#birthday gate

[bylerworld]

bro vecna found out he and will share a birthday and he was like Nope You Are Not Going To Have Peace Ever Again IT IS NOT A COINCIDENCE THAT THE EPISODE WHERE WILL'S BIRTHDAY WAS FORGOTTEN IS CALLED VECNA'S CURSE. BIRTHDAY GATE IS REAL.

[kaypeace21]

Mike & Will getting vecna-ed theory

I actually discussed this way before s4 premiered, here, but I wanted to re-explore this theory since we now have s4 and s5 part 1. Any movies mentioned in this analysis have been claimed to be inspiration by the ST writers .Significant inspirations for ST, that have been mentioned over and over again, are penny wise (from It) & Freddy Kreuger (from nightmare on elm street) . Like Vecna, they are monsters that make people see nightmares of their worst fears and traumas come to life. Vecna in s4 does this to all of his former victims.

In s5, we also see that Max & Holly are now trapped in Henry's dream-scape of memories . In Elm street 3 (cited by the st writers) a group of friends are trapped by Freddy Kreuger: and initially placed into separate dream-scapes, much like It:chapter 2. I believe once everyone goes in the upside-down , vecna may try to 'divide and conquer' by separating some of the team via illusions . He's already doing something similar with the kids/Max. . If vecna tries to mess with people’s minds - Kali/el will be important to combat that . In the Stranger things VR game vecna attempted to show the main boys their worst fears/traumas. So he may try something like that in s5 to various characters (not just Will & Mike) . There have been many other films cited by the ST writers that also have a similar premise of going into surreal dream-like memories . Maybe that's the metaphorical time travel: the characters going into Henry's mind and nightmarish memories (but also Henry going into their minds/memories as well)?

So how does this relate to Mike? In the recent movie adaption of IT , the creature OUTS a gay character's sexuality to the audience . And this character (played by Finn Wolfhard) was secretly in love with his childhood best friend, while he pretended to be straight prior to this. We even have pennywise cause a zombie boy to flirt with him . And pennywise mocks him saying he knows his "dirty little secret" and how he’s afraid of the “truth” getting out to everyone .Richie is also called a "fairy" by a boy he was playing video games with at the arcade (which connects to the "fairy" comment in s1) . Plus, byler who also went to the arcade: "what did you expect, that we'd never get girlfriends play games for the rest of our lives/we could just play nintendo and games for the rest of our lives"").

I think it's very possible Vena will impersonated Will to mess with Mike (similar to how vecna impersonated Billy, Max's mother , and Lucas to mess with Max psychologically). In the Stranger things VR game vecna attempted to go into Mike's mind and tell him he'd lose El (only to realize that’s not mike's biggest fear). And then the scene transitions to a d&d game table with RAINBOW dice hmmmm.

Frankly, it would make sense for vecna to target Mike since he’s the “leader” and “heart of the party”. Especially since he doesn't have any powers to defend himself. Getting to him would make the team " fall apart" theoretically. And vecna messing with Mike would be a good way to possible re-contextualize past memories / other scenes from the past as well ...such as the snowball.

But , I also see vecna shapeshifting into Mike to mess with Will too (similar to him impersonating Lucas- to hurt Max). Especially if in part 2 Will’s already kidnapped or being controlled by the hivemind.

We even see in s5 part 1 Vecna put in Will's mind , moments related to his heart break over mike as possible foreshadowing.

I think Vecna may try to exploit Will's insecurity over being possibly rejected by Mike due to what happens in IT:chapter 2. Ben/beverly have a lot of parallels to byler. Beverly was poor, an artist, had an ab*sive dad, and in the past was kidnapped by Pennywise so gained psychic abilities (aka same background as Will ). She ends up with Ben her childhood friend, but before that there's a misunderstanding. She thinks a love poem to her was not from Ben but another boy (so she initially dates him instead). And Ben doesn't initially tell her the truth.That sounds familiar: aka the painting lie that hasn't been addressed yet.

Pennywise (in IT) makes Ben see an illusion of Beverly rejecting his confession (before they get together irl). Fake-bev mocks him and states she'd never love him and only saw him as a friend. Fake-bev calls him "gross"(Will said love is “gross”) .And fake-bev says his poem for her is "stupid" (cough Will’s painting for Mike + love making you "crazy/stupid" and Will calling himself "stupid" after fighting with mike in s3). Ben has to remind himself that the real Beverly wouldn't be so cruel with her rejection... and it’s not the real Beverly .

Both Ben/Beverly get trapped in their own nightmares Pennywise causes. And they only break free initially because they hear each other’s voices on the other side. Since Mike has always broken Will from thinking of the ud in s2 and s3 via his voice …this wouldn't surprise me. It’s in character for Mike to help Will break from the UD's control:

Mike may be what breaks the illusion for Will. Or maybe if Will is being used as a weapon in the hive mind - Mike may help break Will free.

Or, it may be Will that helps Mike snap out of vecna’s control first as a role reversal , so Mike can then also rescue Will (aka they save each other). I only say this cause of what happens in ‘IT: chapter 2’. Ben when he thinks he's about to die in the hallucination, calls Bev's name says not to listen to the monster , and admits he loves her and wrote the poem : "my heart is... (cough "you're the heart"). This causes Bev to break through her hallucination and also save Ben from his hallucination in the process.

And of course they don't have any time to discuss this love confession cause they have to help save their friends from Pennywise right after this. HMMM...a gay gal can dream.

Finale be like: “I don’t know what’s on the other side of this"/ "and we kiss as though nothing could fall and the shame was on the other side" .

Also, I think Vecna causing nightmares is maybe how 'birthday gate' comes into play too.

We had in Bill & Ted’s bogus journey: Bill (another name for William) have to deal with a awful bday nightmare .

And Will’s bday was supposed to be in s4 but seemed to be forgotten. In s4, murray brought up a mother forgetting her kid's bday. And In s2 Joyce brought up Will’s birthday. Will in s2 also has a "sorry, I forget your birthday" card in his room. And in s2 Will even talks about the upsidedown with Mike : in front of a "happy birthday" mug. The s4 promotion also had the surfer boy van play happy birthday music. And apparently vecna’s birthday is also on the same day as Will’s? So vecna may bring up the forgotten birthday in s5, whether or not he caused others to forget Will’s bday .

Also there's definitely something weird with birthdays in general. We have a character named victor creel in ST (since xmen was reffed in ep 1 by Will , it may be a easteregg to victor creed). Victor Creed in xmen had a habit of traumatizing people on their birthdays. Which is reminiscent of Lonnie who forced Jonathan to hunt and kill a rabbit on his 10th birthday (which caused him to "cry for a week"). Lonnie did this to jonathan so he'd "be more of a man". Since Lonnie already called Will homophobic slurs -and Will is a proficient shooter. (Lonnie may have done similar things on Will's birthday as well ... to the point Will blocked out or forgot some birthday events in the past) . Maybe he doesn't even like celebrating his b-day because of it? jonathan even handed Will a stack of movies in s2 ( one was the twilight zone film: it also had a bday party with a bunny monster). And Bill & ted bogus adventure also has a dream seq where a character goes 10years into the past when he was a kid : and it involves a monster-bunny, and his little brother crying.

Argyle didn’t call Jonathan’s dad issues a “nightmare-cycle” for nothing… vecna may cause jonathan (or Will) to see a nightmare relating to their dad. It would also echo how Kali made El see papa in a hallucination and she screams "get out of my head!" films like: 'the cell' were about dream-scapes relating to traumatic memories of an ab*sive father. And before Ben broke beverly from her hallucination - the hallucination involved her abusive dad from the past too.

The fact Lonnie is mentioned every season verbally -makes me wonder if he may come back in s5 as a flashback or nightmare via vecna. Especially because Lonnie's actor posted THIS on his socials way back in the day...hmm.

Usually i'd say it's a coincidence but after Lucas' comments it's hard to say...

Alright thanks for listening , I’ll probably post a ‘part 2 theories post' before part 2 comes out on Christmas . Same with part 3 (the finale) :)

[just-the-gatekeeper]

Stranger Things Season 5 had 650+ hours of footage filmed.

The final edited run-time was 10.33 hours.

Footage used vs Footage shot =1:65

On a typical show it’s 1:10 -1:15

Intentional hint IMO through the doc!

I don’t care how many people tell me they were just wasteful with the cast/ crews time and they fumbled. No way!

The math isn’t mathing. The script for season 5 comes out July 14th 2026, which is HUGELY DELAYED compared to previous seasons.

Conformity Gate will be real to me until July 11th.

And anyone is welcome to call me nuts.

Also mike, def explored let’s be real. And technically, it did happen offscreen. For now.

“you will be deceived and you will like it.”

Make history duffer bros. 🫡 But also, fuck you Duffer bros.

[the-black-pharade]

and then they didn't

[thetheoryisalie]

On Nov 6th, 1987 Vecna will bait Will to power a wormhole that will enable Vecna to time travel to ---?

[Erica] "Wormholes are neat because they allow matter to travel between galaxies or dimensions without crossing the space between." - [Mr. Clarke] "Yes. Exactly right. Again. And, uh, just think of all the places mankind could go. Another galaxy. Another time, even."

Mr. Clarke's classes have in past seasons always been used to foreshadow events that would happen later in the series, like in S2 when he's teaching the party about viruses and how they respond to fear, which is then applied to a possessed Will and his aversion to heat. This year Mr- Clarke is teaching his class about Wormholes, and specifically mentions them enabling time travel.

On the board, we see that there will be a test on this topic on Monday, November 6th.

Holly Wheeler is kidnapped on the evening of November 3rd. The following night (November 4th), Vecna attempts to kidnap Derek and succeeds in kidnapping 3 other children. On the evening of November 5th, he kidnaps the remaining 7 and Derek, and Will awakens his powers.

12 children on spires in the shape of a wormhole, 12 numbers on a clock. Wormholes can enable travel between dimensions and time.

It's important to note that there appears to be a 13th spire in the middle of the cave that Vecna has imprisoned the children in, which Will is standing right in front of in the picture above. I believe that this is foreshadowing that either Will or Vecna will be attached to that spire at some point. If it is Vecna, then the purpose of that spire is likely to be the actual wormhole and transport Vecna to another time, if Will is attached to the spire, it's likely as a power source to fuel the wormhole. The reason it's unclear whether it's Will or Vecna that is the one that will be attached to the spire is because of Mike's comment about how Will is like Vecna:

This means that when Will is standing in front of that painting of the cave, he could be used as a sort of substitute for Vecna.

Regardless, it's clear that Vecna's goal is to travel to another time, and the fact that it gets activated on November 6th seems to be important, since that is the day Vecna is building this up to and the day Will will likely be attached to the wormhole as well. However, I don't think Will will be kidnapped again like the other children. I think it's much more likely that Vecna has already started luring Will there, and Will will go in an attempt to rescue Holly and the other children, unaware that this was Vecna's plan all along.

Vecna is clearly aware of Will's ability to Spy on him and the Demogorgons. He also seems to be aware of Will's 'potential' abilities going by how Vecna tells Will that Will showed him what he could achieve, and this doesn't make much sense if it only refers to Vecna's ability to spy through those he curses because Will is not the first person he has ever attempted to kill through his curse. As a matter of fact, he's never tried to kill Will through the curse, so Will wouldn't bring him any insight on how that works.

In season 2, the MF has Will tell Owens and the soldiers that there is an important place in the tunnels that the MF didn't want him to see. Because of this, many of the soldiers head there only to discover that this was a trap and then get eaten by Demodogs. The same thing is being set up for Will and the wormhole cave.

These two sets of dialog are so eerily similar to each other, it's not even funny:

S2: [Will] "That's it." [Dr. Owens] "That's what? What... what's there, Will?" [Will] "I don't know. I just know he doesn't want me to see there. I think it's important." -------------------------------------------------------------------------- S5: [Joyce:] "What is it?" [Will] "I don't know, but I could feel it's important to him. [Derek] "To Mr... Whatsit?" [Will] "His real name is Henry. [Robin] "AKA Vecna." [Erica] "AKA One." [Derek] "That's too many names." [Erica] "Why won't you just zip it and listen, dipshit?" [Will] "I had this feeling he didn't want me there. I wasn't supposed to see it."

Except in this case, Will will be going to the wormhole-cave to try and rescue Holly and the other children, only to discover that it was a trap that Vecna lured him into so that he could use Will as a power source for his wormhole.

There is also the fact that Will seems to be just fine out in the cold again:

Just like when he was a spy for the Mind Flayer.

Note: I don't think Will is actually possessed by Vecna like he was in s2 by the MF, as this wouldn't explain why the Demogorgon only knows where the shed is once Derek is awake. However, Will seems to be able to feel when Vecna activates his powers, and this seems to also trigger his powers activating and enables him to look through the eyes of the Demogorgons. In the same way, I think Vecna would be able to feel Will using his powers (whether he's conscious of it or not), which is how he knows about them in the first place.

And I believe Vecna will succeed in creating the wormhole, which would explain this scene from the Official Trailer for volume 1:

And this follow up scene from the Volume 2 Trailer where you can see the UD actively melting:

This isn't something that's been happening for a long time, we can see in these two clips (which are chronologically directly after each other, you can clearly see this in the vol 2 trailer) that the UD has only just started melting, and rapidly at that.

This might also lead into these scenes, although the second one conveniently cuts off right before we can see what happens to the UD wall:

I think this could very well be the UD turning into the wormhole, allowing Vecna to travel to another time. However, even if Vecna initially succeeds with creating the wormhole, I don't believe he will actually be able to use it, or is at least is interrupted while using it.

The Einstein–Rosen bridge ('Wormhole') was discovered by Ludwig Flamm in 1916, a few months after Schwarzschild published his solution, and was rediscovered by Albert Einstein and his colleague Nathan Rosen, who published their result in 1935. In 1962, John Archibald Wheeler and Robert W. Fuller published a paper showing that this type of wormhole is unstable if it connects two parts of the same universe, and that it will pinch off too quickly for light (or any particle moving slower than light) that falls in from one exterior region to make it to the other exterior region. (wikipedia)

[Mr. Clarke] "Einstein-Rosen bridges, more commonly known as wormholes, [...]"

It's interesting that Mr. Clarke makes specific mention of talking about Eintein-Rosen bridges, which have been shown to be unstable when connecting two parts of the same universe by John Archibald Wheeler. This hints at one of the Wheelers being the reason for destabilising the wormhole, and preventing Vecna from completing his plans. Karen and Ted are obviously out of the picture, and Nancy seems very unlikely, therefor I think this will either be Mike by appealing to Will then Will being able to take control over the wormhole, since he has the same powers as Vecna and should therefor theoretically be able to do so, or Holly by somehow connecting both ends of the wormhole to the same dimension (or time) as this is the power Mike describes Holly the Heroic to have in ep 1.

I think it's much more likely for this to be Mike, since we have already gotten hints at Holly using her power, but only in memories, i.e. her imagination.

We can see that she's with Max in this scene in her outfit that she has been wearing in the Creel house in Vecna's memories, so I think it's unlikely that she actually has any powers in the real world that could do this, she only has them when she's in a memory and can use her imagination to go to another memory.

However, what I could see happening is the following:

There might be a reason Vecna needs Will, someone with his same powers from the MF, to open and power the wormhole in the first place. Theoretically, if Will and Vecna's powers are identical, Vecna should have no use for him. But, Einstein-Rosen bridges specifically destabilise when connected to the same dimension at both ends. We know that Henry doesn't actually want to go to another dimension, he wants to go back in time. In this case, we would need to assume that they changed the way wormholes work in the show from how they would theoretically work in the real world, in the sense that instead of destabilising when connected to the same dimension twice, they destabalise when connecting to the memories of the same person twice. What I mean by that is: If Vecna were to be the one on the 13th spire, he would be the one powering the wormhole and therefor it would be connected at the starting end to Vecna's memories, and the destination would also be his memories, therefor the wormhole would destabilise. So Vecna needs Will, someone who now has his same powers, to be the starting point so that the wormhole is not connected to the memories of the same person twice, and remains stable. If that is the case, I could see Holly somehow accidentally affecting this while she and Max try to escape Vecna's mind, and that would end up destabalising the wormhole.

But I think it would be much more fun and logical to have Mike reach out to Will while Will is (involuntarily) powering the Wormhole and be able to bring him back to his senses, much like when Will is possessed by the MF in season 2. Will could then change the destination of the wormhole, or stop it from fully forming in the first place.

In short: Vecna kidnaps 12 children during the nights of November 3rd, 4th and 5th, in order to open a wormhole on November 6th. To power this wormhole he is luring Will into the UD and to the wormhole-cave by deceiving him. Vecna shows Will the cave and lets Will feel as though this place is of importance and that Vecna did not want him to have this information. However, Mike will be able to stop Vecna's plan from succeeding by appealing to Will, who is then able to take control over the wormhole, and stop it from going...where, exactly?

Honestly, this part remains a complete mystery to me. There are several key dates within the show (and the play) that Vecna might want to travel back to, however I cannot settle on which I find the most plausible.

1) November 6th, 1959 / the day Henry killed his sister and parents We have several conflicting sources on when Vecna actually kills his parents. In season 4 ep 3 we see 2 news paper articles discussing the murders, one from (presumably) Thursday, March 14th 1959 and one from March 26th 1959. The article from March 14th dates the murders to the previous Saturday, March 11th 1959.

However, according to Stranger Things Wiki, TFS dates the Creels moving into Hawkins to October 1959. Season 5 seems to support this, we can see that Joyce's play (which Henry acts in) will be performed on November 6th, 1959, and I doubt she would already be distributing Flyers for the play in early March

Obviously November 6th is also the date El opens the portal to the UD and Will goes missing in 1983.

2) March 22nd, 1979 / Will's 8th Birthday as mentioned by @greenfiend in this post, 1979 seems to be a year in which a lot of things change and are forgotten about. Most notably it is the year in which every member of the party turns 8, which is especially significant for Will. In s5 Joyce says that Will was 11 when he went missing in 1983, even though he was 12 at the time.

Obviously, Will's birthday also seems to be forgotten about by everyone, including Will, in season 4.

-> March 22nd, either 1979 or 1986 could also be the memory Will ends up going to instead if he takes control of the wormhole and changes its destination.

3) September 8th, 1979 / the day El first banishes Henry to Dimension X The timeline from the Stranger Things Wiki dates Henry's banishment to September 8th, though I could not find the precise moment this is shown in the show myself. I did find a previous recording that Dr. Brenner has El watch that is dated to September 5th, so this seems plausible.

4) The day Henry Creel is possessed by the Mind Flayer, 1953 (Stranger Things Wiki) As far as I'm aware, we do not know the exact date when Henry is first transported to Dimension X and then possessed by the Mind Flayer. If it's the same date as any of the other dates I have mentioned so far, that would obviously be another reason for Vecna to travel back to that date.

5) The Future Since we're talking about time travel here, the future is obviously a possibility, but I think it's very unlikely because it would be very out of the blue and there isn't really any future event that's been mentioned that could be important enough for Vecna to travel to.

...But why?

What is Vecna's reason for wanting to time-travel in the first place?

I think, while depending on what date Vecna will end up trying to travel to will certainly be related to his reasoning, no matter what, one reason will be getting out of the control of the MF

[Dustin] "How did Watergate open up? Only two gates have opened, so far as we know. One by El, one by the commies. But it's not the commies or El this time, so it... Holy shit. Wait, wait, wait, wait." [Lucas] "Wait, wait, wait, what?" [Dustin] "There's one thing we've never understood. Which is why Vecna's killing people. What's his motive? Killing teens? It always just seemed too random. Too prosaic. On top of that, how does the Mind Flayer figure into all this? Maybe this is it. This is the answer." [Lucas] "WHAT is the answer? [Dustin] "Okay, just hear me out. How did El open the Mothergate?" [Lucas] "She contacted the Demogorgon." [Dustin] "With psychic contact. Just like..." [Lucas] "Vecna when he casts his spells." [Dustin] "Exactly. So, what if, with each kill, he's not simply killing them, he's making a powerful psychic connection with his victims? A connection powerful enough to rip a hole in the fabric of time and space." [Lucas] "He's opening more gates." [Dustin] "Bingo. Why would he be opening gates?" [Lucas] "To take over the world." [Dustin] "Who do we know that wants to take over the world?" [Lucas] "The Mind Flayer." [Dustin] "So if the Demogorgon was just his foot soldier, Vecna's his five-star general. A five-star general with the power to open gates." [Lucas & Dustin] "Holy shit."

Aside from this, TFS also confirms that the Mind Flayer is the one actually pulling the strings, not Vecna. At this moment, we don't know how much consciousness/control Vecna actually has over what he's doing, but if he has any at all, I think it's very likely that, regardless of how evil he actually is un-possessed, he doesn't like being under the control of the Mind Flayer and wants to get out.

Scenes from vol 1 and the trailers that could also be related to the wormhole:

1)

Derek looking at a Tesseract-like structure. This structure represents the fourth dimension, which is the expansion of our 3 dimensional world by time. Dimension 1: length (e.g. a line), Dimension 2: width (e.g. a square), Dimension 3: hight (e.g. dice), and Dimension 4: time

(wikipedia)

2)

From the Teaser, potentially a scene where Will is being trapped/already trapped by Vecna and being used as a power source for the Wormhole, In combination with these lines from Vecna which were used in the Official Trailer out of context:

[Vecna] "William, you are going to help me... One last time."

3)

[Dustin] "This whole time, everything we've ever assumed about the Upside Down has been dead wrong."

Possibly referring to how, until now, we've (and the Party) assumed that the Upside Down is it's own dimension that is frozen in time, but it is actually instead a connecting dimension between Dimension X and the Rightside Up, that can function as a wormhole to enable time travel.

4)

This scene from the Official Trailer of a person falling somewhere through something, potentially Will or Vecna using the Wormhole, though I think it's more likely to be Will since I don't think Vecna will actually fully succeed with his plan. They also seem to be flailing and I cannot imagine Vecna doing that.

5)

These scenes from the Volume 2 Trailer, in which the Upside Down seems to be getting destroyed.

Particularly that 3rd one is interesting, because it seems to be what happens before the person falls through the sky (?), and might be the wormhole opening.

[dnlrrr]

do you remember?

Since Birthday Gate is once again a hot topic (and since I am a huge birthday gate truther), I wanted to collect as much various easter eggs as I can remember related to it in one post! Most of them are from s4 and post-s4, right when this topic started to spread, but there are several ones even earlier then that!

Yes, they said it was just a production mistake blah-blah-blah (and yet they denied any changes to the plot and this birthday date!), but we have already seen a clear example of a lie, when something was noticed by the audience ahead of time :)

So

The first one's reply date is March, 24, 2020, which is before the s4 premiere. Second post is dated March, 22nd, posted a year after s4 premiere.

"Some friends forget birthdays, it happens".

"...but I can't remember".

s4 ep1 - crossword, "Your Birthday"

s4 ep2 - “The last dragon” movie poster, release date is March 22nd.

s4 ep4 - Murray speech

"A one-year-old's birthday party, because who cares? Little idiot's not gonna remember it".

s4 ep2 - Rink-O-Mania random birthday party, it takes place on March 22nd

s4 ep6 - Dustin's birthday mention

s3 ep8 - "Sixteen candles" movie poster, which plot is about a forgotten birthday

“Stranger Things: Season 3 | Title Tease [HD] | Netflix” video fragment

s5 ep3 - inconsistency in Will's age at the time of his disappearance

s5 ep1 - Karen and Ted argument

"Do you even know how old your daughter is?"

s5 ep2 - colored balloons

s5 ep3 - colorful birthday candles print

s2 ep2 - "Crazy together" scene, "Happy birthday" print

everyone's favorite "I forgot your birthday" postcard, covered by "Will the Wise" drawing

Will's birthday turns out to be clearly forgotten in s4 ep2 (Rink-O-Mania incident), while this episode is called "Vecna's Curse".

That's definitely still not everything, but enough to be sure.

Could they actually just simply forgot Will’s birthday date with all these imagery somehow included in the series and his birthday date being mentioned in the show?

well

[z0mbiegirlx]

"I don't think the duffers did it on purpose" MY ASS

"I'm sorry I forgot your birthday"

[gorgo01]

Well, lol, birthdaygate didn't happen, just like I thought.

The only thing is, I expected nothing at all, but it turned out way more interesting.

photo from @nightnut

This time, Will got congratulated by the kid actors (Luke Kokotek and Miles Martaller), which hits even harder on the whole Conformitygate situation. Remember the theory about how Will gets forgotten even in real life?

Yeah, exactly.

And honestly, that carries a special kind of symbolism. The whole "forgetting" the birthday thing started back in season 2, basically foreshadowing what happened in season 4, then season 5, and now in real life (remember the poster: "We forgot your birthday").

Luke and Miles are literally the personification of memories (they literally played in the flashback scenes). In season 2, Joyce makes a big deal out of Will's birthday (the kid actor's mom also reminded everyone about the birthday). That's a memory. What happened before gets forgotten, but it still remains.

And we remember this, unlike the characters themselves. (sorry if the translation isn't accurate)