Will is startled and runs off the road, tumbling off his bike. He picks himself up and runs away, eventually reaching his own house. The location of the Byers' house, down a long dirt driveway on the edge of town, seems symbolic of their position in the community as well as their emotional state. This a family that is isolated, physically, socially, emotionally, financially. It is from that position of isolation that Jonathan and Joyce must begin to reach the Sheriff and Nancy.
Back in the house, Will locks himself in and tries the phone, which stops working just as his bike light did. He realizes that doors alone will not protect him. He runs out back to a detached garage, where he unexpectedly pulls a small rifle off the wall and begins loading it. The literary implications of such a literal Chekhov gun are pretty obvious, and this is one that is never fired, since Will is surprised by the creature from behind. However, I think with something so obvious, that there is an implied meaning as well. While the audience has been encouraged to think of Will as a defenseless child, Will instead demonstrates unexpected resources. The Gun is symbolic of the fact that Will might not be as defenseless as he appears.
Interestingly, we don't ever see Will get taken by the monster. The camera focuses in tight on the light bulb, which surges brightly for a moment, and then returns to normal. When we pan back out, the garage is empty. Until now, when the monster appears, the lights have been flickering. I'm not sure if this surge is the same effect, or suggests something else.
The Next Morning
The next scene opens in the home of Hopper, starting with a child's drawing on the wall. The picture is of a family: two parents and a child - obviously a little girl. In contrast to this domestic scene, we pan to beer cans littering the table, a heavily used ash tray, and Hopper himself asleep on the couch, half-dressed in the midst of the mess.We see him smoking and drinking another beer to wash down a prescription medicine as he gets himself ready for work, already late. It is only as we see him adjusting his gun belt and pin on his badge that we realize that he is some form of law enforcement. Although he pulls himself together, this is obviously not a well man. As he heads out the door, the TV news warns of gathering storms.
Our third rule of interpretation was: Symbols Matter. I think there is something meaningful about the fact that Hopper is taking something from a prescription medicine bottle. This isn't just Advil for his hangover. This is something different, and it is thrown in here very purposefully; part of the core makeup and background of Hopper's character - like the drawing on the wall.
The same morning, Joyce and Jonathan notice the absence of Will, and we get a glimpse of how these two interact. While they are mother and son, we also see a little co-parenting as well with Jonathan making breakfast and working extra shifts to make ends meet.
We shift to the three D&D players coming to middle school. We introduce the two bullies who form their own personal monsters, who make fun of Dustin because of his cleidocranial displasia. But Mike makes an interesting comment, saying that it's like a super power. As I've felt in other situations, I don't think this was merely casual dialogue and that particular line probably means something to the writers.
Meanwhile, over at the high school, we begin to set the social landscape with Nancy in transition between being mostly unnoticed and now becoming the girlfriend of the rich and popular Steve. Barbara, her best friend, is an interested spectator from the sidelines, as Nancy meets Steve in the bathroom and sets up a rendezvous for later that night. A recurring element of Nancy's character is that of being caught between two worlds, and of being able to transition between them. Between the world of the Boys in middle school and high school, between the world of Barb and of Steve, and later between this world and the Upside Down. We will see that she is one of four to ever make that trip safely.
Hopper finally makes it to work, and it is unexpectedly revealed that he isn't just some police officer, but is in fact the Chief of Police for the Town of Hawkins. Why I think this is interesting is that it sets up the pattern for Hopper, that there is far more to him than we realize, than is apparent from just looking at him. Joyce Byers is in his office, reporting her missing son. The exchange between them seems to reveal that Joyce and Hopper have some history. This isn't the formal and awkward meeting between strangers, but there is some obvious familiarity between them.
Joyce says, " Look, he's not like you, Hopper. He's not like me. He's not like most. ... Kid's they're mean. They make fun of him, they call him names. They laugh at him, at his clothes."
Hopper: His clothes? What's wrong with his clothes?
Joyce: I don't know. Does that matter?
Hopper: ... Maybe
Joyce: Look, He's a sensitive kid.
With any dialogue like this, my instinct is to take it very literally. His mother, Joyce, is very clearly stating that there is something different about Will. Possibly in the same way that there is something different about Eleven.
I haven't figured out why Hopper had latched on to the mention of clothes. Possibly it is a reference to the fact that Eleven had a particular relationship to clothes throughout this story. Joyce could be describing Eleven and her meeting with the boys in the same way that the D&D game foreshadowed what happened to Will. Initially, they laugh at her, and call her Weirdo. Even though she is dressed in funny clothes, Eleven - like Will - is a good person. Does that matter, the story asks. And the writers answer, Maybe.
We also pick up from this conversation that Will's father lives in Indianapolis and that Hopper has only been working in Hawkins for 4 years.
The scene shifts to Hawkins Labs, as official government vehicles arrive in the compound and the occupants are met by Dr Brenner. They don quarantine suits, arm themselves with machine guns, and enter the room where the breach occurred. This is the same elevator where the technician was eaten the day before.. As they walk down the hallway, we see the motes floating in the air, signalling the Upside Down. Scratches on the wall, and bubbling residual ectoplasm seem to indicate the passage of the monster. They locate the breach, which is grown over with vines or tentacles, stretching outward to cover a gateway or portal.
Govt Man: Is this where it came from?
Dr Brenner: Yes
Govt Man: And the girl?
Brenner: She can't have gone far.
We see "the girl" herself in the next frame, barefoot, and dressed in a hospital gown; the funny clothes Joyce mentioned. She sneaks into a diner and steals french fries, because she is obviously starving. The question here is, why is she so hungry? If she has only that evening escaped from the Lab are we suggesting that they don't feed her in there? She's not just hungry for breakfast; she's wolfing down french fries, and later a hamburger, like she hasn't eaten for several days. My suspicion is that she had something to do with the escape of the monster from Hawkins Labs, that using her mental powers makes her hungry, though we never get a clear explanation of what actually happened that night at the lab.
Back at middle school, Mike, Dustin and Lucas introduce us to the science teacher who we see will be a resource for all things unexplained. He shows them a newly arrived HAM radio set but is interrupted by the school principal who has Chief Hopper with him, trying to get some information about Will.
Meanwhile Joyce and Jonathan are also out looking for him at his fort in the woods. But the jump cut is not to the present day but to a memory of when Joyce found Will there earlier. We can see the closeness of their relationship. In the present day, however, Castle Byers is empty and Joyce is becoming increasingly desperate. As Joyce walks away, the curtains that had hung loosely a moment before flap and flutter in the wind, almost frantically, but Joyce has already turned her back and does not notice. I suspect that this was Will's first attempt to communicate with his mother from the Upside Down.
Back at the diner, the owner feeds Eleven a hamburger and attempts to find out something about her. What's chilling is that El seems to be very wary of all adults, and particularly these kinds of conversations. She flinches visibly when Benny mentions making a deal with her. After Benny notices the tattoo on her arm, she eventually points to herself and says, "Eleven". Benny calls social services while El eats, and in the first demonstration of her powers, stops the annoying electric fan with the power of her mind.
Hopper and his deputies travel out to the road that Mike and Lucas told him was Will's normal path home. Again, Hopper is seen taking some kind of prescription medicine, when he finds Will's bike down off the road.
Nearby, the scene shifts to a room full of people listening to headsets which appear to be monitoring all the phone conversations that are happening in Hawkins. The implication is that everyone in Hawkins has been bugged and are under audio surveillance and that this is being done by the Hawkins Lab.
At home, Joyce is becoming increasingly agitated calling her ex-husband when Hopper drives up with Will's bike. He begins to look around and discovers the shed in the backyard. He notices the box of bullets, and also that a gun is missing from the wall, but at that moment, the light in the shed goes out
 |
| What does Hopper find so fascinating here? |
Wild Speculation: my own interpretation is that something happened here in the garage that marked a turning point in Hopper's investigation of Will Byers' disappearance. Up until this point, he was still of the opinion that Will had run away, or was off having a personal adventure, something that would be put right in a few hours. After those few minutes in the shed, Hopper was convinced that the boy was in serious trouble and that a town wide mobilization was necessary to conduct a search. Yes, the finding of the abandoned bike was a first step, and the realization that Will was scared enough to take a rifle.
But I feel like something happened in those moments when the light went out and he was searching in the dark with a flashlight, something that triggered a memory or brought a flash of insight that he was dealing with a much larger and more dangerous issue. On a symbolic level, this is an iconic image of Chief Hopper as a character: alone in the dark, searching for something with a flashlight. This is a role that Hopper continues to play throughout the rest of the chapters.
That Evening
The scene shifts to the Wheeler residence where the family is eating dinner. Mike is agitated because Will hasn't been found, while Nancy is angling to be allowed to visit Barb for studying, though her real intention is to meet Steve. Again we see Mrs Wheeler in charge of the household, while Ted, the father, is basically ignoring it. But she does seem to be overreacting to the situation.Mrs Wheeler: Am I speaking Chinese in this house? Until we know that Will is OK, no one leaves.
After Nancy storms off, the Mr Wheeler says to Mike:
Ted: You see Michael? You see what happens?
Mike: What happens when what? I'm the only one acting normal here!
Not only is Mike absolutely correct, but again he is foreshadowing the way that Joyce Byers will begin to feel in her search for her son. While her behavior appears increasingly erratic and her mind seems unhinged, everything that she says throughout the next chapter is absolutely true and she, in fact, is acting with complete rationality. We see it here symbolically with Mike, and then the larger parallel with Joyce.
Wild Speculation: I also see something else in this scene that is completely lacking in foundation but is built out of innuendo and fantasy. I see the father reacting in a particular way that suggests that you shouldn't rock the boat, you shouldn't get involved, you shouldn't take a stand or stick out in any way. I suspect that Ted and even Karen Wheeler, know something about what happened eleven years ago, and what Ted learned from that traumatic incident he is attempting to pass on to his son Mike.
I suspect that by complying and keeping his head down that he saved his own son from something monstrous back then, and that it crippled his authority as head of the house ever since. And I think that Karen Wheeler knows something about this capitulation on Ted's part, eleven years ago, and that she is deeply angry about it and angry with him, and she desperately wants to protect her own children because she thinks she has an inkling about what is going on in the woods outside Hawkins and she is terrified of it. This is the source of her apparent over-reaction. Again, this is all Wild Speculation
Out in the woods, Chief Hopper is leading the search for Will It is long past dark, and the science teacher that we saw earlier with the boys and the HAM radio introduces himself to Hopper, "I don't think we've met. Scott Clark." he extends his hand which Hopper shakes.
Hopper: I always had a distaste for science
Clark: Ah, maybe you had a bad teacher.
Hopper: yeah, Miss Ratliff was a piece of work
Clark: Ratliff? You bet... She's still kicking around, believe it or not.
Hopper: Oh I believe it. Mummies never die, so they tell me.
What's interesting about this exchange is that it confirms something that we suspected from his conversation with Joyce. Hopper went to school here in Hawkins. This is Hopper's home town.
Hopper: Sara, my daughter. ...Galaxies, the universe, and what not, she always understood all that stuff. I always figured there was enough going on down here, I never needed to look elsewhere.
Clark: Your daughter, what grade is she? Maybe I'll get her in my class.
Hopper: No, she uh... She lives with her mom in the city.
...
Unnamed Woman: She died few years back.
Clark: Sorry?
Woman: His kid.
So what is happening with Hopper? Why did he tell Clark that story about her daughter still being alive and living with her mother when it is common knowledge that she has died? Is it that he can't bring himself to face the truth, or is there more to the story? And while we're thinking about Hop's daughter, consider that Hopper is referring to a girl that died over four years ago. If we assume for a moment that Sara would be eleven if she were still alive, this means that Sara understood concepts like galaxies and the universe well enough to impress an adult like her father, when she was 6 or 7 years old. That is certainly a precocious child.
Wild speculation: Hopper professes that he "always had a distaste for science." I think that Hopper had a bad experience with science, something that caused him to mistrust it. And it wasn't merely science's inability to save the life of his daughter. I think his use of the "always" is more inclusive than that. Possibly that he was forced to work with scientific technology and his experiences were negative.
Back in their rooms, Mike calls Lucas on their walkie-talkies. While Mike is sneaking out to meet Lucas, Steve is sneaking into Nancy's bedroom window.
Benny is washing up in the diner at the end of the day while Eleven is still eating, ice cream this time.Social services knocks on the front door but it quickly becomes apparent that they are the troglodytes from Hawkins Lab in disguise when the nice lady shoots Benny in the back. Eleven tries to run but two men come in the back door, cutting off her escape. We shift to the front of the diner for a moment and when we come back, the two men are dead on the floor and eleven has escaped into the night.
Out in the woods, the storm that the newscaster promised has finally arrived and Justin, Lucas, and Mike are out in the rain. Nancy is in her bedroom with Steve, but surprisingly they are actually studying chemistry. Steve tries to move this more physical stuff but they step back from the brink.
Meanwhile Joyce and her son Jonathan are looking over pictures of Will, trying to find some for the Lost posters. Jonathan is overcome by his feelings of guilt and Joyce absolves him of blame.
Joyce Byers: No. You can't do that to yourself. This was not your fault; do you hear me? He is close. I know it. I feel it. In my heart. You have to trust me on this, OK?
Remember that everything that Joyce says is completely true and accurate. Will is close and Jonathan should trust his mother on this. Joyce is a Cassandra-like figure; she knows the truth but is fated never to be believed.
At that moment, the phone rings and Joyce rushes to answer. All she can hear is static and the sound of someone taking gasping breaths on the other end. Despite the confusing sounds, Joyce identifies it as Will moments before a static discharge arcs from the phone, shocking her and destroying it.
Joyce: It was him, I know it was his breathing, I know it was his breathing.
Walking in the woods, the three boys are completely drenched by the soaking rain and Dustin wants to turn back.
Dustin: Did you ever think that Will went missing because he ran into something bad? And we're going in the exact same spot where he was last seen, and we have no weapons or anything.
Mike: Dustin, shut up.
Dustin: I'm just staying, does that seem smart to your?
Mike: Shut up!
And at that moment, the three boys turn and find Eleven, soaked by the rain.
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