Here are some things to expect from season one stranger things: Lots of ’80s pop culture callbacks, Eleven Ex Machina is using her telekinetic powers to save the day, and Will Byers is going through it. Sadly, Will never found peace on this show. It’s his disappearance at the beginning of Season 1 – snatched by a Demogorgon and trapped in the Upside Down – that started everything. like doug hangoverWill is less a character than a plot device in Season 1, and even after being saved, he vomits an inter-dimensional slug in the closing moments of the finale. You hate to see it.
The following years bring a litany of traumas for Will: being possessed by the Mind Flayer in Season 2, finding his friends care more about girls than Dungeons & Dragons campaigns in Season 3, and harboring unrequited romantic feelings for Mike Wheeler in Season 4. During all this time, he still has some kind of connection with the Upside Down. On the one hand, it’s heartbreaking that Season 4 ends with a familiar shiver down Will’s spine as he returns to Hawkins, Indiana. On the other hand, is anyone surprised?
hoping that stranger things‘The fifth and final season makes Will look easy, it’s a fool’s errand. Sure, we open with a flashback to Will’s terrible, terrible, no good, very bad time in the Upside Down. In an interesting twist, Will isn’t just attacked by a Demogorgon and knocked unconscious: he’s brought to Vecna, who forces one of his limbs down the poor kid’s throat. As a tone-setter for Season 5, it’s an effective way to underline that everything that happened in Hawkins can be traced back to the unfortunate kidnapping of Will – a boy who disappeared and never came home.
In the present day, the Byers family now lives with the Wheelers, as a result of living in Hawkins when the town was placed under military quarantine. Vecna has yet to reemerge when Will begins experiencing strange visions. Will believes that his connection to the Upside Down becomes stronger the closer he gets to Vecna, which also explains why he had no episodes in Season 4 when his family moved to California. Those fears are realized when Will not only witnesses a Demogorgon kidnap little Holly Wheeler, but sees everything happening through the monster’s eyes. As Robin Buckley theorizes, Will is basically a human radio receiver that can tap into frequencies from the Upside Down, where every creature is part of a hivemind under Vecna’s control.
That Will is intrinsically linked to the Upside Down is heartbreaking – it’s a powerful metaphor for the ways in which trauma can persist throughout one’s life. Will is further isolated as no other characters are able to connect with his experiences, and, except for Jonathan Byers, no one seems to be aware that he is struggling with his sexuality. Thankfully, Will doesn’t just help move the plot forward in Season 5: He’s coming out of his shell, making some meaningful new connections.
every season of stranger things Likes to put together new characters; This time, Will and Robin will share some screen time. Ultimately, it’s a no-brainer that creators Matt and Ross Duffer will pair Will with Robin – someone who has accepted his queer identity, but in Ronald Reagan’s America, he still has to keep it under lock and key. When Robin visits his new flame, Vicki – who works as a candy striper at Hawkins Memorial Hospital – inadvertently witnesses the pair kissing before fleeing the scene. Later, Robin talks to Will about what he saw, and wonders how he knew that Vicki was also gay. She explains that she picked up on subtle cues: a brushing of knees, a bump of elbows, a shared glance. “It all kind of accumulated, like a snowball rolling down a hill, until it became clear,” says Robin. “Let’s say, uh, the snowball becomes an avalanche.”
Robin realizes that Will is trying to say the quiet part out loud by asking this question. And after watching her interact with Mike – as he’s looking for the same signs she learned from Vicki – Robin knows she’s on the same path she once walked, living her truth before she gave voice to it. In one of the best moments of the season so far, Robin tells Will what it was like when she found out about her sexuality and how her feelings for someone else were never as important as learning to be comfortable in her own skin. “I was looking for answers in someone else, but I had all the answers,” she says. “I just needed to stop being so afraid. Afraid of who I really am. Once I did that, I felt so free, like I could fly.”
Will finding this support system is a much-needed victory for a character who has been through so much, but as soon as our heroes get wind of Vecna’s plan – kidnapping a handful of children by posing as friends instead of enemies – you can’t help but worry. stranger things Will come full circle. If Will was Vecna’s first victim, then perhaps he was destined to become a pawn in the villain’s game. Nevertheless, Will and company come up with an inventive idea to rescue the Hawkins children, who were cornered by the military after Holly’s disappearance: take them quietly through a tunnel under the base and smuggle them to the quarantine area in Murray Bauman’s delivery truck. (It’s like a perfect version of the Pizzagate conspiracy.)
Naturally, things don’t go according to plan. The army captures them, and to add to everyone’s misery, Vesna enters the playground. Vecna and his Demogorgon army barely broke a sweat, wiping out the soldiers and bringing the children back to the Upside Down. Then comes the fateful reunion: Vecna pulls Will over to her side, explaining that she is taking the children to enhance her powers because they are weak and easily manipulated. Vecna tells him, “You were the first, and you broke so easily.” “Some minds, it turns out, aren’t just in this world: They’re in mine.” Vecna returns to the Upside Down, leaving the Demogorgons to eliminate Mike, Robin, and Lucas Sinclair.
This sequence is reminiscent of Vecna’s attack on Max Mayfield in Season 4: he is the victim of her trauma, leaving her feeling less than. But just as Max uses the memories of their friendship to break free from Vecna’s grip – with the help of Kate Bush – Will recalls the formative moments of his youth: meeting Mike, drawing pictures for his mother, building Castle Byers with his brother. Then, just as the Demogorgon is ready to deliver the fatal blow, he is stopped in his tracks. Will wields heretofore unseen telekinetic powers, and he’s not just Eleven’s psychic peer. When he breaks the limbs and necks of the Demogorgons, it becomes clear that his abilities are heavily coded.
First of all: yes! Second, the sudden development of Will brings with it many questions: Are these powers innate? Did his time in the Upside Down benefit him? Is he completely in control, or was he able to reach them only because his friends were in mortal danger? We always assumed Eleven would defeat Vecna, just as she has been the last defense against the demons of the Upside Down at the end of every season. But this development of Will makes me wonder if he is Hawkins’s ultimate protector. One of the nicknames acquired by Will in the series was The Boy Who Came Back to Life, which is an echo of Harry Potter’s nickname, The Boy Who Lived. If the Harry Potter parallels go further than that, he’s probably the only one who can stop Vecna.
In any event, it’s an exciting development for the previous part. stranger things‘The final season. Will has long been the poster child for many of the show’s difficult themes: how trauma lives on in the shadows, the loss of innocence, and the fear of being misunderstood. Through all this adversity, Will’s story always felt like it was going to end in tragedy. But after watching him save his friends and unlock the powers within himself, I realized that maybe I had it all wrong. Will Byers is not the boy who came back to life – he is the boy who learned to fight for life.
Miles writes about television, film, and anything else that interests your dad. He lives in Brooklyn.
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