Characters Spotify Playlists prove a lot of Mike being in love with Will
I’m pretty sure everyone knows about the eleventh song being don’t you want me from the celebrate gay pride album and Smalltown boy is both on Mike Wheeler’s official Spotify Playlist, but there’s also tones more proof.
First, I just want to say, since I’m on PC and too lazy to screenshot things, you won’t be seeing any imagery, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.
The Songs Show what will happen or what has happened
Will has Mirror In The Bathroom (for when he coughed up a slug), Slug Song (same reason), Don’t you (forget about me) (*cough cough*, season 3), Afraid (lyrics are: I wake up, I’m afraid somebody’s gonna take my place, somebody is El), and many more, so the fact that Mike has Smalltown Boy (A song about a gay man with all the band members being gay) is in there (with the lyrics saying run away, turn away, run away), and in the music video the main person runs away, and in I Ran (So Far Away) which of course has “Oh I just ran so far away” in it, is saying how he could possibly run away??? (It also has the E.T kinda stuff - I think, this is paralleled to the entire El and E.T things, and Reece’s pieces being Will’s fav sweet).
There’s Always Something There to Remind Me, a song about a break-up, There’s She Blinded Me with Science, which is about a scientist who falls in love with his co-worker, who of course likes science and does science with the main character (Will and Mike are both in the AV Club). Still Haunting Me is very non-endgame Mileven coded (I never wanted it to end how it did, another lover now crossed off, Off the list) “Your face, still haunting me”. Then When Love Breaks Down has this: “My love and I, we work well together but often we’re apart Absence makes the heart lose weight, yeah, till love breaks down, love breaks down” The absence is El since it has this line: “The lies we tell,” Like c’mon, the Duffers are TRYING to tell us.
As well as the meanings, just the song names is even giving us clues, such as “What is Love?” and “Love is a Stranger”.
Some people don’t seem to get this, so I’ll tell.
The lyrics: Hey kid, you’re sick, well, darling this is it. In the 80s, the AIDS pandemic was a big thing, people used to think that gays were ill, sick, had a disease.
You can all just kiss off into the air, behind my back I can see them stare. Mike and El’s make-out sessions, Hopper seeing them kiss.
I take one, one, one ‘cause you left me. Will moved away. And three, three, three for my heartache. Of course, he’s going to feel a heartache. And five, five, five for my lonely. He will expectantly feel lonely.
Also, the meaning of “Kiss-off” is “a rude or abrupt dismissal or rejection.”
And THEN, we must see that the choices in music in Mike and El’s kissing scenes is all uh… interesting….
Just a little more time is all we’re asking for, ‘Cause just a little more time could open closing doors. It’s the Duffers way of showing that just one or two more seasons could show Byler becoming canon.
Just a little uncertainty can bring you down. Mike’s uncertainty of loving El romantically. And nobody wants to know you now, Mike’s fear is that once he comes out as gay, no one will want to know him. So, if you’re lost and on your own, you can never surrender. Mike can’t surrender this trying to love El otherwise everyone will hate him.
I can’t fight this feeling any longer and yet, I’m still afraid to let it flow. Mike is afraid of his feelings towards Will. What started out as friendship, has grown stronger. Mike and Will’s friendship has been around for YEARS, while Mileven was only friends for a week (and had a fight) when they kissed.
It’s time to bring this ship into the shore, and throw away the oars, forever. It is LITRALLY saying that Byler is going to be endgame XD.
There’s the Snowball dance, in it the song “Time after Time” plays (which is about a break-up) and “Every Breath You Take” also plays, a song about after a breakup, someone stalks their ex, in S3, El literally watches Mike, Will and Lucas after breaking up.