whatever man

stranger things 5 literally killed me, in a bad way

[rl-isthere]

7 Days Left ⭐

[rl-isthere]

I'll probably never recover from the pure amount of potential byler held

They literally had all the cards in hand to make the best thing ever and just decided not to

Keeps me up at night I swear

[velvet4510]

El needed the “independence from men” arc, not Nancy.

Steve needed the “it’s okay if your crush doesn’t like you back” arc, not Will.

Mike needed the “you’re braver than you think” arc, not Holly.

Mileven needed the “shared trauma doesn’t mean we’re compatible” breakup, not Jancy.

Byler needed the “I just needed you” resolution, not Lumax.

Either Willel or Elmax needed the “you understand me better than anyone” resolution, not Mileven.

They kept giving the right arcs to the wrong characters and the wrong relationships.

[rl-isthere]

Season 5 is a collection of good concepts/ideas given absolutely no substance with no follow through

Leaving us all mourning "what could have been"

They had an excellent hand and somehow played it all wrong

This is exactly why we're still hung up on it 31 days after it ended. This is so disappointing exactly because it had the potential to be the greatest ending of a decade long show

Seeing everyone come up with alternative plots and fixes etc in such a small amount of time really baffles me, the writers had so much time... How did we end up with this

[rl-isthere]

Just thinking about the fact that when in California, Jonathan was the only one to make a new friend

Jane was terribly bullied, and Will had no one new at school either

Then Mike came and it was an emotional mess for both of them, they didn't catch a break in there

Oh and now Argyle was entirely removed from the story

I don't know, it made me a bit sad thinking back to this

[lauveyy]

will the wise 🔮

[rl-isthere]

Before the release of season 5 I wasn't necessarily part of those who wanted a lot of main characters to die. However it does get to a point where the supernatural doesn't feel like a threat anymore.

Every single one of the upside down entities/creatures until now have claimed victims. Both named characters and npcs. Yet the Mindflayer in its original, final form, fused with Vecna, didn't.

Season 1 : the Demogorgon got Barb, unnamed Hawkins residents and soldiers

Season 2 : Demodogs got Mews (it counts) and Bob, as well as soldiers

Season 3 : the fleshy Mindflayer got Billy and a whole lot of Hawkins residents (Heather, Mrs Driscoll, etc...)

Season 4 : the Demobats got Eddie, and Vecna got Chrissy, Fred, Patrick and Max

I'd argue we could add Dr. Brenner for season 1. While we know now he survived, at the time of season 1 his perceived death did impact our perception of how dangerous/ruthless the upside down and the monsters could be.

Meanwhile in season 5 all victims from the supernatural are unnamed soldiers (except for Sullivan, but we see he survived). Those victims are from demogorgons in episode 1 and Vecna in Sorcerer. That's it. In those same episodes Hopper goes unnoticed by the demos and Joyce is just left alive by Vecna for some reason.

I would also add Karen and Ted Wheeler, they had no reason to survive outside of the fact that it avoids writing in consequences and grief.

Our characters go through the upside down as well as an entirely new dimension, the Mindflayer's home turf by the way, unscratched. In the finale we get 2 death scares and one of them, Steve's, isn't even during the final fight. On top of that, when finally finishing Vecna off we do not address what should have been a legitimate death scare for Will due to his connection to the hive mind.

And to top it all off, our only, meaningless, main character death happens after our main antagonist is already dead. And it's a suicide.

You can't make this up.

This is very telling of the overall quality of this last season and this is only talking about casualties. This isn't taking into account the fact that every single confrontation with the upside down and it's creatures prior to this season were much more impactful and scarier.

All seasons before had better fights, with much more tension and care poured into them.

[cloudycleric]

coming out & saying that vecna ruined stranger things. at least how it was executed. he was formally introduced in s4, but the lead up to his introduction was terrible. there is little to no foreshadowing that you can point to & say “that directly references henry & nothing else.”

the difference between s4 & s5 was that s4 was able to find its footing. vecna may have felt (not saying that he was) retcon’d, but the story was compelling. storylines like california may have been underwhelming, but with the promise of further exploration once the whole cast reunites, people can push past it.

but s5 does NOT find its footing at all. the entire plot revolves around story elements only added in s4. if you traveled back to 2019 & told me, “actually, stranger things is about this vecna guy who looks like evil adult groot voldemort trying to combine the real world with this dimension x you’ve never heard of” i’d probably ask you why they decided to go in that direction. or what the fuck you were talking about.

s5 suffers from terrible favoritism as well. it’s like they took what worked in s4 (max’s plot line really) & discarded everything else they had been working to build.

[narrativelogicofbyler]

i found the sketches distasteful on multiple levels. from a craft standpoint, it lacked any real tonal discipline, the kind of discipline you expect from a show with decades of institutional experience. instead of using humour to interrogate or illuminate anything, it leaned on cheap provocation and surface level “edginess.” and in the current political climate, where people are already exhausted and hyper aware of how media shapes discourse, this kind of throwaway shock comedy feels not only unfunny but genuinely unnecessary. It wasn’t clever, it wasn’t timely, and it certainly wasn’t contributing anything meaningful to the cultural moment.

the decision to take the mick out of will’s coming out scene was especially tone deaf. that moment mattered, deeply, to queer viewers who saw themselves in it. reducing it to a punchline for a quick laugh doesn’t read as satire; it reads as a dismissal of the emotional weight that scene carried. and honestly, why is it always LGBTQ+ people and women who get targeted? because it’s easy. because they’re seen as “safe” groups to mock without consequence. it’s the oldest, laziest comedic shortcut in the book, and it shows a complete lack of imagination.

and then there’s the choice to punch down at fans, specifically young women. making jokes about “teen girls,” fanfiction, and the people who write it is tired, lazy, and creatively bankrupt. these are the fans who actually show up. they’re the ones giving engagement, buying tickets, streaming content, keeping entire franchises alive. mocking them isn’t satire; it’s bullying dressed up as humour. and taking the mick out of fanfiction? fanfiction is one of the most vibrant, emotionally literate forms of participatory storytelling we have. it’s creative labour, it’s community, it’s meaning making. dismissing it just exposes how little they understand about contemporary audience culture.

[rl-isthere]

"They didn't write the jokes"

Yeah well they sure did agree to perform the skits and be on the show so sincerely, I don't care

[capischao]

Is it too woke of me to say that 90% of the SNL episode with Finn Wolfhard felt oddly disturbing

It didn’t feel like the jokes were directed at the show itself, but digs at the fans. Something like a “here, damn”.

Conformity gate being addressed in itself isn’t an issue, but Lucas joking about Max acting like she’s in a coma during sex was… something

I know it can be interpreted as a pillow princess, lays back and thinks of England, kind of joke, but it’s still a very strange thing to say.

Adding on to that, I know they’re not meant to be in character. It’s a parody. That said, why was most of the humour just… misogyny.

Dustin saying “oh yeah I briefly dated that weird nerdy girl that helped us save the world and never talked to her again” and Lucas making that joke about Max??

Finn saying in his monologue that Stranger Things is where he learnt how girls look ‘down there’ right after showing a clip of both him and Millie as 11 year olds?? Who chose this

That other skit where it’s just Finn’s ‘girlfriend’ being annoying as hell + acting like a boy and that’s the whole joke? Men hating a woman?? That’s the joke????

The skit of Will’s coming is another example.

I don’t care how many people say it’s mocking the writing and show, the jokes they used were literally stolen from the homophobes in TikTok comment sections.

If it were mocking the writing, they wouldn’t have made a dick joke — they would’ve poked fun at the entire city being in that room but no. It was mocking the character and the acting.

Because here’s a shocker folks: most straight people didn’t care that the writing was bad, they were annoyed that the scene existed at all. It could’ve been the most perfect scene ever and they would’ve still hated on it and called it unnecessary

It’s also very hypocritical of the people enjoying this skit to laugh and enjoy a joke where a 16 year old says he likes dick but crucify fans online writing/drawing scenarios in which he gets to explore that in a serious manner

It wasn’t labelled as fetishising when Nancy and Steve had a sex scene in season 1 or Nancy and Jonathan had one implied + a pull out joke. Or when Billy, a minor, set out to fuck a grown woman + was ogled by multiple mothers. Or when Max talked about Billy having girls over and hearing them moaning

Apparently being minors is only an issue when it’s queer? Unless you can laugh at it of course, in which case it’s fine to have a minor saying “I like dick”.

All this episode told me is people are fine with queerness as long as they can mock it.

The heated rivalry skit is praised because it’s making fun of the show, while the actual show is hated by those same conservatives laughing at SNL

Maybe I’m too woke. But just I’m so tired of this bullshit. It feels like we’re regressing and it’s so disheartening to realise that not even the actors give a shit and are kind of vapid

The only ones who seem to ACTUALLY care about the real issues/meaning/consequences of this fuckass show are the women and Noah. All of them conspicuously absent in this episode but talked about in the most disgusting ways

[rl-isthere]

I do not understand anyone trying to say it wasn't harmful

[rl-isthere]

Literally why is it so hard for men to not fucking be misogynistic

[rl-isthere]

Not me seeing an snl extract and thinking it was ai because of how weird it is 💀

I don't get American humor

[rl-isthere]

Maybe after a rewatch (if I can bare it) I would find some but I feel like season 5 is really lacking in terms of beautiful cinematography

Like very well framed, beautiful shots

Don't get me wrong there is some but I feel like season 4 was so visually striking, I have a hard time understanding where all of that went

Thinking back to some fanvid focused on "the beauty of stranger things 4", I don't know if such a video would work with season 5

[revangerang]

God the more I think about any of it, the less it makes sense.

Wdym Will did the whole “he didn’t want me to see there” thing and it wasn’t a trap?

Wdym Vecna showed up, said he was gonna use Will again, WALKED AWAY and let everyone live, and then just…. Didn’t use him for anything.

(He did later but in retaliation for Max escaping and Will invading his mind, not related to the first thing)

Wdym Will only just discovered his powers and could simultaneously control and “Vecna” THREE impossibly strong demogorgons, and even CONTROL VECNA HIMSELF. But Vecna who has been getting continually stronger just… let our heroes get inside the Mind Flayer and kill him like nothing.

Wdym the Mind Flayer has been colonizing entire worlds but was killed in 0.2 seconds by a ragtag group of teens bc they got to one of his puppets and it said oh well, guess I’ll die too.

Wdym Will had to have a full fledged exorcism to get the particles out, and not doing so would mean he would die and even so he was still selectively affected by the hive mind anyways. But Holly and them just had to cough a little and the particles went out?

Wdym Will was being hurt by being connected to Vecna 0.2 seconds before he was killed, but killing him had no effect on Will at all ??

Wdym the only way to effect Vecna/the gate/etc was to use love instead of hate- and that’s even how Will got his powers two minutes ago. But in the final battle we just need to show up and have an ax or something ?

Wdym the particles still being in the world after the exorcism was and existential threat for two seasons, but we let the particles go up the radio tower and didn’t even spare it a glance ??

Wdym Hopper and Joyce knew Henry in high school and were even kind of friends with him, but they never said a word to Vecna when they actually met him ??

Wdym they were involved in a supernatural investigation related to Henry back in the day but then acted like this was all brand new information and Joyce was crazy in S1 ?

Wdym the playwrite had to take out big parts of the script so it wouldn’t spoil S5? What was there to spoil ??

Wdym you used tons of things as inspiration and as actual references in the show that had memory manipulation, unreality, fake endings, alternate timelines, time travel, etc etc and you had a villain ABLE TO DO THESE THINGS but just…. Didn’t.

Wdym one proximity based couple who was pressured to get together by outsiders and who had communication issues and lies and toxic jealousy was unhealthy, but the other was TWU WUV ?

Wdym a hallway crush is the same as a lifelong friendship that was “the best thing they ever did”?

Wdym we should analyze the show, but numbers and patterns and dates mean nothing ??

Wdym the characters had beliefs and plans for the final episode, and they all went exactly how they thought they would?

Wdym you got THEE Sarah Connor and you just had her play a cartoon villain?

Wdym the military just let them go and Max was able to graduate on time and Hopper was able to resume his job as chief?

Wdym the demogorgons and dogs and bats just stopped existing?

Wdym Vecna said the victims were all in his mind, but only Max actually was?

Wdym you gave Will powers and brought Kali back and maybe even hinted at Holly and then having the potential for powers, but then you barely used them in the Final Battle at all ??

Wdym we just let those pregnant women die ??

Wdym there was a traitor ??

Wdym the coming out took 12 hours to write yet had continuity errors and was longer than the final battle?

Wdym you had two setbacks that pushed production back by half a decade but you didn’t have the finale written as you were filming it ?? What were you doing all that time?

Wdym we revealed the tunnels, but the military didn’t bother checking them afterwords?

Wdym all those dick jokes were just random?

Wdym you are your brother and M marks the spot ? But then Mike does literally nothing at all ?

Wdym Papa suddenly became Van Gogh when he couldn’t even doodle a dog?

Wdym Papa created exotic matter and knew all about the upside down and Henry and everything, when they couldn’t even set foot inside the gate in S1 and the rest of the military thought everything was all El’s fault ?

Wdym the spores might be toxic or not?

Wdym we just left the one ring rock out in the desert for whoever else to find ?

Wdym Holly and them fuckass kids had more screen time than our already established characters?

Wdym Dr Owens and Argyle and Susie and Vickie just poofed into thin air?

Wdym this is a coming of age story and each season has gotten progressively darker and more mature, but the final season is 90% references to children’s books and fairy tales ? But also the “personification of childhood” has to die at the end.

Wdym this show is for outcasts and freaks but lol wouldn’t it be sooo cringe if a character got a mohawk ? Or *gasp* dyed their hair ?? Also we can suddenly become bffs with the jocks who hated us, BUT to be accepted and happy we have to move away or die or both(?) ?

Wdym you queerbaited in the year 2026 ?? In a show for outcasts ??

Wdym you had no intention behind any decision ?

[lune-moon-nuit]

What Mike would have said in episode 8 if the Duffers weren't such stupid cowards

"I have been trying to find the right words my whole life, Will. Or maybe I’ve been running from them. I’ve been trying to understand my feelings for as long as I can remember. Because the truth is, you were never just my best friend. You were always something more — something quieter, deeper, harder to name. You were the quiet center of my world, the place everything kept circling back to, no matter how hard I tried to escape its gravity. You were the constant in my life, the one presence that never faded, even when everything else fell apart.

When we were kids, I didn’t know what love was supposed to feel like. I thought it had to be loud, obvious, heroic. Something that looked like movies, like kisses, like saving the girl and winning the war. I thought it had to look a certain way to be real. I didn’t understand that love could live in silence — in shared looks, in unfinished sentences, in the way being near someone makes the world feel steadier. I didn’t know love could be this — steady as riding bikes side by side, unspoken but always there, like a hand hovering inches away, afraid to touch. You were the one who understood me without asking. The one who stayed when things got dark. The one who never asked me to be braver than I was, but somehow made me want to be. And that terrified me.

So I lied, not just to you, but to myself. I told myself that what I felt for you was just loyalty. History. Habit. I convinced myself that love had to look different, sound different, feel safer. That’s why I held onto Eleven. Not because I didn’t care, I did. But what I felt for her was something I could explain. Something the world had already given a name to. A love that didn’t ask me to question who I was, or what it meant that my heart beat faster when you were close.

With you, everything felt too close. Too intense. Too true. Too real. Too dangerous. And that scared me. So I pushed you away. This summer and in Lenora, when you needed me, I chose distance. I chose silence. I chose cruelty disguised as indifference, because it was easier than admitting that every time you looked at me, I felt seen in a way I didn’t know how to survive. Every time you were close, every time I looked at you, it became harder to pretend I didn’t know what my heart was trying to say.

So I told myself stories. I clung to something safer, something I could explain, something the world would accept without questions. I cared, yes. But deep down, I always knew it wasn’t the same. It didn’t shake me the way you did. It didn’t undo me. And because I was afraid of what loving you meant, I hurt you. I pulled away when you reached for me. I acted distant, sharp, careless — like if I made myself colder, I could freeze the truth inside me. I told myself I was protecting us, but really, I was protecting my fear. Fear of losing you. Fear of wanting you. Fear of what it would mean to love my best friend in a world that had already taught us, again and again, how cruel it could be to boys like you. I saw the way people looked at you, whispered about you, tried to break you down for being different. The names. The way the world tried to carve you into something smaller just to feel comfortable. And instead of keep standing beside you the way I should have, I hid, because I was terrified they would see me too. Terrified of what it would mean if they knew I loved my best friend.

But love doesn’t disappear just because you deny it. It waits. It aches. It remembers. It grows heavier with time. And now that you’ve finally spoken your truth — now that you’ve shown me who you are without hiding — I can’t keep lying anymore. Not to you. Not to myself. I don’t want to lose you because I was too afraid to be honest. I don’t want my silence to hurt you ever again. You were never a mistake in my life. You were the reason it mattered. You were the constant — the compass — the home I kept pretending I didn’t recognize. You were never something I needed to run from. You were home. You were the person who understood me when I didn’t understand myself. The one my heart always returned to, even when I tried to push it away.

If loving you means being afraid, then I’ll be afraid. If it means standing in a world that doesn’t always understand us, then I’ll stand anyway. If love is a choice, then I choose honesty. If love is courage, then I’m done being afraid. And if love is standing in front of the person who has always held your heart and finally saying it out loud…

Then hear me now.

I love you, Will Byers. Not despite the fear. But because loving you taught me what courage really is. Because losing you would be worse than any fear I’ve ever known. So this is me choosing the truth. This is me choosing you. I love you, Will. I think I always have."

[howtobecomeadragon]