wheeler apologist

gio | she/her | 21 | brazilian | strkeydrew on tt

[sarhcameron]

it's not like i never imagined the possibility of eleven dying in the end, i just thought the duffers wouldn't be so cowardly and disgusting as to do that. they took everything they could from her, used her popularity to draw everyone's attention for years, and then gave her the saddest, most unfair, poorly written ending in the show. that's not "wanting it to be realistic". not when the show has demogorgons, an upside down, and literally resurrected other characters (and, oh, they used eleven again for that). it's just a coward, uncreative, and absolutely disgusting choice.

and let me just say, the disrespect towards her started long before they gave her that ending and it continued even after that. it began when she, the main character, was sidelined in the final season of her own show. they didn't just "reduce the focus on her to give space to other characters", they erased her. and then, after they finished her story, they went on to disrespect her even further by showing how everyone (except mike) simply moved on with their lives as if she had never existed. no memorial. barely any mentions. they just graduated, moved out, or built new families like nothing had happened. like she was no one.

in the end, it’s just sad, cowardly, and profoundly disrespectful — not only to eleven, but to everything her story meant.

[sarhcameron]

nancy wheeler is kind of the best character of all time.

[sarhcameron]

“life has been so unfair to you. your childhood was taken from you. you’ve been attacked, manipulated by terrible people, but you never let it break you."

[sarhcameron]

i saw someone say something i couldn’t agree more with: one of the biggest issues of volume 2 — if not the biggest — is how overwhelmingly expository it is. stranger things has always relied on exposition, especially as a sci-fi show with complex mythology and a very broad audience. but in these three episodes, the amount of information delivered in such a short time becomes excessive.

these episodes are far less action-driven than the first four and are almost entirely focused on explaining the past, the present, and events that happened off-screen but now affect the story. while this kind of explanation is necessary, and often unavoidable, dedicating three consecutive episodes to constant exposition seriously hurts the pacing. so much time is spent explaining everything that there’s little room left to actually develop what’s happening in the present.

the story does move forward, but very slowly, considering it’s spread across three episodes. the present narrative feels almost paused, especially when compared to the momentum of the first four episodes and the final stretch of the season. as a result, one of the show’s greatest strengths since season one — character development — takes a hit. several characters feel stagnant, sidelined, or barely present, and relationships that usually drive the emotional core of the series are left underdeveloped.

because the show needs to explain so much, it sacrifices depth elsewhere. and while the exposition itself isn’t the problem, the sheer amount of it, and how much space it occupies, ends up being one of the most damaging choices of the season.

[anya-chalotra]

#the duffers finally remembered steve isn't just a pretty face

[sarhcameron]

jonathan confessed that he doesn't like reading nancy’s work and donated her sweater without her permission simply because he doesn’t like pink, but somehow steve is the one people say isn't mature enough to be in a relationship with nancy

[sarhcameron]

just dustin and his divorced parents

[sarhcameron]

friendly reminder that mike is not a bad person or a poorly written character for not reciprocating will's feelings.

from the beginning it was made clear that this storyline was about will and only about him. it was about will discovering and accepting himself. it was about him realizing that his feelings for mike, while genuine, were only a small part of everything this moment meant to him. with robin's help, he not only understood what he felt but also began to understand that regardless of how the other person feels, whether the feeling is mutual or not, it's important that he loves and accepts himself enough so that he is never dependent on another person's validation to believe in himself.

y'all can ship and root for whoever you want but the fact is that both the show and the duffers made it very clear that it was never about mike. he was just a very small part of it, someone who'd help will to get where he needed to, even in a hard way. so no, mike is not bad for not reciprocating someone's feeling when he never, not even once, nurtured those feelings himself — and this was clear even to robin after she saw a single interaction between them. mike isn't a comfort prize for will or anyone else simply because they have been through a lot. he gets to choose who he wants to be with and it does not make him a bad or a selfish person.

stop making will's journey of discovery and acceptance about anyone other than himself. stop seeing it as "successful" only when the other person reciprocates the feelings. if will finally beggining to understand that he's enough and his family accepting and loving him no matter what isn't a beautiful, cohesive, and real way to write this storyline, i honestly don't know what is.

[sarhcameron]

they would love to meet each other

[sarhcameron]

there's something about mike and lucas stepping up to protect those kids that is so special to me.

it hits differently because we remember who they used to be. they were the children no one protected. they were the ones who had to face monsters alone, who had to keep each other alive because the adults around them either didn’t understand what was happening or made things worse, and in the middle of all that, they lost their innocence, their childhood.

that’s why seeing them step in front of those kids hits so hard. they know exactly what that fear feels like — the panic, the helplessness, the overwhelming sense that the world is too big and too cruel. and now that they’re older and finally capable, they’re doing everything they can to keep these kids from experiencing what they did.

[sarhcameron]

i honestly don't get why people act like stancy is the worst thing in the world. you'd think steve kidnapped her whole family or something when he's just... a man who yearns

[sobadbad]

Natalia Dyer as Nancy Wheeler STRANGER THINGS 5 vol.1

[sarhcameron]

i don’t think mike’s lack of reaction when he found out his parents were hurt and his sister was missing can be reduced to “he doesn’t know how to express his feelings.” for me, it goes way deeper than that and it reflects the environment he grew up in.

on paper, the wheelers have the classic suburban “stable” family: married parents, financial security, a house that looks perfect from the outside. but emotionally, they’ve always been deeply dysfunctional. ted is physically present but completely absent in every other way — the kind of father who doesn’t know his kids’ ages, who’s never really involved in their lives, and who doesn’t offer any emotional model for them to follow. karen tries, and she is involved, but she’s also carrying the weight of keeping a broken marriage standing while raising three kids at completely different stages of life. that alone creates a silent pressure inside the household.

i feel like growing up watching that — a marriage that feels heavy, parents who are distant, a mother who has to overcompensate for everything — shaped mike (and nancy) in ways the show never fully spells out but constantly implies. they didn’t grow up seeing healthy emotional expression. they didn’t grow up seeing adults deal with fear, conflict, or vulnerability in a real, open way. so how would they magically know how to do it themselves?

i also think both nancy and mike ended up taking on responsibilities way too early. nancy as the oldest daughter, always having to be the responsible one. and mike, even as the middle child, still stepping into that “man of the house” role because ted never filled it. there’s a hardness there, a toughness they shouldn’t have had to develop as kids, and it shows.

so when mike hears that his parents are hurt and holly is missing, i don’t think the flat reaction means he doesn’t care. i think it’s the opposite. he cares so much that he does what he’s been conditioned to do since childhood: shut it down, stay functional, be “strong,” keep moving. he learned early on that emotions don’t change anything in that house, so he grew up acting like feelings are something he needs to swallow, not express. that’s why, even now, he struggles so much. he doesn’t know how to be vulnerable. he doesn’t know how to show what he feels. his instinct is always to hold it together — even when he’s breaking.

[sarhcameron]

mike wheeler and lucas sinclair the blueprint of loverboys

[sarhcameron]

so let me get this straight... jonathan only asked murray to get a ring so he could propose to nancy because he saw things stagnating and steve making his move? yeah well that's NOT a good reason to marry someone lol

[sarhcameron]

when you're mean to eleven and mike this is who you're being mean with btw

[sarhcameron]

and when eleven, kali and will team up to kill vecna for good then what? how am i supposed to go on with my life after that?