S01.E22: A Land Without Magic

[yeswedo]

 

Emma and Regina team together in order to find a way to save Henry's life. Meanwhile, in the fairytale land that was, Prince Charming attempts to escape from the Evil Queen's clutches in order to reunite with Snow White who, unbeknownst to him, has already taken a bite of the Queen's poison apple.

 

Note: please use spoiler tags when referring to events that happen after this episode to allow new viewers to choose to be spoiled.

[KingOfHearts]

The Land Without Magic is my favorite episode of the whole series. It has all kinds of pay-off, and it pushed the show into new places. I had indescribable joy when the curse broke. There was a dragon slaying to top it off! This episode truly had the Disney magic. In a lot of ways, it was totally unexpected. I've watched it multiple times. It's the very height of OUAT.

Edited June 24, 2014 by KingOfHearts

[KAOS Agent]

Okay, so I just rewatched this episode and while it's awesome and I remember being so excited for Season 2, now I watch it and think on the ashes of those expectations. Anyway, on to the episode.

 

First off, I hate David's hair. Like I forgot how much I hated the really short look, but his hair when he's fighting Rumpel is awful. Not "The Shepherd" awful, but still really bad.

 

We get the the "All magic comes with a price" refrain again in this episode. With this delightful exchange between Rumpel and Regina.

 

Rumpel: I told you, all magic has its price.

Regina: Henry shouldn't have to pay it.

Rumpel: No, you should. But alas, here we are.

 

Why is it the Henrys in Regina's life are always the ones paying the price and Regina never has to? Answer me that show. That's two dead Henrys in one season. Never go near the woman if your name is Henry or you know someone named Henry or even if you're thinking about your Ford truck. I'm telling you, if it can be traced back to a Henry, you're screwed.

 

Regina's love for Henry was once again proven to be wholly selfish when she explains to Emma that her leaving town wasn't enough and that as long as Emma's around, Henry will never be hers. So the obvious solution to that is to kill Emma. I'm sure that will make Henry love you so much, Regina. Hello crazy! You can't fix thinking like this.

 

I should feel bad about August turning to wood, but I also rewatched the end of "The Stranger" and hate him so much. Who could leave such an adorable baby with that horrible, horrible man? I mean did you see that baby? I wanted to cry for Baby Emma knowing how much her life would suck. And here she is being nice to August after he just left her there all helpless and cooing. Okay, so he was a little boy, but still. Use him for firewood! Did I mention that I hate him? 

 

What the hell was Mary Margaret doing wandering around the town after Henry "died"? Why didn't she stick around the hospital to comfort her friend and roommate when she arrived to find her son dead? Who just leaves like that? No one has ever been there for Emma, but Emma called Mary Margaret family and she just left. Mary Margaret is now on my list.

 

Lastly, how far is the town line from Main Street? David left town at a little after 7. Meanwhile, Emma fought a dragon, climbed up an elevator shaft, got to the hospital and broke the curse all before he got to the line. He was kissing Snow on Main Street at 8:15, so like 40 minutes each way? Damn that's a big town.

[Serena]

Rumpel: I told you, all magic has its price.

Regina: Henry shouldn't have to pay it.

Rumpel: No, you should. But alas, here we are.

Damn, that's a great line. Too damn writing something like this would be uncoinceivable for the writers post-S1.

[Zuleikha]

Now that I'm all the way done... my thoughts surprisingly haven't changed at all about well... really much of anything. The final arc was nicely done, but I still think Emma not believing for so long was unsatisfying for me as a TV viewer and made me not invested in her as a character or a protagonist. I think the Emma aspect of the show would have worked better for me if the beginning of the series had used Emma to establish weirdness about Storybrooke and give us a better idea of life under the full curse. Then, around "Heart is a Lonely Hunter," Emma could have seen enough weirdness that Graham's death would be a turning point to make her truly believe. I would then have a slower lull where Emma tried to weaken/undo the curse by restoring individual happy endings to people and then changed almost not a thing about the awesome, amazing Mary Margaret-to-finale arc.

 

And Regina did make a sacrifice for Henry! Because she does love him. I was just in this discussion about it, but didn't the show basically make it canon (for S1, at least) when she told Henry to believe she loved him? Plus, she did choose Henry's life over the curse! (but why, Regina? Why couldn't you just give Jefferson what he wanted when he helped you? If for your own self-interest in potentially getting his help again in the future! Why must you be your own worst enemy every single time. Let Emma leave when she says she's going to, and don't screw over powerful people who may help or hurt you in the future just because you're upset and need a target). I'm expecting an S2 redemption arc.  I like to imagine Regina, Snow, and Emma eventually being friends and being an unstoppable force. Again, after Regina has a lot of therapy.

 

I'm nervous about what's going to happen with Rumple/Belle/Bae and morality in S2. I get bad Baltar and Battlestar Galactica vibes where I feel like the show thinks he's so awesome that his bad deeds don't really count as bad. One of the reasons why I'm able to be Team Regina is that I never feel like the show expects me to view her as either good or justified. I feel that the show's writers know she's unjustified in her treatment of Snow and that if Regina is ever redeemed, Regina will be made to work for it and to prove it. I think Rumple is worse than Regina, but I worry that the show sees him as a protagonist with no need for change or redemption. I'm very nervous about Rumple/Belle being reunited under these circumstances because when Belle tried to do true love's kiss, she seemed to think that all the evil aspects of Rumple were just the Dark One curse. But Mr. Gold is not cursed. He is unquestionably responsible for his own actions, and he's still ruthless and amoral. Bae would not approve.

 

I really wanted Snow to say something to Charming about what a spineless creep David Nolan was when they were reunited. But the Snow/Charming fairybacks were awesome. Action Snow was fun, even if Snow was stupid to bite the apple without there being any way to guarantee Regina would hold her end of the bargain. I was also sad that we didn't see Pinocchio come back to life and reunite with Gepetto. 

 

I felt vindicated when Jefferson wanted his happy ending in Storybrooke with the fake memories. Because the Enchanted Forest sucks and everyone's better off in Storybrooke, especially now that they're themselves. :) 

 

Maleficent as the beast in the dungeon seemed weird to me. I was expecting it to be Cora. Given that Regina didn't know about the egg, I don't know why she would do that particular thing to Maleficent. She liked Maleficent (as much as she liked anyone), and it was just anti-climactic. 

[stealinghome]

One of the reasons why I'm able to be Team Regina is that I never feel like the show expects me to view her as either good or justified.

Hold onto that feeling.

[KAOS Agent]

As Rumpel says, when you can see the future, there is irony everywhere.

[FurryFury]

I actually never felt in s1 that the show pretended that Regina's such a special snowflake and a good person, so I sorta get the OP. There was a (short) time that I legitimately thought they considered Rumple more worthy of redemption or something than her. I was never a Regina fan, though, but I didn't hate her at all then.

 

I was also a bit annoyed at the writers for dragging "When will Emma believe" arc for far too long. It was the biggest reason it took for me a while to warm up to her character (I think I only started to be Team Emma around "Hat Trick").

[KAOS Agent]

I definitely agree that Rumpel wasn't portrayed in a horrible light in Storybrooke. We saw bits of the Dark One in his fairybacks, and those were seriously disturbing, but present day Gold was highly motivated to get Emma to break the curse, so he was largely helpful in that effort. There is also the fact that they were playing Regina and Rumpel off of each other and since Rumpel was on Team Emma, albeit only for his own selfish reasons, his manipulations were portrayed in more of a neutral light or at least given some sort of mitigating factor. He kidnapped Kathryn (evil), but her didn't kill her like Regina wanted and instead used the situation to set Regina up (not totally evil). Plus, Robert Carlyle does an excellent Sad!Rumpel and that can be very effective. Much more so than the endless tears of Regina.

 

But let's not lie, once he had the opportunity to get magic back, his helpfulness came to an end. Once he had the True Love potion from Emma, he didn't even need her to break the curse. He already had his memories and now he would have magic, he was good. He didn't give a damn about anyone else in that town. I mean, Henry, a young boy he seemed to have demonstrated some fondness for, was dying and he sent his mother on a dragon slaying mission to get something he wanted, not something that would have aided Henry. Rumpelstiltskin that magnificent bastard displayed his true colors in this episode. 

[KingOfHearts]

On 6/23/2014 at 11:03 PM, KingOfHearts said:

The Land Without Magic is my favorite episode of the whole series. It has all kinds of pay-off, and it pushed the show into new places. I had indescribable joy when the curse broke. There was a dragon slaying to top it off! This episode truly had the Disney magic. In a lot of ways, it was totally unexpected. I've watched it multiple times. It's the very height of OUAT.

 

... this episode didn't age well. Considering everything across the six seasons that followed, it created a few big problems. If the writers had gone about this episode another way, things would've turned out quite differently. It works great in a vacuum because of all the build-up and tension from S1, but it has an issue this series never had again - there was too much payoff.

Spoiler

Giving everyone their memories back so quickly and bringing magic to Storybrooke with no limitations that lasted more than two episodes were mistakes. The Rumpbelle reunion makes me groan in retrospect. (It wouldn't if they had broken up later, because back in S2 there were still things to mine from that relationship.) 

This episode is, however, still one of my favorites. We've got epic dragon fights, Emma reacting to everything, and Regina sobbing into a pillow. The pink smoke at the end is an awesome cliffhanger in of itself because no one really expected it. Seeing all the cameos - Maleficent, Graham, Jefferson - really ties the season together. This is one of my favorite exchanges in the show:

Gold: "I saved it for a rainy day."
Emma: "Well it's storming like a bitch. Where is it?"

It's great because Gold is echoing what he said in EF to Charming. It's a reference to his fairy tale self. Emma's response is very worldly and something you wouldn't hear a magical character say. I really miss subtle characterization like that. 

Edited August 10, 2018 by KingOfHearts

[CCTC]

The Charming/Emma dragon scenes stuck out for me partially because I thought they were well done and enjoyed the parallel father/daughter EF/SB and also after seeing a number of other season and half season finales it was nice to see two heroes

Spoiler

actually do something besides stand in an empty street with the rest of the main cast and watch  two people have a really lame jazz hands battle.

Charming and Rumple kind of had an interesting dynamic, it is too bad

Spoiler

they really never had any scenes of significance much after season 2 or 3.  They really did not mix up who the main cast interacted with in the later years.

 I am really behind in my rewatching, but I had happen to have rewatched this episodes sometime within the last year.  (I think I have probably season the season 1 premiere and finale the most.)  I do think they did a pretty good job wrapping up the season.  If it would have been done in later years,

Spoiler

the main plot probably would have been wrapped and crammed into the first commercial break with no time to take it -- possibly with no emotional reaction shots to Henry waking up and the rest of the episode would have been clumsily introducing the next arc.

but, I will end on a positive note, it did make me wonder what was going to happen next and you did get some emotional pay-off with the Charming embrace, Emma/Henry, Gold finding Belle although

Spoiler

in retrospect she should have pushed him down the well,

and Regina finally losing with a hint she might be up to more trouble the next season,

Spoiler

if only they would have kept her as a villain, or stuck to the redemption arc they were slowly building in 2A.  

[companionenvy]

Man, even with everything that I know is coming, I love this episode. "Your father's sword" gives me chills every time, and the intercut scenes of David and Emma fighting are terrific. I think it worked especially well because the episode, smartly, I think, not only wasn't going to have Emma and her parents reunite in this episode, it wasn't even going to let her process that Henry being right meant that her best friend and the tool she was having an affair with actually were her parents; Emma becomes a believer, but puts everything else aside in order to focus and save her son (and, probably, because she isn't emotionally capable of processing it at the moment). So offering this reminder in present-day scenes of exactly who she is and where she comes from allows the show and Emma to implicitly address that aspect of what she's just learned without making her confront it overtly before either it or she is ready. 

I also can't help but be moved by Rumple's reaction to seeing that Belle is alive, even being able to see already how messed up that relationship is. It is kind of hilarious that once she gets her memories back, it takes, like, two seconds to go from mutual "I love yous" to "Now wait here a second while I sketchily bring back all my sketchy magic powers with absolutely no pretense that I have any valid and not megalomaniacal reason for doing so."

I have to give LanaP credit for doing a good job of playing a Regina that I could buy actually cared about Henry and was legitimately grieving for him. Her reaction when he wakes up - the immediate joy that he's alive, even in spite of everything else it means, followed very quickly by rage and fear, is perfect.

The problem, of course, is while the scenes may be effective in isolation, they don't gel with the utter sociopath we've seen for most of the rest of her scenes in the season, past and present. I feel kind of bad for Regina in the moment in spite of this, because I'm watching a mother who, in that moment, is being presented as possessing a  normal, non-psychopathic range of emotional responses, grieving the loss of her son. Of course I'm going to feel bad for her. That doesn't make it a consistent depiction of her character. I'll buy that somewhere in Regina, she feels enough for Henry to be genuinely devastated when she realizes what she's done, but it goes beyond that to a near total change in affect, attitude and demeanor. Which makes it more of a manipulation than the addition of complexity to her character.

[Shanna Marie]

I think a lot of what doesn't age well with this episode is the stuff that got retconned later.

Spoiler

Rumple explained the Savior stuff, and it doesn't at all fit with the later mess of the Savior mythology. Then there's Blue's warning that Regina should hide, which barely comes to anything. People are mad at Regina for about thirty seconds, and she ends up getting elected queen of the universe, so the satisfying payoff to her downfall here gets undermined. There's all the dread about that purple cloud of magic enveloping the town, but it just means they have magic, and they come from a magical world, so while it makes an alarming cliffhanger, it ends up being no big deal. And there's the book. It seemed here like Emma got the magical wave because she already believed when she looked at it (given that she'd been looking at it throughout the season with no magic), which makes it rather lame that later just looking at the book gives the magical burst of belief that leads to curse breaking.

We have another strike on Regina's potential redemption when she continues to screw Jefferson over. Having a son and coming close to losing him gives her no empathy for Jefferson's situation with his daughter. It's not his fault she screwed up in implementing her plan. His revenge is rather apt.

I have mixed feelings about how the curse is broken. On the one hand, it's a culmination of Emma's arc for her to be able to give a true love's kiss to the child she gave up, that she can now see herself as a mother, and it's a lovely moment. On the other hand, I'm not crazy about the "break one curse, break 'em all" thing, where ending the sleeping curse on Henry breaks the other curse, in spite of Henry having nothing to do with the Dark Curse. It would have made more sense for Emma kissing Mary Margaret to have broken the Dark Curse, since the curse was centered on Snow, and it would have been a bigger leap of faith for Emma to believe Snow was her mother than it took for her to love her son. So, maybe it could have gone Emma believing because of the poisoned apple tart, doing all the stuff to try to save Henry, ending in waking him with a kiss, and then because of all that, she seeks out Mary Margaret, now knowing she's her mother, and that's what breaks the Dark Curse (well, the memory portion).

But the ending of the episode definitely made me excited about what would come next.

[KingOfHearts]

49 minutes ago, Shanna Marie said:

I think a lot of what doesn't age well with this episode is the stuff that got retconned later.

Spoiler

Gold flat out says he created the curse, when we learned later his mother did. Oops.

And yeah, I don't like how the book became the automatic problem solver. Look at the book. Touch the book. Read the book. 

Edited August 10, 2018 by KingOfHearts

[profdanglais]

This really is a great episode. Emma is badass again, and I love the parallels with her and Charming. She's her father's daughter in a lot of ways and it's nice to see that laid out. 

I agree that magic shouldn't have been returned so quickly, or at least there should have been issues with it in this world. Like it doesn't quite work as expected, it's unpredictable as Regina says. 

Graham's return was a nice surprise, I remember watching it for the first time and thinking, "Oh, yeah, that guy." 

When exactly did Emma put his shoelace on her wrist, I was watching for it but must have missed it. 

[Rumsy4]

This episode works great in isolation. It had the perfect blend of fairy tale and real world stuff, with Emma effectively straddling the two. The return of Jefferson and Graham to play minor, but important parts, was very effective. And I loved the shot of Emma throwing the sword at Maleficent. 

When Charming proposed to Snow, I was like--but you guys have literally met five times. I guess being willing to die for the other and sharing True Love's kiss is justification enough to accelerate the courtship process. :-p 

Spoiler

This episode sets up so many things that are never ever fulfilled. We never find out how Snowing took the kingdoms back. And everything goes downhill from here on when it comes to Regina's arc. Oh well...

Edited August 12, 2018 by Rumsy4

[andromeda331]

I love this episode. It really stinks because of the zero fallout later. But I loved Emma finally believing and her reaction when Regina walks in by grabbing her and yanking her into a closet to toss her around. I wish a couple punches had been thrown. Even if it was too early for her to realized what the truth meant for her and her parents but I do love her threatening to kill Regina if Henry dies. I love the scene with Emma at Mr. Gold's and him giving her, her father's sword. The intercut of Emma fighting the dragon with her father doing the same thing years early. It was so good. This is how they should have handled flashbacks. When they did them right, it was perfect. I loved Emma's tears and kissing Henry. I always loved that's what broke the curse. I wouldn't have minded it if there was another layer or part to break like something between Snow and Emma.  But at the time I loved that it was a kiss from a mother to a son. It was really nice to see it true love wasn't just between a couple but could also be a parent and a child. I love Jefferson going to get Belle even though I still wonder why he didn't do that sooner after he knew Gold was awake. It was also weird the Mary Margaret ends up walking down the street instead of at the hospital with Henry and Emma. It really makes no sense but its still a great scene when the curse breaks. I loved the reactions from everyone after the curse broke. The shock, sitting down,  warning Regina to hide. And of course Rumple making a big mistake by bringing magic which ended up being a much bigger mistake given how it ruined the show. Way too much power for Rumple and Regina to have. I did love Rumple's reaction to seeing Belle. 

[tennisgurl]

Spoiler

First of all, I guess this episode should be called "A Land That Used to Have Magic Until Some Tree Nymph Got Rid Of It A Billion Years Ago Because Of Evil Prehistoric Mean Girls" if they wanted to be more accurate...

In a vacuum, this is still a really great episode. It has action, humor, romance, drama, the whole nine yards. I love both the fairytale flashbacks AND the Storeybrooke stuff, and its really effectively blends the fairytale with the modern world. Especially the flashbacks of Charming fighting dragon Maleficent while Emma is fighting her now, even using Charmings sword. "Your fathers sword" still gives me chills. And, again, in a vacuum, everyone getting their memories back and magic returning isnt a bad way to end the season. Its definately an opening to tell new stories, and keeps the show fresh, and makes you excited to see what happens next. Of course, well...

I really want to throw out how much I love Josh Dallas in this role, especially as Charming. Dude can totally sell being a fairytale prince in a way that I think a lot of actors cant do without a sense of irony or silliness. He can drop lines like "Show yourself witch!" and sound totally badass and sincere, which is pretty impressive. I also love his dynamic with Rumple this episode, and all their scenes together are gold (some pun intended), especially Rumple getting Charming a nicer outfit to wear for his big moment! Maybe its the spinner that still lives inside him? Or Rumple is just that genre savy that he knows how this needs to go. 

Even in episodes featuring the future stars of this show, Regina's Tears, this season really does show how much Regina lacks in basic empathy towards others. I mean, even as she cries over her comatose son, she can still sneer at Jefferson about how because Henry ate the turnover and not Emma, the deal is off and she wont help him find his daughter, even at no cost to her. She could easily just get him to Grace, and as she is currently experiencing the loss of a child, she should feel for him...but nope. Regina is just an asshole who likes making everyone's day worse. I do, however, admit that this is probably the first episode where I bought that she loved Henry, even if its a selfish, possessive kind of love. While this show has always held loving someone as meaning they have "good in them" or whatever, there is a good story to be told in a love that is real and true, but also selfish or twisted, or brings out the worst in people. Its still the same kind of pure love, just in a different filter. I think that could have been interesting to explore. 

Nice seeing Jefferson and Graham in small but important roles. And everyone reacting to the curse breaking was suitably epic for what the show has been building towards this whole time. Its also a great Emma episode, with the iconic sword with red jacket imagine, her roughing Regina up in the closet (HAH!), her frantic search for anything to save Henry, realizing that everything was true, and I even thought her dynamic with Regina was somewhat interesting. Them teaming up while also clearly hating each other worked really well, and I can actually see why people wanted more of them in that kind of relationship. 

Spoiler

Of course, that totally went nuts later on with the SwanQueen types who go on at length about how Regina is the best person and mom ever and Emma should consider herself lucky to be Regina's prize for good behavior, despite ruining her life and never bothering to apologize but thats a whole different thing.

Watching Rumple play the long game this season is a blast, and his reunion with Belle actually is quite moving. Of course, then he has to run off to continue his magic schemes, but Rumple gonna Rumple and all that. He has put, probably literally, centuries into this plan. 

Spoiler

Of course, knowing what we now know, this episode is basically just sad. All of this potential, and it all goes down the drain in place of pointless half season arcs, fire balls down the main street, Regina pity parities, Rumple flopping back and fourth from good and evil, and all those interesting character dynamics and relationships built up this season instantly being tossed away. Its not that nothing good EVER happened in this show again, there are still things I am looking forward to (Captain Swan shall set sail soon!) but it will never be like this, capturing the magic and mystery of Storeybrooke with the curse, and it will become obvious soon what utter hacks A&E are, and how lazy their writing is. Really, very little set up here will end up mattering. Most of it gets retconed anyway, or its never paid off in a way thats satisfying. I just want to pour out some mead for a once great show. 

But, not thinking too hard on any of that, I can still love this episode. I am gathering up my feelings on season one overall, but, really, I think it holds up. It has some very noticeable flaws, that are even more apparent as they become more blatant from here on out, but there is so much that I love, I can over look some of it. 

[daxx]

4 hours ago, andromeda331 said:

. The intercut of Emma fighting the dragon with her father doing the same thing years early. It was so good. This is how they should have handled flashbacks. When they did them right, it was perfect

Loved the way these flashbacks were edited into the current action. It was perfect. Fantastic episode.

[KingOfHearts]

42 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I do, however, admit that this is probably the first episode where I bought that she loved Henry, even if its a selfish, possessive kind of love. While this show has always held loving someone as meaning they have "good in them" or whatever, there is a good story to be told in a love that is real and true, but also selfish or twisted, or brings out the worst in people. Its still the same kind of pure love, just in a different filter. I think that could have been interesting to explore. 

You can get a sense in this episode and in 2A that...

Spoiler

Regina's love for Henry was in the same vein as Cora's for Regina. I totally buy that Cora legitimately loved her daughter, but it was a selfish love. There's altruistic love where you'd put the other person about yourself, and then there's loving something like an object. It's like loving ice cream or a new car. You'd keep it in the freezer or take care of it, but it's always a means to an end for your own pleasure. It's not a full sacrifice.

42 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

Them teaming up while also clearly hating each other worked really well, and I can actually see why people wanted more of them in that kind of relationship. 

I actually really like Emma and Regina working together reluctantly. I ship them as frienemies.

Spoiler

They also had a lot of "chemistry" in 3A and 3x12 where they teamed up to investigate Zelena. It's too bad that dynamic was forever tainted by S4.

Edited August 12, 2018 by KingOfHearts