Why Byler is the Only Logical Outcome of Stranger Things 4: A Necessary Breakdown of Will, Mike, and Eleven’s Narrative Arcs
Buckle in besties, this is gonna be a long one.
I’m going to preface this by saying I’ve been a die-hard Stranger Things fan since 2016 and I’ve watched every season as it’s dropped, reading theories and analysis between seasons. I adored Mileven for seasons 1 and 2.
However, I truly believe that, from what we’ve seen of Mike, Will, and Eleven’s individual and combined arcs over seasons 3 and 4 Vol. 1, the only outcome that makes logical and narrative sense to the story Stranger Things is trying to tell is a Mileven breakup with Byler endgame.
I’m not going to go into extended metaphors and background details, or even what actors have said in interviews; we’re talking about making sense of characters’ actions and words from a narrative standpoint. As a lifelong writer and storyteller, I’m trying to be more objective. And, assuming the Duffer brothers want to follow satisfying emotional arcs for not only their characters but their characters’ relationships, signs are pointing toward Byler.
Let’s break it down.
Guiding Principles of Narrative
First, let’s talk about what I mean when I’m talking about character arcs and things that make sense narratively. It’s important to note a few things before moving forward. These are key principles that inform the viewpoint of a storyteller and how I’m analyzing this.
Everything has meaning and everything is intentional.
Characters start a story with a flaw, go on a journey that forces them to confront that flaw, and end the story by showing how that journey has forced them to change and grow.
Forcing a character to confront inner conflict and grow from it is an essential ingredient of storytelling. Characters must change as a result of plot events.
Eleven
We have to talk about Eleven first. People tend to think Byler shippers hate El and Mileven, but it’s important to note we’re not talking about what characters deserve, or what we think of them, we’re talking about what makes sense narratively. I adore Eleven and want her to have a happily ever after as much as anybody, but I do not see that happening with Mike.
We see her go on a long act two journey to recover her powers. It follows that in Act 3, we will see her return and save the day, likely fuelled by the support of her friends and possibly even by her love for Mike.
However, this has not forced Eleven to confront her fear and learn the truth, that she is not useless without her powers. Even with a sweet monologue from Mike, it would feel empty and unfulfilling for him to confess his love to her only after she returns to the action hero version of herself. Eleven would always have doubts about whether he loves her for who she is.
So what would force Eleven to confront her inner conflict?
Eleven is spending this season learning about who she is, and what she is capable of, in every sense. It’s important to note that El’s most important growth moments happen when she is away from Mike. Season 2’s Kali episode, season 3’s breakup, season 4’s adventures in Nevada. When Mike is with her, such as in season 3, her growth stunts; they both become accessories to the other rather than unique characters with arcs. The focus becomes about their relationship.
Additionally, she and Mike have been in a relationship for a portion of her formative developmental years, and the rest of those years were spent growing up in a lab. Eleven has not had the freedom to fully grow as a person individually. We see this in season 3 with Max encouraging her to be her own person. This is a consistent pattern and the show is making a clear argument that Eleven needs to develop as a person before she can develop in a relationship.
I do believe Eleven loves Mike. However, I think by the end of Volume 1 she has already realized Mike doesn’t love her the way she wants him to. She isn’t stupid. I think this is especially apparent in the scene where she is being driven away from Mike and does not look at him as he promises to make things right, talking about her being arrested but alluding to their fight. She’s already resigned herself: she doesn’t believe him.
Staying with Mike would mean choosing the familiar path where she is not forced to change. Ultimately, if her arc is about discovering herself, standing up for herself, and realizing she is worthy of unconditional love, I believe that she needs to break up with Mike in order to put herself first.
Mike
The most obvious argument against Byler is that Mike loves Eleven, so he can’t be gay.
Mike does love Eleven. He cares deeply for her. He shows it every season. Mileven stans, I get it. But it truly seems like this season’s developments are preparing us for the fact that that love is platonic-with-a-capital-P. While Mike could be bisexual, I believe he is gay and repressing himself, staying with El because it is safe, and pushing Will away because he’s afraid of his own feelings toward Will. He’s trying desperately to play the role of the Good Straight Boyfriend but it’s not quite working.
Some might think this is far-fetched, so I’ll back up and talk more objectively. In season 4 vol 1, we see certain inconsistencies in Mike’s actions compared to his actions in previous seasons. Our attention is supposed to be drawn to these seemingly separate behaviors: he can’t tell Eleven he loves her to her face, despite having said it about her in season 3. And, he’s brushing off his best friend Will—that brutal hug—despite being previously characterized as a loyal friend who puts Will first—such as when he went through the rain to apologize to Will after their fight in season 3, a time during which he was also fighting with Eleven.
These are two very distinct differences we as the audience are supposed to notice. They can each be explained away individually: he can’t tell El he loves her because of his parents’ loveless marriage, or because he has a hard time expressing his feelings because of toxic masculinity, or any number of things. He’s brushing off his best friend because he’s either uncomfortable with Will’s queerness or his crush, or simply because they’ve grown apart after a year apart.
These could make sense individually, but we aren’t meant to see them individually, we are meant to see them as a result of some root character attribute. We’re not explicitly told what root flaw or misbelief is informing Mike’s behavior in Vol. 1—not in the way we’re more directly told how Eleven feels like a monster or how Will is afraid to express his feelings for Mike. Instead, we are meant to guess. What root belief could the character have that explains both of his strained relationships in Volume 1? What explanation addresses all of his strange behaviors simultaneously, rather than one at a time?
It’s also important to note that Mike primarily ignores Will when he’s around Eleven; when just Mike and Will are together, Mike goes gentle and kind in a way that feels starkly contrasted to the way he acts around Eleven this season, and especially contrasted to the way he treats Will at the airport. If Mike is truly just homophobic (which I doubt) or just has a hard time expressing his feelings, why then is he so able to express his feelings toward Will?
Additionally, if his arc is simply to learn how to speak his feelings, and it culminates to him confessing his love to Eleven, this would truly be a disappointing and underwhelming arc for Mike. How does that move him forward, challenge him, help him change as a character? Nothing changes because that is the same emotional climax for him as in season 3.
Conversely, him accepting his queerness and admitting his feelings toward Will would force him to reflect, learn, and grow in a way that continuing his relationship with Eleven simply doesn’t. It would move the story forward in an interesting way that impacts the dynamics of the whole party rather than maintaining the status quo.
Mike’s journey is not so much about him expressing himself as it is about being honest with himself. I’m certain Mike cares deeply for Eleven and doesn’t want to hurt her, but he must acknowledge this truth about himself and who he is in order to grow.
Will
Will is the easiest to tackle of the three, because his crush on Mike is much more overt than Mike’s feelings for Will or the impending doom of Mileven. In season 4, we see him crushing on Mike and afraid to confess his feelings.
We don’t need to address all of Will’s queer-coding over the seasons, but just in season 4, we can acknowledge the painting, the longing gazes, the jealousy, the coded conversation about “scary … to say how you really feel,” emphasized by a fear of being rejected with “because what if they don’t like the truth?”
It follows that his arc is about getting up the nerve to confess his feelings, with the resolution being him learning to accept himself, and that his friends love him no matter what. This could theoretically happen by Mike gently rejecting him but reassuring that they’re always friends—but that’s not interesting.
Why would that matter? How would Mike grow from that? How does that impact any of the other characters? It doesn’t. If Will is rejected, his season 4 storyline is almost entirely isolated and unnecessary, with no consequences or impact on the rest of the group. It’s lazy storytelling and I don’t believe the Duffers would do it if it weren’t connected to a greater storyline at play. If his confession results in requited feelings, it would impact not just Mike and Will individually but also Eleven and the Party at large. In short, it would create much more interesting consequences and tension, and I can’t imagine why the Duffers would have written Will’s storyline in if it weren’t going to play out in a way that had that greater impact.
So basically…
For all characters involved, Byler endgame makes the most narrative sense as a natural result of the setup of Volume 1. I truly am optimistic about this queer couple getting a happy ending and hope that this explains the frenzy I’m in right now.
People argue that they wouldn’t trash Mileven after having built it up for three seasons; I would argue that they built it up for 2, and now have spent 2 more breaking it down. Others argue that it would be coming out of nowhere; I would argue that you might have been watching the show with heteronormative tinted goggles.
I could write so much more about Byler making narrative sense with the greater themes of coming-of-age and self-discovery, and I could easily break down every season 3 and 4 scene in painstaking detail, but I think the most important argument that could be made is that Byler is truly the best narrative outcome for each individual character based on what we’ve seen so far.
if a demon from the upside down’s about to kill me and you need to find out what my favorite song is, please just tell my mother i love her. i can’t choose my favorite song for the life of me.
I really hope we get some Joyce and El scenes in Vol 2 because I feel so robbed so far. The only things we got was Joyce counting her as her kid and El’s Joyce hairstyle (which I loved). I need scenes!
