Hopper and Mike have secrets to share in volume 3
They have bombs to drop. Physical bombs (Hopper has a big ass bomb and Mike makes makes a smaller bomb with Robin) and metaphorical bombs/truth bombs (they both have secrets)
Hopper is Fat Man. This bomb was dropped from an aircraft called Bockscar, at 11:02 am.
Mike is Little Boy. This bomb was dropped from an aircraft called Enola Gay, at 8:15 am.
(Some relevant information I was told by my history buff and physics nerd brother. Little Boy used uranium, and Fat Man used plutonium. I have no idea what this means for stranger things, but if anyone has theories, let me know. Maybe the atomic or mass numbers are important here?)
I'm a Mike analyst primarily, so I'll talk about him first. We hear Holly telling Max that she's not Holly the Heroic. She froze when she needed to be a hero, and she felt incredibly guilty for it.
(Holly is Mike. Insane craziness about that over here)
Little Boy dropped at 8:15, causing the clocks in Hiroshima to stop at that time. It's often described as being frozen in time. Sounds familiar, huh?
The Upside Down is frozen in time, at 8:15 pm. on the day Will went missing.
This day Will went missing was traumatic for the party, Joyce, Hopper, Jonathan, etc. But was this day so incredibly traumatic for Mike that he feels he's stuck there? In that memory? Frozen? Similar to how Henry can't escape the memory of the cave?
And why is it framed as freezing up, specifically? Max assures Holly that there is nothing she could've done in those moments. There is nothing Mike could've done to stop Will from vanishing that day.
But... what if there was?
(Mike begs Karen for just 10 more minutes, and I think that's gonna be really important.)
What if Mike truly believes that he could've done something to stop the vanishing of Will Byers, and that guilt is eating away at him?
What if Mike Wheeler's "I feel like my life started that day" actually means "I feel like my life ended that day." because he genuinely feels stuck on that day. Frozen in time, on November 6th 1983.
06 + 11 + 1983 = 38 = 3 + 8 = 11 btw. but whatever.
(And, I'm lowkirkenuinely manifestation theory pilled rn. Mike seems to say things that just... come true. "You can cast a dimension door", "you're more like a sorcerer", "you can fly" etc.
And we know Mike's foil, through and through, is Sarah from Labyrinth. The whole reason why Toby goes missing is because Sarah says "I wish the goblins would come and take you. right now." what if Mike thought something along the lines of "I wish time would stop", because he wanted his dnd game to go on, and then this whole thing occurred. idk man idk.
there's just so much stuff about Mike and clocks. insert Hopper's letter in season 3. insert “When life hurts you, because it will, remember the hurt. The hurt is good. It means you're out of that cave.")
but Mike's truth bomb is definitely that he's in love with Will, obviously. I just think that there's more to it than just that, and I think it could get dark.
Fat Man dropped 3 days after Little Boy.
so, 3 days after November 6th would be November 9th.
and it's so interesting how we move in intervals of 3, as it seems like the most traumatic day of Will's life happens to be November 12th. (see here for 3gate)
now we don't know when Sara Hopper died, but what if she died on November 9th at 11:02? that's a shot in the dark, but it would make so much sense. this took place in 1978, however, and this was the same year Terry tried to get El back. idk what I'm talking about at this point, because again, I don't know Hopper like I know Mike. (baby that's my son, like. I know dada, and he would never do such a thing.)
but Hopper definitely has a truth bomb to drop in the finale, and I'm convinced it's about Sara.
the stairwell where she died in the hospital is the same location as the Hawkins Lab, hinting that her illness might have deeper ties to the Upside Down or experiments there. and we see Holly get pushed down the stairs... we get Steve talking about how the lab has too much stairs... and then, Mike's room has a theory of relativity poster in it, which is stairs, the same stairs in Labyrinth. like okay... okay...
we also see Owens "die" in the same exact spot. so what the fuck, like, actually?
Hopper also, firmly believes that this was his fault. That his daughter's death was the result of Agent Orange.
I think Mike also believes everything is his fault.
Mike's breakdown in season 2, punching Hopper's chest and bawling his eyes out was Mike confronting himself. "It's your fault, I blame you, I blame you!!" he blames himself for whatever happened to Will. for whatever happened to El. for whatever is happening in general.
the Steve and Dustin fight was also directly referencing that scene. I'm so normal about this actually.
and then we have Kali saying "just as you lie to her, you lie to yourself." which is obviously being said to Hopper, but it 100000000000% applies to Mike, too. (and also Brenner. I'm making a video on this but it's taking for fucking ever because there's so much.)
