OUAT vs. Other Fairy Tales: Compare & Contrast

[Camera One]

Lost did that to a lesser extent, I think. The Oceanic 815 survivors progressed from reluctant strangers to a big family over time. They cared about each other and discovered a belonging they had never had in their lives before. Most of them had screwed up childhoods too.

I feel that "Lost" did that quite well for about four seasons.  Each supporting character got an arc, with some character development.  By the sixth season, they became chess pieces like the "Once" characters are now. 

[Dianthus]

Angel was cursed with his soul, and it wasn't until Whistler intervened (a century or so later) that he decided to pull for the Good Guys. I still maintain that Hook's story is more like Spike's. The chip was done to him, but as he said, the soul he got on his own. Spike got his wake up call in Seeing Red and realized he had to make a change. Angel was more like Douchefire; the first love who left our Hero with deep emotional scars. Hook/Spike being the guy who had to come in after and clean up the mess.

[Camera One]

I don't watch "The Walking Dead", but it seems like a lot of the same problems are cited as on "Once".
http://www.eonline.com/news/814840/the-walking-dead-is-off-track-here-s-how-to-fix-it

Not just in the article, but in the comments as well:

- "The problem is that there is NO character development whatsoever in these slow episodes. They're just filler with no plot advancement and tell us nothing new about our characters, who rarely seem to change no matter what happens to them... Then they suddenly have total changes of personality without any cause ..."

-  "You forgot the actual number one problem: Splitting up the main characters into multiple groups, so that we only get to see our favorites 3 or 4 times a season. We HATED it when the main cast was split into two groups in the past, so now the show splits them into FIVE groups??? "

- "I don't understand how in this genre literally anything is possible but there are still useless fillers, entire episodes devoted to MINOR characters, and overall lack of focus that turned schizophrenic with all these plots, nonsense characters that adds zero value, and overall boring material that I can count on when I’m insomniac and just puts me straight to sleep. "

- "It just seems like all hope is lost for the main group and that's not fun to watch for an extended period. The show is at its best when the main group gets knocked down but then comes out on top "

[RulerofallIsurvey]

11 hours ago, Camera One said:

- "It just seems like all hope is lost for the main group and that's not fun to watch for an extended period. The show is at its best when the main group gets knocked down but then comes out on top "

I could apply this to SO many different shows.  That's usually when I quit watching.  It's a shame that showrunners Just. Don't. Get. It.    

[KingOfHearts]

Just finished the first two episodes of Buffy. It's very cringey. I'm not fond of the high school setting, but the fantasy sections aren't half bad. There's plenty of worldbuilding opportunities with the vampires. As for the characters, Buffy is pretty likeable and reminds me a little of Emma as a bailbondsperson in Once S1. Willow looks like BTVS's version of Belle. I already love Cordelia. She's an air-headed alpha bitch, but in such a way that she's almost cartoonish. It's kind of hilarious. 

I love how a teenager was able to "decrypt the city council's security system". Ah, the 90s, where kids knowing how to hack was edgy and cool.

[tennisgurl]

On 12/7/2016 at 11:51 PM, Shanna Marie said:

There was nothing suggesting tone in the script, but once they saw the way he played it, they started brainstorming about why he might be estranged from his family, and then they drew upon that whole "second in the class" thing that kept coming up. It was a shock, but then you could also look back at the earlier episodes and kind of see it.

Bashir is a really interesting character when looking at how to retcon a more complicated backstory into a character, and do it right. From what I have heard, they hadn't really written very much for Bashir at all in the beginning, they just needed a medical character, and he was who they came up with, as the young, idealistic arrogant guy. His character grew as the actor and writers tried to get a handle on what his deal was, and, as Shanna Marie said, they just came up with the genetically enhanced stuff because of something the actor did, and because they wanted to give him a more interesting backstory. But, unlike when Once throws in random crap into peoples backstories that have never been foreshadowed, and make the characters look like crap in retrospect, this retcon actually made sense, made for a more interesting and complex character, and didn't made Bashir look like an asshole in retrospect. To me, a retcon should exist, if it needs to exist, to make a character more interesting, and allow for more stories with them. Snow and Charming stealing an egg made them look like assholes for one episode, and it was never discussed again. Bashir being illegally genetically enhanced when he was a child gave him more conflict that added to his character and to the world,, and added a lot more interesting stories that tied into the main plot. 

4 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

It's very cringey

To me, the first episode of Buffy is decent, but not all that great. The metaphors are kind of lame, the bad guy is forgettable, and its pretty dated. The second and third season are where it actually starts getting good. Although, personally, I tend to actually prefer Angel, its spin off. If your not into high schools stuff, you might enjoy it more as well. 

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

 But, unlike when Once throws in random crap into peoples backstories that have never been foreshadowed, and make the characters look like crap in retrospect, this retcon actually made sense, made for a more interesting and complex character, and didn't made Bashir look like an asshole in retrospect.

DS9 could get away with the Bashir thing because it didn't have introspective flashbacks of the characters' pasts every single episode. We didn't see the play-by-play of how Bashir grew up, went to the academy, and got assigned on Deep Space Nine. He hinted at bits and pieces of his history (not the genetic enhancements for obvious reasons), but it's not like he had a complete story and then the writers just shoehorned in something out of nowhere. With Snow and Charming, we saw their first meeting, second first meeting, break-up, quest to get back together, proposal, wedding, what happened immediately after the ceremony, their honeymoon, their daughter's conception night, what happened immediately after they got back from their honeymoon, the moment they found out they were pregnant, their months spent worrying about the curse, their daughter's birth, etc, etc. There's not much room for more story.

Quote

To me, a retcon should exist, if it needs to exist, to make a character more interesting, and allow for more stories with them. Snow and Charming stealing an egg made them look like assholes for one episode, and it was never discussed again. Bashir being illegally genetically enhanced when he was a child gave him more conflict that added to his character and to the world,, and added a lot more interesting stories that tied into the main plot. 

I'm trying to think of when a retcon/character twist actually worked on Once. There's ones that fit narrative... ish, but they don't really add entertainment value or depth. The most recent retcons were Snowing's first-first meeting and Rumple's mommy abandonment issues. While they both sort of fit the narrative (they don't create plot holes), they don't really provide any interesting revelations. Snowing are True Loves and Rumple hates fairies because he blames them for screwing his life. How is that news?

Edited December 10, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[daxx]

Good Form was a good retcon for Hook since him being navy fits with his diction and the way he carries himself. The brothers jones really wasn't, they were far too old in that for the navy part to really make sense. If they had been rescued from their slavery by a high ranking naval officer and adopted at a younger age then bought commissions as they came of age it would have played better in my mind.

[Camera One]

Good Form was a good retcon for Hook since him being navy fits with his diction and the way he carries himself.

Since that was his first real centric into his background, they might well have already decided he was in the navy when his character was conceived.  "Good Form" fit into the "opposite" playbook of these Writers when writing flashbacks... make the character completely opposite to the way they are now, as a surprise twist, plus to create story about HOW he got to be the way they are.  

[Shanna Marie]

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

From what I have heard, they hadn't really written very much for Bashir at all in the beginning, they just needed a medical character, and he was who they came up with, as the young, idealistic arrogant guy.

A lot of it had to do with them creating a character for the actor. They'd seen him in something else, playing a much older character, and initially wanted him to play the captain, then found out he was actually in his 20s, so, the way I understand it, they wrote a character for him to play, and what they came up with was the young doctor. In general on that show, they were very good with developing characters and relationships organically. They noticed what worked and wrote it into the story. If two actors worked well together, they wrote more of a relationship between them. That's why they had some unlikely pair ups that ended up working so well as they developed over time.

The flashbacks on Once do complicate matters because we know a lot about the characters' background from seeing them and there isn't the chance to treat someone's past as a mystery. I think you can still throw in surprise twists as long as they fit what we see on screen, like our hypothetical Clarence, Hook's overworked guardian angel. We might roll our eyes over the revelation that Hook murdered his father and orphaned his younger half-brother, or over the revelation that Hook was a useless drunk until right when he joined the navy after his brother murdered a whole crew, but if they'd introduced Hook's guardian angel or shown us that Hook's father was Davy Jones and had the spirits of the deep watching over his son, we'd have nodded and said, "Yeah, that explains so much."

I'll definitely ditto the recommendation of Angel over Buffy, but I think you get more of an appreciation for that series if you've seen the first three seasons of Buffy. You kind of need to see where the characters came from to really get how much they grew. They did a good job of doing a total turnaround on one of them while still making the change believable.

[Camera One]

Mary Poppins is trending on Twitter right now.  Clearly a sign that she needs to be written into "Once Upon a Time" in 7A.  As we have talked about before, it's a shame she can't be Rumple's mother.

Edited December 11, 2016 by Camera One

[InsertWordHere]

I third (fourth?) the recommendation of Angel over Buffy. I have always preferred it to the mother show. 

13 minutes ago, Camera One said:

Mary Poppins is trending on Twitter right now.  Clearly a sign that she needs to be written into "Once Upon a Time" in 7A.  As we have talked about before, it's a shame she can't be Rumple's mother.

Well, like her baby daddy Pan is also the Pied Piper and her son is about 100 other fairy tale characters besides Rumpelstiltskin, she could be both Mary Poppins and the Black Fairy. They both have a thing for children. Mary Poppins is probably her origin story. 

[KingOfHearts]

49 minutes ago, Camera One said:

Mary Poppins is trending on Twitter right now.  Clearly a sign that she needs to be written into "Once Upon a Time" in 7A.  As we have talked about before, it's a shame she can't be Rumple's mother.

Or is she? *dun dun dun*

Edit: Dang it. InsertWordHere beat me to it with a more eloquent reply.

Edited December 11, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[InsertWordHere]

I felt like we've had a similar conversation before, so I went back and checked.

On 2/20/2016 at 6:25 PM, Camera One said:

And with high profile casting for Mary Poppins, I still think that's who Rumple's mother is.  Creepy woman who descends upon other people's children while abandoning her own.  True villain, that is.  And the quest for her magical umbrella could last an entire arc.  And when the umbrella connects with the magical chimney sweep brush... OMG, the darkness.

 

On 2/21/2016 at 1:27 AM, InsertWordHere said:

Mary Poppins could be the Black Fairy. Blue kicked her out because she was feeding spoonfuls of fairy dust to unsuspecting children. She's also clearly a Time Lady, but that's a whole other show.

 

On 2/21/2016 at 2:32 AM, KingOfHearts said:

The ancient incantation to conjure the darkest evil ever - "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"

And we did! Same three posters in the exact same order too. Are we cursed?

Maybe Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious is her real name. Explains why she would name her child Rumplestilskin. 

[Rumsy4]

Hah! This is too funny!! Lbr, you guys made this happen. What's the price??

[Camera One]

Did anyone watch "A Cinderella Christmas" with the actress who played Anastasia?  I saw the trailer, and it looks like a modern-day retelling of "Cinderella"... didn't seem too original and I couldn't get Ana from "Once Upon a Time in Wonderland" out of my mind.

[KingOfHearts]

Emma Rigby has a pretty distinctive look. She's one of those actors who are hard to forget.

[Shanna Marie]

I have A Cinderella Christmas on my DVR. I'm saving up all the sappy Christmas movies to marathon once the busy part of my holiday season is over.

It's funny how many Once cast members show up in these, probably because they're all filmed in Canada. Christie Lang (Marian) is a regular, as is Granny. I've spotted a dwarf or two.

[KingOfHearts]

I saw Nova in one the other day.

[Shanna Marie]

11 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

I saw Nova in one the other day.

That one's also on my DVR, but I tend to think of her more as Root in Person of Interest (where Amy Acker showed me that maybe it's the typecasting she often gets -- Fred from Angel, Nova -- that I find incredibly annoying and not necessarily her). And I kind of want a return of Nova so I can imagine her gleefully gunning down all the bad guys with a machine gun while standing up through a car's sun roof.

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

And I kind of want a return of Nova so I can imagine her gleefully gunning down all the bad guys with a machine gun while standing up through a car's sun roof.

She'll gang up with the Black Fairy as revenge for not being allowed to date Grumpy.

Edited December 13, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Rumsy4]

2 hours ago, KingOfHearts said:

She'll gang up with the Black Fairy as revenge for not being allowed to date Grumpy.

Not her. She'll dump Grumpy and fall in love with the 70-s computer at the Storybrooke library--and start communicating with it with stolen black fairy dust.

[Shanna Marie]

1 minute ago, Rumsy4 said:

She'll dump Grumpy and fall in love with the 70-s computer at the Storybrooke library--and start communicating with it with stolen black fairy dust.

And she might flirt outrageously with the Black Fairy (who's likely to flirt back) along the way.

[Camera One]

Adam Horowitz ‏@AdamHorowitzLA  1h1 hour ago
For first time I noticed that Vader has no dialogue in the whole Alderaan blows up sequence. It's just Tarkin. But you feel DV's presence.

An entire planet of innocent people dies, and he focuses on Darth Vader's "presence".  Of course...

[KingOfHearts]

1 hour ago, Camera One said:

An entire planet of innocent people dies, and he focuses on Darth Vader's "presence".  Of course...

A&E wish Regina was Darth Vader, but she's really Kylo Ren.

[Camera One]

The latest Timeless episode had a male villain utter the line "Take her to my bedchamber".  It wasn't meant to be bold and audacious.

[KingOfHearts]

17 minutes ago, Camera One said:

The latest Timeless episode had a male villain utter the line "Take her to my bedchamber".  It wasn't meant to be bold and audacious.

You mean Regina wasn't just being flirty?!

[Curio]

But guys, it's okay if the creator goes on Twitter to assure fans that they're just misinterpreting things. (Didn't A&E also give a podcast where they joked about Regina and Graham playing Monopoly in her bedchamber or something? Or am I totally making that up?)

[daxx]

I think that was Eddy, I don't remember what interview though.

[Rumsy4]

6 hours ago, Curio said:

But guys, it's okay if the creator goes on Twitter to assure fans that they're just misinterpreting things. (Didn't A&E also give a podcast where they joked about Regina and Graham playing Monopoly in her bedchamber or something? Or am I totally making that up?)

It was in the official podcast which they did in their first season, and the "joke" was that Regina and Graham could've been playing chess in her chambers. They were so flippant over the whole thing. To me it seemed like they got defensive over the question. Own your shit.

[YaddaYadda]

10 minutes ago, Rumsy4 said:

It was in the official podcast which they did in their first season, and the "joke" was that Regina and Graham could've been playing chess in her chambers. They were so flippant over the whole thing. To me it seemed like they got defensive over the question. Own your shit.

Often, I don't think they realize what they've written or understand what they've written. Or maybe they just don't care since Zelena also raped Robin. I'm gonna skip right over the whole Golden Queen and EQ propositioning Aladdin.

[Curio]

Quote

Often, I don't think they realize what they've written or understand what they've written.

Responding in the writers thread.

Edited December 16, 2016 by Curio

[KingOfHearts]

Watching Scrooged for the first time. I like how Bill Murray's character is so bored with the supernatural elements. They do freak him out at times, but he has a very "been there, done that" attitude. In that universe, the Christmas Carol exists, yet its a modern retelling of it as well. It makes me want to see more reactions to fantasy from modern characters, such as Emma. Over the years, people have become so accustomed to fantasy tropes that it would make for some interesting humor if they got to react to it in a more cynical, realistic way. I've found that fictional characters who are meant to react to the supernatural often accept it too quickly. (Especially in superhero movies.)

Once Upon a Time completely misses the opportunity to combine fantasy and reality.

Edited December 17, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[KingOfHearts]

Almost done with S1 Buffy. Stopping in here to make some Once Upon a Time comparisons. 

Even though this is teenagers slaying monsters, 1990s Scooby Doo style, I can see a layer of depth. 1x07, Angel, was very heavy and pulled the Angel/Buffy romance along very quickly. There was this scene in another episode where Buffy's dad explains how disappointed he is in her, and while it's a sort of dream, it still touched me. As someone who has dealt with issues of parental approval, I could really feel for Buffy. While Once relies on theatrics to pull sympathy for the audience, BTVS seems to stoop down and talk to viewers face-to-face. I thought the point of Once S1 was to make the fairy tale characters more relateable, but 2B onwards, all their drama has been very floaty. You can't identify with them as well. The cast and the writers have said that the magic in the show is a metaphor for real life problems, but it never comes off that way. Things like rape are never dealt with and the characters never act like real human beings. Rumpbelle is probably the closest to something real, and that's an abusive relationship.

BTVS follows that half-procedural format Once did in S1. Even in the more filler-y episodes, we still learn new things about the characters. The main plot is never too far away. (We have to check in with the vampires, you know.)

I already see a few Bangel and Captain Swan similarities. There's a few key differences, but some inspiration was definitely drawn.

My opinions will probably change in later seasons since shows tend to retcon or evolve a lot. I'm curious to see where the character progressions will go. I hope Xander finishes puberty soon. I'm really done with his raging hormones.

Edited December 19, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[CCTC]

I rewatched the first season about a year ago.  It is interesting watching Cordelia in those early episodes, because she is much more one dimensional (although still great line delivery by Charisma), and not part of the group at all.  She would basically walk by them and say a snarky line and be gone.  It seems like they either got feedback that people liked her or they just liked what they saw, because near the end of the season she was finally featured in an episode where they hinted she was not really happy with her kiss-up friends and there might be more to her.  Then in the finale, she seems to be written as she would be the next couple of years and is more likable, she learns the secret, and is incorporated into the group by the end of the episode.  Really that season 1 finale seemed like a big change for the show in general, much more like what the show would become than the episodes leading up to it.

Also, interesting to see early Angel.  He had none of the character quirks or humor that he would have by the time his series started.  

I do think Once, while being dark, never really embraces what some of the darkness means and glosses over it.  Often you don't see any real human reaction to what is occurring.  I do think the on-going new sleeping curse is the closest they have come to that in awhile -- where you see how it is affecting people's day to day lives.  I thought they were getting some real human reaction to how Belle and Rumple were dealing with the fall-out with their break-up, but I am worried that is all going to be swept under the rug with Rumple doing one noble deed erasing every thing he has done the last 3 years. 

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

Really that season 1 finale seemed like a big change for the show in general, much more like what the show would become than the episodes leading up to it.

The Once S1 finale was similar. It pretty much turned the show on its head.

Quote

Also, interesting to see early Angel.  He had none of the character quirks or humor that he would have by the time his series started.  

I hope he gets a bit more humor. Right now in S1, Angel reminds me a lot of Brooding!Hook.

Quote

I do think Once, while being dark, never really embraces what some of the darkness means and glosses over it.  Often you don't see any real human reaction to what is occurring.  I do think the on-going new sleeping curse is the closest they have come to that in awhile -- where you see how it is affecting people's day to day lives.  I thought they were getting some real human reaction to how Belle and Rumple were dealing with the fall-out with their break-up, but I am worried that is all going to be swept under the rug with Rumple doing one noble deed erasing every thing he has done the last 3 years. 

Whenever I watch Once, it's like someone is telling me a story about something terrible that happened to a stranger. You try to show that you care, but you still find it difficult to really feel for them. If something bad happens to you, a friend, or a loved one, you immediately connect emotionally. To put it simply, Once is not engaging. You're not there with the characters or seeing the world through their eyes. It's one thing to hear about a tragedy, but it's another to see the faces of those who are hit by it. Since the characters have no time to react to anything, the show is more of a fast sequence of random events. It's like reading a badly written history book.

While BTVS's quiet human moments are brief, they're consistent and numerous enough to remind us that the characters are real people. You don't have to slow the pacing down to a screeching halt (like A&E fear) to portray deep emotion. On Once, I've really stopped caring what happens to most of the characters because they're so robotic. We see tears, stress, and sadness in flickers, but it's all choppy and manufactured. We don't see what's going on behind the eyes. All we can do is guess and extrapolate what's happening Offscreen.

Edited December 19, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Shanna Marie]

27 minutes ago, CCTC said:

It seems like they either got feedback that people liked her or they just liked what they saw, because near the end of the season she was finally featured in an episode where they hinted she was not really happy with her kiss-up friends and there might be more to her.

I got the feeling that this was intentional, that they set her up as a character you'd love to hate or would just laugh at her, so it would then have a lot more impact when we got to know her. We're used to the "popular" girl not being allowed to have much humanity in shows like that, so it challenges our assumptions and prejudices. That sort of thing happens a lot in Whedon's shows, where a character is introduced in a way that almost asks you to think of them as a one-dimensional cartoon, and then over time they force you to care about that person.

30 minutes ago, CCTC said:

I do think Once, while being dark, never really embraces what some of the darkness means and glosses over it.  Often you don't see any real human reaction to what is occurring.

That's one of the show's flaws, that they try to do dark without really getting it. The point of going dark is the impact it has on the characters -- it's something so big that it has to change things. The "fun" of watching something dark is seeing the reactions and emotions. That's why angst and hurt/comfort are such popular fanfic genres -- fans want to really wallow in the characters' emotions and put them in situations even more extreme than you'd find on the show to amp up the emotional reaction. But A&E just write the dark events without the aftermath or consequences, and the reactions are all offscreen. If they'd written the Red Wedding from Game of Thrones, we'd have just had the pile of bodies, and then it never would have been mentioned again. If the family members had learned about it, those scenes would have all happened offscreen, and we wouldn't even have been entirely sure whether or not they had learned about it because we wouldn't have been able to tell from their behavior. It wouldn't have changed the attitudes toward the other characters involved, wouldn't have changed the status quo. You'd never know it had happened. They also would have skipped the setup, so the only way we would have learned that guest right was a big deal would have been when they tweeted about it after the show, getting all huffy when people asked about it. Then in interviews, they'd pat themselves on the back for being so dark and gritty.

I won't mention it specifically, since there are people Buffying for the first time, but when you get to the end of season two and then into early season 3, compare that to season five of Once and its aftermath in the handling of darkness.

[Camera One]

Another thing I liked about "Buffy" is that the protagonists work together and use their brains to solve problems, with everyone being given a chance to make a positive contribution.  On "Once", MacGuffins and deux-ex-machinas are always dropping randomly, with half the cast standing in the background doing nothing or saying the obvious. 

[KingOfHearts]

15 minutes ago, Camera One said:

Another thing I liked about "Buffy" is that the protagonists work together and use their brains to solve problems, with everyone being given a chance to make a positive contribution.  On "Once", MacGuffins and deux-ex-machinas are always dropping randomly, with half the cast standing in the background doing nothing or saying the obvious. 

This. Willow seems to be the Belle or Velma of the group, doing research with Giles. But she still gets to interact with everyone. You don't see her off having baby drama with the Master. She gets to take part in the craziness and help. I like that she's not perpetually stuck in the library. (Even Giles isn't at times.) While it's easier because there are less characters, I enjoy the fact they all get to interact with each other. There's no strict pairings. It has some centric-ish episodes where a certain character is featured, but it's not like all the other characters get shelved for an hour.

I keep calling Cordelia, "Clorinda", like Cinderella's step-sister. That's sad.

Edited December 19, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

7 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

I keep calling Cordelia, "Clorinda", like Cinderella's step-sister. That's sad.

It means you subconsciously loved 6A.  

[CCTC]

11 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

You don't see her off having baby drama with the Master.

It might be just me, but I find that a fairly disturbing visual.  

I suppose on this show they would have spent years showing how the Master is really a plucky hero.  Buffy would apologize for trying to kill him and it was her own fault that she had a bad prom, and the Master probably never even had a prom. Cordy would then teach him how to dance.

[FurryFury]

You're all joking, but some of the stuff with Spike in s7 wasn't much better than Regina's or Rumple's woobifying on Once.

[KAOS Agent]

The less said about Season 7 of Buffy the better. The show was originally intended to end at S5 and that finale was written as the series finale. I don't even like S5, but I thought the show "ended" well. Then the CW picked it up and the show had to go on. By the end, I found most of the characters unlikeable because I think, like Once, the show had run its course and they were struggling to come up with storylines. Funny story, before S7 aired, they said they were going to return to a more S1-S3 vibe. Sound familiar?

Unlike Once, Buffy got stronger in Season 2-3. The first season they established the rules of the world and nominally had an overarching arc with the Master, but mostly it was cheesy one offs. For a Once connection, Eion Bailey is one of the hyena kids in "The Pack". Once Buffy was picked up for a full second season, they established a stronger season arc and went a little deeper in developing the characters. And even the one off episodes would have consequences that were not forgotten later. It was like they took the time between Season 1 & 2 and really worked out where they wanted to take things and that made for some stellar organic storytelling.  Once went more for a "wouldn't it be cool if" idea and then never worked out how that would play out over the long term and the show suffered for it.

Edited December 20, 2016 by KAOS Agent

[Camera One]

As well-written as "Buffy" was in earlier seasons, the show jumped the shark hard by mid-Season 6.  In the final season, I actually disliked the main characters who I had formerly liked.  It hasn't even gotten to that point with "Once" yet, and I hope it doesn't.  6A is making me not care about the characters, but not necessarily hating them.

Edited December 20, 2016 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

Funny story, before S7 aired, they said they were going to return to a more S1-S3 vibe. Sound familiar?

Lost showrunners said S6 was going to have the S1 vibe too. It was horrible. I would prefer writers to improve on where they're at and not try to back to something they did before. I think in Once's case, they could make it worth without trying to rekindle the S1 success. But you know, TS,TW.

Edited December 20, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Dianthus]

I've watched every damn episode of Buffy at least once, and most of them more than that. The show worked on multiple levels, and it lends itself to detailed analyses. I subscribe to the theory that the supporting characters (especially the Scoobies) represent free-range aspects of Buffy herself.

I have no desire to do a rewatch of Once, outside of having watched the CS movie a few times. Sadly, this show doesn't even work well on its surface.

@KingOfHearts; wait 'til you get to s2!

[Camera One]

19 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

Lost showrunners said S6 was going to have the S1 vibe too. It was horrible.

Another case of the Showrunners becoming arrogant and out-of-touch.  I wonder sometimes how they could do such a great job with character development in the earlier seasons, yet by the final season, the characters have become hollow chess pieces, and they're fine with it.

The problem that the "Lost" showrunners share with A&E is that by that point, "The Twist" was more important than telling a good story for the characters.  They did a few good flashsideways stories, but the first few episodes insisted on trying to convince the audience that they had succeeded in changing history.  So we got the re-tread of Kate Runs, etc., while the later characters actually got better stuff to work with (except Sayid, Sun and Jin, who became throwaways). 

Edited December 20, 2016 by Camera One

[KingOfHearts]

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They did a few good flashsideways stories

They remind me much Storybrooke in S1. I wasn't all that impressed with the purgatory ending, so it was mostly a waste of time to me. A few were interesting, though. Most of it was "OMG, this person is interacting with this person! Look at the references to earlier seasons!"

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The problem that the "Lost" showrunners share with A&E is that by that point, "The Twist" was more important telling a good story for the characters. 

The Lost showrunners became unhinged and started doing whatever they wanted. It was like Once S2 in that regard. Psh, you thought this was about the characters? Nah, plot was always going to be the fun part!

Edited December 20, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[ParadoxLost]

2 hours ago, KAOS Agent said:

The less said about Season 7 of Buffy the better. The show was originally intended to end at S5 and that finale was written as the series finale. I don't even like S5, but I thought the show "ended" well. Then the CW picked it up and the show had to go on. By the end, I found most of the characters unlikeable because I think, like Once, the show had run its course and they were struggling to come up with storylines. Funny story, before S7 aired, they said they were going to return to a more S1-S3 vibe. Sound familiar?

I think Once's problem is that they broke the original curse way too early.  Most shows, like Buffy, stick with the original concept of the show for four or five years until its completely wrung out and they are forced to reinvent the show or end it.

Once clearly didn't have a long term plan for how to keep the show going after the curse broke so I think they should have kept the curse in place longer while they figured it out.  I tend to think that would have forced more in depth characterization.

[KingOfHearts]

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I think Once's problem is that they broke the original curse way too early. 

To think A&E were planning to break it halfway through S1. They couldn't wait to get to the point where they no longer had to consider realism.

Edited December 20, 2016 by KingOfHearts