Winona Ryder and David Harbour agree they have a Stranger Things bond to the delight of Jopper fans
Stranger Things stars Winona Ryder and David Harbour bond both on and off the set so famously, it’s no surprise they’re getting shipped as #Jopper.
Stranger Things fans just intersected with Winona Ryder’s followers, and the result is an explosion of excitement for the popular Netflix show.
Winona first captured our interest in 1986 with Lucas. She quickly became a breakout star in movies such as Heathers (1988), Mermaids (1990), and Edward Scissorhands (1990). What her roles in those films had in common with her Stranger Things character is Winona Ryder’s willingness to, as her co-star David Harbour told the Los Angeles Times, “explore personal, intimate things that most actors get to a certain point and go, ‘That’s enough,’ … like the complexities of the human psyche, which is messed up and strange and wonderful and mysterious and horrible.”
Harbour and Ryder are both earning attention for their skill in smoothly becoming part of the Stranger Things world. David portrays police chief Jim Hopper while Winona plays a single mom, Joyce Byers. After having a high school romance, the two meet in the present with Hopper helping Joyce’s son. And there’s something so magnificently mesmerizing about their interactions that fans are shipping them as #Jopper.
Reflecting on their chemistry, Harbour pointed out that the two have “twin flames, which are like soul mates who burn off karma together.” The Stranger Things actor described Jopper as “two lost people who don’t think they need anything who actually need each other.” Harbour also took time to praise Ryder’s performance, promising that “there are moments [in Stranger Things] where you fall in love with Winona.”
Ryder and Harbour share the goal of using their roles in Stranger Things to show emotional truths. David described himself as “hungry to work with Winona” for that reason.
"[Winona Ryder is] willing to cut me and be cut and we’ll bleed together. And that’s a rare thing. We’re willing to go the distance in that way that gets really uncomfortable. I want to do a scene with Winona where I get so messed up that I have to go back to my trailer and cry."
Harbour and Ryder also have taken the time to create histories for their characters. Winona envisions Joyce, for example, as getting “into the hippie thing” at one point in her life. David sees Hopper as being “a New York cop in the ’70s, probably when Frank Serpico was a cop.”
Ultimately, says the Stranger Things actor, Hopper and Joyce are “two people who can’t be together because of their pride.”
But never say never.
David hinted that Stranger Things will explore the “vulnerability” of their characters in ways that could turn Jopper into a relationship as famous as “Indiana Jones and Marion, Han Solo and Princess Leia and Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway.”
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Above all, adds Winona, Stranger Things is focused on “finding the truth,” with viewers watching as Hopper and Joyce unite onscreen despite the challenges. Somewhere, in a galaxy far, far away, Han Solo and Princess Leia are cheering.