"Better a fallen rocket than never a burst of light."
~ Tom Stoppard, The Invention of Love

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Favorite Characters: Eleven (Stranger Things)


It’s to this child’s credit that I heard the name “Eleven” throughout the whole of season 1 and never thought about Matt Smith.  Since the latest season of Stranger Things dropped earlier this summer, it’s got me thinking about the Hawkins gang again, and while the show has plenty of good things going for it, Eleven remains my favorite (Eleven-related spoilers that can’t be avoid.)

The creepy small child with powers is a hallmark of supernatural/horror-type stuff, and Eleven’s introduction certainly fits the bill on that.  She’s raised in a mysterious lab by shadowy government scientists, first appears in a hospital gown with a shaved head, can actually kill people with her mind, and speaks mostly in cryptic single-word sentences.  Check, check, and check.  Her powers are by turns awesome (that truck, man) and horrifying, both for her (making contact with the Demogorgon) and those around her (effortlessly snapping someone’s neck with her telekinesis.)  Seeing her in action, the boys are alternately excited, wowed, scared, and sobered by what she can do.

But hand in hand with the powers go Eleven’s trauma.  This girl has been horrifically messed-up by the scientist who’s taught her to call him “Papa,” who kidnapped her and has been grooming her to be a spy/future weapon against the Russians, who pushes her toward a monster from another dimension to poke at it because he wants to see what will happen, who calls her the number he tattooed on her body, who shoves her into the enclosed spaces he knows she fears, who looks at the destructive force of her powers and sees potential.  When she escapes at the start of the series, Eleven is terrified, plagued by guilt over something she hadn’t wanted to do in the first place, and completely disoriented by the world around her.

One of the real joys of the series is Eleven discover the world.  In season 1, I love her wonder at eating Eggos, and I just adore that moment where, after Dustin’s repeatedly tried to get her to float the Millennium Falcon model with her powers, she does it for fun when she’s alone in the house.  It’s wonderful to see her learning what friends are and that people can be kind.  In season 2, she seems to find one prison traded for another, albeit more well-intentioned, one (the road to hell, Hopper…), and she chafes at her protective constraints.  She and Hopper get angry with each other in that painful/yearning way that only people who really care about each other can.  She seeks to uncover her past, understand who and what she is, and figure out what that means for her.  In season 3, she navigates “normal” tween life with having superpowers: kissing boys, making friends, sneaking out and enjoying the mall.  She struggles to understand the quagmire of boy/girl relationships and immature boys who don’t say what they feel, but she also has honest fun and comes into herself more than ever as a person – the delight in her eyes as she snaps those suspenders is one of the purest things I’ve seen all summer.

On the flipside, it breaks my heart to see how used she is.  Even the kis, who do like her, are often preoccupied with what she can do for them.  Demonstrate her powers.  Contact Will.  Find Will.  Find the gate.  Heck, open a locked door.  In season 1, when the kids finally connect with the adults and the teens, even though they’ve spent the day hiding from Eleven’s former captors and Eleven is burnt out from flipping a truck with her mind, she’s immediately asked to make contact with Will and Barb in the Upside Down.  I understand the impulse, since a) the stakes are super-real and b) she can do what no one else can, but I’m sure that’s what Dr. Brenner thought, too.  In light of all she’s been through and been forced to do, it makes me sad that even the people who are nice to her make demands of her and, despite whatever earnest kindness they show her, take a long time to indicate that they’d still like her if she didn’t do things for them.  She deserves more than that, and thank goodness Max comes along.  As the two girls develop a friendship in season 3, it’s super-satisfying to see Max take Eleven under her wing and teach her the ways, not just of being a tween girl, but of doing what she wants. Whether that means breaking the rules or saying for herself what she can and can’t handle (Eleven’s a hero, so she’s naturally inclined to want to help anyway, but it’s important that it’s her choice to make,) it’s high time Eleven had someone in her corner who gives her that space.

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