#papa script analysis

Hey everyone! I know we've all LONG been anticipating the Papa Script release, and it's finally here! I have the full script, so I'm going to be breaking down my full thoughts here as to what's going on in the Van Scene and in Mike's reunion moment with El.

Okay, so the first thing I want to clear up here is that the Van Scene is entirely in Will's POV. I know there's been some speculation on Mike's stage directions here, but again, the perspective here skews and distorts the meaning, so hopefully this analysis will give some perspective on what I believe the takeaway from this scene is.

So without further ado, let's jump into the most controversial section of the script first, because this bit has caused a lot of heat, but I don't think it's the bad thing it's been made out to be.

At the beginning of the Van Scene, we get this exchange happening between Mike and Will where Will is suggesting that they have El use her powers in Vegas so he and Mike can sit around and play D&D and Nintendo for the rest of their lives and Mike says "Yeah, totally" with the stage direction here saying "(insincerely)"

This is important to note because the "Uh..." IS in reference to Mike (kind of like a record skip in his head) and the "(insincerely)" stage direction is the ONLY unbiased stage direction we get in regards to Mike's feelings in these scenes. The rest of these interpretations are all Will's POV.

Now, if you've read my Brokeback Mountain × Byler parallels analysis, you'll know that I have talked about the subtext of the rain fight in which Will suggests something similar, that his desired life with Mike is to sit around and play games in Mike's basement forever, that he always just wanted it to be himself and Mike, but during the rain fight, Mike rejects that idea because he believes that the relationship he has with Will, as well as playing games like DnD and Nintendo, is something he has to leave behind in order to grow up. Will believes Mike views him as childish, and then goes to destroy Castle Byers because he feels stupid for wanting that life with Mike.

Will is bringing up his desired life with Mike again in the Van Scene here. He wants to know after they've grown closer again if Mike could be open to that possibility, and so when Mike says, "Yeah, totally," in an insincere way, Will is viewing this once again as a rejection of that desired life. It's WILL who believes he made things awkward and interprets that Mike believes that he is childish for wanting to play DnD, and this acts as a callback to the destruction of Castle Byers and Will calling himself "stupid."

This is why we then get the direction that Will senses the change in the vibe but misinterprets the motive behind it, because Will views this as Mike not being open to the possibility of their playing DnD and Nintendo forever, that Mike is not open to the possibility of WILL, so he interprets that Mike is thinking about El here when he's not.

Though we don't get any indication of what Mike is ACTUALLY thinking about, my guess here is that he just doesn't believe that it's possible for him to have the life that Will wants. Just like in season 3, Mike feels as though he's still expected to grow out of these things, so when Will brings it up, Mike is confused and disappointed because he doesn't think he can have that. If you watch the scene back, the way Finn plays the scene does not line up with the interpretation that Mike thinks Will is stupid for bringing it up. While this COULD fall to acting choices, I think they probably would have directed Finn to deliver it a bit differently if we were supposed to think Mike was scoffing at Will.

So Will shifts the entire conversation over to being about El, not Mike. He's reading his best interpretation of why Mike is upset, and he believes that Mike doesn't want to break up with El and that he's happy being in that relationship, so this is when he decides to switch gears and makes the painting about El instead of himself. Will is looking to rip off that Band-aid.

When we get to this bit where Will shifts the conversation to El, Mike seems to start explaining his insecurity and his own uncertainty about his relationship with El. He's expressing how unbalanced the dynamic feels to him. That he doesn't feel like El really needs him, but Will is missing what Mike really means here. Will is interpreting this as Mike needing reassurance, and in a way, Mike sort of does, but NOT in the way Will is thinking. Mike's thoughts here about El not needing him anymore, "after all this is over," I think heavily hint toward Mike attempting to explain that he's uncertain how El is going to take his truth. That yes, he still wants El to need him, but that he's not the person she needs. Will misunderstands Mike, thinking that he wants El to still need him in his relationship with El, but I don't really think this is the direction Mike's thoughts were going. So when we get this "We've been over this already" stage direction, it's made clear to us that Will thinks this is an extension of the conversation he had with Mike after Mike gets El's letter in El's bedroom, but Mike is actually continuing the conversation that he had with Will on top of the car in the junkyard, "Because what if they don't like the truth?"

And here, Mike is revealing his truth to Will, that his relationship with El was "simple, dumb luck" and not this great destined love story.

So when we get to this part about Mike saying "It's so stupid, given everything that's going on. It's just...I don't know." This scene mimics what Robin says to Steve earlier in this episode, that with everything going on, the stakes of her love life feel spectacularly low. Just like Robin, Mike is feeling selfish for centering his feelings here because he's attempting to look at the bigger picture. He thinks it's stupid to be considering his own happiness or lack thereof because El is about to have to save the world again, and he's putting aside his own internal struggles because he doesn't think his feelings really matter.

And when Will says, "You're scared of losing her," Mike nods, because he IS scared of losing El. But he's not scared of losing his relationship with El, he's scared of losing his place in her life if he puts his own feelings at the forefront here, if he acknowledges that his happiness matters.

So then we get to the painting reveal, and this is HUGE because there's so much that's going on here:

While this is still Will's POV and he's interpreting Mike's reactions, here, from the way that the scene plays out visually, we can tell that Mike finding the painting stunning is genuine, and there's a few things that that says:

1) We get a callback to the DnD line here with the VISUAL of the painting

Mike was NOT rejecting Will's idea of playing DnD and Nintendo for the rest of their lives in his basement because he thought Will was childish, and this proves it: Mike is absolutely glowing at seeing the visual representation of Will's desired life laid out here. Mike has been conditioned to believe that his wants to play DnD and engage in fantasy are something he has to give up, but he doesn't WANT to give them up, and that's so clear because Mike still keeps all of Will's DnD art up in his basement and in his room. Mike joined Hellfire and invested all this time into Eddie's campaign. He wasn't mocking Will, he was sad because he believed he couldn't have this, but now Will is giving him this painting that says everything about what Mike secretly wants, what he's been holding onto since Will left.

2) Mike is glowing because this painting is showing him that he matters

His whole conversation leading up to this scene is about his feeling inferior to El and about his putting his own happiness on the back-burner, but now he sees how he believes Will views him (since this is before Will tells him the painting is from El, which of course, it's not actually), as the hero who is leading the party. As someone who is gallant and brave, not someone who is weak in comparison to Superman or who doesn't matter.

3) Mike is overjoyed because he thinks this painting is from Will.

He's been feeling Will pull away from him since he left Hawkins, and now he's so overcome because he realizes that Will has been thinking about him the entire time and that he's just as important to Will as Will is to him. We know this because Mike follows this by asking "Did you paint this?" and his inflection in the scene is full of wonderment.

But when Mike opens the painting and Will sees his reaction, Will gets scared. He feels the need to backtrack because he still thinks that Mike wants to save his relationship with El. So we then get the stage directions here of Will attempting to "Act cool"

He kind of backs out here. He's trying not to engage with Mike romantically because he's so afraid that Mike will reject him that he's basically rejecting himself. And that's so clear from the further stage directions we get. At first, Will moves closer to Mike when explaining the painting, but that's only because he's using El as a guise and he's trying to get the message across to Mike that Mike does matter, but when Will feels himself start to trip up, to put too much of HIS emotions into telling Mike he matters, he "retreats."

Mike here is maintaining this closeness with Will, in fact, Will has Mike's whole attention, but Will can't really see past his own nose here because he thinks that revealing his whole truth means losing Mike, so once again, Will pushes Mike away, literally turning himself away from the intimacy of this moment, that Mike is completely open to.

Will is doing a lot of projecting in this scene, because Will hates himself, and so he believes that if Mike knew what he was, Mike would hate him too.

So when we get to this little exchange here, I think there's so much that could be going on, and this is perhaps the hardest scene to really gauge the full extent of what Mike is thinking/feeling

There are two main ways I think we can read this:

1) That Mike doesn't know these are Will's feelings

If that's the case, I think he's more confused in this scene because what's being shown to him (the painting, Will's art, and Will's perception of him), is not the same thing he's being told (that El cares about and needs him), which causes Mike to experience the narrative dissonance in this scene

2) Mike gets a sense Will is talking about himself, but is confused that Will believes he could lose Mike

If you've read my other analysis posts, then you know my take is that I believe Mike has always seen their friendship as being lost because Will stopped communicating with him, and not the other way around. So when Will is saying that if he's going to lose Mike, he'd rather do it quick, like ripping off a Band-aid, Mike could be not getting it because he's always been there and he could never just abandon Will, and if we read it this way, then it would nicely mirror what Jonathan tells Will later in the Surfer Boy Pizza scene.

I think either way we read this, Mike is hoping that these are Will's feelings.

He's being reassured here by Will that he won't lose El, but he's also being reassured that he won't lose Will. So it's ambiguous, and Mike is relieved I think to hear both, but he's still somewhat uncertain of the outcome of what Will is trying to say.

So from these deductions, I'm not convinced he was going to tell El he loved her at Surfer Boy Pizza. I think he was maybe ready to explain some of what he was feeling and would have probably asked her about the painting there, so that he could know for sure one way or the other.

Mike is still holding hope here that these are Will's feelings while Will thinks that he just ripped off the Band-aid and that Mike will now be happy with El without his feelings standing in the way.

It's not until the love confession that I believe Mike fully believes that maybe the painting was from El all along because Will is rejecting him and pushing him back to his relationship with El.

Let's digest that for a bit.

Okay? Okay. Now let's move on to the reunion scenes:

The first is between Mike and El:

Notice Mike calls her Eleven here again and not El? I just think that's interesting considering that Mike gave her the nickname El as an affectionate gesture in s1 and now he's consistently referring to her as Eleven throughout s4.... (which, she literally just escaped from Brenner's lab again, so this is 100% intentional mirroring of Mike and Brenner again)

Anyway, El is kind of out of it when Mike gets to her, and there's this interesting pause that happens between her and Mike before she embraces him. Now this COULD be just because she's dazed, but the fact that the stage directions stand in such stark contrast to how she embraces Will I think are telling. This pause I think is hinting to lack of resolution in their relationship, and the "WARM AND INVITING" physical presence here I really think just points to relief that they're both safe and a shared happiness to not have lost one another. It's familiar and comfortable.

However, her reunion with Will is packed with more emotion, not just visually, but in the script as well:

She pauses to embrace Mike but "rushes" to Will. And their shared bond being not of this world....definitely hints, among other things in this script, to Will's supernatural arc next season.

The description of this hug being so much stronger and more gripping than the hug between Mike and El I think also really hints to El's focus: she needs familial bonds. Will feels like home to her. And this is all the proof I need to point toward El recognizing that she's displaced her own needs to be loved onto Mike.

I really believe that so much of this points to a mutual, but separate recognition for both Mike and El that their relationship is not what either of them needs or desires anymore. The only one who doesn't recognize this is Will.

guys.

the snippet is about how will feels in that moment.

it does not mean that this is how he will feel forever, nor that byler will never happen.

him ripping off the bandaid confirms that he still believes he has lost mike. but i also think he believes this is what he has to do. he believes he can never be happy with mike. he has to help mike conform. has to help him in his relationship so he is happy. because ultimately, mike's own happiness is arguably the most important thing to will. and i think people are also forgetting that mike thought he lost will, too. we have not seen the transcript for that scene yet, but it seems like everyone is freaking out over this one section of the story, when it is only one section of the story. it is not the entire story, nor it is it the be-all and end-all for will and mike.

onto the snippet itself: we all know will is the glue that is holding mike and eleven together. he is forcing mike and eleven together because of his own hatred for himself. because he doesn't believe mike could ever love him back. considering he grew up in a rural, small, town, with not too many other queer people, it makes sense that he would think this, because he himself has never seen a queer couple, let alone another queer couple being happy. there are indicators that there were queer couples at the rink-o-mania, but to be honest, i believe will and mike were was way too focused on each other that day to actually see past each other and understand, hey, other people are queer too, and they can be happy! it is a horrid thing to believe. as a bisexual who has had a crush on a straight friend, i truly understand will's pain.

but with the sheer amount of times that mike has expressed his own doubts about his relationship with el, not to mention that they didn't speak much after his forced confession; it shows me that there is more going on within mike than will realises.

will thinks he has to keep his best friend happy in his relationship with el.

mike thinks he has to be happy in his relationship with el.

their thoughts parallel, but the things we are seeing through other scenes and subtext shows that this is not the actual truth for either of them:

will is in love with mike, and wants nothing more than for mike to love him back.

mike is experiencing comphet and struggling to ascertain his own feelings for will.

both of them are forcing themselves through unhealthy situations because they believe there is no other way. and that just comes down to:

the general miscommunication from the past year (mike calling the byers to talk to will and the line always being busy bc of joyce; will seeing the letters mike sent el and him getting none; thus resulting in both of them thinking they lost the other)

they have not had exposure to happy queer couples, therefore reinforcing the belief that heterosexuality is the only way to be

in the end, this entire situation is simply because they don't know anything else yet, they think they can't be who they are freely, and they aren't able to tell each other the truth yet. it isn't the right time just yet. and it will take something else (exposure to a queer couple, or anything of that nature) to wake them both up and realise the truth within them, not the lies they are telling.

it is not the end, don't be silly!! there is still so much more analysis to come; so much more to add to just that one moment in the van. nick himself said we will be analysing for weeks to come.

will hasn't let go of mike.

not completely.

there is no fucking way he would ever let go of him.

the band aid is not a metaphor for will 'letting his feelings for mike go.'