S05.E19: Sisters

[Rumsy4]

On 4/25/2016 at 11:42 AM, Curio said:

By adding the second part of the dialogue, the writers seem to be implying that Robin was just as much of a villain as Regina and that Regina had a hand in redeeming him, albeit not as much as Zelena would have to redeem Hades. By not using Regina as the example of a villain being redeemed in Outlaw Queen's situation, the writers are whitewashing her past actions again by erasing her history. The writers could have easily had Zelena call Regina out and remind her that she also used to be a villain who was redeemed by Robin, so why shouldn't she give Hades a chance? But the writers didn't do that and instead brought up Robin's past as a thief. It also doesn't help that Regina comes off as holier-than-thou again when she's yelling at Zelena for dating a villain when she was one of the worst villains on the show. I don't know if it's the writers setting Regina up for a fall or if it's just the Regina Exception Clause where the writers don't realize how hypocritical Regina sounds in these sisterly conversations.

I rewatched the episode, and I have to agree with you. The idea seems to be that Regina and Robin "helped each other" change for the better. What about poor Marian, who is supposed to the the one to originally have set him in the right path? 

This is definitely part of the Regina Exception Clause at play in the Underworld arc. That's why she gets to only meet the dead who love her and affirm her, while Emma gets punched by Cruella. 

[Curio]

1 minute ago, Rumsy4 said:

This is definitely part of the Regina Exception Clause at play in the Underworld arc. That's why she gets to only meet the dead who love her and affirm her, while Emma gets punched by Cruella. 

You know the Regina Exception Clause is at full throttle when Emma gets punched in the Underworld by someone who attempted to murder her son, but Regina will probably leave the Underworld scot-free. Even Hook got a bag shoved over his head by his former crew and David had to duke it out with James.

[YaddaYadda]

Quote

Even Hook got a bag shoved over his head by his former crew and David had to duke it out with James.

And they didn't even do anything to deserve that. They were both victims of someone else's choices.

Meanwhile, it's not the first time Emma gets punched either. Emma was punched in 4x19 by Lily. This year, 5x19, it's Cruella. I imagine she'll get punched for being such a life ruiner in 6x19.

Edited April 29, 2016 by YaddaYadda

[Rumsy4]

Not to mention Hook being tortured by Hades for no logical reason. 

[Mathius]

19 minutes ago, YaddaYadda said:

And they didn't even do anything to deserve that. They were both victims of someone else's choices.

Meanwhile, it's not the first time Emma gets punched either. Emma was punched in 4x19 by Lily. This year, 5x19, it's Cruella. I imagine she'll get punched for being such a life ruiner in 6x19.

To be fair, Lily punched Emma because Emma was trying to prevent her from going after the guilty party, not punching her in place of the guilty party, and Cruella punched Emma because she's a bitch (I love that Emma was not at all apologetic toward Cruella here.)

Edited April 29, 2016 by Mathius

[RulerofallIsurvey]

I wait to read the comments until after I've seen the episode.  Most of the time.  :)  And I did with this episode also.  But with the down time the forum was having and work (blech!) this week, I'm just now still getting caught up on the comments.  So, basically, I have nothing to say that hasn't already been said - Cora moving into the light was a WTH? moment definitely.  But the reason I'm really writing this is to thank all the other posters for making me laugh with your comments.  I "like" a lot of comments while I'm going through the thread, but I'm not sure that adequately conveys how much I really like really enjoy reading what everyone else has written.  So thank you very much!

ETA: Weekend at Bernies, OUAT style: can we actually see this in an episode?

Edited April 30, 2016 by RulerofallIsurvey

[Mari]

24 minutes ago, RulerofallIsurvey said:

ETA: Weekend at Bernies, OUAT style: can we actually see this in an episode?

Probably not.  We never got the dwarves throwing tacos at the dwarf-tree, either.

We hardly ever get the good stuff.  But, hey, we'll probably get another scene or two of Hades mooning over Zelena.  Hopefully you're totally excited about that, instead.  I know I am.  Really.  

 

Oh.  Wait.  No.  No, I'm not.  

[RulerofallIsurvey]

15 minutes ago, Mari said:

Probably not.  We never got the dwarves throwing tacos at the dwarf-tree, either.

Aw geez...now I'm totally depressed.  ;)

Quote

We hardly ever get the good stuff.  But, hey, we'll probably get another scene or two of Hades mooning over Zelena.  Hopefully you're totally excited about that, instead.  I know I am.  Really.  

 

Oh.  Wait.  No.  No, I'm not.  

Yeah, me neither.  

[legaleagle53]

On 4/29/2016 at 8:43 AM, Mathius said:

To be fair, Lily punched Emma because Emma was trying to prevent her from going after the guilty party, not punching her in place of the guilty party, and Cruella punched Emma because she's a bitch (I love that Emma was not at all apologetic toward Cruella here.)

Indeed.  If I had been Emma, I would have bitchslapped Cruella right back and said, "And that's for threatening to throw my son off a cliff in the first place!"

[KingOfHearts]

1 hour ago, legaleagle53 said:

Indeed.  If I had been Emma, I would have bitchslapped Cruella right back and said, "And that's for threatening to throw my son off a cliff in the first place!"

It's too bad people in the Underworld can't be harmed according to James... unless you're Hook. I didn't really buy the arrow-through-James thing. It should have at least left a hole or some blood. If they can't die, then just go the Death Becomes Her route, where even if your head is disembodied you can still speak. 

Edited May 1, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[KingOfHearts]

Earlier I was thinking, "Why did Cora kill Daniel and not just give them forgetting potions?" Then it hit me - Cora had tried to steer Regina away from people by using forgetting potions. Daniel was the last straw. Regina probably kept falling back into trusting others, so she had to end it once and for all by killing her boyfriend and framing the blame onto Snow. 

[Camera One]

She also made a point of killing Daniel in front of Regina.  How could she know that Regina would only blame Snow and not her?  Because that makes no sense.  Even now, all Redeemed Regina can say is, "It's complicated", and all those vague regrets that Cora uttered this episode, that she shouldn't have wasted her time?  Because it's all about her and her daughters.

[Hecate7]

Wait...Zelena is the Wicked Witch of the West. Does that mean that Regina is the Wicked Witch of the East? Is a house going to fall on her?

[Curio]

6 hours ago, Hecate7 said:

Does that mean that Regina is the Wicked Witch of the East? Is a house going to fall on her?

I wish! 

[Shanna Marie]

I can see how getting back the memories of a day or so spent as friends in childhood might reconcile Zelena to Regina (unless getting back the memories of the kind of luxury Regina grew up in set off her jealousy), but you'd think that learning that Cora knew she was in an abusive situation and sent her back there should have made her hate Cora even more. Leaving an infant by the side of the road is one thing. Cora wouldn't have known how things would work out, and there was always the hope that someone would find her and give her a new home. But in this incident, Cora knew Zelena was in a terrible situation, and she sent her back there without doing anything to mitigate her conditions. Since she wiped Zelena's memory, she could have sent her somewhere else, like to a magical school, or something like that, so she could learn to use her powers. Cora could have pretended to be her patron, plucking her out of obscurity and getting her trained, and then Cora would have had a powerful minion on her side.

Yeah, I know, they were stuck with the outcome we already know, but then that means they have to work around what they established, and having Zelena remember that Cora abandoned her twice, the second time after going to get her to save Regina and then disposing of her again, probably isn't going to make things better.

And it still seems monumentally unfair that Cora gets to go to "heaven" while Aunt Em, Gaston, and Milah are stuck in eternal torment.

The bit where Regina talks about how she and Robin helped each other change from villains into heroes is a bit of a head-scratcher. They already told us that Marian was the one who got him to turn away from crime, and they did a whole episode about him figuring out that he could steal to help other people and be a hero, and those were all long before he met Regina. Meanwhile, all that being involved with Robin has led her to do is whine a lot about not getting to execute his wife and try to change the rules of the universe so she can get a happy ending. She does better at actually being a hero when Robin's out of the picture.

I know that David was trying to be noble and play fair when he wouldn't let Emma help him in the fight with James, but if he'd let her help magically, they might have been able to stop him without dumping him in the River of Lost Souls. They talked like he was a lost cause, but they seemed to be rationalizing giving up on him after the fact.

If Underbrooke was created as a copy of the curse, why would there have been a photo of David and Snow together and happy in the Underbrooke version of their apartment? They were separated by the curse. The version Hades made should have been a copy of what was done by the curse. It shouldn't contain stuff that was added to Storybrooke later.

[KingOfHearts]

11 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

If Underbrooke was created as a copy of the curse, why would there have been a photo of David and Snow together and happy in the Underbrooke version of their apartment? They were separated by the curse. The version Hades made should have been a copy of what was done by the curse. It shouldn't contain stuff that was added to Storybrooke later.

I'm guessing Underbrooke magically adapted like Storybrooke did with its technology. Perhaps it appeared because Snow and Charming had entered the Underworld?

[Melgaypet]

4 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

I'm guessing Underbrooke magically adapted like Storybrooke did with its technology. Perhaps it appeared because Snow and Charming had entered the Underworld? 

*shakes head*

In the fantasy story I'm working on, I'm making damn sure the magical system makes sense. The protagonist (and the hypothetical reader) won't know right away how it works - discovering that is part of the story - but I need to know how it works, so there are no inconsistencies. And it is because of this show that that is uppermost in my mind. Good job, OUAT, for being a handbook on What Not To Do!

Edited June 8, 2019 by Melgaypet

[Camera One]

Underbrooke was basically a place where the tyrants continued to rule.  Cora was the Mayor, James was the Sheriff and Peter Pan continued to wheel and deal at the pawnshop.  So good people with unfinished business were at their mercy.  

Why would Snowing's loft even be free?  People who died long ago like Liam and his crew lived in Storybrooke too.  I mean, how big was Underbrooke?  

Spoiler

I feel like this whole thing with Zelena and Regina as BFFs as children was basically never mentioned again nor did it make an ounce of difference.  Their problems in Season 6 stemmed from Regina unfairly blaming Zelena for Robin Hood dying.  And then their problems in Season 7... heck, I don't even remember at this point.  

Edited June 8, 2019 by Camera One

[Shanna Marie]

On 6/8/2019 at 2:27 PM, Camera One said:

Why would Snowing's loft even be free?  People who died long ago like Liam and his crew lived in Storybrooke too.  I mean, how big was Underbrooke?  

That's one of the things that bothers me. From the sounds of things, Hades has been refusing to let people move on for at least a century. It seems to be the Underworld for people with unfinished business from the entire Enchanted Forest world, as well as random other places, like Fictional Kansas world. Underbrooke should be overcrowded, but instead both Emma's house and the loft are conveniently vacant, and unless people are lined up for the telephone, the streets are just as deserted as those in Storybrooke.

[tennisgurl]

Oh yes, now Cora gets to go to heaven, while tons of innocent or significantly less evil people get dunked into the river of lost souls. Not that she has to try and make it up to any of her victims or anything, she just has to make nice with her daughters, who ALSO never have to face any of their victims. Isn't that awesome?!

James was such a wasted character, its like they were trying to go out of their way and keep him from being an interesting character or keep Charming from actually getting interesting to do. Even in an episode clearly trying to do a parallel to Zelena and Regina with James and Charming, it was all so hilarious half assed. Even what Cruella said about him being insecure about his mother giving him up, its like the writers said "oh no, we cant have moral ambiguity and character complicity to a supporting or minor character out of here! Just make him evil and kill him, cant give poor Josh TOO much stuff to do here!" and just wrote him cackling evilly and twirling his mustache. James being here hardly ended up even mattering, despite him being an important character in a main characters backstory. 

Cruella did have some good lines at least. "Why is it always the forest with you people?!?" I've been saying the same things for years, lady. 

[KingOfHearts]

I'm confused why James was even brought back to begin with. He doesn't impact Charming's character all, even after Charming had to damn him. What was the point? We don't learn anything new (other than James' mommy issues, which never amount to anything). He disappears for half the arc like most of the characters reintroduced in the premiere. It's not much of a surprise that Snowing got another crappy subplot. 

[Shanna Marie]

2 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

I'm confused why James was even brought back to begin with. He doesn't impact Charming's character all, even after Charming had to damn him. What was the point? We don't learn anything new (other than James' mommy issues, which never amount to anything).

I kind of feel like James' whole character here is a big retcon. James was a jerk, but I can't see him having mommy issues, resenting his brother for getting to be raised in poverty while he was a prince and heir to the throne, or even resenting his brother for taking his place for about 30 seconds before he quit and then got hunted down and imprisoned by George. I could see James impersonating his twin if he thought he could get something out of it, maybe even trying to switch places to go back to the land of the living and trap his twin in the Underworld. But not so much all-out brawling driven by resentment.

Spoiler

I know they ended up backing up this retcon in season 6, with James running away from home because he hated George and meeting his birth father, but

season one James seemed to actually get along well with George, and one of George's few virtues was that he genuinely seemed to love his son. And James then seemed to have absolutely no knowledge that he was adopted. It might have been more fun here to have James be astonished to meet a twin in the afterlife and get upset by the news that he was adopted, that he was a farmboy rather than a real prince. That meltdown might have been fun to see.

[profdanglais]

1 hour ago, Shanna Marie said:

James then seemed to have absolutely no knowledge that he was adopted. It might have been more fun here to have James be astonished to meet a twin in the afterlife and get upset by the news that he was adopted, that he was a farmboy rather than a real prince. That meltdown might have been fun to see.

Once again, the scenario you come up with is far better than anything the show produced. Can we just go back in time and have you write the whole thing?

[Shanna Marie]

2 hours ago, profdanglais said:

Once again, the scenario you come up with is far better than anything the show produced. Can we just go back in time and have you write the whole thing?

I would say that I've had the advantage of years to think about it while they were in the midst of writing a TV series, but James learning that he wasn't actually royal would probably be the first thing I came up with, even under deadline pressure. Now, maybe that would count as one of those cases where you dismiss the most obvious thing that comes to mind first, but then there are times when a thing is obvious because it's most true to character, and that seems more true to character than James either whining because they gave him up and kept David or resenting David for being forced to replace him.

If I had the time for nonprofit writing, I'd be tempted to do a rewrite of what would have happened if the characters had been allowed to react like normal humans, kind of like that fanfic that rewrites 3B.

[KingOfHearts]

James trying to switch with David in order to return to the land of the living sounds like the best way to incorporate him into 5B. I would've rather had Charming get a character beat by helping his brother move on than just killing him and forgetting about it.

The Regina/Cora/Zelena love fest kind of works and does feel necessary, imo. Regina and Zelena needed to resolve their conflict to somehow, and Zelena needed to deal with her abandonment issues. Mills family melodrama is usually insufferable, but it seems to fit the needs of the plot here. (As annoying as it is to see Cora go to heaven.) I just wish it was this constructive all the time.

Edited June 11, 2019 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

The whole James thing felt like a redux of the Gaston showdown, which was only two episodes before. 

[andromeda331]

7 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

I would say that I've had the advantage of years to think about it while they were in the midst of writing a TV series, but James learning that he wasn't actually royal would probably be the first thing I came up with, even under deadline pressure. Now, maybe that would count as one of those cases where you dismiss the most obvious thing that comes to mind first, but then there are times when a thing is obvious because it's most true to character, and that seems more true to character than James either whining because they gave him up and kept David or resenting David for being forced to replace him.

If I had the time for nonprofit writing, I'd be tempted to do a rewrite of what would have happened if the characters had been allowed to react like normal humans, kind of like that fanfic that rewrites 3B.

That would have been so much better. How does James feel to find out that he really wasn't a prince? That he was sold. That the father he loved and got long with really wasn't his father (at least until they changed that). Angry, hurt? How does he feel that he had twin he knew nothing about? Maybe he's really pissed off to find out his twin brother has been passed off as him all this time. It really is so easy to come up with stuff for James and/or David. But they don't. They'd rather come up with stupid and really boring stuff. 

7 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

James trying to switch with David in order to return to the land of the living sounds like the best way to incorporate him into 5B. I would've rather had Charming get a character beat by helping his brother move on than just killing him and forgetting about it.

That would have made sense too!

[KAOS Agent]

Instead of semi-paralleling David/James with Regina/Zelena, they could have done it with Liam/Killian. They'd already laid the ground work there with David and Hook discussing their respective brothers in S3. I know the characters must stay in their boxes, so Hook must only interact significantly with Emma, but it's a huge missed opportunity to not have David/Hook interaction.  

[andromeda331]

On 6/14/2019 at 12:58 AM, KAOS Agent said:

Instead of semi-paralleling David/James with Regina/Zelena, they could have done it with Liam/Killian. They'd already laid the ground work there with David and Hook discussing their respective brothers in S3. I know the characters must stay in their boxes, so Hook must only interact significantly with Emma, but it's a huge missed opportunity to not have David/Hook interaction.  

They really did. That could have been really great. 

[daxx]

Honestly I despise this episode and Cora getting her happy ending. 

[Iju]

i don't like that suddenly R&Z are suddenly childhood friend so that they can get some quick reconciliation. and yeah i'm not happy about cora getting redeemed but this is a show that redeems rapists and child murderers. just put jack the ripper in here, they'll get to him yet!

the one thing that disturbed me was cora and regina crying and holding each other. their relationship always grossed me out. regina's twisted love for her mother only because she can't full understand parental love was personally, shown in a light of pity. so there was no emotional attachment when they said goodbye. 

 

[Speakeasy]

I think Cora's redemption isn't that much of a problem because I thought Barbara Hershey sold the idea she was just ready to move on and honestly didn't know if she was going to Heaven or Hell-she looks really frightened when she's going toward the door.

If you take it as saying it's all good in the hood because she was nice and honest with her own children for three minutes after 70 years of neglect and abuse that's pretty bizarre. But if you take the system of the afterlife as being more based around your own state of mind-like you are at peace with your life and prepared to accept whatever happens next even if that means pain or annihilation, and that is what let's you move on-than about balancing out some invisible karmic calculator I don't think it's so bad. 

I mean without wanting to get too into this (too late)-people use the term 'redemption' a lot when they're talking about silly TV shows and I'm just not sure exactly how you're supposed to measure or quantify it. You can measure when someone's reformed but redeemed? What does that mean? Because it doesn't seem to be in the traditional Christian sense which, to my understanding, is about having a genuine change of heart (plus, you know, Jesus, who we are leery of mentioning on network tv...) But hearing people talk about how character X, Y or Z is or isn't redeemed or redeemable there definitely seems to be a general consensus that the sinner needs to suffer as well. Is it more important they suffer to balance the scales of justice or that they do something good to balance out the scales of karma? Or do they need to apologise, do good and go through pain, and how much?

Edited March 20, 2020 by Speakeasy

[Camera One]

I think the problem with the Underworld as they portrayed it, was it was more than just the person's psychological state or readiness to "move on".  If it was just a matter of someone getting past their "unfinished business", then there shouldn't be a "better" place or a "worse" place.  You shouldn't be able to shove someone off the cliff into their fiery doom (which Cora did to a random redshirt).

To me, redemption can be simple.  When watching a TV show or a movie, however silly, it's whether the viewer feels that there was justice and the character deserved their reward or punishment.  In some stories, this character suffers, and in other stories, this character does good deeds to make up for what they did, and in yet other stories, this character sincerely apologizes and repents.  I think all of these can work, especially when all three are involved. 

Personally, the weight of Cora's crimes and her actions/feelings about the evil she had done did not earn the happiness the viewer was clearly supposed to feel as she walked up into the light.  So this was a case where the Writer's motivations was so obvious that I felt manipulated into feeling something that I don't think was deserved, especially in contrast to characters who were never allowed to move on, such as Aunt Em or Milah or even that redshirt.

Edited March 20, 2020 by Camera One

[Shanna Marie]

1 hour ago, Camera One said:

To me, redemption can be simple.  When watching a TV show or a movie, however silly, it's whether the viewer feels that there was justice and the character deserved their reward or punishment. 

I think that's the key for fiction. Real life is a lot more complicated. But in genre fiction, particularly, we expect there to be some kind of justice, since someone is in control of writing it and can make things work out in a way that doesn't always happen in the real world. I came up with a semi-joking formula for redemption in which bad deeds equal good deeds plus suffering, and if the equation is out of balance, the audience doesn't feel like justice was done. The worse the bad deeds, the better or more good deeds are needed, but if the character suffered (not counting suffering that came as the result of their own bad deeds so, for instance, Regina's father dying doesn't count as suffering for her because she killed him), that also balances things out. The suffering is especially important when someone has their change of heart late in the game and doesn't have a chance to do enough good deeds for balance. If they suffered, we feel like there's some karma. One key function of the good deeds is to show us that the change of heart is for real. I think in one version of the equation, I also included remorse because if you don't feel like someone is actually sorry, the good deeds and suffering don't really count (that's the problem a lot of us had with Regina. Even though she had good deeds, she never really seemed sorry for all she'd done).

Cora leaves us feeling unsettled because she has a positive outcome in getting to go to the good place, but her change of heart seems to have come after death, and her only real good deed is undoing a bad deed from the past that really only affects her and her family. Yay, her daughters don't hate her anymore, and she feels bad about that thing she did, but the woman was a mass murderer who was killed while she was plotting more mass murder, and not too long ago she was "killing" random people. It's hard to feel like her remorse for her evil was genuine and that she really had been redeemed. She didn't even have a lot of suffering to feel like there was karmic balance. She came from a poor background, but so did a lot of others who weren't evil. She was jilted by a lover, but she slept with him because she thought he was a prince, so she bears some responsibility. She was lying to and stealing from Leopold when he dumped her, so it's hard to count that. She had an unhappy marriage that she chose in order to get social status. Boo hoo. Regina sent her away to Wonderland, but we see in the spinoff the damage she did there, where she lived as a queen.

1 hour ago, Camera One said:

I think the problem with the Underworld as they portrayed it, was it was more than just the person's psychological state or readiness to "move on".  If it was just a matter of someone getting past their "unfinished business", then there shouldn't be a "better" place or a "worse" place.  You shouldn't be able to shove someone off the cliff into their fiery doom (which Cora did to a random redshirt).

Yeah, if it wasn't supposed to be a measure of goodness and was just about being ready to move on with no unfinished business, we shouldn't have had the imagery of pits of fire below and glowing clouds above.

[KingOfHearts]

On 3/20/2020 at 9:50 AM, Speakeasy said:

I think Cora's redemption isn't that much of a problem because I thought Barbara Hershey sold the idea she was just ready to move on and honestly didn't know if she was going to Heaven or Hell-she looks really frightened when she's going toward the door.

Like most things on this show, it worked in a vacuum. Barbara Hershey, as you said, sold it well and her actions in this episode seem to be redeemable. You had a mother hugging and crying with her two daughters, all reunited and pledging to make things better. It was emotionally manipulative but it worked for the single episode. However, if you take two seconds to think about Cora's crimes outside the vacuum, it all starts to fall apart.

Edited March 21, 2020 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

That's the thing about this show.  I admit that I was moved by this episode even at the same time I was feeling disgust that I was manipulated into being happy that a mass murderer like Cora didn't fall into the fiery pits of hell (oops, I mean A Worse Place™).  Things did work in a vaccuum surprisingly, a lot of the time, at least until Season 6.  The show is best enjoyed by someone coming out of a Curse with no memories of the past, each time you watch an episode.

Edited March 21, 2020 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

27 minutes ago, Camera One said:

The show is best enjoyed by someone coming out of a Curse with no memories of the past, each time you watch an episode.

It's probably why the writers used so many curses. They had to routinely wipe all the characters' memories to create a blank slate.

[andromeda331]

17 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

It's probably why the writers used so many curses. They had to routinely wipe all the characters' memories to create a blank slate.

That's the type of audience they wanted too. One that would be so moved in an episode like this and not remember all of the crimes Cora committed. Just like they wanted you to always be moved and feel bad for Regina but forget all the crimes she committed. 

Edited March 22, 2020 by andromeda331

[Speakeasy]

On 3/22/2020 at 12:43 PM, andromeda331 said:

That's the type of audience they wanted too. One that would be so moved in an episode like this and not remember all of the crimes Cora committed. Just like they wanted you to always be moved and feel bad for Regina but forget all the crimes she committed. 

And she was a popular character-quite possibly the most popular- and the series lasted 7 years-so I think it's fair to say they got That Kind of Audience 😉

[Speakeasy]

On 3/20/2020 at 5:35 PM, Camera One said:

I think the problem with the Underworld as they portrayed it, was it was more than just the person's psychological state or readiness to "move on".  If it was just a matter of someone getting past their "unfinished business", then there shouldn't be a "better" place or a "worse" place.  You shouldn't be able to shove someone off the cliff into their fiery doom (which Cora did to a random redshirt).

I think that the unfairness isn't a problem (see below)... Maybe the imagery which was very Christian Heaven and Hell-y could have been switched out for something a bit more ambiguous.

On 3/20/2020 at 5:35 PM, Camera One said:

To me, redemption can be simple.  When watching a TV show or a movie, however silly, it's whether the viewer feels that there was justice and the character deserved their reward or punishment.  In some stories, this character suffers, and in other stories, this character does good deeds to make up for what they did, and in yet other stories, this character sincerely apologizes and repents.  I think all of these can work, especially when all three are involved. 

This is where I get in trouble possiy just by overthinking it-because it seems like people talk about 'redemption' as like-this character is in the Bad Guy Column but after X amount of time being nice, feeling sad and/or getting punched in the face they can officially move back to the Good Guy Column. This person is now Officially Good and you're a prick if you hold their past misdeeds against them.

And I just overthink it and don't know what the values are for balancing out someone's bad karma. 1 murder=how many hours sadness/what kind of good deeds/how many punches to the face? I don't know!

On 3/20/2020 at 5:35 PM, Camera One said:

Personally, the weight of Cora's crimes and her actions/feelings about the evil she had done did not earn the happiness the viewer was clearly supposed to feel as she walked up into the light.  So this was a case where the Writer's motivations was so obvious that I felt manipulated into feeling something that I don't think was deserved, especially in contrast to characters who were never allowed to move on, such as Aunt Em or Milah or even that redshirt.

See to me the afterlife doesn't necessarily have to be fair-in fact a big feature of this arc was that Hades had corrupted the afterlife and it wasn't working the way it should. Being shoved into Hell or melted into soul goo seems like it was a hazard more than any kind of moral judgement. 

This being the case it seems that the people who get to walk into the light don't have to necessarily be worthier, it's essentially like any other storyline where some people make it out and some don't and the people who make it out aren't necessarily who you'd think of as the most deserving but you can still feel good they escaped.

[Shanna Marie]

10 hours ago, Speakeasy said:

This is where I get in trouble possiy just by overthinking it-because it seems like people talk about 'redemption' as like-this character is in the Bad Guy Column but after X amount of time being nice, feeling sad and/or getting punched in the face they can officially move back to the Good Guy Column. This person is now Officially Good and you're a prick if you hold their past misdeeds against them.

I don't know that I ever get to "you're a prick if you hold their past misdeeds against them," though I guess it depends on how that works. Don't want to hang around with the person who spent years tormenting you, no matter how many sacrifices they've made? Fine. But if you're constantly throwing that person's past misdeeds in their face, even after they've sincerely apologized and tried to atone, and that's your go-to insult, that they used to be bad, then maybe you're kind of a jerk.

I think the reason I came up with my formula was that I was trying to figure out why I felt the way I did. Normally, I'd say that someone who's doing good deeds for good reasons (mostly, not trying to get something out of it) gets to count as a good guy, even if they used to be bad. But Regina fit that, and yet I still didn't find her "redemption" satisfying. I realized that I need the "come to Jesus" moment in which the person acknowledges their past wrongs and expresses some kind of genuine remorse. But it also helps if you feel like karma's on the job.

So I'm less convinced about Regina, who's only talked around the idea of her responsibility for her evil. She admits she used to be a villain, but only in a few instances did she grudgingly confess to any actual wrongdoing, and she got angry if anyone brought up her past deeds. If she was confronted by a past victim, that victim was generally shown as a villain and subsequently died (Gregowen, Percival, the Count of Monte Cristo). I mean, talk about being treated like a prick for holding her past deeds against her! They kept talking about how bad stuff always happened to her and how she always got the short end of the stick, but all the bad stuff that supposedly happened to her was actually bad stuff that happened to other people that made her sad.

The obvious contrast is Hook, who stated the rationale behind his change several times, talking about how he realized that revenge was pointless. He admitted to his past wrongs, talking about them as bad deeds, not trying to justify them, and he expressed remorse for his past behavior. Not only did he do good deeds, even self-sacrificial ones, but karma still smacked him around. The bad stuff that happened to him actually harmed him. When he ran into his past victims, he was contrite and tried to atone. I only felt like David was sometimes a jerk for bringing up his past deeds because it was often wildly inappropriate. It wasn't like they were long-term foes. About the only thing Hook ever did directly to David was bonk him on the head once (well, and kill his father, but neither of them knew about that connection until later). Hook could be in the middle of helping David, after having already done things to help him, and David would go on about the fact that Hook used to be a villain.

Cora didn't have a chance to really do good deeds to make up for her evil. Dying didn't seem to change her much, so it was a past last-minute conversion. When we'd seen so many people have worse outcomes, it seemed horribly unfair that she got the good afterlife, especially since they used that heaven/hell imagery.

[Jynnan tonnix]

On 4/24/2016 at 9:44 PM, Curio said:

 

 

 

Heh, me too. When I saw the fire engulfing Cora, I was like, "Wow, I didn't know the show had it in them! That's refreshingly...oh wait. Never mind. There's the light." I think a much more fitting ending for Cora would have been to leave it open-ended about where she ended up and ultimately let the viewer decide which fate she deserved.

I was pretty sure that there was someone else who got that fakeout with the fire, then the light. I was thinking that it was the first time we saw that bridge, but I think that was Herc and Meg, but it might have been Liam, who at least might have deserved the worse fate. In any case, I remember the fire flaming up, but then being followed by the earthquakey effect of the bridge stretching itself out toward the light, so I was pretty sure the same was going to happen to Cora. 

I didn't mind it, per se, because I personally believe that if there is some sort of afterlife (which I sincerely doubt), there is no one whose finite sins deserve infinite punishment. Though it might be fitting to have some period of time that they get to suffer, and, frankly, the villains seem to have a better time of it in Underbooke than the Heroes do.

And, as a total change of subject, while I thought the casting of young Regina was good, young Zelena's features didn't look as though they would grow into anything like the delicacy of Rebecca Mader's. Plus she appeared to be wearing clear braces, which seemed a little progressive for the Enchanted Forest.

[KAOS Agent]

12 hours ago, Jynnan tonnix said:

I didn't mind it, per se, because I personally believe that if there is some sort of afterlife (which I sincerely doubt), there is no one whose finite sins deserve infinite punishment. Though it might be fitting to have some period of time that they get to suffer, and, frankly, the villains seem to have a better time of it in Underbooke than the Heroes do.

If they didn't have such heaven/hell imagery, it wouldn't bother me quite as much.  However, I have to wonder what Blacktooth did that was so much worse than Cora, whose crimes include slaughtering an entire village and using their hearts to reanimate their corpses and use them as her personal zombie slave army. It doesn't track for me. 

The Underworld stuff I can kind of see if I look at it as having been corrupted by Hades. The regular process was circumvented by him, so we never really see how it's supposed to work if he's not there. Still too many contradictions, but less of an issue than the whole heaven/hell thing that happens when they leave there.

[Camera One]

It also bothers me because I feel emotionally manipulated.  Why was I supposed to be so happy that Cora resolved her unfinished business while people like Milah and Aunt Em continued to suffer?  The whole injustice of the scenario is inevitably at the back of my mind.

[KingOfHearts]

14 hours ago, Camera One said:

It also bothers me because I feel emotionally manipulated.  Why was I supposed to be so happy that Cora resolved her unfinished business while people like Milah and Aunt Em continued to suffer?  The whole injustice of the scenario is inevitably at the back of my mind.

It would've helped if we saw that everyone got the equal opportunity to finish their business before moving onto Definitely Not!Heaven. The fact Blacktooth, Milah, and Aunt Em all got the short end of the stick is what makes it all so frustrating. It wasn't so much Cora ascending as it was she was able to and other people who did far less worse things than her didn't. That speaks to a larger issue with the show - villains like Regina and Rumple were given numerous opportunities to redeem themselves while other villains did not.

I'm not sure it would be very comfortable if everyone had the opportunity to change and go to Definitely Not!Heaven without any hell, but that would be easier to gloss over than Blacktooth going into eternal punishment just because the writers needed to raise the stakes. 

Taking the rest of my response to the "Should've happened this way" thread.