Sorry for the upcoming rant,,
The Bychance vs Byler shipping debate pisses me off, mostly because there’s always a few consistent arguments
-“Will would never date (a bully)”
-“Bychance would mischaracterize them both”
-“Will would never get over Mike”
^things I’ve heard several times
I’m separating my arguments here based on the three things above so. Yeah. Uhm
1. The idea that Will could simply never date a bully is, I believe, rooted in more than just “oh but Chance beat up Dustin!!!” because we’ve seen characters who were formerly part of the popular crowd, who have beat up those close to them, and still later become part of the whole thing w/ the Party and their lot
Steve who literally beat up Jonathan. And had a redemption arc and became friends with the group.
I think it’s more so about Chance’s redemption arc happening for him to become closer to a queer person rather than a straight one, and because he’s consistently headcanoned AS queer, because the same “idea” of the developmental arc Steve would be carried out, even if it’s not done the same way and not for the same reasons.
2. Will could realistically date a jock and still be in character, let’s get that out of the way. It’s a matter of how they build their relationship, if they’ve both gone through growth as people, and if they CLICK. <- romance isn’t based off the two characters on their own, dynamics and personalities matter as well as their interactions. There are ways to built the relationship up before they get together so it doesn’t “come out of nowhere” and whatnot.
Also, on the topic of Chance, he barely had a canon personality? He had five minutes of screentime (I am NOT counting//the “five minutes” is sarcastic) and all we got to know was that he was a jock, he was friends with Andy, and he’s a “bit” of a jerk. Headcanoning him while also giving him a character arc WORKS because it characterizes him more than canon does
(The same could not be said for Mike, because a lot of the time he is written in fics to be better than he actually was. Sorry. Not just in the context of Byler btw but in almost everything? His relationship with El, for example…)
3. Will not getting over Mike is some BULLSHIT🗣️ I don’t even know what to say for this one but come ON. People cannot be deadass when they say these things I don’t believe it
anon i could kiss you on your forehead for this
10/10, this is so articulate and clean. you single-handedly destroyed every argument anti-bychancers have <333
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