okay this started off as a bit but then it just kept getting longer. so uh. the losers as canadians, I GUESS????
for my non-canadian friends: being canadian is basically just like being american (so either imagine the US if you're american, or imagine some random high school movie) there's just less billboards and if you're french you can buy alcohol while still in high school, but i was thinking about it, if anything would be notably different about the losers if they were canadian.
and then it struck me! they're french immersion students!
derry is now derry, ontario, a rural township 30 minutes from vankleek hill and about an hour from the quebec border. they have one k-8 school and one 9-13 school that sit side by side on a river. the town has a pretty strong francophone foundation, but in recent years english speakers have been moving up from southern ontario, and the town is now pretty evenly split french/english.
but thats not what we're here for!! so: losers!
bill, eddie, stanley, and richie have been in the same class every year since they were four on account of being french immersion students (schools will typically only have enough french immersion students for one or two classes, and with derry being a small town with a growing english population i think even families who spoke french at home would begin putting their children in the english stream)
when they were five stan started crying trying to color the northwest territories with a crayon on a map of canada assignment, bill lent him his color pencils which is how they became friends
richie could not spell saskatchewan to save his life, and fits "scasckatchawan" into the space on the map in horrible squished letters, stan is aghast at this, and richie realizes his opportunity to get a rise out of stan, so he does an even worse job than normal, this is how they become friends
eddie can't spell saskatchewan either but is embarrassed to admit it because he doesn't want to be grouped in with a dumbass like richie, he announces that he thinks the assignment is stupid, and richie immediately dares him to spell it. a friendgroup is born.
eddie, ben, beverly, and mike all have english as a first language, richie and stan learned both simultaneously, and bill has french as a first language
eddie's paternal grandparents immigrated from poland, and since they wanted frank to speak both polish and english, they decided not to bother with french, sonia met frank at an english university and moved up to derry with him when they got married, they speak english at home, and sonia never learned polish. the plan was to have frank teach eddie polish but he died before he could, so sonia puts eddie in french immersion so he'll still be bilingual
ben is from labrador and had to move to derry to live with his aunt. ben had been in french immersion when he was living in labrador, because arlene figured it would give him more opportunities, so he continued with it in derry
beverly's mom was from a french speaking part of quebec, but her dad never learned french. he puts her in french immersion since he can't teach her french himself.
mike speaks english at home but the only nearby catholic school was a french school closer to the quebec border, so he's the most fluent of the four. theres no catholic high school nearby so he ends up going to derry high with the rest of the losers where he takes advanced french
maggie and went are both quebecois, but went is from montreal and grew up speaking english, whereas maggie is from a small town north of quebec city and grew up speaking french. they're both french/english bilingual and speak both at home.
richie has grown fond of speaking in an unholy sort of "franglais" that mostly consists of english words with a godawful quebec accent, french swears, and incorrect verb conjugation he picked up from eddie
maggie is an angry ex-catholic who swears a lot (most french canadian swears are religion based and lowkey sacrilegious in nature) and has a pretty strong quebec accent. richie, does not, except for when he's swearing in french (or stressed or angry), this isn't even a bit on his part, he just emulated the way his mom said the words. his friends point out that he sounds like a very angry lumberjack when he says "tabarnak" and he bases an entire Voice on it
stan's parents both grew up in derry when it was a mainly french speaking community, but wanted to make sure stanley would fit in with his peers who were becoming more and more english, so he learns both from birth
bill's parents both immigrated from france and only speak french, bill is french french and is frequently confused by the differences between quebec french and france french. he starts speaking in a pretty distinctly french canadian way because of richie, and starts swearing like a french canadian (like a sailor), also because of richie, his parents are horrified.
when they're in high school richie won't stop making fun of bill for being french and bill's like??? you're french too??? and richie's like. no. i'm french canadian, you're actually french. eddie points out that richie's thing is worse.
richie uses pretty much exclusively french-canadian swears (of which there are many) because of maggie, his friends will sometimes say these things because he says them so frequently, but none of them have quebec accents, so it sounds horrible and awkward and richie mocks them relentlessly whenever this happens
every time one of the losers turn 18 they drive up to quebec so they can get a drink lol. even for the losers who don't want to drink they drive up to quebec, and make the birthday boy/girl show the bartender their ID and ask for like. an apple juice. it is very funny.
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