Morality in Storybrooke / Social Issues: Threads Combined!

[Shanna Marie]

The season 4 Author storyline has to be the biggest mess of mixed morality messages ever. On the one hand, we have Regina's plan to find the Author and make him write her a happy ending, which is endorsed by just about all of the good guys. Henry and Emma express enthusiasm and devote a great deal of time to it. Snow and David decide to save the Author Door page when they find it because they believe Regina needs the happy ending the Author can provide her, even though they know that Rumple also has a plot in the works involving it and that requires turning Emma dark. The only ones who don't seem to be supporting it 100 percent are Hook and Belle, and they don't seem to be protesting it as a bad idea.

 

And yet, once we meet the Author, we learn that he's actually forbidden to do what they're planning to ask him to do. He's supposed to record events, not alter them. He's punished by being trapped in the door page because he was altering events (and, in spite of Regina's hypothesis that it's the Author making her life so miserable because villains don't get happy endings, it turns out it was Snow and David he messed with because he wanted to take heroes down a peg). When Rumple does exactly the same thing Regina was planning to do, it's wrong, and the heroes are trying to stop it at first and then trying to set things right. When Henry learns that he's the Author, after undoing what Rumple and the old Author had done, he breaks the magic quill because no one should have that kind of power, and the Apprentice approves.

 

So, simultaneously, they're showing the heroes all enthusiastically on this quest and showing that their quest is a bad thing, and yet this is never acknowledged on the show. Regina changes her mind not because making the Author rewrite reality to give her what she wants is the wrong thing to do, but because she decides she doesn't need it. Henry may have snapped the quill, but he never shows any sign of realizing that Operation Mongoose was bad or shows any sign of feeling responsible for the AU, in spite of his devotion to helping find the Author for Regina. Emma was gung-ho about it, but she doesn't show any sense of "oops" even after being trapped in that tower. It's like no one is able to make the slightest connection between their previous actions and the consequences.

 

And to make things even messier, we have the one-off episode in the middle of all this in which former villain Hook does the "My Name is Earl" thing and sets right one of his past wrongs, plus even goes the extra step and helps another former villain mend something that wasn't his fault, so that Ursula's life is turned back around and her rift with her father is mended. That's the episode when we get the only bit of sense spoken about all the "villains don't get happy endings" nonsense when Ariel gives it a big "duh" and explains that it's only because villains go about things in the wrong way. After hearing that, Hook manages to work things out. This entire episode is a total contradiction to everything else happening in this arc.

[Faemonic]

This entire episode is a total contradiction to everything else happening in this arc.

Probably one reason why I've only watched Hook-centrics since quitting as a viewer of This Show.

 

Although the finale was a total contradiction of itself as well as everything else in the arc.

 

It was very ambitious to deal with those big themes like creative responsibility, reputation, moral polarity, free will versus circumstance...but they did family legacies of abuse/abandonment pretty well in the first season, so I thought they had something going on here. Instead it was pretty messy.

[Rumsy4]

Another galling thing about Regina's last minute volte-face over Operation Stupid was its juxtaposition with the flashback to Cora where Regina is portrayed as some feminist icon. She rejects the sexist Sheriff of Nottingham because she is a "strong independent woman who doesn't need a man". 

This plays into the terrible notion that powerful women--even if their power stems from evil motives and acts--are positive symbols of feminism. No. It just means they are evil, just like their male counterparts would be. Being a woman doesn't excuse one of being a mass murdering rapist, because at the same time Regina is asserting her independence, she has the Huntsman at her beck and call in her bedchambers. The writers did a similar thing when they had Regina berating Zelena for the "vile act" she perpetrated in deceiving Robin into sleeping with her. Why does Regina get to call out other people on their sins and mistakes, but no one is allowed to call her out with impunity? 

[KAOS Agent]

 

When Henry learns that he's the Author, after undoing what Rumple and the old Author had done, he breaks the magic quill because no one should have that kind of power, and the Apprentice approves.

 

This one cracked me up because it happened only after the Apprentice told Henry that it wasn't possible to re-write the story so that Neal was alive. Henry had been sitting there thinking about how to use the pen to get his dad back (an understandable plan) and it was only after being told that he couldn't do it that Henry decided the quill was too powerful. Instead of Henry realizing that the whole AU was seriously messed up and should never be repeated by anyone regardless of their intent because people get hurt, he broke the quill when he found out it wouldn't give him what he wanted.

[Camera One]

What if he hadn't broken the Quill?  Would it have reversed Dark Emma becoming Dark?  So the 4B arc ended with Henry realizing it was wrong to bring his Dad back from the dead, and the 5A arc ends with everyone trooping down to the Underworld to bring Hook back from the dead.  When is it okay and when is it not?

[Shanna Marie]

Although the finale was a total contradiction of itself as well as everything else in the arc.

Although the rest of the arc set up the finale by introducing the elements like the Author and Rumple's need to be made a hero because of his black heart, the finale works best if you ignore the rest of the arc and just take it as a given that Rumple and the Author rewrote the universe. Otherwise, it kind of makes your head explode with the lack of awareness. Henry goes through the whole AU, sees that his mother has been locked in a tower for ages and watches Hook die and never once seems to make any connection between these events and Operation Mongoose. There's no "oops, maybe that wasn't such a great idea," no "this is my fault for helping with this." Emma spends ages locked in a tower, presumably with time to think about it, and never seems to have a "wow, this was a bad thing" thought. She's upset after Hook's death because she never told him she loved him, not because she freed the Author from the page while she was in a snit with her parents, and that's what allowed this to happen. After all is restored, Regina's focused on whether Zelena is still pregnant rather than having had a moment's thought that all these things happened because of her dumb idea, and experiencing Snow's life under the persecution of an evil queen doesn't seem to have changed her perspective one bit.

 

So the 4B arc ended with Henry realizing it was wrong to bring his Dad back from the dead, and the 5A arc ends with everyone trooping down to the Underworld to bring Hook back from the dead.  When is it okay and when is it not?

I think the issue with the quill was that it would create an alternate reality that wasn't real, so even if Henry wrote Neal back from the dead, it wouldn't actually happen. The quill could only write the next thing to happen to change the real world (like giving Cruella powers and then taking away her ability to kill). When Rumple had the Author rewrite history, it created another reality that was fake. So undoing Neal's death would only create a fake world. We don't yet know how it's going to work with Hook and if they'll address the question of trying to bring back any others. One problem there might be with Neal is that he was actually kind of dead for a long time before he died. He was being artificially kept alive by sharing Rumple's body, so he was already on borrowed time before he died for good, and that means his body had been almost dead for nearly a year already before he died. Then there was the life-for-a-life sacrifice, so both Rumple and Neal can't be alive at the same time. Hook died to take the Darkness into the Underworld, but then the Darkness was siphoned away, so his death was unnecessary. I'm sure they'll come up with some handwavium. I guess that's one benefit of a wildly inconsistent magical system. It's so inconsistent that being crazy fits.

[KAOS Agent]

 

So the 4B arc ended with Henry realizing it was wrong to bring his Dad back from the dead, and the 5A arc ends with everyone trooping down to the Underworld to bring Hook back from the dead.  When is it okay and when is it not?

 

I don't think Henry did learn that it was wrong to use the quill to bring back Neal. He just learned that it wasn't possible the way he was thinking it did. In terms of what's okay and what's not I think the big issue with the quill was that it removed free will. The Apprentice was forced to do the whole Darkness thing with Lily because it was written that way. Cruella couldn't kill for the same reason. No one should have that kind of power over others' actions good or bad. I'm sure that there will be some handwavy magical whatsit that allows Hook to return and not others, but it will be his choice to return not the quill forcing the action. 

[Shanna Marie]

I don't think Henry did learn that it was wrong to use the quill to bring back Neal. He just learned that it wasn't possible the way he was thinking it did.

Yeah, it did seem like the problem wasn't that it was wrong, but that it wasn't possible. Even if he hadn't broken the quill, he wouldn't be able to use it to bring Hook back (though he might have been able to do something about making the Darkness vanish, so Hook wouldn't have died in the first place). The quill couldn't actually change the past, only create an illusion of a fake past in an alternate reality, and even there it doesn't seem like bringing back the dead was possible, or else Rumple would probably have brought back teen Bae rather than giving his son a fictional death.

 

The issue of free will doesn't actually seem to have come up. There was talk about how this wasn't the way it was supposed to be, but the criticism of Rumple and the Author's actions didn't get into free will, and it certainly didn't come up in Operation Mongoose when they were talking about giving Regina a happy ending without ever specifying how that would work. When she came up with it, it was before she knew Robin was going to choose her or that the spell on Marian would be what forced them apart. So was she going to alter Robin's choice, make Marian die, make Marian give Robin up? There was no way of giving Regina a happy ending without interfering with someone's free will, and no one seemed to have a problem with that. After the frozen heart issue, maybe Regina's happy ending might have involved a cure for Marian that allowed the Hood family to come back to Storybrooke, and then Roland could have spent alternate weekends with his dad while Robin and Regina were together. But then in that case, might it not have been a better use of Regina's time to search for a cure for Marian's problem than some vague idea of finding an Author to get a happy ending written?

 

This show really has issues with agency, without admitting to those issues or even seemingly being aware of them, and the writers tend to get defensive when it's brought up.

[Curio]

There was talk about how this wasn't the way it was supposed to be, but the criticism of Rumple and the Author's actions didn't get into free will, and it certainly didn't come up in Operation Mongoose when they were talking about giving Regina a happy ending without ever specifying how that would work.

 

It's still absolutely insane to me how not a single person questioned Regina specifically what her happy ending plan was. It's like the writers assumed the audience would automatically know what Regina wanted, but even Regina didn't know what she wanted up until the last seconds of "Mother." And actually, since all the characters were 100% on board with Regina's plan up until "Mother," that means they were 100% on board with what Regina was about to do...which was wipe Zelena out of existence. If Regina hadn't had her epiphany, Emma, Snow, David, Belle, and Hook all would have been responsible for essentially killing Zelena because they all helped Regina get to that point.

 

And then these same idiots all yelled at Emma for trying to do the exact same thing half a season later, but Dark Emma was doing it for a more noble cause and was saving a baby in the process.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Curio

[Faemonic]

Something I read about screenwriting: one possible measure of a good script is its balance of logic and legibility. It not only has to make sense, it has to convey the sense that it makes (not necessarily through dialogue exposition, actually that's supposed to be screenplay poison.)

 

 

I've resorted to headcanon-ing Operation Mongoose. Henry gets on board with Operation Mongoose because his storybook is wrong about Mama Mills. I could buy that if The Dark Curse broke the Narrative Imperative present in the Enchanted Forest, thereby allowing Henry to grow up with someone neither good nor evil but human. Because complex human beings inhabit the Land Without Magic. However, how could the Narrative Imperative be broken enough for Henry to see through it and yet still be active enough that Regina must push back against it? Maybe that's been seeping in since Emma broke the curse, and Snow's Dark Curse with Rumple's True Love Wishing Well Magic and Zelena's Memory Wipe actually brings in enough Narrative Imperative for Regina to start complaining again. (On this point, please let's put aside the evidence and just humor the conclusion being shoved in our faces like a cream pie in a clown-filled comedy routine.)

 

 

So, the idea might have been that the Author, as Narrative Imperative personified, is already interfering with what would have been free will. Once Henry has it laid out for him what being an Author really means, he still decides that no one should have that power. Even though it's technically not the limitlessly omnipotent power that was so bad in the first place. And technically the Dark Curse pocket world creation and personality rewrite was all just more Narrative Imperative. Perhaps the only window of free will really came between Emma's cursebreak and Rumple returning magic to Storybrooke. Except apparently there's fate (plot) that brings Nealfire and Emma and Lily together outside of the pocket dimension or the Enchanted Forest.

 

 

But if the Author represents the determiner of all predispositions and circumstances, then 4B isn't necessarily about shifting blame so much as a journey to realizing that one can rise above those, and so free will then begins. Which is something I could totally dig if that were what I was watching.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Faemonic

[Shanna Marie]

If Regina hadn't had her epiphany, Emma, Snow, David, Belle, and Hook all would have been responsible for essentially killing Zelena because they all helped Regina get to that point.

Belle and Hook have far less culpability because I don't recall either of them actively contributing to Operation Dumbass. They don't seem to have objected openly to it (but then neither of them are generally allowed an opinion of their own), but they weren't really participating. During the 6-week hiatus, while Emma and Henry were obsessing over Operation Idiocy, Belle and Hook were focused on Operation Free the Fairies. Then they transitioned to Operation What's Rumple Up to Now. Hook only got involved at all in the Find the Author quest after it was revealed that Rumple also wanted the Author and needed to turn Emma dark, so he seemed to have more of a parallel operation with a different goal. He wanted to find the Author to keep Rumple from getting the Author rather than to help Regina. I have no doubt that if he'd been the one to get his hand on the door page, he wouldn't have hesitated to throw it into the fire immediately. The way he said the "maybe villains don't get happy endings" line in his moment of self-pity with Ariel suggested that he previously hadn't believed or considered it, and then she snapped him out of it. They missed a chance at some organic conflict with Emma, since he seemed to be a little hurt by her belief about villains not getting happy endings, as seen in her devotion to Operation Stupid, given that he was a former villain. That didn't seem to have occurred to Emma at all. She played it as not seeing him as a villain on the same level as Regina, but was there any element of worrying about Hook's future for her in all that?

 

Anyway, when it comes to blame, first and foremost is Regina, who came up with it. Then Henry, who endorsed it and found the blank books. Then Emma for also being 100 percent on board and freeing the Author. Then Snow and David, who didn't seem to be part of it at first but who chose to keep the door page in spite of knowing that it meant danger for Emma. Way down the line would be Hook and Belle, for apparently never once saying, "What are you idiots thinking? That's not how it works!"

 

But if the Author represents the determiner of all predispositions and circumstances, then 4B isn't necessarily about shifting blame so much as a journey to realizing that one can rise above those, and so free will then begins. Which is something I could totally dig if that were what I was watching.

Unfortunately, they killed that idea (which would have been cool) with the conclusion, when they showed without a doubt that the Author had not meddled in Regina's life and was actually more interested in messing with the heroes, and when Regina learned that she actually was responsible for her own unhappiness and for writing her own happy ending. That made the whole thing a big case of "oops, never mind," which then made all the other characters look stupid for not having thought that themselves. And it made the arc a massive waste of time.

 

The exception would be the Hook and Ursula episode, which did look a lot like villains realizing they could rise above the narrative imperative by not acting like villains. Their problem was that they were doing villain things, and the way to get out of a villain outcome is to stop acting and thinking like a villain, to focus on helping rather than beating and winning. Once they broke their own patterns, they had a positive outcome with reconciliation and possibly even new alliances (I'm holding out hope for a return of Ursula and Poseidon, along with Ariel, as allies to Hook in some sea-based story).

[RulerofallIsurvey]

(I'm holding out hope for a return of Ursula and Poseidon, along with Ariel, as allies to Hook in some sea-based story).

 

That would be an incredible adventure!  Unfortunately, that means we'll probably never see it.

[Shanna Marie]

Thinking about that Narrative Imperative thing, storybook morality vs. real world morality, and the meta discussion sparked by Galavant that's been going on in the Other Fairy Tales thread, I've had some more thoughts on all this as it relates to Operation Mongoose.

 

For one thing, in spite of the early season one episode in which Regina rallied a bunch of other villains behind casting the curse so they could go to a place where villains could get happy endings, would this be something they'd be aware of in that world? Did Regina think of herself as a villain? For the most part, she seemed to see herself as a victim of that life-ruining Snow White and was frustrated that not everyone else saw it that way. So was that a label she accepted when others gave it to her? Would they even have thought in terms of "villains" and "heroes" in that world where they didn't realize they were storybook characters? Or was that part of the ethos of that world?

 

Then there's the fact that villains don't seem to have always lost in that world -- mostly because they had to be saved to deal with in the present, but internally to the story, there wouldn't have been that many villain losses documented in the storybook. The book ends with Regina casting the curse, so the book doesn't show her losing. The only "losing" villains who might be in the book are Hansel and Gretel's witch, maybe James, and possibly warlord Bo Peep (but did she lose all her power, or just her power over David and Ruth?). Meanwhile, the heroes had small triumphs, but mostly got their "happy endings" by being content in their circumstances rather than by really winning definitively. Couples got together, but evil wasn't vanquished. So it's weird that Regina had her "the book depicts me as the villain, so I can't win" epiphany from reading a storybook that presents events she actually experienced, when she knew the outcome after the book ended.

 

They could have done something interesting and played with the meta of a fairytale character who's learned she's a fairytale character if when she was sulking over the breakup with Robin she did the drink wine and watch movies thing and stumbled upon one of those Hallmark-type romance movies in which there's a triangle involving the sweet girl-next-door and the glamorous but bitchy fiancee who's dying to redecorate the man's cozy home with a stark black-and-white style. Regina would have had the "hey, they're showing someone like me as the villain here!" reaction, which might have spurred her to dig up the Disney Snow White, which would have had her arguing with the screen: "That's not how it happened! She ruined my life! I didn't care if she was more beautiful than me, because she's not!" After seeing her fate there, she'd have moved on to watching the movies about the other villains, and then would have come to the conclusion that villains don't get happy endings. From there, she'd have looked at the book and realized she was written as the villain, and the only way to change her fate would be to get the Author to rewrite her as not a villain.

 

The response would then have varied, with some of the Enchanted Forest people who've seen how they're depicted in stories buying into it and the more real-world people thinking it sounded crazy. Emma would have thought that was the craziest thing ever. Henry might have said he didn't think that was how it worked, but he was curious about where the book came from and how it was written, so he might have been interested in looking for the Author. The various storybook character people might have had different reactions depending on whether or not they were happy with their lives and how they were portrayed in the book and in pop culture. Most of the villains would jump all over the idea, but I think Hook would reject it on the grounds that he was the one who chose to turn to darkness, and he was the one who chose to turn away, and besides, he's nothing like his storybook counterpart.

 

Then they could still have had Ursula and Hook's story where they proved it wasn't true by overcoming their villain instincts and Ursula being rewarded, and Regina could have still had her "I've been the one making myself unhappy" epiphany. And nobody would have looked like a total idiot.

[Curio]

The main issue is that somewhere along the way, the writers decided to put all their chips in on the idea that Regina was truly the main victim of Henry's Storybook. It's one thing for Regina to be delusional and think of herself as the victim, but when Henry says "lots of bad things happen to her in it," that's the equivalent of the writers telling the audience that we're supposed to take Henry at his word because he's always been the character who sees the truth for what it is. Even though Belle immediately says, "Well, that doesn't mean they'll always happen to her that way," that notion is completely ignored for the rest of 4B in favor of taking a shortcut and finding the author.

[Shanna Marie]

I suppose a lot of bad things did happen to Regina in the book. She had Cora as a mother and a wimp for a father, her boyfriend was killed right in front of her, she had an unhappy marriage, she missed out on meeting her soulmate, her husband was murdered, none of her people sided with her, she was betrayed by people she trusted, people made fun of her and rebelled against her, she was taken prisoner and sentenced to execution, she lost her kingdom and was exiled, and her father was murdered.

 

The problem with the "Regina's a victim" thing is the giant asterisk that has to go next to every item except her parents and her boyfriend's death, since every other bad thing that happened to her was a result of a choice she made or was something she did. She chose to get married so she'd be in a position to get her revenge, she doesn't seem to have even tried to be happy, she chose not to meet her soulmate, she had her husband murdered, she torched and slaughtered villages, she ordered people to do horrible things they couldn't go through with and then ripped out their hearts, she was a terrible queen, and she murdered her father.

 

But yeah, according to the writers, she gets the short end of the stick every time.

[Faemonic]

The thing about Henry's storybook was that it was supposed to be a much truthier truth than the Grimm Brothers, Hans Andersen, Barrie and Baum ever wrote down. If they were going to break that down, like we were going further down the rabbit hole, then I could have still been on board with that if only they'd figured out what we were meant to find there in that other onion layer. Other than tears.

 

 

Is the Author the embodiment of all predispositions? Is the Author the embodiment of circumstances?

 

 

Is the Author the (insidiously invisible) organizer and distributor of reputation-determining information? Maybe he could have stuck it to the Apprentice and Merlin who saw in good and evil by making the good people evil, and got punished for it once for the wrong reason (good people should be good and evil people should be evil, and he was just bored and sick of it because heroes are a bunch of stuffed shirts) and the second time for the right reason (because you don't record with honesty and compassion by making good people evil, but by making everybody human.)

 

 

Does the Author relate to the characters as his puppets? (So they should wake every day and prostate themselves at the altar writing desk of the Almighty Author, grateful that he hath deigned them worthy of taking another breath. If it wasn't supposed to be a super secret divinely-ordained position in the cosmos or something.)

 

 

Or does the Author relate to the characters as his muses? (So, they're just living their lives, but he's compelled to write it down in the best way he can. Maybe closer to some inadvertent Leanan Sidhe than a Greek muse.)

 

 

 

Allow me for a moment to knot my scarf and don my ungraded hipster glasses, and compare it all to an indie publication, Songs of the Metamythos by C.F. Cooper. One of the main characters is a bard turned time-traveling prophet, and his job as a divine writer-author basically sucks because

he's not allowed to warn his wife that she's about to be raped by some other guy.

He's not even allowed to talk, he just has to shut up and write down the whole thing. And while it's contained in a very predeterministic philosophy/cosmology, the narrative devices around prophecy and how that affects the relationships between even these fate-tied characters is spot-on in terms of making the Feels happen.

 

 

This Show doesn't need to be as angst-filled as all that, but 4B took on a pretty heavy theme and it was just so...insubstantial. I can't even develop an idea about the moral implications, because there's not enough established about the position of Author.

[KingOfHearts]

 

This Show doesn't need to be as angst-filled as all that, but 4B took on a pretty heavy theme and it was just so...insubstantial. I can't even develop an idea about the moral implications, because there's not enough established about the position of Author.

That seems to be a trend with A&E - bite off more than they can chew, give you less than a reader's digest version, then move on to the next big thing. This year they're tackling the afterlife... woohoo. I'm sure that won't be a trainwreck.

Edited February 6, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

The Underworld and guest stars will provide a great chance for them to pull out even more morality double standards.

[Camera One]

Batman, Superman, Harry Potter, Frodo, James Bond, etc., are you taking notes?... I just realized the REAL secret to becoming a Big Hero.  Big Hero 1, not Big Hero 6.  You need to have a plan to kill everyone and then in the very very very very very very very last moment decide not to do it and be willing to sacrifice yourself instead.  That is the only way to get Hero status.  Well, that and protecting a woman from a Bear who's also a woman.

Edited February 9, 2016 by Camera One

[Faemonic]

I thought they did redemption well-ish with Regina, actually. In S2, she was doing all those thousand-yard stares about how she's becoming her mother, and letting Charming foster Henry, and she went to therapy and everything. By the middle of S3, she was showing a willingness to co-parent with Emma ("our" son, she said! "our"!!! pop the monocles and clutch the pearls) and I forgot who articulated it best, that 3A demonstrated how Regina would have had it easy had she blown up with the diamond. Actually going on to live as a Team Player is more difficult, and 3A showed her doing that.

 

But I'm leaving out all the stuff that made these good things so meaningless. You can't slap someone five times across the face, stop and say, "I forgive me. And I haven't slapped you recently in the past few seconds, so you're not allowed to slap me back." Where did that sudden turn around come from? Charming saying that she was family, or the electroshock therapy that GregOwen gave her, that Archie wouldn't despite Regina clearly needing it? And if Regina has zero regrets about what she did that brought her Henry, then that's not redemption at all.

 

I guess it's a human nature thing, or with some individuals, that they need a win so badly that they'll never behave decently until they get one...when what the world around them really needs is for them to sit with the damage they did and admit it was wrong and have the humility and fortitude to follow through with making amends. When that sort of thing comes from pain, it's only coddling that pain that will bring them to the level of self-actualization they need. Or...they might get used to the coddling and become entitled to it, completely forgetting what they've done that was so awful, and you spoil all the fake serenity if you bring it up.

 

Hence the redeeming unconditional love of an innocent baby.

[Shanna Marie]

I just realized the REAL secret to becoming a Big Hero.  Big Hero 1, not Big Hero 6.  You need to have a plan to kill everyone and then in the very very very very very very very last moment decide not to do it and be willing to sacrifice yourself instead.

Or for the even easier route to becoming an even bigger hero, such a pure hero that you can draw Excalibur without being vaporized like unworthy people, you can be as bad as you want to be, then get all the blackness sucked out of your heart. Do one good, heroic deed while your heart is still pure, and you're the greatest hero ever! Never mind that you did so much evil in the past that there was nothing but blackness left in your heart, never mind that you had far more acts of sheer cowardice than of bravery in your history, and never mind that your heart being cleansed had nothing to do with you -- you didn't repent, you didn't want to change and become a new person.

[Camera One]

Study says that Disney characters "mask the miseries of working class life".

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3457537/Grumpy-s-happy-Disney-characters-mask-misery-working-class-life-say-academics.html

 

Do you agree?  Does "Once" do a better job of handling this?

[Curio]

According to the creators, the character who is screwed over the most is also one of the wealthiest characters on the show. Rumple and Regina are portrayed as always suffering in their top 1% positions, while the working-class characters already have their happy endings so we don't have to worry about their daily miseries.

 

Working-class lives in children’s movies are often portrayed as so fun and cosy that rich people will voluntarily go down the class ladder to join them, the researchers say.

 

Once doesn't attempt to give the working class much of a voice or opinion on this, so we don't really know how they feel about their jobs. But from what I can tell, the dwarves enjoy doing their low-paying, very physical job. (They even sing a happy tune while they work!) Hook has always enjoyed being a sailor, which that article defines as working class. Robin seems happy as a clam living in a tent doing...whatever job it is he does. Emma and David have fairly physical Sheriff jobs that they seem to enjoy. Mary Margaret voluntarily gave up a (most likely) higher-paying position to become a school teacher again. We're always told that their lives are so much better than the villains (who are usually the rich people), but they're not that much better.

 

I find it funny that the article says the rich people will voluntarily go down the class ladder to join the happier working-class characters. I will eat my shoe the day Regina or Rumple decide to live outside their cushy homes and give up their wealth. On this show, it'd be more likely that Robin would join Regina in her cozy mansion than Regina would join Robin in his camping area. Not that we'll ever get an interesting social class discussion between them about that...

 

But yes, I'd agree with that article and say this show definitely "masks the miseries of working class life" for certain characters.

Edited February 22, 2016 by Curio

[KingOfHearts]

Well, I don't think the show "masks the miseries of working class life" when it comes to Emma. The social issues (like most issues this show has) spring up when you start to incorporate the magical society of EF, especially as you get further away from S1. Earlier stories like Bandit Snow and Archie's backstory don't attempt to glamourize the commoner's life in any way. It's later in the series when Storybrooke seems to stop caring that Regina is still mayor that the side-eyeing truly begins. The lawless town is so perfect even though there's monsters and witches trying to kill people all the time. Surely the happiness of the rich and powerful (Regina and Rumple) is the most urgent issue. /sarcasm

 

The Charmings lost their castle and had to live in an apartment together. R&R still have their mansions. The writers don't even allow the Charmings to keep their royal titles. Why is it that Snow was trained from birth to be Queen, yet she could handle being mayor of a small town for only 5 minutes? (Meanwhile, the dictator gets the be Mayor with no responsibilities.)

Edited February 22, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Faemonic]

I recently caught up with Galavant, and I agree with whoever said that it was refreshing to watch after Once if only because it had lowerclass people in it who were main characters. A squire! A cook! A handmaid!

 

The lives of the Downstairs People on Once have gone the way of bureaucracy and politics. We used to get to see Rumple with his Oppressed Peasant Sadface, and I miss that even though we get to see the same face with the same expression above a Dolce & Gabbana suit. He's gotten used to a particular standard of living, and maybe if money is the same as power, and magic is the same as power, then his addiction to magic is a metaphor for his fear of ever going back to the peasant-level again?

 

And I may have been personally disappointed that Hook's story about his dad leaving him on a ship was true, and that he was sold into slavery as a child. Still holding out for blueblood Mama Jones, but I thought they were doing more with Hook As Gentry Plus Scruff, or Rebellious Trust Fund Brat than they were with Hook Is Always Unemployed And Homeless Without Even Disability Benefits. (Pirates during the Age of Sail in the Land Without Magic had disability benefits! Occupational hazards, you know.)

 

Will Scarlett has one cup of coffee for lunch and dinner, but Regina cursed him with a huge apartment with working lights and an ice maker in the spinoff show.

 

The Merry Men appear happy as a troupe of survivalists.

 

I'd like the idea of David Nolan as The People's Prince because he was a farmer before he met Snow, but I think even he forgot.

 

 

If they showed more class tension between the Nevengers and Granny + Dwarves, maybe this show would be more honest, but usually Granny + Dwaves exist in some extradimensional space that someone throws in whenever needed...like pokémon, or something. R.I.P. Johanna.

[Shanna Marie]

I think the class issues on this show are a symptom of overall poor worldbuilding. The writers don't seem to have put any thought into it whatsoever. Obviously, there is class because you generally don't have an egalitarian society with equal opportunity for upward mobility while also having kings (and real kings, not just ceremonial figureheads, since we've seen no sign of a parliament). The dwarfs are an entire race bred for manual labor. Cora was supposedly a social climber, and in order to have a social climber, class has to be an issue. On the other hand, the problem initially keeping Leo from marrying her wasn't the fact that she was a miller's daughter but rather the fact that he was already betrothed to someone else. Once he decided that he got to choose his own wife, I don't recall her background being considered a problem. Both Rumple and later David and his mother were forced to do things by their rulers who had complete power over them, but was that because the Duke or King's word was law or because those rulers had a Dark One working with them? Plenty of feudal leaders in our world were able to force people under them to comply without a pet sorcerer, so does that mean that these positions are weaker in that world without magic to back them up?

 

Then there's the issue that the fate of the common people on this show goes beyond "hey, why do you nobles have to work out your disputes in the middle of the crops that were supposed to get my village through the winter?" When the powerful people in this show have a problem, the common folk may find themselves uprooted from their world and transported to another one, often transformed into another kind of being and sometimes with their identities destroyed. They don't seem to be at all considering the perspective of Random Peasant #4763 who never met either Regina or Snow and doesn't have a strong opinion in the matter and yet found himself suddenly in a strange world where his job is processing seafood at the cannery.

[Rumsy4]

The Show's morality has always been wonky, but its version of afterlife takes the cake. 

 

Sociopathic villains like Cora and Pan seem to have been assigned pretty good, if slightly boring lives in the Underworld. The Blind Witch runs a diner in the Underworld. These "villains" coexist with dead people like Henry Sr. (who had his faults to be sure), and presumably other less villainous characters and "heroes"

like Hercules

. Henry Sr.'s unresolved issue was with Regina. Resolving that qualified him for Storybrooke heaven or whatever the "happy" place is supposed to be. He didn't need to apologize to King Leopold or the poor Black Knight he helped to kill. Neal died a "hero" and apparently had no unresolved issues, so he went straight to "heaven". Killian wanted to die a hero, but apparently being a Dark One qualified him straight for the torture chambers.

Whatever Meg did or did not do in her life, she too is being held in the depths of hell.

. Hades doesn't want people leaving the UW for reasons unknown as of now, but there seems to be some other authority who allows people like Henry Sr. into heaven.

 

None of this makes a lick of sense as to why people in this world are obsessed with hero/villain labels. It doesn't seem to matter much in the afterlife, when all is said and done. It basically depends on the whim of Hades?? So, where are these people getting their moral values from? 

[Faemonic]

Henry Sr.'s unresolved issue was with Regina. Resolving that qualified him for Storybrooke heaven or whatever the "happy" place is supposed to be. He didn't need to apologize to King Leopold or the poor Black Knight he helped to kill.

That, I can maybe sort of understand. Henry Sr. did...nothing. Maybe that makes him complicit, but with such a passive character I can sort of understand someone running the cosmos deciding that this guy ought to just resolve what he feels guilty about personally in his heart of hearts...rather than facing the consequences of what he's actually done and come to some mutual resolution that involves the victims, which just doesn't happen.

 

 

Neal died a "hero" and apparently had no unresolved issues, so he went straight to "heaven". Killian wanted to die a hero, but apparently being a Dark One qualified him straight for the torture chambers.

There's a trope called Protagonist Centered Morality, where of course the world is going to slightly bend around the character that the writer most relates to and/or anchors the plot to. Maybe this is an example of Plot-Centered Morality: Neal's story is done (not in my opinion, but evidently) literally done to death, so he's done. Killian's still in the narrative, and that needs conflict, so eeuuurraaagh waterfall of blood on his beautiful faaaace!

 

None of this makes a lick of sense as to why people in this world are obsessed with hero/villain labels. It doesn't seem to matter much in the afterlife, when all is said and done. It basically depends on the whim of Hades?? So, where are these people getting their moral values from?

I'm still trying to get past that there is an Underworld, after all that Dead Is Dead stuff (on par with the supposedly sheer Impossibility of crossing a realm to a Land Without Magic but now they're like, there's a door but whatever let's do it the hard way both ways). At least with Blue and Rumpel it could make sense if you squint.

 

The first season sort of established some people in the Enchanted Forest as polytheists, so I figured that if you believe in Ursula then you go somewhere else after you die versus if you believed in Aslan. If they all go to Hades anyway, though, I guess it still makes sense. Hubris was the big villainy, so Athena could smite Arachne for being a better weaver and telling the truth about the gods, and that would be a-okay. The arbitrary rule of temperamental gods would fit, although I'm disappointed to hear that they didn't have a clearer method of sorting people into Tartarus, Asphodel, Elysium, etcetera.

 

On the other hand, there were great rewards for heroism in Greek myth, such as the deification of some guy named Hymen. He started out as a mortal human slave, and after some cross-dressing adventure with pirates, he emerged a hero and even became a lesser-known god of marriage. Heroes could become gods, and not only through battle, but just from being some god's favorite beloved (see Psyche, minor goddess of love) or I even count the halfway deification of Sappho the poet into "the tenth Muse." There could be great rewards for other values such as hospitality to strangers, because they might be Zeus in disguise (such as in the myth of Baucis and Philemon.) And there were terrible consequences for villainy other than hubris. In Oedipus Rex, incest was punishable by widespread plague, even though the people dying weren't necessarily the people incesting, I don't know if that was a miasma thing or a sovereignty thing. In the myth of Orestes, slaying of the kin got the Furies after you (I didn't catch up on 5A so I don't know what Robin did to get the Furies after him.)

 

If we were considering Norse mythology, then the motivation for heroism might be very different, because the definition of heroism would be very different. Hel (as in the goddess named Hel in Helheim) was reserved for people who didn't die in battle, so that was the line between hero and "villain". Basically, you couldn't be a hero if you died nonviolently at a great old age in a comfy bed surrounded by loved ones. You probably wouldn't be tortured, even though Helheim was a bit nippy, but you'd miss out on all the best parties going on in Odin's Valhalla, Freya's Sessrumnir, Heimdall's Himinbjorg, whoever recruited which warrior for the war to come...which was supposed to be an awesome thing. (Me, I'd rather chill at Helheim with the other nerds.)

 

At least that would establish that the afterlife mythology relies a lot on a sort of morality schema of the society itself. While I'm sure These Writers who brought us the Operation Mongoose parts 1 and 2 definitions of some sort of other-life morality, which was a total mess, didn't stand outside of that and ponder what it would look like and think about it...I think they'd just do it. If they write by the Rule of Cool, that's our moral schema: what looks coolest. If they write by how there are characters defined by how they feel in their heart of hearts, and other characters are props, then that's what it's going to be.

Edited March 9, 2016 by Faemonic

[KingOfHearts]

 

That, I can maybe sort of understand. Henry Sr. did...nothing. Maybe that makes him complicit, but with such a passive character I can sort of understand someone running the cosmos deciding that this guy ought to just resolve what he feels guilty about personally in his heart of hearts...rather than facing the consequences of what he's actually done and come to some mutual resolution that involves the victims, which just doesn't happen.

 

Heaven must have very low standards for who gets in. Neal and Henry Sr. both led morally screwy lives and did little to fix that. I can't imagine what Black Tooth did to deserve fire and brimstone. What he did had to be worse than rape, mass murder, and cursing entire realms. Let's be real - A&E would admit Regina into heaven in their universe. Desiring to be a hero equates to ascension better than actually being a hero.

Edited March 11, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Faemonic]

Let's be real - A&E would admit Regina into heaven in their universe. Desiring to be a hero equates to ascension better than actually being a hero.

That's exactly it: this is A&E's universe. They do run this cosmos.

[KAOS Agent]

Oh I'm completely waiting for Cora's one redemptive moment ala Vader vs the Emperor and we'll find out that you can completely suck at life, abandon your child in the woods, murder entire villages and form your own zombie army and not feel a bit of regret about it, but make one move to save your daughter and you're heaven bound. Does anyone really think Cora is going to go to hell? Does anyone think she'll be delivering flour for eternity? This arc is going to put real morality to the test. If Cora goes to a better place at the end of it, what does that say for people who sacrifice and do the right thing? Their sacrifices mean nothing when it comes to the final judgement. 

[Camera One]

Well, we can't expect too much from this show.  This is the first real time she has received a negative consequence for something she did, though in this case it's Hades being a big meanie, like Snow was the big meanie when she killed her.  A&E&J probably thinks it's already more than enough punishment that she has to wear the ugly rags. 

[Camera One]

I wonder if Snow's bird painting that Regina threw a fireball at is down in the Underworld too.

[CheshireCat]

Shanna Marie, on 05 Feb 2016 - 3:23 PM, said:

The problem with the "Regina's a victim" thing is the giant asterisk that has to go next to every item except her parents and her boyfriend's death, since every other bad thing that happened to her was a result of a choice she made or was something she did. She chose to get married so she'd be in a position to get her revenge,

 

I always assumed she already was married by the time she wanted to leave but that aside, when she makes the choice to let Rumple teach her, she clearly says that she doesn't want to become like her mother and she also later reveals that she wants to use magic to bring Daniel back to life. It's only once she learns that that's not possible and Rumple crushes her last bit of hope in regards to that with Dr Frankenstein and his "failed" attempt to put the heart into Daniel that she gets on the path of revenge and one could argue that Rumple led her on that path since it's exactly where he wanted her.

I also believe that it would not have boded well for Robin had Regina actually gone into the tavern that night. Rumple needed her and Regina's happiness wasn't in his best interest and that makes me wonder what he would have done to Robin if he and Regina had hooked up. So, it might have been for the best (at least from Robin's point of view) that Regina didn't have the courage to go in.

I'm not excusing what she did because there's no denying she was cruel and evil. I'm just saying that it's not just black and white. Fairy tales usually put characters into a clear black or white column, this show doesn't (except for the characters they need as antagonists and even then it's not all of them).

[YaddaYadda]

Rumple worked hard to create his monster. I think he said it, and Regina said it to him last season in 4B. Rumple definitely gave her that push, and he tried to do the same thing with Emma by turning her dark.

 

Rumple will shove anyone over the edge to get what he wants. In a lot of ways, she learned from it. And there's something to be said about having visions and doing your damnest to make them happen in order to have the desired outcome. 

[KingOfHearts]

 

I always assumed she already was married by the time she wanted to leave but that aside, when she makes the choice to let Rumple teach her, she clearly says that she doesn't want to become like her mother and she also later reveals that she wants to use magic to bring Daniel back to life.

 

The flashbacks from 2x02 occur days before her wedding, IIRC. Regina and Cora were already staying at Leopold's palace in preparation for it. The show never gives a reason why Regina chose to marry Leopold anyway after such a short time, which is strange.

 

 

It's only once she learns that that's not possible and Rumple crushes her last bit of hope in regards to that with Dr Frankenstein and his "failed" attempt to put the heart into Daniel that she gets on the path of revenge and one could argue that Rumple led her on that path since it's exactly where he wanted her.

 

I would agree that up to that point, Regina was under bad influences. She was abused by her mother and Rumple manipulated the heck out of her. It's later when Regina had been shown the light (thanks to Snow, Henry Sr., etc) and had every power to change that I start putting more of the fault on her part. But still, Regina's dark path is not 100% her own doing. Cora and Rumple incubated it.

 

 

Fairy tales usually put characters into a clear black or white column, this show doesn't (except for the characters they need as antagonists and even then it's not all of them).

I do have to disagree here though. S4 threw around the "hero" and "villain" titles like there was no tomorrow. Just read KAOS Agent's word tallies.

 

To me, there is a difference between flip-flopping between good or evil and being gray. Gray characters are usually only doing what is in their own interest, regardless of the measurement on the morality scale. They're not working exclusively against the antagonist or the protagonist, just anyone who gets in their way in any particular moment. S2 Hook is an example. I'd say S5 Zelena is too. 

Edited March 12, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Rumsy4]

On the other hand, there were great rewards for heroism in Greek myth, such as the deification of some guy named Hymen. ...

 

I agree that heroism is a huge cornerstone of morality in ONCE. Heroism and bravery are valued very highly in this Universe, and that would explain why people seem obsessed with the hero/villain label. And yet, it's unclear whether or not the afterlife is subject to the same definitions of heroism or good & evil the "living" use. As far as Hades is concerned, he seems to be doing what he wants (and in that sense, as unlike the mythological Hades as possible). At any rate, the rules governing afterlife morality seem as arbitrary as the moral code of the people in the living world. Being "good" and "evil" doesn't really seem to matter in the afterlife, from the glimpse we have seen so far. 

[Shanna Marie]

One of the issues is that they don't seem to recognize any middle ground between "villain" and "hero." If you're not a villain, you're a hero. There doesn't seem to be a category for people who aren't actively doing evil but who aren't doing much good, for selfish people who aren't going out of their way to hurt others but who aren't lifting a finger to help anyone else. And the moment a villain does something non-villainous, they get called a hero.

 

So Regina first got called a hero for choosing not to kill Snow and Emma as they tried to return to Storybrooke. She backslid badly after that, but then got permanent hero designation after undoing her own doomsday device. Hook had to do a bit more before they first used the "hero" label on him, and oddly enough, Emma first told him he had a mark in the hero column after he helped restore the fairies. That was undoing his own action (though in that case he was being controlled by Rumple, but still, I wouldn't call undoing it to be heroic). Rumple was enough of a hero to be worthy of drawing Excalibur after he got the darkness sucked out of him (which had nothing at all to do with any choice or action on his part -- in fact, he'd chosen to come back to the town in spite of the risk it meant for everyone else rather than dying out of town where the Darkness would have no effect) and doing one good deed. He was the same person who'd done all those evil things, he hadn't changed his mind about any of it, and yet he was magically proven to be a pure and great hero.

 

All of that rather devalues the concept of a "hero." Basically, you're a hero for not doing anything particularly evil at this moment. They don't seem to have a category for Not Killing People But Still Being Bitchy or Not Actively Opposing the Good Guys Right Now. There's no "Okay, you're not killing us, but we don't yet trust you and we probably won't ever like you."

[Faemonic]

I always assumed she already was married by the time she wanted to leave but that aside, when she makes the choice to let Rumple teach her, she clearly says that she doesn't want to become like her mother and she also later reveals that she wants to use magic to bring Daniel back to life. It's only once she learns that that's not possible and Rumple crushes her last bit of hope in regards to that with Dr Frankenstein and his "failed" attempt to put the heart into Daniel that she gets on the path of revenge and one could argue that Rumple led her on that path since it's exactly where he wanted her.

I always assumed that she was riding away as a way to break the engagement, and I guess she could have done that anyway to break the marriage if she didn't have SparkleDark obviously interested...and that would surely be easier to handle if she were empowered enough to have something to barter with ("Cut off trade with King George's kingdom. I need him broke! What do you care?") Instead of, like, having to cope with living in a world she barely understands when she doesn't even have love to lure her away from the emotional pressure cooker of the upper-crust world that she knows. And SparkleDark would maybe keep bugging her to learn magic, like how much faster dark can a person go when she's faced with poverty, or the life-ruining whims of those in positions of greater political power? The word "villain" comes from "villager" for a reason. Regina knows it. Rumple knows it. For sticking with the loveless marriage to her mother's ex-boyfriend that she never even consented to in the first place, I'm not sure how much I can blame her.

I also believe that it would not have boded well for Robin had Regina actually gone into the tavern that night.

 

I agree. But that was What's-His-Name's writing experiment, so maybe he focused on writing Regina fix-it fanfiction so much that he wouldn't have considered the consequences of a moment of happiness, and he could handwave all the complications because he was the author. That's why when Robin finds that storybook page, he and Regina seem to agree that if Regina would have only just done that, then everything would have been fine.

 

(That's sort of the same feeling I get whenever the show gets interesting and then pulls a "haha, never mind!" Like, maybe what actually happened between Emma and Ingrid would have urged on some character growth and resolution, or the Hook/Nealfire/Rumple triad, or Regina and Zelena...but we're watching the extra page of some fix-it fanfiction writer play out instead.)

I'm not excusing what she did because there's no denying she was cruel and evil. I'm just saying that it's not just black and white. Fairy tales usually put characters into a clear black or white column, this show doesn't (except for the characters they need as antagonists and even then it's not all of them).

Oddly enough, I think the writers give lip service to Moral Grays but actually do ink and whiteout these characters...and much of the vocal fandom sees it just as simplistically, moral judgments and all, but maybe the exact opposite of what was intended. This might not be a fandom that generally even allows for gray area: it's either they're the best in the world if you would just ignore the pile of bodies, or they're the worst triggering squick for the hint that feeds the fanon.

 

yet, it's unclear whether or not the afterlife is subject to the same definitions of heroism or good & evil the "living" use (...) Being "good" and "evil" doesn't really seem to matter in the afterlife, from the glimpse we have seen so far. 

I'd guess it's the same, all service to the Plot.

 

One of the issues is that they don't seem to recognize any middle ground between "villain" and "hero." If you're not a villain, you're a hero. There doesn't seem to be a category for people who aren't actively doing evil but who aren't doing much good, for selfish people who aren't going out of their way to hurt others but who aren't lifting a finger to help anyone else. And the moment a villain does something non-villainous, they get called a hero.

(...)

All of that rather devalues the concept of a "hero." Basically, you're a hero for not doing anything particularly evil at this moment. They don't seem to have a category for Not Killing People But Still Being Bitchy or Not Actively Opposing the Good Guys Right Now. There's no "Okay, you're not killing us, but we don't yet trust you and we probably won't ever like you."

The bolded part, I think yes there is, but it falls squarely into the evil category (or pretentiously good) to carry that attitude. So is lying because the truth is too emotionally painful to acknowledge (if you're Emma or the Eggnappers; if Rumple, that's resolved offscreen and if Regina...hit and miss?) Or accomplishing what should be pragmatic and necessary and right, but has collateral damage. Hook gets that sort of Aesop Amnesia a lot. (So that people don't go to TV Tropes and get lost in looking up links, Aesop Amnesia is when a character learns a very valuable lesson in a very special episode...and then seems to have completely forgotten it by the next episode, or even by the end of the same episode.)

[KingOfHearts]

 

Or accomplishing what should be pragmatic and necessary and right, but has collateral damage. Hook gets that sort of Aesop Amnesia a lot. (So that people don't go to TV Tropes and get lost in looking up links, Aesop Amnesia is when a character learns a very valuable lesson in a very special episode...and then seems to have completely forgotten it by the next episode, or even by the end of the same episode.)

Honestly, I think every character on the show suffers from Aesop Amnesia...

Edited March 13, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Rumsy4]

I'd guess it's the same, all service to the Plot.

 

And this is what keeps taking me (and others) out of the story constantly. It's impossible to get fully "immersed" in the experience when we can constantly see the puppet strings of the writers.

This might not be a fandom that generally even allows for gray area: it's either they're the best in the world if you would just ignore the pile of bodies, or they're the worst triggering squick for the hint that feeds the fanon.

 

Oh I agree, and it is a consequence of the black and white morality present in the writing. If the writers want the viewers to feel sympathetic towards Cora in a particular episode, her downfall becomes the fault of the nasty White clan. When the writers want to drum up anti-Cora sentiment, Regina's father gets to stress the fact that Daniel's death is solely Cora's fault. And Hades points out to Cora that she gave up Zelena for the sake of bettering herself, and Eva is not even mentioned for being a tattle tale. It's impossible to take any moralizing seriously when the writers are so blatantly manipulating the audience behind the scenes.

Edited March 13, 2016 by Rumsy4

[KingOfHearts]

 

It's impossible to take any moralizing seriously when the writers are so blatantly manipulating the audience behind the scenes.

It's hilarious when the writers seem to know what they write is messed up. That realization seems to come through truth bombs like Henry Sr. dropped toward the beginning of 5x12. What's strange is that instead of feeling like we're getting different perspectives on one issue, the sense of right or wrong itself is ever changing. It's not the opinions of the characters - it's the entire moral structure of the show's universe.

[Faemonic]

I watched a video review of Man of Steel that personified the film as a way to notice the unexamined assumptions...such as, if Man of Steel were a person, then what would this person's opinion of military action be? While the villains of the piece are the warrior class, the presence of some sort of military remains and their decisions are not interrupted or questioned. Conclusion: Man of Steel is a-okay with the absolute rule of the military.

 

If Once Upon A Time were a person, I think that Once's childhood abandonment issues would open them up to abuse because they're that desperate for company that they can be sure will never leave them. (An abusive parent is at least a parent who is present; and it's the unconditional love of a child that satisfies them, not the impossible love of any parent.) Once might have a double standard when it comes to cheating in a monogamous relationship: if they do it, it's a great love story and makes them feel special enough to be worth cheating on...but if it's done to them, it's punishable by death and exile. Generally, Once has unhealthy personal boundaries because of their insatiable need for validation/acceptance in spite of how they lash out. They will vacillate between clinging and lashing out, but in the moment would insist that their attitude had always been that way, that whoever they cling to had always been the best most steadfast loyal good-hearted whatever...or, that such a person had always been the worst evil. There remains an immense discomfort with ambiguity or complication. Once will always find an external cause of something they did, so it is never their own fault, and never a need to make amends if only others would understand that it was always somebody else's fault. Once themself feels entitled to forgiveness, or a family who would attack meanies who call out Once's harmful behaviour and dare demand amends. Once's morality isn't a philosophy of life that they strive to keep to, but an expression of how they believe things should be at the moment because they feel like it. Once is sick and needs help.

[Shanna Marie]

A discussion in the relationships thread made me think more about the lack of gray areas. Neal is very much a gray character in what they show us. He was a good, heroic kid, but as an adult, he wasn't all that heroic. He was a career thief, but he came to that after having had honest employment. He had a job, but became an outlaw fugitive when he stole from his employer. Then there was his treatment of Emma, which had a lot to do with wanting to avoid his father even though he told himself it was for her own good. His "heroic" ending wasn't really, since he raised the Dark One (so he's at least partially to blame for the mess they're currently in) for selfish reasons, because he wanted to be with Henry, even though Henry didn't remember him. Henry wasn't in danger at the time. He'd been given a good life with Emma. It wasn't because Henry needed Neal, but Neal wanted to be with Henry, so he used dark magic, in spite of his usual anti-magic stance, to raise the Dark One, with no more of a plan than "my papa will know what to do," in spite of being warned that it was a trap. Yeah, he let himself be separated from Rumple so Rumple could tell them who the Wicked Witch was, so in a sense he died for them, but he actually died back when he raised the Dark One. He didn't have a real life or existence while trapped in his father's body all that time.

 

When he first came back on the scene, they seemed to be showing him as gray. Emma was allowed to call him out on her treatment of her, and he was shown to have had cowardly motives for abandoning her. We knew he was wrong about Tamara and Emma was right, so we knew he was being unfairly dismissive of her. But somewhere along the way he was declared a Hero, and therefore it was like he became all good. Suddenly "he had no choice" became the mantra about how he treated Emma, and Emma had to act like a guy she was with for a few months a decade ago and who treated her terribly was hugely important and meaningful to her, and they're naming kids after him. Neal wasn't a bad man, but a hero? He did some good things, but mostly he was kind of a screwup as an adult. He fit somewhere in the middle on the continuum between hero and villain, but there's no room for that on this show, so since he wasn't a villain, he was a hero, and now nothing bad can be said about him and we even have evidence that he went straight to "heaven."

 

Also, based on the look at young Snow this week, these characters seem way too obsessed with being labeled a "hero." They talk more about wanting to be a hero than they talk about wanting to do the right thing, so it comes across as sounding rather self-absorbed. They sound more like they want to be called a hero than like they actually want to do anything heroic, and they sound like they only want to do heroic things so they'll be called a hero.

[Curio]

When [Neal] first came back on the scene, they seemed to be showing him as gray. Emma was allowed to call him out on his treatment of her, and he was shown to have had cowardly motives for abandoning her. We knew he was wrong about Tamara and Emma was right, so we knew he was being unfairly dismissive of her. But somewhere along the way he was declared a Hero, and therefore it was like he became all good. Suddenly "he had no choice" became the mantra about how he treated Emma, and Emma had to act like a guy she was with for a few months a decade ago and who treated her terribly was hugely important and meaningful to her, and they're naming kids after him.

 

Remember the good ol' days when Jennifer was allowed to ask when David was going to punch Neal in the face for sending her to jail? We did end up having David punch a guy in the face a few times, but it ended up being Hook.

 

Changing gears to a completely different topic...

 

I brought up the idea of having a magical legal system in the magic thread, and it really frustrates me how this show lacks any decent legal system. In a small town like Storybrooke where the mayor has magic and antidemocratically self-elected herself to the position, and the Sheriff also has magic and is a part of the royal family that decides most of the town's decisions, it makes sense that Storybrooke doesn't have any working legal system. Why would any lawyer or judge even bother? They know they'd ultimately lose the case because the Charmings, Mills, and Stitskins run everything in town anyways. Where was Will's lawyer to come to his aid when Emma had him locked up in jail? Nowhere to be found because he probably doesn't even exist. If lawyers still exist in Storybrooke, I think it's clear that a) they don't matter, and/or b) they're too afraid to practice law now.

 

So in a way, I can kind of accept there's no legal system in Storybrooke because it's supposed to be shown as a corrupt small town with weird rules. Okay, fine. But what about Magic Law that applies outside of Storybrooke? Magic transcends many realms, stretching from Storybrooke, to Mysthaven, to Arendelle, to Agrabah, to Wonderland, etc. Because so many lands have magic, then there ought to be some kind of overarching rules/moral system that all magical users shall abide by. Why isn't there some Supreme Magical Court that decides what is fair and unfair use of magic? Why aren't there consequences for magical beings who abuse their powers? Having magic is a gift and a privilege, and it isn't fair to non-magical people that magical people are too powerful to be properly sent to court for their crimes. There should be a powerful magical legal system that tracks all the magicians in all the lands and makes sure they're abiding by the magical laws. If you crush a heart, you will be stripped of your magical abilities and charged for murder in the magical court system, not the regular non-magical court system. If you magically turn someone into a fish, you're looking at 3 years in magical prison. If you break a magical law in a realm that isn't your own, you're in bigger trouble because it becomes a federal magical crime. (Maybe that would persuade magical villains from other realms to stop wreaking havoc in Storybrooke so often.) But because no legal system exists on this show, magical people can do whatever the fuck they want because there are no rules or limits set. So the non-magical people can cry out, "You crushed my groom's heart! I'll see you in court!" But the magical people can just say, "Yes, but I used magic to do it, and because there are no magical laws, I can do whatever I want and you can't put me on trial for anything! Suck it." All the non-magical people try to apply normal, human emotions and basic morals to magicians, but telling a villain that the thing they did was "mean" or "not generally accepted by society" doesn't matter to them.

 

Emma—being one of the few light magic practitioners—should start the very first official magical rules system and be its president/leader. It's a huge step up from being Sheriff of Storybrooke, and she could begin applying her Savior title to help protect all the magical realms and attempt to bring law and order back into the picture. Emma could be the leader of this new magical order, and whenever she receives a call from another realm asking for her help because someone broke a federal magic crime, Emma would be on the case. (Emma's too busy to deal with everyone's drama, so she only deals with issues that cross realm borders. Thus, she's the head of the federal magical department.) She could bring along her fellow Storybrooke co-Sheriff, expert tracker mother, and pirate to investigate the evidence, interview people, and discover a huge magical mystery conspiracy along the way. Damn, this case needs more magical backup and some muscle? Guess Emma has to call in help from Rumple and Regina. Shoot, Emma can't remember the specific magic rule that would help as a precedent for their case? No worries, Belle totally completed Magical Law School in like a year. Boom. I just set up Season 7 and beyond. You're welcome, writers. (And to get around the whole wait, why aren't Rumple, Regina, and Hook locked up in jail for their crimes? issue, we'll just say they were grandfathered into the new legal system and their past crimes can't counted against them...)

Edited March 19, 2016 by Curio

[Shanna Marie]

And to get around the whole wait, why aren't Rumple, Regina, and Hook locked up in jail for their crimes? issue, we'll just say they were grandfathered into the new legal system and their past crimes can't counted against them...

Hook's crimes weren't magical, and he has no power, so I guess there's no reason for him not to be locked up under the current system, other than the fact that they keep needing his help, and by now perhaps he's done enough community service to keep him out on probation, at least for the crimes he committed within the Storybrooke jurisdiction. And for the most part, he is treated by many of the characters like he's on probation. Death may count to wipe the slate clean and give him a fresh start (the same could have applied to Rumple, but he's committed crimes since he came back to life and death clearly didn't reform him).

 

But Hook is a case study in why some kind of justice system is necessary. He likely wouldn't have committed his crimes if there had been any kind of justice because it was being horribly wronged with no chance of redress or justice that led to him taking matters into his own hand(s), which kicked off his life of crime. A justice system may not have helped against the genocidal king, given that our world still has rulers like that, and there's not that much that can be done about them. I don't know if Hook would have been satisfied with telling the international media about the king's genocidal plans and seeing the UN put that kingdom under economic sanctions or if he'd still have wanted to fight. But Hook might not have gone off the deep end if Rumple had been held accountable for Milah's murder, if the magic police had shown up, slapped an anti-magic cuff on him, and locked him in a magic-proof cell in a tower in the middle of the ocean. Or Rumple might already have been locked up after all the people he turned into slugs and stepped on or the things he did to his housemaids, so Milah wouldn't have been killed. And if Rumple was locked up for misusing his power, Regina wouldn't have become the Evil Queen. She might still have been bitchy on her own, and Cora still would have been a social climber who wouldn't have let her daughter marry a stableboy, but Regina wouldn't have been able to do all the horrible things she did without Rumple. There's a whole ripple effect of harm coming off of Rumple's abuse of his power that wouldn't have happened if he'd faced any consequences and had been stopped earlier.

[Curio]

Hook's crimes weren't magical, and he has no power, so I guess there's no reason for him not to be locked up under the current system, other than the fact that they keep needing his help, and by now perhaps he's done enough community service to keep him out on probation, at least for the crimes he committed within the Storybrooke jurisdiction.

 

Well, I guess Dark Hook could be magically charged for killing Merlin, but you're right about his other crimes. Hook has also shown how shoddy the current jail system is on the show if he's been able to break out of the many prisons he's alluded to being held in over the years.

Edited March 20, 2016 by Curio

[Shanna Marie]

More on the crazy lack of a justice system: When Teen Snow beats the bandits -- who have wanted posters -- she considers it a triumph that she's chased them away. No one seems to consider arresting them (remember, wanted posters) and putting them on trial or even just locking them up so they can't continue terrorizing villages. Are these bandits really going to give up their lives of crime because a teenager pointed an arrow at them? She can't be everywhere at once. True, they might have stopped if Regina quit paying them, but Snow didn't know that, so why did she let them get away instead of bringing them to justice?

 

Not to mention that there should have been some kind of law enforcement confronting the bandits so that the princess didn't have to do it herself. The peasants are really screwed if the only protection they get is from the royalty themselves, with no guards, cops, soldiers, or anything like that keeping the peace.

[Camera One]

That's part and parcel of the time and energy devoted to world-building, which is pretty much nil.  So a teenage princess would lose respect of the entire kingdom if she couldn't single-handedly stop a band of roving bandits who have full-grown peasants cowering in fear?

 

It's also kind of funny how for everyone else the lesson is you have to do it TOGETHER, including the present-day story of fighting against Cerberus.  Whereas with Snow in the flashback and Charming in "White Out", it's if you don't single-handedly do this yourself (and no, Hercules isn't going to help you), then you're a LOSER, a FAILURE and a SORRY EXCUSE FOR A LEADER (Snow) or a SNIVELLING COWARD (Charming).  

Edited March 22, 2016 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

 

More on the crazy lack of a justice system: When Teen Snow beats the bandits -- who have wanted posters -- she considers it a triumph that she's chased them away. No one seems to consider arresting them (remember, wanted posters) and putting them on trial or even just locking them up so they can't continue terrorizing villages. Are these bandits really going to give up their lives of crime because a teenager pointed an arrow at them? She can't be everywhere at once. True, they might have stopped if Regina quit paying them, but Snow didn't know that, so why did she let them get away instead of bringing them to justice?

Nothing made sense about Teen Snow and the bandits. It's faultily planned scenario. Snow shouldn't have been the one to stop them anyway.