WARNING: “Stranger Things” Season 4 spoilers are ahead.
Noah Schnapp is busting down the closet door for his character Will Byers in the hit Netflix series “Stranger Things.”
The 17-year-old actor has previously left Will’s preferences to the interpretation of viewers. But after the season finale dropped on the streaming service, he revealed to Variety that Will is gay and is in love with his best friend, Mike Wheeler (played Finn Wolfhard).
“Obviously, it was hinted at in Season 1,” he said of Will’s gradual comfortability. “It was always kind of there, but you never really knew, is it just him growing up slower than his friends? Now that he’s gotten older, they made it a very real, obvious thing.
“Now it’s 100% clear that he is gay and he does love Mike,” Schnapp confirmed. “But before, it was a slow arc. I think it is done so beautifully because it’s so easy to make a character just, like, all of a sudden be gay.”
He also revealed that the scene where Will’s brother, Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), nonverbally supports him coming out was added into the script after executive producers Matt and Ross Duffer saw his now meme-able scene in which he cries in a van.
“It’s also very important for people to see that Will is not alone — because all we ever see of him is struggling and feeling depressed and that he can’t be himself,” he said of Jonathan’s protectiveness seen in the rearview mirror.
“Jonathan is talking to him in code — it’s just the perfect way to tell someone like Will that he cares about him and he accepts him no matter what,” he concluded. “I think it was really wholesome.”
Schnapp also declared he made amends with pop star Doja Cat as he infamously posted a DM exchange to TikTok in which the “Need To Know” singer asked Schnapp to set her up with his co-star, Joseph Quinn. His share of their conversation incurred Doja’s wrath.
“I’m super unserious on social media and pretty goofy, so I posted that not thinking too much of it, but obviously it hurt her feelings,” Schnapp said.
“So, as I should, I apologized and she was totally okay with it, and was like, ‘I’m sorry how I reacted,’” he said of Doja, who reportedly lost nearly 200,000 followers because of her reaction, while Schnapp apparently gained close to 2 million fans. “It was all good. I love her. I’m like the biggest fan of her music.”
Season 4 of “Stranger Things” is now streaming on Netflix.
