The upcoming Teen Wolf movie should show more of the relationship between Lydia Martin and Stiles Stilinski. Airing on MTV from 2011 to 2017, Teen Wolf focused on Scott McCall (Tyler Posey) as a young werewolf who defends the California town of Beacon Hills from supernatural threats with the help of loyal friends. Those friends included Stiles (Dylan O’Brien) and Lydia (Holland Roden). From the show’s very first episodes, Stiles and Lydia were positioned as a potential romantic pairing. And after several years of teasing the possibility with pivotal scenes, the two got together in the final season.
After the recent announcement that a Teen Wolf follow-up movie is in the works with original cast members potentially returning, fans have already dusted off a checklist of storylines that they’re hoping the project will address. From mysteriously disappearing supporting players like Danny (Keahu Kahuanui) to how the characters’ lives have changed, there is no shortage of ways that the movie can satisfy longtime fans. But one thing that should be taken into consideration, particularly with how the sixth and final season unfolded, is the relationship between Stiles and Lydia.
Commonly referred to by fans as Stydia, the two share a breakthrough moment in the premiere episode of season 6. Stiles finally tells Lydia that he loves her. However, due to O’Brien’s scheduling conflicts at the time with Maze Runner: The Death Cure, Stiles was missing for most of Teen Wolf’s sixth and final season. When the character briefly returns, Stydia shared a kiss and they seem to at last try their hand at dating each other. And in the series finale, through flashforwards to a few years in the future, it appears that they’re still a couple. But for some fans, that’s precisely the issue. After drawing out the relationship between Lydia and the season six-missing Stiles for the entirety of the show, it barely seems to matter when they actually get together.
This is a problem with most of Teen Wolf’s relationships. The show’s writers would often devote plenty of screentime to establishing a certain couple’s rapport, before pulling away from that couple for several episodes at a time to focus on something else. The problem was particularly pronounced with Stydia. In some episodes, they would interact heavily, and they’d seem like the most important people to each other. And then, abruptly, nearly half a season could pass with barely any Stydia scenes. The inconsistency, often frustrating to viewers, is something that the upcoming movie could fix.
The movie could also shed light on the relationship between Scott and Malia (Shelley Hennig) which was set up by the finale, in addition to the new couple of Melissa McCall (Melissa Ponzio) and Chris Argent (JR Bourne). But, unlike those relationships, there was a lot of build for Stydia. Fans should get a chance to see what they’re actually like as a couple. Do they bicker and banter, as they occasionally have, or do they bring out the best in one another? Do they do both, alternatingly depending on the situation? And crucially, do they even make sense together romantically, in the long-term, or are they better off as friends? After the final season failed a very popular pairing, both because of scheduling and the writers’ own split attention, the Teen Wolf movie has a chance to offer a needed corrective.