Stranger Things spoilers ahead.
Back when Stranger Things premiered in 2016, streaming was nascent enough that its nostalgia-fueled 1980s pastiche still felt somewhat novel. Season one pulled off a convincing alchemy of the decade’s greatest hits: latchkey kids on bikes à la E.T., teens battling monsters in the vein of Halloween and Nightmare on Elm Street, and adults trying to uncover the mysteries within their town in a way that evokes the sci-fi intrigue of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and the labyrinthine unease of conspiracy thrillers.
Nearly a decade later, the show’s schtick has become arguably well-worn, with storylines borrowing from its past seasons nearly as much as popular '80s fare. But the first four episodes of the fifth and final season of Stranger Things do manage to set themselves apart from that bygone era in one key way: the gays are front and centre.
Season Three
Stranger Things’ gay representation came into the series somewhat unexpectedly. Over the course of season three — which premiered in 2019 — popular kid-turned-bonafide babysitter Steve Harrington (Joe Keery) bonded with his new ice cream shop coworker Robin (Maya Hawke). Although it initially seemed like Robin was being set up as Steve’s new love interest, she eventually came out to him as a lesbian while the two were under the influence of a truth serum (long story). It’s a lovely moment that helped cement Steve and Robin as one of the series’ most beloved duos, but it wasn’t always in the cards: As Hawke later explained, she successfully convinced Stranger Things creators the Duffer Brothers to make Robin gay rather than pairing her with Steve.
Season Four
Aside from a small subplot where Robin strikes up a flirtation with classmate Vickie (Amybeth McNulty), season four was not very gay. But around that time, Noah Schnapp confirmed to Variety that his character Will Byers is a closeted gay teenager who’s secretly harbouring a crush on his oblivious best friend, Mike Wheeler (Finn Wolfhard). Shortly after the season aired, Schnapp himself came out as gay on TikTok, captioning the video, “Guess I’m more like Will than I thought.”
But Will’s queer journey in season four didn't reach nearly as much clarity. When Mike visits the Byers family at their new home in California, he ignores Will almost entirely, instead focusing on his super-powered girlfriend, Will’s adoptive sister Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown). Though Will has been kidnapped to another dimension, possessed by an evil psychic entity, and forced to spend several seasons sporting a truly unfortunate bowl cut, somehow his unrequited love in this season may be the most devastating thing he’s sustained in the series so far.
Season Five, Volume One
This season, Will’s grappling with his identity plays a major role right off the bat. While visiting the town hospital in the season five premiere, he accidentally stumbles across Robin making out with Vickie. Will freezes at the sight, his expression softening from surprise to awe. Inevitably, Robin catches Will looking. They end up working together across several episodes to stop the show’s big bad, Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower), but more importantly, Robin becomes something of a gay Yoda for him.
In their following debrief about Will catching Robin kissing Vickie, Robin seems to clock Will’s massive, perhaps one-sided crush on Mike. In a rousing monologue, Robin describes the freedom she felt when she first accepted her own queerness through a story of her past crush on classmate Tammy Thompson. She had fantasised about accepting herself entirely once Tammy fell for her, but then Tammy dated Steve instead. As she began to spiral into despair, she found an old film reel of her younger self in her family’s basement that brought her a revelation.
“That little me, I could hardly recognise her,” she tells Will. “She was so carefree and fearless… She just loved every part of herself.” Robin remembers realising at that moment that it was never about whether Tammy liked her back, at all.
“I was looking for answers in somebody else, but I had all the answers,” she says as they both tear up. “I just needed to stop being so goddamn scared… of who I really was. Once I did that, I felt so free.”
It’s a lovely testament to the power of self-acceptance and inner child work that could very well be to Gen Alpha and younger Gen Z what Jennifer Garner’s Love, Simon “You get to exhale now” monologue was to legions of sniffling audiences in 2018. Already, fans are debating online about whether or not Robin’s speech means that any possibility of a romance between Mike and Will — dubbed “Byler” by the fandom — has been dashed because Mike is Will’s Tammy Thompson. I can’t speak to what the Duffers have planned, but the scene is bound to keep AO3 chugging along at full steam until the next drop of episodes on Christmas. It also does a hell of a job teeing up the first volume of season five’s explosive cliffhanger bringing back Robin’s monologue.
During a climactic battle at the local military base in episode four, titled “Sorcerer,” Vecna decides to make his grand return, brand-new slutty little waist and all. After dragging a writhing Will to face him, he launches into a villain monologue about his plans to use the town of Hawkins, Indiana’s children to remake the world as he sees fit.
“Do you know why I chose them to reshape the world? It’s because they are weak… in body and mind,” he declares. He says Will’s mind broke “so easily” back in season one and that showed Vecna what he could achieve usurping more children. (Baby Will could definitely benefit from an “It Gets Better” campaign, but that’s a pretty harsh way to put it!)
“Some minds, it turns out, simply do not belong in this world,” he concludes. “They belong in mine.”
As Vecna strides away, he leaves his Demogorgons to finish the job of devouring Will’s friends. When all hope seems lost, the sound cuts out and Will closes his eyes, remembering Robin’s words to him. As we hear her speech once again in voiceover, the episode cuts to a film montage of some of young Will’s happiest moments. He befriends Mike on the playground, then presents drawings to his mum, then builds his “Castle Byers” fort in the backyard with his brother Jonathan. Before Will became gripped by fear of his own queerness he, like Robin, was free.
Back in the present, the Demogorgons moving in on their prey are suddenly frozen in mid-air thanks to Will, who, in this Robin-inspired revelatory self-acceptance, conjures Eleven-like telekinetic powers. Right before the episode cuts to black, he even wipes a trademark nosebleed with his sleeve.
“I was freaking out, reacting like a fan. It was such an honor that they handed that opportunity to me,” Schnapp tell Glamour.
This certainly isn’t the first time that a fantasy protagonist has gained supernatural abilities through the power of self-actualisation (see: countless anime). Directly relating Will’s unlocked powers with his gay identity feels distinctly X-Men, too (I hope he enjoys X2’s mutant “coming out” scene in the future, should he survive his final showdown with Vecna).
At its best, the Netflix juggernaut has celebrated its characters for differences that might make them feel like outcasts, hopefully giving its viewers the permission to do the same in their own lives. Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time serves as a key inspiration for Stranger Things season five, and in Anna Quindlen’s introduction to the novel, she writes about how the best stories “make us feel less alone, convince us that our own foibles and quirks are both as individual as a fingerprint and as universal as an open hand.”
Since Stranger Things season five premiered, thousands of young queer fans have taken to social media, posting photos and home videos of their child selves alongside Robin’s speech. Judging from their reactions, the show’s final instalment could very well serve as the same kind of balm that Quindlen described.
This article originally appeared on Them.
