they need to start making testosterone you can apply as lip gloss

college byler

cleradin my beloved you will always be famous to me

every universe except this one, i guess.

byler getting together in college and mike feeling happy and free for the first time since he was a kid. will gets an earring. mike grows his hair back out. they go to parties and kind of hate it but kind of love it. they go to gay bars and will gets hit on constantly and it pisses mike off so bad. they go on dates semi-publicly and sometimes mike gets up the courage to hold will’s hand while they’re walking down the street and sometimes they get dirty looks but they mostly get left alone at least in comparison to hawkins. they visit jonathan at nyu and all sit around chatting with mike’s legs in will’s lap and will’s hand on his thigh and jonathan just smiles and says they look good together. life is good, they’re moving forward. and then after a year or two, on a stormy night, jane hopper shows up on mike’s doorstep, soaking wet and smiling sheepishly. and the guilt that mikes been suppressing for going on three years all crashes down on him in an instant.

Ok I have so much doubt like it’s built into me . I won’t get queerbaited again . but . if they’re not gonna make byler canon .I need someone to explain why the first season is basically mike’s love letter to will (why do we only see mike go home to Karen instead of Dustin or Lucas or anyone after the body is found? why does mike first think it’s not wills body? why’s he insistent on looking for him——we see Lucas is as adamant as finding him but we don’t see his response to the body do we?) and his perspective on the pain of losing both will first and then eleven by the end of the season. And then the second season is having Will back and how to protect him more than anyone else (why is mike in the spy sequence? how does he understand everything in relation to Will first? why does he stay with him? why does he go to the hospital?) and the newfound pain of losing eleven. This makes narrative sense and we get to see some of the ways Will and el might parallel, which makes some cool lore sense later on, cus Will clearly has a relationship w the upside down now!!! but also…. why do we parallel a male character with mike’s love interest, if he clearly has a special connection to both? we won’t think about this too hard. and then season three plot is like, eleven is back, yay! obviously we need to explore her dynamics with the other kids but that dynamic is inevitably with Mike because of the s1/2 connection, and max because max is new too and now the two girls can find comfort in each other (like we see el want in s1!). and for some reason part of that dynamic with mike is wildly overshadowed by Will being literally shattered by this development and therefore mike and will fight all the time. Huh. okay. weird choice but okay. but then in s4 we realize wait, how’s Will handling this? we finally have a season to get to know who Will is WITHOUT the upside down! While we do that we are going to send MIKE only to California. And then whisk his love interest away for an entire season. They’ll be completely separated the whole time and we will no longer see how their relationship developed because——ohhh, shit, cus mike can’t say i love you. That’s, objectively, narratively crazy. why can’t he just say that? and oh shit wait, Will is gay. that’s, okay, awesome!! That’s awesome. glad we learned that that’s really sweet and cool——And he confesses his feelings to mike but he does it through the lens of a “playing cyrano” trope. Oh. Weird. …..okay. Whys he playing cyrano???? Surely this has no pay off. Now it’s season 5 and will just told his first person ever he’s gay. YAY! He is clearly starting to flirt with mike and asks how you know if someone wants to date. what? okay. that’s pretty forward. mike seems kinda protective again this season, which he hasn’t done since….. season 2? And they also live together. In the same house. Right, cus the California——okay, that makes narrative sense. Cool. what next? now he’s got powers!! yay will! which is something meaningful to mike (Superman speech, someone special, etc)……who is back in full character force as a leader only after Will reminded who he is!! by confessing his love (gay love) to him. Why are…… hm. I am wondering why the show is structured like this if . you are going to write a rejection into this. like. For real. and yes, we also establish more max in s3, which is then followed through in s4, and el’s story is scattered throughout this timeline, but Dustin and Lucas are pretty uninvolved for most of this Will/Mike/El situation. they’ve got their OWN love triangle. That’s Dustin/Max/Lucas. and they resolve it basically in one season. But im still watching Will Byers fag out and I’ve got 4 more episodes of television left to watch . And narratively what SHOULD happen. Perhaps does not align with what WILL happen

Right so me from the past in case you were wondering the way they did this was actually just ignoring the entire narrative you just explained and putting some bullshit on screen. Just so you know

was getting deja vu from the post s5 disappointment and bewilderment i was feeling and then realized it’s because mike wheeler got fucking lance mcclain-ed

since the creators like to leave so many things in the finale ambiguous then I'm running with it and making my ship canon anyway lmao. they belong to us now!!!

Yes, they meet up accidentally during college, yes, they never stopped thinking about eachother, yes, they're now free to face those feelings!!!

Imagine writing a finale so terrible it got half the fandom theorizing it was fake and there's an actual finale coming our way. Truly bizarre. (Love reading those theories tho, they're so fun).

Anyways, I'm doing my part with a little fix-it fanart :) I tried to make it as big of a tribute for this ship as possible. I've had so much fun these past few weeks interacting with this fandom, I'm truly grateful I've found a little space for myself in here. And I'm glad so many people enjoyed my art and stayed with me for longer, I am so thankful for you all! 💕 Reading your comments, sharing excitement with you and interacting in general has been a highlight of my days! I think it got me through this winter, it was a really nice escape. And an intense one. Whew.

I hope to create more fanart for this series in the future, maybe branch out into other characters as well. I'm still full of ideas! But for now I feel like I need to take a step back and let this hyperfixation fade out a bit. I need to focus on my college assignments for now, maybe I'll even find some time to work on my comic, but in the meantime I'll be posting some art that has been waiting on my drive :) I also still need to process the conclusion to this show, cause geez. Feels kinda terrible. But I'm glad to be a part of this incredibly supportive community. Never stop being so passionate, fun, and creative, y'all are amazing 💕 I've learned so much about storytelling and visual symbolism thanks to all the people's analysis and I can now implement it into my own art! And all of you should too! I can't wait for what the fandom comes up with now!

Lots of love 💙💛

i was giggling when i wrote this thinking to myself “i just gotta put something here, whatever happens in s5 is gonna override it.” anyway heavy hopes is still canon compliant i guess

i’ve gotten a lot of comments on heavy hopes since vol2 dropped asking how i could have predicted this and guys the answer is very easy. i predicted it because the duffers are insanely predictable writers

michael you need to lock tf in its all up to you now.

I'd rather pretend there was no season 5