

Hair-tearing, what-the-fuck-are-they-doing bad.

Just. Plain. BAD.

[narrativelogicofbyler]

the duffers didn’t just borrow from queer cinema, they plundered it. they treated queer cinematic language like a buffet: take the longing, take the gaze choreography, take the storm symbolism, take the displaced confession, take the colour grammar, take the proxemics, take the intimacy blocking, and then toss the actual queer narrative responsibility in the bin. they didn’t engage with queer film history; they extracted it. they strip‑mined decades of coded storytelling built under censorship, danger, and necessity, and used it as a decorative flourish. and when it came time to honour the emotional promise that language makes, they ran. they hid behind ambiguity like it was a shield. from a film and tv standpoint, it’s not subtle, it’s not clever, it’s not “open to interpretation.” it’s a betrayal of form. it’s narrative cowardice masquerading as depth.

the rain fight is the first act of narrative violence. in queer cinema, rain is not weather, it’s rupture, confession, emotional exposure. eyewitness uses it as the moment repression collapses into longing: the camera tightens, the sound isolates breath, the blocking forces philip and lukas into a shared emotional frame. the l word, generation q, the umbrella academy, shelter, handsome devil, even pride and prejudice (2005) and spider‑man (2002) use storms as romantic hinges. the grammar is so established it’s practically a cinematic law.

and the duffers didn’t just echo that grammar, they staged mike and will near on identical to philip and lukas. same emotional geometry. same storm charged framing. same expectation of confession built into the shot choices. and then they added something even more vicious: mike’s line, “it’s not my fault you don’t like girls.” that is not teenage frustration. that is a deliberate narrative choice to weaponise heteronormativity against a queer coded character in a moment of forced vulnerability. it’s the rupture before recognition beat, except the duffers take the rupture and refuse the recognition. they take the wound and deny the healing. they take the queer pain and leave it festering.

and then comes the van scene, the single most exploitative moment in the entire show. the van scene is not subtext. it is a textbook displaced confession, a queer cinematic device used when characters cannot safely speak their truth. will expresses his feelings, but he’s forced to route them through el. that’s pariah’s coded poetry, weekend’s hesitant honesty, the way he looks’s gesture based longing. it’s queer cinematic language, full stop.

and the painting, the emotional core of the scene, is straight out of call me by your name’s lineage of symbolic offerings and portrait of a lady on fire’s portrait as confession. will pours his heart into that painting. he gives mike a piece of himself under someone else’s name. and the duffers bury it. mike never finds out. not about the painting. not about the speech. not about the feelings. the entire emotional arc is erased. will’s heartbreak becomes narrative scaffolding for mike’s arc, and then it’s discarded like it never mattered. it’s emotional extraction. it’s using a queer character’s pain as a plot device and then refusing to let it matter.

and then season 5 has the audacity, the shamelessness, to double down with the toilet scene. the burst pipe, the panic, the two of them trying to stop the water together, it’s blocked like a romantic beat. intertwined hands, overlapping fingers, bodies aligned in a single frame. it’s the “forced proximity” trope from god’s own country and happy together. it’s the intimate hand choreography of moonlight and the notebook. it’s physical intimacy coded as emotional intimacy. and then mike tells will to take off his jacket to stop the water, even though mike is wearing one too. that’s not practicality; that’s symbolism. that’s will being asked to sacrifice something again. that’s the van scene all over again: will gives, mike receives, the story takes, and will is left with nothing.

and when you place the toilet scene alongside the van scene, alongside the rain fight, alongside the pink sky field scene, alongside the romantic two‑shots, alongside the slow push‑ins, alongside the breath based acting, alongside the entire collage of queer cinematic references, portrait of a lady on fire’s gaze choreography, call me by your name’s asymmetrical awareness, moonlight’s colour as interiority, weekend’s micro expressions, pariah’s art as truth, the way he looks’s soft framing, happy together’s cramped emotional spaces, heartstopper’s colour cues, the pattern becomes undeniable. this isn’t accidental resonance. this is deliberate construction.

and then you add the straight media romantic grammar they layered on top, the “i see you” close‑ups of titanic, the colour coded emotional states of la la land, the confession as pivot point structure of the fault in our stars, emotional breakthrough sequence of the notebook, and the intent becomes even clearer. they used every tool in the romantic cinematic toolbox.

and here’s the part that makes me furious on a craft level: this is queerbaiting at the level of form. not marketing. not dialogue. form. they built byler using the established cinematic language of queer desire, queer rupture, queer confession, queer recognition. they coded the romance visually, structurally, symbolically. they made the promise in the grammar itself.

and then they refused to pay it off.

no thematic resolution.

no narrative accountability.

no acknowledgment of the lineage they were invoking.

no truth for mike.

no closure for will.

no emotional payoff for the grammar they used.

they used the repressed queer yearning arc.

they used the displaced confession.

they used the romantic two shot.

they used the intertwined hands intimacy of the toilet scene.

they used mike’s cruelty in the rain fight as a queer coded rupture.

they used will’s emotional labour as narrative scaffolding.

they used all of it, formally, deliberately, with technical precision.

and then they abandoned it.

from a film and tv perspective, it’s not subtle. it’s not ambiguous. it’s not “open to interpretation.” it’s a refusal to honour the cinematic vocabulary they chose to speak in. when you deploy queer cinematic language, you inherit the history of queer filmmakers who used those tools because they weren’t allowed to say it outright. you inherit the responsibility of that lineage. and the duffers spat in its face.

they didn’t just borrow queer cinema.

they exploited it.

they strip mined it.

they used will as a prop.

they hid the truth from mike.

they gutted the arc.

they weaponised mike’s cruelty in the rain fight.

and they queerbaited with the entire form.

[puppydogmike]

“mike, i love you” sedate me rn

apparently, noah was stating that will would’ve said this to mike. he’s really pushing byler confession but we didn’t get it. 😭

[crazyjane13]

Just rip out my heart and dance on the pieces, why don't you???

[crazyjane13]

Duffer apologists and Milevens think it's just terrible that the brothers are being "abused" by people who are critical online about season 5 and the queerbaiting.

To which I say: just fuck off. The Duffers dismissed any fan engagement they didn't like as "noise". They can cope with reading critique about the utter shitshow that was season 5. They can cope with being labelled - with receipts - as queerbaiters.

They made this bed. They can damn well lie in it.

[crazyjane13]

So, I watched the first six minutes of Stranger Things: Tales from '85 (as released on Twitter/X/Elon's sewer), and ... it's bad. My god, it's bad.

I'm not talking about the animation style, or the voice acting. I'm talking about the fact that in the opening moments, the writers have attempted major retcons to shore up their pathetic claim that Mike and Eleven have always been in starry-eyed, pure and eternal love.

Add to that a piece of news from the creator of '85, and it's even worse.

Behind the spoiler cut for those who want to subject themselves to this dreck.

First. The picture of Mileven at the Snow Ball. We all saw it taken - the two kids were standing awkwardly next to each other, not touching, looking embarrassed. In '85, however, that photo has magically transformed to be two kids standing with their shoulders touching, turned slightly towards each other, smiling cutely and shyly.

We also saw that photo was in El's custody - it's clearly visible in her 'shrine' to Mike in season 4. Yet in Mike's first scene in '85, it's on his shelf (something that never happens in the original show). He interrupts his usual panicked morning rush to take it down and gaze at it tenderly.

There's literally no reason to do this except to attempt to convince viewers that they didn't see what was clearly shown in the original show - that Mike was in no way gooey-eyed and pining over Eleven the whole time.

Second. El's isolation from the Party. In the original show, she is hidden away for almost all of season 2, and a good part of season 3, for her own safety. Hopper is paranoid to the point of aggression about her never showing her face outside.

In '85, however, we El rushing around in the morning getting ready to meet up with the Party. Hopper, far from acting in character and blowing his stack about it, merely reminds her gently not to be too visible, and not to use her powers where the public can see. So El's isolation, an integral part to her character development and the disintegration of the party in season 3, is completely erased.

Third. One of the explanations bandied around for Mike's inability to say "I love you" to El (and backed up by the Duffers) states that Mike comes from a loveless family where the members don't show affection for each other.

In '85, however, as he's running out the door, Karen calls him back, saying he's forgotten something. Mike looks momentarily baffled, then calls back, "Love you?" This can be nothing more than an attempt to rewrite Mike into a character who voices his affection. I suspect there'll be more than one completely unnecessary "I love you" directed at El during the animated show's run.

Fourth. The statement by '85's creator Eric Robles that in this show, that Will is going to find a partnership like Mike and Eleven, or Lucas and Max. It's not explicitly said that it's romantic, but why else compare it to the two canon couples in the Party?

And who's that romance with? New character Nikki. A girl.

This is egregious. Inexcusable. Will is canonically gay. His entire character arc is informed by the isolation he feels because of his sexuality. He doesn't like girls - even before that torture chamber of a 'coming-out' scene in season 5, it's known and accepted by his friends.

To suggest a romantic relationship with a girl is not only bad writing, it's erasure.

So for all those reasons, I won't be watching the rest of Tales from '85, and I suggest no one else should, either.

[unspeakabledigressions]

Me: Wow! You really used to write fan fiction, Grandma? What did you write about?

Grandma: Oh, it was for Star Trek. Just little stories about Kirk and Spock, you know?

Me:

[fanlore-wiki]

Grandma was probably very aware of The Premise, if you aren't, go check out the Fanlore page.

[crazyjane13]

Literally me. I'm that grandparent.

[teambyler]

Will's original motivation to come out was to build up courage to approach Mike about his feelings about him:

The show quietly REPLACES this. The reason he comes out becomes a vision from Vecna???

A vision that was OFFSCREEN?

I smell meddling.

Byler was planned, then pulled. You can't convince me otherwise.

-teambyler

[crazyjane13]

I choose to live in a world where Steve didn't cause a horrendous time paradox, but came home after returning the stones and finally allowed himself to let Bucky in.

I choose to live in a world where Mike learned the truth about the painting, El dumped his ass for good, and he finally realised that it's always been Will.

I choose to live in a world where writers lucky enough to be able to turn their dreams into creative works are not cowards who kowtow to comphet, are not blinkered by comphet, are not so afraid of queer love that they have to deny it at every possibility.

That world isn't this world. But I have AO3, where some of the best stories I've ever read live.

So fuck all y'all comphet cowards and bigots.

[crazyjane13]

Same, Noah. Same.

[crazyjane13]

Sign the Petition

Renew Star Trek Starfleet Academy for a full season 3

[crazyjane13]

Me, at 3.00 am: I need to sleep. Stop giving me fic ideas, brain.

My brain: No but hear me out ... I've got this idea for an a/b/o ...

Me: Let me stop you right there.

My brain: ... genderfluid demisexual omega who takes on the system through the courts.

Me: ...

Me: ...

Me: Goddammit.

My brain: You're welcome.