Will Byers deserved better.

Stranger Things, you fumbled.

credit: pjposting on Pinterest

note: this post will include spoilers for Stranger Things.

I’ll just say it: I hated the final season of Stranger Things.

Having watched the show since its first season, I could not help but feel frustration at how the story was ultimately concluded. To put my very long list of grievances short, season five showed a blatant disregard for what had been established previously. After years of buildup towards this finale, we were given ten hours of television filled with plot holes and lazy cop-outs. It felt like a slap in the face to the people that have cared so much about this show for the past decade.

A major source of my disappointment in this final season stems from the handling of Will Byers as a character. In the previous seasons, Stranger Things—at least, in my opinion—handled Will’s struggles with his identity with the nuance and care that it required. The realization of his queer identity was not sudden, but rather a slow burn made up of small moments and details. We watch him navigate his queer identity throughout the show, coming to a head in season four. Season five presented a significant opportunity to expand on that journey, especially with how central Will’s understanding and acceptance of himself was to the final season’s plot.

And yet, the final season had its eyes closed when it came to taking advantage of that opportunity. The show treated Will’s sexuality superficially, dodging any chance to examine the emotional complexity of growing up as a queer person in 1980s Indiana. Scenes that could have given him depth were either minimized, awkward, illogical, or simply absent. By the end of the series, Will felt like a shell of the person we have come to know. It all boils down to one simple truth: the writers did not put in the effort required to portray a queer character with the honesty and respect he deserved.

And because of that, Will Byers as we know him suffered.

the coming out scene.

Upon my first watch of Will’s coming out scene, I did not necessarily hate it. I thought Will’s never-ending examples of the ways that he was similar to his friends—which people online took issue with—showed his desperation to remind them of why they liked him before opening up about his secret; he was still the Will that they knew and loved, but he just so happened to be gay. It also made me smile seeing him receive unwavering support, despite my disbelief that people in 1980s Indiana would be so quick to accept someone coming out as gay.

But now, let’s think about it for a second: in what world would Will come out in the way that he did? I understand that in the story, Will felt as though he had to come out when he did because he feared that Vecna would prey on that perceived weakness; Vecna relies on the weaknesses of the people he targets to maintain power over them, after all. Will felt that he needed to open up about his queerness so it could not be held against him later. I get all that, but why did he announce it in a way that felt like a press conference?

In an ideal world, one where the writers actually understand the character that they created, the coming out scene would have been Will coming out to Joyce and Mike, the two closest people to him since season one. Jonathan, Lucas, and Dustin being there would have also made sense given their strong bonds. Having Will first come out to the ones that he cares about most aligns with who he is as a person; most people tend to come out to the ones they trust before to the greater public, anyways.

Instead, the writers decided to have every single character in the room as Will spilled his heart. What type of logic went into that decision? Sure, Will may have felt like he needed to come out before the final battle, but did he seriously need to do it in front of everybody? Why would he not just pull aside the people that actually matter to him to open up about something he has been hiding for so long? Would the Will that we have known since season one really tell people like Murray, Steve, Nancy, and freaking Kali about his sexuality? This choice made no sense, and felt incredibly out of place for Will as a character.

The placement of the scene in the show felt awkward and jarring. Will comes out in the penultimate episode as the group prepares for their final battle against Vecna and the Mind Flayer. With so much on the line, the show spends an ungodly amount of time on this coming out scene. These characters are about to embark on the fight of their lives, but have to spend several minutes listening to Will emotionally ramble about his sexuality. The poor reception that this scene received does not shock me, as it felt shoved down our throats at such an odd moment.

My criticism of this scene does not equate to me not seeing the value of Will coming out. Will’s self-actualization is integral in season five, evidenced by how volume one ends. He can only harness Vecna’s power—which literally saves the lives of Mike, Lucas, Robin, Max, and Eleven—when he stops running from who he is, with Robin’s voiceover telling us that Will has all of the answers inside of himself. Will’s acceptance of his queerness plays a role in the eventual defeat of Vecna, and naturally includes him opening up about it to the people around him.

For the sake of the story, the writers should have placed Will’s coming out scene in the moments following the conclusion of volume one. Will’s emotional breakthrough at that point would have served as an ideal opportunity for him to open up about his queerness in a way that felt natural for his character. Rather than slamming the brakes on the narrative right before the final battle, Will’s coming out right after volume one could have been an intimate moment that felt earned.

Will’s coming out did not feel written for him, it felt written for a generic gay character. No real thought went into such a pivotal moment for him as a person, and therein lies the issue.

let’s talk about byler…

I would be lying if I said that I did not have my fingers crossed hoping that Byler—the romantic ship of Will and Mike—would be confirmed as I watched the final season. The many hints of Will and Mike’s mutual romantic feelings for each other throughout the show made me feel dangerously confident in my belief that Byler would be made canon; but, like many things with this season, I was let down.

I won’t only focus on the fact that Will and Mike remained platonic, but rather on how the show downplayed the story of a boy being in love with another boy.

Will’s feelings for Mike have been on display since the beginning. Will’s friendship with Mike differed significantly from his friendships with Dustin and Lucas; noticeably, the connection between Will and Mike is deeper in emotional intimacy and familiarity. Why do you think that Will only ever confided in Mike? Why do you think that Mike was the only friend Will screamed out for in moments of distress? Why do you think Mike was the only friend that Will could remember when overtaken by the Mind Flayer?

Will becomes noticeably and obviously jealous when Mike starts dating Eleven, creating a divide between them once Mike starts spending more of his time with Eleven. This cultivates into an argument where Will voices his desire for their friendship to be as strong as it used to be, and Mike saying “it’s not my fault you don’t like girls!” to Will; it looked as though Mike had stabbed him in the heart. No, he doesn’t like girls, Mike, he likes you so much and you can’t recognize it!

Season four makes Will’s feelings for Mike impossible to ignore. Will gifts Mike a painting that he claims Eleven commissioned, and essentially confesses his feelings for Mike under the guise of it being how Eleven feels. Eleven feels different, Eleven feels like a mistake, Eleven feels like she can be herself around Mike, Eleven needs Mike. Will had never been so honest about his feelings, but even still could not take ownership over them out of fear that he would lose his best friend.

the painting that Will gives to Mike in season four.

I recount all of this to say that Will’s feelings for Mike are not just a silly school crush. Will was in love with Mike. Whether you supported Byler or not, that fact cannot be debated.

My biggest hope for Byler in season five was for the truth of Will’s painting to be revealed to Mike. From Mike’s point of view, the painting was done by Will because Eleven asked him to. This painting serves as a symbol of Will’s love for Mike, and Mike learning that the painting (and, thereby, its message) came directly from Will would have sparked a much-needed discussion between them about Will’s feelings. Given the amount of time we spent watching Will love Mike, a conversation between them felt earned; not only for Will, but also for us as the audience.

Did we get that? No. Of course not.

The end of volume two buried any chance of Byler being canon six feet under. This alone did not upset me, but how it happened did. During his coming out, Will refers to Mike (not by name, just as a crush that he has) as his “Tammy”—a reference to an unrequited crush Robin told him about earlier in the season. Robin liked Tammy for her singing voice and hair, all from a distance. It very much was a typical school crush built on admiration from afar rather than direct interaction.

Equating Will’s deep, long-running love for his best friend to Robin’s experience with Tammy unsatisfyingly reduces something that had been central to his emotional arc for years to a crush that can be moved past with ease. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I could not imagine being in love with my best friend for years and getting over it as swiftly as the writers wanted Will to get over Mike.

Also, what is the greater message that is being conveyed here? That if you are a queer person, you should just give up any hope that your romantic feelings can be reciprocated? That you should only focus on loving yourself, because there is no way in hell that someone else will love you? That queer characters are not worthy of a love story like their straight counterparts?

Will learning that the only love that he truly needs is his own is not inherently bad writing—after all, this was the entire point of Robin telling Will about her crush on Tammy earlier in this season—but having what Will felt for Mike for most of his life undermined without any real closure is bad writing. But, just to keep this already lazy and rushed story moving, the writers decided this was the closure that Will was worth: a shitty one.

that’s how it ends?

Aptly coined as “the storyteller,” Mike lays out the ideal fates of our characters in the final scene: Dustin goes away to college, continuing to learn about the world around him; Lucas and Max stay together, finally having the movie night they had been wanting since season 4; Mike becomes a writer, making sense of the events he has lived through; and Will moves to a new city, meeting up with his, what I assume to be, boyfriend at a bar. All of these endings, while only imagined scenarios by Mike, showcase what the writers want for the characters they have spent years with.

I like the idea of Will leaving Hawkins, and actually don’t mind that his epilogue included a boyfriend. But, why does that make up his entire ending? Of course, Will feeling freer to be himself in a place outside of his hometown is a satisfying resolution on its own, but why is this achieved by giving him a random epilogue boyfriend and nothing else that will add value to his life? The result is an ending that conveys Will’s queerness as the most interesting thing about him, the single trait meant to define the rest of his story.

Following the finale’s release, someone online said that they wished that Will’s ending showed him at an art gallery, where he perhaps shares a look with a guy with the quiet implication that they may become something more. That is the ending that I would have loved for Will: one where he pursues a passion that we know means a lot to him, which we see in the endings of Mike and Dustin, with the subtle hint of him finding romantic love.

The writers extinguished the possibility of Byler on the grounds that Will did not need the love of another person because loving himself was paramount, so it’s almost laughable that the only concrete outcome he receives by the end is a boyfriend.

It is one thing to center a gay character’s ending around them achieving self-acceptance. It is another thing to conclude that character’s story by essentially saying, oh, they’re just gay, absent of their other traits and interests. Writing a coming out scene where Will emphasizes that his queerness represents only one part of who he is, just to end his story with him defined solely by being gay, ranks among the most insulting choices the show made.

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Stranger Things would not exist without Will Byers, and he deserved so much better from the writers that fundamentally misunderstood him when it mattered most.