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"Chapter Four: Will the Wise" is the twelfth episode of Stranger Things and the fourth episode of the second season. The episode was directed by Shawn Levy and was released with the rest of season two on October 27, 2017.

Synopsis[]

An ailing Will opens up to Joyce – with disturbing results. While Hopper digs for the truth, Eleven unearths a surprising discovery.

Plot[]

While the shadow monster's tendrils take root inside of him, Will Byers is found motionless by Mike Wheeler, Dustin Henderson, Max Mayfield, and Lucas Sinclair outside Hawkins Middle while his mother tries to wake him up, only doing so when the monster finishes injecting its material into him. As Joyce leads him away, the boys observe that his episodes are getting more frequent and refuse to disclose their true nature to Max. At home, Will cannot remember what happened to him during his episode. When she shows him his picture of the shadow monster, he becomes tearful and describes it as more like a feeling, and that he does not know what it wants. Joyce promises that she will protect him from it.

Ep4-Eleven crying at the cabin

Eleven returns to the cabin to find an enraged Jim Hopper waiting out front. He lambasts her for being spotted and jeopardizing their safety. Hopper grounds her for a week and attempts to take the TV, but she holds it in place with her powers. He ends up pulling out the TV cables altogether. She angrily compares him to Martin Brenner, and locks herself in her room, tearing the cabin apart mentally while Hopper shouts at her to grow up. Jonathan Byers returns home to find his mother and brother asleep in Will's bed. As he leaves them be, Will's eyelids flutter in his sleep. Nancy Wheeler makes up a bogus excuse to be unsupervised for the day and meets up with Jonathan.

S2E4-Plant your feet

Joyce calls the Hawkins police, but cannot get in touch with Hopper. She takes Will's temperature and finds he is a few degrees under average. Dustin continues to shelter and feed a growing d'Artagnan as he goes to school, finding his friends still looking for the creature. As Scott Clarke teaches a lesson on all species' biological state of fear, Will becomes visibly nervous at the hot bath Joyce has drawn for him, and the skin on the back of his neck flares up while visions of Upside Down tunnels flash through his mind. When a perplexed Joyce insists that they need to raise his body temperature, Will states that "he likes it cold." Hopper considers apologizing to Eleven, but instead orders her to clean the cabin up and leaves.

Ep-4 Will tries to explain his now-memories

Billy Hargrove again taunts Steve Harrington while they square off in basketball, telling him his problem is that he is not planting his feet after knocking him down. In the showers, Billy and Tommy H smugly taunt him over Nancy skipping school with Jonathan the day before. While at the park and waiting to meet with Mrs. Holland, Nancy notices a man murmuring to himself. As they notice several more people watching them, they leave the park, but are stopped at their car by a man telling them to come with him. Hopper arrives at the house to find it freezing and Will clad only in his briefs. Will confirms the "he" he spoke of is the shadow monster, and describes the visions he is having as distant memories that aren't his, dubbing them "now-memories." Will describes something in his now-memories as "growing and spreading," but is unable to say what he means. Joyce tells him to draw what he means instead, and he begins to draw dozens of thick blue lines shaded by a black background.

Dr

Sam Owens shows Nancy Wheeler and Jonathan Byers the gate

Mike calls the Byers house but gets no answer, and tells Lucas and Dustin about Will's episode on Halloween. They trade theories on what is happening with him and the shadow monster, and agree to split up, Mike going to Will's house to check on him and Lucas and Dustin continuing to look for Dart. As Eleven cleans up the cabin, she finds several boxes hidden under the floorboards, and pulls out the one labeled "HAWKINS LAB". At the lab itself, Sam Owens shows Nancy and Jonathan around, insisting those responsible for the lab's mistakes are gone. He takes them to the basement and shows them the gate being burned, explaining they are unable to destroy it, but are able to stop it from spreading its tendrils. He affirms that no one else can know about it, as the gate could easily be used by enemies of the United States as a weapon. Will produces dozens of the blue lines, Hopper and Joyce initially thinking they are meaningless scribbles until Joyce realizes two of the drawings connect. They begin mapping out the connecting drawings, taping them all over the walls and floor to form an interconnected series of blue lines. Hopper realizes he is drawing vines and leaves hurriedly.

Annoyed that Mike clearly does not like her and the boys are keeping secrets from her, Max confronts Lucas about it and leaves in a huff when he does not reveal any information. Watching her talk to Lucas, Billy warns her not to hang around that "certain type of people." Eleven sees an article about Terry Ives, as well as photograph of Ives and Martin Brenner. Eleven enters the void and finds Ives in her rocking chair, still catatonic but now murmuring the same phrases repeatedly. She suddenly stops and identifies Eleven as Jane, her daughter, and Eleven recognizes her as her mother. Ives vanishes when she tries to touch her, leaving her distraught. Nancy and Jonathan are let go, and she reveals in the car that she had recorded Owens' monologue. She affirms she still wants to destroy the lab when Jonathan asks her.

Stage 4 - 2

D'Artagnan reveals himself to be a juvenile demogorgon

Mike arrives at the Byers house and tells Joyce he knows about the shadow monster. Dustin returns home to find his mother looking for their cat. He finds the glass of Dart's tank shattered with what appears to be shed skin left inside. He follows a trail of blood to a bigger Dart feasting on his dead cat. It turns around and screeches at him, its head opening up like that of a demogorgon. Hopper digs down in an infected pumpkin patch until he hits grey, organic matter. He chips at it until it retracts and reveals a hole. When he drops down into it, he finds himself in a long, dark tunnel.

Ep4-Hopper enters the tunnels

Hopper in the tunnels

Cast[]

Starring[]

Also Starring[]

Co-Starring[]

Music[]

Soundtrack[]

  • "This Is Radio Clash" by The Clash - After telling her mom she's staying at Stacey's overnight, Nancy heads outside to join Jonathan.
  • "Scarface (Push It To the Limit)" by Paul Engemann - Hopper starts his truck after getting a message about Joyce's many calls; Billy gives Steve advice on holding his ground on the court.
  • "The Growing" by The Haxan Cloak - Billy advises Max to stay away from Lucas; Hopper heads out into the pumpkin field and starts digging.

Original Score[]

  • "No Weapons" - Will explains his visions to Joyce.
  • "Inside The Black Room" - Will's temperature is low.
  • "Presumptuous" - Dustin arrives late to the search party for Dart.
  • "Photos In The Woods" - The bathwater is too hot. Again when Billy warns Max to stay away from Lucas.
  • "Looking for a Way Out" - Hopper and Joyce connect Will's drawings together.
  • "Fresh Blood" - Nancy and Jonathan listen to the voice recording Nancy made.
  • "Possessed" - Dustin finds Dart eating his cat.
  • "To Be Continued" - Hopper finds the tunnels.

Behind the scenes[]

S02E04 Behind the Scenes

Filming Will's possession sequence

One of the notable visual-effects intensive sequences of the episode was Will's confrontation and his subsequent possession by the Shadow Monster. The storyboards for each shot between Will and the monster were created by concept artist Michael Maher, Jr.[1]

The scenes were filmed on the grounds of Patrick Henry High School. For filming the sequence, visual-effects supervisor Paul Graff told that actor Noah Schnapp had to stand in the center of a circular camera track 6 feet in circumference. While the green screen was behind him, they had to rotate the camera in full circular motion to capture Noah's facial expressions. A VFX shop, Hydraulx, was responsible for digitally rendering the Shadow Monster and transforming the background into the Upside Down.[1]

David Harbour also said in an interview later that filming the argument scene in the cabin made him feel terrible on the inside, even though it was just for the show. As he said, "That was a really messed up day, when we did that scene. I mean I was feeling all messed up about it. But I did want to treat the scene with the respect it deserves and I wanted to treat Millie [Bobby Brown] with the respect she deserves as my female costar, and really give her my all and my power, and she's able to give it right back. So that was a very complicated day."

Gallery[]

View Gallery For this subject's gallery, see Will the Wise/Gallery.


Notes[]

  • In an interview, Charlie Heaton revealed "Will the Wise" was a major episode of the season.[2]
  • "Will the Wise" is the name of the wizard character played by Will Byers in the boys' Dungeons & Dragons campaigns.
  • In Beyond Stranger Things, it was revealed by Shawn Levy that the argument between Hopper and Eleven where Eleven shattered the windows was actually filmed without any visual effects, with the crews blowing out all the windows on-set.
  • The title of the fourth chapter was originally assumed to be "The Palace" because the announcement trailer for season two listed this as the fourth title. However, the titles in the trailer were out of order and only meant to "provide some hint of where [they] were going in season two without giving anything away."[3] The real title was revealed along with the titles of the six first chapters on October 9, 2017. The image representing the episode was the Shadow Monster and Will's drawing of it.
  • Eleven cries twice in this episode. First during her temper tantrum when being punished by Hopper, then when she finds Terry (after finding out she is her biological mother) in the void, but is unable to talk to her due to her disappearing, just like how Mike did in the second episode for this season.
    • She's not the only one who cries as Will also cries twice. Max does somewhat cry, but not at the state the two formers do.

References[]

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