A Thread for All Seasons: OUaT Across All Realms

[andromeda331]

1 minute ago, Curio said:

I definitely agree that's it's one of Regina's better scenes in Season 5 because she's the one getting all the character development by speaking her mind. But when you look at the scene through Emma's perspective, that's where it falls apart for me because Emma's character development has to be silenced in order to bolster Regina's development. If it was Regina monologuing to a mirror or talking to Rumple or even Zelena, her speech would have been a lot more poignant.

That's where it always falls apart for me too. Regina speaking her mind? Getting character development? Great, except she's once again talking to one of her victims who is never allowed to point out how Regina ruined her life. Never allowed to bring up her issues because they all stem from being sent away as a baby because of Regina. 

[YaddaYadda]

They belittled everything Emma went through in season 5 with the Dark One to make Regina's monologue work for Regina. You were the Dark One, but you didn't give into it. Well she didn't give into it because she was stopped. She didn't kill because she was stopped by Hook. She could have snapped Arthur's neck, but she didn't because Hook was standing right there. She was going to kill Zelena, but Hook took a leap of faith and freed her instead so that she could get away. 

That's the difference they should have pointed out in the dialogue as to why Emma didn't fall into that precipice. 

Emma as the Dark One is sort of the middle of Regina's story. When Regina gave into becoming the EQ, there was the Daniel situation and how she could never get him back, Rumple's manipulations because he wanted her to cast the curse. 

I think this is where the parallel runs, and then the paths diverge. 

I don't understand what happened between 5x08 and 5x22. In 5x08, Regina was all I get it, it's good to be bad, using dark magic, hiding behind it. It all feels really good, so it's not like Regina didn't understand there was a struggle there for Emma. I mean she knew it was there, she saw Emma talking to no one in 5x02.

In 5x22, it became about how Regina was the only one who ever suffered, which makes what Emma endured, the burdens she carried around mean nothing because here's the greatest sufferer who ever suffered from suffering. 

Hook coming back doesn't negate what Emma went through. The reason Emma didn't give into the darkness like Regina did was because her goals were different from hers, her happy ending was completely different, and even then, Emma was looking for retribution against Zelena because she chose her as the person that would be sacrificed.

I was thinking about something Snow told Emma back in season 2 after they came back from the EF and Anton was harvesting the magic beans. She told her that the Land without Magic was nothing but cruel to her, and it just made me wanna kick something because let's not blame the people responsible for that.

[Camera One]

The long monologue in the finale was well delivered by the actress, but it didn't even make sense within Regina's arc of growth and redemption.  She could have said the same thing at the beginning of Season 4.  I had no clue she hated doing good all this time, and who knew her base impulse was as violent as ripping Hook's throat out.  

[YaddaYadda]

I think it's about rewards when it comes to Regina. She isn't good because she wants to be, she's good because of the reward she gets from it, Henry's love, family and friends. The love, being called a hero, are her treat, she doesn't necessarily enjoy the work that goes into being good, but the end result is good enough that she does it. She doesn't like it, but reward.

The dialogue in 5x22 made it sound like the reward wasn't enough anymore, but that losing all of it all at once, she wasn't really ready for that. 

[Camera One]

I watched the second and third episode of 5B with my friend last night, and I think the first three episodes with "the rescue of Hook" was a decent start to the season, with a clear focus to the main characters' goals, and still mostly enjoyable on rewatch.  I like the mood that was set for the Underworld.  Even though the Hercules episode was clearly filler, I really liked the bond between the younger and older Snow and the Hercules actor.  I felt like I could appreciate the episode and Ginny Goodwin's performance more, without the initial disappointment.  

The third episode's ending had a couple of things we now know went nowhere or wasn't resolved (despite what Adam said on Twitter), such as Milah being thrown into the river, and Hades' blackmail of Rumple and having Rumple "work" for Hades.  I think to enjoy these episodes, you really can't think too hard, because Hades is really vindictive towards Hook in these three episodes, but it made little sense that he knew Emma was rescuing Hook and not only did he do nothing about it, he let Hook and his "hope" go back up to the surface.  Surely, this would bring even more hope to the heroes, and perhaps even the citizens of Underbrooke.  The three tombstones "cliffhanger" felt even more dumb.  These characters already had no way of escape.  It was just redundant to have a few of their names chiseled as well.  

There were a few things that I now "understand" due to forum explanations.  I now realize that the dumb horse was to show Regina got her magic back.  I think the Writers felt she *needed* to make her magic work at that point since she knew she had to do the heart-splitting for Emma.  But since that was never spelled out, there was no urgency for her magic not working.  I think the horse was also meant to be a message from beyond from Daniel, which was so unnecessary.  Either Robin Hood or Charming deserved the C arc more.  

I also never realized that the boat Rumple, Milah and Emma were on, could have allowed them all to escape the Underworld, and that's why Hades wanted it destroyed.  It still isn't very clear.  The whole way in which they got down to the underground, to get that boat, etc. was way too easy.  I doubt Hades allows anyone to enter the depths as long as they're dead.  And why didn't they enter through the caves?  What was the point of entering from Emma's basement except maybe to show us the cradle and mobile in cobwebs?

The sequence of events was a little off when watched one after another.  Rumple was MIA in Episode 2, yet at the beginning of Episode 3, he enters his shop and reads Peter Pan's note, but Emma later said he spent all of "yesterday" hiding in his shop.  So what was he doing and why didn't he read Peter Pan's note until the next day?  I suppose he could have been contemplating whether to use the shop materials, or maybe Peter Pan was still there yesterday, but it still made me wonder and took me out of the episode.  

In the second episode, they also had Henry in the Mayor's office for a huge length of time.  While he was there, Hercules made his first attempt on Cerebrus, failed, Mary Margaret had a pity party, then she went to find Hercules and convince him to fight, then the giant dog crashed the loft, then they had the big defeat of Cerebus, then they went to the diner to celebrate and Mary Margaret doesn't want to be Mary Margaret anymore.  THEN, Henry came out of the Mayor office.  Did he and Cruella have a five course meal while they talked?  

Overall, I think 5B was still okay by the third episode.

Edited August 25, 2016 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

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That's where it always falls apart for me too. Regina speaking her mind? Getting character development? Great, except she's once again talking to one of her victims who is never allowed to point out how Regina ruined her life. Never allowed to bring up her issues because they all stem from being sent away as a baby because of Regina. 

That scene really, really belonged in S4. The subject matter matched perfectly for Regina's themes in S4. Just replace Hook with Marian. If S4 was comprised of more scenes like that, it would have been far more tolerable than the ridiculous Author plot that ended up having zero relevance to Regina.

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I think to enjoy these episodes, you really can't think too hard

5B passes off as okay if you don't think too hard. Cora's ascension into the light is sweet if you don't think about it. Hades is a formidable villain if you don't question his lack of backstory. The moments with Milah are nice if you forget she gets thrown into the RoLS without really getting rescued. 

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I also never realized that the boat Rumple, Milah and Emma were on, could have allowed them all to escape the Underworld, and that's why Hades wanted it destroyed.  It still isn't very clear.  The whole way in which they got down to the underground, to get that boat, etc. was way too easy. 

For some reason I found that all confusing too. When Rumple threw Milah into the river, I thought Hades was controlling his magic for some reason because he said something like he would pay. But now I realize that was just him covering up his own tracks. The writers really had to jump through a few hoops to get Milah and Emma working together while also getting rid of her by the end of the episode.

[Camera One]

Rumple claimed to have been in Underbrooke last time he died.  But he didn't encounter Milah at all, even though she was constantly on Main Street where Rumple's shop was?  Rumple "died" the same time as Peter Pan last time, so did they fight over Gold's Shop?  Hades didn't try to take revenge on Rumple for "killing" Zelena?  And then Rumple knew exactly how to get into the underground, plus that crap about sharing the "aura of the dead" so they wouldn't be detected.

When Rumple threw Milah into the river, I thought Hades was controlling his magic for some reason because he said something like he would pay. But now I realize that was just him covering up his own tracks. The writers really had to jump through a few hoops to get Milah and Emma working together while also getting rid of her by the end of the episode.

Yeah, Hades kept telling Rumple he could've destroyed the boat, but he really wanted Rumple to destroy the boat.  They also had Rumple do the sad-face afterwards, and even had Hades voice that Rumple was *really* affected by what he did, and Rumple said out loud that he never wants to do something so horrible again.  Then Hades said he was really mad Rumple was keeping secrets from him... why, when the baby contract has nothing to do with Hades?  I still don't know what the point of all this was.  I'm wondering if they wanted to get rid of Milah since they didn't want to/didn't know how to write a reunion conversion between her and Hook.  

[Camera One]

I was reading this interview with the actor who played Hercules, and I kind of find it funny how actors sometimes research their roles, when there's really no point.

Sorry for the nested quotes... this function has been really messed up lately and I can't fix it.

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Interviewer: Because you made quite the splash in the Once Upon A Time fandom, can you talk a little bit about Hercules and how you prepared for the role?

JW: Yeah, for sure. Upfront, when I had actually auditioned for it they didn’t post it as Hercules, they posted it as ‘a strapping young lad,’ and I remember going into the room and there were all these guys that were like six foot five and bearded and huge and I just had the mentality that I wasn’t going to get it. It wasn’t until two weeks after that I found out that it was Hercules. From there it was kind of like, I felt a lot of pressure, because it was definitely a character that I grew up with and I knew a lot of people loved those films, obviously, and I really wanted to do it justice. I looked at the whole spectrum, I looked back at the Disney films, and into the actual mythology, the Rock’s interpretation, even [laughs] Ryan Gosling’s interpretation. Just to get pieces from each and see which tidbits I could grab. And I brought my own spin to it, while still trying to keep true to the Disney series. It was nice, because at the time I was just bulking up for the sake of bulking up and it was perfect timing because I was weighing 170 pounds at the time, which is the most I’ve ever weighed in my life, so things kind of just worked out really well.

 

 

Interviewer: And you got to work with Ginnifer Goodwin as well, was it intimidating at all coming into an already extremely popular TV series, with such a talented cast? 

JW: Yeah. It’s always kind of that way with a guest star. You’re coming into an established show, with a cast who have been with each other for a long time. Upfront, I always find it nerve wracking to find your space on set, but with Ginnifer, I never felt intimidated by her– she was so welcoming and she was so open to answering questions that I had. The first day I had on set were the scenes when we were on the docks and she was just ready to answer any question I had. I was picking her brain about how she interpreted Snow, how was it taking Snow White in such a different path from the Disney films. And how she tackled it. I feel like her words of wisdom really helped me that day and helped me for the rest of the shoot. She’s a phenomenal actress, and I would love to work with her again.

http://nowhitenoise.com/2016/04/the-100-star-jonathan-whitesell-talks-on-screen-romance-with-jarod-joseph-and-his-stint-as-hercules-on-once-upon-a-time/

Edited August 25, 2016 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

Rewatching 5A. I keep getting reminded of all the dropped or pointless plots. Merida? Pointless. Guinevere? Never de-sanded. Dopey? Still a tree. Dwarves coming to Camelot? They do nothing. Merlin's warning? Last minute and doesn't make sense. The arc has great setups, but it's definitely different knowing what happens (or doesn't happen) later.

I do, however, love how Camelot tries to appear so glamorous. It really compliments the twist that comes later on.

Edited August 26, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Shanna Marie]

I watched "The Dark Swan" last night for maybe the first time since it originally aired, and now I want to go to the alternate universe where we get the season that was set up in that episode. It really makes you wonder how much they actually had planned at that point and how much of that episode was just them throwing in stuff that sounded good at the time, and they made up the rest later.

Set up in that episode that was either contradicted later or not paid off later:

• The wand required both light and dark -- but Regina, who wasn't able to use it in this episode, was later able to use it to open a portal to send Zelena away. We spent about half the episode with them finding a way to make Zelena use it because Regina couldn't, and then later Regina was able to use it, with no explanation as to why, no concern about the fact that it meant she was darker. Actually, that wand seemed like a setup about needing both light and dark, which they never really dealt with.
• Emma struggling against the Darkness and finding that she was either tempted to use it or using it unconsciously -- we didn't see much more of that. We knew she wasn't sleeping and was going crazy from the Rumple in her head, but then later the crazy seems to have gone by the wayside. She seemed to have more trouble in this episode and even did more stuff that was actually dark than she did later when she was full-on dark.
• Merlin's cryptic warning not to pull Excalibur -- that was a really weird thing to warn Emma about since pulling Excalibur was never the problem. It didn't even nearly cause a problem. The problem was her saving Hook. Maybe that should have been the cryptic warning: "You can't save him. You mustn't save him, no matter how much it hurts you to lose him." Things had already gone horribly wrong by the time she had Excalibur pulled. I guess maybe the only problem was that uniting the sword and dagger after they took it out of the stone meant that she couldn't control Hook anymore, and that was what led to him letting the Dark Ones in, but then the warning needed to be about uniting the sword and dagger. She needed the sword out to control Hook. They've have been in the same trouble if she'd left the sword in the stone. In fact, Hook wouldn't have been able to stop the Dark Ones without the sword, so they'd have been worse off if she'd listened to Merlin.
• Given what happened later and how it all came about with Hook, maybe we should have at least had one glimpse of Nimue here, to show that she was trying to take over Emma and use her. That might have set up things for later. Emma might have resisted her and gone back to Head Rumple. Even the slightest appearance -- maybe instead of the warthog? -- would have set up the later plot.
• There was that whole scene of the dwarfs wanting to come along to be part of the adventure. That went totally by the wayside. They were in the background for the ball, but did we even see them again in Camelot after that?
• The way they showed the diner returning at the end wasn't consistent with the Dark Curse. The Dark Curse remained unnecessary, since Storybrooke already existed. The diner was brought back, like it was brought through a portal rather than anything Dark Curse-like. I get the feeling that when they wrote this episode, they hadn't yet thought of using the Dark Curse to get them back.
• Merida wasn't bad here. What happened to her vow not to give in to her own darkness to save her brothers? What would you call conking Belle on the head and kidnapping her?
• The Dark Swan appearance at the end was strictly for shock value and ended up having nothing to do with what happened later. You can kind of squint and imagine that the way she looked at Hook and said she was doing this because she was the Dark One might have hinted about what was going on with him. Otherwise, nothing about her behavior holds up to the way the story later unfolded, like her going out of her way to creep Snow out and her criticizing them for failing her (when it turns out that they didn't, other than being general-purpose idiots. It all happened because of decisions she made).

So now I want to see the season that really delved into the nature of light and dark, contrasting darkness with light and sometimes mixing it. I want to see the dwarfs being involved in the adventure. I want to see the consequences of pulling Excalibur from the stone. I want to see Merlin playing some kind of role. I want to see more of Emma exploring her own nature in fighting the darkness, maybe using the fact that she had her own darkness removed so that she's different. I want to see something that actually explains what she turned into. If she went that far, I want to see her doing something with that. I don't necessarily want to see her loved ones failing her, but if that's what she accuses them of, I want to see how that played out instead of it being just an act on her part. I want to see why she wants to shut them out, and I want to see them at least trying to fight for her.

[KingOfHearts]

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The wand required both light and dark -- but Regina, who wasn't able to use it in this episode, was later able to use it to open a portal to send Zelena away. We spent about half the episode with them finding a way to make Zelena use it because Regina couldn't, and then later Regina was able to use it, with no explanation as to why, no concern about the fact that it meant she was darker. Actually, that wand seemed like a setup about needing both light and dark, which they never really dealt with.

It really makes no sense that Zelena was able to yield it, considering she lacked light magic.

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Emma struggling against the Darkness and finding that she was either tempted to use it or using it unconsciously -- we didn't see much more of that. We knew she wasn't sleeping and was going crazy from the Rumple in her head, but then later the crazy seems to have gone by the wayside. She seemed to have more trouble in this episode and even did more stuff that was actually dark than she did later when she was full-on dark.

Emma and Clippy!Rumple do not work, and consequently, neither does any "real" form of Dark Swan. Clippy!Rumple's temptations are not catered toward Emma and they're mostly as clever as the devil on your shoulder from cartoons. He's basically telling her, "Hey, isn't evil fun and more convenient?" It's like someone telling you to rob a bank or steal a car. It's too easy to know better. Clippy!Rumple doesn't play much on Emma's wealth of insecurities or anything that would actually cause her to want to go dark. He could tell her how much her parents fear her now or that she's nothing but the Savior in everyone else's eyes. (Which, 4B would feed into.)

With Hook, Clippy!Rumple makes so much more sense. For one, he totally exploits his vulnerabilities. He resurfaces his pain from losing Milah and his feelings of being betrayed by Emma. Just having Rumple's face is a constant reminder of his anger and thirst for holy vengeance.

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Merida wasn't bad here. What happened to her vow not to give in to her own darkness to save her brothers? What would you call conking Belle on the head and kidnapping her?

As I said before, if Merida were only in this episode, she would be fine. This is the only place where she's portrayed as anything close to the movie version.

Edited August 27, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

I personally wasn't impressed with Merida after that first episode, and thought her turnaround at the end after she and Emma tried to kill one another was particularly ridiculous.  Though her rewatch value plummeted even further after seeing half a season of her abrasiveness.  I did actually like her in "The Bear King", so it didn't have to be this way, if A&E understood the power of moderation.

"The Dark Swan" was a weak opening episode.  I thought the Emma/Merida stuff was tedious.  The Storybrooke stuff was just uninspired obstacles to get the heroes to where Emma was.  I suppose the climax with Emma and Merida's heart might have been touching for CS fans.

A lot of the premieres seem to be a whole lot of plot-focused setup.  Many of the B-arc premieres (eg. 3B, 4B) tended to undo big shifts from the finales, to re-create a status-quo.  I think both the 5A and 5B premieres avoided falling into that trap, at least.

Edited August 27, 2016 by Camera One

[profdanglais]

This reminds me of why I stopped watching soap operas. They were always bringing in new characters who would act normal in company and then look shifty when they were alone, and say things like "No one must ever discover my terrible secret!" Then there would be a mysterious black-gloved hand removing a vial of liquid from a carved box. In the end it would turn out that the terrible secret was a child out of wedlock or that they were actually so-and-so's love child or former one-night stand. Not really that terrible. And there'd never be any explanation for the mysterious black-gloved hand. It was obvious that the writers had no idea what the terrible secret was, and would just drag things out for as long as possible until the secret had to be revealed, then make something up. 

So basically, OUAT is written like a daytime soap. 

[YaddaYadda]

9 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

• Merlin's cryptic warning not to pull Excalibur -- that was a really weird thing to warn Emma about since pulling Excalibur was never the problem. It didn't even nearly cause a problem. The problem was her saving Hook. Maybe that should have been the cryptic warning: "You can't save him. You mustn't save him, no matter how much it hurts you to lose him." Things had already gone horribly wrong by the time she had Excalibur pulled. I guess maybe the only problem was that uniting the sword and dagger after they took it out of the stone meant that she couldn't control Hook anymore, and that was what led to him letting the Dark Ones in, but then the warning needed to be about uniting the sword and dagger. She needed the sword out to control Hook. They've have been in the same trouble if she'd left the sword in the stone. In fact, Hook wouldn't have been able to stop the Dark Ones without the sword, so they'd have been worse off if she'd listened to Merlin.

They said that they decided to add that scene later in the episode to introduce Merlin, which seriously did not make sense. And if he had told her she couldn't save him, and to not save him, we would have guessed right away that something had happened to either Henry or Hook, which we had already guessed anyway. But TWIST, they couldn't sacrifice the TWIST!

If Merlin had told Emma that, and she had remembered him in 5x06 like she did, her travelling with him the next episode, with this guy who is telling her to trust him but refuses to tell her who she should let die would have changed the dynamic between them a lot, and Nimue could have preyed on that the same way she tried to prey on Emma's insecurities with the whole "don't go back to being nothing."

The Camelot arc should have 75% of the season at least. It would have been more cohesive, they would have answered the questions they left completely up in the air. If they wanted to make Hook the Dark One, they could have had him struggling with it instead of going from 0 to 100 in one fell swoop, and he could have died at the end of the season instead of episode 5x11, and they could be going to the UW in season 6, and exploring that Savior mythology there and how Saviors don't get their happy ending after Emma goes home without him.

Even for this season, the whole Savior mythology, Emma found a home, her parents, she has her son, and the man she loves was given back to her by a God, so she's clearly breaking that cycle of no "lived happily ever after".

I think they do what we do when we speculate, throw stuff against the wall to see what sticks.

[sharky]

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The Camelot arc should have 75% of the season at least. It would have been more cohesive, they would have answered the questions they left completely up in the air. If they wanted to make Hook the Dark One, they could have had him struggling with it instead of going from 0 to 100 in one fell swoop, and he could have died at the end of the season instead of episode 5x11, and they could be going to the UW in season 6, and exploring that Savior mythology there and how Saviors don't get their happy ending after Emma goes home without him.

Or 0% of the season. I know Merlin is part of the Camelot mythos, but these writers have prided themselves on not telling the typical story. Peter Pan is evil, Ursula is a good girl now, etc. So why couldn't they just go to the Camelot, find Merlin, have their adventures there and come home? Maybe you have an episode or two where they hang out with Arthur and have a dance before moving on, but that's it. You could have Hook be the Dark One in Camelot longer, really dig into the dynamic between Dark Hook and Dark Emma, have them find another way home that isn't the Dark Curse, and there you go. No need for the weirdness of Arthur in Storybrooke that is a useless plot line. No need for not tying all of that up. Problem solved.

And then you could have someone else in the Underworld helping Hook after they all leave and getting happy endings for everyone. Wouldn't it have been amazing to have Milah not die and instead help Hook? Imagine Milah, the one who left her family behind to find a happy ending for her and her son (at some point) instead finish the work her grandson started by finding happy endings in the Underworld for other people? Ohhhh....I could have so much fun writing that fanfic.....

I just finished Birth/The Bear King, which was sitting on my DVR as one two-hour block. I was so happy when I got to delete that. Birth was such a great episode, the twist was actually executed well, there's that whole Zelena stabbed Hook, but he's not dead, and OMG! Hook has that demented look on his face, Emma is frozen from the squid ink and then.... an hour of Merida. That hour had no point. It not only was a useless side story, but it totally dropped the momentum from Birth. And then we had two weeks until the next episode! I get that ABC ordered the extra hour and the writers had to scramble for something, but holy crap, that was so useless. I really hope ABC doesn't do that again this season. Or perhaps with this larger Untold Stories thing, it will at least be easier to shoehorn in an extra hour with a guest character episode.

[daxx]

Loved birth and I refuse to rewatch The Bear King. Nothing happened that was remotely integral to the plot or characterization.

[Curio]

4 hours ago, profdanglais said:

This reminds me of why I stopped watching soap operas.

So wait, did you stop watching OUAT? ;)

[Shanna Marie]

11 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

It really makes no sense that Zelena was able to yield it, considering she lacked light magic.

It should have required Regina and Zelena to team up to use it, bringing both light and dark. Then, not only do they have to trust Zelena, but Regina has to actually cooperate with her, and she has to work with Regina, thus paving the way for their 5B arc.

3 hours ago, YaddaYadda said:

If Merlin had told Emma that, and she had remembered him in 5x06 like she did, her travelling with him the next episode, with this guy who is telling her to trust him but refuses to tell her who she should let die would have changed the dynamic between them a lot, and Nimue could have preyed on that the same way she tried to prey on Emma's insecurities with the whole "don't go back to being nothing."

They could have picked anything to insert into that opening scene, as long as it actually had something to do with the plot. But if Merlin really had been holding out on Emma because he wouldn't tell her who it was she couldn't save, that would have added a lot of tension. Also, there could have been a lot of red herrings. Yeah, we'd expect it to be about Henry or Hook, or maybe David, but then there's that thing with Robin very early in the season. As soon as we saw Emma start to go crocodile after saving him, and after we saw the Furies coming to Storybrooke in the aftermath, the audience (and Emma) might have assumed that this was what Merlin was talking about, so we'd have been complacent, and then Hook would have been a sucker punch.

We needed to see Nimue talking to Emma far sooner than we did, given that Nimue was the original Dark One and the one who had an agenda. That then would have allowed us to compare the experiences of Emma and Hook, showing us how Nimue tries to use each new "host" to carry out her agenda. She apparently failed with Rumple because his own agenda was so strong. Did she even try with Emma? Then she was able to get in the driver's seat with Hook so easily.

I think I'm probably in the "more Camelot" camp, if they'd done it well. I was surprised by how much I found myself liking Arthur in this rewatch. He was a truly "grey" villain in that he initially had good, non-selfish intentions, in that he wanted to restore and repair Camelot, but he was screwed up by all Merlin's whispering and got obsessed. There was all that buildup and development of him, and then they abruptly killed him for no real reason in any way related to his story, just so he could work with Hook in the Underworld. His story really needed a better resolution. I don't think the Camelot people needed to have been dragged to Storybrooke. That's yet another reason why the Dark Curse was stupid. If the wand required dark and light, Emma should have been able to use it, with both her light magic and her Dark One magic. Or maybe Hook himself could have used it, with his Dark One magic and his good self that was buried inside. Without the Camelot people in Storybrooke, they'd have had to work harder to figure things out and they wouldn't have needed to contrive so many things to keep people like Lancelot and Merlin out of Storybrooke so they couldn't just tell them what was happening.

Basically, they wasted the Camelot plot line -- all that setup with Merlin, only to kill him off without him actually doing anything. All that setup for Arthur, only to kill him in a way that had nothing to do with his story. All that setup with Guinevere and Lancelot, only to not resolve it at all. The whole thing about "Camelot" being nothing more than a glamour, only to never resolve it.

[YaddaYadda]

The opening scene of 5x01 was as cryptic and stupid as they came knowing how Emma taking Excalibur out of the stone was her trying to destroy the darkness instead of the light. 

Merlin was powerful and all, but in the end, he was really all kinds of stupid. 

[Camera One]

Arthur started off as a grey villain, but he pretty much became full-out psycho by the 6-week ago plot in "The Broken Kingdom".  I thought he was really unbelievable and full out muhahahahahaha after that.  His present-day storyline was even worse, and consisted of ensuring our heroes acted dumber than a doorknob (the surveillance tape should have been when he was discovered, as many have suggested, given Arthur's lack of knowledge of present technology). 

Upon rewatch, it's hard to forget that so much of the "mystery" was needless.  Dark Emma disappearing in the premiere was treated like no one had any idea where she went, but multiple people should have known she just went back to the Enchanted Forest where the vault of the Dark One was.  Couldn't they have used the Door in The Sorcerer's House?  Emma was trying to use the wisps to find Merlin, but all she needed to do was ask where Camelot was.  Except The Apprentice never mentioned anything about Camelot, or Merlin's fate or Arthur, because ???   Even if The Apprentice died before he could say anything (though he actually had plenty of time), I just cannot believe that Blue would not know that Merlin was trapped in a tree, given how close Camelot was.  Belle knew about of the existence of Camelot.  Did she not pore over The Dark One chronicles in the library, given how she looooooooves to read, and she would want to know more about Rumple?  Were none of Camelot's stories in Henry's book?   The Writers tried to ensure the characters were as blind as the viewers with regards to Merlin, Camelot, Arthur and The Dark One in the first two or three episodes of 5A, pretty much because The Apprentice was *that* stupid.

Edited August 27, 2016 by Camera One

[sharky]

50 minutes ago, YaddaYadda said:

The opening scene of 5x01 was as cryptic and stupid as they came knowing how Emma taking Excalibur out of the stone was her trying to destroy the darkness instead of the light. 

Merlin was powerful and all, but in the end, he was really all kinds of stupid. 

Actually, he was pretty smart about that one. He probably saw that the whole getting Excalibur and trying to reunite the blades and blah blah blah was just going to lead to his death. But his self preservation was very vague, wasn't it?

There is the other factor of Merlin not knowing everything. He mentions to Hook when they storm the prison that some things are hazy for him or he can't see everything. It's like a random throw away line that can cover the writers' asses when they can't explain why Merlin doesn't know this or that.

[Shanna Marie]

9 minutes ago, sharky said:

Actually, he was pretty smart about that one. He probably saw that the whole getting Excalibur and trying to reunite the blades and blah blah blah was just going to lead to his death.

But his warning to Emma was not to take Excalibur from the stone. At the time of his death, it was already out of the stone because of Arthur. He was already dead when Emma had the option of getting the sword out of the stone. Emma removing Excalibur from the stone had nothing to do with Merlin's death. The only potential bad from what Emma did when she disregarded his warning was if she'd used it on Zelena. That might have darkened Emma for good, even if she'd removed the Darkness from herself and Hook. Though if she removed the Dark One, I'm not sure how that would have sent her over the edge. But Hook got in the way of that happening (even though he was the Dark One at the time -- still not sure how him not remembering becoming the Dark One kept Nimue or Head Rumple from being able to pop up and remind him). Otherwise, I can't see what the dire consequences were. With Excalibur in the stone, they still didn't have a way to control Hook. Without the whole sword, Hook wouldn't have been able to stop the Dark Ones. From the point Emma had the sword taken out of the stone, other than the possible damage to Zelena, everything bad that happened would have happened with or without the sword, and the sword was necessary for the good.

1 hour ago, Camera One said:

Dark Emma disappearing in the premiere was treated like no one had any idea where she went, but multiple people should have known she just went back to the Enchanted Forest where the vault of the Dark One was.

Belle should have at least suggested that one, given that she was there when Rumple emerged from the vault. She may not have known for sure that's where Emma ended up, but that would have been an obvious starting point.

[Camera One]

I agree the Excalibur warning made no sense from Merlin's perspective.  Merlin's warning to Emma, "Leave the sword alone" also made no sense given that Merlin actually intended on getting Emma to reforge the sword/dagger.

A&E just likes to use dumb warnings to create intrigue.  Look at that "fantastic" use of the Neal actor to say "It won't end the way you think it will", which was pointless.  It's not like Neal could see the future from that "better place".  Why not just leave it at I'm worried because Hades is powerful and the Underworld is hard to escape?  Or better yet, have Henry dreaming instead, so Neal could actually have a final moment with his son?

Basically, the "You will have the opportunity to remove Excalibur from its stone. But you mustn't." warning was so the audience would wonder and worry when we got the reveal at the end of Episode 2 that Emma had Excalibur.  They replayed the warning at the end of Episode 7, to make it dire that Dark Swan was reforging the sword.

I suppose the Writers could explain that Merlin had a single restricted premonition of Dark Swan reforging the sword with the black hoods stretching out in front of her, and that's what caused him to make that warning, despite not even knowing what the context of that scene was.  But however way we cut it, the warning was a nonsensical red herring.

Edited August 27, 2016 by Camera One

[YaddaYadda]

The show is good at bringing stuff up and not addressing it.

See Emma's nursery in the UW. 

Adam: It's about Emma's lost childhood.

Me: *bangs head on wall* you brought it up, why aren't you talking about it?

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

Me: *bangs head on wall* you brought it up, why aren't you talking about it?

The writers are creepily self-aware of what they try to avoid with all their being. Eventually, it all seeps out here and there. At some points they seem to know Emma's relationship with her parents is not well-developed or that Regina blames everyone else for her problems. It's those moments of awareness that make me question how blind the writers truly are to their own wish fulfillment and ADD writing style.

Edited August 27, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

Me: *bangs head on wall* you brought it up, why aren't you talking about it?

Almost everything is at an Easter-Egg level of depth, that's why.  They can pat themselves on the back for the cleverness of having Emma's cobweb crib and mobile at her house, and then have Regina wave away the impact by telling Snow that she got Emma back, so what's the big deal?

[profdanglais]

On 27 August 2016 at 4:47 PM, Curio said:

So wait, did you stop watching OUAT? ;)

If it weren't for CS, I'd have been gone in S3. Just like I used to watch the soaps for particular couples.... I guess maybe I don't learn my lessons. 

[Shanna Marie]

Wow, "The Price" makes so little sense in the grand context. It gets worse upon rewatching when you know what's really going on. All that talk about them needing a Savior for what's coming next and Emma goading Regina about whether she can be a Savior, and it has nothing to do with anything. We now know that Emma's probably talking about Dark Hook rather than the Fury (since we don't even know that Emma had any idea the Fury would be coming), and it's not like Emma would expect or even want Regina to play the Savior for dealing with him. She wouldn't have wanted to goad the others into gearing up to deal with him, since she had a plan to take care of him and save them both. So all of that was purely for red herring suspense and OMG moments within this episode rather than anything to do with what was really going on.

There were a few moments between Hook and Emma that took on a new meaning if you knew the truth. Some of her treatment of him, including that initial kiss when she brought him back to the house, could be read as being her just being so glad to see him back to himself again -- tying into her saying that when he woke, he'd be the man she loved. But all the stuff about her being hurt about him responding to the way she was and her smirking smile when he said that's not who he was anymore don't work in context. She was planning to remove the Darkness from both of them. She didn't want to be who/what she was, so why be hurt that he wasn't into it? And would she have smiled at knowing the truth when he said that's not who he was, or would that have been painful, since she was the one who did it to him? I'd think that would have been like a punch to the gut, not a smirk reaction, and that's where you get the feeling they didn't tell Jen what was really going on, which hampered her ability to play it honestly.

The Head Rumple stuff makes no sense when he's talking about her being able to snuff out the light when, if he's in her head, he knows exactly what her plan is. There's no reason for the entity in her head to be talking around that stuff instead of directly addressing her plan. You'd think he'd be goading her about how the plan won't work rather than talking about something that has absolutely nothing to do with what she's planning, and saying it as though it is what she's planning. Again, more about the OMG for the audience than what would actually happen.

I'm not even going to get into the other silliness that's been more than covered in the episode discussion. I'm just looking at it in terms of the arc, and as an arc episode it's utterly ridiculous.

[Camera One]

Quote

 

The Head Rumple stuff makes no sense when he's talking about her being able to snuff out the light when, if he's in her head, he knows exactly what her plan is. There's no reason for the entity in her head to be talking around that stuff instead of directly addressing her plan.

Yes, and that problem continues with Head Nimue later, to the point where I was wondering if Emma was able to block off that "dark" part of her mind from knowing her true plan, because otherwise, it would be ridiculously nonsensical.

Edited August 30, 2016 by Camera One

[Camera One]

I marathoned the next two episodes with my friend ("The Brother Jones" / "Our Decay").  My friend felt that Liam was a horrible person, which I guess was the intent of that episode.  She also thought it was ridiculous how easily Dorothy/Scarecrow got away from Zelena (after Toto knocked down the curtain - what, did Dorothy train him to do that?), when she could murder people by turning them into dust with a flick of her hand.  It is so inconsistent when the villains are a threat, and when they're not.  Hades heard every word of every conversation that Liam had with Emma and Hook in the loft, yet in previous episodes, he was oblivious to what they were doing?  Yeah, right.  Emma and Regina tells Henry not to wander around the Sorcerer's house, but they were completely casual about him walking in after being who knows where (with Cruella, no less).  

These Writers seem to have no clue about morality or how a moral person would act or feel.  When Liam was dangling over the brimstone holding onto Killian's hand, Liam says, "I can never forgive myself.  For what I did to YOU."  Uh, what about the rest of the crew?  A normal person would be feeling downright guilty about that too, wouldn't they?  

Zelena has sure become a favorite of the writers.  She was way too weepy throughout "Our Decay" it became a tad unbearable.  Still, I do think they did do a reasonably good job of showing her slow path to redemption, and also building her and Regina's relationship throughout this arc starting with this episode.  This is what actual significant screentime to writer-favored characters can do, I suppose.

I forgot how much "Our Decay" began to mess with/destroy the whole concept of "true love".

How convenient that the Cruella story was in the Underworld Book edition, and not in the Storybrooke edition.

It was dumb the first time, but the "love of the people" concept was even more trite the second time around.

I didn't realize that there was absolutely no Rumple for two episodes in 5B up to this point (Episodes #13 and #15).  I didn't even notice he was gone.  But has this occurred in previous arcs?  It really bugged me how Rumple left his dagger on the shelf in the Underbrooke library while he was talking to Belle.  

It looks like Rumple already learned the lesson Regina needs to learn in Season 6 in "Our Decay".  He said, "You fell in love with me... because there was a man and a beast. Neither exists without the other."  

He is such a hypocrite.  

Belle: No. No. I-I can't condone you being like this. Not again.
Mr Gold: Yes, you can. You just have to choose to. And if you do... we can have what's important... Family, happiness. It's your choice.

Well, all HE has to do is choose as well.  Choose Power OR Belle.  And if he chooses the latter, then he can have what's important... family, happiness, blah blah blah.  I just can't with him anymore.  Dump the ass and move on, Belle.

[Camera One]

We were talking about Henry in the Relationships thread, which reminded me of something.  It seems like the characters are just on autopilot spewing the same thing over and over again.  I had forgotten how Henry was all "I don't want to be on the sidelines anymore.  I want to be a hero!" in "The Brothers Jones".  It feels very repetitive.

[KingOfHearts]

11 minutes ago, Camera One said:

We were talking about Henry in the Relationships thread, which reminded me of something.  It seems like the characters are just on autopilot spewing the same thing over and over again.  I had forgotten how Henry was all "I don't want to be on the sidelines anymore.  I want to be a hero!" in "The Brothers Jones".  It feels very repetitive.

Regina: "I just want my happy ending. Why doesn't the universe understand that?!"
Emma: "I have so many walls, I'm not sure who would be more jealous - China or Trump."
Zelena: "I'm a psycho who just wants to know what love is!"
Hook: "I have a dark past and I can't forgive myself."
Belle: "There has to be good in Rumple's heart!"
Rumple: "I need more power. I must become the Energizer bunny."
Charming: "I have to be brave in order to protect my family."
Snow: "I'm not sure why I'm even on this show any more."

Edited August 30, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

I'd have to say, though, rewatching 5B has been more enjoyable than 3B (which was tedious) or 4B (which was maddening).  It's less all-over-the-place than all the B arcs so far, with a pretty clear goal, and a pretty consistent structure, while offering variety in terms of the flashback subjects.  

Edited August 31, 2016 by Camera One

[Rumsy4]

5B was certainly consistent. If only Last Rites had been the season finale, it would have finished strong. The writers went and ruined the mood with the finale episode they did give us.

[Shanna Marie]

I've been thinking more about the plot weirdness in 5A. When you're showing a character with a secret agenda in a long-form story (like a novel or TV series), you need to make that characters actions consistent with that agenda. The way you keep the real agenda a secret and a surprise is by finding other reasons that make sense in the present context to explain each of the actions in the agenda. I don't think 5A entirely passes the test with Emma in Storybrooke. Look at what she does:

1. She tells her family that they failed her. (has nothing to do with her agenda)
2. She warns Regina that something worse than her is coming and taunts her about not being a Savior (may have been referring to Dark Hook, but whether or not Regina is a Savior has nothing to do with her plan for dealing with that)
3. She gets sad when Hook doesn't want her dark self (she's not planning to stay dark, so why does that bother her? And wouldn't she be glad that he's not showing any signs of darkness?)
4. She smirks when he rejects her in spite of darkness by saying that's not who he is (yeah, there is some amusement from the audience about the irony, but would she really feel that way about it? Wouldn't that be painful?)
5. She fakes a date with Hook so she can steal his sword and use it to revive Rumple, but also acts sad that Hook doesn't want to be with a Dark One (finally, she's doing something that actually progresses her agenda! But again, why be sad that he doesn't want anything to do with the darkness when she's planning all this to get the darkness out of both of them?)
6. She kidnaps Merida and forces her to make Rumple be brave, eventually cursing her into being a bear. It works, and Rumple is able to draw the sword (again, actual steps toward her agenda, but it's awfully convoluted, and this particular plan seems to have more to do with contriving a way to bring Rumple back than the best way for Emma to get the sword drawn in a town crawling with heroes)
7. She steals Violet's horse and helps Henry find it so he can win her back (not really to do with her agenda, but I guess it makes up for what she did to him before, not that Henry seems to give her credit for that, but if she's trying to mend fences with Henry and doesn't see that as potentially derailing her plot, why all the "you failed me" stuff with her parents?)
8. She accelerates Zelena's pregnancy so she can use her as a vessel for darkness. (finally, she's really getting on with the agenda)
9. She keeps Hook from getting his fool self killed or hurt in a way that might reveal what he really is (again, yay, agenda, but maybe that could have been woven in better all along in more subtle ways rather than throwing it all into one episode)

Meanwhile, the other explanation they're giving for all the stuff she's doing is that she wants to unite the sword and the dagger to snuff out the light, and needs Zelena's baby to do really dark magic -- except it's her own family that jumps to that conclusion about her based on no evidence whatsoever, and not even so much as speaking to her about it, even while she's doing stuff like helping Henry with his love life. And the being that lives in her head and is privy to her thoughts also thinks this is what she's doing. That's another thing that's tricky about these long-term secret plot things -- you can't have private conversations between characters who are in on the plot that don't come across as artificial because if they both know what's going on and they're alone, they can talk about it. They're not going to be vague and use code. When one of those characters actually lives inside the person's head and is just a manifestation of her thoughts, there's really no excuse for that character to get it wrong. They should have played that more as Head Rumple trying to goad her into carrying out the Dark One's agenda rather than acting like that's what he thought she was doing. And maybe shouldn't the inner Dark One have been trying to get her to do what it later got Hook to do? Most of the stuff Emma does during this arc is strictly designed to make the audience think she's really evil and has nothing to do with anything she's actually doing.

[Camera One]

They never even had to explain what "cutting away the darkness" or "dousing the light" even meant.  As you so well described, a scene like this one below is hard to understand.

Rumplestiltskin: Go on. It's time.

Emma: Why will you not leave me alone?

Rumplestiltskin: Well, how could we? We're here to witness something historical.

Nimue: Rumplestiltskin's eyes are fine to look through most days, but I wanted to see this myself.

Emma: You tried to keep me from doing this.

Nimue: Back then, there was a chance that you would use Excalibur to cut away the darkness, but now you can douse the light instead. We are proud of you... All of us.

Hooded figures: All of us. All of us. All of us. All of us.

[KingOfHearts]

I would have preferred it if Emma needed Arthur to release Excalibur from the stone - not Purest of All Heroes Rumple. Heck, even psycho Merida would have been a better choice. Team Camelot and Merida needed a reason to be in Storybrooke beyond the stupid Brave 101 course. I really, really hate what happened to Rumple in 5A. It was just loads of stupid. 

Quote

They never even had to explain what "cutting away the darkness" or "dousing the light" even meant.  As you so well described, a scene like this one below is hard to understand.

This bothers me a lot. I'm still trying to headcanon what Excalibur could possibly do. All Nimue needed was Rumple's blood, so I don't know why repairing the sword was so important to her. It was also never explained how Underworld!Nimue and Clippy!Nimue were in contact. Was Rumple in cahoots with Clippy!Rumple? The world may never know.

Edited August 31, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Shanna Marie]

The bad setup/plotting for 5A is bothering me so much that it's becoming a distraction! I keep trying to puzzle it out and fix it in my head. It really looks like they were writing based on what would be cool in each episode rather than starting with what was really going on and what Emma's goal was and reverse engineering to figure out what she'd be doing at each step of the way, and then weaving in enough red herrings that it wouldn't be obvious. The best way to disguise the real agenda is to find other patterns that the actions fit into. For instance, they didn't really drop true clues about the fact that Hook was a Dark One. There was some meta irony there, some things he said that took on a new meaning when you knew, and Emma was dropping some irony based on her knowing what he really was, but the only actual clue in the story until the episode in which it was revealed was him being drawn to the locked basement door. That made it seem awfully abrupt, and there's no rewatch value in going back and finding the clues that were hidden in plain sight.

One obvious one would be the fact that Dark Ones don't sleep. Did not remembering he was a Dark One change that? It would have been obvious if they'd handled it the way they tend to handle things, so that in the same episode as the Camelot flashbacks were showing Emma not sleeping they made a big deal in the Storybrooke part of the episode about Hook having insomnia. But if you bury the sleeplessness in an overall narrative about how messed-up Hook is about what happened to Emma, you can show that without waving a red flag. Not sleeping would fit into other stuff like not eating, drinking too much, drinking too much coffee, being generally testy and morose, so it's not that obvious that his sleeplessness comes from a different source. So, they could have shown Belle finding him in the library first thing in the morning, surrounded by piles of books, having obviously pulled an all-nighter researching the Dark One, Merlin, and Camelot. Granny could have shoved a plate of food in front of him and told him he needed to eat something to soak up all the rum. Snow could have gone all maternal on him and told him he wasn't doing Emma any good by not taking care of himself. David could have been doing a late-night patrol and spotted him at the docks, staring out to sea, and they could have talked about how he couldn't sleep because every time he closed his eyes, he saw what Emma had become, and he couldn't stop thinking about how they'd failed her. I don't know that most people would see all that and realize he was the Dark One, but when it was revealed, we could look back and realize that the clues had been there. They were sort of doing this with his appearance, with his hair being all messy, and I think Colin was playing Hook like he was barely hanging on, but I don't think this quite reached the point of being a true clue.

At the same time, Emma's actions don't match. She's on a desperate quest to find a way to get rid of the darkness in both him and herself before he realizes what he is. She's turned the man she loves into a Dark One, and he sank immediately into the darkness, so now a guy with serious anger management and impulse control issues is the Dark One, he's mad at her, and Nimue is in control with a terrible agenda of her own. If he ever realizes what he is, he'll fall into the abyss again. One of the key ways of him figuring it out would be the fact that he immediately heals if he gets hurt, and he can't be killed. This is a guy whose primary character traits are that he's reckless, impulsive, and brave. Lately, his hobbies have included sacrificing himself for others and getting killed or nearly killed. He has a close, personal relationship with the floor, and at the moment he's desperate and despairing. This is a disaster waiting to happen. Would Emma be wasting time playing mind games with him and her family or helping her 13-year-old son get a girlfriend? Or would she be watching Hook like a hawk, having to take over for his guardian angel to make sure he doesn't get himself into the kind of trouble that would reveal he's a Dark One? That could easily have been buried in a narrative of the Dark One being obsessed with him, her love for him having been twisted by the darkness. They kind of did some of that with her trying to make him accept who she was, but it wasn't played like she was using that as a ploy to keep an eye on him. And why on earth would she have brought him to her house, where the sword that would call to him was in the basement and there was a locked door that would make him curious? I'd have thought she'd have kept him away from there at all costs until she was ready to remove the darkness from him.

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

One obvious one would be the fact that Dark Ones don't sleep. 

You bring up an interesting point. Why didn't Clippy!Rumple bother Dark Hook in Storybrooke? He's the personification of power, not memories. That shouldn't have been affected by the dreamcatchers.

Edited August 31, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

I forgot that one "speculation" that my friend had when we were watching "Our Decay" was that Zelena's baby was actually Hades's instead of Robin's.  Not sure if there was speculation about that in the spoiler thread back in the day.

[KingOfHearts]

1 minute ago, Camera One said:

I forgot that one "speculation" that my friend had when we were watching "Our Decay" was that Zelena's baby was actually Hades's instead of Robin's.  Not sure if there was speculation about that in the spoiler thread back in the day.

I don't really remember any speculation about that, but none of us really wanted it to be Robin's baby anyway.

[YaddaYadda]

31 minutes ago, Camera One said:

I forgot that one "speculation" that my friend had when we were watching "Our Decay" was that Zelena's baby was actually Hades's instead of Robin's.  Not sure if there was speculation about that in the spoiler thread back in the day.

I speculated that. Baby not Robin's, Zelena was already pregnant when she left for NYC. Totally crossed my mind. But since it's always "years ago" with them...

Edited August 31, 2016 by YaddaYadda

[Shanna Marie]

On 8/31/2016 at 4:04 PM, KingOfHearts said:

You bring up an interesting point. Why didn't Clippy!Rumple bother Dark Hook in Storybrooke? He's the personification of power, not memories. That shouldn't have been affected by the dreamcatchers.

I had a long drive today and was thinking about this -- why would Hook even have a Clippy!Rumple or Nimue? If we look at the origin of the Dark One, we go back to the Grail. Nimue drank from the Grail, got power and immortality, but she used the power for darkness and became the Dark One. The Grail got turned into the sword, which got broken, and Merlin tethered her to the dagger. Then the next Dark One must have killed her with the dagger, and that transferred the power to that person, possibly with some essence of Nimue. And so forth until Rumple, who had the Darkness sucked out of him and contained in Emma. But Hook came from Merlin's line -- he drank from the Grail, got power and immortality, and used it for good, so he didn't go dark or become a Dark One. Zelena tethered him to Excalibur, and he was forced to do some bad things, but that was not his intent, and he didn't really do all that much that was bad. Then Emma seemed to have sucked the power out of him into the Excalibur fragment, and then put that into Hook.

So, if anything, Hook should have had a Clippy!Merlin. Whatever was in him had not been through Rumple and Nimue. And that should have meant that Hook would have been a Light One, because there shouldn't have been Dark One levels of darkness in Merlin. It's possible that Hook could then have gone dark, given his anger issues, but he shouldn't have started that way. He should have started as a Light One. And that would have tied into the talk at the beginning of the season of light and darkness, with Hook embodying the Merlin role and Emma in the Nimue role, playing out that old drama of the lovers. Though I guess the problem with that would have been that there would have been less incentive to "save" Hook if he wasn't a threat and if the power was what was keeping him alive, but I can't imagine them leaving Hook as Merlin 2.0 permanently. I guess there would have had to be some kind of thing about how they couldn't get the Darkness out of Emma without also getting the power out of Hook.

Come to think of it, in Emma's plan for getting the darkness out of Hook and into Zelena, what was she planning to do about that unhealable wound? Was it all just about stopping Nimue's plan, keeping Hook from being a threat, and letting him die in peace the way he'd begged? Because it seems like if her plan worked, he would die because they hadn't resolved the problem that started this in the first place. If that's what was going on with her, that would explain some of the sillier-seeming aspects of her plan, like her constantly trying to get him to accept her as she was, if she was just hoping for one last time to hear him say he loved her before he was going to die, but they didn't seem to be playing it that way. Most of the stuff in the date was a convoluted way to get him to tell her what on his ship Rumple had touched, and all her talk about "this is the way I am now, and I'm better than I was before" was a lead-up to saying that Rumple was better, which was to spur him to talk about that incident. She's lucky she had script writers putting all that together for her, because the outcome didn't necessarily flow naturally from that.

[KingOfHearts]

I really hated 5x05. It's the Breaking Glass of S5. I found the majority of the episode cringey and boring. The stuff with Rumple/Merida was ridiculous and a total waste of time. I got sick of Rumple's speeches about how he used to be a Dark One and how he's just a humble coward, blah blah blah. It stirred my stomach how much the writers were trying to convince the audience he changed. Other than the Henry stuff, there were just more plot holes and random magic rules that made no sense. For example - are protection spells so easy to bypass that just a belonging of someone who matches up with the blood magic will do?

So here's what offended me. The purpose of the Stable Boy flashback was to highlight the similarities between Emma and Cora. That's asinine. Emma didn't kill Violet, Henry barely knew her, and the intention was to save everyone's lives including his. Emma was telling Regina that she was doing it for her son's own good, but Regina reflected back that "Cora said the same thing". Yeah, Cora was a twisted monster who couldn't care less about how her daughter felt. Funny how Regina was totally okay with using Henry's tear for the spell. Even after Dark Emma told her that they needed to free Merlin and didn't have much of a choice, she still got shunned for it. Then after all that crap, the Pilot got tainted with a nonsensical parallel to make Emma feel bad. Screw off, show.

If Emma didn't want anyone discovering the dreamcatcher, why did she place it in its own box in the middle of a table like she wanted someone to grab it? She might as well of labeled it "OPEN ME". There's no freaking way she didn't anticipate others attempting to break into her house. 

The only episode I dislike more than this one in S5 is the season finale. The Merida stuff, while extremely awful, was mostly forgetful and didn't attempt to assassinate main characters.

[Curio]

15 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

So here's what offended me. The purpose of the Stable Boy flashback was to highlight the similarities between Emma and Cora. That's asinine.

Well, the main purpose of having to sit through the entire Stable Boy flashback was to have Emma feel sorry for Regina.

I bet we'll never get a scene where Regina sees Emma's past and says, "I'm sorry. I didn't know how things were for you. I... didn't know... I'm so sorry."

That reads like freaking fan fiction. 

Edited September 2, 2016 by Curio

[andromeda331]

11 hours ago, Curio said:

Well, the main purpose of having to sit through the entire Stable Boy flashback was to have Emma feel sorry for Regina.

I bet we'll never get a scene where Regina sees Emma's past and says, "I'm sorry. I didn't know how things were for you. I... didn't know... I'm so sorry."

That reads like freaking fan fiction. 

They'd probably have Emma apologizing anyway. Probably for breaking the curse and ruining Regina's life or something.

[tennisgurl]

I talked about this a bit on another thread, but I have been watching season 1, as part of my Big Once Re-watch of late summer/early fall, and its really interesting to see how some issues I have always had with the show have always been there, and some seemed to have came up later, seemingly out of nowhere. For one thing, this show has ALWAYS had an issue with abandoning characters and story lines without using them to their full potential. Like, I feel like they killed Graham off WAY too quickly, especially given how much he came to mean to Emma, and there was still a whole lot of story that could have been told with him. There were also plenty of one off issues and characters that were never really dealt with (Nova and Grumpy? Gepatos parents? That wolf that was running around?), and plot lines that really went nowhere, and there was some of the Regina apologizing and backtracking by the end of the season. BUT, there was enough good stuff that still allows season 1 to be my favorite season, although I still get kind of sad watching it, seeing how much potential was there that was never really used. 

For example, the show had a mystery to it, not just figuring out what person was what fairy tale character, but the town itself had a kind of mystical quality to it, where things were normal, but also just slightly...off, in a way that only Emma and the audience could see. It almost came off as magical realism, with a quirky, almost Stephen King "Creepy East Coast" vibe. It just felt really interesting, with the flashbacks being epic (and actually relevant) and the Real World stuff being intriguing. It also spent more time with the supporting cast, allowing them time to shine, and exploring their backstory and characters. Granted, not all of the backstory episodes were great, some had the pointlessness of later flashbacks, but they were at least fresh, and generally tied into the current plot, without messing up what we already know about a character. Also, the first season was really great at combining comedy and drama, as well as high romance with all the Snow and Charming stuff. The first season had some pretty dark subtext, that, while not explored greatly, was very much there, and played for the drama that it was (Regina's abusive behavior towards Henry, her rape and murder of Graham, the towns small issues, some of the backstories), while also adding a playfulness to a lot of the scenes, the shout outs to Disney or classic stories, and plenty of funny one liners. And, again, I LOVED Snow/Charming in season 1. It was such a classic romance, played totally straight, meshed with the mundane disaster of Mary Marguerite and David, and it was just really compelling. Plus, it had Regina when she was actually a competent villain. She still had her moments of sympathy, but she was the Bad Guy, and she was good at it. I totally forgot the scene were she wrote WHORE on MMs car, by the way. Just so petty and stupid. 

In my head, I think I do tend to see season 1 with nostalgia googles, but I do still really find it to be a strong season, even without comparing it to what will come next. 

[Mari]

18 minutes ago, mjgchick said:

Yeah, they really should've had a year gab between S4 and 5 again at least. But nope they had to have their cliffhanger which I guess worked because people were praising them for turning their protagonist into an antagonist and then they A&E it up and we got S5.   . . .

ETA: why did they not do a year jump between S1 and 2 when the only cliffhanger was really that magic was back? The real cliffhanger was Emma and Snow falling in that hat for S2 to be honest.

(Moved from the spoiler thread, as I was going off-spoiler topic.)

They actually could've had a year's jump between 4 and 5 again, even with the cliffhanger.  Leave Henry out of the cliffhanger scene, or age him up for the cliffhanger, and have it be a year.  It wouldn't be any  more jarring than a twelve/thirteen year old who'll be able to legally buy cigarettes, soon.

[profdanglais]

Time jumps would be a lot more satisfying from a narrative standpoint as well. Give the characters time to worry about Dark Emma, where she's gone and what she's doing, before they find a way to get to her. Show us Hook and the Charmings getting closer as they work together to find her. Show us Regina feeling remorseful about Emma taking the darkness instead of her and using all her magical knowledge to help find her. Don't just give us some super powerful wand that summons up a portal five minutes after Emma left. 

[Mari]

Yes.

Why didn't they keep their cliffhanger, but do a time jump.  Those would have been interesting flashbacks.  Show us the team fretting about Emma, and trying to figure out how to find her, and how to get to the EF, because shouldn't Belle and Rumple know that Emma's likely to materialize--if not stay--at the manhole of evil?

The Camelot stuff would have worked, even after a year.