it’s been a year, mike. (MAJOR BYLER REVELATION INCOMING—MUST READ)
mike and will constantly saying “a year” or “all year” when talking about the time since the move when it’s only been six months keeps me up at night
i saw people talking about how they say a year when it was only 6 months because they’re idiots in love and are being dramatic. as cute as that is, i didn’t really buy it until RIGHT NOW. i just saw it as a cute headcanon, but now i see that the writers could be enabling you to make this realization by use of subtext.
^ these are the three times they say it
at first i thought the writers may have just used year because that’s less confusing for the audience because 1 year time jumps have been used before in stranger things and are super popular in books/movies/tv shows. BUT, it clicked for me that that doesn’t make sense. the timeline in stranger things has always been acknowledged. throughout s1 we hear the amount of time will has been missing several times (as far as i remember). in s2, mike counted the days el had been gone. he called her every night for 353 days. when el and hopper argue in s2, el uses specific numbers to tell us how long she’s really been with him. in s3 hopper specifically says ‘6 long months’ when talking about how long he’s been dealing with mike (lol). that’s the same amount of time between s3 & s4, yet mike and will don’t say 6 months, they say year. there’s a date at the start of every season. and in s4, el says this in her letter to mike.
185 days = 6 months (almost on the dot)
the writers have specifically told us how long it’s been since they moved, down to the amount of days. and it’s 6 months, not a year. this makes it very hard for me to write off mike and will saying ‘year’ as just the writers slipping up. also in el’s letter, she says this:
mike and will are saying the wrong amount of time. the writers aren’t stupid, they know how much time has passed since season 3. THEY WROTE IT. i’m a writer as well, and i know how much time is passing between what im writing because I CREATED IT. IT CAME FROM MY BRAIN. and like i said, the stranger things writers have proven to be very keen on dates and time. all of this happening in the same season is not a slip up, its on purpose. stranger things 4 had a 30 million dollar budget PER EPISODE. do the math–that’s 270 MILLION DOLLARS. and yes, i know they supposedly forgot will’s birthday, but that’s different. his birthday is a date that was mentioned one time and served no purpose aside from creating emotional tension in that one scene. none of their birthdays are important to the plot, hell, will’s is the only one mentioned in the show and it wasn’t even on his birthday. one date that was mentioned one time and never brought up again is NOT the same as continuous attention given to timelines/time jumps over the course of all four seasons. and some fans theorize that they’re lying about forgetting his birthday anyway. either way, its not the same.
so….the writers want us to know that emotions can make time speed up or slow down….and that el’s week has felt very fast because of her emotions….and then show us mike and will SPECIFICALLY deviating from the timeline established in the SECOND LINE OF EPISODE ONE “yeah, but you knew she was having problems for months and didn’t tell me.” “its been six months, mike.”, or “it’s been months, mike.” or not even including that line at all, or “the past couple months have been weird” would’ve worked and stayed in check with the timeline we’ve already established. but when writing those scenes, they chose to say year. which is flat out wrong and way off from the actual time they’ve been apart.
and what did el say makes time speed up or slow down? emotions? oh, okay got it
the first two times mike and will say it’s been a year are in the same scene: the rink o mania fight. emotions are high. they’re in a pretty serious fight. its not about something dumb, it’s about their ten year friendship and how they’ve grown apart. their friendship is VERY important to both of them. (remember when mike said asking will to be his friend is the best thing he’s ever done?) the third time it’s said is when mike is opening up to will in episode 4. it’s a very emotional scene. mike is being honest and vulnerable with his feelings. in this conversation he apologizes and admits that will didn’t deserve how mike had been treating him, which mike never does to anyone else. he admits his relationship with will is different and home isn’t the same without him, and that he feels like he lost will and wants to be best friends again.
and the obvious: emotions making time speed up or slow down doesn’t just apply to in the heat of the moment occasions. (in theory) mike and will are in love. the six months they’ve been separated felt like a year to them because of their emotions, just like el said in the letter. and mind you, will is canonically in love with mike, yet they’re both acting the same way about this. it’s not just will. it makes sense for six months to feel like a year to will because of his emotions, because he is in love with mike, right? well, mike feels the exact same way. this isnt even about the characters as people. narratively speaking, mike and will both doing this doesn’t make sense if it’s unrequited. one way writers show how characters aren’t on the same page about something, a relationship for instance, is whether they’re on the same emotional page about different plot points. something major and emotional happens to all the characters—now we watch how they react to it. and i don’t mean small disagreements & such, characters are allowed to feel differently about things. i mainly mean when whatever happened is painful and important to one or more of the characters. for example, steve and nancy. steve and nancy didn’t feel the same about barb, barb’s parents, and everything that happened in general. steve wanted to keep on like nothing happened while nancy was literally eaten up with grief, guilt, and trauma. jonathan was the one who was on the same page as her and made her feel better about carrying that baggage around all the time. they understood each other. and who was nancy in love with? jonathan. narratively, that makes perfect sense and even further sways the audience into understanding they’re in love.
so…what? the emotions that made mike and will’s six months apart feel like a year to them is….friendship? not a fucking chance. mike and el are a couple, and according to mileven fans, they’re the main couple of the show who are in love and are going to be an endgame couple. why save this incredibly romantic coded trope for will and mike, the best platonic bros? idk, you tell me. and the fact that the line about emotions came from someone in the love triangle?? and it was said to someone else in the love triangle?? not a coincidence.
edit: someone reblogged and pointed out how el said 185 in her letter to mike that we SEE him reading. there is no reason for him not to know how long it’s been. so either he isn’t paying attention to a damn thing el says in her letters or he is just extremely in love with will
another edit: i keep seeing reblogs of people saying they’re probably referring to the time since mike and el started dating, which i used to think too. but the context when mike and will say a year makes it hard for me to believe.
“but you knew she was having trouble for like a year and you didn’t tell me”
here mike is specifically talking about el’s bullying problem which has only been going on since the byers have been gone and she enrolled in school. what he’s talking about is something very strictly related to the time since they moved, and it’s been six months, not a year.
“you called maybe a couple times. it’s been a year, mike. meanwhile el has like a book of letters from you.”
will is again, very specifically talking about something that strictly happened between the time since the byers left and the start of s4. he’s saying how crazy it is that it’s been a whole year and mike has barely called. but it hasn’t been a year, it’s only been six months.
“the last year has been weird, you know? and you know, max and lucas and dustin, they’re great, they’re great, it’s just..it’s hawkins it’s not the same without you. and i feel like maybe i was worrying too much about el…i don’t know maybe i feel like i lost you or something.”
this one i will cut some slack, i think he could be talking about literally the last year, as in since the beginning of 1985. but immediately after he starts saying how home hasn’t been the same without will (and separates his relationship with will as being different than his relationship with max dustin and lucas and even el), something specific to the time since they byers have been gone, six months, not a year:
in conclusion: mike and will referring to their time apart as a year when it’s only been six months is not a mishap on the writer’s part. they go out of their way to make sure you know exactly how much time has passed, down to the number of days, and they put this much attention on time in every season. and in the same season mike and will do this, there is a line in the SECOND LINE OF THE OPENING SCENE OF THE SEASON about emotions making time go by faster or slower.
byler is going to be a s5 surprise, but its not coming out of nowhere. there’s piles of subtext in every single season—enough that when you look back, it all makes sense. small details like this aren’t outlandish because this is without a doubt the length writers will go to keep something hidden, and in byler’s case and many other tv show plots case, to keep something a surprise. and for christ’s sake, WATCH THE SHOW! the amount of attention to even the TINIEST details in stranger things is insane. they put so much thought into everything—not just ships, and not just byler. idk how many times the writers are going to have to say details matter and that there are no coincidences until people believe them.
anyways, byler is endgame. thanks for reading :)
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