Jean

Well I don't think they ever saw Neal as a character. They saw him as Rumple's Holy Grail. Except they gave Rumple his Holy Grail too easy and too soon and now no longer know what to do with Rumple. That's the real problem. It's not so much they didn't know what to do with Neal, more they don't know how to write for Rumple anymore. Neal had to go because he and Belle occupy the same role for Rumple and they weren't getting rid of Belle. Notice they never had those 2 interacting with Rumple at the same time in any meaninful way. After Manhattan, Rumple didn't get to interact with Neal. He was tied up with LacyBelle. Then in Neverland they ditched Belle so that they can do Rumple and Neal. And when Neal wasn't around ShadowBelle popped up. And now that Rumple doesn't have a quest any longer, there's no story for him according to the writers. He's been relegated to supporting duty which is a shame cause he's Robert freaking Carlyle. He's always isolated from everyone else. It's like they don't know how to write for him in relation to everyone else anymore. It wasn't until the finale that he got to interact with some of the cast again and that was his best episode besides the Neal dying one. They've also never been willing to write Rumple as one-half of a couple either but that's all that's left by their own dumb writing.

This is either a continuity error or Rumple was acting. Because it was heavily implied he set up the whole shebang before any of them were even born. He was involved with James and David's life from the very beginning. Then he set the wheels in motion by making King George bankrupt after he was set with Snow's side of the equation.

I'm pretty sure the ratings speaks for itself when it comes to S1 vs S2 and S3 and the drop off between the seasons which speaks to audience retention. Their biggest mistake is probably getting rid of the semi-procedural format and crawling so far up St. Woegina's ass that they can't see anything else. I'm pretty sure it was the height of delusion when Adam, Eddy and Lana practically screamed from the rooftops that Pan was so much more evil than Rumpel or Woegina cause he didn't regret anything and lo and behold we got "No Regrets." I was rooting for Pan all the way. Robbie Kay made the Neverland arc. What was lacking was "Neverland" could've been a random forest or world somewhere. They just plain didn't use Neverland and we all know the reason why, cause it would've left out their Victim Sue. Rumpel, Hook, and Bae had strong ties to that place and the characters there and we didn't get one single flashback about their relationships to one another. And they didn't do anything with Wendy or Tink either. Hell Neal didn't even get to react to the fact that Pan is his grand daddy. Rumpel never interacted with Henry. They had 4 generations of that side of the family together and did nothing. That was supposedly Rumpel's arc but compare the Zelena/Woegina and Rumpel/Pan stories. There's a world of difference to what Rumpel got out of Neverland and it wasn't very much.

Emma did at the end of S2 in the diner when Snow was trying to sacrifice their entire universe to save St. Woegina. All Emma got for her trouble was a big ass lecture by Snow how they have to do the right thing and not take the easy way out and OMG how can you live with yourself if St. Woegina's blood is on your hands, and do this one thing for your momma or some such crap. That was when Snow too went on my crap list. To be honest I don't care if Emma is villified for it. I'd bet A&E's whole supply of crack that she will be. People can line up in town ready to stone her and I'd be ok with it if she was like WTF, I don't give a damn that Woegina lost her boyfriend of 2 days. What I don't want is for Emma to turn into Snow, the biggest Woegina cheerlearder to have ever lived. I swear I will give up this show, screw Robert's fine self, if I hear a repetition of "Woegina even though you were the biggest victim ever, you still love and feel so much more than anyone ever!" again. RIP Snow. This. What happened to S1 when Emma, Rumpel, even Snow was allowed to snark back at Woegina? Now she's the only that gets to throw stones while everyone has to stay mute or kiss her ass. Even Rumpel got in on the game by proclaiming the child abuser as the bestest mom ever. Good gawd they acted like Woegina was so self-evolved and generous for saying that the Cora/Snow thing was complex because Cora killed Eva. Err dude you yourself tried to kill Snow and everyone else a million times over and was in on the plan with Cora. But oh no that didn't happen according to Adam and Eddy. St. Woegina had too much heart and soul and felt so much pain and it's all Snow's fault.

Cora was literally in the middle of trying to kill all of them. Whether or not Snow hates her at that point is irrelevant. It's still self-defense. It's not like Cora was minding her own business sipping some margaritas on a Miami beach and Snow plotted to kill her. I can't even call it a plan when it took 2 minutes while Cora and Woegina was trying to bust down the door to murder them. It was a direct reaction to Cora and Woegina trying to kill them in the moment. When it's established self-defense, emotions, motivations etc. are irrrelevant. Whatever I just can't understand how the writers keep harping on every imaginary slight against Woegina yet try to spritz a gallon of Febreeze all over Woegina's actions. Like seriously, not eating female Joffrey's lasagna is somehow the crime of the century? It's exactly like them claiming Regina never raped Graham because sex between them was never shown onscreen. Say what?? For heaven sakes, if you don't want her to do those things, don't write it and then put it onsceen. The audience isn't dumb with an IQ of a donkey. It's so crazy to me. What are they watching? Are they permanently high on Woegina butt crack or something? Someone explain this to me like I'm an American tourist in France. I've truly never seen this amount of obsessive fanfiction levels of delusional love for a character anywhere. I know back on TWOP Lana Lang seemed to be Mt. Everest for that measure but this surpasses that by a galaxy. As a result Woegina has become my most hated TV character ever. I will always root for the underdogs aka everyone else on the show over their Victim Sue. I don't believe that's the way they would've presented that. Then they would claim Snow was a mind rapist of Cora and needs to be put down like a rabid dog.

Oh I wasn't making a comment about her fandom either way. I can't tell from that one tweet. She might be a fan, it doesn't really matter. But even if she was a fan, there's a difference between "Regina has a mean streak. Awesome balls! I love her" vs "My poor baby angel Regina, people are so cruel to her. She's the biggest victim ever! I love her." The show's stance is clearly the latter, that was my point. Like if that was Adam or Eddy, they would never tweet that Woegina has a mean streak because they don't see that she's mean. They see it as Woegina saintly bearing the weight of the cruel world upon her tiny shoulders and generously meting out gentle justice to those who mightily wronged her, for which she deserves to be worshipped for all eternity. That's the cult the makeup artist needs to be brainwashed into.

Camera One I agree and disagree with you about S2 flashbacks. Honestly all I recall about them is that they were just another infinite part in the "Great Victimization of Regina Saga" that was S2. Seriously I don't think it's an exaggeration to say there was not one episode that went by without Woegina crying, whining, making sad the world is ending faces or someone is "victimizing" her. If someone can point to an episode when she appeared in S2 and none of those things happened I will eat my Jimmy Choos. But yes you're right it was one"coherent" picture but it's not a story to me like S1 was. What it was, was an in depth (so in depth, I think they lived on the bottom of the Mariana Trench) character study. S1 was a plot story with character moments. It was about how and why the curse was cast and in getting there we got to see Snow and Charmings falling in love story, the beef between Snow and Evil Queen, and how and why the rest of the cast contributed to the curse, Rumple, Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella, Mad Hatter, Ruby etc. If I got paid I would figure out how to replicate that story structure. I don't think its impossible at all. The people who did get paid decided to write fanfiction instead after S1's payday. Also going back to how S1 was presented I don't think it was ever sold as Emma vs St. Woegina either. I always thought it was about Snow vs. Regina and Emma vs. Rumple, in the sense of Emma the detective unraveling Rumple's games, or cat and mouse story. Snow and Regina was the real conflict and the superior one too. That was the emotional fight. Emma's fights with Regina came off as impersonal despite the Henry thing, until Regina poisoned him. It was always cop vs corrupt politician but most of the time the cop didn't give a crap. She was more involved with her games with Rumple. It was an inferior version of Hannibal and Starling. That's how I saw the focus of S1.

Obviously that makeup artist hasn't been indoctrinated into "Woegina is the biggest victim ever" bible written by Adam and Eddy. I give it 2 days before that tweet is deleted and changed to OMG everyone is so mean to poor poor St. Woegina! Have we forgotten where Woegina hooked up with Cora to go on killing rampages only for A&E to spin it as the fairytale folks deserved it for being so cruel for not eating her lasagna? And those cruel people need to be punished! No worries Oncers, Woegina's halo will remain untarnished by this. In fact her wings are probably going to be dipped in gold and baby Jesus' tears after heroically suffering from the cruelties of Marian.

Adam and Eddy wanted to kill Charming in the pilot flashbacks. The network execs said no way when it was pitched. In S1 they both talked a lot about getting permission to do or write something. That changed in S2. They started saying they were pretty much given free reign. It's just strange how S1 is so different in every way from the latter 2. The wtiters might rely on online craziness for feedback but ABC/Disney runs focus groups for feedback but not often. I think they only do it when there's a drastic change in ratings. I figured out why the flashbacks bother me so much now. S1's flashbacks formed one coherent story by itself. If you just watch the flashbacks and not the modern stuff it still stands alone as a story. Now the flashbacks are filler. It's a one off specific to that episode and it doesn't build to anything. As for how this show was pitched originally, I thought it was exactly how S1 went. A fairytale procedural with Emma as the outside narrator and Rumpel as the big mysterious figureand the whole shebang focused on Snow White. If I recall correctly the pilot trailer's first scene was the Rumpel and Emma introduction scene bookended by Rumpel ominously smirking at Emma. Now its turned into Days of Woegina's life. And technically Ginny is the leading lady of the show as she gets first billing, but you wouldn't know it by watching.

Zelena's sob story was Shakespeare compared to the Woegina fanfiction that followed. If I had known that was coming I would've sacrificed 50 virginal chickens for Zelena. I hope they spend so much time on Elsa that they only have limited time for Woegina's tears cause you just know that's the only stories they have. The rest of the cast can spend their time fighting Elsa's giant marshmellow away from Woegina and I'd be happy. Going by the premiere pictures, I'm expecting a 5 minute montage of Woegina walking and sobbing to some sad hymn with a quick cut to Snow, Emma, Marian, Hook etc all sporting the sign of the antichrist on their foreheads. I'm convinced the flashbacks are there for filler because they can't plot out a 40min episode that stretches for half season. Besides Elsa and Arendelle plus Elsa and Rumpel and the soap opera triangle, what else can they use for flashbacks? I'm not seeing an opportunity for much else.

I think his "ingenuity" is based on the fact that no matter what happens as a result of his actions, he can work with it. He can't lose, yet. I don't think he planned out everything to the last detail and was able to predict exactly everything the way it happened. He said it best, "chaos is ladder." His unique ability is being able to thrive in it. I'm also starting to think his end goal isn't power after all, it's just the satisfaction he gets from playing the game. He likes outsmarting others just for the sake of knowing that he outsmarted them. I don't think he wants power for power's sake. I think he wants it to prove that he can get it and also wrest it away from someone else. I'm not sure what his goal with Sansa is. He wants her, but the interesting part is that he genuinely wants to teach her the game. If all he wanted was to get Sansa, the easiest way would be to keep her like the old helpless Sansa. If he only saw her as a substitute Cat, why is trying to mold her into something un-Cat like?

That was some awesome cinematography for a tv show. Color me impressed. I was expecting to be bored because Jon and his wall is the least interesting arc for me but I was glad to have a small breather from the palace intrigue stuff. Too much of a good thing and all. That said this didn't feel like the penultimate episode. I didn't get a sense of any buildup to the finale.

How are people deciding what's unpopular? Based off of Twitter or something? What if you're insulated to just this place for this show? It'd be hard to discuss. Or is this based off of old TWOP? If so I think TWOP was big and diverse enough not to have an "unpopular" opinion. Except maybe if you loved a Mary Sue. That was the one single unanimous sentiment across all boards and all shows, Mary Sues are the most loathsome creatures! On top of that I find most of the internets' "popular" opinions seem to run counter to those not sitting on social media obsessing over shows, i.e. most of the general viewing audience. And since we make up what 0.001% of all viewers, anything on the net would be unpopular.

Nobody and nothing on this show has a shot at any kind of Emmy nomination. Maybe Robert Carlyle has an outside shot, like on Venus kind of shot. The others might as well be on Pluto. As for the supporting or lead, usually the lead competition is viewed as fiercer so sometimes if you are really a lead you submit in supporting to better your chances. Also as a lead that goes up against real supporting people, chances are your material has more weight. For those who knows that they have zero chance at getting a nomination then the lead vs supporting thing is probably just a status thing. Soap operas, which is basically what Once is, always attract the most rabid and psychotic fans.

Oberyn took a page out of the dumb villain's handbook where they prioritize talking over fighting. But the fight was the highlight for me. It's great how something as simple as Arya's laugh says so much about her character. Loved it. This might be the first episode I didn't hate Sansa and that's because she was acting very un-Sansa like. Hope this version sticks around. Just tweaking her character turned the whole Littlefinger-Sansa dynamic around. It's doesn't come off as creepy anymore. I still don't dig it but I'm intrigued where this is going. I also can't tell anymore if he's really an unrepentant diabolical chess master or just a pathetic lovelorn fool turned fatal attraction. I want him to get his comeuppance but I don't want his ending to be reduced to his downfall being due to his love/obsession for Cat or Sansa. I thought she was sewing the dress when Littlefinger went to go ask her why she helped him no?

Robert and Ginnifer are the show's best regular actors. Everyone else is mediocre but can be good if the writing is there, a rare event, to downright bad. But those 2 will take some crappy material and make it look good. Regina has exactly 2 emotions "someone killed my puppy, kitty, baby and stole my Ben and Jerry's" and "I'm on a daytime soap, watch me chew all this scenery and act evil." Lana has zero nuance or subtlety in her performances and she and the writers have turned Regina into a full on Mary Sue and caricature. Back when they first started I thought they were going to copy Cersei for her but she's more like a combination of my 2 most hated characters Joffrey and Sansa. All the nastiness and whinyness of Joff and the victim complex of Sansa. It takes a special brand of delusion to try to sell female Joffrey as a victim. I can't believe they destroyed Robin and Marian to sell her disgusting self. What just because Disney's Hood was a fox they don't matter? I wouldn't be surprise if they had the most popular recent Disney character in Elsa come and prop Regina some more too. I wanted Maian to rip out her tongue at the end so she can finally stop her I'm a victim whining. Or for Snow to get the baby blues and cut out her vocal cords. Maybe people didn't see Emma being attracted to Hook cause they have little chemistry. She has more chemistry with her dad and Rumple. But she sure was making googly eyes at him. Honestly the amount of camera time spent on those 2 staring soulfully at each other was downright eye roll worthy. And her constant fluttering eyelashes or whatever she was doing with her Jane Austen era flirt manual was silly. I saw the attraction from both ends like instant oatmeal. Just no chemistry to back it up. Except for the kiss in Neverland. That was hot. Their relationship was never about worthiness. It was individual journeys, even if they were crappy ones. That's what these 2 episodes were about. Hook and Emma both had to like themselves before they hooked up officially. In the past you see that current Hook didn't like his old self. He might've agreed that he gave up the ship for her but really letting go of the ship was letting go of the pirate. That ship technically started the whole pirate thing. And Emma finally liked herself, her parents, world peace and unicorns. Now they've turned her into Snow and watch her debase herself for ruining female Joffrey's life.