Killian Jones/Captain Hook: One Handed Pirate With A Drinking Problem

[pezgirl7]

I don't know how Liam 2.0 could ever forgive Hook for killing his father. He already lost his mother, and then Hook left him an orphan. Like, WTH Hook?! I seriously hate this storyline.

[YaddaYadda]

2.0 seems to sleep through crises just like his namesake. Hook trying to wake Liam after their father dumped them, Liam still catching his zzzzz like nobody's business.

 

 

 

I seriously hate this storyline

 

I think we're giving it more thought than the writers have. I'm not even sure this will amount to anything at all. If Hook's father is in the UW, they can just have a line about how Hook found him, and keeps tabs on him, and that he's fine. Done, solved!

Edited December 15, 2015 by YaddaYadda

[KingOfHearts]

 

I don't know how Liam 2.0 could ever forgive Hook for killing his father. He already lost his mother, and then Hook left him an orphan. Like, WTH Hook?! I seriously hate this storyline.

Like most victims in this show, we'll never see him again. If he did come to Storybrooke seeking vengeance, he would be portrayed as unforgiving and evil for questioning a murderer's redemption. That's what happened to Greg. But I do wonder... what if he never found out it was Hook? What if he's been living in Storybrooke this whole time? Gosh, like A&E would care.

Edited December 16, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Shanna Marie]

I don't know how Liam 2.0 could ever forgive Hook for killing his father. He already lost his mother, and then Hook left him an orphan.

It's unlikely with these writers, but good writers could do something interesting with that storyline in showing a different outcome from a revenge quest.

 

With Regina and Snow, there's the superficial reconciliation, in which Snow has apologized repeatedly for her role in wronging Regina, while Regina has only barely admitted that she used to be evil but hasn't admitted that her revenge against Snow was wrong and hasn't apologized at all, but apparently this is enough for Regina to have stopped seeking revenge and for them to get along now. With Rumple and Hook, there's the uneasy, mostly one-sided truce. It's not so much reconciliation that has anything to do with Rumple as it is Hook realizing that getting revenge was only ruining his own life. He's admitted (though not directly to Rumple) his fault in their history, but while he's no longer taking action when he's in his right mind, he does still seem to be angry about everything Rumple's done to him. He hasn't changed his feelings, only his actions that come from those feelings. Meanwhile, Rumple doesn't seem to have any remorse, doesn't feel the least bit bad about what he did to Hook and Milah, and even gloats about it, and he keeps doing things to hurt Hook.

 

But with 2.0, and more likely if he grew up outside the curse and is an adult now (since I wouldn't expect a kid to be able to deal with this kind of stuff maturely), there might be the chance of Hook admitting his wrong and expressing remorse and 2.0 hearing his side of the story and understanding why Hook did what he did, even while recognizing that he was wrong to do it, and then Hook being able to make him listen to his experience with revenge to understand that killing Hook wouldn't make it better and would only mean eliminating his last family member. I would suspect that 2.0 didn't know he had older brothers or what his father had done to them, and knowing he was named after a brother his father sold into servitude and abandoned might give him pause. I doubt he knows his own brother killed their father. He might just suspect that some pirate did it, and he might have sought that pirate without knowing he even has a brother or any of his story, and he might have some of the wind taken out of his revenge sails if he finally meets that pirate, only to find out that he's changed and very contrite and apologetic. There's some potentially juicy stuff here.

[Curio]

There's some potentially juicy stuff here.

 

This show's famous last words...

[Rumsy4]

I hope we don't get Emo!Hook in 5B. 5A Hook is my favorite Hook, so I don't want him to revert to the emo version from 4A. We get enough manpain from Rumple in the Show.

Edited December 17, 2015 by Rumsy4

[Shanna Marie]

This show's famous last words...

Oh, I know. It's so frustrating how they keep coming up with stuff with so much potential and don't seem to recognize it. It appears to be purely by accident most of the time because with Hook especially it's like all his backstory came about to serve the plot needs of particular episodes. He came with the Rumple revenge feud built in, since that was in his opening episode, but since then, it seems to have been pieced together in what flashback they needed to go with the present plot, and then they don't bother to build on it, or when they do, they take the least interesting route.

 

The abandonment story he told Bae was clearly created just to give him a point of bonding, but it worked because it added a layer to what he said to Emma on the beanstalk. It was easy to imagine in retrospect that when he talked about recognizing her as a Lost Girl, it wasn't just because he'd been to Neverland and knew the Lost Boys. It was because he'd been there, himself. And yet he ended up going back to Neverland and they didn't bother to use the fact that he was a Lost Boy, even though they set that up in the episode in which he went back to Neverland. Not to mention that there had to be some kind of story there -- what kind of father would just abandon his kid like that? Why not take him with him when fleeing? Did he make provisions for him? What was he running from? Or was he maybe not really his father? Was fleeing like that actually protecting him?

 

Then the story about what happened to Liam was thrown in to parallel with him saving David, and it was so out of nowhere that it didn't seem to fit what we already knew of him. Not that it didn't work, but it raised a whole lot of questions about how a couple of kids abandoned by a fugitive father ended up as naval officers getting a prestigious assignment. Suddenly Hook wasn't just an abandoned kid who fell by the wayside to become a pirate. His life had taken a totally different turn along the way. I think Colin tries to incorporate a touch of that naval officer in his portrayal now, but the scripts don't seem to remember it. A lot of the Captain Charming bromance fanon comes from this episode that showed how much Hook loved his big brother and that had him comparing David to his brother, but they haven't built on that idea in the relationship.

 

And then they finally got around to delving into the abandonment story, and it's pretty straightforward, just as he described, though with the added touch of the father selling his kids into servitude to buy his own escape. That would have raised even more questions about what he was running from, whether he was really their father, whether he still might have been diverting the authorities from them and working on that ship was the safest place for them to be, but instead they confirm that it was just what it seemed, since they weren't interested in exploring that. They only put this story in to serve the plot of this episode, and so they didn't bother with any of the interesting story potential they set up.

 

But it doesn't actually serve this plot. When you think about it, "Remember that time you did something awful?" is a terrible strategy for persuading someone that he can fight the darkness and find the good within. It would have made more sense if he'd refused Regina's order and stood up to her, and that proved that he could stand up to Cora (the whole testing thing was especially silly, considering that we already know he caved to Cora in about 30 seconds and flipped sides, turning on Regina and faking Cora's death), so it reminded him that he can choose to do the right thing. Or maybe they could have taken a cue from season one and spread this flashback out over multiple episodes and going out of order, where it looked initially like his flashbacks were helping him find ways to help Emma fight the Darkness, until we later learned it would also apply to him. So maybe we start with him killing a man, later see him and his brother struggling, then finally see what triggered it all and link back to see how the killing came about, and then they'd have had time to get into his reaction and how Regina knew that this would be a powerful trigger for him.

 

Or what would probably have worked best of all, especially if they're doing it in one episode, would be if someone inadvertently triggered his memories by saying something like "what kind of man do you want to be?" but not knowing where that would lead his mind. He'd already said stuff to Emma like "that's not who I am" and he's talked to her about finding the good man he used to be, so she could have used that in pleading with him, and then the flashbacks might have shown not just the abandonment, but also maybe some of the positive turning points, where he doubted himself because of what his father had done and Liam helped him find his strength and courage. Seeing Emma wearing Liam's ring would have been a reminder that made him realize that he was strong enough, that what his father was didn't define him. They had that ring right there and had talked about it, so why didn't they use that for Hook's wake-up call flashback instead? They spent two scenes talking about that ring and what Liam meant to him as a reminder of a good man, but then when it came time to have the flashback that helped him snap out of his darkness, they showed him killing his father? Really? The ring was right there.

[Dianthus]

If Killian doubted himself and/or his judgment due to his father's betrayal, wouldn't Liam be subject to those same doubts? Whatever Poppa Hook did was supposedly bad enough to warrant a sleeping curse, but Killian (at least) presumably had no idea that his father was a bad guy prior to the abandonment. Liam, as the older brother, would know their father better (?), was maybe better able to understand what was going on? So then the question becomes what, if anything, did Liam know? Was he holding out on Killian? That wouldn't really fit with him fixating on Liam as the "good" one, while his own character is under question. If he doubted his own judgment so badly, how could he be so sure of Liam? Plus, I think that's maybe beyond his reasoning capabilities at such a young age. Maybe he didn't feel the Lost Boy thing as strongly because he had Liam.

Also, I really don't think that Killian's fall is all that precipitous after Liam's death. As for turning on the king they served, I think his reasoning at that point boiled down to: Liam dead, King bad. Same with his decision to fire the Pegasus sail: Liam dead, Neverland bad. It's only after Rumple leaves him to suffer and ignites his desire for revenge that he decides to go back to that awful place.

Killian's the one who lived, so of course what little we're got in these flashbacks had more to do with him.

Maybe the upcoming Jones Bros flashbacks will give us more insight on this?

[Camera One]

We might see that Hell has affected him soooooooo much, providing a new hurdle for the Emma/Hook relationship.  Even though Rumple was hardly affected by Hell at all.  That's the type of consistency you can expect from this show.

[Shanna Marie]

If Killian doubted himself and/or his judgment due to his father's betrayal, wouldn't Liam be subject to those same doubts?

We have no idea what's up with Liam, since he slept through the whole thing (probably because they didn't want to bother casting an actual actor in the role). The reason I wonder about the effect on Killian's psyche is that he learned about his father's betrayal immediately after he decided that his answer to the "what kind of man do you want to be?" question was that he wanted to be like his father. That's got to be a jolt, especially to a kid who's still young enough to have a bit of magical thinking going on, where he thinks that believing or wanting something makes it happen. Meanwhile, Liam might have been more mature and more aware, less in awe of their father. Killian likely already had some of the traits that enabled him to later turn dark. I would suspect that even as a kid and as a good person, he still had that hot temper and was still prone to being rash and impulsive, which could have led to him getting into some trouble or facing some moral dilemmas. That would have given a lot of flashback fodder for an episode about Dark Killian having to find his inner goodness again, if he recalled the times his brother nudged him in the right direction or provided a good example even as they were going through tough times.

 

Also, I really don't think that Killian's fall is all that precipitous after Liam's death. As for turning on the king they served, I think his reasoning at that point boiled down to: Liam dead, King bad. Same with his decision to fire the Pegasus sail: Liam dead, Neverland bad. It's only after Rumple leaves him to suffer and ignites his desire for revenge that he decides to go back to that awful place.

He was already pretty awful and the total opposite of Lt. Jones when he met Rumple in the first place. I imagine his fall could have traced a similar trajectory as Emma's descent into darkness -- initial struggle with it while still having good intentions, going enough into darkness that it brought about a physical transformation and some dark ruthlessness even while she thought she had good intentions, and then there was the chance that something else might have really sent her over the edge into true darkness. So Killian might have started out as still mostly Lt. Jones with some anger issues and good intentions, with something else later happening to make him start looking and acting like a pirate and being the jerk we saw, and then Milah's death being what tipped him over into real darkness. That would have made this story a good parallel to what he was struggling with in the present. Did he ever actually wear Liam's ring other than around his neck, and what was it that made him decide he wasn't worthy to wear it? Showing that as triggered by seeing Emma wearing the ring would have made a lot of sense to depict his turning point, of going back to being the man he was before that.

[Dianthus]

Don't most boys want to be like their fathers? Who else is he going to want to emulate at that age? He thought his father was a good man. Presumably Liam did too, for the most part. He wasn't shown as a small time grifter like Malcolm.

It's entirely probable that Killian already had some less charitable characteristics (a sharp temper, rashness) inside him, like everyone else, but I don't see him acting out much as a kid under threat of disciplinary action. A "good thrashing" or two would make him think twice about it.

He wasn't as straight-laced after Liam's death, but I honestly don't remember him being presented to us as all that terrible. Was he a dick to pre DO Rumple? Yes, but that's on a totally different level than vengeance at all costs, and damn the consequences.

[Dianthus]

Hook explained the rings to Emma: they were trophies. Why would he wear Liam's ring as a trophy?

 

I'm thinking this is just another of their ham-handed parallels. Poppa Hook's actions were self-serving. Hook's actions became more self-serving over time, until they weren't, and then they were (again) as a DO. He didn't even have a son of his own to abandon, so he had to abandon one by proxy.

OTOH, Liam died in service to King and country, with his honor intact, so he becomes, in Hook's mind, the "good" one. Liam didn't go the self-serving route. Given that he really died from terminal stupidity, I can see why Hook might be angry with him for that, then feel guilty for getting angry. It's complicated, and reaching for the rum is totally understandable.

[YaddaYadda]

Hook explained the rings to Emma: they were trophies. Why would he wear Liam's ring as a trophy?

 

But he doesn't wear Liam's ring as much as he keeps it on him. I don't think he thinks himself worthy of it. Even with Emma being the Dark One, and him not remembering what happened in Camelot, or the circumstances under which he gave it to her, he thinks she deserves to have it more than he does. 

[Shanna Marie]

He wasn't as straight-laced after Liam's death, but I honestly don't remember him being presented to us as all that terrible.

He was the complete opposite of Lt. Jones. He'd given up all traces of even pretending to be a military man (even if it was in his own private navy of one ship) and was full-on pirate, complete with black leather and guyliner. There are some continuity issues with his "trophy" stories since he was wearing those rings even then and one of them supposedly came from someone who called him "One Hand Jones," but he was wearing jewelry he later described as trophies. I seriously doubt that as a pirate he was just pulling up alongside other ships and inviting their crews to tea. He was a heavy drinker. He took up with a married woman. He seems to have given up entirely on "good form." He himself has said he was the villain in the encounter with Rumple. He may not have been as dark as he was when he became obsessed with revenge about Milah, but he was not a good person then. He's said that it was his reaction to Liam's death that turned him dark. That was what he brought up when he was counseling Emma after what they believed was Snow's death, not Milah's death and his revenge against Rumple, but the way he responded to losing Liam.

 

It may have followed a trajectory similar to what we saw with Emma on her way to becoming the Dark One -- the immediate aftermath of Liam's death when he wanted vengeance on the bad king but maybe was still functioning kind of like a military officer and being focused in his efforts might have paralleled to when she was in the grey cloak. She had darkness in her but was focusing on positive outcomes, even as she occasionally did something she wouldn't have done as her normal self. Then when he went full-on pirate it might compare to when she went into Dark Swan mode, a physical transformation that reflected an inner change, capable of ruthlessness but not necessarily full evil. She never went over into full evil the way he did, but that's the comparison to when he went into revenge mode with Rumple.

 

As for the ring, he may have started wearing it as a reminder of his brother, to honor him, but when he started wearing trophy rings he felt weird about wearing his brother's ring the same way as he wore trophies and started wearing it hidden and around his neck instead. He acted like he didn't feel worthy of it.

 

The thing with Hook was that he always had a conscience. He always seemed to know right from wrong and to feel like what he was doing was wrong. He just had that automatic override that kicked in whenever his vengeance came up. Maybe that's why he drank so much, to shut out the part of his mind that was telling him he was on the wrong path. It was the only way he could live with himself while he was going against his conscience. He's been drinking much less after getting his act together.

[Dianthus]

Sorry, but I think this is a serious case of YMMV. Taking up with Milah doesn't make him that bad IMO. Milah was done with Rumple. Say what you will about her, she found a man and a way of life that brought her a greater measure of fulfillment, despite her estrangement from Bae. Much as I hate to even think about it, the OQ crypt sex wasn't meant to paint Robin as dark.

No he wasn't acting exactly like he had in the military, but he was no longer in the military, so there's that.

As for inviting other ships' crews to tea, I'm not even gonna dignify that one. I never said he wasn't doing anything wrong, just not that he was as bad as you seem to think. He started down a slippery slope after Liam's death. He didn't walk off a cliff.

[Faemonic]

Mileage may very vary verily, because Hook's characterization would ultimately depend on what the plot is.

From what I've seen, when it comes to the villains (and that's Hook, Regina, and Rumple) This Show vacillates between so-and-so is So Evil That You Must Respect the Awesome Terror, and that so-and-so was called evil by mean people when it's really all just a misunderstanding.

 

So, it's very rarely getting to watch a redemption arc so much as a retconning arc.

 

If the writers collectively agree that Hook would be more Interesting as a "bad seed" who's had it in for fellow prepubescent deckhand Edgar ever since they started sailing, and Liam's death just gave Killian an excuse to whimsically homicide at someone...then that's what it's going to be, a message to irresponsible fathers about what their kids could turn into when you leave them.

 

If the writers collectively agree that Hook would be more Interesting as a captain who sent Edgar to a siren in hopes that some fabled magical creature would cure Edgar's addiction, instead learning by the end that All Magic Comes With A Price, and then so Killian went around broodily telling people that he got one of his carnelian rings from, "Edgar. Good sailor. Caught him drinking the captain's wine. I drowned him." ...then that's what it's going to be, a message to the mean people in high school cliques about how gossip is never what it is.

[Dianthus]

Whimsically homicide...I like it.

 

Actually, I was thinking that if you flipped this argument around, you could make a case for Milah as a villain (hypothetically). She did abandon her husband and son to sail away with a drunken pirate and (judging by that red leather getup) turned pirate herself. Maybe she was playing Bonnie to his Clyde. We don't really know, and that's kinda my point.

[Shanna Marie]

I suppose you could make a distinction between "dark" and "bad." Can you do bad things without being truly "dark"? I guess someone could enjoy piracy for the travel opportunities and challenge and enjoy the loot and be bad for not caring too much about the victims without being driven by darkness -- being a jerk but not necessarily evil.

 

But Hook did say he went to a very dark place after Liam's death. I could imagine that he could have been very dark in his initial phase of striking back at the king without necessarily being bad -- still holding on to military discipline, not drinking, but being very focused and ruthless. And then the initial grief and pain eased and he either succeeded or failed (I would imagine he failed, or else he would have learned his "revenge doesn't fix things" lesson earlier) or perhaps someone else got to the king and robbed him of his revenge, and he sank into being more "bad" than "dark," sort of being "what the hell" about the whole thing and being a jerk about it. He's agreed with Rumple's assessment of being selfish at that time. He wanted what he wanted, and he didn't care who or what got in his way. He just didn't have any particular overriding goal that triggered his automatic override, so he might also have been capable of doing good without the goal of revenge coming up to stop him. That's been his downfall in the flashbacks we've seen of him in his Hook days -- his initial instinct is to help, but the moment that conflicts with his revenge goal, he flips over to darkness. But what would he have been like as pre-Hook Captain Jones -- did he ever go through with helping people because there was no revenge to stop him?

[Dianthus]

We'll never know, I guess, but even working-with-Cora villain Hook 'saved' the guy she turned into a fish. It was a small thing, just a nudge with his boot, but live-or-die for the poor fish.

[Faemonic]

If we're trying to get on the same wavelength as the show, then I can only guess that Milah is an irredeemable evil on par with Cora and Pan: she abandoned her child, which on This Show is only second to murder in the hierarchy of bad-evil things, especially when she never told Darth Rumple "I thought you were Bae's best chance." Nope, what's shown tells us that Milah left because it was her best chance with the hot pirate. Evil, evil, evil. Family before Romance, people.

If we have our own opinions of what we're watching, then I personally still can't see what pre-Hook saw in Milah that all the light went out of the world when she died, because onscreen she was just shrewish. But death is awfully harsh to sentence an ex-wife to for shrewishness, isn't it?? I might not like what I imagine Milah to have been as a person and a character, but I think her death was treated much less seriously in-show than I'm personally comfortable with.

And this ties into Hook's characterization. I balk at a centuries-long enmity over a shrewish girlfriend, but if nobody else on this show is treating her death with the least bit of respect, then...have at it, Captain. Hook fans, and I'm sure some Emma fans, also appreciate that Hook called Neal out on leaving a pregnant teenaged Emma in prison (a poor substitute for Charming punching Neal in the face, but again we'll take it.)

Let's say that's what some viewers make of what the show makes of Killian Jones.

But what does the show make of Killian Jones? It comes off to me that the show tries to make him out as unreasonable for wanting to avenge someone who got exactly what was coming to her, because Rumple's side of the story had a whole season's head start, and not one flashback of Killian and Milah being sweet on each other. (Hook's love for Milah is really all just talk. We can squint to see it in the Crocodile, but that episode tells it more from Rumple's point of view.)

It must be that Hook's being shady and sleazy for taking a jab at Neal's abandonment of Emma, when the target audience agrees that Neal was a hero for doing it. Obviously, I am not the target audience.

Let's consider all that along with slaughtering a village (Cora, not him, I believe it), playing catch-and-release with Aurora's heart (this has many contradictory interpretations), kicking the fish-man out of the way (coincidentally saving his life, unless there's a shark in that bay), healing Mr. Gold's leg and returning Excalibur to the hero's side (could be Captain Good Form is scheming somewhere in there, could be bad fight choreography combined with plotting logistics.)

There's no line in this show between "kind of a jerk" and "deepest darkest evil". In-show, that Queen Eva would tell her ex-fiance that his lowborn girlfriend is pregnant with a bastard pushed over all these dominos to give us The Big Bad of the arc. This makes Eva the worst deepest darkest scheming evil, ever.

So...I think Killian being kind of a jerk pre-Hook could arguably be Daaaarknesss. It might not even have come from an inner jerk place, if he was just living in the moment and having fun with his fellows. But if he ever tripped a passing peasant, then he's apparently complicit in creating another Cora-level evil somewhere out there.

Edited December 20, 2015 by Faemonic

[Rumsy4]

Your post perfectly encapsulates the wonky morality presented in the Show. The writers want to manipulate the audience depending on what angle they want to pull for a given episode. That's why there is little consistency between different interpretations of a character among viewers. We are like the blind men in the elephant story, where each one has a different idea of what the elephant looks like.

As for Milah, she doesn't need to be a paragon to deserve the kind of devotion Killian gave her. She was probably the best thing about his life after his brother died. And Killian is nothing if not loyal to those he loves.

Edited December 20, 2015 by Rumsy4

[YaddaYadda]

I never thought Milah was shrewish as much as the life she was leading turned her into that. She's the recurring character that's never gotten a centric, but you can see the change in her. She goes from seemingly happy, and fulfilled, learning Rumple's craft, and proud of herself, to becoming bitter, and shrewish because she was trapped in her life.

 

She and Hook were together for a while, and if she remained the shrewish person she was, the odds are, he would've dumped her. Instead, she's in a position of authority. Maybe leaving Rumple, and the life she had behind worked wonders for her.

[Dianthus]

If she felt proud of herself for learning from Rumple, imagine her pride at learning from Killian and (presumably) his crew. Learning how to fight, how to sail, seeing new places and experiencing different cultures...being the Captain's woman certainly seemed to agree with her.

[Faemonic]

I want Milah to be awesome if only because otherwise Hook comes off as really foolish, but from what we've seen we can really only be sure that Rumple makes her grouchy, which means that isn't really her character trait; and that Killian loved her an awful lot, which is sweet...but ultimately tells us nothing about her.

[OnceUponAJen]

I want Milah to be awesome if only because otherwise Hook comes off as really foolish, but from what we've seen we can really only be sure that Rumple makes her grouchy, which means that isn't really her character trait; and that Killian loved her an awful lot, which is sweet...but ultimately tells us nothing about her.

I didn't have a favorable opinion of her, and when I first saw the character I had no idea that Captain Swan was even on the horizon, so it had nothing to do with that. I thought she was cruel to Rumple and it seemed to be only because his reputation as a coward made her look bad.

[daxx]

I didn't have a favorable opinion of her, and when I first saw the character I had no idea that Captain Swan was even on the horizon, so it had nothing to do with that. I thought she was cruel to Rumple and it seemed to be only because his reputation as a coward made her look bad.

I felt empathy for her plight. She begged Rumple to move to a new place. Being the wife of a coward in those times and a small village would mean she would have no friends and be shunned. It would even be difficult to make a living. It wouldn't just make her look bad it would impact every aspect of her life. Likely why she was at the tavern talking to strangers the only adult interaction outside her marriage.

Once she asked Rumple to move and he refused I no longer had pity for Rumple, he deserved what she dished out. She should have told him she was leaving though.

[Rumsy4]

She should have told him he was leaving, but she admitted that herself later. Was berating her husband a good way to deal with things? No. But reasonable requests to her husband to move had no effect, and she was bitter. Milah is a morally gray character in a world of black and whites. She made mistakes, but she apparently made Killian happy, and they were both ready to die for each other. Neverland probably contributed to the length of time Hook held on to his revenge, but I don't think Milah was unworthy of his devotion.

[Shanna Marie]

Once she asked Rumple to move and he refused I no longer had pity for Rumple, he deserved what she dished out. She should have told him she was leaving though.

That's where I have sympathy for her. He was unwilling to do anything to help his wife be happier, even though it would have also helped him be happier. It doesn't seem like he had any ties to that village, so there was no good reason for him to stay there. He was just being stubborn and cowardly.

 

While leaving the way she did by faking her death was somewhat cowardly, leaving everything she knew to try to improve her life and find adventure was the kind of courageous that I think would appeal to Hook. While I'm sure he had no trouble finding women who were up for a dalliance with him, how many women would he have found who were up for making a life with him? He'd have been more likely to encounter women who either wanted him to stay home with them or who expected him to keep coming back to them while they stayed on shore. But she was up for a life living on a pirate ship, constantly traveling, probably going through hardship and danger at times. There aren't too many people, male or female, who would be up for that kind of life. And she stuck with it for the better part of a decade, and she seemed to be quite at home and happy about it.

[Camera One]

She should have told him he was leaving, but she admitted that herself later. Was berating her husband a good way to deal with things? No. But reasonable requests to her husband to move had no effect, and she was bitter.

 

Rumple was being completely unfair in refusing to move, though we have yet to see why, other than he was "cowardly", though brave enough to go onto Hook's ship and risk his life to find Milah.  She could have used that to coerce Rumple into leaving the village.  Because of that, I have doubts that being married to a coward was the only issue she had.  I feel about as much sympathy for her as I do for Hook's father or Peter Pan.  Her heartfelt talks with Killian about missing Baelfire sound like crocodile tears to me... yes, I'm sure she loved Bae on some level but not enough to give up her pirate life (much like Rumple does love Belle but not enough to give up his magic).  Milah and Hook were being selfish together, and based on what we have seen, they both made each other happy.  In that sense, they really were made for each other, so I would have no problem if 5B saw Hook and Milah reunited and happy in the Underworld, maybe having a child and living out the rest of their death together.  Of course, this would never happen, since apparently, that's not who Hook really was (or he's "not that person anymore"), and he deserves someone like Emma.

Edited December 22, 2015 by Camera One

[YaddaYadda]

Rumple was being completely unfair in refusing to move, though we have yet to see why, other than he was "cowardly", though brave enough to go onto Hook's ship and risk his life to find Milah.  She could have used that to coerce Rumple into leaving the village.  Because of that, I have doubts that being married to a coward was the only issue she had.

 

The Milah situation often has me wondering if she wasn't married to Rumple against her will. Rumple was a spinner, and I think he was doing well for himself that he would have been a good match for someone's daughter. It's like the whole Regina being married off to Leopold, Abigail to David. Milah straight up told Rumple she never loved him, so that kind of opens up the whole if she never loved him, then why did she marry him? 

 

I think the "coward" part was just an excuse to do what she had wanted to do for a while. It's one thing to live, and share the bed of someone she didn't love, but at least he could provide, it's a whole another ball game that the same man maimed himself so that he wouldn't fight, and die (although I feel sympathy for Rumple's situation where he finds out he might never meet his child).

 

As far as Hook is concerned, I won't defend what he did. He behaved like an asshole. Hook is very confident in who he is, his looks (even Cora told him he's used to his good looks buying him anything), and he picked on Rumple because he was the stronger one. And he still picked on him when he had no clue he was picking on the Dark One. As far as everything goes, he sort of had things coming to him.

 

I liked that there seemed to be regretful in the part he played in blowing up Rumple's family apart. I think the marriage was already blown up anyway, but he recognizes that Rumple was fighting for his family when he stepped on the deck of the JR, and he called himself the villain in that story, which is something he never acknowledged in the past. 

 

I think some of his redemption in his 11th hour turnaround in the finale also comes from him acknowledging that Emma has a family, and that includes her son, and they need her, which is something he didn't exactly acknowledge in Milah's case, that she had a family, and a young child (younger than Henry is when his mother leaves) who needed her.

 

I thought it showed some character growth. This is also why I didn't really feel the character was destroyed (making abstraction of the face palming from some of 5x10)

[october]

Milah and Hook were being selfish together, and based on what we have seen, they both made each other happy.  In that sense, they really were made for each other, so I would have no problem if 5B saw Hook and Milah reunited and happy in the Underworld, maybe having a child and living out the rest of their death together.  Of course, this would never happen, since apparently, that's not who Hook really was (or he's "not that person anymore"), and he deserves someone like Emma.

 

I don't think the quotation marks are fair because Killian really isn't the man he was when he and Milah met and the show has made that his main arc since the S2 finale. I believe he and Milah were happy and I have all sorts of head-canons about their time as a pair of hot pirates getting up to no good on the high seas. But they were together for the best part of a decade at least and by the time of her death Killian was basically still the man he was when he and Milah first met: a jerk and a bully. Since Milah's death Killian has been on centuries of adventures, faced down the father who abandoned him, and crossed moral lines he probably hadn't before. And this is all prior to meeting Emma. Milah will always be his first love, but they couldn't pick up where they left off any more than Emma could with Neal.

Edited December 22, 2015 by october

[Rumsy4]

in that sense, they really were made for each other, so I would have no problem if 5B saw Hook and Milah reunited and happy in the Underworld, maybe having a child and living out the rest of their death together.  Of course, this would never happen, since apparently, that's not who Hook really was (or he's "not that person anymore"), and he deserves someone like Emma. 

 

Whether one thinks Hook "deserves" Emma or not (I'm sure he doesn't think he does), it doesn't make any sense that he would go back to playing house with Milah in the Underworld. By that logic, Regina would find Daniel in the UW and ditch Robin, and Robin will bring the real Marian back to Storybrooke, and Emma will get back with Neal. They all clearly moved on from their previous partners (Regina's tears over Daniel weren't sad enough to free Merlin, Robin wouldn't even chose his wife in the world of the living, and Emma didn't want to get back with Neal). 

I thought it showed some character growth. This is also why I didn't really feel the character was destroyed (making abstraction of the face palming from some of 5x10)

 

It makes total sense for Hook to give in to Darkness. Even Emma, who had the Darkness removed from her pre-birth, wasn't able to fully resist it. But eventually, they both did. Hook asked Emma to stab him saying he "deserved" his fate in going to the UW. So, it's not like he got an artificially clean slate and a free pass. The mistake the writers made was in not drawing out Dark Hook over a few episodes at least. It was all too rushed, and last minute, and done for shock value.

[Camera One]

If Daniel didn't come back as a zombie in Season 2, Regina would have been torn between Daniel and Robin for sure.  The whole Robin/Marian thing was never dealt with properly.  By all accounts, he should have been torn by Marian returning.  The Emma/Neal situation doesn't fit with any of the others, since it wasn't separated by death and Neal's poor decision led to the end of their relationship.  Hook and Milah's relationship ended abruptly and due to death, and just because he has fallen in love with Emma since then doesn't mean his love for Milah was extinguished.  Yes, Hook has changed, but this "new" Hook can't still love Milah?  Why not?  Milah doesn't deserve him anymore?  Milah's life was also cut short by being murdered.  I don't see it as too much of a stretch if Hook saw his extended time on Earth as "up" and wanted Emma to live the rest of her life with the living.  He was already ready to make that sacrifice when he knew he would die in "Birth".  Hook's arc was redemption and that arc has now been fulfilled.  The show won't go there since it would make too many fans unhappy, but one possible story route would be for Hook and Emma to meet one last time for closure.  It's nice to not have to worry about that actually happening, when it would be a very viable possibility on many shows.

[Rumsy4]

It's not a question of whether Milah deserves Hook or Hook deserves Emma. Milah will always have a special place in Hook's heart, but I don't see him as a man who would go back to Milah after moving on from her and having a relationship with another woman. It diminishes both relationships IMO, even if it was possible to play house after death, which I don't think it is. For all intents and purposes, he was a widower when he met Emma and fell in love with her. Besides, as a rule, ONCE doesn't have people going back into past relationships once they have actually moved on (if there was no curse-induced amnesia involved). 

 

The writers clearly killed Hook off intending for Emma to fight for him and bring him back. Hook's story could have ended with 5A if Emma had let him die in Camelot, or if he had got rid of the Darkness for good with his death in Sb. As it is, his arc remains unfulfilled. And it's just too cruel to let Emma suffer another loss just when she was on the brink of happiness. 

[YaddaYadda]

If Daniel didn't come back as a zombie in Season 2, Regina would have been torn between Daniel and Robin for sure.

 

Okay, but would Regina have looked twice at anyone if Daniel was still alive, and she was in a relationship with him? I think the only way she would've looked at Robin, or considered what Tink said to her, is if she fell out of love with Daniel. By the time Marian came back, Robin wasn't in love with her anymore (and that situation was treated very poorly, and I don't know why I'm even writing about it).

 

With all the crap Neal pulled, Emma told him she would always love him, he is her first love, and holds a special place in her heart. The same can be said about Hook, and Milah. I don't think whatever he feels for Emma diminishes what he felt for Milah. 

[Shanna Marie]

Putting aside the question of "deserving," would a man who picked out a "white picket fence" kind of house in a small town to share with a woman and her child be happy with a woman who had such a thirst for adventure that she left her husband and child behind to travel the world with a pirate, and would she be happy with him? Milah's been dead all this time -- would she continue to grow and change while in the Underworld? Hook was alive for another century after he lost her, and he already wasn't the same person after all that even before he started turning his life around. Now he's got very different interests and priorities, and he's ashamed of a lot of his behavior when he was with her. They had a good time together, and if they'd been allowed to stay together, they might have continued moving in the same direction and remained happy. But they didn't. She died, and he's gone through a lot since then.

[Curio]

I interrupt your intelligent conversation to bring you this tweet. Carry on.

[OnceUponAJen]

I interrupt your intelligent conversation to bring you this tweet. Carry on.

Well, it definitely gets your attention!

[pezgirl7]

Oh gosh. I saw that on Tumblr while I was at work and tried very hard to contain my giggling.

[legaleagle53]

The Milah situation often has me wondering if she wasn't married to Rumple against her will. Rumple was a spinner, and I think he was doing well for himself that he would have been a good match for someone's daughter. It's like the whole Regina being married off to Leopold, Abigail to David. Milah straight up told Rumple she never loved him, so that kind of opens up the whole if she never loved him, then why did she marry him? 

 

You're assuming that Millah meant it when she told Rumple that she never loved him.  My take, based upon the context of her remark, is that it was her way of twisting the knife -- I'm surprised she didn't add "loser" at the end.  As it was, it was that remark that sent Rumple over the edge so that instead of continuing to try to fight for her, he simply killed her in a fit of rage.  In other words, I think she did love him at one time, but by the time she left him, whatever love she had for him had died, so she was left with nothing but contempt for him and decided that leaving him wasn't enough -- she wanted to make him suffer, so she deliberately rubbed his nose in it by lying to him that she had never loved him.

[Camera One]

The Milah situation often has me wondering if she wasn't married to Rumple against her will.  

 

In the earliest flashback we got with Rumple and Milah before he left for the Ogres' War, Milah clearly cared for Rumple.  It didn't look like she was there against her will.  Though in that type of medieval world, it could always have been arranged.

[Rumsy4]

 

she wanted to make him suffer, so she deliberately rubbed his nose in it by lying to him that she had never loved him.

 

I have to disagree. I'm sure that Milah herself believed that she had never loved Rumple. She seemed to care for him when him left for war initially. But we don't know how much her view was influenced by her life with Killian. At any rate, she was confessing to being a coward. In the interest of full disclosure, she also told him that she had never loved him. Sometimes, honestly is not the best policy. Even after seeing Rumple looking reptilian, I bet Milah did not realize how evil and powerful he had become. However, I don't think Rumple would have let her live in any case. 

Edited December 24, 2015 by Rumsy4

[Faemonic]

It could be that, how Milah thought she loved her husband, maybe even enough to marry him without the arranged marriage part, and she worried about Rumple going to the front lines and all that...But Rumple just didn't give her the thrill of breathing the same air that Killian Jones does, which called for a redefinition of love. That happens.

 

It can also happen that someone falls in love or out of love with a person and it colors every memory that they have of them. That's probably where the myth of love at first sight comes from. I don't believe that happens, but once you've had enough sights to actually fall in love, then you treasure every memory you have of that person from the first moment. And then you think you loved them even at first sight. And then go around telling people that's what happened, when that wasn't what happened. Likewise, if a person's grown to utterly despise somebody, that person might not be able to help feeling that it was hatred all along...even though that couldn't have been the truth.

 

I like Hook because he appears to have a slightly more tempered and objective view of those sorts of things, but if I'm going to go on about Milah and Rumple, and the dynamics of that awful confrontation, then I'd better take it either to the Relationships thread or the Recurring Minor Characters thread.

Edited December 24, 2015 by Faemonic

[Dianthus]

Faemonic, on 23 Dec 2015 - 8:47 PM, said:

It could be that, how Milah thought she loved her husband, maybe even enough to marry him without the arranged marriage part, and she worried about Rumple going to the front lines and all that...But Rumple just didn't give her the thrill of breathing the same air that Killian Jones does, which called for a redefinition of love. That happens.

 

It can also happen that someone falls in love or out of love with a person and it colors every memory that they have of them. That's probably where the myth of love at first sight comes from. I don't believe that happens, but once you've had enough sights to actually fall in love, then you treasure every memory you have of that person from the first moment. And then you think you loved them even at first sight. And then go around telling people that's what happened, when that wasn't what happened. Likewise, if a person's grown to utterly despise somebody, that person might not be able to help feeling that it was hatred all along...even though that couldn't have been the truth.

 

I like Hook because he appears to have a slightly more tempered and objective view of those sorts of things, but if I'm going to go on about Milah and Rumple, and the dynamics of that awful confrontation, then I'd better take it either to the Relationships thread or the Recurring Minor Characters thread.

ITA. This is also a theme in Casablanca (haven't seen it yet? Go, run, do not walk). Rumple seems like a decent guy and a good provider, but then...BAM! Killain Jones. Just imagine...there he is, laughing in the face of danger and then later, in the privacy of your quarters, singing your praises as he worships your body, and, um, yeah. 'Scuse me, I'll be in my bunk.

[Rumsy4]

Now that Brennan turned out to be a bit pf a washout, it's time for a new Davy Jones theory. Davy Jones is Hook's grandfather. He is the Season 6 villain. ;-)

[YaddaYadda]

Or Davy Jones is his mother. I mean why not? 

 

I'm thinking they didn't go down the Davy Jones road because of rights, and such.

[HoodlumSheep]

Now that Brennan turned out to be a bit pf a washout, it's time for a new Davy Jones theory. Davy Jones is Hook's grandfather. He is the Season 6 villain. ;-)

Villain origin story: he found out about Davy 2.0 >_>

[Faemonic]

Daveigh Jones, Pirate Queen, scourge of the seas. Dammit, now I really want to see this... Oooh or if he has a secret twin sister and they were separated at birth but both became pirates. Hey, A&E do love Star Wars!

His secret long-lost twin sister's name is Jessica, although she knows she's a Jones, she got caught up in some Land Without Magic transport identity rewrite and decided to stick around a different genre...still a Disney property, though.

[Souris]

Or Davy Jones is his mother. I mean why not? 

 

I'm thinking they didn't go down the Davy Jones road because of rights, and such.

 

There are no rights to Davy Jones, much as there aren't any for King Arthur, Robin Hood or Merlin. He's a longstanding legend. Nobody owns his copyright.

 

I do love the idea of Davy Jones being his mother, though!

Edited January 11, 2016 by Souris

[YaddaYadda]

There are no rights to Davy Jones, much as there aren't any for King Arthur, Robin Hood or Merlin. He's a longstanding legend. Nobody owns his copyright.

 

I didn't know that. I thought it was a Disney thing with the PotC franchise. 

 

They had the chance to introduce Davy Jones last season in 4A, when Blackbeard mentioned Poseidon's Boneyard instead of Davy Jones' locker.