r/Eleven_StrangerThings

In the past week, Millie has been busily promoting Enola Holmes 3, and inevitably Stranger Things came-up, more than once.

And, it feels like some deliberate hints were dropped:

1. Millie is obviously still very upset by the ending, as was clear during her Joshua Horowitz podcast. The fact that she nearly broke down in tears, to the point where some tissues had to be brought out for her, more than 6 months after the ST ending first aired, was pretty shocking to witness. Her deep attachment to Eleven, and her insistence in believing that El is still alive or the depression which she felt throughout January will return, was also clear, along with her irritation at many of her castmates stating that they think El is dead.

- interestingly, despite firmly stating that he believed El was dead earlier in the year, at the Milan fan event last month Caleb hedged his bets this time, and was more willing to accept the idea that she was still alive. David Harbour's comments that he believed that Netflix would make an Eleven-focused series if they thought it would make money, and Noah and Cara Buono stating that they believed she was alive, were also noteworthy.

2. She all-but-admitted that El is still alive. She did not say this out loud, but the hints were pretty obvious.

3. In the Discourse Podcast, and in another Enola Holmes interview, she clearly stated that she is not finished with Eleven, and would love to explore her life say, in her 30's. This is another interesting hint, perhaps the most interesting given in the past week.

As things like this are rarely said by accident in interviews like these, is Millie dropping deliberate hints here?

The timing of all of these developments is interesting for a few reasons. First, ownership of the Stranger Things IP legally passed from the Duffers to Netflix in mid-April. Second, the negative impact of the ending upon the Stranger Things franchise is being exposed by the Tales from '85 series' viewing figures, which are down because seeing Mike and El together in it is more depressing because of knowing what their ultimate fate - at present - is. Third, Netflix have now got the HBO Max Harry Potter series hurtling towards them in only 5 months, and that will surely give them serious streaming competition, which they will need to answer.

Is something now being planned, in the early stages at least? Millie is clearly willing to return to the role in future, which removes the biggest obstacle to giving Eleven a better ending. Are she and Netflix potentially planning something now, to the point where hints like we have gotten in the past week can now be dropped?

I’ve read a couple fics for Mileven that have a “realistic“ reunion for them. But honestly, I say screw realism. Was the way they were separated in the final realistic? Was their reunion in season 2 realistic? This might just be me, but I think they deserve to have a happy, “unrealistic“ reunion after everything they’ve been through.

To all of you people saying “oh eleven’s ending is misogynistic” or “They were fridging! So sexist“, this is for you.

Honestly, calling Eleven’s ending "misogynistic" completely misses the entire point of her character arc, and it feels like you're just throwing around buzzwords because you didn't get the fluffy, fan-fiction ending you wanted. For five seasons, her entire struggle was about fighting for her own autonomy against people like Brenner and the military who wanted to use her as a weapon. In the finale, her deciding to fake her death and isolate herself isn't her being "oppressed"—it's her making a tactical, independent choice to protect her friends and completely outsmart her abusers. That is the literal definition of narrative agency, but you’re reducing her ultimate act of free will to her being a passive victim just because it makes you sad.

It is also incredibly dense to act like a female character making a heroic sacrifice is automatically sexist. This is textbook, gender-neutral mythological storytelling; look at Frodo Baggins or Harry Potter, who both had to leave their normal lives behind because they were too changed by their trauma to just go back to playing D&D in a basement. If Mike or Hopper had done the exact same thing to stop Dr. Kay, you would be calling it an epic, legendary sacrifice and praising the writing. Holding Eleven to a different standard just because she's a girl, and demanding she get a neat little domestic happy ending instead of a grand heroic conclusion, is the actual regressive take here.

Finally, if you actually paid attention to the literal plot of the episode instead of just crying over the bittersweet tone, you’d know she didn’t even die. Thanks to the plan with Kali, she completely tricked the government and successfully escaped the system that hunted her for her entire life. The final shots show her alive, free, and living peacefully by a waterfall, away from the violence and the lab. She isn't some tragic prop sacrificed for the boys' emotional growth; she is a survivor who won her freedom on her own terms and beat the system, so please stop twisting a massive victory into a sob story about sexism.