Dani-Ellie

They thought there was a dragon in that egg. They thought they were going to darken Spyro's heart, not a person's. Snow perked up when she heard that Dragon Maleficent had laid a dragon egg. Snow freaked when the egg started to hatch and tiny human hands popped out of it. And they thought they were going to be able to return the egg to Maleficent. it's totally still wrong but it's not like they intended to harm a human baby to save theirs and it's not like they intended to separate a child from her mother. Is darkness forever or can it fade with time and good works and atonement? Because if one bad action brands you impure and darkens your heart for the rest of your life, why bother with redemption? If Snow and Charming stayed on the hero path following this as a way to atone for their sins, can they shrink the dark spot on their hearts?

People who write true crime books are still authors. People who write non-fiction and biographies are still authors. They still take events that happened and put them in language that doesn't bore people to tears and make them feel like they're reading a text book. It still takes some kind of writing talent but just because the events were real means it's somehow less deserving of the title of author?

And I prefer to wait and see what happens before I start flipping tables. There are zero indications in this episode that (the only) Rogue Author did anything beyond what we saw him do. I much prefer the idea of one Rogue Author than everything that ever happened is predetermined by said Authors. The whole reason Rogue Author got put in the book was because messing with free will is bad.

Holy crap, you guys. I completely get that if you hated this, there's nothing I can say to change your mind, but if the standard for "hero" is "never does anything wrong ever," we'd have no heroes. I mean, look at Emma, for crying out loud. I think we all agree that she's attained hero status but her past is not squeaky clean, either. Snow and Charming did a terrible thing. They learned the hard way that predicting the future isn't certain. (Neither one of their unicorn visions was untrue ... it just didn't happen the way it looked like it would.) But the whole point of their ending scene is that they dedicated the rest of their lives to attempting to make up for it. They thought there was no way to get the baby back; that was the first thing they suggested. In the absence of that, they did what they could to atone for their mistake. The fact that they were so broken up about it is a good thing, as far as I'm concerned. Because good people feel bad when they hurt other people. If they'd just gone on about their lives, all, "Oh well, too bad, so sad," then I would have had some issues. This just made me sad for Emma, because how few friends had she had to consider that relationship a best friend relationship?

The next person in line? Author is a job, not a specific guy.

That is not at all what they're saying. Free will does exist, per the Apprentice. Authors have existed from time immemorial, and they were tasked with recording events. (Liked August's Plato namedrop, by the way. The philosophy major in me grinned.) It's just the one dude who got power happy and began behaving like a writer rather than a recorder. We don't know how much he messed with, but everything from the time he got trapped in the book until the end of the book still happened, manipulation-free.

It was mentioned a couple of times that the Author is a way for Regina to get her happy ending, not the only way. I know Charming brought it up but I want to say someone else did, too. What Snow thinks is not gospel, especially if there are other characters challenging her views.

We don't know how much Rogue Author manipulated before the Apprentice trapped him in the book. It may have only been that one incident (go big or go home?). We also don't know how long he had the job before he began manipulating the book. With all the talk of free will, it's not like the show is avoiding the possibility of it. In fact, it is stating that it exists and the Author position is a recording position. My point is: there is nothing to indicate right now that everything every villain on this show has ever done is because of Rogue Author. Since Regina cast the Dark Curse after the Author got booked (heh), that is most definitely still on her. Snow and Charming's mistake is still quite obviously a very big mistake, but I thought it was quite clear even before Snow's freakout when the egg started hatching that they thought there was a baby dragon in that egg, not a baby person. Their intent was to return the egg to Maleficent and they felt guilt for what they'd done. Again, it's not at all right, but it's not the evilest evil that ever eviled, either. I was intrigued by Rumple's pause after he kissed Belle's hand (though, seriously, Rumple, ick and boundaries). If this was in fact a widespread sleeping curse, does the fact that she didn't wake when he kissed her mean they're no longer True Loves? I totally know Emma was going to be more upset by the lie than the actual secret. (And I thought it was a neat bit of paralleling with Snow's vision of the "I'm your mother." "I don't care." exchange. In the vision, the tearing out of the heart was literal. When it actually came to pass, it was figurative.) Hook being jealous of August and all the Captain Swan beats made me aww like nobody's business.

If I recall correctly, she was convicted as a juvenile. When Sidney ran the story about how she had Henry in jail, she went to Regina pissed because the records were juvie records and were supposed to be sealed.

The most recent one I recall is here, specifically this: I do agree that Regina is trying, but I take exception to "continually" doing the right thing (because attempting to kill your son's entire family is the right thing?) and vehemently disagree that out of everyone on the show, Regina's the one who's gotten the short end of the stick. There are a few other main characters I can think of who have gotten shorter ends of the stick, and at Regina's hands to boot.

Back in season one, I loved to hate Regina. She was an awesome villain, watching her machinations was fun, and even seeing the little chinks in her armor (like her nightmare where Emma tied her to the apple tree) was great. I was even on board with the beginning of her redemption arc in the beginning of season two, where the things she did came back to bite her in the ass (in the form of Henry telling her he didn't want to see her and people not necessarily being willing to welcome her with open arms). Because news flash, Regina, your actions have consequences, too, and I think she needed to recognize that. If you hurt people and break their trust, it's going to take time and work to earn it back. That's not people being mean, that's just life, because look how hard Snow had to work to regain her trust. The problem I have is that when she backslides, it's not a one-step-forward, two-steps-back process. It's a complete 180, so we go from Regina recognizing that if she wants to be in Henry's life, she can't continue to hurt the people he loves to Regina spending half a season trying to kill the kid's entire family. We had that great speech she gave Tink in Neverland where she does allow that she made her heart dark with her choices but then six episodes later, she scores a victory by admitting she doesn't regret any of what she did to make her heart dark because it got her something in the end. Instead of recognizing that she had a hand in the whole Robin/Marian fiasco by separating them in the first place, it's all Emma's fault for bringing Marian forward and reuniting them. And then she spends half an episode trying to figure out how to kill Marian in a way that she won't be the obvious culprit. So yes, she makes progress, but my issue is that for me, that progress then becomes undone by her words and actions a few episodes later. Absolutely. Don't try to tell me she's a hero while continuing to flip-flop her from hero to villain based on whichever one you want her to be. And don't try to sell me on how Regina is the biggest victim ever if you're also going to show me all the various and sundry ways she victimized other people.

If we're going to see Snow and Emma apologize for the things they did to Regina, a fair and balanced narrative would have Regina apologize for the things she did to them. While that may be true, it's still kind of all about Regina. Sometimes the hurt party needs to hear the I'm sorry, whether the person who hurt them dwells in regrets or not.

I agree that Regina's arc has been great for Regina, but that's kind of my exact problem with it: it's only great for Regina. Her victims, on the other hand, are getting nothing. Regina is changing, to be sure, but in my eyes nowhere in that change has she seen the value in apology and atonement. Like, does she still have a vault full of hearts? Has she even tried to figure out who they belonged to and return them? Has she apologized to Snow or Charming or Emma for ruining their lives? Because Emma saves a woman's life in the past, inadvertently messes up Regina's love life, and that's worthy of a "You ruined my life!" but casting the Dark Curse and putting Emma's parents in a position where they had to send her through a magical wardrobe alone or let her be killed somehow isn't ruining Emma's? Regina's actions stole three decades of togetherness from the Charming family and stole a happy and loving childhood from Emma and I've yet to see her offer even a token apology for that. I try not to compare characters but a proper redemption arc for me is more along the lines of Hook's, where the villain recognizes that they were wrong and tries to make up for it. Sometimes that is righting the wrong they did (like we saw with working to release the fairies from the hat and again this past episode with Ursula). Sometimes all that can be given is the offer of an apology (like we saw in "The Jolly Roger" with Not!Ariel). (And this also means being okay with not being forgiven. Some people will probably never forgive her, and she needs to recognize that their anger is also valid.) Maybe I'm just being impatient and Regina's lightbulb moment is still coming. But it's not working for me as a redemption arc as of yet because we have seen her do some really atrocious things but, as far as I'm concerned, we have not seen her put in the work to make up for it. She's just decided that since she's good now, that means everyone should just accept that she's no longer the Evil Queen. But since she hasn't offered anyone but Henry and Belle (that I can recall) even the slightest "I'm sorry," I don't understand why they should automatically trust her. She destroyed these people's lives, and I actually like that the show does have various people calling her out on that.

I hope you realize that since you told us you're going, you also signed yourself up for giving us a full report afterward. ;)

Yeah, I have no problem with Wee August leaving Emma, because he was tasked with the impossible. Where I have the issue is two grown-ass men conspiring to send a homeless 17-year-old girl to jail because, whatever their reasons, neither one of them had the strength or desire to actually help her. But in terms of the betrayal to Emma, I'd argue here that what Neal did was in some ways worse because Emma actually knew him. Emma had feelings for him. Emma told him she loved him. That betrayal was an emotional gut punch for her that devastated her for a decade. August sucks for coming up with the plan in the first place, don't get me wrong (and I say this as someone who actually likes the character), but Neal went along with it knowing how much it would devastate her. My point in saying this is: if Emma was willing to forgive Neal for what he did to her, I can't fault her for forgiving August, too. (I can, however, fault the writing for completely snuffing the drama from the situation, but that's a different point altogether.)

Same here. I don't know and I can't tell. Some of the overreaction to things (like "you're my happy ending" somehow being a bad thing) strikes me very much as college-freshman-taking-intro-to-women's-studies. Like, they're so big into pushing "feminism" and "down with systematic misogyny" but they don't really understand the intricacies of the theories enough to know when something actually is anti-feminist or systematic misogyny. So you end up getting arguments like "Hook is an ass who wore Emma down and that's the only reason she's going out with him" without recognizing that that argument reduces Emma to only being in a relationship because the man wants her to be and not because she may in fact (and, in my opinion, actually does) want to be in the relationship herself.

I adore August. I can't really put into words why. Maybe it is because I feel sympathy for the little boy he was who was ripped from his father and sent into this world completely alone with the heavy burden of keeping this tiny defenseless baby on the straight and narrow when he himself was, in terms of life experience, not much older than Emma. In terms of Emma and August, I remember that when he was first introduced, I shipped it. When he took her on the "date" to the well, I'm reasonably sure I actually said, "OMG just kiss her already!" out loud. But then when it was revealed that he was essentially her big brother, I no longer shipped it and frankly, I think it's better that way. I do think the two of them can relate to each other in a way that no one else can because they both grew up alone in this world. Even though I did kinda want to see Emma deck him for his part in the whole sending her to jail business, I d'aww-ed at their reunion. Because it was sweet and really, Emma needs friends. August needs friends. The two of them are buds, and it's cute.

Hee, thanks. I try not to answer stuff like that with anger and obscenities because it's kinda my (apparently naive) hope that if I respond reasonably, my points might be taken a little bit more reasonably. This is what I don't understand, both here and the phenomenon of "hate-watching" in general: If you really don't like the show, stop watching. Life is too short for that shit. I certainly wouldn't still be watching this show if the stuff I enjoy didn't outweigh the stuff I don't. I get that sometimes hate-watching can be fun, in the MST3K kind of way, but when someone's dislike of the show becomes so destructive that they're hurting other human beings and actually proud of "using social media as a weapon?" That's not the show's problem. (And I agree with you re: Emma and Neal. I have never noped a potential relationship on a show so much in my life and if they had gone in that direction, my little Emma-loving heart would have been so broken that I don't think they would have gotten me back.) I think this is really my big problem with these people: they're holding the damn fandom hostage. Because if "boom" is offensive and "Don't you know, Emma? [My happy ending] is you" between two people in an established relationship is rape culture, where does it end? If every single thing that they even mildly disagree with becomes a call to arms, they're silencing everyone else's voices with their hatred.

Exactly. Not to mention that Marian is the mother of Robin's child, so you'd think he'd care at least a little bit for Roland's sake.

WTF is right. I do not understand that mindset at all. I don't get why anyone would think rallying others to harass a celebrity online for using a word that has no real meaning whatsoever is okay. But I have to share a fandom with these people and well, they're called bad apples for a reason. They make us all look bad and they spoil everything. Most of the time I can ignore it but lately it's just been making me angry. I just need to get to the point where I pity them, because clearly their lives are so miserable that they think of nothing but how to spread that misery on to others.

Here and this was the follow-up (with a ridiculous amount of hyperbole). I don't usually approve of hijacking someone's post like that (nor do I usually do it myself) but seriously, that was the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen and I'm so very tired of it. I just want to have fun with the actors and I want the actors to have fun with us, and the fact that *every* single little thing the actors do becomes something for fans to hurl abuse at is disgusting. And the fact that the follow-up was just all, "Screw y'all, you're the problem, not me, whatevs," I just can't.

I just need to say this here because if I don't, I'm going to get myself into a flame war on Tumblr and I don't need that in my life: some people in this fandom make me absolutely fucking sick.

I was going to ask if you'd be able to tweet at them. I've always had good luck with poking Comcast when something's not available when it should be. It may be coincidence but every single time I've tweeted at them asking to look into it, the missing content has been added within a few hours. (I also still use a VCR, so I feel you. I tape one thing a week, that's not worth the extra money for me. I actually have to fix my tape because my cable cut out in the beginning of the ep so I missed a couple of minutes.)

If that is not how this pans out, I need someone to write the canon divergence fic, because I would read the hell out of that sucker.

This. It has to start somewhere. The cycle has to be broken somewhere. If the villains don't believe there's a chance things can get better, why bother trying to be good? Why not just stay evil? I do believe that there is a lesson for the others to learn with Ursula's story, and that it's if you open yourself up to the possibility, things can go your way. Instead of trying to force her happy ending (i.e. "going about getting it in the wrong way"), she trusted the person who took it from her to give it back. And it worked! We don't know what she did as Villainess of the Seven Seas, but who's to say that she's not going to go home and start seeking out the people she hurt to right her wrongs?