When They Were Special

thinking about how a part of her would always know what truly happened during the war.

how a part of her would always know where she truly went.

how a part of her childhood and adulthood would always be lost to the land of no time

how a part of her would always remember that her family was lost there too

no matter how hard she tries to deny it, she knows

she remembers

she remembers the god that threw her out of paradise and knows that she can no longer step foot in a church

she remembers silk dresses and heavy crowns and knows that scratchy nylon and caked makeup will never suffice

she remembers blood stained fields and war torn siblings and knows that this world was worse in every way for it

she remembers herself

she doesn’t know herself

she sits in front of her bedroom wardrobe

it does not have carvings of trees or fauns or fairytales

it holds flimsy dresses instead of winder coats

she opens it up and walks inside

she prays to a god that she doesn’t believe in

she prays to the version of him that she knew

she prays for her family people back

she prays that this time the back of her wardrobe will fall away and take her with it

it never does.

today I am thinking about susan pevensie

I’d only make two changes.

No god threw her out of paradise. She threw herself out of paradise.

She did make it back. Not in the books — but Professor Lewis did say she would.

But even as a non-nepo baby, I’ve always thought that nepotism can get you the audition — it can’t get you the job.

The MCU made *billions* off of nepo-baby Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark. I don’t care who his father was, RDJ had talent that put asses in seats. (And despite her complaints about “fair” compensation, nepo-baby Gwenneth Paltrow did not. Not in the MCU, at any rate).

pt 3 to my doodles! :D mike & el once more. spoilers but this is my fav scene from @johnconstantius "When He Was Special," specifically chapter 31: The Star :)

When i first read this scene on Mike's sacrifice & El's love for him, i felt so many thingsss. so today when i had extra time (& motivation to practice procreate) in starbucks, i drew out my feelings for this one. haha. 

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"Don't let me go," he whispered.

"I won't," she said.  "You're here with me, Mike.  You're here with me and I’ll never let you go."

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thank you so much for writing such a wonderful story @johnconstantius! :D I love how you write mileven and of course all the characters! 

here’s the fic link for anyone interested: x

A few things:

“Soviet” and “Russian” were used interchangeably by Americans during the Cold War, as Russia was by far the dominant state and culture of the Soviet Union. So ST using this nomenclature means absolutely nothing other than the Duffers are familiar with the time period. So folks should relax on this one — sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

The Russian nomenclature for the USSR survives despite the tyrannical autocrat Stalin being from Georgia and Brezhnev and Khrushchev technically being Ukrainian. To be fair, Ukraine had been part of the Russian empire since the late 1700s, so until ~30 years ago this was a distinction without a difference.

The gulags still existed in the 1980s. The fact that OP apparently doesn’t know this is… sad.

ST has *never* been about “the countless atrocities of the American government.” ST is 80s nostalgia, which includes post-Vietnam suspicion about the US government à la Three Days of the Condor and Firestarter, as well as fear of the Soviets à la Red Dawn and the vast majority of the James Bond films.

Media like Condor and Firestarter typically draw distinctions between the “normal” government who came and went with each election cycle and were generally clueless, and permanent, shadowy agencies running their own game under the radar with a black budget — a government within a government, if you will.

So let’s be clear — ST isn’t saying Brenner was running his lab because Reagan was President. ST is saying Brenner would run his lab no matter who was President. Which is the most terrifying thing of all, because it means elections don’t matter and ordinary citizens can’t stop the likes of Brenner without taking extraordinary action (which El did).

If it helps, I’m assuming that at a minimum Millie, Finn, Winona and David come back, but everyone else is a toss up.

Ooh, this is an interesting one.

Millie and Finn would definitely come back. I say this based on what they've said over the years about their love for their characters and Mileven, their cryptic answers during the S5 press tour, and their social media activity post-finale.

I'm not as certain as you about Winona and David. Winona doesn't need the money and seemed pretty done during the S5 press tour, while David is now part of the MCU and also seemed pretty checked out. Of course, an easy paycheck is an easy paycheck. The only two cast members I can't see coming back are Sadie and Charlie. Sadie has made it very clear that she's glad to move on and doesn't care, while Charlie was consistently shafted post-S1, which is a shame considering he's probably the best actor of the younger cast.

With that, I think an interesting storyline would include more of the dark matter from Dimension X or remnants of the Upside Down showing up. El has to act, even if surreptitiously, but her tether with Mike brings them back together. Maybe he hears something about it and wants to learn more for a book, maybe it's taking place in Hawkins because of course it is. At the end, Owens helps El get amnesty from the US Government — it'd be around the time of the 1994 MKUltra report — though she still chooses to leave the United States with authentic documentation, finally making a choice to leave on her own terms, but not before a tearful reunion with Hopper and Joyce. Mike, being an adult capable of understanding and accepting what risks may come with it, goes with her, as she learns to finally let someone else make a sacrifice out of love for her.

It'd need to be gritty, à la Seasons 1 and 2. Not necessarily R-rated, but more adult than what we got in Season 5. And it would absolutely need to return to the anti-establishment ethos of the first two seasons.

I love this take. I take @theduchesswrites point about Winona and David, maybe they aren’t in it.

I suppose my biggest concern about the ST movie, which like the Duchess I think *will* be made eventually in a cash grab, is that it won’t specifically be a Mileven movie. There will certainly be Mileven, that’s part of the show, but I suspect it will be very sci-fi horror focused rather than a relationship movie.

I love the Duchess’s proposed storyline though, especially El leaving the US to go back to Iceland and Mike going with her. It would be great for El to get the gift of someone else making a sacrifice for her.

(nyt)

But I hesitated to repost.

It probably comes as no surprise that I’m a big space exploration nerd — I love Stranger Things and sci-fi generally, so wow, what a shock. I’ve probably read a dozen books about the history of the space race and endlessly watched documentaries and dramatizations of the exploration of the Final Frontier.

So Artemis II has been kind of emotional for me. But when I saw some of the comments on this post, the level of toxicity was stunning. There are no words for how much hatred is out there. I was genuinely concerned about brushing up against that level of hatred.