A Thread for All Seasons: OUaT Across All Realms

[Camera One]

I marathoned "Sympathy for the De Vil", "Lily" and "Mother" with the friend who came back to town for the weekend, and these three together weren't too bad on rewatch.  Now that I knew Emma wasn't going to turn dark from that Cruella event, I was less tense watching these episodes.  It also helped the baby-napping stuff was mostly over, although each of these episodes had almost identical scenes of Emma giving Snow/Charming the cold shoulder.  There were some nice moments in each episode... I swear, despite cheesiness, the episodes somewhat work because of the actors, both the regulars, but also the guest characters like Young Emma or Maleficent.  My friend asked why Emma suddenly looked like a drug addict in "Sympathy for the De Vil" with the extreme paleness.

Edited May 16, 2015 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

Sympathy for the De Vil probably goes on my list of favorite episodes of the whole show. It's only for the flashbacks, I assure you. It was just an intelligent, self-contained story with a good setting and good characters. The only other episode in 4B I found particularly rewatchable was Darkness on the Edge of Town. Poor Unfortunate Soul received a lot of praise, but I'm not a major Hook fan.

[HoodlumSheep]

^ I agree about Cruella's episode. It was my favorite ep. of the season. Easily in my top ten if I don't include the Wonderland episodes in it.

I guess this is probably an unpopular opinion, but I enjoyed Lily well enough and even Mother too. I agree with Camera One that once you get past the egg-baby nonsense, they aren't too bad (still mediocre though).

[KingOfHearts]

 

Maybe that's my problem.  I don't remember what exactly was so terrible about season 2.

S2 gets a lot of flack, but I never saw it as terrible. However, I do understand why viewers had such distaste for it. I binge-watched it and didn't get to see it live. Riding off the coat-tails of S1, it is a major drop in quality. There was still many loose threads from the previous season that either executed poorly or not at all. The only real payoff I can think of was with Neal. (Within the context of the season, mind you.) Everyone was waiting for the big reunions and the "what do we do now" conversations. It took a different turn with the Team Princess arc, which was pretty decent imo. For the most part the season was passable, but it was a marginal difference from S1. That alone turned off a lot of people.

 

As for 2B, a few of the episodes are downright 4B-level of terrible. Honestly I still enjoyed most of 2B, except some of the episodes toward the end were a total blur. I can't recall when many of the events from 3x19 to 3x22 happened. The episodes all stood up well, but this was a time where character development was in a dreadful place. There was so much going on and plot to cover that a lot of the stories we were still waiting on got sidelined. While I found 4B's content to be crappy 90% of the way, 2B was still at least entertaining. It was the dismantling of characters that shoved it down the sewer.

 

I didn't hate S2 or even most of 2B for that matter. I can tolerate a lot as long as it's not boring.

Edited May 16, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[HoodlumSheep]

I didn't really have much of a problem with 2b either. I actually think my biggest problem with it is that I largely don't remember it; it was kinda forgettable. There weren't as many stand out moments in it (whether good and bad) as other seasons.

I guess maybe I had issues with the whole Snow dark spot stuff, but my anger lies more with the lack of follow through with later seasons concerning this plot (yeah, Snow getting a dark spot for self defense is stupid, but it would be much more livable if they followed through with it; the door of purity, the splitting of the heart and who got the bad spot/if they both did, etc).

But like I said, it was the follow through that gets to me the most.

Most I remember from 2b is August getting reverted to a child, "Queen of awesomeness" Cora, and Science! Oh, and a Nealfire somewhere in there.

The only stand out moments in 2b for me was Miller's Daughter and the ending "Neverland!"

Two. Two moments.

2B was just bland, but at least it wasn't as messy as 4b.

* I just had an epiphany! Maybe Snow's dark spot wasn't from killing Cora in self defense, but from the egg-napping! Maybe A&E foreshadowed that storyline all along! They're geniuses I tell you, geniuses!

[KingOfHearts]

Here are the episodes I liked in 2B:
* In The Name of the Brother. While the Frankenstein flashbacks were predictable, the momentum of Cora's reveal and everyone panicking over the hospitalized outsider kept me watching.

* The Outsider. Belle finally gets a centric that doesn't involve gluing herself to Rumple's hip. Plus - Mulan!
* The Queen is Dead. A great history piece for Snow. Cora's rivalry with Eva was a nice touch.

* The Miller's Daughter. This is my favorite episode of 2B. Long live Cora!

* Lacey. This is the Rumpbelle story I found enjoyable besides Skin Deep. Nice humor.

 

Everything else was pretty boring, really. No, I didn't like Manhattan.

[stealinghome]

I'm not sure there's universal hatred for all of S2 as much as 2B. While I agree with KingOfHearts that there was a large drop in quality from S1, I still think 2A is the best half-season the show has produced outside of S1.

 

2B has some meh episodes but is actually relatively okay through Miller's Daughter (in fact, Manhattan and Miller's Daughter are imo two of the show's top 10 all-time episodes) and then the last 2 episodes are solid. What really ruined 2B was the 17-20 stretch. Having Welcome to Storybrooke/Selfless, Brave and True/Lacey/The Evil Queen back to back just killed the half-season.

 

I also think there's a lot of frustration with 2B not just because parts of it are rather bad, but also because it's where the show made bad decisions that have continued to be problems for them since then. 2B is the root of a lot of the weaknesses of seasons 3 and 4. So I kind of see it as the specter that continues to haunt the show.

[HoodlumSheep]

That's another unpopular opinion of mine, everyone seems to praise Manhattan as one of the better episodes, and I just don't like it. I guess it's just not my cup of tea.

[YaddaYadda]

Manhattan was okay.  I thought the best episode in season 2 was the Miller's Daughter followed by the Crocodile but I'm also biased as hell because Hook.

 

I find that my preference is for episodes that are mostly contained like we had with Sympathy for De Vil for instance.

[Mari]

I think it might be tougher to do Storybrooke flashbacks than Fairytale Land flashbacks, because the Fairytale Land flashbacks allows them to go back to any point in a huge stretch of time, from pre-Rumple as Dark One, all the way to right before the Wardrobe, and all events in between, whereas there's very little missing time from Storybrooke to tell in flashbacks, unless they do a time jump.

 

So one way to reverse Fairytale Land/Storybrooke is to have everyone wake up in Camelot at the beginning of Season 5, a year later, and they gradually reveal what happened in Storybrooke after Emma became the Dark One following the events of the 4B finale.  The problem with that is, they would need to give everyone amnesia again for that to happen.

Going back a page, because I am catching up.

 

Would doing a big jump--like a year or so--and skipping the memory curse work at all?  They could jump straight to landing in wherever the main story is, with the occasional reference to person/event/whatever that becomes clear in the flashbacks.

 

So, while they're using the ThingOfImportance, we have flashbacks to how they learned about or found it in Storybrooke or the Enchanted Forest.  When they first confront character X, we could have flashbacks to their discovery of why character X is important, or their first encounter with character X in Storybrooke.  When they travel to location  or castle in the present story, we could have flashbacks to  realm jumping plans or resource gathering. . .

Edited May 17, 2015 by Mari

[Camera One]

I think it is possible to do it without amnesia, but it's a little harder for a few reasons.  Jumping right into the middle of a plot, like the characters landing in Camelot, one year later, and then revealing the how's via flashback stretched for an entire half-season would require characters to talk around what they know.  Thus far, the show has done many flashbacks where one character knew the story but others didn't, and the one who knows is reluctant to discuss it.  For example, "Quite a Common Fairy" revealed what happened between Regina and Tinkerbelle, where Regina remembered exactly what happened, but the other characters and the viewers didn't, and it was revealed via flashback.  Or Emma's flashback in "Lily" to her final encounter with Teenage Lily.  Flashbacks to Storybrooke might need to explain why only one or two characters knew about these events, while everyone else was unaware, and if everyone knew, it might result in some weird stilted dialogue, like when Rumple spoke to the Snow Queen in 4A, talking around what they both knew but had not yet been revealed to the audience.  With amnesia, no one knows what happened, so that keeps it more clear-cut.

Edited May 17, 2015 by Camera One

[ParadoxLost]

Would doing a big jump--like a year or so--and skipping the memory curse work at all?  They could jump straight to landing in wherever the main story is, with the occasional reference to person/event/whatever that becomes clear in the flashbacks.

 

I was going to post that nothing would make Storybrooke in flashback work in a satisfying way because the best way to do it was if they hadn't made the curse Groundhog's day and showed their cursed lives before Emma came and how that changed the EF characters.  Because Bandit Snow and Mary Margret are not the same person.

 

But I just realized that wasn't true.  You can make Storybrooke work in flashback in an entirely satisfying way; but they'll never do it.  You make Storybrooke flashbacks offscreensville.  A ton of stuff has happened offscreen or illogically enough that the journey from A to C had to happen via B offscreen.  Show that and how that is influencing current events.  How many times have we said they moved too fast past the curse and a ton of events since then but its too late to go back and revisit it or fix it.  But really it isn't.  There are a ton of relationships and character progression that could use the added depth of 'hey.  you never saw this before but does it make more sense now?'  or 'see character X did tell character Y what happened, see for yourself how it went down.' 

[Shanna Marie]

At the time it was on, I hated 2A just because it was such a letdown. I was so excited from the end of season one and had all these hopes for what would happen next -- the Charming family reunion, retribution from all the people whose lives Regina had messed with, the integration of fairy tale personalities with the cursed memories, getting some juxtaposition of fairy tale people living in our modern world and what kind of society they would create -- and we got almost none of that, instead immediately jumping int the Team Princess adventure. But when I got the DVDs last summer and rewatched it, I found that I really enjoyed 2A. I guess having realistic expectations and bad lingering impressions helped. If you remove the hopes of what that stretch of episodes could have been and should have been, they're not bad. They're mostly just a disappointment in contrast to what should have happened in that time and ended up never really happening.

 

2B is the root of a lot of the weaknesses of seasons 3 and 4. So I kind of see it as the specter that continues to haunt the show.

Yeah, that's when they started the heavy-duty victim narrative for Regina, stopped what had actually been a decent redemption trajectory and started her flip-flopping, actually making her worse in both the past and the present before suddenly declaring her a hero for undoing her own evil scheme. Meanwhile, the morality got really wonky with the dark spot on the heart stuff. And they got all kitchen-sinky, like with 4B, so the plot threads included Cora, Regina turning villain again and plotting to destroy the whole town, Hook and his revenge, Lacey/Belle and her memory issues, the mystery of Greg, Neal coming to town, Tamara and the Home Office stuff. Just imagine if Colin hadn't broken his leg and they'd included a Hook plot line for most of the second half of 2B. There was so much going on, but everything was dealt with fairly superficially and with no consequences. There was little follow-up with Rumple and Neal -- Rumple finally reached his son after all those years and all that effort, but he got sidetracked by his girlfriend. Regina's plan to kill them all, which included destroying all the magic beans they'd been growing and getting out the failsafe, was conveniently forgotten in the aftermath. Belle later didn't seem to have any problems with what she'd done as Lacey. After all the build-up, the Home Office concept was brushed aside and forgotten (and I do think that an anti-magic faction would be an interesting plot and is probably something that they need to face for real). And then there was what now seems even more like an unearned I Love You from Emma to Neal, coming out of nowhere after he'd dismissed her concerns about his fiancee who was trying to kill them all. Now that we've seen her I Love You to Hook after he sacrificed his life and after all the other things he's done for her, that one looks even more hollow.

 

I did like the Bae and Bae and Hook flashbacks in the last two episodes and the Hook and David "mismatched buddy cop" bit in that last episode when they had to work together but were still hating each other. I kind of liked supposedly dark Snow when she was listening to Joan Jett, practicing archery and slapping Marco, even though we were supposed to think she was bad.

 

I thought "Manhattan" was kind of boring, too, but then I'm very much over Rumple. I think that's one of those episodes that diminishes in hindsight because there was too little honest follow-up with it. It seemed like it was going to be a gamechanger, but it really wasn't.

[YaddaYadda]

I thought "Manhattan" was kind of boring, too, but then I'm very much over Rumple. I think that's one of those episodes that diminishes in hindsight because there was too little honest follow-up with it. It seemed like it was going to be a gamechanger, but it really wasn't.

 

I thought Manhattan in hindsight did for Neal exactly what the Echo Caves did for Emma, gave both characters two parents who didn't sign up for a grown up child.

Edited May 17, 2015 by YaddaYadda

[Serena]

I always really wanted an episode where there is not big plot or flashbacks, just all the characters talking to each other. Like, there is a party at Granny`s, and everyone gets a chance to talk, and maybe hash out some of their issues. Hell, lets bring back the MIA supporting cast! You have all these characters, with interesting, complex histories and backstories. Use them! 

What are those episodes called when everyone in in one room for the whole episode, that shows use to save money? Bubble episodes? Something like that. They could do that, AND save the money to get Emma her own place! Win-win.

[YaddaYadda]

Between the time travel adventure, the fireside chat, White Out, and deckhand Hook sacrificing his life for Emma (all scenes in which Charming was present for), I hope the writers are done with Charming's offhanded comments about "reputations" and "maybe he really has changed" and "if Ursula hasn't turned him evil yet." 

They should be done with that.  If anything, Snowing and Hook should present a united front if they have a prayer at helping/saving Emma.  That means removing any doubts regarding Hook and completely trusting him and Emma's judgement in him.

 

And I'm saying saving, but all I can think of is what Emma told Hook in 3x22.  "The only one who saves me is me".

Edited May 17, 2015 by YaddaYadda

[tennisgurl]

 

What are those episodes called when everyone in in one room for the whole episode, that shows use to save money? Bubble episodes?

Bottle episodes! Those are classic for lots of character development and interaction. And, more practically, it saves money, because they cost basically nothing, so they can save up for bigger special effects later. Its a win win! 

[Shanna Marie]

I rewatched "Sympathy for DeVil" to see if putting it in context helped. I was pretty consumed with rage at the end of the initial airing because I feared the whole "Emma's gone dark!" aftermath for killing the woman who was holding a gun to her son's head, so maybe knowing that Emma didn't go dark and no one got judgey with her about it would help.

 

And I think I liked it even less. Without the big twist in the Cruella backstory, that part wasn't quite as interesting. It didn't seem to me that there were any hints or clues that she was anything other than she seemed at face value, so it wasn't the kind of thing that's fun to rewatch after learning the twist so you can see what was set up. The Emma stuff just seems anticlimactic. Not that I wanted her to go dark, but ending the episode on the scary eyes and then have that go nowhere just feels cheap -- like it was done for an episode-ending shocker that ended up having nothing much to do with the story.

 

Meanwhile, learning that Cruella was basically a sociopath whose body count was minimized only because of a magical leash makes the episodes before it weaker. She and Ursula wander into town, saying they want to seek redemption, and no one bothers to ask them what changed their minds, what they want, what their happy endings are. At least with Ursula, Hook knew, but no one knew he knew. Regina, who is supposedly exploring the idea of whether villains can get happy endings, just joins in with them to infiltrate them but doesn't try to talk to them from the perspective of a villain seeking redemption before that.

 

The really sad thing is that Cruella's presence ends up having absolutely nothing to do with the plot. You could cut her out entirely without losing anything other than some witty quips and a form of transportation. It wouldn't change the story. Killing her changes nothing for Emma. They don't manage to magically extract the ink from her hair. She doesn't make anyone really question anything. She doesn't do anything that changes the status quo, unless Pongo is going to be suffering PTSD next season. At least in the Ursula story, it somewhat affects Hook's mindset and brings back the Jolly Roger.

[Camera One]

On my rewatch, I don't think I liked it less, but I see what you're saying about how ultimately, what happened had no bearing for what came next.  That seemed to be the case with a few of the plot points in the middle of the arc, like Regina taking Belle's heart and then Rumple getting it back in the next episode.  I'm sure the writers would say the the episode made Emma doubt herself and precipitated her erratic behavior in "Lily", and it motivated Maleficent to switch sides.  Though I personally found it difficult to follow the reasoning in the next episode regarding Maleficent's change of heart and why there was so little discussion about whether it was a good idea for the two most powerful magical people on the "good guy" side to leave town, or why Rumple was so sure trying to find Lily would lead to Emma's darkness.  It gave the impression he did know about the darkness switching spell, in which case, I find it doubtful Rumple didn't realize Lily's blood would work as the ink.  At the beginning of "Mother", Rumple said there was some loophole but then he collapsed and we never heard about that again.

Edited May 18, 2015 by Camera One

[coops]

Interesting you point out Cruella's presence has nothing to do with the plot because I find characters rarely drive the plot but there has been a ridiculous amount of times some magic object or other has surfaced to drive the story forward. Its such a repetitive plot device in the show now I roll my eyes everytime it happens. Just a few off the top of head are the snow queen's scroll, the magic ink, the magic quill, maleficent's baby rattle, the gauntlet, the magic tree, pandoras box, from season 3 and the compass/magic beans/wardrobe from season 2. And lastly rumple's (now Emma's) dagger but at least that has some thought out mythology behind it whereas the others are flimsy and cheap ways to move the plot from a to b.

Edited May 18, 2015 by coops

[Shanna Marie]

You know you've got trouble when you're more likely to be able to remove people without altering the plot than you are to be able to remove objects without altering the plot.

[KAOS Agent]

I find the Cruella can't kill thing to be more implausible now that we've seen everyone basically exert their free will in the AU. How come everyone else was able to overcome their written character abilities/traits in the AU, but Cruella was just stuck? It messes with their idea that free will triumphs over the Author's power.

[Shanna Marie]

I find the Cruella can't kill thing to be more implausible now that we've seen everyone basically exert their free will in the AU. How come everyone else was able to overcome their written character abilities/traits in the AU, but Cruella was just stuck?

I wouldn't say that everyone did. Hook definitely, but we don't know how specifically his character definition was written -- was he just a deckhand who'd never been given the experiences that would give him skills and confidence, or was he explicitly written to lack confidence? Ditto with Rumple -- was he specifically written to be a good person, or was he just written as a generic hero who did heroic things? Did he really always make the right decision, or was it just written so that Belle would say stuff like that about him? I guess Zelena reverted to type, but we don't know what she was supposed to have been before the ending (she didn't seem to see Regina as a threat when she first met her, only after the wedding where, to be honest, I can't entirely blame her). Everyone else seemed to play more or less true to the type they seemed to have in the story. The prohibition on Cruella taking a life was very specific. Still, though, if she was that much of a psycho killer even from childhood, you'd think she'd have found loopholes over the years. She, herself, couldn't take a life, but she could have tricked and manipulated others into doing it for her, like with using Henry as a hostage to try to force Emma and Regina to kill Isaac. It would have helped there if they'd been setting up that twist from the time she was introduced, like having situations where someone got killed and she managed to never quite be the one doing it even if she was involved, so you got the impression of her evil and it seemed like she was dangerous, and then only after the twist was revealed did you realize that they never actually showed her being the one to take a life. As it was, the idea that she might kill wasn't even introduced until her centric episode that revealed the twist. All we'd seen of her before that was her being snarky and occasionally waving a gun around. She didn't even seem like much of a real threat.

[Camera One]

Regina dismissed Cruella and Ursula as nowhere near as bad as her, so Cruella clearly didn't try very hard to find a loophole, at least in her Enchanted Forest days.  She was also reluctant to go with Rumple in "Darkness on the Edge of Town".  Not to mention you'd think the Chernobog would go after her as the one with the darkest potential, if she wasn't reined in by the Writer's words.  

 

Even though it was dumb, the potion to prevent herself from becoming pregnant being revealed at the end of "Mother", did make Regina's line at the beginning of the episode make sense upon rewatch ("No matter what happens from now on, there's going to be this child.  You're tied together in a way In a way we'll never be.").  

[KAOS Agent]

Except that we've seen the no baby curse reversed already in Snow White in "Lady of the Lake" which made that storyline have zero resonance for me. Regina is always getting in the way of her own happiness, but the whole part where she made herself barren wasn't as meaningful as it could have been since we already know that there's an easy fix. That story about Snow would have been in the book that Regina spend the season staring at, so this was just false angst in my mind. The only thing I thought it did was answer why Regina never got pregnant herself and keeps away any speculation about accidental pregnancy now or in the future. 

[Dani-Ellie]

Snow was cured by the single drop of water left in Lake Nostos. Yes, Cora and Hook raised the groundwater to the surface but the lake is still all the way back in the Enchanted Forest, where Regina hasn't been since the Missing Year.

[KAOS Agent]

So go through the door to Arendelle and hire someone to travel to the lake and get some water. Or just ask Ariel to get it for heaven's sake. It's not this forever and ever condition that makes it so that Zelena has a link that she can never share with Robin. It's an obstacle sure, but it's not a woe is me, our lives are forever marred by this thing that they made it out to be. 

 

On the topic of magical fixes, if Lily wants to find her father all she needs to do is get that globe thing and prick her finger. Seems it's not that hard to find missing parental units. Similarly, if Emma's missing and can't be summoned her parents or son could do the same to find her location. Getting to her might be more difficult depending on where she is, but missing relatives aren't all that hard to find due to the blood globe.

[Shanna Marie]

Even though it was dumb, the potion to prevent herself from becoming pregnant being revealed at the end of "Mother", did make Regina's line at the beginning of the episode make sense upon rewatch ("No matter what happens from now on, there's going to be this child.  You're tied together in a way In a way we'll never be."

Dumb as it was, that was a case of a retcon that works. It's totally in character for Regina to do something out of spite or revenge that hurts herself more than it hurts the person she's trying to hurt (and yet she still feels like a victim). And it explains her creepy obsession with other people's children -- even if she hadn't thought about having kids, once she knew she couldn't, she may have started feeling the loss. If you go back and look at earlier episodes, like the Hansel and Gretel one or "Welcome to Storybrooke," you can slot in this information and it makes perfect sense and even explains so much.

 

Is Snow's Lake Nostos story actually in the book? And how much information was included? It's been hard to tell how much of what we see in the fairybacks is actually in the book. There's really very little text in the bits of the book we've seen, just big pictures and a few lines, so I suspect there's a lot missing from the book that we know but they may not if all they know about an incident is what's in the book.

 

Up until Robin, I don't think Regina had much thought about whether or not she could get pregnant. For the time of the curse, it would have been impossible anyway because of time not moving (though I suppose she could suddenly have found herself pregnant by Graham once the curse broke and things started moving again), and then she didn't really have any suitable candidates until Robin, who's been gone a few months. Now she might start looking for a cure. But if I were her, I'd wait a while before going there with him because he's awfully fickle. And that would mean he'd have children with three different women. That's getting into pro athlete territory.

[KAOS Agent]

Regina may not know, I guess, but as an audience member I do know that it's a relatively easy fix. So I end up feeling like a cold bitch because I don't really care. It's unnecessary angst just for angst sake.  The thing is that Regina likes to spill all of her woes. In this case, that would be a good thing because she'd totally tell her BFF Snow about her inability to conceive and the potion and so on and then Snow would tell her the magical fix. It's not secret information and there are people within Regina's immediate circle that know the cure, so I'm left cold by it. It's a major problem that this show suffers from in that they've created so many magical items/fixes that so often I spend a lot of time thinking well just use X item, you idiots. Problem solved. There's too little drama involved because they can always pull out the magical spatula and turn back time to fix things or whatever. 

 

Is it wrong that I don't want her to have any plans to have kids with Robin? It's a tie that can't be severed and I'm still pulling for a Robin death so that Regina can find someone who's not a jackass that could easily be replaced with a cardboard cutout. He is just so personality free such that his only real character trait is his very easily transferred affections when it comes to women. How stupid was it that in the AU he was still basically cardboard Robin? The Author couldn't even be bothered to give him a new persona. Probably because his regular bland persona is curse enough.

Edited May 19, 2015 by KAOS Agent

[Camera One]

For me, the other problem with the pregnancy reveal was that it felt tacked on and on both my viewings, I actually didn't feel it was too relevant to the story.  Now, in hindsight, I guess Regina was looking at a pregnant Zelena and having a light-bulb moment of, "Hey!  I just realized I destroyed my own ability to have children!  I was the one standing in the way of my happiness all along!"

[KingOfHearts]

For me, the other problem with the pregnancy reveal was that it felt tacked on and on both my viewings, I actually didn't feel it was too relevant to the story. Now, in hindsight, I guess Regina was looking at a pregnant Zelena and having a light-bulb moment of, "Hey! I just realized I destroyed my own ability to have children! I was the one standing in the way of my happiness all along!"

If that was the point, they totally failed at bringing it across. The only obvious connection I saw was Zelena mentioning Cora, which triggered Regina's memory. The barrenness is a missing puzzle piece that explains a character's actions over the course of several seasons, but I found it unnecessary. As a post above states, one magical item and it's fixed. There's no drama because Regina already has a kid and potentially a stepson. She's never shown a great need to have a biological child until her comment regarding Zelena's relationship with Robin.

It's a reveal that fits but it doesn't really add anything. It's worthy to be noted just to fill out the character details, but the show acted like it was some big reveal or a source of tension when it's really not.

[KAOS Agent]

There are so many moments that we've seen on the show that would have been better suited to Regina having this light bulb moment. I mean, wouldn't the part where she killed her son have been a better memory to see that she's her own worst enemy over that one time she took a potion to spite her mother? What about that time she walked away from the tavern? Or when she murdered her father to cast the curse that left her dissatisfied and bored within days? Suddenly, though, her infertility (something which has never come up before) is the impetus for this great revelation.

 

Regina's been getting in the way of her own happiness for 50 years now and this is what it took to realize that. Counter that with a two minute conversation between Hook & Emma where he basically says nothing her parents can do is going to be enough and she's only hurting herself with her actions, so just accept that it's not something that can be truly fixed and move on. Or Maleficent's two minute conversation with Lily saying the same thing. Both Lily and Emma listened to these words, processed them and moved on. We've seen several conversations with Regina over the seasons where she was told the exact same thing and never paid it any mind, but pregnant Zelena reminds her of this one time and suddenly she has an epiphany that she's her own problem. 

[Lieutenant]

I personally hope that Regina isn't magically "healed" and able to have kids again.  I'd really love it if something done in rashness, anger, and with intent to hurt others finally sticks on this show (even if she hurt herself in the process).  That's what happens in the real world.  Often poor decisions made have lasting consequences.  We can wish they were different, and wish we could change the result, but it's not gonna happen.  That's life.

[YaddaYadda]

Regina dismissed Cruella and Ursula as nowhere near as bad as her, so Cruella clearly didn't try very hard to find a loophole, at least in her Enchanted Forest days.  She was also reluctant to go with Rumple in "Darkness on the Edge of Town".  Not to mention you'd think the Chernobog would go after her as the one with the darkest potential, if she wasn't reined in by the Writer's words.

 

Cruella seemed to be perfectly contented with the life she had in the Enchanted Forest.  She said so herself.  And she seemed okay living in that large mansion until the feds came and took everything away from her.  The line for her that doesn't fit is the one where she says she will never go back to where she started.  I thought she was some very poor girl who had to claw herself out of that and fight (or marry into) what she had.  So that line was just weird, along with the aren't you tired of being ordinary.  Rumple didn't even know that Cruella could not kill anyone.  And honestly, does that even apply in the LwM?  That was written by a magical quill.

 

We've seen several conversations with Regina over the seasons where she was told the exact same thing and never paid it any mind, but pregnant Zelena reminds her of this one time and suddenly she has an epiphany that she's her own problem.

 

That's because Regina always knows better than everyone else or because according to Regina no one understands her or whatever, she is the only one who has had a tyrannical mother, a dead lover and so on.  She believes that she's the only person who has ever suffered.

 

And if Regina is cured, would they saddle Robin with 3 kids?  I mean we don't know if Zelena's baby will be born or not, so I guess that leaves the door open for Regina and Robin to have children, but after her epiphany, I don't think they're going there with Regina at all.  She said she already has a child, Henry and she has a 5-6 year old to mother in Roland, I just don't see them giving her a bio child.  

[Dani-Ellie]

From KingOfHearts in the Ratings thread:

 

 

 

Emma as the Dark One is a bit counter-productive to what the show is about. The main protagonist going "evil" when the hope and family message is the foundation just doesn't work for casual audiences. It's not particularly exciting or appealing and it's a continuation of a 4B plot that did horribly like the others. You stick with Emma, who's been working to be a hero this whole time, then find out that's all being undone due to magic contrivance. It's disappointing because we all know this show can't handle angles like that.

 

(I'm taking this from the casual watcher perspective. I don't believe this really undoes Emma's arc or makes her evil, but it definitely appears that way at first glance.)

 

I disagree. It's not like they had Emma be all, "Screw being the savior, I want to go take a walk on the dark side." She did this because she's the savior. Before following any discussion here or elsewhere, I thought it was quite clear that Emma made this decision as a stopgap. She did it to buy everyone time to find Merlin and figure out a way to destroy the darkness once and for all. She did what Merlin did way back when: tether it to a human soul so it wouldn't lay waste to all the lands. She turned around and told her parents to figure out a way to get the darkness out of her once she did it, and she gave Hook a reason to fight by telling him she loved him. She may have made herself the Dark One but her reason for doing so was heroic in and of itself. She still is the hero for the casual audience to root for, and now they get to root for the darkness to be vanquished.

Edited May 19, 2015 by Dani-Ellie

[orza]

Emma as the Dark One is a bit counter-productive to what the show is about. The main protagonist going "evil" when the hope and family message is the foundation just doesn't work for casual audiences. It's not particularly exciting or appealing and it's a continuation of a 4B plot that did horribly like the others. You stick with Emma, who's been working to be a hero this whole time, then find out that's all being undone due to magic contrivance. It's disappointing because we all know this show can't handle angles like that.

 

Yeah, speak for yourself. I watch the show with a bunch of kids and they and their friends all loved this past season. They think dark Emma is cool and are looking forward to season 5. They are the target demographic for this show so I think it will be fine.

[YaddaYadda]

From the RadioGirl27

My mom is a casual fan of the show. She watches it every week, but it's not obsessed about it and she doesn't mind spoilers. So today when she asked me about the finale and I told her that Emma was the new Dark One her answer has been: "Oh, no. That's horrible. I'm not going to watch next season". She trully hates the idea of Emma as the Dark One. So, I think that, if A&E aren't really careful with the way they treat this storyline, they can loose more casual/non obsessed fans than they think they would.

 

Maybe I'm in the minority to believe this, but this is one thing that was planned on all along by A&E.  I don't think they woke up one morning in season 4 and decided that Emma was going to be the new Dark One.

 

Emma and Rumple have paralleled each other, a lot.  They are the complete opposite of each other.  When faced with the dame dilemmas or set of problems to fix, they will always go the opposite direction.

 

I don't think the conversation between Emma and Rumple in 408 was for nothing, it illustrated both characters' journey.  Back in season 1, i can't remember which episode, Zoso told Rumple that he recognized a desperate soul which is something Rumple also told Emma.  He knows how to recognize a desperate soul.

 

But Emma has grown since season 1.  She's not the same woman.  She has embraced her son, allowed her parents in, opened her life to a man she is now in love with.  Everyone and everything life has given her since season 1, she has embraced and taken in a 100%.  

 

What she did in the finale was heroic.  She prevented people from getting killed and the town to be destroyed.  

 

So yeah, she's become the new Dark One, but Emma is not the same person Rumple is.  She's the ultimate hero and maybe it's a too optimistic view of things, but this is still her journey.  And before anyone pipes up about Regina, I'm gonna go ahead and disagree with you right now.

 

It's Emma we got to see bond with Henry and it's Emma we got to see form an attachment and a bond with her mother and her father (even though that still needs a lot of work) and it's Emma's love story we are seeing on screen.

 

So this is Emma's journey from Lost Girl, to not so Lost Girl anymore to Dark One and then to coming back from that.  Every hero walks on the dark side in every single TV show.  It's happened before, it will still happen tomorrow.

[FurryFury]

Yeah, speak for yourself. I watch the show with a bunch of kids and they and their friends all loved this past season. They think dark Emma is cool and are looking forward to season 5. They are the target demographic for this show so I think it will be fine.

Kids are not the target demographic, this is not Disney or even ABC Family. People 18-49 are target demo, specifically, women. Sure, some of them may watch it with children (even if personally, I would never do it because of all the unapologetic rape going on - if it's not violent, it doesn't mean it's not rape), but this is a show for adults.

[Trini]

 

Every hero walks on the dark side in every single TV show.  It's happened before, it will still happen tomorrow.

 

Yes, but this show goes back and forth way too much. And I'm tired of it. This casual viewer is passing on season 5.

[stealinghome]

but this is a show for adults.

At least theoretically!

 

I personally find that wanting to be both a kids' show and an adults' show has hurt OUAT. You can tell that they want to cater to both demographics--the adult 18-49 viewers and the Disney-obsessed kids--and it shows, often in not good ways.

[KingOfHearts]

 

I disagree. It's not like they had Emma be all, "Screw being the savior, I want to go take a walk on the dark side." She did this because she's the savior.

That's not how its going to read to audiences coming back, though. That's my point. It's not appealing and only people who have been intently watching will know that this was done out of sacrifice and does not mean she'll go evil. It's not suitable marketing-wise as a cliffhanger to keep people interested in the next season. Again, this is from the perspective of the returning casual watcher.

 

 

There are so many moments that we've seen on the show that would have been better suited to Regina having this light bulb moment.

The irony is that Regina already had the light bulb moment two seasons ago and for the same reason - Cora. In 2x02, she decided to redeem herself because she didn't want to become her mother. This was the catalyst for her entire redemption and was by far more believable than what we got in Zelena's cell. Then Cora came back and well... that trainwrecked for no reason.

Edited May 20, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Shanna Marie]

I think one of the issues I have with the Dark Emma possibilities is that it will make the series itself go darker, and just about everything went off the deep end in darkness for the end of this season. I've joked about the Writers Guild Suicide Pact, but way too many things I watch had a character turned into the villain at the end. Up until now, the villains on this show have been "fantasy" characters -- over-the-top figures out of Disney-type stories. We have Regina's crazy eyes, elaborate wardrobe and fireballs, Sparkle Dark Giggling Imp Rumple, Cora the Queen of Hearts, Captain Hook, Peter Pan, Ingrid the Snow Queen, Cruella, Ursula, Maleficent. With the exception of season one Mayor Mills Regina and Mr. Gold Rumple, it seems like the more evil they are, the more outrageous they are, and vice versa. As any of these characters get redeemed or start behaving less like villains, they become more down-to-earth. Hook ditched most of the pirate get-up, you'd never know that Storybrooke Maleficent was even Maleficent, and even Regina has become more normal.

 

But now we've got Emma, perhaps the most down-to-earth and normal character, the one who's essentially the viewpoint character for the audience as the outsider being introduced to all this stuff, turned into the Dark One. I'm holding out hope that this will be kind of a fake-out, where there will be a real villain who's able to take advantage of the distraction of Dark Emma and that Dark Emma won't be the main villain or even a villain at all, just someone who's struggling to hold it all together long enough for them to find a solution. But it's hard to hope that on a show that seems determined to tear down heroes and make them equal to villains. It's just a little too dark to have the viewpoint character turn into the Dark One. At least on series like Angel, the darkness was built into the concept of the character -- we always knew Angel had Angelus within him. But Emma has been specifically shown to have no real dark side. When tested with darkness, she resisted it. I would love her to be a contrast to Rumple by showing that the Dark One doesn't have to go evil with the power, but on this show? Not bloody likely.

[Dani-Ellie]

I don't know, I think expecting that the casual viewer can't follow what the Apprentice told the characters moments before the scene in the street is underestimating the casual viewer a touch.

 

Apprentice: Long before your stories began, the Sorcerer battled the darkness. He was able to keep it from consuming the realms. He tethered it to a human soul that could be controlled with a dagger.

 

Emma even references this in the scene in the street:

 

Emma: The Apprentice told me, we have to do what the Sorcerer did. We have to tether it to a person to contain it.

 

When she steps forward, Regina says there has to be another way, and Emma sadly says there isn't. I think the fact that Emma is sacrificing herself for the good of all is quite clear here.

[Camera One]

For me, my problem with Dark Emma is that there are still so many aspects of Emma AS Emma that I want to see.  I think Emma as a regular person still has a lot of potential for growth and for development of relationships and her place in the world, and as a viewer, that is what I want explored.  Similarly, I am more interested in Mary Margaret/Snow and David as themselves, as parents who never really got to be parents and as rulers who never got to be rulers, than as baby-nappers.  Why does the show always feel the need to create a brand new mess for characters to deal with, instead of building organically on what's already there?

Edited May 20, 2015 by Camera One

[YaddaYadda]

Why does the show always feel the need to create a brand new mess for characters to deal with, instead of building organically on what's already there?

 

Because they think conversations and character growth is boring.

 

One of the best things during season 1 was the character interaction.  Nowadays, we get comments like well if Captain Swan fans want to see Emma and Hook watch Netflix while having pizza, it's not going to happen.  I'm using this as an example because that's the example they used but it can be applied to all the characters and relationships on the show.  

Edited May 20, 2015 by YaddaYadda

[KAOS Agent]

 

It's not appealing and only people who have been intently watching will know that this was done out of sacrifice and does not mean she'll go evil. It's not suitable marketing-wise as a cliffhanger to keep people interested in the next season.

 

This does bring up an interesting point. Previous seasons featured the marketing of iconic villains. Come watch the Wicked Witch of the West, Maleficent, Ursula, Cruella, the Queen of Hearts and the Evil Queen battle the heroes! Hey we're in Neverland! Now we're in Oz! Check out Arendelle! Last season, they had Frozen as a draw. Next season's marketing would be to come watch Evil!Emma. That's not overly inspiring in terms of getting an already apathetic viewing public to tune in (and before anyone gets all disturbed about casual references to the Once audience, I will express that I am discussing the fact that the overall audience for television in general has been dropping precipitously because it is competing with all kinds of other forms of media - but if we want to get super factual, Once lost five million viewers last season, so regardless of how much anyone may personally enjoy the show, clearly millions weren't inspired to continue tuning in). 

 

Watching the crazy eyed Evil Queen was fun, seeing the over the top scenery chewing of Zelena or the fun quippiness of Cruella can encourage someone to check it out. There was deep drama and interesting character moments, but the over the top nature of these villains helped keep their darker ambitions somewhat lighter and more fun. How do you make the rather sad story of a woman sacrificing her humanity after working so damn hard to find happiness into the fun often campy story that people tune in to watch? Tie this into the mess of character destruction and very dark tone of 4B and there's not a whole lot of fun fairytale adventure to encourage viewers to tune in next season.

[ParadoxLost]

Isn't the draw supposed to be Camelot, however that is worked in?

 

I remain unconvinced that just because they mentioned Merlin that we'll get Camelot.  They didn't come close to setting up Camelot like they did Frozen or Neverland.  The focus was more on Dark One Emma with Merlin as a side mention.  Its entirely possible they'll just find Merlin in the psychedelic fire cave and that's it.  I'll start to believe it when there are signs that they are casting a realm.

[KingOfHearts]

 

Isn't the draw supposed to be Camelot, however that is worked in?

I'm not sure about that. Whenever the show had something new that was supposed to be appealing, it always took center stage at the end of the finale. End of S1 had magic coming back and the curse breaking, end of S2 had Neverbacks and the epic boat trip, and end of S3 had Elsa's big reveal. An apprentice murmuring Merlin's name isn't exactly a grand entrance for Camelot. From what I saw, the biggest setup for S5 was Dark Emma. That's where it ended.

Edited May 20, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Rumsy4]

I guess it depends on how much the network is willing to give for new set budget, considering the Frozen arc didn't do much to retain viewership. Oz was poorly utilized in 3B. Neverland was a bunch of potted plants. At best, Camelot may just be the reworked Enchanted Forest shoot location.

[RadioGirl27]

 

But Emma has been specifically shown to have no real dark side. When tested with darkness, she resisted it. I would love her to be a contrast to Rumple by showing that the Dark One doesn't have to go evil with the power, but on this show? Not bloody likely.

I actually think that, in the end, the Dark Emma storyline is going to be more about Rumple than about Emma, and that A&E are going to use it to explain Rumple, his actions and choices. It depends on whether they want to redeem him or not. If they want to redeem him, Emma, no matter how hard she tries, won't be able to control the Darkness, and if Emma, the Savior and the product of True Love, can't resist it, we can't expect that someone as weak and coward as Rumple could have done it, can we?. But if they don't want to redeem him, Emma would be able to control the Darkness and when faced with the same choices as Rumple was (love vs power) she would make the right choice, showing that Rumple was always a terrible person that made his own bad decisions.

So, yeah, Emma and her family (well, at least Hook) are going to get some important moments and some great character development from this storyline, but, in the end, everything is going to be about Rumple.

Edited May 20, 2015 by RadioGirl27