An aroace/aro reading of Mike's character is so important to me so I want to talk about it! 🙌
I've actually been in a pretty similar situation as him with the whole "I love you" thing. I only really say I love you to my mom and sister (and even then it's more of a "love you" instead of "I love you", if that makes any sense). Like I don't even say it to my friends even though I do love them. I think the problem is the implication of it. Even though I know it's not romantic, it may come across that way to SOMEONE. So, I can't do it, in case they misunderstand me (like how everyone misunderstands Mike).
So when I saw Mike struggle to say it for three seasons, when I was that video of Finn reacting the the mlvn fight in season 4 (where he was talking about saying I love you to your friends and wondering why Mike can't say it even though he does love El), when I saw Mike not say he loved El in the void even though that issue was supposedly "resolved" in season 4; it was truly like looking in a (mostly likely unintentional) mirror.
Whenever I see people get on Mike's case about saying I love you to either Will or El, I get a hollow feeling in my chest icl.
It extends beyond just that tho! Like in season 3, when Mike tells El that he had never felt the way he felt about her about anyone before but then couldn't say when he fell in love with her or what he romantically liked about her in season 4. It's cause he's not in love with her and he never was but everyone told him he was (in season 1), so he believed it too. His feelings for her never changed from when they first meet, friendship.
This also makes the void scene so much sadder to me because he does love her just not the way that she wants him to and I think he knows that. I feel that Mike's grief for El is often conflated with his guilt, like in season 2. He feels guilty for lying to her about how he feels about her even at the end of her life. I wish more than anything that Mike and El could have truly talked to each other, understood each other, and been friends (but the writers hate us ).
It extends to how he feels about Will too. A lot of Mike's defensiveness around Will is about his actions being taken romantically. I also enjoy a gay reading of his character where these actions are taken as projection and I agree with it (just a little differently)!
The infamous season 3 rain fight, where Mike says, "it's not my fault you don't like girls!", is still be projection! He doesn't like girls either and is trying to avoid that fact. He gets angry at Will because Will never got into a romantic relationship, he never felt pushed into one like Mike did. It's also why he basically says that Will needs to grow up, because to him (and society) growing up = pursuing romance.
In season 4, Mike says, "we're friends!", and doesn't bring up the fact that he tried to call Will while he was in Lenora. We must remember that while Mike's calls were getting blocked by Joyce's telemarketing job, Will's were not. Instead, Will was just not calling him. Mike might have thought that he was being TOO clingy. If Will wasn't putting as much effort in to call him as Mike was then maybe it was "weird" that he was calling so much. Maybe his effort to call might be interpreted differently then how he intended them (again, the implication of his actions having an affect on him and his actions just like with the "I love you").
This is why declaring that him and Will are best friends makes him so geeked in season 4 and 5 (that godawful tower scene ☠️). He LOVES being Will's best friend and I love that ❤️🩹
Obviously this isn't the only reading of his character (and DEFINITELY not what the writers intended) but I think it's pretty neat and it makes me happy (when I'm not crying about it lol)!
