Season 5 Volume 2: A Lesson I Should Have Learned the First Time
It's genuinely mind-boggling to me that at the end of the day, the Duffer brothers believe they actually pulled off the best queer representation of the millenium and are sitting there patting themselves on the back when all they've actually done is reinforce the same rep we had 20 years ago that's completely worn out its welcome. But I guess I gave two middle aged straight people too much credit when all they were actually doing was projecting their failed youth romances onto a gay kid and then having a gay actor relive playing that experience for... fucking what, exactly?
How was any of this a payoff? "Will is accepted by everyone." Yeah. He was tormented into telling a full house of people, in the 80s, that he's gay, forced to perform a straight up humiliation ritual in front of God and everyone because the villain might use his secrets against him, but god FORBID that ANY OF US had thought our main character who - quite frankly got sidelined AGAIN imo in volume 2 - could have more than that. And no, this is not about fucking "consolation prizes" or whatever the fuck, this is about having the same rhetoric force-fed down queer people's throats for years never to expect more than that because the life of a queer person is, by default, a lonely one. Thanks for teaching everyone you'll never get lucky to be loved back by the person you've loved your whole life. And no, for the last fucking time, it wasn't just a little crush. I don't know HOW you could actually sit up there and write a character to be so clearly and deeply in love with another character only to reduce it to "just a crush" at the last second of the season because you can't bear to give queer people more than the same tired shit we've seen over and over. This is not even about a ship war, you absolute fucking troglodytes. It's about queer people getting more than the bare minimum and once AGAIN being stuck watching the pure, innocent, apparently dumb hope we had of good representation of that turn to utter horror as we were forced to watch that slip through our fingers yet again. You had the opportunity to write something ACTUALLY moving, you had all the cards set up, and you fucking blew it. Now all this show will only be is a reminder of what could have been the greatest queer love story of all time, of people who were not afraid to actually shine a light into the darkness of homophobia and those who don't understand us, and now all you've done is pulled the wool over thousands of queer people's eyes.
And hey, we're not done, because what the fuck was the point of any of it? You literally started making people in the GA who never would've considered it before ship Byler, you turned some Milevens into Bylers, you ruined Mileven to the point that I feel bad for them, and you did all that for fucking what? Your self insert character is currently now nothing more than that, and he's even MORE of a background character at this point than he's EVER been. It's been 3 seasons without seeing his perspective on ANYTHING and all we can do is make guesses based on what Finn Wolfhard is doing with his face. I feel bad for Finn too, it's no wonder he can't even talk about his character in interviews because you actually gave him nothing to work with.
And the worst part is, because Mike's feelings about anything are so fucking ambiguous, you actually HAVE convinced us to sit all the way through to the finale for some stupid, stupid hope we'll actually understand him once and for all. You guys are cowards. Complete and utter cowards. And even if Byler is still endgame in the finale, it's too late to take back your cowardice on the matter. We don't need to be plot twists. You don't need to push that to the finale. But I guess your Coke product placements were more important than your story, and that bullshit is exactly WHY you should never have become product placement central in the first place. The companies you're selling out to are the ones who don't want us to exist in the first place. That, or they expect the bare minimum out of you in return for their investment. And you gave into every single one of them. Thanks for your message "we can't have good queer rep and keep our sponsorships and we need money more than to stand up for the people we claimed in the past we stood up for". The messages that "you will suffer relentlessly with being in love with someone and unfortunately most of the time it's not going to work out for you" so fuck hope. Fuck hope.
So now that you've royally pissed off every sector of your fanbase, what's next? You've left a bad taste in my mouth and I honestly could barely care to find out. But rest assured, you've already secured for me that I'm never going to watch anything you guys make ever again whether Byler is endgame or not. Good fucking job.
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