Continuity, Nitpicks, Unanswered Questions and Timeline Headaches: When Did That Honeycrisp Apple Come From

[Curio]

Yeah, those were definitely some hints. My question was why it wasn't a bigger deal in 3B when we spent an entire half season centered around Snow having a baby, Zelena posing as a midwife, and Zelena attempting to take the baby away from Snow. I'm wondering why Regina wouldn't have had her epiphany during that season's plot instead of it randomly popping up during her conversation about the author in Season 4.

[YaddaYadda]

I always thought it would be a conversation she would have with whomever she's with.  I still don't get what her epiphany had to do with Zelena and Zelena's pregnancy.  This show isn't that deep when the viewers put more time into trying to figure shit out.

[Shanna Marie]

Scared of change and the unknown which is exactly how Rumple's character is built.

But this is a case where Rumple's position is either strengthened or weakened, depending on whether or not the fact that he and his wife have different accents from the people around them actually means anything.

 

There's a big difference between "I know my wife is miserable here, and I'm the town pariah, but I've never lived anywhere else and leaving is too scary to contemplate" and "I know my wife is miserable here, and I'm the town pariah, and we were strangers and outsiders to begin with, but I can't leave." The local accent being so different that their son doesn't talk at all like his parents suggests that they're from elsewhere, and yet Rumple is refusing to leave a place where he very likely is an outsider.

 

On another note, there was a lot more past evidence for Regina being barren than there was for the egg baby napping incident -- enough that I can almost believe they planned it all along -- but both should have come up and been a factor during the Baby Do-Over pregnancy. Watching her (former?) enemy be pregnant while knowing she could never be and she did it to herself should have shown a bit in Regina's behavior. Going through a pregnancy after the eggbaby thing should have made Snow worried or guilty.

[legaleagle53]

Why didn't Snow and Charming fret about Baby No. 2 being evil? They never even questioned whether it was a True Love Baby or not. Why exactly wasn't BDO a TLB? Story reasons?

 

Because the prophecy was specifically about the child that Snow was then carrying (Emma), not one that Snow wouldn't have until 30-odd years later.  And Emma's role as the Savior was specifically written into the curse as the means of breaking it, hence her role was dependent on being the product of true love. Prince Neal's role doesn't depend on that (in fact, whatever role he was born to play has yet to be revealed), so it doesn't matter at this stage whether he is actually the product of true love, just as Henry's role as the new Author doesn't depend on his being the son of the Product of True Love.

[Camera One]

Before the prophesy, Maleficent said the following, which was about the product of true love:

 

MALEFICENT: Your child is the product of true love, which means it could grow to be a powerful hero capable of great good.  But with the potential for that good also comes something else.

SNOWING: What?

MALEFICENT: The potential for great darkness.  Your child might turn out to be just like us.  

SNOWING: You mean a villain.

MALEFICENT Darker than any this realm has ever seen.

 

To me, the real reason why Snowing didn't fret about Baby #2 being possibly evil?  It was because that was Season 3, and this mumbo jumbo was made up specifically for Season 4.

Edited June 27, 2015 by Camera One

[Writing Wrongs]

I'm re-watching all seasons. I know people were always taking about Emma wearing Graham's shoelaces around her wrist. Where is it said that that is what those are? Is that something people just came up with or is it a fact? I actually just noticed it this time around watching 7:15.

[Camera One]

From what I've read, it was Jennifer Morrison who decided to do that.

http://oncerstv.tumblr.com/post/94775455828/jennifer-morrison-answers-10-questions-asked-by

 

Jennifer Morrison:

A common theme that came up in the memoirs that I read written by people who had beed raised in the foster system, was that they held onto small significant objects that they kept with them their whole lives. Graham was extremely significant to Emma and I wanted to find something she could keep with her in memory of him. The shoelace was something that Jamie Dornan and I came up with while chatting about this idea. His boots, missing one lace, are still in Emma’s office in the sheriff station as well.

 

When asked on Twitter what Emma's favorite things were:

Jennifer Morrison

‏@jenmorrisonlive@theMagicalTweet one of her favorite things is Graham's shoelace that she wears on her wrist. #WickedIsComing #uglyducklings (Mar 2014)

Edited June 27, 2015 by Camera One

[Writing Wrongs]

Ok, thanks.

[Writing Wrongs]

The original curse changed people's story and Jefferson wanted Regina to write him and Grace a new story and she agreed. How does that fit in with The Author stuff?

[orza]

Regina was just manipulating Jefferson. She had no intention of delivering what she agreed to. The curse gave people a false identity and backstory to support it. It didn't change their real story, just prevented them from remembering it.

[Camera One]

What the Author ultimately did for Rumple was the exact same thing, though.  He basically made Rumple "forget" the true story of what happened to his son and gave him a fake backstory.  Which all completely reverted when Henry became the new Author.  

 

This is different from what the Author did in his prior flashbacks in 4B, in which he "changed" the story in ways which were irreversible, such as making the Author transfer the darkness into Lily, which resulted in consequences that stuck.  Even by giving Cruella magical powers, it led to the consequence of Cruella's mother dying which stuck.  But nothing in the Alt World of the 4B finale stuck.

 

So they didn't really need to have THE Author who could change destiny and dictate events.  They could easily have had some villain trapping all the characters inside a book.

Edited June 28, 2015 by Camera One

[orza]

The Author's real job is to record stories, not create them, so he is still needed. Without the Author, there would have been no book for Snow to give to Henry. The Author managed to effect real, permanent change when he was writing while he was residing in one of the "realms of stories" as he called Fairytale and Cruella's home. He wrote Rumple's story while he was in Storybrook, which is a real place and not in the realm of stories.

[Camera One]

He did write in the book to transport himself from Zelena's prison cell to Gold's shop, though, so his story-changing powers still seems alive and well in Storybrooke.  

 

I still don't understand how Isaac could have been everywhere at once recording all those stories in Henry's book.  And how exactly does he decide which stories are significant enough to write down and which are not?  Do the nameless peasants in the Enchanted Forest not have their stories told?  Was Regina murdering the groom on his wedding day in the Book as well?

 

So what about all those stories currently happening in the entire universe now?  Is Henry supposed to spend every waking moment being everywhere at once recording all of them?  

 

I don't understand how Storybrooke is a "real place" while the Enchanted Forest is a "realm of stories".  What's the difference?  Cruella's world was timeless but was the Enchanted Forest timeless too?  Even though events had a timeline?

Edited June 28, 2015 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

 

I don't understand how Storybrooke is a "real place" while the Enchanted Forest is a "realm of stories".  What's the difference?  Cruella's world was timeless but was the Enchanted Forest timeless too?  Even though events had a timeline?

The "timeless realms of story" concept really dumbed down the fantasy multiverse. Yes there are all these amazing worlds, but they have no time so in a strange way they're as good as fiction within the show's universe. It's saying that while the LWM is ever-changing and real, all other worlds are lesser and simply based off different time periods. I'm not a fan of that idea one bit. 

 

What I hate most from 4B was all the ridiculous retconning. I don't understand how they introduced 5 villains and resorted to modifying what they already had. Was there no new interesting material? Stop messing with our timelines, writers!

Edited June 28, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Dani-Ellie]

I didn't take "timeless" to mean that Cruella's world had no time at all. Clearly time passed within her world because she grew up. I took it to mean that the inhabitants didn't have a sense of time, in that no one really paid attention to how much time was passing. Without marking minutes and hours with clocks and days and weeks and months and years with calendars, it's very easy to lose track of time. If you're in a world that's never kept track of its time beyond sun up = wake up and sun down = go to bed, no one would have the slightest clue what day it was or what month it was or what year it was. (Hell, even years in our world are based on the religions of this world. I know BC and AD are now BCE and CE, but that doesn't change the fact that 2015 is based on the Christian notion of years since Christ's birth. If there's no Christianity in Cruella's world, their years might not even match up to ours anyway.)

Edited June 28, 2015 by Dani-Ellie

[Camera One]

I took it to mean that the inhabitants didn't have a sense of time, in that no one really paid attention to how much time was passing. Without marking minutes and hours with clocks and days and weeks and months and years with calendars, it's very easy to lose track of time.

 

That's what I think it is too.  I was wondering if it was also the case in the Enchanted Forest.  Somehow, I don't think it was since Regina was marking the years since Daniel's death.  The timeless aspect was introduced but it was ill-defined.  

 

I also somewhat interpreted Cruella's world "timelessness" as in that world was stuck in a world which was perpetually 1920s-ish in style.  But 1920 is only in relation to the style compared to here on Earth.  In her world, it could be the year 1066 and it would still be "1920s"-esque.  

 

What I hate most from 4B was all the ridiculous retconning. I don't understand how they introduced 5 villains and resorted to modifying what they already had. Was there no new interesting material? Stop messing with our timelines, writers!

 

They think "filling in the gaps" results in the best twists.

Edited June 28, 2015 by Camera One

[orza]

Timeless doesn't mean no time or having no perception of time. It means unchanging, enduring, lasting. The realms of stories did not experience the progress that occurs over time in the real world. Time passed in them. People were born, grew old and died, They knew how old they were, so they were obviously keeping track of time passing, but the society as a whole didn't change much. Cruella's world was the eternal flapper era. Fairytale land was an unchanging feudal society. We saw that during the 300 years Rumple lived in Fairytale land things didn't change much. Fashion was pretty much the same, there were no technological advances that we saw, no apparent progress in the legal system or human rights, etc.

[KingOfHearts]

 

Timeless doesn't mean no time or having no perception of time.

Actually, Cruella's world has no real perception of time. She couldn't, for no good reason at all, even recall what year it was. How could she know how old she was without the year? In fact, Isaac said himself "this place exists out of time" and "we're not in a time". The idea that a society can just continue without any record of years or advancement is a cop-out so the writers can avoid actual timeline details. There had to be advancement because the magical objects on the show had to be invented at some point and there were also influences from other realms, like what Rumple collected from Oz.

 

 

I took it to mean that the inhabitants didn't have a sense of time, in that no one really paid attention to how much time was passing. 

 

I also somewhat interpreted Cruella's world "timelessness" as in that world was stuck in a world which was perpetually 1920s-ish in style.  But 1920 is only in relation to the style compared to here on Earth.  In her world, it could be the year 1066 and it would still be "1920s"-esque.

There's just so many problems with that which I could write essays about. It's a major hand-wave. It's not really possible without a total Groundhog Day effect. A world like 1920s England would not be able to function without calendars, unless there's a heap of magic doing everything for them al a Dark Curse. That gets incredibly arbitrary to the point where people would only perceive time when its convenient to the plot.

Edited June 28, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

Timeless doesn't mean no time or having no perception of time. It means unchanging, enduring, lasting. The realms of stories did not experience the progress that occurs over time in the real world. Time passed in them. People were born, grew old and died, They knew how old they were, so they were obviously keeping track of time passing, but the society as a whole didn't change much. 

 

If that's the case, then the line with Isaac asking "What year is it" was pointless.  

Edited June 28, 2015 by Camera One

[Rumsy4]

The people in the EF are well aware of time and its passing. But they seem stuck in a quasi-medieval era. So, I donno why A&E had to confuse the issue with the "timeless story realms" crap.

Cruella's world seems sort of like Cursed Storybooke, where people existed out of time. But unlike Cursed Sb, where people were frozen in age, apparently people grow up and stuff in Cruella's realm, because Cruella is supposed to have killed her father as a child. If people grow up and die, why is no one aware of the year? It's internally inconsistent.

Edited June 29, 2015 by Rumsy4

[KingOfHearts]

 

The people in the EF are well aware of time and its passing. But they seem stuck in a quasi-medieval era. So, I donno why A&E had to confuse the issue with the "timeless story realms" crap.

It did weird me out a little in Think Lovely Thoughts when the Enchanted Forest had zero difference in appearance from modern times. A world with a history that grows different over time is much more fascinating than a place that never changes. Hook and his Navy seemed foreign in style to the rest of EF, but maybe he's from another realm? Arendelle is also unique, but it's in the same realm of storytelling. Both examples reminded more of the Renaissance era, while everything else is closer to medieval. The Jolly Roger even had a cannon.

Edited June 29, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

It did weird me out a little in Think Lovely Thoughts when the Enchanted Forest had zero difference in appearance from modern times. A world with a history that grows different over time is much more fascinating than a place that never changes. 

 

The medieval era lasted 1000 years in some areas, so that would have spanned many generations.  

[YaddaYadda]

It did weird me out a little in Think Lovely Thoughts when the Enchanted Forest had zero difference in appearance from modern times. A world with a history that grows different over time is much more fascinating than a place that never changes.

 

I always sort of thought that the reason nothing was changing was because magic exists there.  If people rely on magic, then it sort of puts a damper on any kind of progress...at least that's what I think.

 

I've come to the conclusion that the Enchanted Forest is divided into small "kingdoms" like Westeros is divided into seven kingdoms in GoT.  Everyone rules their parcel of land, I just don't know if there's a king or queen of everything and who rules over all.  So far we've met (I'm not including Regina because she was a usurper).  We had George, Cinderella's father-in-law, Midas and Snow.  We also know that Ava is from the Northern Kingdom (is it in the EF or outside of it?), Henry Sr's kingdom was clearly in the EF, but we don't know which one of his brother's became king (though I could have sworn his father and Thomas/Sean's father were one and the same).  Aurora's kingdom seems to be outside of the EF, those castle turrets reminded me of Agrabah.

 

Arendelle is across the Narrow Sea along with other kingdoms/cities.

 

Maybe people identify themselves as being from the EF, like someone who is travelling abroad identifies themselves as being from their country of origin?

 

Hook seems to be from somewhere in the EF.  On top of canons, he also has a firearm which doesn't seem to exist in the EF.  Mulan had no clue what Emma's gun was when she saw it.  But Hook knew how to use the one he took away from Belle because it was similar to the one he had in his cabin on the JR (the one he pulled on Ursula).  So did he acquire one in his many travels or do they exist where he comes from?  I thought maybe where he was from was closer to Atlantis because of the Pegasus sail and all the Greek mythology surrounding the ship especially (ship made of Enchanted wood - Argo...) but that doesn't really seem to make all that much sense.

 

The world building on the show sucks. 

[Dani-Ellie]

I guess I just don't see why Cruella's world being permanently Art Deco is a problem but time moving so differently in Neverland so that it keeps everyone in stasis isn't? The notion that all these lands with different rules and levels of magic exist in the same plane was introduced way back in 1x17 by Jefferson:

 

Emma: This is it. This is the real world.

Jefferson: A real world. How arrogant are you to think yours is the only one? There are infinite more. You have to open your mind. They touch one another, pressing up in a long line of lands, each just as real as the last. All have their own rules. Some have magic, some don't. And some need magic. Like this one. And that's where you come in.

 

Yeah, the world-building could be better but I don't think Cruella's land is a retcon. It's just another one of these lands that have its own rules. People don't pay attention to time there. Maybe they have no need to. Maybe magic sustains the day-to-day stuff so people don't have to focus on being somewhere at a specific time. I don't think we can judge their world based on our rules because our rules don't necessarily apply there.

[Faemonic]

I burnt my brain out on this too when it came to Neverland (where you can't see the future because time stops, but the forest can grow over everything so Killian Jones can't recognize the old ways through, and Regina can complain about camping with the Charmings for a week) and Wonderland (where Alice knew the Mad Hatter in Wonderland as a little girl, but can't be more than twenty years later that the Dark Curse is broken and Will Scarlett jumps from Storybrooke to Victorian London to Wonderland, unless Alice is a spry and fresh-faced forty who still lives with her parents.)


I figured that it was a matter of scope, like...

- Cora Dome was a miniature time freeze where everybody kept their memories and kept their youth

- Storybrooke was a miniature time freeze where everybody lost their memories and kept their youth

- Victorian London is a realm-wide time freeze where everybody kept their memories and lost their youth (see also Flapper Town)

- The Enchanted Forest is not usually time frozen but doesn't progress politics and technology because of societal reasons

- I never knew about Neverland so never mind

- I can't wonder at Wonderland

- I snooze at Oz

- We shall not speak of The Nightmare Before Christmas and the forest with doors into holiday realms that might be temporal or might just be realms we shall not speak of it!

We saw with August how you can make a human body young again, and Rumple offered to do that with Nealfire. Strangely, this isn't only biological memory because August shouldn't exist the moment his child-self diverged from the timeline of experiences that created August Boothe, but they brought August back from youth-death parallel universe of a life that could have been lived and he remembered his alternate youth.

But time itself can only be frozen, whether with magic or the nature of the realm (until Zelena invented time travel with Oz magic.)

[Camera One]

I guess I just don't see why Cruella's world being permanently Art Deco is a problem but time moving so differently in Neverland so that it keeps everyone in stasis isn't? The notion that all these lands with different rules and levels of magic exist in the same plane was introduced way back in 1x17 by Jefferson.

 

Yeah, the world-building could be better but I don't think Cruella's land is a retcon. It's just another one of these lands that have its own rules. People don't pay attention to time there. Maybe they have no need to. Maybe magic sustains the day-to-day stuff so people don't have to focus on being somewhere at a specific time. I don't think we can judge their world based on our rules because our rules don't necessarily apply there.

 

I don't have a problem with Cruella's land being permanently 1920s either, nor time working differently in different realms.  I'm just curious why the writers felt it was necessary to say the people in Cruella's world have no conception of year, or to introduce the concept of "realms of storytelling" and "This place right here is one of them.  It it exists out of time."  

 

Out of what time?  Isn't that judging their world based on our rules?   And that raises the question of whether the Enchanted Forest is considered "a realm of storytelling existing out of time".  But our world isn't?   The whole "existing out of time" concept is vague, and could mean a variety of different things.  For example, were the events in Cruella's life occurring parallel with Snow's childhood in the Enchanted Forest and let's say 1960 in our world (since Isaac was originally living after WWII and then went realm hopping)?  Or is it literally "out of time"?   I'm guessing that whole exchange with Isaac and Cruella was just a really clumsy way of saying that it was permanently Art Deco in Cruella's world.

 

 To me, it's a problem with worldbuilding when new details added generate  questions that make the whole fictional universe more murky. 

Edited June 29, 2015 by Camera One

[Dani-Ellie]

Out of what time?  Isn't that judging their world based on our rules?

 

But it was Isaac who said that, who would be speaking of her world by the rules he knows, which are the rules of our world because he's from here.

 

This is why I don't think things the characters say can always be taken 100% literally, especially when you have someone like Isaac, who was just some random guy the Apprentice plucked out of obscurity to be the next Author. Like, did he have on-the-job training or was he just handed the pen with a "Now, off you are to record, see you later!" Was anything explained to him or did he just pick it up as he went along?

[KingOfHearts]

 

I don't have a problem with Cruella's land being permanently 1920s either

I didn't mind it either that much, but like what you said, the lack of perception was where it started not making sense. If a realm has magic, I suppose it could work like the Dark Curse in that no one ever wanted to change their culture, invent anything, or do anything "new". I can head-canon that. I wish they hadn't brought up this "realms of storytelling" concept at all because it's so confusing.

 

 

The medieval era lasted 1000 years in some areas, so that would have spanned many generations.

I guess what I found strange was that from a story perspective there was nothing to tell us this was centuries ago, besides little Rumple. It would help us understand the timeline heaps better if it wasn't all muddied. Maybe their choice in not portraying progression doesn't bother people, but I'd find it a lot more interesting if the Enchanted Forest had differentiating styles signifying certain time periods in history. There's just more variety that way, in my personal opinion. It doesn't have to be too drastic, just subtle color, scenery, dialect or accent changes.

Edited June 29, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

About the Sorcerer, for one, he can see into the future.  And I mean not Rumple's Seer power that he stole and has a hard time making heads from tails with his visions.  

 

I find it funny that on the show where we talked about free will and the Author changing someone's story, Merlin seems to be doing just that, manipulating everything.  It's like he's playing a game of chess and these people are his pieces.

 

He sends Ingrid to the LwM in exchange for the hat that is oh so very important to him because he knows she'll end up doing the right thing.

His mansion is there with the second curse, but not the first curse.  People and the stuff in Gold's shop have been travelling with curses, not houses and especially not mansions.

Rumple didn't even write the original curse.  It was already written, he probably just modified it to for the finished product (let's add in a Savior born out of true love and keep people in stasis until she comes and breaks the curse)

The Apprentice could have easily gone to the LwM and retrieved Lily and brought her back to her mother, but the Sorcerer was like oh no biggie!  She and Emma's lives and entwined anyway and since Emma will eventually end up there anyway, then whatever...works with my plans.

He probably gave Blue the very last magic bean in the whole wide Enchanted Forest and told her that way she'd be rid of Rumple for good, but instead, he probably knew that Baelfire would be the only one to realm jump.

 

Merlin aka Master Manipulator, it seems.  To what end I'm sure we'll never find out because it's this show and it's these writers.

 

That's what bothers me about the whole Season 4 retcons.  

 

They had Merlin/Apprentice make that shady deal with Ingrid which directly messed with Emma.  And then we see the Apprentice going to Smoke-Merlin and going, "Oh nos, the Author forced me to put all the darkness in Lily and throw her through a portal".  Excellent point that the Apprentice could easily have brought her back, given all the travelling we've seen him do (including the useless telling-Lily-everything and visiting August crap).  But apparently, her darkness would be a danger to all if she did come back?  Or not?  

Edited July 3, 2015 by Camera One

[KAOS Agent]

Nothing has changed with regards to Lily's darkness level. Why woul d it be okay to bring her back now as opposed to when she was a baby who could have been raised on the right path? The whole darkness thing still pisses me off beyond belief. There's free will and you have to work harder to make the right choices, but you were much too evil to allow in the Enchanted Forest. I mean, the Dark One has darkness that will consume all the realms in him, how the hell would Baby Lily with Emma's potential darkness be a bigger danger than that?

[Writing Wrongs]

I'm confused by something. In The Doctor, Rumple says that Jefferson's hat can't take him to a land without magic. Later, Jefferson takes Victor back to his world through the hat. So does that mean that the black and white world had magic? I thought the point of Victor coming to the EF was because it didn't.

[Amerilla]

The black and white world did have some magic, and Rumple travelled there to recruit Victor/Whale to come to the EF to trick Regina into giving up her attempts to reanimated Daniel.

Edited July 4, 2015 by Amerilla

[Writing Wrongs]

Something that drives me nuts in shows is hair continuity. Once is pretty bad with this. I'm on my Season 3 re-watch and ugh. First, at the end of Season 3 David had his buzz cut hair but somehow at the beginning of Season 4, his hair is longer on top. Blame it on the portal, I guess?

 

At the beginning of the season Snow's hair is longer and starting to curl up a bit, but in Ariel, Snow's hair is pixie cutted again. I guess she found a Super Cuts on Neverland.

[Camera One]

If Rumple had died, would the Black Blob have emerged?  This all seemed kind of inconsistent from what was said in Season 2 when Cora was freaking out that Rumple might die.  It raises the question of why The Apprentice would even have attempted to put Rumple's darkness into the Hat.  

 

And if Rumple death would have prevented the Dark Emma crisis in the first place, I wonder if Belle would feel a modicum of guilt for getting everyone to save Rumple.

[Shanna Marie]

If Rumple had died, would the Black Blob have emerged?  This all seemed kind of inconsistent from what was said in Season 2 when Cora was freaking out that Rumple might die.  It raises the question of why The Apprentice would even have attempted to put Rumple's darkness into the Hat.

I think there's some wiggle room here. For one thing, no one, including Cora, would have reason to know for sure what would happen if Rumple died. For another, the situation is very different. Hook managed to find an impossible loophole of a way to kill the Dark One without stabbing him with the dagger and becoming the Dark One himself by attacking him in the world without magic and poisoning him in a way that Rumple wouldn't be able to instantly heal himself even if he got back to a magical location. So it's possible that at that time the Dark One would have died with Rumple. But what was happening this time was that Rumple wasn't physically dying. His body would still be around, but without any humanity in it. The way they described it was like Rumple's heart/soul and the Dark One coexisted, and while Rumple wasn't doing much to resist the darkness, he also wasn't taking it to extremes. All those years, and while he did bad stuff, he was focused on finding Bae, so he didn't do anything like take over the world and rule as a true absolute monarch. In a way, maybe his selfishness was his saving grace because he was more focused on things that benefited him immediately rather than any grand scheme to spread his power far and wide. But as his heart was disintegrating from the darkness, there was less Rumple in there. If he'd just died without the Apprentice's intervention, then Rumple's body would have been run by the Dark One, with no humanity left. It was the Darkness eating him away from the inside rather than him being killed by an external force.

 

And if Rumple death would have prevented the Dark Emma crisis in the first place, I wonder if Belle would feel a modicum of guilt for getting everyone to save Rumple.

If unrestrained Dark One using Rumple's body as a vessel would have been as bad as they were saying, Belle may be the least at fault because getting the Dark One out of Rumple and into someone who stands a chance of controlling it might have been the best-case scenario (other than hauling him over the town line into the world without magic, and I guess that's where Belle gets the blame if she wanted him saved and wasn't willing to let him die in the outside world). However, there's plenty of blame to go around, starting with Robin's dumbass move to get the elixir to save Rumple while he was dying of his own dark heart in the world without magic. It seems like if he'd died there, he'd have just died, since the Dark One had no power there. I still don't understand the reasoning there (I understand the meta reasoning, that it would have ruined the story if Rumple had just died there, but they needed a better reason for Robin to save him). It made no sense for Robin to put his family at risk to go rob the store and get the potion to keep Rumple alive. Yeah, Rumple promised the apartment, but if he died, wouldn't they have been able to keep it anyway? It's highly unlikely that Neal had a will leaving his stuff to Mr. Gold. If anything, it would now belong to Henry, and Regina is Henry's parent, and Regina was the one who gave them the apartment in the first place.

 

Or if we want to go further back in time, Neal was the idiot who brought the Dark One back when it was safely locked in a vault.

 

Further back, there's all the "We must save him! He's family!" nonsense when Hook poisoned him, though at least saving him ended up saving them from Cora.

 

Or we could blame Hook for being a drama queen about it and wanting him to suffer instead of just outright killing him, with the poison as a backup to a killing blow (or was his attempt to stab Rumple affected by the others showing up, so he didn't get a chance to give a fatal blow? I don't recall specifically).

 

At any rate, they've had multiple opportunities to get rid of the Dark One but have saved Rumple's life every time, leading to the situation they're currently in.

[KAOS Agent]

 

or was his attempt to stab Rumple affected by the others showing up, so he didn't get a chance to give a fatal blow?

 

I think he was pulling back for the killing blow as it were when Emma hit him over the head and knocked him out. The poison just ensured that no matter whether he was able to inflict a fatal strike, Rumpel would die.

[Faemonic]

 The way they described it was like Rumple's heart/soul and the Dark One coexisted, and while Rumple wasn't doing much to resist the darkness, he also wasn't taking it to extremes. All those years, and while he did bad stuff, he was focused on finding Bae, so he didn't do anything like take over the world and rule as a true absolute monarch.

Your overthinking makes the show so much better for me. XD

 

My first thought when Rumple revealed his true motivations (his dark heart) was, oh, so Snow had nothing to worry about her own dark heart unless she found a way to live for 200 years! But this explains it, if dark heart Snow would have become Evil Queen Snow in like...ten years, say David had an unfortunate altercation with a microwave or died in battle with a dragon or fell through a portal and he couldn't stick around to keep her heart pure.

[Shanna Marie]

I think he was pulling back for the killing blow as it were when Emma hit him over the head and knocked him out. The poison just ensured that no matter whether he was able to inflict a fatal strike, Rumpel would die.

So we can remove Hook being a drama queen from the culpability list, since he wasn't doing any kind of "dying quickly is too good for you, so I'll just wound you and let you die slowly. Or be saved" thing, but we can add Emma to the list for not letting Hook kill Rumple.

 

Really, when you look at it, it's rather ridiculous how many times these idiots have saved Rumple's life, when you consider all the things he's done. It's not even a case of them pulling back from killing him. They keep intervening when his own bad deeds come back to bite him and go through some pretty extraordinary measures to save his life. Karma must be getting very frustrated with them by now.

 

My first thought when Rumple revealed his true motivations (his dark heart) was, oh, so Snow had nothing to worry about her own dark heart unless she found a way to live for 200 years! But this explains it, if dark heart Snow would have become Evil Queen Snow in like...ten years, say David had an unfortunate altercation with a microwave or died in battle with a dragon or fell through a portal and he couldn't stick around to keep her heart pure.

I don't know, Hook was pretty dark for almost as long as Rumple was without seeming to have any risk of his heart turning into charcoal. Or is it like stopping smoking, where within a certain amount of time your lungs stop looking like a smoker's? So that a year or so after turning himself around, Hook is reversing the damage? But I suspect the Dark One has something to do with it with Rumple, maybe a combination of the two, his own native darkness combined with the Dark One influence, and no human was meant to contain the Dark One for so long. After a while, the Dark One may have been influencing him more and more. He was finally getting to the point of seeking out world domination of some sort when he was trying to separate himself from the dagger while maintaining his powers so he could go into the world without magic and still have magic. I doubt Snow would have keeled over from briquette heart within her lifetime, even if she lost David and started wallowing in self-pity. I mean, Regina's still ticking.

[Mari]

I don't know, Hook was pretty dark for almost as long as Rumple was without seeming to have any risk of his heart turning into charcoal. Or is it like stopping smoking, where within a certain amount of time your lungs stop looking like a smoker's? So that a year or so after turning himself around, Hook is reversing the damage? But I suspect the Dark One has something to do with it with Rumple, maybe a combination of the two, his own native darkness combined with the Dark One influence, and no human was meant to contain the Dark One for so long.

But was Hook as dark as Rumple? I'm not arguing he was a semi decent guy, I'm just arguing that while we've seen Hook do some relatively minor evil deeds, and the occasional minioning gig, he apparently wasn't actively corrupting person after person, like Rumple was.

Another factor could be a desire to change. From what we've seen so far, Rumple mostly embraced his Dark One abilities and its corrupting influence. He relished in it, and had no desire to get rid of it--the most he ever lashed out at Belle was when she almost kissed it away, and he refused to go with or after Baelfire without keeping it.

In comparison, Hook at least made a stumbling effort to reform. Maybe his heart wasn't as evil-steeped, and adding in the desire to change cleanses it, little by little?

[Amerilla]

I've always thought Dark Heart Syndrome is caused by use of dark magic. 

 

Rumpel's heart is darkest because he's been host body for the Dark One for [insert theoretical timeframe here], Regina is starting to look a bit spotty because she's used dark magic and/or cast the Dark Curse, and Snow had that fleck of black from using dark magic to defeat Cora. Hook hasn't really used dark magic, he's just occasionally glommed on to others who use it.

 

For Snow, it seems like they were building a longer storyline around that three-episodes arc (The Queen is Dead/The Miller's Daugher/Welcome to Storybrooke), where we see Past!Cora hatin' on Eva, poisoning her, creating the Life for a Life candle to tempt Mini!Snow to darkness, and vowing over Eva corpse to turn Snow's heart "black as coal" no matter how long it took. Then, Snow uses the Life for a Life candle to kill Cora, and that final scene in Welcome with Regina yanking out the ole battery and gloating over the spot that, now that it's seeded, will cause Snow to destroy everything she loves.

 

But other than that passing scene in Selfless, Brave and True when Snow slaps Marco and looks at her hand like it's an alien attached to her arm, we got nothing. (Because TW;TS, Snow was eeeevil for getting mad that Marco had lied to her and separated her from her daughter, forcing Emma to grow up alone and unloved while Snow languished in an unending hellscape of virginal elementary school teaching and compulsive closet-cleaning.) That's really the last we hear of it - by the finale, Snow's back to making nonsensical speeches about the Hard Road of Goodness. It hasn't come up in any place in S3 or 4 where it logically would - splitting her heart with David, eggnapping, etc.

 

TL;dr - being a shitty person doesn't give you DarkHeart-itis, being a shitty Dark Magic user does.

Edited July 17, 2015 by Amerilla

[Shanna Marie]

But was Hook as dark as Rumple?

My instinct is to defend Hook, so I was trying to be objective. On the one hand, Rumple's goal of finding his son is a lot less dark than Hook's goal of vengeance. On the other hand, there's a fine line between vengeance and justice. Hook really was wronged, and the proper authorities for dealing with that kind of wrong were either unwilling or unable to do anything about it. Then again, Hook's desire for vengeance was about how he felt (which was how he was able to turn around -- he realized that it didn't actually make him feel better), not about justice or protecting others from Rumple's evil. On a third hand (the one in a jar, I guess), Rumple indulged in a lot of side evil just for fun that had nothing to do with his goal. Flaying Robin Hood, taking Cinderella's baby and threatening to evict nuns had absolutely nothing to do with finding Bae, and he kept being evil after finding Bae. Hook was capable of being a decent guy when his revenge wasn't involved. It was just when he had to choose between doing the right thing and getting his revenge that he was willing to create collateral damage. Rumple set out to corrupt people in order to reach his goal, while Hook didn't care what happened to someone who was in between him and his goal.

 

Rumple probably was overall darker. Hook couldn't have been too bad if he was able to walk away from it so easily. He's screwed up from time to time, but he's always felt bad for screwing up, and I don't think Rumple has yet felt all that bad about anything he's done, and I don't think he could walk away from being evil.

 

But then there's this:

I've always thought Dark Heart Syndrome is caused by use of dark magic.

I think that's probably the key. Being a jerk may cloud your heart, but it's probably not going to turn into charcoal and crumple into bits, killing you. It would be nice, though, if they incorporate this into their worldbuilding. They need some kind of constraint on magic use to keep it from being just a case of wave your hand and get what you want, and having there be a limit to the amount of dark magic someone can use before they cause irreparable damage and kill themselves would work well for that. That seemed to be what they were suggesting with Rumple toward the end, that he had to be very careful about using magic. But will the same thing apply to Regina? Will she have to think twice about conjuring up a fireball? Will she have to work really hard to try to use light magic, for fear of damaging her heart? Is she regretting all the dark magic she's used over the years? Will this be a reason they need to help get the Dark One out of Emma fast, before she's permanently damaged?

 

Unfortunately, I don't expect them to incorporate this in the worldbuilding and magic system. It'll be something that happens to Rumple, but they won't think about how it might apply to others.

[Amerilla]

Probably in the minority here, but I was actually sorry they dropped Dark Snow.

 

It could have had some big payoffs in S3. For example: How does the Dark Spot influence what Snow is willing to do to #SaveHenry or save David from Death-or-Abandonment-by-Dreamshade?  In 3b, it could have added a bit of nuance to Yay! Adultery! and given some edge to Emma will save us! It could have added some additional drama to the shared heart, because David could be "blackened" a bit by association. It could have played a role in her pregnancy. It was just a lost opportunity to give the character a little more fullness and add a little interest to her relationships with Regina and Emma and David.

 

It would be nice, though, if they incorporate this into their worldbuilding. They need some kind of constraint on magic use to keep it from being just a case of wave your hand and get what you want, and having there be a limit to the amount of dark magic someone can use before they cause irreparable damage and kill themselves would work well for that.

 

As always, some basic rules would be wonderful.

 

I get the sense that the "Rumpel Dying From Black Heart" storyline was pulled from far up their collective colon - they needed a way to jump the DO from him to Emma without killing him, and this was the blunt instrument they chose.

 

Myself, I would have gone with a Tipping Point model....that one can survive with a dark heart almost indefinitely, but there's always the risk of hitting the wall, and then you risk losing your humanity forever. For Rumpel, the obvious tipping point was losing Bae and then being banished by Belle. Absent of the two people towards whom he could feel love even through the blackness of the Dark One's curse, of course he would be unable to hold back the tide. But they really didn't present it that way - his actions in S4 seems to be decoupled from anything that had gone on in the previous three seasons.

[Camera One]

Myself, I would have gone with a Tipping Point model....that one can survive with a dark heart almost indefinitely, but there's always the risk of hitting the wall, and then you risk losing your humanity forever. For Rumpel, the obvious tipping point was losing Bae and then being banished by Belle. Absent of the two people towards whom he could feel love even through the blackness of the Dark One's curse, of course he would be unable to hold back the tide. But they really didn't present it that way - his actions in S4 seems to be decoupled from anything that had gone on in the previous three seasons.

 

 

 

That would have made more sense.  I guess they presented the reason as Rumple being in the World Without Magic.  He claimed that back in Storybrooke, he used magic to protect himself against his heart failing, but they never addressed why he didn't try to do so again once he was back in Storybrooke.   I suppose it's possible to fanwank that he was too far along in the degradation process.  At first, I thought maybe the 6 weeks took a much stronger toll than the brief visit in S2.  But Rumple actually collapsed right when he got to NYC and went to Neal's apartment.  I'm also not sure what the Elixir of the Wounded Heart actually does. Could it have healed Rumple if they had more?  

[KAOS Agent]

I wondered why Will had Cora remove his heart after his devastation about Ana rather than try to get more elixir. He'd used it before and knew where to get more, so why not try to get some rather than handing his heart to an evil bitch?

Edited July 18, 2015 by KAOS Agent

[YaddaYadda]

I wondered why Will had Cora remove his heart after his devastation about Ana rather than try to get more elixir. He'd used it before and knew where to get more, so why not try to get some rather than handing his heart to an evil bitch?

'Cuz they hadn't come up with the elixir idea yet and figured they needed to use Michael Socha to meet his minimums or something like that?

[legaleagle53]

And also because Cora was one of the most masterful manipulators of all time.  She talked him into giving up his heart as a way of getting to her real target, Anastasia, whom she wanted to train as a surrogate daughter after her failure with Regina.

[KingOfHearts]

Adam addresses plot hole:
 

 

Get asked this alot by #Oncers: Zelena/Marian's heart was red in s4 b/c of glamour spell.  Even out of body, the spell affected whole body

Good thing that was the only inconsistency with Zelena/Marian... right?

Edited July 27, 2015 by KingOfHearts

[RadioGirl27]

Not only that

@NicoleLeeTV @arrow_true yes. it's a MAGICAL glamour. It's super powerful!

Edited July 27, 2015 by RadioGirl27

[Serena]

I mean, of all their retcon, this is their least nonsensical I guess. Let's talk about "Emma was totes not underage when Neal knocked her up" instead...

[Mari]

Seriously, Serena, like just anyone can do math. That's a very specialized skill that only a few people have. We're probably just doing the math wrong. :)

Edited July 27, 2015 by Mari