(Credits: Netflix)

Joyce made one thing crystal clear to Vecna as he was gasping for his last breaths in the series finale of Stranger Things on Netflix: you don’t mess with the Byers and get away with it; you pay it with your dear life, no matter what it takes!

As she takes up that iconic axe in her hand, all ready to give Vecna a piece of his mind, she tells him, “You fucked with the wrong family.”

Speaking of that knowing scene, Winona Ryder recalled in her conversation with Tudum, “I remember when he was in that position, and we were talking about bands, and he’s the most lovely person. I came in that day just for that. You can’t rehearse a scene like that. You just have to sort of save it for the take. I think I only did it twice.”

While Stranger Things ensured the moms of Hawkins got their heroic moments in the fifth and final season, as was previously evident with Karen Wheeler brandishing a broken wine bottle to attack a Demogorgon and later blowing up a trio of Demodogs, the question that makes all of us curious is why Joyce was the one who got to deliver the final deadly blow to the big bad of the show.

Well, according to co-creators and co-showrunners Matt and Ross Duffer, it just had to be her. “We talked a lot about who should deal the final blow to Vecna, and we really went through everyone. And at the end of the day, it felt like it had to be Joyce because Joyce was the one in the first season who’s the first one to really take action, to believe that something strange was going on,” Ross Duffer revealed.

“And that fierce love she has for not only Will but her family and the others is a superpower in its own way. And so, we thought if anyone is going to defeat this guy, it had to be Joyce.” Ross Duffer further acknowledged, “Of course, she uses the axe early on in the season, but she’s just swiping at the Demogorgon, and we wanted her to actually use that thing.”

Earlier in the first season, although Joyce was audacious and ready to swing it, she never really got to leverage her choice of weapon against the monsters. Hence, it made sense to give her the ultimate payoff after nine years to actually use the axe to kill the ultimate villain.

Meanwhile, Noah Schnapp, who portrayed Joyce’s on-screen son, chimed in, saying, “I was always kind of curious how they were going to write that ending of who will really defeat Vecna. And I think it was so fitting and perfect that it was Joyce, and it’s very reminiscent of season one and very full circle.” But according to Matt Duffer, this was not the only remarkable first they had saved for Joyce Byers in Stranger Things.

“We haven’t used the F-word in the show, and we’ve been looking for a moment for it. I think Dacre muttered it without us wanting him to in season three’s ‘The Sauna Test.’ So I guess this technically doesn’t count as the first time, but we were looking for a real moment that would deserve stronger language, and we’ve been saving it and felt like, well, if we’re going to go there, this is the moment for it. Let’s give it to Winona,” he said.