Why Max Broke Up With Lucas In Stranger Things 4
Warning: This article contains spoilers for Stranger Things season 4.
In the time between Stranger Things seasons 3 and 4, Max broke up with Lucas, and this time it stuck. Stranger Things 4's Max story is one of the season's central points, focusing on her reaction to Billy's sacrifice and what the fallout of his death has done to her home life. Her grief is palpable during the season, but it's only one of the reasons she broke things off with Lucas.
Stranger Things season 3 suggests Max has dumped Lucas a number of times since they first started dating at the end of season 2. Treating breakups as more of a cooling-off period, Max would dump Lucas whenever she felt he needed to apologize to her or make things right. In Stranger Things season 4, a distance between the two of them is suggested that feels less like the games of young love.
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One focus in Stranger Things season 4 is Max's guilt over Billy's death, symbolized by the Kate Bush song, «Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God).» It's suggested that Max has survivor guilt, wishing she could go back and switch places with Billy. While Lucas shows that he wants to be there for Max, he doesn't really have a frame of reference to help understand or contextualize her feelings and the changes in her life. While everything between them seemed okay at the end of Stranger Things season 3, grief can take time to manifest fully and many of the changes in Max's life were only just beginning at that point. Lucas shows that he's also undergone many changes in the season break and seems to be at a crucial point of change in his life.
Max is haunted by Billy's death—so much so that Billy returns
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