Mike Wheeler and his Promise
"It means something that you can't break. Ever."
A huge part of Mike Wheeler's hidden character arc is set up in season 1, episode 2 with this scene right here. It's pretty much the motivation behind many of his actions towards El and Will, can be a partial explanation for his internalised homophobia and explains why he seems like to have a saviour complex.
Narratively, promises are made to be broken. When writers decide to make a promise 'important' and emphasise that this promise cannot be broken, ever, it will always come back to bite that character in the ass. Promises are either made to be broken in stories like these, or they are made to make a character feel trapped. Promises are rarely ever used in a romantic fashion unless the character cannot keep their promise or they feel like they are forced to.
What makes it really seem like Mike and El are a doomed couple to me is that the writers chose Mike to say: Ever.
No word is misplaced in writing a script. There is no such thing as an unintentional line in Stranger Things tbh, and this word in particular means two things:
Mike will always keep his promises throughout time.
Mike will keep his promises no matter if circumstances change, no matter if his feelings change.
There is no reason for this line to be in there other than to foreshadow the fact that Mike will eventually have to eat the words from his naive 12-year-old self. He will eventually regret promising something, but he'll feel like he can't go back. Ever.
The domino effect Promise begins:
*Smiling* "And we can go to the Snow Ball."
*No longer smiling* "Promise."
This promise was made in order to foreshadow that it doesn't come true right? Because that is often what happens to promises narratively, and of course, it can't come to be because they get separated and Mike thinks she's died.
But.... the promise does come true.
So instead, this promise was made, narratively, to trap Mike. While this seems harsh of course, this young Mike has no idea that what he has just promised to himself is not only to go to the Snow Ball with El (which was a promise made to comfort her here, to make her feel like she will survive). He doesn't necessarily seem happy about making this promise. He seems more... indifferent. Knowing that this is something he just has to do.
Yeah, because this is definitely the actors' expressions and lighting and scenery you want for a first kiss, right?
So not only has Mike promised to go to the Snow Ball with her, he has also promised to save her, he has promised to be with her. And he can't break this promise, ever.
Even when his feelings change:
The writers separated Mike and El and put Mike with Will in season 2 for a reason. They used it to build up a good development of Mike and Will's dynamic of course, but it was also to change Mike's feelings.
It eventually becomes apparent to the viewer that Mike has resigned himself to not finding El. In season 2 episode 2, the last time we see Mike on the walkie, he walks away. Music swells and El looks onwards. Instead of looking happy, she seems disappointed that her bond with Mike is not as strong as she thought.
Mike, after his talk with Will in the same room, has begun to give up.
And over time, he figures out that maybe... maybe finding and choosing to Will's friend is the best thing he's ever done instead. Once he figures this out, he cries, he's not loud, he's not angry. But it's at least the thing to bring Will's message forward.
Then El comes back, and Mike feels like a liar.
I've never really figured out why Mike shouts 'LIAR!' many times towards Hopper when he's clearly projecting as he starts to cry. Until now. It's the guilt that he didn't keep his promise. The promise he had made back when El had almost died, back when El had clearly thought promises could never be broken. EVER. Even when feelings change.
Of course he'd felt pissed at Hopper. Hopper was the one to keep El safe, not Mike, which is not the thing he had promised.
When El returns, Mike says:
"I never stopped looking for you."
Woops, Michael, that's a bald-faced lie, and you know it. But he also knows what a promise is, something that can't ever be broken.
Mike is now committed into this relationship. He's ready to keep El as his girlfriend for many reasons, but the next commitments he makes (i.e. saying 'I love you') are not intentional.
Saying 'I love her' happens on accident, she's never meant to hear. The next time he's asked about it, he fumbles and wants to deny ever saying it. But when El says it back, he realises... oh shit. I really am in this now. I can't escape, even though I know my feelings are different.
In the famous words of Hopper. "I don't want things to change." "[I want] to go back to how [we] were."
Throughout summer, before the Mindflayer, his relationship with El was easy, it was fine. He could deal with this because he can still go to movie theatres with Will and his friends and El can't go out in public. His relationship isn't real, and the fights they have are just 'silly, stupid fights'.
But then she says she loves him too and now what? He realises this is real, he can't go back on what he's said again. Because no matter what, a promise can't be broken.
He has to reject childish things and pretend to be 'normal' (but only around El).
He has to keep away from Will, who has the potential to break his promise to El forever.
He still can't say 'I love you' because of this great big commitment, this potential for change, and El clocks him, despite his best efforts to keep up the same relationship he was trying to have in season 3.
When he no longer has the threat of this great big PROMISE looming over him, when he feels that El has no broken up with him through that note signed 'From, El', he now suddenly has the ability to act close to Will. When he's confident that El's safe and that they just need to get back to Hawkins, he's able to express how he really feels.
He can finally, finally work with Will without feeling guilty.
That is, until El's in danger again. Until Argyle reminds him of the ramifications of his girlfriend being missing, reminding him of the promise that he's always made.
That's when this intimacy with Will suddenly feels taboo again:
The next time he needs to make a commitment towards her, it's through pressure. The bottom line is, Mike likes being a hero, he wants to be a saviour, but he was never ready for it to feel like this.
When Will reminds him that he's the heart of the Party in Surfer Boy Pizza, he believes that it could never be Will that needs him, but that Will's telling him that it really is El that still needs him. And that she always will.
So he holds her hand, exactly like he did back in season one, and makes his Promise again, this time, knowing that he's trapping himself.
Now, instead of a naive kid, he's a teenager, he's changed, despite not wanting to. He's resigning himself to a life without truly being able to express his feelings. He's not just some kid going to the Snow Ball with a girl that he cares about, he's promising to love her, knowing he's trapped himself in this promise again.
After all, he's already promised to save her, and if he thinks saying 'I love you' will save her, he's gotta do it no matter his true feelings right?
In season 5, someone, someone needs to tell this poor boy that he does not need to keep his promise. El needs to tell him about her growth, what she has learned from her time at the lab---that is, that she does not need Mike to love her, which she seems to have understood. She has already accepted that her lover won't arrive at the train station.
And Mike should realise that saying 'I love you' did not in fact save El. It was the reminder to fight, that Max is in trouble, that there are more important things, bigger than their relationship, that allowed her to escape the vines.
So when Mike hears that he no needs to keep up this promise, that he no longer has to hate himself for being a 'liar' to someone he cares so much about, that he can open himself up to happiness and understanding again, he'll probably feel pretty complete.
