A Thread for All Seasons: This Story Is Over, But Still Goes On.

[Shanna Marie]

7 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

I'm getting some serious Dread Pirate Roberts vibes.

It seems that the concept of the Dread Pirate Roberts had some basis in history -- the reputation that struck fear (whether or not he actually did anything). Possibly even the famous pirate name being passed on to other people when the pirate retired, if the reputation was what got people to surrender without a fight. Hee, now I'm imagining franchising -- invest in your Dread Pirate Whoever franchise, complete with costume, flag, and insignia for the ship, and then take advantage of the existing reputation to make easy money. Only one per territory.

I think part of their problem in dealing with Hook was that they wanted him to be famous as Captain Hook, since that's the iconic character. No one knows who Killian Jones is, and that name doesn't strike the same note of fear. But in the episode in which Hook was introduced, we saw him heading to Neverland immediately after getting the hook, so they were stuck with that. They had to come up with convoluted ways for him to have been active and known as Captain Hook in spite of him having spent all that time in Neverland, and that really messed with his backstory. Oddly enough, we never actually got to see Captain Hook active in Neverland and going up against Pan and the Lost Boys like in the story (aside from the time with Bae when they first arrived). They clung so desperately to their iconography, but never really showed the iconic part of Hook's story.

They could have had some fun with giving Killian Jones a different pirate identity during the pre-Hook days -- like, we find out that some other famous fictional pirate (drawing a blank here -- maybe Long John Silver?) is the same person as Captain Hook, in this show's way of mashing up characters, and the Silver identity was what Killian Jones was known as before he lost his hand.

[KingOfHearts]

45 minutes ago, Shanna Marie said:

like, we find out that some other famous fictional pirate (drawing a blank here -- maybe Long John Silver?) is the same person as Captain Hook, in this show's way of mashing up characters, and the Silver identity was what Killian Jones was known as before he lost his hand.

It was a real missed opportunity. We could've had Long John Silver mentor Killian Jones, who's filling in for Jim Hawkins.

[companionenvy]

I guess the more I think about it, there are some frustrating vagaries even in Killian's backstory. He's a mostly well-drawn character, but I do think we needed a better sense of just what being a pirate or working for Pan actually looked like for him on a day-to-day basis. That's why it winds up being hard for me to say whether or not his redemption is entirely believable (although on screen, I do think it basically works). Before the information about the rings and David's father, I think it was much more possible to simply think of him as a guy who did some bad things but still operated by a code that gave him some fairly defined limits. He may have been willing to compromise himself in working for much worse people to get what he wanted, but even so he clearly wasn't willing to go nearly as far as they were.

I still mostly believe this about him, but once we know he killed one guy for stealing his wine, another for laughing at his hand, and another to silence him, it becomes harder to be quite as charitable in filling in the gaps. Presumably, being a pirate involved, at minimum, taking over other ships and stealing from them. Were they always naval ships? Did they always come from the kingdom of the king who Killian and Liam had once served? What happened to the crews of those ships? Were they given an opportunity to surrender, and if they didn't, was Killian trying to minimize casualties in any ensuing battle, or did he kill even people who were subdued and no longer a threat for having the temerity to challenge him? Were the incidents in which he got the rings the few worst things he had done, or was that a pretty typical week for Captain Hook? 

Again, I really do mostly think the character works. He's established as someone who did have some conscience when he was at his worst, and was simply too driven by anger and too set in the life he had chosen to abandon revenge, whether in the more general sense of living the life of an outlaw as a kind of revenge against the corrupt king who had not only taken his brother but shattered his sense of idealism, or in the far more specific sense of his campaign against Rumpelstiltskin. But on some level, he always hated that life and hated himself while he was living it, and was looking for something, or rather someone, to give him a way out - Bae, Alice (in the case of Whook), Emma.  Once he was out, he was able to go back to his core of being a decent person.

But...after we get some details of a few truly awful, borderline sociopathic killings, that narrative, to me requires at least a little bit of suspension of disbelief, or at least a probably optimistic level of charity in filling in the gaps in his past, to sustain. As I've discussed in relation to Regina, I do believe that people, even truly awful people guilty of horrendous crimes, have the power to change. But I don't believe that's true of every awful person. It depends a lot on what the underlying reason for their actions was, how they wound up being in a position to commit those crimes, the exact nature of the crimes, etc. And even to the extent that people can change, there may be limits. If you were a serial killer, coming to the point where you recognize that killing was wrong and you feel remorse for what you've done is a really massive change. But Hook goes a lot further than that, and I'm not just talking about heroism in the forms of acts of physical courage. Some lingering pirate swagger aside, Killian, once redeemed, is never less than totally respectful of and patient with Emma. He sublimates his own desires to support her in whatever way she needs. He gives up pretty much literally everything he has, and becomes capable of routine gestures of self-sacrifice. He doesn't just feel bad over what he had done to Belle (which, in the scheme of things, was actually pretty minor), he becomes a protector and a sensitive, sympathetic ear. He's honestly a sort of wish-fulfillment fantasy: the sexy bad-boy who is also the best, sweetest, and most loving partner ever. 

Ultimately, it is a difference in degree rather than a difference in kind, but I do find that for me to believe fully in Hook's turnaround, I have to believe that the killings that got him his rings were uncharacteristic, and that mostly he did stick to at least fair targets and fair fights that didn't end in him letting his crew kill any survivors.  Which is still possible, per canon, but a little bit hard to swallow. If you'll kill a guy for drinking your wine, I can't really imagine you were being all that selective and scrupulous in your ordinary course of business. Which in turn makes it hard for me to buy him evolving into someone precisely like Emma's boyfriend/husband Killian. It is a small enough leap required that I'm willing to make it, but it is a leap. 

[andromeda331]

I still want to know if the King really was corrupt or not. We know nothing about him or the war they were fighting. What was it about? They were so careful not to say the King's name it seemed like they'd come back to that but never did. We never learned anything but the King wanted this deadly weapon. Were they fighting the ogres? Another kingdom? Were they trying to take over another kingdom? Was another kingdom trying to take them over?  If they were at war or the King was getting desperate why wouldn't these men know that and be acting like it? On the other hand if they were trying to take over another kingdom then were they only okay with that until the weapon? Did they never think about it? It doesn't make sense. Maybe they were always off on their own missions and not part of the rest of the Navy? 

[daxx]

4 hours ago, andromeda331 said:

I still want to know if the King really was corrupt or not. We know nothing about him or the war they were fighting. What was it about? They were so careful not to say the King's name it seemed like they'd come back to that but never did. We never learned anything but the King wanted this deadly weapon. Were they fighting the ogres? Another kingdom? Were they trying to take over another kingdom? Was another kingdom trying to take them over?  If they were at war or the King was getting desperate why wouldn't these men know that and be acting like it? On the other hand if they were trying to take over another kingdom then were they only okay with that until the weapon? Did they never think about it? It doesn't make sense. Maybe they were always off on their own missions and not part of the rest of the Navy? 

Perhaps giants since the blade at the top of the beanstalk was poisoned? Not saying that exact situation but why would the giants be so wary of humans in Tiny’s time if they hadn’t had altercations in the past. Humans can really only take on giants by changing the power structure of the battle, poison or something like that.

[KingOfHearts]

9 hours ago, companionenvy said:

But...after we get some details of a few truly awful, borderline sociopathic killings, that narrative, to me requires at least a little bit of suspension of disbelief, or at least a probably optimistic level of charity in filling in the gaps in his past, to sustain.

The writers on this show constantly resorted to using sociopathic murder in order to signal a character's malevolence. IIRC, the only villain who didn't resort to murder was Ingrid. It's narrow-minded to think that killing is the only primary way to express villainy or a dark past. In my opinion, it doesn't add any depth to the redemption arcs of Regina nor Hook to give them a flock of nonsensical murders. It does, however, make their repentance more improbable. Not impossible, but improbable. 

[tennisgurl]

8 hours ago, andromeda331 said:

They were so careful not to say the King's name it seemed like they'd come back to that but never did. We never learned anything but the King wanted this deadly weapon.

Yeah, I was so convinced that there was a reason they never said the name of the King, like it was going to be a twist, or someone we already knew. Maybe it was King George, or King Midas, or, more interestingly, it was King Leopold. I assumed it was a different land or time period at the time (as the costumes looked more regency than the EF clothes), so maybe it was some other famous king from another famous book or movie, and this was an entrance into another world. Maybe a Regency era England that also had magic, which I thought sounded cool. But, none of that happened, or was followed up on. I think that his first flashback was early enough in the show that I actually thought this show might follow through with something it set up, or create some interesting, unique lands to explore. Oh, how young I was...

[KingOfHearts]

27 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

Yeah, I was so convinced that there was a reason they never said the name of the King, like it was going to be a twist, or someone we already knew. Maybe it was King George, or King Midas, or, more interestingly, it was King Leopold. I assumed it was a different land or time period at the time (as the costumes looked more regency than the EF clothes), so maybe it was some other famous king from another famous book or movie, and this was an entrance into another world. Maybe a Regency era England that also had magic, which I thought sounded cool. But, none of that happened, or was followed up on. I think that his first flashback was early enough in the show that I actually thought this show might follow through with something it set up, or create some interesting, unique lands to explore. Oh, how young I was...

The King was from the era before Rumple became the Dark One, so it was a century or two before King George et al. If we assume the Enchanted Forest and Neverland have the same rate of time as the Land Without Magic, Rumple has only been the Dark One for, at the very most, 160-170~ years. Baelfire came over to Victorian England with Big Ben in the background. Big Ben was completed in 1859.

I'm really not a fan of the "realms of story" idea where society never progresses and it's perpetually the same time period. That makes no sense to me. 

[Shanna Marie]

11 hours ago, companionenvy said:

I do find that for me to believe fully in Hook's turnaround, I have to believe that the killings that got him his rings were uncharacteristic, and that mostly he did stick to at least fair targets and fair fights that didn't end in him letting his crew kill any survivors.  Which is still possible, per canon, but a little bit hard to swallow. If you'll kill a guy for drinking your wine, I can't really imagine you were being all that selective and scrupulous in your ordinary course of business.

If it helps, my fanwank headcanon is that Hook was doing his usual self-loathing routine and not only taking full responsibility for his past bad actions, but selectively editing the story to remove any extenuating circumstances. Like, maybe he killed the guys who drank his wine or made fun of his hook in self-defense or defending another member of his crew after they started a fight, but he still blames himself because he was thinking about those offenses when he killed them, and maybe he wouldn't have gone so far as to kill them if he hadn't already been mad. I'm afraid there's no way around his killing of David's father, since we saw that play out rather than merely hearing him tell it, but we've discussed how badly that fits into what has been established about Hook. Then there's the continuity problem that Hook was wearing the ring he supposedly took from the man who made fun of him for having a hook for a hand long before he lost the hand and got the hook.

I think this is yet another case of them writing what they want/need for the plot of a particular episode, with no regard for what's been established for the character or consideration for how this will affect the character going forward. The story about how he got the rings was purely about setting up the Shocking!Twist that Hook was really a Dark One all this time by having Hook look like he's taking the moral high ground over Dark Emma by owning up to his bad past and showing how he's not like that anymore, and it's supposed to be ironic that he's a Dark One when saying that, and everything Dark Emma is doing is to try to help him. I guess they're maybe also providing an explanation for why he's supposedly renounced his past but still maintains all his pirate accoutrements, but I suspect that might be giving them too much credit. Anyway, apparently no one noticed that these rings have been part of his costume going back to his first appearance, and they didn't think/care how this revelation fit into his character.

This happens to all the characters, to various degrees, because the characters are developed purely on an ad hoc basis. There's no real character bible for each character, roughly outlining the key parts of their backstory and the important elements of their character (a sense of what they would or wouldn't ever do, what their goals were at various parts of their lives, etc.). Not that they had to have a rigid character history from the start, but I think everything would have been a lot more consistent and flowed better if they'd had some general idea. Then when they got to an episode where they wanted to show that part of the character's story, they could have fleshed it out. Or if they came up with a better idea along the way, they could have changed their idea of the character's backstory, as long as it was consistent with what had been shown on screen. I seriously doubt they had any general sense of the kind of pirate Hook was both before the hook and after. I'd bet they made up the cake runs when they realized they couldn't show him outside Neverland with the hook otherwise, and that probably wasn't considered part of his background until they made it up in season 4. I rather doubt they knew the military officer backstory in season 2 -- in fact, his story to Bae leaves out his brother, so my guess is that was added when they needed it for "Good Form." The way his father abandoned him was in a deleted scene in season 4, so at least they came up with that before it was onscreen in season 5, but it's a safe bet that Liam making a deal with Hades and Killian having been a useless drunk before they got in the navy was only created for that one episode in late season 5. A lot of the problem with these late-series revelations is that by that time, the character has been established. We've seen that Hook is someone with a very strong conscience, someone who had a kind of code even at his worst and who only really stepped over the line where his revenge was involved. The writers even said that the flashback of Hook with Ursula was Hook "at his worst," and all he did was steal her singing voice when her father interfered in his and Ursula's plans. But then after that they tell us about all these senseless murders, and they show him murdering his father (and orphaning his brother) and murdering David's father, which is far worse.

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

Yeah, I was so convinced that there was a reason they never said the name of the King, like it was going to be a twist, or someone we already knew.

I was trying to think of names of fictional kings it might be and got stumped because most fairytale kings don't get names.

10 hours ago, andromeda331 said:

Were they fighting the ogres? Another kingdom? Were they trying to take over another kingdom? Was another kingdom trying to take them over?  If they were at war or the King was getting desperate why wouldn't these men know that and be acting like it? On the other hand if they were trying to take over another kingdom then were they only okay with that until the weapon?

I doubt it was ogres or giants, since they were in the middle of a sea battle when they took off to go to Neverland, and maybe I'm being racist, but I don't really see ogres as a seafaring race, and giants at sea would need much, much bigger boats. But I can see someone drawing a line between fighting an honest war and genocide (which was pretty much what Killian said). This was going to be chemical warfare, something the enemy couldn't defend against. It's one thing to shoot a cannonball at someone. It's another to use an incurable poison as a weapon. We never even found out if Liam was right and the king honestly thought it was a healing herb or if Killian was right and the king had lied to them to get them to collect a terrible poison.

[Mitch]

2 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

I'm really not a fan of the "realms of story" idea where society never progresses and it's perpetually the same time period. That makes no sense to me. 

Me either..its stupid and convoluted (so of course guess where they went..) Just say the Curse tracked Neal to 1985 and took everyone to the "future" and all the rest of the "magical realms" ( I refuse the dumb story realms thing) were frozen until Emma's arrival in SB started time again.

[KingOfHearts]

Gold had so much more energy than Weaver or even Rumple past S4. He's very cool, exerting confidence and charisma. His exterior is on the verge of respectable, but you're never sure what he's up to. Even in Storybrooke, Rumple was too over-the-top sketchy and moody to be intimidating in any innovative sense. Robert Carlyle went positively cartoonish in later seasons whenever Rumple was doing anything particularly evil. (Like cleaving things.) By S5-S7, however, he seemed quite jaded and ready for retirement. His sparkly counterpart didn't age well. Weaver shouldn't have existed, full stop.

Rumple/Gold was much more deceptively human, tricking the viewer into thinking he wasn't always up to something nefarious. 

[Rumsy4]

On 7/12/2018 at 1:20 AM, tennisgurl said:

"Two valentines. Sounds like a complicated life." I still freaking love season one Mr. Gold. He was cool and seemingly in control, but had a more vulnerable side. I even like him more than Imp Rumple, who I loved in season one as well. I also liked his relationships with Emma and Regina, respectively, a lot. He seemed to be a bit fond of Emma, and maybe even vice versa, and he and Regina trying to out villain each other without bursting out into cackles every five seconds. It really did seem like a long term chess game between them. 

...

Its really weird, knowing what happens later with Regina and Rumple, seeing this part of the show, especially this episode. 

I would think, watching this, that Rumple would be the one heading towards Redemption, not Regina. Rumple is evil here, oh yeah, but you also see his conflict, self hatred, hints at his tragic backstory, and his love for Belle, and even in Storeybrooke, seems like a more morally grey character with ambiguous motives. While Regina is smugly rubbing Rumples true loves horrible death in his face with glee, is keeping Henry away from Emma just to be an asshole, and is seemingly messing with Belle for the same reason in the EF, and is locking the poor woman up for years forcing her into isolation, with only a creepy lady showing up to grin smugly at her sometimes. Yeah Rumple gets around to being good after awhile, but he has to die for it to happen, but it really is hard to look at episodes like this and see her as a candidate for future Queen of Goodness. 

Completely agree. In Season 1, it was much more believable to buy that Rumple/Gold was a layered character with complex motivations. In later seasons he became more cartoonish and two-dimensional. In S1, he seemed to care about Emma as more than a pawn. Later, he was ready to murder her. I think it's consistent that he tends to punish the easiest target for his worst mistakes. He beats Belle's father within an inch of his life becasue he thinks he had her love and shut her out and locked her in a tower. Which is what he did with Belle. He also brutally murdered Milah for abandoning Bae, when he also did the exact same thing. Too bad how Belle's father and Milah never got to make up for their mistakes, but Rumple got chance after chance after chance.

Rumple really was an idiot, huh? He never checked to see where Belle really was and he never checked to see where Bae really was. Otherwise, he may have gotten them back much sooner and more easily. 

Rumbelle's foundations were flimsy from the start--his first romantic gesture was linked to murder and she wanted to be a hero--but there was something there that could have turned out real. Instead, they turned it into an abusive relationship that was romanticized. It's hard to see it as anything but Stockholm Syndrome now.

Regina as she is depicted in this season, is a total sociopath. She is narcissistic, manipulative, and has zero empathy. It's impossible to buy the transition into the matronly Roni of Season 7 who ended up being crowned Good Queen of the freaking Multiverse. 

Speaking of Season 7, I still find it hilarious that adult Henry's attempts at True Love's Kiss failed with both his wife and daughter, but worked with his mother, as she lay in his lap, dying. Lovely. 

[tennisgurl]

I know I frequently complain about this show issues with world-building, but Dreamy makes a decent case that this show couldn't ever hope to build up a decent mythology, or any kind of consistent, interesting world, that I am almost glad that it didnt really try very much. Yeah it sucks that such great potential was wasted, but its clear that A&E had neither the skill or the interest to create a really well built magical universe. Some of that might be because they have a serious case of ADHD when it comes to story and character. They drop huge things into the shows universe (dwarfs hatch from giant eggs and are forced to mine for fairy dust forever!) or their backstories (Hook killed Charmings dad for no reason!) and they just never follow up on it, explain things, or try to do anything interesting with them, because they instantly get bored and move onto the next thing. They cant just explore one thing, because they've already moved onto the next five things. 

I am pretty sure that Nova/Grumpy are the only time I've seen couple that were torn about by society or prejudice, especially in a fantasy context, and not only do they not end up together anyway, but no one really gives a shit, and its actually never brought up again. Its like if the first time someone told Buffy that Angel was a vampire and that made their relationship awkward, she was just like "yeah, thats true" and they never spoke again, and the relationship was never brought up once. 

[KingOfHearts]

1 hour ago, tennisgurl said:

I know I frequently complain about this show issues with world-building, but Dreamy makes a decent case that this show couldn't ever hope to build up a decent mythology, or any kind of consistent, interesting world, that I am almost glad that it didnt really try very much.

The Dark One, Savior, and Author mythologies were the worst examples of "in-depth" or "complex" worldbuilding on the show.

[companionenvy]

6 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

The Dark One, Savior, and Author mythologies were the worst examples of "in-depth" or "complex" worldbuilding on the show.

As I binge-watched the first time around, I'll be curious to see how all of these things come off in the rewatch. My first instinct is the Dark One thing was the most forgivable, because the most egregious part of it -- Hook not being at all changed by becoming the DO until he found out he was the DO -- actually was, IMO, in the service of a really good twist, and there's enough room in how exactly we interpret the Darkness that we can probably fanwank it. If a large part of the corrosive power of the darkness is simply knowing that you have the power and can abuse it, then Hook having no idea would, actually, help keep the darkness at bay, only allowing it to take hold with a vengeance once he found out about the power in a highly emotionally charged situation, possibly exacerbated by weeks of suppression. In fact, it might even tie in with Killian's reformation more generally: he's been trying to be a better man and not give in to his worst impulses, which may have (unconsciously) extended to resisting whatever effect the darkness was having. But that made it worse once the floodgates opened, as part of the nature of the darkness is to want control over the host. Similar reasoning can help deal with what I see as the other obvious issue of the Darkness apparently affecting different people differently, and what it does to their respective levels of culpability. Hook going absolutely bonkers when he realizes he is the DO is something he should legitimately feel bad about because it does emerge from weaknesses that are part of his normal character, but he shouldn't be held responsible for it because his mind was substantially altered and he made up for it pretty quickly. That doesn't get Rumple off the hook for his behavior as DO, both because he chooses to become the DO willingly, twice, and because allowances that might be made for a kind of temporary insanity when first trying to cope with the Darkness don't extend to behavior carried out over the course of years, once you've  come to some kind of reasonable integration between your core and DO personalities.

The Savior thing is more of an issue because it is such a clear retcon; there's no hint in season 1 that this is anything more than a specific prophecy about Emma's role in breaking a specific curse. But I suppose it is kind of plausible that it simply wasn't clear to most people in the EF/SB that "savior" actually did have broader implications that were known to certain people in places like Agrabah and Camelot. I didn't particularly like that plotline in S6, but again, they at least did enough with it to justify a retcon - and I actually did in theory like the idea that Rumple was supposed to be a Savior and had been turned against that destiny, although I wasn't thrilled with all of the specifics of how the show dealt with that.

The really terrible one was the Author, and it was terrible for some of the same reasons that the Wish Realm wound up being terrible (despite my gratitude for Whook and Alice). Introducing an Author with the power to potentially alter fates -- even if it is a power that isn't supposed to be exercised -- creates huge problems for the ontological status of your fictional world, and unless you want to actively deal with that, don't bring it up. Presumably, ordinary people in the LWOM don't have to worry about an irresponsible author retconning them out of existence. So if the people of SB do, that would seem to suggest that they are in certain respects less real or less autonomous than us Muggles. What makes it far, far worse is the fact that so much of S4 doubles down on this by having so many people on-board with Regina's plan to "make" the Author give her a happy ending, which means they also buy into the presumption that their fates and actions are not entirely within their control - but seem untroubled by this, except in the very immediate sense of it affecting Regina's chance at happiness. This is somewhat resolved by the clarification that ordinarily, the Author is just recording events, but it still doesn't really make sense, because if the Author is just recording events, I'm not sure why he is so important, or why the fact that Henry is author matters that much. I like that he winds up helping people in the Underworld complete their unfinished business - but did he really have to be the Author to do that?

To be clear, the idea of introducing an Author in a show that centers around a storybook is potentially clever and can be done right. This was just done terribly, and there are other models of shows doing somewhat similar things better. Buffy has a character who is essentially magicked into existence - but she goes through an understandable crisis about this, and the issue of why and to what extent she is nonetheless real is explicitly addressed. Even Supernatural, a show that is no paragon of plotting or characterization, actually has a great plot involving the main characters realizing that someone is writing books about their lives based on premonitory visions. But again, there is a consistent, in-universe explanation for this, and the implications re: free will are addressed at length (although, to be fair, the practical implications of having in-universe fans who assume Sam and Dean Winchester are fictional characters, some number of whom will inevitably catch wind of the fact that they are real - especially given Sam and Dean's multiple appearances on the FBI's most wanted list -- are never addressed). The issue, as it so often is on Once, is failure to deal with the emotional and logistical ramifications of things.

But as I said, binge-watching, and none-too-carefully at times, may be warping some of my perspectives here. I'll be interested to see how all of this looks the second time around.

[Writing Wrongs]

On 7/12/2018 at 12:30 PM, profdanglais said:

Which makes the S4 scene where Snow tries to justify adultery to Regina a definite retcon, and it was such a WTF moment for me

Especially since she is talking to the woman who created the whole Katherine situation to begin with.

Which reminds me: The curse was for Regina to get her revenge on Snow, so was everything involving the curse Regina's doing? I find it hard to believe that she cared about Grumpy and Nova's happy ending or anyone else's. And in Welcome to Storybrooke, she seems surprised about how things are in town. So who controlled what the Dark Curse did and created?

[tennisgurl]

You know what I think this show when it comes to worldbuilding? It needed more things like Miners Day, in Storeybrooke, the Enchanted Forrest, and in the other worlds that they explored. I think I could maybe learn to deal with inconsistencies in the backstory, how the magic worked, or its many retconed ideas that got thrown around haphazardly in an attempt to make the story more epic, if they had spent time making this world seem real and lived in, by adding in details about what this world is like. It doesn't have to be anything huge, just some details about the culture and customs of the people of the people in this universe, especially in the EF. 

I know we saw Snow and Charming get married for second in the pilot episode in what seems to be a typical Christian style ceremony (including being married by apparently a Bishop), but, what exactly does a wedding entail? I guess there is a religious aspect, but how prevalent is that? Do they have rings and a reception, do they break glasses, do the colors they wear have any significance? And speaking of, I always wanted to get a bit into religion in the EF. It apparently exists (the aforementioned Bishop looking guy) but they kind of skirted the issue. How does a world where actual gods and monsters exist deal with the idea of a higher power? Do they have holidays? Festivals? What are their funerals like? Do the various fairy-tale species (dwarfs, humans, faeries, anything else we didnt see) always get along? How prevalent is magic in this world to the common folk? Does this world have a class system beyond the monarchy? Do they have their own music, plays, or books? What lullaby do EF parents sing to their kids at night? 

Maybe that wouldn't matter very much with the bigger picture, and maybe I would still be just as annoyed with the larger inconsistencies of the world and story, and the generally crappy greater worldbuilding, but I think if they had more details like that, I could have been a bit more forgiving. Of course, asking A&E to come up with a consistent culture for its main characters is a bit much to ask for people who cant even come up with a consistent accent. 

[profdanglais]

8 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I always wanted to get a bit into religion in the EF

I'm curious about this too. Arthurian legend is explicitly Christian in the search for the Holy Grail, how does that work with the Enchanted Forest and the Author? Why do they embrace a "saviour" that is not Jesus? Of course, Arthur also explicitly fixed in Britain and Anglo-Celtic mythology. I really didn't like the shallow way Once handled the Camelot arc, from the CGI to the lazy characterisation, Monty Python's version had more depth. 

[KingOfHearts]

55 minutes ago, profdanglais said:

I'm curious about this too. Arthurian legend is explicitly Christian in the search for the Holy Grail, how does that work with the Enchanted Forest and the Author? Why do they embrace a "saviour" that is not Jesus? Of course, Arthur also explicitly fixed in Britain and Anglo-Celtic mythology. I really didn't like the shallow way Once handled the Camelot arc, from the CGI to the lazy characterisation, Monty Python's version had more depth. 

The Enchanted Forest citizens seem to be firm believers in the Greek gods, referencing them and even seeing them in person. There's a temple built for Morpheus. But we don't see any worshippers or clergy outside of that one bishop. You'd think the subject would be particularly interesting given that the nuns in Storybrooke should be having a massive crisis of faith post-curse.

Edited July 16, 2018 by KingOfHearts

[Shanna Marie]

23 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

I am pretty sure that Nova/Grumpy are the only time I've seen couple that were torn about by society or prejudice, especially in a fantasy context, and not only do they not end up together anyway, but no one really gives a shit, and its actually never brought up again.

That's why it's hard to tell what position the show was taking on their relationship. If they should have been together but were torn apart by society and prejudice, then you'd think they'd have got together once they found each other again. After the curse broke, they would have remembered each other, she would have known she really didn't take any nun vows and didn't actually believe in that religion (presumably, unless the We Are Both was so strong that she could have legitimately lived as a nun while also knowing she was really a magical creature), and they both would have been human while they were still in Storybrooke, so the dwarf/fairy thing no longer applied. So, really, the only thing keeping them apart was Amy Acker's availability. There's no reason, in-story, why they shouldn't have at least given it a shot. But since they didn't, does that mean the show was trying to say that Dreamy made the right choice in sticking to the work he was born to and giving up Nova so she could go after her dream? Which is kind of a downer. He did say he was happy just with the fact that she'd looked at him as a hero, but that was Leroy without Grumpy's memories. We have no idea what he thought of it all after the curse broke and he remembered.

In general, I think what this show has is more Making Stuff Up than Worldbuilding. With worldbuilding, all the choices that are made about what the world, society, and people are like add up to create a picture of the world. There's some thought and planning to start with, and after that, each choice is made to fit into the established world, or with some thought as to how that will affect the world. If you've got a world with a race bred for hard labor, then that says something about that society, and future choices about things going on in that world will reflect that kind of society. But these guys just make stuff up, throwing things out that they need for an episode, regardless of how it fits into what they've already established, and with no thought of the implications beyond that episode.

3 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

And speaking of, I always wanted to get a bit into religion in the EF. It apparently exists (the aforementioned Bishop looking guy) but they kind of skirted the issue. How does a world where actual gods and monsters exist deal with the idea of a higher power?

In season one, I've noticed that they say "gods" for places we'd generally say "God," like "gods bless" or "thank gods." That kind of fits with the fact that the Greek gods are around and people actually see them, but there again we have making stuff up instead of worldbuilding. If your god can pay you a visit and talk to you, that's going to affect religion and the belief system. As I've said before, learning for absolute fact what the afterlife is like should have had earthshattering implications. The existence of gods and the afterlife has occupied philosophers and theologians for centuries. Having actual interactions with gods and knowing what happens after death is kind of a big deal that would alter society. With the gods thing, you'd think that would make people really, really devout because you'd know for certain that getting a god's favor could make a material difference in your life. Or else you'd lose all respect when you learned what they were like. There would be no atheists, but there might be anti-gods factions.

[Camera One]

On 7/13/2018 at 11:43 AM, KingOfHearts said:

I'm really not a fan of the "realms of story" idea where society never progresses and it's perpetually the same time period. That makes no sense to me. 

I'm trying to catch up on all the comments I've missed so I'm reading and responding to some old posts. 

The "realms of story" idea felt like a convoluted mess because it was unclear how they were connected to each other.  Some lands were geographically close by and navigable by conventional means like ship or wagon like Arendelle, Camelot and the Enchanted Forest.  Yet other "worlds" like Wonderland or Oz or Frankenworld or Victorian England world required a door or a hat or magic slippers.  And then with Season 7 came the even more confusing "realms of story" where you could have a different version of characters like another Cinderella, but yet characters from that world like the alternate Blind Witch somehow could directly contact the Oz with Zelena.  And was that Season 7 Wonderland another Wonderland, or the same one?  Then, there was the mess of a Wish Realm, where characters could travel to a completely different "realm of story" with a different Rapunzel.  

On 7/16/2018 at 6:49 PM, Shanna Marie said:

In general, I think what this show has is more Making Stuff Up than Worldbuilding. With worldbuilding, all the choices that are made about what the world, society, and people are like add up to create a picture of the world. There's some thought and planning to start with, and after that, each choice is made to fit into the established world, or with some thought as to how that will affect the world.  But these guys just make stuff up, throwing things out that they need for an episode, regardless of how it fits into what they've already established, and with no thought of the implications beyond that episode.

That's a good way of looking at it.  In Season 1, we assumed it was worldbuilding and maybe that's why we were surprised that a lot of what we thought was groundwork was actually random "wouldn't it be cool if" ideas that the Writers subsequently forgot about because they evidently don't read any old scripts before writing new ones.

[Shanna Marie]

19 hours ago, andromeda331 said:

It was really fun to see a character who was human and wolf. They never really divided into characters who were animals and now human. Or Archie being human again. Ruby was really the only one.  

Moving this over from the episode thread because it goes broader.

The way they dealt with animals is one of those cases of "making things up" instead of worldbuilding. It's already a bit iffy that they managed to put the population of at least two kingdoms into a small town. But that was a world where horses were the major form of transportation and mechanical power, and yet there's one small riding stable in Storybrooke. Where did all the horses go? Were some of them turned into humans? Were they left behind by the curse?

Then there are the people who were transformed. Archie chose to be a cricket. How does he feel about being human again? When the curse is reversed, how does he feel about being a cricket again? Is he ready to just live life as a human now? Magic exists in Storybrooke. Why doesn't he ask to be turned into a cricket? Can he be turned into a cricket in Storybrooke?

What about dogs? There aren't really pets in Storybrooke, just Pongo and later David's dog who shows up at the very end of season 6. We don't see Pongo in the Enchanted Forest. Does that mean he was created by the curse? Did he belong to someone else in the Enchanted Forest? Did he have a cursed identity that made him think Archie was his owner? When the curse broke, had he forgotten his original owner? Did he ever want to go back to that owner? Of course, David's dog only appeared at the end of season 6 because they didn't make him up until season 6, but he was established as being around David before he went off to become a prince. Where was his dog all this time? He wasn't at the palace before the curse, even after David's mother died. David worked in an animal shelter, but he didn't think to go looking for his dog after the curse broke? Years went by before he found his dog again (and I think it was meant to be the same dog, not him going and getting a new dog).

Then there's poor Gus-Gus. Why was he turned into a human by the curse? Archie was really a human. Gus was a mouse who was temporarily turned into a human for Cinderella to go to the ball -- was that enough to mean the curse turned him into a human?

Really, what about all the animals in the Enchanted Forest? The wolf was brought over by the curse, but what about the deer, rats, mice, dogs, cats, etc.? The Enchanted Forest world was mostly, well, forest, and that population was stuck into a town, so where did the forest creatures go?

22 hours ago, Camera One said:

The "realms of story" idea felt like a convoluted mess because it was unclear how they were connected to each other. 

My problem with the "realms of story" idea is that the original concept was that these weren't just stories. They were real events about real people, and we just know them as stories. By making their worlds into "realms of stories," it's almost like making them artificial. These are just worlds stories are about, not real places with histories and cultures. I could see where we might run into places at various stages in their development, but that doesn't mean they have to be stuck in that era eternally. The steampunky Victorian world might eventually evolve and become a more advanced world, for instance. We just happen to pop in on it during that phase. We seem to be visiting the Enchanted Forest world during the 1700s, but give it another hundred or so years (and no massive disruptions like curses) and it might be more Victorian. But this idea that there were worlds permanently stuck in a single era and that were the home of all stories set in that era is at odds with the idea that these are real people in a real place, and that makes the stories more complicated than the fairy tales you know, which is so much more interesting.

[tennisgurl]

On 7/16/2018 at 4:19 PM, profdanglais said:

I'm curious about this too. Arthurian legend is explicitly Christian in the search for the Holy Grail, how does that work with the Enchanted Forest and the Author? Why do they embrace a "saviour" that is not Jesus? Of course, Arthur also explicitly fixed in Britain and Anglo-Celtic mythology. I really didn't like the shallow way Once handled the Camelot arc, from the CGI to the lazy characterisation, Monty Python's version had more depth. 

I was very disappointed with how that all went, for a number of reasons. Its like, they started out with the search for the grail, and some basically Arthurian stuff, which had some real promise, and then its like they got scared when someone said the word "holy". They wanted to do Camelot, as in use the names of characters we know, but without any of the stuff that Camelot was actually about, including how Christian mythology is woven into its fabrics. When the whole Savior thing was mentioned, there wasn't even a mention about they their savior is this dead carpenter guy. They dont have to turn into Veggie Tales, but acknowledging that this place has a culture different than our EF crew, and that can actually be interesting, and create distinctions between the lands. But, it seems like they either were afraid to mention a real world religion (or even an ancient religion, or one that they just made up) and possibly offend someone, or they just didnt care to get into the actual mythology of the story they were mining from. And, its not like writers dont use Christian mythology and imagery in their fantasy work. I mean, even beyond books like Chronicles of Narnia, which is pretty upfront about its ties to Christianity, TONS of fantasy stories, both DnD style and Urban Fantasy, use Christian stuff like angels and demons and magical swords and holy grails (I mean, Indiana Jones found a working Grail!) without making any real statement about religion. Mentioning the Holy Grail, and Camelot in general, without mentioning what the hell the Grail even is, is just so lame.

3 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

But this idea that there were worlds permanently stuck in a single era and that were the home of all stories set in that era is at odds with the idea that these are real people in a real place, and that makes the stories more complicated than the fairy tales you know, which is so much more interesting.

Yeah, all of that really raised more questions than it answered. Originally, the concept was that the EF was real, and, for some reason, our world had gotten a hold of stories from it. But the, the Author stuff started, and they through in the whole "world of stores" stuff on us, without really getting into what that actually means. And, what does that actually mean? Are they separated by genre, or by just time period and location? And, did the writers not notice that, in most stories, time DOES change, and pass like it does in the real world? Does that mean that there is a Land of Stories set in modern day too? There are tons of stories set in the modern world, so why not? Like, a fictional NYC where the Cloverfield Monster and Godzilla duke it out every once in awhile, while Ted Mosby drones on about his dating life while Lily reads Carrie Bradshaws latest article while underground the teenage mutant ninja turtles are fighting the foot clan, occasionally bumping into the ghostbusters? How big does this whole Author thing get? Are they all stuck in some vaugly modern era forever, and we just never noticed while watching? Its all just made so confusing, and there wasn't even really a point to it. They could have streamlined everything and said the Author was a group of people who can observe other worlds, and give inspiration to other, more traditional, authors to start their stories, and maybe even have Issac the rouge reality warping Author still. It could have stayed with the basic concept, but then they went with this super weird meta fictional story, that was never even explored!

Edited July 24, 2018 by tennisgurl

[Camera One]

22 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

Does that mean that there is a Land of Stories set in modern day too? There are tons of stories set in the modern world, so why not? Like, a fictional NYC where the Cloverfield Monster and Godzilla duke it out every once in awhile, while Ted Mosby drones on about his dating life while Lily reads Carrie Bradshaws latest article while underground the teenage mutant ninja turtles are fighting the foot clan, occasionally bumping into the ghostbusters? How big does this whole Author thing get? 

I would imagine there's an outer-space "realm of story" with Star Wars, Star Trek, Stitch, Tomorrowland and the Jetsons as well.

[KingOfHearts]

3 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

Where did all the horses go?

Regina cursed them all and they're all sleeping in a cave under her crypt. If she can't be an award-winning equestrian, no one can be.

3 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

We don't see Pongo in the Enchanted Forest.

It was a missed opportunity in 4B for Cruella and Ursula not be self-aware about their fairy tale identities. I was just thinking about how Cruella met Pongo and it wasn't addressed at all how coincidental that was. We should've gotten more characters from 101 Dalmatians, even if the parts were small, instead of the Lily/Author crap or that awful Maleficent flashback episode with Regina. (Anita and Roger, Jasper and Horace, etc. Heck, even the nanny.) While we're at it, let's rip some characters from The Little Mermaid as well. Sebastian is a chef in a French restaurant in Storybrooke, Nanny was Cruella's nanny as a child before she got murdered, etc. The possibilities are endless.

Edited July 24, 2018 by KingOfHearts

[Guest]

3 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

 Where did all the horses go?

The glue factory.  Had Regina's horse been a better horse, more worthy of her love, then Regina's father wouldn't have had to die.  No horse shall be allowed to live.

[Shanna Marie]

1 hour ago, tennisgurl said:

They dont have to turn into Veggie Tales, but acknowledging that this place has a culture different than our EF crew, and that can actually be interesting, and create distinctions between the lands. But, it seems like they either were afraid to mention a real world religion (or even an ancient religion, or one that they just made up) and possibly offend someone, or they just didnt care to get into the actual mythology of the story they were mining from.

It's especially odd that they never really dealt with religion when it's part of the plot that an entire race of people from the Enchanted Forest was turned into nuns by the curse, and there's a convent in the town that seems to be central to the culture/folklore of the town. They have a whole festival centered around the nuns giving candles to the miners (or however that went). Considering that convents are dwindling even in fairly religious areas of our world, the fact that this smallish town has a good-sized convent should affect the culture of the town. It seems like it would be a fairly strong Catholic community. But they seemed to entirely forget the fact that a convent is related to religion. Even in Storybrooke, which is in our world and should have our religions, and even during the curse, when they didn't know they weren't from our world, we never hear of anyone going to church. Was there a priest in town or just nuns? Did people just stop going to church when the curse broke because they realized they didn't believe in that religion anymore, or did any of them find some sort of comfort or peace in it and keep going?

It seems like the whole convent thing stemmed from their initial plan for Mary Margaret to be a nun (and that's such a Catholic name -- you'd think we'd have seen her, at least, faithfully attending church and therefore being even more wracked with guilt about the affair), and they just kept the convent with the fairies without there being any real story reason why the fairies needed to be nuns.

[companionenvy]

I know this isn't the fanfic thread, but if you're a fic reader and want to see Storybrooke and religion done right, check out jncar's Peace I Leave with You: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1167798/chapters/2375299

It's a CaptainSwan AU of Season 1-2 based on the premise that Killian was brought to SB during the first curse, under the identity of an Episcopal priest. The fic deals with the issue of people maintaining their faith - or not -- after the curse breaks, and is generally really respectful of religion without being preachy, in addition to doing great character work. 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, tennisgurl said:

I was very disappointed with how that all went, for a number of reasons. Its like, they started out with the search for the grail, and some basically Arthurian stuff, which had some real promise, and then its like they got scared when someone said the word "holy". They wanted to do Camelot, as in use the names of characters we know, but without any of the stuff that Camelot was actually about, including how Christian mythology is woven into its fabrics. When the whole Savior thing was mentioned, there wasn't even a mention about they their savior is this dead carpenter guy. They dont have to turn into Veggie Tales, but acknowledging that this place has a culture different than our EF crew, and that can actually be interesting, and create distinctions between the lands. But, it seems like they either were afraid to mention a real world religion (or even an ancient religion, or one that they just made up) and possibly offend someone, or they just didnt care to get into the actual mythology of the story they were mining from.

I don't think this was about shying away from religion.

I remember being really perplexed that they decided to do Camelot during the Emma is the Dark One/Dark One origin arc.  Both of those stories seemed like they should have enough meat on them that they deserved their own arc.  Cramming them into the same arc did a disservice to both.

I think most of the worlds they explored felt like the writers got bored with them because there was no organic way to tie in the main characters to the flashbacks and as a result they didn't really do much exploring of them because the way to do it didn't fit the show's formula.  So a slippery slope started.  Neverland had Hook.  Bex was enough to carry Wicked (and they gave her a family tie to Regina).  Frozen's popularity was enough to carry 4A (and even then, everyone had a one-off backstory / meeting with the Frozen crew).  But Camelot was more of a Dark One origin story with Merlin/Nimue.  The Greek Mythology arc was basically Underbrooke and had little to do with Greek Mythology,  Then they completely gave up on Land of untold Stories and I'd argue they didn't really do Aladdin any better.  The Black Fairy was just Rumple's Mom (and I'll never understand why they didn't do that much with the Faerie Realm or visit the Seelie/Unseelie Courts during the series) .

[CCTC]

33 minutes ago, ParadoxLost said:

I remember being really perplexed that they decided to do Camelot during the Emma is the Dark One/Dark One origin arc.  Both of those stories seemed like they should have enough meat on them that they deserved their own arc.  Cramming them into the same arc did a disservice to both.

Yes - each episode had some time spent in Camelot in a recent flashback - some time in present day Story Brooke - and some time spent in a flashback from further back in the past and then they felt the need to throw in an additional story line for Meridia.   Too bad because the people they cast for the Camelot characters had potential.

They kind of did the same think with 4B - they tried to cram in all four potential villainesses and a lost dragon child and half the characters were wasted.  Cruella rose above the material and is really the only memorable character from that half season.

38 minutes ago, ParadoxLost said:

 (and I'll never understand why they didn't do that much with the Faerie Realm or visit the Seelie/Unseelie Courts during the series) .

The Faerie Realm could have been interesting, but it would have taken time away from Dual Reginas...

[tennisgurl]

With A&E, its really hard to tell what is bad storytelling with some kind of thought process, and bad storytelling that is just pure incompetence. So much of the stuff they do that pisses me off the most is stuff that really seems to happen because the writers have the attention spans of fruit flies, and play some of the worst kind of favorites I have ever seen. 

47 minutes ago, ParadoxLost said:

The Black Fairy was just Rumple's Mom (and I'll never understand why they didn't do that much with the Faerie Realm or visit the Seelie/Unseelie Courts during the series) .

Yeah, that would have been really cool. It also would have been interesting to contrast the more Disney style faeries, with the Faerie Realm based more around older mythologies, and would generally been a cool place to explore. But, yeah, we cant have that, we need to change things up to spend more time with Regina making sad faces, or tie yet another god dang character back to Rumple!

[Camera One]

I was re-reading the Variety interview with A&E, and I think this quote is quite telling.

Quote

“It’s about celebrating what we loved about ‘Once.’ We all took a really long car trip together. For us, it’s about saying goodbye to the show and what we loved about the show: the magic, the swashbuckling, the romance,” Kitsis said.

This show was like a really long car trip.  One that was unplanned where you look out the window and see something momentarily that piques you interest, that you never revisit again.  One where you get lost and you end up circling the same vicinity over and over again.  One where you end up re-playing the same cassette tape over and over again until you were sick and tired of the songs.  

And then there were the 3 things that Eddy listed as what they "loved" about the show.  Magic... yes, they brought magic back to Storybrooke at the first opportunity, and they used it as an easy out whenever they needed.  Swashbuckling... random "adventures" where characters fight or quest with no depth or payoff.  And finally, romance.  Because developing friendship and family pretty much went out the window for almost everyone except Regina and maybe Whook.

[superloislane]

4 hours ago, Camera One said:

I actually thought that was an early indication of the Writers using Mary Margaret as a counterpoint.  It's similar to the way they would use Mary Margaret or David later on.  One would take one side, and the other would take the other side, for the sake of the conversation needing a Devil's advocate.  I thought Mary Margaret's reactions in this episode didn't seem natural and counter to her philosophy in the eight episodes prior to this.

Moving this from the True North thread - I'm glad other people noticed this. If one character was the centre of a scene and they were arguing one way, they would ALWAYS have Snow come in and argue the exact opposite way even if it didn't make sense for her character or it was the opposite to what she herself had done previously. Always.

[Guest]

4 hours ago, Camera One said:

This show was like a really long car trip.

And the plot was one long game of slug-a-bug?  Every time they showed Emma's VW Bug they had to hit the viewer in the proverbial arm?

[Mitch]

On 7/16/2018 at 5:19 PM, profdanglais said:

I'm curious about this too. Arthurian legend is explicitly Christian in the search for the Holy Grail, how does that work with the Enchanted Forest and the Author? Why do they embrace a "saviour" that is not Jesus? Of course, Arthur also explicitly fixed in Britain and Anglo-Celtic mythology. I really didn't like the shallow way Once handled the Camelot arc, from the CGI to the lazy characterisation, Monty Python's version had more depth. 

Blue said the Dark One Curse is "not from this realm" so I thought they were going to go with a mystical Camelot in our worlds past..and that magic itself existed in our world. In order to rid the world of evil and dark magic, Merlin eradicates magic in the world, thinking he was sending it into a void, only it was sent to other realms of existence..they were originally the Lands Without Magic (get it..an A & E TWIST) until Merlin sent magic there. Only of course, there is no way to eradicate evil as, in Catholic theology..its a choice someone makes with their free will. That is why their worlds are connected to our world and how why Neal was automatically flipped to our world and how SB could exist here. When the gang went back they went back in time to our world...or course I would have made the Big Bad who created the Dark One Satan but that would flip out the Bible Thumper watching...(despite the magic, cleavage and innocent people getting killed constantly.)

But also, from reading Facebook fan page, I dont think the audience for Once would request or enjoy a more indepth show or storyline like yours.

Edited July 25, 2018 by Mitch

[RolloTomasi]

23 hours ago, Camera One said:

 One where you get lost and you end up circling the same vicinity over and over again. 

I'm picturing the Griswolds stuck in the roundabout in London. "Big Ben! Parliament!" 

[KingOfHearts]

4 hours ago, Mitch said:

But also, from reading Facebook fan page, I dont think the audience for Once would request or enjoy a more indepth show or storyline like yours.

All the people who comment on the Facebook page want is romantic GIF sets and Regina apologism. 

Edited July 25, 2018 by KingOfHearts

[Mitch]

15 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

All the people who comment on the Facebook page want is romantic GIF sets and Regina apologism. 

And responding to the latest post from whomever moderates that board on the latest "epic" (be it Henry and Jacinda's boremance, or an adventure, or a "journey" or a "twist"..) I seriously never knew people actually got that much into Regina and Boringhood until I read it on Facebook...I mean I understand different strokes  ( i never got into Snow and Charms that much or Emma and Hook but could understand how people could) but really...pair Regina with a stump or Mr. Magoo and you have the same excitment...

[KingOfHearts]

1 hour ago, Mitch said:

And responding to the latest post from whomever moderates that board on the latest "epic" (be it Henry and Jacinda's boremance, or an adventure, or a "journey" or a "twist"..) I seriously never knew people actually got that much into Regina and Boringhood until I read it on Facebook...I mean I understand different strokes  ( i never got into Snow and Charms that much or Emma and Hook but could understand how people could) but really...pair Regina with a stump or Mr. Magoo and you have the same excitment...

I'd still take Regina with Robin over her with Facilier any day.

[Mitch]

On 7/26/2018 at 10:17 AM, KingOfHearts said:

I'd still take Regina with Robin over her with Facilier any day.

Were there actually Regina/Facilier fans???

I think the Regina/Facilier thing would have been interesting if they had her sexually drawn to him but also afraid that being that close to him could bring out some of her darkness again.  But it also didn't make sense as to where and how could they meet in her EQ days??? Well, and they didnt have chemistry and after he died it was like "Oh..okay..hey, the special at the bar are Bloody Marys and a burger..wanna go?"

I just hated that Robin was such a puss for Regina...she needed a confrontational lover..

[RolloTomasi]

Regina was never going to get a confrontational love interest because nobody involved actually wanted to write that story. Lana wanted a love interest so they gave her one, but they also didn't want anything to upset the Poor Bold and Audacious Regina narrative so he became set dressing - no story, no personality, no purpose. Anything good about him came from either the actual Robin Hood tale ("I have a cooooooode") or fans projecting Sean's personality onto the character. For all the "(Insert Character of Choice) is just a purse holder!!!" that existed in the fandom, Robin Hood was the real purse holder of the cast. 

As for Facilier, he too became a love interest because Lana wanted one. Both of her relationships were total duds. 

Edited July 27, 2018 by RolloTomasi

[Camera One]

1 hour ago, RolloTomasi said:

As for Facilier, he too became a love interest because Lana wanted one. Both of her relationships were total duds. 

It seems like the Writers lost interest too.  Knowing the series was ending, they didn't even throw in a line or two about how Regina and Facilier met in the past.  Facilier seemed like the spare villain they added to occupy screentime.  Though Mother Gothel also went MIA for half of 7B despite her "Coven" being a central plot.  I really don't understand how their planning process works.

[superloislane]

20 hours ago, Mitch said:

I just hated that Robin was such a puss for Regina...she needed a confrontational lover..

Well hey Robin did disagree with her about one thing...and then took it back, apologized and died in the same episode. Probably karma for daring to go against her on something.

[KingOfHearts]

55 minutes ago, superloislane said:

Well hey Robin did disagree with her about one thing...and then took it back, apologized and died in the same episode. Probably karma for daring to go against her on something.

Same thing happened to Graham. Disagree with Regina and you die. That's why the main characters are always at her feet - they don't want to kick the bucket next.

[daxx]

3 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

Same thing happened to Graham. Disagree with Regina and you die. That's why the main characters are always at her feet - they don't want to kick the bucket next.

Now if they had made it clear that is what they were doing, coddling Regina so she wouldn’t go evil I would have bought it more than the wanting to be friends with your abuser nonsense.

[Camera One]

3 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

That's why the main characters are always at her feet - they don't want to kick the bucket next.

That's the only headcanon that makes this show bearable after the first two seasons or so.  We can imagine all the hush-hush conversations Snow, Emma, Charming and Henry have in private as they draw straws to decide who would placate Regina that day.

Edited July 28, 2018 by Camera One

[daxx]

1 hour ago, Camera One said:

That's the only headcanon that makes this show bearable after the first two seasons or so.  We can imagine all the hush-hush conversations Snow, Emma, Charming and Henry have in private as they draw straws to decide who would placate Regina that day.

As we witnessed, Emma is terrible at Rock Paper Scissors. lol

[Camera One]

27 minutes ago, companionenvy said:

As written, young Regina is Mary Margaret , to a great extent: she is sweet, good with children, and believes deeply in the power of true love. 

That is their usual trick of writing a character in flashback as the complete opposite of the character in present-day.  They did it in "Dead of Summer" as well.  

I think this was even worse in the 5B episode "Sisters" (I think it was that episode).  Child Regina might as well have been Child Snow.  

[KingOfHearts]

33 minutes ago, Camera One said:

Child Regina might as well have been Child Snow. 

It didn't help that Young!Regina's actress looked similar to Bailee Madison.

2 hours ago, Camera One said:

That's the only headcanon that makes this show bearable after the first two seasons or so.  We can imagine all the hush-hush conversations Snow, Emma, Charming and Henry have in private as they draw straws to decide who would placate Regina that day.

The day before her coronation, Starbucks stopped selling Regina's apple caramel spice latte. They knew something had to be done before she killed half the multiverse. You can't see it in the episode, but Grumpy kept a barf bag in his pocket.

Edited July 28, 2018 by KingOfHearts

[KingOfHearts]

Even though we complained a lot about the guest star overload and ADD-style writing, I do think there was enough time to explore all the franchises A&E wanted to. The jumping between stories between arcs actually worked to the writers' advantage, since they seem to do better with short-term endeavors. The issue was that a lot of time was wasted on plots that didn't matter, specifically the kind that concerned the main characters but had no consequences. Instead of more Camelot, we got that random episode with Belle and Merida or Ruby and Mulan crashing the party, not to mention the pointless Storybrooke scenes. From a micro point of view, most of the episode airtime is wasted on characters regurgitating plot points or skating around important information being withheld from the audience. (Seriously, Rumple - I don't want to imagine what you mean by cleaving.) Many of the scenes are just the main characters contributing nothing of value or the Big Bads parading their evil schemes. The majority of everything is repetition, and I don't mean a repeated arc formula. The characters repeat conversations relentlessly.

Want to delve into Greek mythology? Here, take Auntie Em, Dorothy, and Zelena on a bike. Curious about the Land of Untold stories? I'm sure you'd rather see Regina's clone sucking face with Rumple instead or the universally famous Mirror World. I'm not against all filler, but the filler has to be entertaining in its own little vacuum. Some of the S1 centrics like Hansel/Gretel were fun by themselves. But no one asked for Pied Piper Pan, Dark-Haired Rapunzel, or Post-Apocalyptic Wonderland.