The Writers of OUAT: Because, Um, Magic, That's Why

[TheGreenKnight]

3 hours ago, sharky said:

I agree with that, but it hasn't always played out that way on screen. If Regina is the flip side of Emma, how come Regina has had five times as many flashbacks? Why have we been shown the bad things Regina has done in the past without any consequences in the present? If Regina is the flip side to Emma, why was the 100th episode focused on Regina being forgiven by her father? It would've been the perfect opportunity for the writers to show that Regina understood how decisions in her life affected Emma's life and instead we got her wandering around the Underworld with her father instead. Even with her dad moving on he was dead in the first place because of her and her actions that led to Emma being separated from her parents. But none of that was acknowledged and it was a huge missed chance by the writers. 

But they did acknowledge that Regina killed her father in 5B?? As for the differing amount of flashbacks, that has more to do with the fact that Emma did not grow up in the Enchanted Forest. Her flashbacks would be hard to relate to the current plot because they won't feature Snow, Rumpel, Hook, etc. I agree with all of you that I wish the Underworld had showed Regina helping more people, but many of the people she killed were nameless randoms they were not going to waste an episode on. The only major ones I can remember are Henry, Sr. and Graham (whose actor was not going to come back). Most of the other notable characters she screwed over are still living. That's why we saw her help her father, and even helping and forgiving her sister/mother for doing similar things she'd been forgiven for doing by other people. As far as the 100th episode being Regina-heavy, that has more to do with the episode falling into the B half. It's always been this way. They both have major plots throughout, but A seasons are always heavier on Emma and B seasons on Regina. I guess the disconnect is this whole idea that the character hasn't suffered enough, which philosophically never jived with me so maybe that's where I don't get it. I'm not even sure if the writers could solve that feeling for the viewers who still hate the character, since every viewer would have a different opinion on how much and what ways she should suffer. And, moreover, I'm not sure how the show could work if one of the leads spends most of the series in jail or an asylum.

There are plenty of viewers who can and do root for Regina, so I can't really follow that as a justification for why she shouldn't be the lead or the heart of the show. I don't understand how anyone can think Emma doesn't play the heart of the show just as much as Regina after nearly all of season 5 revolved around her romance and the fact that she didn't want to be alone/let go?

Edited September 6, 2016 by TheGreenKnight

[Rumsy4]

6 minutes ago, TheGreenKnight said:

I guess the disconnect is this whole idea that the character hasn't suffered enough, which philosophically never jived with me so maybe that's where I don't get it.

I mainly wish the writing wouldn't dwell on her "tragic" life and "misunderstood" status so much. Regina certainly hasn't faced any lasting consequences for her terrible actions. What she told Snow in the Hercules episode basically applies to her as well. Sure-she has faced a bunch of setbacks and failures, but she has also successfully overcome them all. That's why when the writing insists that she is the character who has suffered the most, I can't agree. I think she's come a long way in her road to redemption, but the writers have refused to tackle several elephants in the room when it comes to her redemption--like Graham for instance. Or the fact that she is yet to apologize to Snow for having killed her father, and the other evils she has done to her, or exhibit any sign of remorse for it. When she does talk of her EQ days, it's either to boast of it, or as though she was a third party. She showed true remorse in the UW for having killed her dad. So, she is capable of it. It's just that she's not willing to extend that beyond her inner circle.  

[Camera One]

I guess the disconnect is this whole idea that the character hasn't suffered enough, which philosophically never jived with me so maybe that's where I don't get it. I'm not even sure if the writers could solve that feeling for the viewers who still hate the character, since every viewer would have a different opinion on how much and what ways she should suffer.

I don't think most people want Regina to suffer more (though I think seeing half a season of Henry in 3B not remembering Regina would have made viewers even more sympathetic to Regina, not less).  I'm assuming most people just want Regina to show more remorse for the things she had done and to straight-up apologize to the people she hurt, even the "nameless randoms".  She is still dismissive to Snow and Emma regarding what she did to them.  Why haven't the Writers given her a chance to apologize to them, the way she did her father?  I actually liked the episode with Henry Sr., but making amends to someone she already loved in the first place is not the same.  And helping Cora and Zelena... well, Cora has even more innocent victims that they need to apologize to, and Zelena still has a long way to go (again, being selfless for one's own baby is not the same).

[Rumsy4]

8 minutes ago, Camera One said:

I don't think most people want Regina to suffer more (though I think seeing half a season of Henry in 3B not remembering Regina would have made viewers even more sympathetic to Regina, not less).  I'm assuming most people just want Regina to show more remorse for the things she had done and to straight-up apologize to the people she hurt, even the "nameless randoms".  She is still dismissive to Snow and Emma regarding what she did to them.  Why haven't the Writers given her a chance to apologize to them, the way she did her father? 

Heh--you read my mind, Camera One. 

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I actually liked the episode with Henry Sr., but making amends to someone she already loved in the first place is not the same.  And helping Cora and Zelena... well, Cora has even more innocent victims that they need to apologize to, and Zelena still has a long way to go (again, being selfless for one's own baby is not the same).

None of the Mills women have shown remorse for the random innocents they killed, or have had to make restitution for their wrongs. Zelena is basically Regina 2.0, fasttracked. The writers could have used Zelena as a mirror to make Regina realize how her own actions affected Snow and Emma, but they didn't. I guess the writers wanted Regina to make nice with someone who had wronged her the way Snow and Emma have with Regina. But the writers failed to acknowledge that the main victim of Zelena was Robin, and he never got any justice. Somehow, Regina ended up being written as the main victim in all this.

Edited September 6, 2016 by Rumsy4

[TheGreenKnight]

2 hours ago, Camera One said:

And helping Cora and Zelena... well, Cora has even more innocent victims that they need to apologize to, and Zelena still has a long way to go (again, being selfless for one's own baby is not the same).

Yes, but I'm not talking about Cora and Zelena's characters, but Regina's moral character when helping them. Isn't that an acknowledgment by the character that she's been forgiven for a load of things she's done to those around her and now she's doing the same for someone else that's harmed her? Because many of the things they did to her and her loved ones or planned to do are just as bad as what Regina has done to others. Forgiving does show how far she's come because she couldn't forgive Snow or anyone for most of the timeline after Daniel was killed.

Overall, I feel like if the writers were going to given Snow-Emma-Regina a talk about everything that's happened because of Regina's actions in the past, it would've happened in season 2. Although now that you mentioned him, it would've been great if Snow's father had appeared in the Underworld. That would've been a good way to bring that up organically for Snow's character anyway. Bringing up things so long after the characters have already treated the situation as letting bygones be bygones would be weird to me, to be honest.

[Camera One]

3 minutes ago, TheGreenKnight said:

Although now that you mentioned him, it would've been great if Snow's father had appeared in the Underworld. That would've been a good way to bring that up organically for Snow's character anyway. 

That would have made a good episode.

[Curio]

24 minutes ago, TheGreenKnight said:

but many of the people she killed were nameless randoms they were not going to waste an episode on

They had the perfect opportunity with Percival. Why introduce him in 5x02 with the sole purpose of proving that Regina did something terrible to his family and not bring him back for 5B when he's fresh in the minds of the audience?

29 minutes ago, TheGreenKnight said:

As far as the 100th episode being Regina-heavy, that has more to do with the episode falling into the B half. It's always been this way. They both have major plots throughout, but A seasons are always heavier on Emma and B seasons on Regina.

This kind of gets back to the point I was trying to make earlier. The fact that one arc tends to be Emma heavy and one arc Regina heavy shows that the writers don't really know how to balance those two characters as co-hearts. They can't both be the heart of the show at the same time because their stories are so different and their motivations and happy endings aren't aligned, so we end up with an overall disjointed season where some episodes focus more on Emma and some episodes focus more on Regina, and that's why I think the show has a bit of an identity crisis. I'm hoping that the show going back to a 22-episode format drops this writing crutch. 

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I guess the disconnect is this whole idea that the character hasn't suffered enough, which philosophically never jived with me so maybe that's where I don't get it.

I think @Shanna Marie has an interesting post about this in the morality thread. The morality equation or something like that. I'll tag her and see if she can find her post.

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I'm not even sure if the writers could solve that feeling for the viewers who still hate the character, since every viewer would have a different opinion on how much and what ways she should suffer.

This is true. Some viewers think she's suffered enough, some think she's suffered too much, and then there's people like me who wouldn't mind seeing her trip in mud and spend an entire arc getting rotten fruit thrown at her while she returns innocent hearts from her vault.

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There are plenty of viewers who can and do root for Regina, so I can't really follow that as a justification for why she shouldn't be the lead or the heart of the show. I don't understand how anyone can think Emma doesn't play the heart of the show just as much as Regina after nearly all of season 5 revolved around her romance and the fact that she didn't want to be alone/let go?

I don't think people are saying Emma isn't the heart of the show, but that the show works better when she's the heart instead of Regina. Depending on the arc, they trade heart statuses, and the arcs tend to vary in quality because of it. But this all comes down to personal preference, and obviously if you're a Regina fan, you'll probably think the show works better when she's the heart.

[Shanna Marie]

31 minutes ago, Curio said:

I think @Shanna Marie has an interesting post about this in the morality thread. The morality equation or something like that. I'll tag her and see if she can find her post.

I don't know about finding the post, but the gist of it is that the justice equation involves good deeds+suffering (that isn't a direct result of their own bad choices)+remorse-bad deeds=outcome. If the equation doesn't balance, it doesn't feel like justice has been served. So if you get a positive number because the amount of good deeds, suffering, and remorse far outweigh the bad deeds, you expect the outcome to also be positive, and if it isn't, then you feel like the character got ripped off. I think this is where a lot of us are on Emma. She's done a lot of good, has suffered a great deal (and not as a direct result of her own actions), feels bad even for things that aren't her fault, and hasn't done many seriously bad things, but her outcome is only slightly positive -- she's never allowed to just be happy and enjoy being happy. On the other hand, Regina's bad deeds are seriously bad (mass murder), and while she's done some good deeds, most of her suffering has been a result of her own poor choices, and she's shown no remorse, but her outcome is overall positive, considering she's faced no real consequences for her evil and continues to live a more luxurious life than all her victims. Hook is fairly balanced -- he did a lot of bad things, but he's now done a lot of good things, he's suffered a great deal, and he's taken responsibility for his bad deeds and feels remorse for them, and he has a fairly positive outcome at the moment, since he has love and has found friends, but it's not a massively positive outcome because he's tied to Emma's happiness, and she keeps being dragged into suffering, and it's not like he's living in luxury.

It's not a perfect model, though, because I kind of feel like remorse should be given more weight than suffering. Regina just suffering in general doesn't help things feel more balanced. When Robin died, I didn't feel like that evened her equation out at all. Without the remorse and without bad things that are consequences of her actions, it doesn't matter how much more she suffers if it's just random suffering. Robin dying the way he did didn't add balance. If Robin had died because Regina burned Percival's village, it might have helped.

8 hours ago, Curio said:

Kitsis: “The first thing we talked about was the Evil Queen and how hard it would be to live in a land where everything you did failed.”

The problem here is that this isn't what they wrote. The only thing the Evil Queen had failed at before the curse was killing Snow. Otherwise, she'd succeeded in getting her husband killed without getting any blame for it, getting some patsy to take the fall. She'd driven Snow, the rightful heir, out of the palace and had taken over as queen. She had great magical power that pretty much gave her absolute power over her kingdom. She could drop into other kingdoms and give orders. She'd trapped her mother in Wonderland and rescued her father. Even when she lost the war, she was still living in a palace. She probably would have been able to remain a queen in power if she hadn't been so intent on destroying Snow and making Snow unhappy, if she'd been content with taking everything else away from Snow and going with "living well is the best revenge." She even successfully cast the curse that gave her power over her enemies for 28 years. Worst metaphor for failure ever.

[TheGreenKnight]

2 hours ago, Curio said:

They had the perfect opportunity with Percival. Why introduce him in 5x02 with the sole purpose of proving that Regina did something terrible to his family and not bring him back for 5B when he's fresh in the minds of the audience?

[...]

I don't think people are saying Emma isn't the heart of the show, but that the show works better when she's the heart instead of Regina. Depending on the arc, they trade heart statuses, and the arcs tend to vary in quality because of it. But this all comes down to personal preference, and obviously if you're a Regina fan, you'll probably think the show works better when she's the heart.

No, I like them both equally. I might be that one person out there who liked both 5A and 5B nearly to the same degree. I can enjoy the show when CS takes over, but I can enjoy the Mills sisters, too. I know that's probably really rare in the OUAT fandom. LOL

But, yes, they should've used Percival. I wouldn't be surprised if they introduced him because they meant to use him in the Underworld, but then just forgot about it or got sidetracked with Zelena's story. (It's not like that hasn't happened...)

As for comparing Regina to Hook, there's also the fact that the writers have a conflict of showing Regina as being on a redemptive arc while also giving the dose of Evil Queen that made the show popular (which is probably how S6's plot came about). They don't have that problem with Hook because nobody's clamoring to see Hook as a villain because he was never that great a villain to begin with. As for atoning for his past, I'm guessing it has more to do with their desire to bring angst and conflict for CS as a relationship than their concern with Hook as a character on his own. By having him keeping a secret from Emma (with Ursula) or believing he doesn't deserve to come back to life, they are creating conflict for the relationship. Maybe the same might've happened with Regina if they had had real interest in Robin. Or, to be more hopeful, maybe it will happen with Hyde if he ends up being a new love interest for her.

Shanna Marie, we probably wouldn't agree because I think Regina has shown remorse, but not in the way many of you would find satisfying as far as acknowledging directly in a face-to-face convo what she'd done to them. I think it's a problem in general for the writers that they don't want to have conversations or quiet moments with heart-to-hearts.

[sharky]

I love all the answers you've all given! But to bring this back around to this topic, do you think this is supposed to be a debate? Do you think this is a debate that A&E want the viewers to have? Or do you think the fact that we are even debating this is a sign that the writing isn't up to snuff or that the show runners aren't giving the writers the right direction? For me, all these what ifs make me kind of sad. Imagine what kind of different, unique, interesting, thought provoking and fun show this could be in different hands. Thinking of my favorite shows -- Chuck, The X Files, The Office -- all of them had a vision for who their main characters were and where they were going. There were hiccups and issues, but I knew who those characters were. With this show, it just seems like they've forgotten any foundation they laid more than half a season ago, which leads to all this ambiguity when it comes to the characters. It's almost as if they are as forgettable as some season 3 flashback. Maybe that's why I'm a Captain Swan fan. The fewer flashbacks may actually be a help to liking these characters because the lack of flashbacks doesn't muddy the waters as bad. 

[Mari]

I don't think that they realize there's a serious debate to be had.  They've spoken about how successful Regina's redemption was, as well as how Regina suffered the most.  The stories are usually framed from Regina's perspective, with little to no consideration given to the impact and consequences for the nonRegina characters.  

Edited September 7, 2016 by Mari
While this issue does make me freak, it is not the same thing as frame.

[Curio]

13 hours ago, sharky said:

But to bring this back around to this topic, do you think this is supposed to be a debate? Do you think this is a debate that A&E want the viewers to have? Or do you think the fact that we are even debating this is a sign that the writing isn't up to snuff or that the show runners aren't giving the writers the right direction?

No. They 100% think we're all on board...

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For the Once Upon A Time writers, operation nuanced villain is a success. "And the greatest thing ever for us was season two, all the heroes left to go celebrate Emma and Mary Margaret's return and no one invited the Evil Queen. She had just spent, you know, 30 episodes trying to kill them, cast curses, we saw the horribleness she did and the audience was like, 'how they could not invite her?' And we thought, that's the victory. People love the queen."

[Mari]

That would be one of the quotes I remembered.  

Of course, I remember that moment slightly differently.  It was not a success at my house,. It was one of the moments I considered a low point, simply because it was such unearned victim moment.  It backfired, because it was so blatantly manipulative, and made me even more annoyed with Regina and the show.

[Curio]

I'm still chuckling at the term "operation nuanced villain." Is burning down villages nuance?

[Rumsy4]

They totally manipulated the audience into feeling sorry for Regina in that instance.

If anything, I remember feeling at that time that Emma and co were being stupid to leave the sociopath alone. Not sorry for Regina because the heroes were being "mean" to her. 

[andromeda331]

I remember being so happy that Charming family was finally back together and I didn't feel sorry for Regina at all. I didn't care about her "sad" face. I was too happy that Snow, Charming, Emma and Henry were all together. They were the reason I wanted to watch the next episode to see the family living together.  I hated when I learned later the audience was suppose to feel sorry for her. And surprised that many people did feel sorry for her. She was the one who kept the family apart for 30 years.

[Mari]

I cared. 

I cared a lot.

It just wasn't the type of caring they were aiming for.

[Shanna Marie]

I almost quit the show at that point. When they tried to make it look like Regina was the victim and her former victims were all big meanies because they didn't invite the person who separated them in the first place to their first-ever family meal together, I was so mad that I very nearly didn't come back the next week. In fact, I might have watched the next one on OnDemand later in the week when I got bored and curious.

I've been thinking about that idea that Regina is a metaphor for a Hollywood writing career. If that's so, then what they're showing is a writer who managed to end up running a major network series that gets good ratings but not necessarily critical acclaim who still somehow feels like a failure because a writer who got the job he wanted earlier in his career (thus ruining his life) is not only still working, but has a critically acclaimed and award-nominated Netflix series, in spite of all his efforts to sabotage this writer's career by spreading gossip about that writer, sending his own scripts to anything that writer is up for, and trying to hire away all the other writers who work on that writer's series. Then word gets out about all the sabotage attempts, and the "Regina" writer is ostracized by the rest of Hollywood for about five minutes before all is forgotten and he keeps on with his job, and the writer he tried to destroy becomes friends with him.

[Rumsy4]

I guess I'm still finding it hard to believe that Regina in her present iteration is exactly how she was originally conceived. It's possible that A&E had more of the Angelina Jolie Maleficent-like villain in mind, where the villain does have a genuinely tragic back story, and the king is the real villain. But A&E fell so in love with the EQ's bold and audaciousness, that they kept pushing her past several moral event horizons, knowing they can still keep her sympathetic by emphasing her victimhood over and over in the writing. That might so be reason for making Snowing into evil babynappers. The only way to "balance" Regina was to drag the heroes completely down. 

[KingOfHearts]

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They totally manipulated the audience into feeling sorry for Regina in that instance.

This. It wasn't because Regina was a sympathetic character by design or that the writing was deeply multifaceted. It's all about the POV and how the audience is directed to perceive something. If we didn't get lingering shots of her tears, a frame job against her, and if Snowing got to voice their opinions beyond, "Why did you invite her?!", then viewers would have reacted differently. If A&E were surprised by the feedback, it was because they weren't sure if people would buy it. They had a clear plan for Regina and they carried it out.

You can make any character look sympathetic with enough focus and trickery. You can also make any character look bad.

Edited September 7, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Curio]

6 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

You can make any character look sympathetic with enough focus and trickery. You can also make any character look bad.

It's all in the editing. If anyone watches The Bachelor, the producers can easily make a nice person look like a villain and a mean person look like a hero based on the footage they show the audience. A&E force the audience to like Regina because they only show her point of view. They don't want the audience to think too hard about how Percival got the short end of the stick, or how it's really abnormal for a TV show to have its lead character murder a regular cast member in Season 1 and five years later still have the crime hidden from everyone.

[Rumsy4]

Graham is just one of the many many set-ups the writers have wasted over the years. What is the point of setting up so many good story moments, and never ever addressing them? They don't seem to care about the long-term value of their own writing. They only care about what works in one episode, and are more eager to try their newest ideas than going back to old ones and deliver long-range pay-offs.

Edited September 7, 2016 by Rumsy4

[KingOfHearts]

31 minutes ago, Rumsy4 said:

Graham is just one of the many many set-ups the writers have wasted over the years. What is the point of setting up so many good story moments, and never ever addressing them? They don't seem to care about the long-term value of their own writing. They only care about what works in one episode, and are more eager to try their newest ideas than going back to old ones and deliver long-rage pay-offs.

Robin's death has gotten more payoff and he's only been dead for two episodes.

[Curio]

2 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

Robin's death has gotten more payoff and he's only been dead for two episodes.

That's because Regina didn't kill him. (Though, I still wish Regina forcing Emma to use magic in 5x02 was directly responsible for Robin's death.)

[andromeda331]

40 minutes ago, Rumsy4 said:

Graham is just one of the many many set-ups the writers have wasted over the years. What is the point of setting up so many good story moments, and never ever addressing them? They don't seem to care about the long-term value of their own writing. They only care about what works in one episode, and are more eager to try their newest ideas than going back to old ones and deliver long-rage pay-offs.

That's one of if not the biggest problem I have with them writing Regina as the victim. They want us to see her as the victim and everyone else is mean. Or she was "misunderstood". But then they shower doing horrible things. Regina spent 28 plus years raping Graham and then murdered him because he dumped her and makes zero connection when she's yelling at Zelena for doing the same thing to Robin. She murdered a groom on his wedding.  Why write Pervcial as yet another victim of Regina. They get the "Oh my God someone wants to kill Regina" but then write in a very valid reason for him wanting to do so "She slaughtered his entire village!" If they want to make Regina sympathetic. Stop showing every crime she's committed and then no remorse for it. No remorse, no guilt, no apology, nothing.

[Rumsy4]

19 minutes ago, andromeda331 said:

Why write Pervcial as yet another victim of Regina. They get the "Oh my God someone wants to kill Regina" but then write in a very valid reason for him wanting to do so "She slaughtered his entire village!" If they want to make Regina sympathetic. Stop showing every crime she's committed and then no remorse for it. No remorse, no guilt, no apology, nothing.

And Charming freaking killed Percival! Why didn't that darken his half-heart? This is where the writing double-standard comes into play. If killing is evil, it is evil no matter what. With a different tint, Percival would be Inigo Montoya getting revenge for the death of his father and entire village. But, he is painted as a villain for wanting revenge, and the heroes don't seem to care one way or the other about the village slaughter (which doubtless was another hapless village that refused to give away Snow's location to Regina). OUAT should own its mixed morality--not try to pretend there are no double-standards in the writing. 

[Mari]

So, OUaT is the Princess Bride from Humperdinck and the Count's point if view and desired outcome?  

 

Well, that did away with my hope.  :)

 

(Wait.  Which one would be Regina and which Rumple? )

[Curio]

4 minutes ago, Mari said:

(Wait.  Which one would be Regina and which Rumple? )

If Percival is Inigo, Regina is the six-fingered man. If Hook is Dread Pirate Roberts, Rumple is Humperdinck.

Edited September 7, 2016 by Curio

[tennisgurl]

7 hours ago, andromeda331 said:

Stop showing every crime she's committed and then no remorse for it. No remorse, no guilt, no apology, nothing.

I know! It just makes no sense to me at all! They keep wanting us to feel sorry for Regina, and keep framing her as a super sympathetic character, but then they will just go back to showing her doing horrible things. Like, that episode where we are supposed to feel all sad for her because its the anniversary of Daniels death, and we get lots of Sad Regina, and Tears of Regina, and Woobie Regina is the Saddest Woobie in the Entire Multiverse stuff. Oh, and Regina kills some poor random guy on his wedding day. Will we be getting scenes of the guys widow crying at his grave, will we be getting scenes of HER being a big huge woobie whos True Love was murdered in front of her by a power hungry female tyrant? Of course not, because this show, for reasons I cannot fathom, keeps asking us to feel bad for a person who has committed an endless parade of crimes against humanity, and has never faced justice, or shown real remorse for what she has done towards her victims. I mean, when most shows try to redeem a villain, they try to later play down their evilness, or they show the characters angsting about their crimes when they meet a former victim. But not in Once land. In Once land, its the victims fault, and being angry that Regina murdered your whole family means that YOUR the asshole for not falling all over her feel to proclaim her amazingness. 

Regina's story could be completely different if we choose to focus on another character, or actually had the characters have a normal reaction to having a murderous dictator eating waffles at their favorite diner. To me, Regina will not be fully redeemed until she really has to face up to what is has done, and the writers refuse to do that. Now, to be far, this most recent season has been the best Regina season in awhile (at least the Underworld stuff), and she did seem to feel some real remorse about her choices, but I need to see her doing some serious magic community service before I take her seriously as a hero. And I HATED that stupid diner scene where Regina didn't get to go to the diner. I felt nothing for her, especially at that point in the show. Nothing but annoyance and anger. But the writers have decided their self insert Fan Fic character is a Misunderstood Hero now, so we all feel sad for her. Or something.

[Mathius]

Seriously, Graham's rape and murder was at least done when Regina was being portrayed as unquestionably the villain.  But when they decide they want to make her "misunderstood" and a hero....that's when they begin trotting out things like the groom, Percival, and those countless villages and denizens of the Underworld that she never once has any sort of confrontation with, nor does she help any of them move on or show any real desire to.

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Oh, and Regina kills some poor random guy on his wedding day. Will we be getting scenes of the guys widow crying at his grave, will we be getting scenes of HER being a big huge woobie whos True Love was murdered in front of her by a power hungry female tyrant? Of course not, 

We were probably supposed to laugh at Regina's "sassy" line of "Next time, book the church" after she did that, then feel sad for her when she visits Daniel's grave in the next scene, totally ignoring that she literally did to some poor couple exactly what her mother did to her and Daniel!  OR, if we were supposed to take away that Regina had become just like Cora (given that Zelena later hurls that accusation toward her in the present-day), then that's all well and good, except that then we're supposed to rejoice when Regina realizes that she's standing in the way of her own happiness and won't do that anymore and can be happy with Robin....never knowing if that poor bride-to-be ever moved on and found the same sort of happiness, since she is never seen again, or brought up again, or cared about in any way.  Regina most likely forgot she even existed, just like she forgot Sydney existed, and she probably forgot she killed her fiancee, just like she forgot she killed Marian.  So no burden on Regina's conscience, then! Hooray?

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Now, to be far, this most recent season has been the best Regina season in awhile (at least the Underworld stuff), and she did seem to feel some real remorse about her choices

It was for a good while, yes, but I think she really slipped toward the end, around the point of "Ruby Slippers", when it became clear that she wasn't going to have any story with her Underworld victims and it was just going to be all about her, Zelena and Cora instead.  The writing flaws began to resurface, and they came back with a vengeance in the season finale.  After that debacle, I gave up all hope on the writing for Regina improving.

7 hours ago, Curio said:

If Percival is Inigo, Regina is the six-fingered man. If Hook is Dread Pirate Roberts, Rumple is Humperdinck.

Oh, Rumple is totally Humperdinck, since a big part of that character was also that beneath all his strength, scheming and competence, he's a coward.

Edited September 8, 2016 by Mathius

[KAOS Agent]

Percival is Inigo dying when the Six Fingered Man caught him with the knife with his final words being, "Sorry, father. I tried. I tried." In the Princess Bride, we would have been devastated had Inigo died that way having failed. Once wants us to not care because the Six Fingered Man is a main character and Percival is just some random. It's all about POV.

The writers on Once mostly seem to write from the villains' POV. It's not really a Regina only thing. It's a villain thing. Look at how they wrote Maleficent as this poor, mistreated woman and Snowing as evil eggnappers. Did we ever see Aurora's POV? Or her parents'? Or how about the villagers who had to flee their homes because she scorched the earth surrounding her egg laying den? Maleficent was not some innocent. She'd destroyed countless lives, but that was all ignored. Rumpel murders innocents all the time. So does Regina. Same with Zelena. We never see their victims POVs. Their pain and suffering doesn't matter. But we see all about abused Zelena and sad, lonely Regina and harangued husband Rumpel. It makes these characters more relatable, but it's pure manipulation by the writers.

[Camera One]

In "Our Decay", we see Zelena murdering a Munchkin and then chuckling about it while flirting with Hades, like it's so hot and hilarious as Hades compliments her flair in killing.  Meanwhile, in the present-day, we get a full-out sobfest and we're supposed to feel sorry for her as she realizes her magic might have caused a scratch on the baby's face?  But exactly as you said, due to the POV, we do, or at least it's obvious we're supposed to.

[daxx]

The only villian I've had any empathy with is Hook. They haven't shown very much of his actual villainy and they have shown all the tragedy that has befallen him at each step into revenge. I still don't dismiss his treatment of Belle or his orphaning his half brother but of the villians he seems to have done the least collateral damage or just plain evil for evils sake. I can't emphasize with Rumple, Regina or Zelena as they revel in the evil or wicked they do.

[YaddaYadda]

8 hours ago, Mathius said:

Seriously, Graham's rape and murder was at least done when Regina was being portrayed as unquestionably the villain.  But when they decide they want to make her "misunderstood" and a hero....that's when they begin trotting out things like the groom, Percival, and those countless villages and denizens of the Underworld that she never once has any sort of confrontation with, nor does she help any of them move on or show any real desire to.

If they had done that in the UW, where she was confronted with her past, by the people she killed, or whose life she messed up, then the split would have made so much more sense than her going on about how she hates doing the wrong thing, how she doesn't really wanna control her impulses.

She caused a lot of pain, she redeemed a lot of that in the UW by helping those whose life she ruined move on, this is why Hades didn't want her in the UW in the first place (plot that was completely dropped). She's tired, she's scared of the day she might not be able to control herself because her impulse is to throw a fireball at someone's head, or take a heart to get what she wants, take the serum. It's a much more human reaction.

Whatever though. I can't with this character, so I just ignore her completely now.

[Mathius]

Quote

Whatever though. I can't with this character, so I just ignore her completely now.

Unfortunately, that's pretty hard to do given her prominence, especially now that there's two of her.  I don't like having to harp on about Regina in the Writers thread, but it's pretty much a fact that so many of the problem with the writing on the show and the writers' twisted moral viewpoints are either embodied by Regina or caused by her.  When talking or debating about the show's bad writing, bringing up Regina is sadly unavoidable. 

Quote

The writers on Once mostly seem to write from the villains' POV. It's not really a Regina only thing. It's a villain thing. Look at how they wrote Maleficent as this poor, mistreated woman and Snowing as evil eggnappers. Did we ever see Aurora's POV? Or her parents'? Or how about the villagers who had to flee their homes because she scorched the earth surrounding her egg laying den? Maleficent was not some innocent. She'd destroyed countless lives, but that was all ignored. Rumpel murders innocents all the time. So does Regina. Same with Zelena. We never see their victims POVs. Their pain and suffering doesn't matter. But we see all about abused Zelena and sad, lonely Regina and harangued husband Rumpel. It makes these characters more relatable, but it's pure manipulation by the writers.

As daxx pointed out, Hook is the bizarre exception to the rule, since not only do we get to see more of his victims' POV, but his own POV usually shows his understanding that what he did was wrong and feeling remorseful about it, and whatever evil he did in the past usually has direct consequences on what's going on in the present (unlike random groom murders by Regina, random Munchin murders by Zelena, random anyone murders by Rumple, etc.)  Belle, Baelfire, Ariel and Eric, the Apprentice, Ursula, Hook's father and half-brother, even Rumple...what Hook did to these people is actually show to matter, both to Hook and to the story.  Even dead people we never actually see and are only referenced by Hook via his rings is in the context of Hook understanding that it was sinful to kill them and feeling remorseful about it.  I think the only one of Hook's victim we've never seen any remorse or consequences for is Claude, and given that he was a complete scumbag even before he joined up with the Evil Queen, nobody can really begrudge Hook that.  It's confusing as hell why the writers can't do this same thing with Regina or any other mainstay villain.

Edited September 8, 2016 by Mathius

[YaddaYadda]

2 hours ago, Mathius said:

I think the only one of Hook's victim we've never seen any remorse or consequences for is Claude, and given that he was a complete scumbag even before he joined up with the Evil Queen, nobody can really begrudge Hook that.

Claude also called Hook a slave, which now that we know a little bit more about his backstory...

[Shanna Marie]

I think that while a lot of the writing problems on the show come back to their use of Regina as self-insert/pet/metaphor for their own lives, which skews a lot of things, the real problem is that they're not even competently conveying the messages they say they're sending. So, they say that Regina isn't really a villain and is just misunderstood, but then they show her -- from an objective viewpoint, so it's not just someone reporting incorrectly -- doing absolutely villainous things against innocent people. It would have been one thing if they'd just focused on her feud with Snow. That was still misguided, since Snow didn't kill Daniel, didn't intend harm to come to Daniel, was trying to help Regina, and had absolutely no idea that harm would come to Daniel, but you might consider Regina to be somewhat misunderstood if no one else knew the basis of her actions. Showing her murdering someone she didn't even know, who had done nothing to her, just because she was having a bad day or showing her slaughtering a village and leaving a pile of bodies means that no, Regina is not misunderstood at all. She's a villain who did horrible things, and her motivation wasn't enough to dress that up into "misunderstood." If they wanted to show a misunderstood villain, we needed to see that there was another explanation behind her horrible acts, like maybe the village she burned was full of zombies, and by burning it she saved the kingdom, but all anyone talks about is the burning because they just assumed she was evil. I think the misunderstood villain is a bad cliche to begin with unless they've got a really good twist on it (come to think of it, I kind of like the idea of the person everyone assumes is being evil while she's actually having to do horrible things to save them), but they're not even giving good grounds for her being misunderstood because she's doing what people think she's doing, for the reason they think she's doing it. They need to look up the definition of "misunderstood."

It's the same thing with their assertion that Regina always gets the short end of the stick, while they show her constantly winning. In the Enchanted Forest, the only thing that really went wrong for her when she was evil (between Daniel's death and the curse) was not being able to kill Snow and not being loved by the people she was terrorizing. Otherwise, she'd managed to take over the kingdom, had an army of knights doing her bidding, had a hot guy forced to share a bed with her, she defeated her mother twice, and she managed to cast the curse. Even when she lost the war, she kept living in the palace. She did grow up with a social climbing, abusing mother and her first boyfriend was murdered, but that just puts her on an equal basis among every other character, since they've all had difficult lives and lost loved ones. In Storybrooke, she ruled the town for 28 years, having absolute power. She was able to adopt a son and love him, in spite of being told she'd have a hole in her heart. After the curse was broken, she faced no consequences and her life actually got better. She's still the mayor, still lives in a mansion, and all her victims are friends with her, in spite of her never apologizing. The only really bad thing she's faced is losing her boyfriend. She's even managed to reconcile with her parents in the afterlife. So how is she at all an underdog who always gets the short end of the stick? If that's what they're trying to convey, they've utterly failed. They've shown far worse things happening to just about every other character. I think the woobie villain who really has had a sad life that excuses her villainy is a terrible, cliched trope, but they aren't even carrying that off competently. They're trying to do bad cliches, and failing to actually execute them.

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

 It would have been one thing if they'd just focused on her feud with Snow. That was still misguided, since Snow didn't kill Daniel, didn't intend harm to come to Daniel, was trying to help Regina, and had absolutely no idea that harm would come to Daniel, but you might consider Regina to be somewhat misunderstood if no one else knew the basis of her actions.

If Daniel's death had just made Regina crack, then okay. If everything she did had something to do with her revenge against Snow, then I'd buy that. 2A played it right when she realized she had become the woman she hated and then decided to change her ways for Henry's benefit. That, to me, was perfect. It wasn't "Oh, I want to be a hero now!" but rather, "I hurt my son. He's in my pain, and it was my fault. I want what's best for him, and that's why I have to send him where I know he'll be safe." It didn't fix all her problems, but it initiated what could have toppled her house of cards. She could have realized the unnecessary pain she caused to Snow's family. Henry was the perfect catalyst, since he was effectively in the same group.

The rest of S2 could have been her fighting off her mother's temptations and trying to prove her intentions to repent were genuine. Her reversion once Cora arrived wasn't totally illogical considering the tight mother grip in place. But eventually Regina realized her entire quest for vengeance was a setup... and did nothing with that. She could have seen that Cora was a danger to Henry and decided to help Snow defeat her. Or, at the very least, we could have seen that she was too scared to face her. Just a few weeks prior she was prepared to obliterate her at all cost because she was such a threat. I

The writing choices concerning in Regina make no sense and boggle my mind. She could have been the victim they wanted her to be, but instead they made her do more evil things. They gave her control where she couldn't have it if she was so helpless. Redeeming her would not have been that difficult within the show's writing style. Zelena's was more palatable and that only took a few episodes. 

Edited September 8, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Rumsy4]

26 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

But eventually Regina realized her entire quest for vengeance was a setup... and did nothing with that. 

I totally expected Regina to turn away from her mother at that moment. But--we got nothing. The writers wanted to push Regina's volte face to the literal last moment with her trying to defuse the fail safe. The last minute change of heart is not in the least interesting and does nothing to help characterization. But they repeat it all the time. 

Edited September 9, 2016 by Rumsy4

[Camera One]

I will never understand the Writers deciding to go for a village massacre in "The Evil Queen".  Up until then, Regina was evil, but genocide took it to a whole new level.  And since then, they've regularly thrown in killings of random innocents, plus yet another village massacre with Percival.  I suppose the message was Snow was wrong in rejecting Regina in the flashback to "The Evil Queen", since Regina was soooooooooo close to seeing the errors of her ways.

Quote

 

I totally expected Regina to turn away from her mother at that moment. But--we got literally nothing. The writers wanted to push Regina's volte face to the literal last moment with her trying to defuse the fail safe. The last minute change of heart is not in the least interesting and does nothing to help characterization. But they repeat it all the time.

Regina could easily have floored when she found out Cora killed Snow's mother.  But no reaction.  Since they were actually using Regina as Cora's prop for a few episodes... what a surprise.

Edited September 9, 2016 by Camera One

[Rumsy4]

1 minute ago, Camera One said:

Regina could easily have floored when she found out Cora killed Snow's mother.  But no reaction.  Since they were actually using Regina as Cora's prop for a few episodes... what a surprise.

It's not just that. Even the runaway horse bit was manufactured by Cora, so that Regina would swoop-in and rescue young Snow. Cora manipulated everything, and still Regina was clinging to her. Cora's hold on Regina was really strong. That would have made Regina breaking away from her mother's influence really powerful. Instead we got Snow "murdering" Cora, and the stupid dark spot. 

[Camera One]

Instead we got Snow "murdering" Cora, and the stupid dark spot.

Snow killed Cora right when she was ready to change and realized Regina "would have been enough".  She always makes the bad choices.

[Shanna Marie]

1 hour ago, Rumsy4 said:

Cora manipulated everything, and still Regina was clinging to her. Cora's hold on Regina was really strong. That would have made Regina breaking away from her mother's influence really powerful. Instead we got Snow "murdering" Cora, and the stupid dark spot.

That was the point of no return for me with Regina. When she learned the truth of what had happened all along and that Snow had been manipulated, and what happened to Daniel probably didn't even have anything to do with Snow in the first place, then when Regina kept siding with Cora and acted like the victim when Cora was killed -- and then they made it look like Snow was the real villain there. Even Regina's eventual grudging admission that it was "complicated" because Cora had killed Snow's mother didn't help. That's where we see the extremely biased writers who have this weird blind spot for things that are actually in their show that they wrote, where they conveniently forget anything bad Regina did to others and remember every last detail of everything every other character did to Regina. They're all "huh, Graham? Oh, that's old news" and forgetting what happened to Leopold while even in season 5 still reminding us that Snow killed Cora. They talk like the fans are being weird and obsessive for bringing up some things from past episodes that they'd rather forget, but then they keep writing the same sort of events that we're apparently supposed to disregard in our view of Regina, while at the same time they keep reminding us of every little thing every other character has ever done wrong.

[Camera One]

And they continue that to this very day.  Even in the latest episode, they had Snow say that she was partly responsible for bringing The Evil Queen into this world.  They don't have Emma say anything to that, even though I don't think she would agree.

And now, to justify their new arc, the dialogue makes it seem like The Evil Queen is a completely separate entity, said by Regina herself.  

Look at this: "The problem is, as long as she's inside me, that doesn't matter.  Her baggage, her karma, call it what you want, will always be there."

What is Regina talking about?  Who talks like this? The Evil Queen's karma is HER karma because it's HER baggage, since she did those horrible things HERself, even though she was wearing different clothes.  The Writers want us to see The Evil Queen as this separate being, so they make Regina say that line, which makes her seem to refuse responsibility, when that isn't their intention. 

Edited September 9, 2016 by Camera One

[YaddaYadda]

The thing is, Regina seems to be one of two people on the show that seems to separate the bad person from the good person. She's said it to Emma twice during the 5A arc that she knows the good Emma, while Emma acknowledged that there is no good or bad, just people, and Hook did the same with Emma when he recognized that she wasn't just the Dark One, but also Emma. Meanwhile, Snow in 5x08 was all about how there may not be an Emma left, and only the Dark One.

Snow was adamant that the darkness be sucked out of Emma while she was a zygote, and she talks about helping create the EQ. Snow's first reaction to Emma disappearing "she's still good" when talking about Emma. Lady, your daughter just got swallowed up into the black hole of evil, and that's what you're thinking about?

Snow and Regina are peas in a pod. They see the world without the grey areas. It's black or white, there's no in between.

Edited September 9, 2016 by YaddaYadda

[TheGreenKnight]

19 hours ago, Camera One said:

And they continue that to this very day.  Even in the latest episode, they had Snow say that she was partly responsible for bringing The Evil Queen into this world.  They don't have Emma say anything to that, even though I don't think she would agree.

Yeah, I've never understood why the writers make Snow says things like that. I've always assumed they mean it to be taken as the character being kind to Regina, not because she really feels responsible for the Evil Queen era. But maybe we're supposed to take it as Snow's relationship with the current Regina tapping into the pre-EQ relationship they had, and Snow does feel responsible for telling Cora about Daniel even though she was a child.

Back in season 2, I thought for sure as everything was happening that the writers would reveal Regina was playing Cora at the climactic moment and that would be the way the writers would forge a relationship between her and the Charmings/Emma, but.... I always thought that was a lost opportunity, although I guess I could believe that Regina was really that desperate for her mother's love that she'd actually team up with her after everything (and they used that to show how psychologically damaged she is that she apparently does not hold Cora primarily responsible for Daniel's death).

[KingOfHearts]

It almost seems like A&E were going for making Regina betray her mother, but at the last second getting a "cool idea" that Snow would murder her and get a dark heart. Both possible outcomes are setup at roughly the same time, so Regina's realization was ultimately played for pointless exposition to the audience.

Edited September 9, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Curio]

It's as if the writers thought Season 2 would be the end of the show, so they were setting Regina up to realize her mother was the real reason behind her suffering and side with the Charmings, but then ABC came in at the last second and let them know the show would be on the air for a few more years, so they didn't want to scrap the Regina/Cora relationship that quickly and awkwardly tried to extend it beyond Season 2. 

[Camera One]

I was rewatching clips from "Manhattan" and I heard another similar line they used in "Dead of Summer"

Once Upon a Time:

NEAL: [My father] used to tell me that there are no coincidences. Everything that happens, happens by design

Dead of Summer:

TOWNIE: Who's there?  Dad?
DAD: Nothing happens by accident, kiddo.
TOWNIE: What?
DAD: Nothing happens by accident.

---

The other thing that really bothered me about that line in "Dead of Summer" is that Jack's father on "Lost" called him "kiddo" in some iconic lines... it felt like a total ripoff to me.

Henry's scenes with Emma after finding out his father was pretty good, up until the Writers had Henry compare Emma to Regina.  I thought it was kinda weird that no one reacted when Henry climbed out the window.  There were little staging things that bugged me, even though the scenes in this episode were well acted.  One was Emma taking a very long moment to look away from the running Neal, to tell Gold to look after Henry.  Another was the weird unnecessary trip to a bar to resume their talk, complete with two mugs of undrunk beer.  There was just so much untapped potential after this episode... typical rewatching experience with this show.

Edited September 10, 2016 by Camera One

[Rumsy4]

In addition to the huge untapped potential in the writing, another huge pet peeve of mine is their tendency to have characters backslide or retconning them into worse versions of themselves. The posterchild for this is the Snowing eggnapping debacle. They practically ruined Snow and Charming with that twist. A simpler example is Emma calling her parents "mom and dad" be the breakthrough 2 seasons in a row, and her having to learn to "let people in" every season finale (some version or the other). 

Then we have Rumple going from complex villain to the garden-variety muahahaing bad-guy over the last two seasons. He's basically unredeemable except to die-hard Rumple fans now.

We had Killian be all heroic in 5A, and then throw it all away in one episode. He made up for it, but still, they had him say and do some pretty bad stuff. I know some people who were starting to like him go back to disliking him after that episode where he went berserk.

The same way, every time I start tolerating, and even liking Regina, she goes and does something horrible on-screen. 

I understand that it is important to have characters do bad or stupid things sometimes, or they end up looking artificially perfect. But I think the whiplash turns from one end of the pendulum to the other, and lack of follow-up are what make them unrealistic and character-destroying in ONCE. It's like they want to make their characters as unlikable as possible, and see if the viewers will still remain loyal or something.