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

[Mathius]

Unfortunately, that kind of bias is one that we're stuck with.

Although while I know the whole writing staff devise the stories, the script writer is still in charge of delivering the execution of said story, and on this show there are some that are better than others at that (Jane Espenson being one, David Goodman being another. A&E themselves used to be pretty good at it, but their output has taken a nosedive since Season 4.)

[Free]

On 10/17/2016 at 4:35 AM, Rumsy4 said:

I would think they decided to kill off Hyde before the season started. I still think the episode 1 reshoots were so that Hyde could play the (re-)exposition fairy. I feel like Hyde would've been captured by the end of the first episode anyway--they just changed which scene it did. 

Reshoots haven't exactly been kind to OuaT (ex. S5a's messiness).

 

16 hours ago, sharky said:

Yea, killing a character off isn't something they do on a whim. That was something they would've worked out when they put the whole season together back in May. That being said, I think something changed from the S5 finale to putting season 6 together, namely that Channing Dungey took over at ABC. I wonder if the network -- and the Disney owners -- decided to put a bit of pressure on A&E. I wouldn't be surprised if they told them they needed to add more Disney properties -- hence, Aladdin coming in after they kill off Jekyll/Hyde after only four episodes. It's seriously just a rehash of the Greg/Tamara situation. It was a bad idea that served no purpose and they were axed in the season premiere.

Of course, this does then make me wonder how much control Disney and ABC are exerting on the show now. I wouldn't necessarily be against them having a heavier hand if they control A&E properly. The last time this show seemed put together properly was the Frozen arc so it may not be a bad idea to have some outside influence.

It seems like no one seems to know what to do, so they're just throwing in as many characters as much as possible into the mix because it's become increasingly obvious they've ran out of ideas a long time ago.  Frozen was pretty much their last trump card and that didn't even last long.

[sharky]

6 hours ago, Free said:

It seems like no one seems to know what to do, so they're just throwing in as many characters as much as possible into the mix because it's become increasingly obvious they've ran out of ideas a long time ago.  Frozen was pretty much their last trump card and that didn't even last long.

Frozen also had quite a bit of interference from Disney to make sure their property was taken care of. There's a reason that season was better than other recent ones.

[Free]

2 hours ago, sharky said:

Frozen also had quite a bit of interference from Disney to make sure their property was taken care of. There's a reason that season was better than other recent ones.

That makes more sense, it's too bad most of the other characters usually just end up in a big mess.

[Shanna Marie]

Thinking about the weird disconnect between Hyde's actions and the motives that were later revealed, I've come to the conclusion that a lot of this show's writing woes come down to a sense that it's all so very half-baked, like this is a first draft written in a frenzy during a brainstorming session and then never developed further and refined. That's why there are so many good, creative ideas buried in a mess of things that don't work, there's no setup or payoff, there's often no connection between what we're shown and what we're told, the characters' emotional reactions aren't considered, and so many plots are dropped. The show as it goes on air comes across like the result of a session in the writers room with people shouting out ideas, with no one going back and really thinking about or developing the ideas. Take Hyde -- if they started with the idea that he wanted revenge on Rumple and Jekyll, then they didn't really follow through the series of steps he might have taken. Would that really have caused him to load an airship with Untold Stories people when he went to Storybrooke to get his revenge? Would he have bothered showing up at the airship to gloat at Emma and the gang (when he didn't even know Emma and Regina) and therefore reveal his presence to them so they could thwart him before he got his revenge? Or did they start with the whole "keys to Storybrooke" and airship full of Untold Stories people concept and reverse engineer a reason behind it? Or did they even bother creating a reason, just throwing out the idea that Hyde wasn't really the "bad" one and he wanted revenge on Rumple and Jekyll, and also let's bring in all those Untold Stories people to give us one-off plots, and Hyde brought them for Reasons?

I feel like the writing is missing the step of going back and looking at the ideas and then doing some development on them, working through motives, thinking about possible outcomes and consequences, considering emotional impact, etc. When I do brainstorming, I take each of the ideas I really like and then brainstorm further on each of them, and then I take the plot elements that come from that and think about the motivation needed to get there, or else think about how the characters' already established motives fit those plot elements, and then consider the possible ripple effects on the story and the emotional effects on the characters. For this thing to happen, what else needs to happen, what do the characters have to do, why would they do it, and then after it happens, how does that change things and how does it affect the characters? I feel like that part of the process is missing in this show and the writers don't care about all that stuff.

[TheGreenKnight]

22 hours ago, sharky said:

Frozen also had quite a bit of interference from Disney to make sure their property was taken care of. There's a reason that season was better than other recent ones.

I don't think that season was at a noticeably higher quality than usual. It may just seem that way because 4B was noticeably worse than usual.

[KingOfHearts]

Has anyone else noticed all the writers this season we've never seen before? Nelson Soler, Leah Fong, Brian Ridings, etc. (Some of their episodes haven't aired yet.)

[Camera One]

4 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

Thinking about the weird disconnect between Hyde's actions and the motives that were later revealed, I've come to the conclusion that a lot of this show's writing woes come down to a sense that it's all so very half-baked, like this is a first draft written in a frenzy during a brainstorming session and then never developed further and refined. That's why there are so many good, creative ideas buried in a mess of things that don't work, there's no setup or payoff, there's often no connection between what we're shown and what we're told, the characters' emotional reactions aren't considered, and so many plots are dropped. The show as it goes on air comes across like the result of a session in the writers room with people shouting out ideas, with no one going back and really thinking about or developing the ideas.

That's the key.  They probably thought of the idea for Hyde in the spring as they were planning the latter half of 5B.  They knew they wanted to do The Evil Queen/Regina split, so Jekyll/Hyde was a natural parallel.  So they set up Hyde in the Season 5 finale.

BUT then Season 5 finished production and they went to their planning camp for Season 6 and no one had any idea where they were going with Jekyll and Hyde, except probably the final "twist" that Jekyll was the "evil" one.  So that's why it just fizzled out.  And at the Season 6 camp, they had tons of stuff to follow-up for the villains.  But for those boring heroes, they didn't care to look back at where the various characters emotionally left off, and they just came up with new "Wouldn't it be cool if..." stuff for Emma, Snow and Charming.  And then they realized they needed a bigger draw so Aladdin was born.

[Mathius]

1 hour ago, Camera One said:

They probably thought of the idea for Hyde in the spring as they were planning the latter half of 5B.

You mean the Spring between S4 and S5?  Doubt it, since the decision to kill Robin came around December 2015, and the Regina split plot relies on that happening as the catalyst.  I think they only had the Camelot and Underworld stuff planned out in the camp between seasons, nothing else.

Edited October 20, 2016 by Mathius

[Camera One]

Yeah, spring is probably a little late since they were already filming 5B.  It was likely in the fall, then.  They could have decided to end with the Regina/Evil Queen split, and then figured out the details later.

[KAOS Agent]

6 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

Has anyone else noticed all the writers this season we've never seen before? Nelson Soler, Leah Fong, Brian Ridings, etc. (Some of their episodes haven't aired yet.)

One of the writers died last season and another one left, so I assume these would be their replacements. I know Scott Nimerfro didn't write anything last season, he was still credited while he was battling cancer. There were a lot more solo writing efforts last year, so maybe they decided to bring in some newer writers to help take on some of the burden. Jane is the only one with a solo writing credit through the first ten episodes of Season 6.

[Camera One]

I guess it doesn't matter since they're all the mouthpiece of Sauron, uh, I mean A&E.  Just another delightful fictional mash-up.

Edited October 20, 2016 by Camera One

[Curio]

I feel like the writing is missing the step of going back and looking at the ideas and then doing some development on them, working through motives, thinking about possible outcomes and consequences, considering emotional impact, etc. 

1

I think they're very selective when they do this. If the plot revolves around a certain character, they're very in tune with how that specific character is feeling in the current timeline, but they generally forget to think about how the other characters would naturally react to that character.

A major issue is that the writers seem to enjoy not knowing the final end goal to their plot lines when they're breaking the season. I know certain show runners and writers enjoy not having a totally concrete ending and like puzzle-piecing together the plot along the way to get to the final destination, but that tends to only work on shows where it's a linear story and flashbacks don't play such a prominent role. Vince Gilligan has mentioned that he sometimes enjoys writing himself into a box, and that part of being a writer is figuring out how to get out of the box. But on OUAT, they can't just say, "Oh, I'll let future Adam & Eddy figure out what happened between this flashback and this current event." Since the flashbacks happened in the past, those are the main events where the writers should 100% know what happened, and then the current timeline can be looser and more malleable. The characters in the present behave based on what has already happened in their past, so you can't just retcon an eggnapping because we've already seen how Snow and Charming behave in the present timeline. But when flashbacks are treated the same way as the present where the writers don't even know what happened in the past and are willing to just making things up on the spot, that's when the continuity and characterization issues pop up. 

[Shanna Marie]

5 hours ago, Curio said:

I think they're very selective when they do this. If the plot revolves around a certain character, they're very in tune with how that specific character is feeling in the current timeline, but they generally forget to think about how the other characters would naturally react to that character.

While they wallow in Regina's emotions, I don't think they're that much better with her in thinking through how she would really react to those circumstances. They give her emotions to drive the plot, rather than the other way around. Take 2B. She sent an assassin after her mother and was glad when she died. Her mother tricked her and then framed her for murder, ruining the bits of ground she'd gained in changing her reputation in the town after she'd tried to do better. She learned that everything in her life had been part of her mother's scheme, that the person she'd been blaming all along had been just as much a victim of her mother's scheming as she was. She watches her mother murder an innocent woman. How would she really react if she's the person they keep telling us she is? What would she feel about all this? She did the exact opposite of what the person they told us she was would do. Ditto for all of season 4. There's a huge gap between the person they tell us she is and her actions. It's like they've written a character sketch for her and then completely disregard it when it comes to writing the character's actions because they need her to act a certain way to progress the plot, and it only gets worse because the other characters are reacting as though the character sketch was true and not reacting to the actual actions. They have an idea of Regina as this person of great, deep feeling whose anger comes from the fact that she loves so deeply, which is what caused her to hurt so much that she lashed out, and yet they write her actions as someone who's completely narcissistic and has zero empathy, and meanwhile all the other characters interact with her as though she's that deeply loving person.

[Mitch]

1 hour ago, Shanna Marie said:

While they wallow in Regina's emotions, I don't think they're that much better with her in thinking through how she would really react to those circumstances. They give her emotions to drive the plot, rather than the other way around. Take 2B. She sent an assassin after her mother and was glad when she died. Her mother tricked her and then framed her for murder, ruining the bits of ground she'd gained in changing her reputation in the town after she'd tried to do better. She learned that everything in her life had been part of her mother's scheme, that the person she'd been blaming all along had been just as much a victim of her mother's scheming as she was. She watches her mother murder an innocent woman. How would she really react if she's the person they keep telling us she is? What would she feel about all this? She did the exact opposite of what the person they told us she was would do. Ditto for all of season 4. There's a huge gap between the person they tell us she is and her actions. It's like they've written a character sketch for her and then completely disregard it when it comes to writing the character's actions because they need her to act a certain way to progress the plot, and it only gets worse because the other characters are reacting as though the character sketch was true and not reacting to the actual actions. They have an idea of Regina as this person of great, deep feeling whose anger comes from the fact that she loves so deeply, which is what caused her to hurt so much that she lashed out, and yet they write her actions as someone who's completely narcissistic and has zero empathy, and meanwhile all the other characters interact with her as though she's that deeply loving person.

Not to mention the big moments, those moments where we should see a lightbulb go off in Regina's head and see Regina make steps to becoming a better person, (and give Parrilla a chance to really shine) those moments are glossed over so swiftly its almost like the writers resent them. When Whale brought Daniel back and Regina had to kill him to get him out of his pain should have been BIG...and a moment when Regina started to really change (not just for Henry) and David of all people to see the kind of person Regina could be...and start a bonding process where it would cause friction when Snow go back.(I would have had Daniel say something to her like..."Why are you like this? You brought all these people to this loud ugly world to hurt them? You have become like your mother!") but they show her crying and then next week its on to something else..(and no mention to Snow what happened..) Both Rump and Regina did not want Cora in SB, yet when they see her they are like "Hey wad's up?" Regina finds out Cora has manipulated things so that Daniel would die and that Regina would marry Snow's dad...Regina has a five second realization of this and then its..."Oh and Regina I need the dagger to be the dark one so...") and Regina still helps her...(we should have seen her very angry and conflicted and had her acting like she was working with Cora and then helping ( I would have had Regina being the one to manipulate Snow into killing Cora, since Regina couldnt do it herself and in her sicko mind would make them even steven on the killing of parents...I would always leave Regina a quirky edgy figure...not villain and not hero.)

Magic is the writers excuse not to devolpe these characters and really relish the big moments the characters and the actors could do justice to. Its always off to the next "world" or guest or dumb magic threat and solution.

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

I would always leave Regina a quirky edgy figure...not villain and not hero.

I really like the position Zelena is in. She's trying to do better for her child, but she's not putting herself on the side of the angels for her ego. She legitimately wants what she thinks is best for her and Pistachio. Because of that, she has the capability of functioning on her own. Her decisions are hers and hers alone. I have more respect for her because she can think for herself. She isn't persuaded by any one figure.

Redeemed!Regina doesn't have to be boring. The writers are terrified of losing the Evil Queen because they can't live without excessive scenery chewing. If written correctly, Regina can be complex and even sympathetic. If she were trying to be good because of a conscience and actually felt remorse, she would be compelling. But she expects the world to give her happiness instead of going about it herself. 

[Shanna Marie]

I don't watch Frequency, but I was intrigued by the headline on this site's article about it this week, "Frequency's Credibility Is A Bloody Mess: If you want the audience to buy the big crazy thing at the center of your story, you can't screw up the small stuff," which reminded me of this show, so I read it. And you can pretty much replace the show-specific details and have it be about this show. For instance:

Quote

if you want us to believe in the farfetched or even impossible premise that is your story, that a father and daughter can communicate across time via ham radio -- if you want us to accept that big thing, you really have to nail all the small things, the little details and emotional realism that let us trust you on the big stuff. And you aren't doing that. Viewers can accept that you haven't sat down with a theoretical physicist and bulletproofed every single possible outcome of changing events in the past, but only if they aren't questioning whether your characters would think and respond the way they do in any timeline.

Replace the bit about "father and daughter can communicate across time via ham radio" with "fairy tale and literary characters are living in a small town in Maine," and they've nailed it. We're already having to suspend disbelief with the premise, so the emotional realism needs to be spot on. We can accept all the magic and curses and portals, and all that. Where things fall apart is when we question whether the characters would think and respond the way they do.

I think part of the problem is that the writers are waffling on what, exactly, they want this show to be. There's some element of campy farce in there, where we're not supposed to take any of it seriously, and part of the joke is throwing the Disney characters into a real-world setting, so we have Disney princesses who are just too perky for words and who of course don't get mad or hold grudges, but if you're going to do that, you have to commit to it, and you also need a real-world character to contrast and get exasperated by it. They could have had Snow be all sunshine and happiness and talking to birds, but then Emma needs to be the one who stays in "Seriously?" mode. But then at the same time, they seem to want us to see it as a serious character drama, where they're fleshing out the fairy tales and showing that there are shades of gray, not just black and white. If you're going to do that, then you need to have very real, multi-dimensional, relatable human beings against this wacky situation. She's Snow White, and yeah, she talks to birds, but her sunny demeanor masks the pain she carries from having suffered so much loss at the hands of the Evil Queen, and she's had to become tough and strong to survive life on the run and a war to win back her kingdom, and now she's justifiably pissed off at Regina for everything she's lost due to her, but they're stuck together in the same small town, so they have to make the best of it.

I think that's part of what worked so well in the first season. The situation was rather ridiculous, and the show knew it, but while they were under the curse, all these fairy tale characters were very real human beings who had very human reactions to everything.

[KingOfHearts]

Lost had the same issue, albeit to a much smaller degree. We, as the audience, could accept that the Island was magical and had a bunch of supernatural shenanigans going on. But as the seasons went on, the demand for character realism got higher as the plot got crazier. Pretty soon we had time travel everywhere, two godlike immortals battling for dominance, magic diseases, and a whole freaking purgatory world. In my personal opinion, it lost a lot of its grounding in S5/S6, and went straight for the scifi fantasy aspect. The character focus was never lost, per se, but the writers began to lose ideas and I wasn't impressed with where the characters were going. (Like Juliet and Sawyer... ugh.)

Once hit that point much sooner... in S2. The gloves were off and realism flew out the window. 

[Camera One]

Quote

 In my personal opinion, it lost a lot of its grounding in S5/S6, and went straight for the scifi fantasy aspect. The character focus was never lost, per se, but the writers began to lose ideas and I wasn't impressed with where the characters were going.

I really liked aspects of the sci-fi of Season 5 "Lost", but I think post-Season 4 on "Lost", the characters became more chess pieces rather than real people, which is exactly the problem with "Once Upon a Time" from Season 2B onwards.  "On Lost", the lack of interest in actually writing for the characters themselves (especially the supporting characters like Sun, Jin, Sayid, etc.) became blatantly obvious in Season 6, which sort of ruined the show for me.  The egregious thing is that A&E didn't even realize there was a problem, and promptly did the same thing by the second season of "Once".

It's the same problem they're describing for "Frequency".  Even if the worldbuilding is lacklustre (which is the other problem with "Once"), if the characters themselves were responding to crazy events in believable ways and developing organically, the show could still be extremely enjoyable.  But it is just so obvious nowadays that characters are acting in ways convenient to the predictable plot, that it's not even fun anymore to see these characters' lives, because what they're doing and how they're responding, either aren't believable, or are on a hamster wheel of repetition.

Edited October 21, 2016 by Camera One

[Mitch]

23 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

I really like the position Zelena is in. She's trying to do better for her child, but she's not putting herself on the side of the angels for her ego. She legitimately wants what she thinks is best for her and Pistachio. Because of that, she has the capability of functioning on her own. Her decisions are hers and hers alone. I have more respect for her because she can think for herself. She isn't persuaded by any one figure.

Redeemed!Regina doesn't have to be boring. The writers are terrified of losing the Evil Queen because they can't live without excessive scenery chewing. If written correctly, Regina can be complex and even sympathetic. If she were trying to be good because of a conscience and actually felt remorse, she would be compelling. But she expects the world to give her happiness instead of going about it herself. 

I do too, but I fear that they will screw that up to, by making her mistake something Regina does and be jealous and cackle and go full on evil, or become a whiny "hero"  This is why I wish Cruella could be alive and in town as a supporting character..to be friendly with Zelena in their annoyance with the Charmings and Regina and not give too hoots what the hell they think. Maleficent could do that but they have watered her down so much...what a waste of the best Disney villain ever!

[Shanna Marie]

14 hours ago, Camera One said:

Even if the worldbuilding is lacklustre (which is the other problem with "Once"), if the characters themselves were responding to crazy events in believable ways and developing organically, the show could still be extremely enjoyable.  But it is just so obvious nowadays that characters are acting in ways convenient to the predictable plot, that it's not even fun anymore to see these characters' lives, because what they're doing and how they're responding, either aren't believable, or are on a hamster wheel of repetition.

I think if the characters were more grounded and the plots were stronger, we could buy the lackluster worldbuilding as a feature rather than a bug -- after all, when you have multiple worlds and people who get their magic from multiple sources, it's hard to have consistent magic rules. Or if the worldbuilding was strong and the characters were realistic, we could cope with weak plots. Or if the worldbuilding was solid and the plots were really strong, we might care less about whether the characters were reacting in believable ways to the plot events. But on this show, the worldbuilding is thin-to-nonexistent, the plotting is scattershot, mostly relying on surprise twists that either aren't surprising or that are only surprising because they come out of nowhere, and the characters don't respond to plot events in any believable way. The character thing may be more of a problem because the real strength of the show is that they have good characters who, for the most part, are perfectly cast and very well portrayed. That makes it even more glaringly obvious when they act out of character.

[Camera One]

Quote

3D Planet ‏@3DPlanet20  Oct 18

@AdamHorowitzLA Dear Adam I think that the next OUAT villain should be the original owner of the yellow bug out for revenge. Good Idea?

Adam Horowitz Verified account ‏@AdamHorowitzLA

@3DPlanet20 that's actually a great idea!

I hope he's joking.

Edited October 22, 2016 by Camera One

[Camera One]

Because I'm avoiding work, I was reading some interviews with A&E from 2011:

"That was the greatest lesson on Lost: Really learning how to approach the story through character." Kitsis notes that Lost bosses Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse strived to put character first on the island mystery series. "On Lost, we started to realize how you can tell these character stories with the background and the mythology and hopefully try and weave it together."

Clearly, they abandoned this "lesson" soon after planning out the first season.

Horowitz and Kitsis have also pieced together their own "bible" to keep track of the Once timelines and character histories, not unlike the one used by the Lost writers. "It's just to keep ourselves straight as to what we're doing," Horowitz says. "But we're allowing ourselves freedom. It's not like we said, 'Here's what all three seasons would be, or five seasons.' We've got some goal posts, but we're allowing ourselves to create a freedom to change our minds."

So what happened to this Bible?  I thought everything is inside Andrew Chambliss's mind?

Freedom means that the producers are mainly focused on the current season, rather than looking too far ahead to what their endgame may be — though they recognize that Lost fans relied on knowing there was an end in sight, however far off that may be. "We want to make sure that five years from now, whatever thoughts we have, they're still relevant," Kitsis says. "There's a curse that needs to be broken, and these characters have had their happy endings ripped from them. Emma [Jennifer Morrison] comes in there trying to help them find their happy endings. Ultimately, the last happy ending is for Emma."

Forget the endgame, how about the point of each arc?

"We've heard people discussing: Will [Emma] break the curse? How will she break the curse? When will she break the curse?" Horowitz says. "The curse, in many ways, is the tip of the iceberg. Even if you do know who you are, that doesn't mean everything immediately comes back to you and you get your happy ending." Adds Kitsis, "In fact, in a lot of ways, it might just make it worse."

It got worse, alright.

"The Evil Queen is not somebody whose bad side you want to get on, but if anyone can take her on, it's Emma," Kitsis says.

You'd think this was a quote from this summer, but it's from 2011 and The Evil Queen = Regina back then.  

[Free]

22 hours ago, Camera One said:

I hope he's joking.

Don't give them any ideas, if they can do a backstory with the red jacket, they can do the same here.

4 hours ago, Camera One said:

Because I'm avoiding work, I was reading some interviews with A&E from 2011:

 

 

Clearly, they abandoned this "lesson" soon after planning out the first season.

 

 

So what happened to this Bible?  I thought everything is inside Andrew Chambliss's mind?

 

 

Forget the endgame, how about the point of each arc?

 

 

It got worse, alright.

 

 

You'd think this was a quote from this summer, but it's from 2011 and The Evil Queen = Regina back then.  

They threw out this "Bible" by the 2nd or 3rd season, they've been making things up on an arc to arc basis.  Seeing how the show turned out, I almost wished the curse didn't get broken as selfish as that sounds.

On 10/20/2016 at 10:21 PM, KingOfHearts said:

Lost had the same issue, albeit to a much smaller degree. We, as the audience, could accept that the Island was magical and had a bunch of supernatural shenanigans going on. But as the seasons went on, the demand for character realism got higher as the plot got crazier. Pretty soon we had time travel everywhere, two godlike immortals battling for dominance, magic diseases, and a whole freaking purgatory world. In my personal opinion, it lost a lot of its grounding in S5/S6, and went straight for the scifi fantasy aspect. The character focus was never lost, per se, but the writers began to lose ideas and I wasn't impressed with where the characters were going. (Like Juliet and Sawyer... ugh.)

Once hit that point much sooner... in S2. The gloves were off and realism flew out the window. 

 

On 10/20/2016 at 11:42 PM, Camera One said:

I really liked aspects of the sci-fi of Season 5 "Lost", but I think post-Season 4 on "Lost", the characters became more chess pieces rather than real people, which is exactly the problem with "Once Upon a Time" from Season 2B onwards.  "On Lost", the lack of interest in actually writing for the characters themselves (especially the supporting characters like Sun, Jin, Sayid, etc.) became blatantly obvious in Season 6, which sort of ruined the show for me.  The egregious thing is that A&E didn't even realize there was a problem, and promptly did the same thing by the second season of "Once".

It's the same problem they're describing for "Frequency".  Even if the worldbuilding is lacklustre (which is the other problem with "Once"), if the characters themselves were responding to crazy events in believable ways and developing organically, the show could still be extremely enjoyable.  But it is just so obvious nowadays that characters are acting in ways convenient to the predictable plot, that it's not even fun anymore to see these characters' lives, because what they're doing and how they're responding, either aren't believable, or are on a hamster wheel of repetition.

OuaT is definitely much worse in that aspect, because even Lost's craziness felt like it was heading towards an endpoint (which turned out to be majorly disappointing as was the final season).  It's repeating the same problems and magnifying the problems even more.  It was better as a character centric story.

[Mathius]

Quote

Clearly, they abandoned this "lesson" soon after planning out the first season.

I thought they still applied it well in 2A and 3A, but not 2B, and unfortunately 3A turned out to be the aberration rather than 2B.

Quote

They threw out this "Bible" by the 2nd or 3rd season, they've been making things up on an arc to arc basis.  

It was by the 2nd season.  Any lingering threads from S1 (the identities of Dr. Whale, the Queen of Hearts, Henry's father, etc.) got wrapped up there.

Quote

Seeing how the show turned out, I almost wished the curse didn't get broken as selfish as that sounds.

The curse getting broken at the end of S1 was fine.  Completely unrestricted magic coming to Storybrooke was not.  That's what did the show in.

[Shanna Marie]

I think I've figured out the writing on this show: what we're seeing is the bad fanfic of a real show that exists in another dimension. That explains everything! It's got a really good premise and situation and a great cast of characters, which comes from the source show. What we're seeing is one of those epic, long-term fanfics, probably written as a round-robin by a group of friends, that they post as they write each installment, where they don't really have a firm plot structure or definite ending in mind. They're just making it up as they go, and they don't bother to re-read previous installments before writing the next one. As a result, you get all the hallmarks of that kind of thing: Continuity errors and retcons, things that happen out of the blue with no setup or with setup only in that installment (there was a gauntlet in the shop!), getting bored with a storyline and just wrapping it up with no real payoff, story lines that peter out and never get concluded, each writer has a favorite character who gets really developed in that writer's installment and forgotten in other writers' installments, the main characters of the show are pretty much ignored and sidelined, one character becomes a kind of avatar for the writers and used to work out all the writers' issues (and probably correct what was believed to have gone wrong with that character on the show -- in the real show, Regina probably did face consequences for her actions and was shunned by the other characters, so the fanfic writers have her be universally loved and not lose anything), the story increasingly focuses only on romantic relationships, and the plot lurches along, with weird pacing. About the only thing common to that kind of fanfic story that hasn't happened yet is the writers losing interest in that show when they get obsessed with a new one and then just dropping the story without bothering to wrap it up or end it properly. If the series gets cancelled abruptly without a real conclusion, we'll know that's what happened.

Now we just need to be able to travel to the dimension where we get to see the real show this fanfic is based on.

[Free]

16 hours ago, Mathius said:

I thought they still applied it well in 2A and 3A, but not 2B, and unfortunately 3A turned out to be the aberration rather than 2B.

It was by the 2nd season.  Any lingering threads from S1 (the identities of Dr. Whale, the Queen of Hearts, Henry's father, etc.) got wrapped up there.

The curse getting broken at the end of S1 was fine.  Completely unrestricted magic coming to Storybrooke was not.  That's what did the show in.

I felt that the curse allowed the show to be grounded while allowing the characters to be established and developed and it helped that it was a community setting so we got to see the minor characters even when it wasn't their centric episodes.

To me, the show got further away when they tried to turn it into a plot oriented show instead of the character oriented it was conceived as.

3 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

I think I've figured out the writing on this show: what we're seeing is the bad fanfic of a real show that exists in another dimension. That explains everything! It's got a really good premise and situation and a great cast of characters, which comes from the source show. What we're seeing is one of those epic, long-term fanfics, probably written as a round-robin by a group of friends, that they post as they write each installment, where they don't really have a firm plot structure or definite ending in mind. They're just making it up as they go, and they don't bother to re-read previous installments before writing the next one. As a result, you get all the hallmarks of that kind of thing: Continuity errors and retcons, things that happen out of the blue with no setup or with setup only in that installment (there was a gauntlet in the shop!), getting bored with a storyline and just wrapping it up with no real payoff, story lines that peter out and never get concluded, each writer has a favorite character who gets really developed in that writer's installment and forgotten in other writers' installments, the main characters of the show are pretty much ignored and sidelined, one character becomes a kind of avatar for the writers and used to work out all the writers' issues (and probably correct what was believed to have gone wrong with that character on the show -- in the real show, Regina probably did face consequences for her actions and was shunned by the other characters, so the fanfic writers have her be universally loved and not lose anything), the story increasingly focuses only on romantic relationships, and the plot lurches along, with weird pacing. About the only thing common to that kind of fanfic story that hasn't happened yet is the writers losing interest in that show when they get obsessed with a new one and then just dropping the story without bothering to wrap it up or end it properly. If the series gets cancelled abruptly without a real conclusion, we'll know that's what happened.

Now we just need to be able to travel to the dimension where we get to see the real show this fanfic is based on.

It does feel like a fan fic with all the problems associated with them as well.

[Camera One]

Except these are supposedly professional Writers.  It definitely feels like those piecemeal fan-fics, though from the way Jane describes it, the entire Writers' Room hashes everything out together before the individual Writers do the episodes.  Maybe they discuss episode by episode instead of first laying down the emotional arcs they want for each character.  Or they do the "Wouldn't it be cool if..." FIRST and then make the character motivations fit those.  Regardless, it doesn't seem like they're looking at each event and brainstorming the natural and organic character reactions.

The easiest example would be someone with a very simplistic arc in Season 6 - Snow.  She wants a normal life and she wants to go back to teaching.  But would this be the natural response when someone dreaded from her past - The Evil Queen comes back, she gets reminded of all the collateral damage, she sees her favorite handmaiden Charlotte die from the exact same poison as her father?  Her daughter's hand is shaking but as a family, they are not discussing this and she doesn't get to worry?  One of her best friends Cinderella goes on a suicide mission and she doesn't get to help?  Her husband finds out his father was murdered and she is completely disinterested?  Her mortal enemy is back in town, but she's not afraid her baby will be a target?  

Did they discuss any of that?  Or was it just "Wouldn't it be cool if Snow met Jasmine at school, and Jasmine reminded Snow who she really was?"

This whole "Return to Storybrooke" stuff is so superficial.  We see a scene at school, and it's back to the "feel" of Season 1?  How can it be, when the characters' entire universe and worldview is now different with their full memories, with magic, etc.  You can't just go back and have Snow teaching about the Third Law of Motion, and call it "real life".  And aside from Snow, we haven't had any other aspects of "small town life" shown at all.  The Count hunting down Snowing?  Cinderella with a shotgun to defend herself against Lady Tremaine?  Jekyll/Hyde trying to kill Belle?  None of these things are anywhere near "everyday life", despite throwing in a few scenes of Emma having therapy with Archie to discuss the otherworldly Savior disease, while not asking for magical advice from the sages in town.

[Serena]

I've just started watching the latest episode, and right there in the first minute one of the things that bugs me most about the writers is apparent: their laziness. At the very beginning, we have "Capital of Agrabah" and "Many years ago". They don't even make the minimum effort anymore of telling us *how many* years ago and the name of the Capital! Like, I'm not a huge GOT fans, but one of the reasons that show is so successful, IMO, is that you can really believe the worldbuilding. The writers (or, I guess, the original book writer) know the name of all the cities, all the character's first AND last name, how they are related to each other, and when exactly something happened. Even if sometimes they get some date wrong, at least they make an EFFORT.

[Mathius]

3 hours ago, Serena said:

They don't even make the minimum effort anymore of telling us *how many* years ago

I don't blame them for that...they actually did tell us how many years ago with the Merlin flashbacks and ended up getting the math all wrong.

[Rumsy4]

I do blame them for getting the math wrong, and subsequently giving up on even bothering. lol

[KingOfHearts]

Post moved to All Seasons thread.

Edited October 24, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Eolivet]

Both the ratings and this forum have seemingly indicated the story is not working with year, and I find it interesting because of the approach the writers took this year. It makes me wonder if the whole "back to basics -- Evil Queen/long story arcs" angle was these writers trying to emulate Grey's Anatomy and how it shifted its focus back to the woman affected by the death of a male character (albeit one with much more importance in the case of Grey's).

Regardless, I think this arc has proved a very important fact: loyal viewers comprise a minority of this show's audience. I believe the vast majority of viewers are newer -- and didn't start watching in season 1. They would have no allegiance to or interest in season 1, and the Evil Queen and the longer story arcs. This show is most definitely not Grey's Anatomy, loyalty-wise. And Regina is not Meredith.

I feel these writers are constantly writing to the audience they lost rather than the audience they have. The audience they have, I think, joined them around season 4. They are more into romance than the show originally was. They like adventure, and shorter stories. They're invested in the characters they like, but have no loyalty of a long-time viewer to all characters. The Evil Queen is the stuff of folklore to them, and hasn't been a major player on the canvas pretty much ever.

I believe these writers made the mistake of thinking online fandom represents all viewers, when they really needed to be looking at the media coverage. I think this show could run if not in perpetuity, but pretty close to it with "Emma and Hook battle other fairytale guest stars, with the help of Snow and Charming, and an occasional guest appearance by Rumple and Regina." I believe that's the show viewers were sold in season 4, and that's the show the majority of the audience now wants. Not the online audience, not the fandom audience, but the casual viewer who tunes in, watches the show and tunes out until the next week and never even glances at the Internet.

But these writers fooled themselves into thinking they were Shonda Rhimes, that Regina was Meredith and that the season 1 audience is the season 6 audience. Whether that's arrogance, wishful thinking or a combination of both, I don't know. But I think they'd be better off if they traded their Twitter for TVLine. That is, if they want to survive by more than just the skin of their teeth into next season.

[Shanna Marie]

I don't know that the problem is writing to the wrong audience, or miscalculating a return to season one. The real problem is that what they're doing just isn't very good. There's no real suspense because the outcome for just about every story question they've raised is obvious. The pacing is off, so that there are either constant action scenes that don't amount to much or static conversation scenes. We don't get to see the characters having honest emotional reactions, which makes it harder to get invested in the characters or the story. The story doesn't make much sense whether you've been following it from day one and remember all the details or have just joined for this season. Most of the episodes this season have been pretty boring. The scenes are repetitive. How often have we seen Emma have the same conversation with Archie about the same vision? How often have we seen the Evil Queen and Zelena have the same conversation about whether Regina accepts Zelena? Then there are the things that are even more repetitive if you've been watching for more than one season, like Belle's latest breakup with Rumple, Emma's latest secret-keeping from her family, or Snow's latest identity crisis. I don't care how original or compelling the subject matter is, when it's executed this badly, it's not going to appeal to audiences. With this level of writing, they could have the latest and hottest Disney property around as the focus, and they'd still end up losing their audience. As it is, there's the double whammy of not very interesting subject matter executed very badly (there's actually a lot of potential in the Untold Stories, but they aren't choosing to use most of it).

[tennisgurl]

So, this has really been bugging me this season. Would the writers PLEASE explain to me what the hell the "savior" actually is? Is it like a Buffy thing, where a new one is born in every generation? Or do they pop up whenever someone evil shows up who needs to be beaten? Does someone just get chosen based on deeds? Who does the choosing? What we see from Emma and Aladdin, there seems to be no consistent answer. Because, originally, I`m pretty sure it was just Emma, and her big job was just to break the curse. Granted, she did that by the end of the first season, and they needed somewhere to go from there, but she could have just kept helping fight evil like she always has, without all this "savior" business even being a thing. And, as someone on the main thread pointed out? Why do they keep saying the savior will...DIE! like its so dramatic? I mean, everyone dies at some point, right? Couldn't they say that Saviors die violently, or die alone, or die young? Because that angst would make sense. This is just weird in how its phrased. I get that Emma is more upset about her death visions than by prophesies about dead saviors, but it could all be explained a lot better. Does every land get a savior? Does this tie in with the Author (the other vaguely magic person who exists) at all?

7 hours ago, Serena said:

Like, I'm not a huge GOT fans, but one of the reasons that show is so successful, IMO, is that you can really believe the worldbuilding.

Right there with you. GOT isn't perfect, but I do believe that this is a full world filled with people and cultures and a vast history. With Once? The worldbuilding is ridiculously inconsistent and lazy. I do kind of get them not wanting to specify a time, so they dont mess with continuity or actual historical parallels, but I feel like the writers have no idea what time this is either. Worldbulding either never gets set up, or it gets set up in the vaguest, more convoluted ways. The Land Of Untold stories, for example, had a great concept, but the way its been set up has been disappointing. It could be used to tell little known stories, or stories that authors never had the time to finish, or have the characters rebel against their stories, but none of that has really happened. Or the Author. How many Authors are there? Is everything in fiction ever written by Authors, or just a few? Why are the stories we know so different than the ones we see in the show? The Author screwing with the books? What? 

That got a little off topic, but this just bugs me. There is so much that is just thrown out in this show and how its multiverse works, and then its thrown away, or ends up retconing stuff that was already established. 

[Shanna Marie]

19 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

Because, originally, I`m pretty sure it was just Emma, and her big job was just to break the curse. Granted, she did that by the end of the first season, and they needed somewhere to go from there, but she could have just kept helping fight evil like she always has, without all this "savior" business even being a thing.

That's one of those things that makes it clear that they're making up their rules as they go. It seemed so clear in the early going that it was only about her DNA being woven into the curse so that she would be the one to break it that it came as a jolt when she's suddenly some kind of all-purpose Savior. I liked that her having magical powers was some kind of unintended consequence that even Rumple didn't suspect, and initially it seemed like her magic mostly stemmed from love, that it was unpredictable and not something she could control but kicked in when someone she cared about was in danger or for self defense. But then somehow it became some kind of all-purpose cosmic role. I think that actually somewhat diminishes Emma. It means more if she's helping because that's the kind of person she is, and she's finding a good use for those powers she realized she had, rather than because it's her duty as Savior to never let herself rest or have a day off because she has to save everyone from everything. It also lets the other characters off the hook -- let Emma do it, she's the Savior. It gets even worse when they add in sloppy worldbuilding, like the dark Savior blood for the magic ink and now Jasmine being able to tell that Aladdin was a Savior, or had Savior potential, and did he get that power just from saving her or was it already there? It's like the more they develop it, the worse it gets.

[Mari]

5 hours ago, Eolivet said:

Regardless, I think this arc has proved a very important fact: loyal viewers comprise a minority of this show's audience. I believe the vast majority of viewers are newer -- and didn't start watching in season 1. They would have no allegiance to or interest in season 1, and the Evil Queen and the longer story arcs. This show is most definitely not Grey's Anatomy, loyalty-wise. And Regina is not Meredith.

 

I have no idea of the audience make-up, but I don't think this is the entirety of the problem.  They say that they're shooting for a season 1 vibe, but just having the occasional small town scene doesn't equal season 1.  

In the first season, the actions had actual consequences and the characters had actual, natural reactions.  There's no point in trying to switch back to a character-driven drama with bits of fairytale plot, if you're not going to actually treat the characters like people with emotions, instead of those dolls that say six or seven stock phrases.

Some of the tune-out could easily be people being tired of the completely nonsensical character behavior and plots that make no sense.

[Free]

6 hours ago, Eolivet said:

Both the ratings and this forum have seemingly indicated the story is not working with year, and I find it interesting because of the approach the writers took this year. It makes me wonder if the whole "back to basics -- Evil Queen/long story arcs" angle was these writers trying to emulate Grey's Anatomy and how it shifted its focus back to the woman affected by the death of a male character (albeit one with much more importance in the case of Grey's).

Regardless, I think this arc has proved a very important fact: loyal viewers comprise a minority of this show's audience. I believe the vast majority of viewers are newer -- and didn't start watching in season 1. They would have no allegiance to or interest in season 1, and the Evil Queen and the longer story arcs. This show is most definitely not Grey's Anatomy, loyalty-wise. And Regina is not Meredith.

I feel these writers are constantly writing to the audience they lost rather than the audience they have. The audience they have, I think, joined them around season 4. They are more into romance than the show originally was. They like adventure, and shorter stories. They're invested in the characters they like, but have no loyalty of a long-time viewer to all characters. The Evil Queen is the stuff of folklore to them, and hasn't been a major player on the canvas pretty much ever.

I believe these writers made the mistake of thinking online fandom represents all viewers, when they really needed to be looking at the media coverage. I think this show could run if not in perpetuity, but pretty close to it with "Emma and Hook battle other fairytale guest stars, with the help of Snow and Charming, and an occasional guest appearance by Rumple and Regina." I believe that's the show viewers were sold in season 4, and that's the show the majority of the audience now wants. Not the online audience, not the fandom audience, but the casual viewer who tunes in, watches the show and tunes out until the next week and never even glances at the Internet.

But these writers fooled themselves into thinking they were Shonda Rhimes, that Regina was Meredith and that the season 1 audience is the season 6 audience. Whether that's arrogance, wishful thinking or a combination of both, I don't know. But I think they'd be better off if they traded their Twitter for TVLine. That is, if they want to survive by more than just the skin of their teeth into next season.

Grey's Anatomy has procedural elements and a huge cast, they've cycled characters in and out and they've been able to maintain much more longevity and a fanbase.

OuaT relies more on gimmicks like Frozen and to a lesser extent Oz ever since they've ditched the character driven stuff back in Season 1 and it's been floundering since it's been so repetitive and boring.  The short lived Jekyll/Hyde stuff suggests that they don't have enough material for an entire arc which is probably why they just ditched the split arcs season.

[Camera One]

I was reading an interview with the producers of "The Walking Dead" after the latest bloodfest:

Quote

Ultimately, Nicotero said, fan outrage is just proof that the producers are doing their jobs. "I think it’s a kneejerk reaction that people have, because they care about these characters. If we killed someone and they didn’t care, like, 'no big deal, just gonna go have a bagel and not worry about it,' that means we haven’t done something to connect our people to the characters.

To me, killing characters off is a cheap way to get emotion.  In shows where "anyone can die", after awhile, I find it extremely tiresome and I become wary about becoming attached to any characters since they will probably die anyway.

In some ways, I appreciate that "Once" in general doesn't put their regular cast in *real* mortal danger.  They know that we know that Emma, or Hook, or whoever, won't die.  To me, it's much harder to be a writer when you *can't* kill the regulars off for shock value whenever you feel like it, like they do on "The Walking Dead" or "Game of Thrones".  I thought it was sort of refreshing that "Once" didn't even pretend that Hook was actually dead or would stay dead at the end of 5A.  Whereas "The Walking Dead" played a bunch of mindgames with their fans, yet claim that it's all about their writing. 

Now, the constant killings of redshirts on this show is manipulative and cheap, however, since we never get any human response from any of the main characters.  Look at the Oracle in "Street Rats".  And as many pointed out in the episode thread, no one is at all concerned about Archie.

Edited October 25, 2016 by Camera One

[InsertWordHere]

My issue with The Walking Dead isn't who they killed off. It's the mindgames and the amount of time they spent in the episode (after a finale that ended on a cliffhanger, mind you) before they answered the question of which character died. And while we waited we were treated to Ramsay Bolton-esque torture and mindgames towards one of the other characters. 

15 hours ago, Serena said:

 The writers (or, I guess, the original book writer) know the name of all the cities, all the character's first AND last name, how they are related to each other, and when exactly something happened. Even if sometimes they get some date wrong, at least they make an EFFORT.

I cannot give enough props to GoT for their continuity and world building. They do an incredible job. One thing they did mess up was the kingdom of Dorne on their awesome credits map. Instead of specifying the specific location in Dorne like "The Water Gardens" or "Sunspear," which is what they do with every other city or castle, they simply put "Dorne" which is the name of that region. So they do make mistakes but they are relatively small and I am not sure if the credits are even considered canon or if they're just unique bonus material. Fun fact since I'm talking about Dorne: both Oded Fehr and Naveen Andrews were popular fancasts for one of Dorne's main characters. 

But a small map mistake is nothing like having to wait until Season 4 to find out the name of Snow's kingdom and still not knowing the names of Midas, George, Thomas, Eric etc's kingdoms. Or how all these kingdoms seem to be within a day's walk from the EF or the Dark One's vault, including Camelot and Dunbroch, two place it seems no one from the other kingdoms ever visited. Even Littlefinger's "teleporter," which has become the joke used to describe how one GoT character seems to travel at will between lands that usually take weeks if not months to go between, isn't as glaring as the travel in OUaT.   

[KAOS Agent]

Yeah, I think it's pretty disingenuous of The Walking Dead writer to claim that people were unhappy with the show because they killed off a well liked character. That happens all the time and everyone knew from the finale that someone was going to die, so it's not like it was a shock. It was the torture porn and fuckery that went on outside of the death that has people walking away.

The Once writers do this kind of crap too. Remember how Adam claimed that the worst mistake in Season 2 was having the Taser of Doom? That is just flat out delusional if that's really what he believes. I don't really think that they didn't understand what happened because they were damn quick to off Tamara and Greg and get all of the main cast interacting on an island. I understand not wanting to admit to your mistakes in the media, but it wouldn't have been too hard to admit that too many disparate plots that didn't connect their main cast made things difficult to follow and fans tuned out. That's not entirely the reason, but it's much more honest than the answer given by the showrunners. These showrunners have a bad habit of being really flippant when it comes to legitimate questions that may be critical of the show. If it seemed like they were addressing some of the biggest issues, the flippancy wouldn't be so hard to take, but they continue to double down on some of the shows biggest flaws and so their responses often anger me as a viewer and make me question why I continue watching.

[Curio]

I was contemplating this in another thread, but I'm beginning to suspect we're heading towards another How I Met Your Mother situation with A&E and the series finale of this show. I think they have a very specific ending in their minds that they want to achieve and they never expected to be on the air this long, so that's why we have so many repetitive plots this season and resetting characters backward like robots into former versions of themselves. We have the writers literally bringing back the Season 1 version of Regina with the Evil Queen, we have the writers reverting Emma back by pushing her walls up and not learning her lesson from last season, we have Snow reverting to wanting to become a teacher again and even giving a speech about how she missed Season 1 and the curse, and then they try to revert Hook back by having David make pirate comments again about not trusting him. It's like they're afraid of letting the characters grow too much so they have to reign them back now. The characters have done a lot of growth since Season 1, and there's still so much more room for improvement, but Season 6 seems to be trying it's hardest to stall on any progression and even revert the characters instead of trying to move forward. Like with HIMYM, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the characters have to act out of character or get stomped on in order to fit the mold of whatever ending A&E have in mind.

Also, where's the exploration of " character duality" the writers promised over the summer? They said that Regina and the Evil Queen was the obvious physical representation of exploring character duality, but I'm not seeing much of that exploration with the other characters. Is Emma's duality supposed to be her struggle between being a Savior and being magicless? Is Snow's duality whether she wants to be a teacher or a badass archer? They haven't really explored duality with any of the other characters yet.

Edited October 25, 2016 by Curio

[tennisgurl]

4 hours ago, Curio said:

I was contemplating this in another thread, but I'm beginning to suspect we're heading towards another How I Met Your Mother situation with A&E and the series finale of this show.

I swear to God, if this show ends with Hook dying a pointless and vague off screen death, only for Emma to end up standing outside of a resurrected Neal's apartment with a picture of her car in her hands...

[Curio]

3 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I swear to God, if this show ends with Hook dying a pointless and vague off screen death, only for Emma to end up standing outside of a resurrected Neal's apartment with a picture of her car in her hands...

 

Why...why would you put that out into the world?

[Shanna Marie]

13 hours ago, Camera One said:

To me, killing characters off is a cheap way to get emotion.  In shows where "anyone can die", after awhile, I find it extremely tiresome and I become wary about becoming attached to any characters since they will probably die anyway.

You do tend to get grief fatigue, where you just quit caring about the characters and regard them as essentially videogame figures. I think the "anyone can die" thing is another version of the idea that shock/surprise is the highest value in storytelling. If you've totally shocked the audience, you've won, with no consideration of whether the surprise was earned, where there's any emotional resonance, whether people care about what happens. Plotting, world building, and characterization don't matter as long as there's a surprise. I also think the "anyone can die" thing works better in a one shot like a movie. In an ongoing series, if all the people you care about have died, you aren't interested in the show anymore, and there's that grief fatigue, where you don't let yourself care about anyone new. I watch ongoing series because I care about the characters, and I like to see them develop over time. I like to see a more gradual buildup, and I like to see more of the aftermath. That's why I prefer TV to movies. I find most movies emotionally unsatisfying because I like more development and I like seeing the fallout and consequences of the big events. These writers seem to be writing TV like it's a movie, so they only hit the high points and skip over the stuff TV is usually good at.

[tennisgurl]

3 minutes ago, Curio said:

Why...why would you put that out into the world?

Maybe if I do, they wont? Or maybe because I`m...wicked?!?! *muahahahaha* 

[Curio]

11 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

Or maybe because I`m...wicked?!?! *muahahahaha* 

Hey, at least you're not evil!

[KingOfHearts]

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

Maybe if I do, they wont? Or maybe because I`m...wicked?!?! *muahahahaha* 

Quote

Hey, at least you're not evil!

Being wicked means you're only slightly a serial killer. ;)

[tennisgurl]

5 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

Being wicked means you're only slightly a serial killer. ;)

And, as we all know, being slightly a serial killer is just peachy as long as your related to a main character!

[KingOfHearts]

Some sage advice from Adam's Twitter:

Quote

@ButtercupOUAT @FordMiss id suggest not trying to figure out what we're doing.