#mayogate

season 2 trailer was a super bowl ad. it was an 80s eggo commercial that glitched into the trailer.

jake is doing sponsored content for hellmann’s mayonnaise because he lied to his friends and said he was doing a “mayo documentary” instead of stranger things.

hellman’s is likely to have a super bowl ad.

EDIT; feb 8 is not duffer birthday. feb 15th is. BUT STILL!

PSA: remember this doesn't confirm any theory or prediction, although it does point out to the Stranger Things/Netflix team keeping watch on our theories and sending us a little wave (kind of reminds me of Derek).

I'm also copypasting some insights from @whispering-goat on how the search bar works that I think we all should be aware before continuing.

AI (machine learning) isn't the only way to parse the internet for keywords and information, I get a little peeved personally when any and all algorithms are called AI. Anyway, Netflix and the ST team use various algorithms, and you're right that the search bar output could be completely updated hands-free. I don't think it's that far-fetched to think there might still be a human component to this, at the back-end someone who makes decisions, what websites to parse for example, which keywords are useful to store which aren't, etc. Algorithms don't tend to make executive decisions. This is such a niche theory, either the algorithms found that the #watergatefiles tag (besides #conformitygate) contains posts with valid ST theories, and then pluck any and all keywords from them, or someone got a list of keywords and had to check manually that "mayonnaise" and "hellmann's" actually is a real ST theory. I'm inclined to think the latter, because there are so many nonsensical ST theories and not all of the keywords from them give output from the search bar. The algorithms can't really tell what's of substance and what isn't to ST. They just collect and parse data.

That being said, I've been playing a lot with the search bar using keywords mainly related to Derek and Jake becase I think he's playing a crucial role both inside and outside the story. Thinking of his connection to 3 Sheeps Breewing, I first got here.

Getting a result for Milwaukee, the city where 3 Sheeps operates, reminded me of a post in which op found evidence that they had sent Will there (if someone has the link to it I'll add it here), but what caught more my attention was the result for brewers, as in Milwaukee Brewers?

So, I then matched my searches to the NFL playoffs bracket.

And got results for 10 out of 14 teams.

Not perfect, but statistically odd. Also, curiously 3 out of the 4 that don't relate directly to ST, do show results for the Mockumentary.

And coincidentally these are teams that have a more direct relation to Stranger things.

Chicago Bears

Buffalo Bills

New England Patriots

What about the Philadelphia Eagles? Well, while that search doesn't lead to a direct result in the search bar, the city was prominently mentioned in the epilogue.

What conclusions do I draw from all this?

The chances of the big announcement occurring during the Superbowl have increased a lot, even if I won't dare to claim 100% probability.

There's an unbelievable amount of planning and preparation behind conformitygate, in case #wsqksync project wasn't proof enough (shout out to @pjofan1912 and all the people working on it).

As for why they would choose these 4 teams specifically to make a connection between ST and the Superbowl, I think they had to make sure to have at least one ally in the final so that the stealing of the show won't be so blatant. Thus, they made deals with teams on opposite sides of the bracket (I know shit about football, but I presume to understand how these brackets work, thank you very much).

At this point, we can only wait and enjoy the silence.

Tried to learn more about egg marketing but i had to see the words “just mayo scandal” so i’ll leave the rest to you

-

“pink sauce created by mixing mayo with ketchup” MY DUDE THAT’S UTAH FRY SAUCE 

ok maybe some types of mayo have rights

i'm a careful observer of the show and its characters. always have been. but it was astounding to me how "disney channel" this finale felt. the cliche dialogue, hokey sfx, marvel-esque final boss fight, and complete character assassination.

speaking of character assassination: you could have swapped any character's role with another character and you'd have the same outcome in the finale. they were all essentially cookie-cutter action movie hero roles with no depth. (the only exception to that being the hopper vecna vision, methinks. that was really well-done).

no stranger things episode has EVER felt like this before. EVER. in fact, even in the worst finales i've watched, it's still felt somewhat like the show. this felt nothing like stranger things.

and back to the title cards: the shortened intro keyed me into something being terribly wrong. no actor names, no full intro as we've had for 5 seasons. just "stranger things" and "written by the duffer brothers".

Short answer, yes.

Long answer, not exactly as it's a prominent part of something bigger.

Before we continue here, the obligated PSA (jcf, why do we have to keep doing this?): I'm doing this for fun, following trails of evidence that on their own are ridiculous, but that are overwhelming in quantity for me to pretend they are not pointing to conformitygate. Stay at your own risk.

What happened on January 27th?

This is the day Hellmann's Superbowl commercial was released.

First of all, I didn't even know it was a thing to release these commercials before the game, and only learned after some reading that this is so they can show a longer version than the "official" one that only allows 30 seconds. At first glance, the spot has nothing to do with stranger things, which was a bummer... for like 3 seconds.

People, I'm firmly planted on this bus and I'm not going down without a fight. I still believe ST is buried up to the neck in mayonnaise.

The story

Simply put, it is a musical parody of Neil Diamond's Sweet Caroline, turned Sweet Sandwich Time, starring Andy Samberg and Elle Fanning.

The whole thing starts in a ridiculous note, something expected if Andy Samberg is involved, but the longer it goes on it gets uncomfortable. Meal Diamond, Samberg's character, seems desperate despite the cheerful song and lyrics, while everyone around him is oblivious. At first, the other commensals at the dinner look him weirdly but as the song progresses they join in the singing and seem completely absorbed. Really?

Am I being biased? Definitely, but as usual, there are too many details that shouldn't add up. In particular, there are three lyrics that make me think of different aspects of ST.

I live in the walls Some times I wonder who my parents are I've never been outside

The first one immediately makes me think of the wall surrounding Hawkins, which depending on how long the illusion was going could still be where the kids (Mike, in case the whole season happened inside his head) are actually kept.

The second and third are basically the experience Jane and the rest of the children at the Hawkins lab went through at the hands of Brenner.

Then, at the end of the song he tells this to Elle Fanning (the only character who seemed to realize the oddity of the situation):

If you marry me the curse is broken and I can leave

So now there's a curse involved that can be broken via marriage?

I know marriage doesn't always involve love in real life, but in many stories it goes hand in hand, and what is it that frees people from Camazotz? Love.

I only needed you.

In addition, this is the classic Beauty and the Beast story line, which may I remind you made an appearance in the inspiration board.

Some visual similarities

Samberg and Fanning are wearing faded Byler colors, which could be attributed to Hellmann's graphic identity, but also work as the perfect excuse to use those colors without seeming suspicios, right @nuffit?

This blue and yellow lighting first made me think of Rink O' Mania, but yesterday as I rewatched bits of S4 I found the scene where Chrissy is killed by Vecna

There's something eery about that blue light in places with cursed people

An exit sign? I'm a freaking labrat (call out to Murray) taking part in the most elaborate social experiment of all times at this point. However, take this last one with a mountain of salt because it's not part of the spot itself but a review of it, which it's more likely AI generated, but it still intrigues me that the sign was added. Btw, there's something suspicious about the review channel but I got too much in my plate right now to go check.

Confirmation bias

Now, trying to be as objective as possible with this thing, I went to check previous Hellmann's Superbowl spots to see if there is an ongoing theme going on here. It appears to be against food waste, which doesn't align with this year's, and while the tone is comedic, it doesn't reach the level of Meal Diamond's song, in my very humble opinion.

As for how the spot is perceived, I found various articles, but this is the one that caught my attention the most. Doesn't this sound extremely exaggerated? What backstory? This is his life's great calling?

Again, it could be attributed to Samberg, but note the different tone in Variety's article between the Hellmanns spot and the Rocket + Redfin's one (this without considering Mr. Rogers song has also being pointed out to be conformitygate related).

The Mandela effect

At first I wondered about the choice of Sweet Caroline to parody as I don't remember it ever being mentioned or used in the show. I was named after this song, so I'm pretty sure I would remember if it had played even for a second at some point. It wasn't, as far as my research went, but I found there was a group of people who claimed it was used in S3 EP4 when the flayed gather to create the meatflayer, but was later changed for We'll meet again by Vera Lyn.

So, either there was actually a change in preparation for this moment, or the ST team prove once again they are aware of the theories circulating the fandom and this was a nod to that. I'm inclined to believe the latter.

The cherry on top

A vinyl containing a single that will play during the big game? During the last quarter? Do I need to add anything at all?

In conclusion, I still believe in Mayogate, but considering other small details I found in other Superbowl spots (which I hope to cover before Sunday), Green Day's cover of Heroes and Gatorade's massive involvement, this is proving to be a huge team effort.