Regina, the Evil Queen: The Only Happy Ending Will Be Hers

[Rumsy4]

1 hour ago, Curio said:

The writers have tried to make it seem like her rock bottoms were losing Daniel and Robin, but she's still had magic, power, or wealth to fall back on.

This is what puzzles me most about the "woegina" mantra the writers keep pushing. She is literally the most privileged person in Storybrooke in terms of wealth, power, and status. She continues to be disdainful of people who live in a more modest fashion, and is consistently dismissive of other people's pain, some of which was caused by her. And yet, the characters and the audience are expected to see her as the one character who has suffered the most!

[KAOS Agent]

I actually appreciated some of Regina's responses in 5B, but the problem was that while it was meant to be supportive, Regina is the one who benefited the most from the trip to the Underworld and never even faced a single one of her innocent victims (Blind Witch doesn't count). Cora arranged for Regina to leave with Robin and Henry and she refused because she wanted to help her friends. That's a fantastically good response from Regina. It would have been more meaningful if Regina were sacrificing something or in incredible danger or having to face the pain she'd doled out to innocents. Instead, her father, whom she'd murdered, apologized to her and then she got to introduce him to Henry and say goodbye before watching him enter heaven. She got closure with Cora too. And gained a sister. Lots of very positive things happened to her in the Underworld. It's hard to see her as a big victim to root for when she's getting all the shinies while very nice old ladies get dumped into the River of Lost Souls. 

Yes, you can point to Robin dying as suffering, but I don't see that as a result of her staying/being in the Underworld.  Pistachio would have been an issue with Zelena/Hades regardless of whether she'd stayed or not. What led to Robin dying was Regina holding the idiot ball and handing the baby over to Hades & Zelena in the first place. If Regina hadn't gone to the Underworld, nothing would have changed on that front. 

[Rumsy4]

I blame Robin more for handing over the baby. After all, Regina wasn't a parent. He was. It could have been an interesting storyline if Robin had broken up with Regina over this rather than died. 

[TheGreenKnight]

Regina already hit rock bottom in season 2, when she was struggling to change, losing her control over everyone (the Curse), and knowing Henry despised her. Being separated from Henry at the end of 3B was also a biggie (she essentially wanted to commit suicide and initially DGAF about Zelena), but somehow it didn't feel like it because they were initiating the romance with Robin simultaneously.

I know Regina's sassy one-liners make people here rage, but... I guess it's because most of my friendships have a similar back and forth that it doesn't bother me at all? Although I'll say Zelena is much funnier than either Regina or Hook, since she's an outsider looking in. And I think most of the other characters go along with it because they understand she doesn't know how to be a friend in straightforward terms.

[Curio]

6 hours ago, TheGreenKnight said:

Regina already hit rock bottom in season 2, when she was struggling to change, losing her control over everyone (the Curse), and knowing Henry despised her. Being separated from Henry at the end of 3B was also a biggie

But can we consider these points rock bottom if she still has magic, wealth, and power? Sure, Henry might have been giving her the cold shoulder in Season 2 for a couple episodes, but she wasn't in a jail cell for longer than a few minutes, still manages to be Mayor at the end of the day, still lives in her mansion, and still has a fabulous, expensive wardrobe. She might have thought she was separated from Henry forever in Season 3, but that "rock bottom" is tainted by the fact that Snow, Charming, and Neal weren't able to properly grieve their separations from Henry and Emma as well. Again, Regina still had magic, a castle to live in (with Robin and Roland), an expensive wardrobe, and power in 3B.

Maybe everyone has a different definition of rock bottom, but the point I was trying to make is that the show is afraid to truly strip her character down to the most humbling, lowest of points, and for someone who has always lived a relatively spoiled and rich lifestyle and can't seem to go a day without using her magic, it seems like the most logical comeuppance—from a writing perspective—would be a long string of episodes (because this show's timeline is so fast, it would feel like cheating if she only had a comeuppance for a week, which is usually 5 episodes) where she has lost someone close to her, lost her wealth/power status, and lost her magic. Unless she loses all three major categories, it technically isn't a rock bottom because there are other privileged aspects to her lifestyle that make me lose sympathy for her. How am I supposed to feel sorry for a character who has never seen justice for her crimes, and then goes and cries about it into her $1,000+ pillow case from Neiman Marcus? Now if we go into Season 6 and she's just lost Robin, quickly gets transported to a realm where there's no technology, loses her magic and status as Mayor/Queen, and is separated from Henry, that would be my definition of rock bottom.

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I know Regina's sassy one-liners make people here rage, but... I guess it's because most of my friendships have a similar back and forth that it doesn't bother me at all?

I think the key words here are "and forth." Regina gives back, but she can't take the and forth. I rip on my friends all the time too, but if a person can't make a joke at their own expense, I tend to not be friends with them. The one-liners don't necessarily bother me in theory, it's the walking-on-eggshells the other characters have to do to avoid upsetting her that gets aggravating. If we made a list of all the digs Regina has given other characters and vice versa, the two lists would be heavily uneven. It would be much more entertaining to watch if the lists were split evenly, but they're not because of the REC.

Edited July 5, 2016 by Curio

[Mari]

1 hour ago, Curio said:

I think the key words here are "and forth." Regina gives back, but she can't take the and forth. I rip on my friends all the time too, but if a person can't make a joke at their own expense, I tend to not be friends with them. 

Yes to your entire post, @Curio, but especially this.  There's lots of Regina jabbing at people, and almost no person ever jabbing back.  That's not banter, that's verbal abuse.

Plus, usually with jibes to-and-fro, if the relationship is supposed to be amicable,  there is an established affection between the characters.  There was no real transition from "We hate each other and want them to disappear." to "Regina insults me, but it's done with love and affection."  

There's a difference between teasing someone who knows you love them, and just being the resident mean girl that insults everyone while they just take it and take it.

[orza]

1 hour ago, Curio said:

But can we consider these points rock bottom if she still has magic, wealth, and power? Sure, Henry might have been giving her the cold shoulder in Season 2 for a couple episodes, but she wasn't in a jail cell for longer than a few minutes, still manages to be Mayor at the end of the day, still lives in her mansion, and still has a fabulous, expensive wardrobe. She might have thought she was separated from Henry forever in Season 3, but that "rock bottom" is tainted by the fact that Snow, Charming, and Neal weren't able to properly grieve their separations from Henry and Emma as well. Again, Regina still had magic, a castle to live in (with Robin and Roland), an expensive wardrobe, and power in 3B.

Of course we can consider it rock bottom. I found it believable that Regina was emotionally at rock bottom. Still having her magic and material possessions does not make up for the loss of her child. That's something many people never recover from. There is really no comparison between losing her magic and losing her child. It is entirely possible and happens all the time in real life that one still has the appearance of having a good life but is emotionally at rock bottom. Why do rich people commit suicide, or affluent stay-at-home mommies get addicted to benzos, or any number of other examples from real life? How Regina experienced the loss of her child had nothing to do with what other characters went through emotionally. Loss is a very individual thing and shouldn't be compared to see whose suffering is more righteous. There is no pain and suffering scorecard. That would be dumb.

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I think the key words here are "and forth." Regina gives back, but she can't take the and forth. I rip on my friends all the time too, but if a person can't make a joke at their own expense, I tend to not be friends with them. The one-liners don't necessarily bother me in theory, it's the walking-on-eggshells the other characters have to do to avoid upsetting her that gets aggravating. If we made a list of all the digs Regina has given other characters and vice versa, the two lists would be heavily uneven. It would be much more entertaining to watch if the lists were split evenly, but they're not because of the REC.

No one is walking on eggshells. Everything does not have to be "fair" with each character getting exactly the same amount of screen time, snappy one-liners, emotional moments, etc. Keeping score is pointless. I have also not seen anything on this show that I would consider actual verbal abuse. Not every unkind remark is abusive.

[Curio]

34 minutes ago, orza said:

Loss is a very individual thing and shouldn't be compared to see whose suffering is more righteous. There is no pain and suffering scorecard.

This might be true in the real world, but in a fictional story where the writers have full control over creating character arcs that use logic and karma, you almost have to use a pain and suffering scorecard if you want the story to be well-balanced. When the creators of the show declare at Comic Con that Regina is the character that has suffered the most, they're clearly keeping their own Writers' Room personal pain and suffering scorecards, so why shouldn't we also use a measurement tool as the audience? When I watch the show, I watch it through a writing lens and analyze how certain characters' redemptions are treated compared to other characters. If one character is constantly complaining about their pain and suffering, but the show largely ignores the pain and suffering that character inflicts on others, I'm going to have an issue with it. If it isn't done purposely or for dark comedic effect (e.g., the way Selina Meyer treats her daughter like crap, or the way the Parks & Recreation crew always makes fun of Jerry/Larry/Gary), it looks like character favoritism or tunnel vision.

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No one is walking on eggshells.

We might have to agree to disagree. There's already a lot of discussion in this thread that covers this ground.

[Shanna Marie]

3 hours ago, Curio said:

She might have thought she was separated from Henry forever in Season 3, but that "rock bottom" is tainted by the fact that Snow, Charming, and Neal weren't able to properly grieve their separations from Henry and Emma as well. Again, Regina still had magic, a castle to live in (with Robin and Roland), an expensive wardrobe, and power in 3B.

Plus, she's far from being an outcast or ostracized. Her former victims are being emotionally supportive of her, in spite of the fact that they're going through the same pain she is (and that's definitely not a two-way street, since she doesn't seem to consider that they might be suffering, as well). She's invited to stay in the palace she kicked Snow out of as a co-ruler to present a united front to the kingdom. I have a hard time seeing that as rock bottom. Having one thing not be the way you want it isn't rock bottom. I would consider rock bottom to at least feel like losing everything, feeling like there's nowhere to go but up because there's nothing less to lose, and you can either give in to the despair and give up or you can pull yourself together and make a go of changing the things about your life that put you into that situation.

Compare Regina's situation to what some of the other characters have gone through: Hook's rock bottom was getting his revenge only to realize that it was meaningless and didn't make things better and knowing that he'd wasted his life on it -- then finding out he didn't get his revenge, after all, so that he'd wasted his life and made everyone hate him for nothing. I would say that Emma's rock bottom might have been giving birth alone in prison as a teenager and feeling like such a disaster that she didn't even let herself hold her newborn before giving him up, having no home, no family, no idea who she even was, and having been abandoned and betrayed by the person she thought loved her -- and she's one of those heroes who supposedly get such happy endings in comparison to Regina's suffering.

[Curio]

19 minutes ago, Shanna Marie said:

I would consider rock bottom to at least feel like losing everything, feeling like there's nowhere to go but up because there's nothing less to lose, and you can either give in to the despair and give up or you can pull yourself together and make a go of changing the things about your life that put you into that situation.

That's my definition as well, and also the reason why Regina keeping her wealth, magic, and friendships prevent her from having a true rock bottom. Ana in the Wonderland series had her jewels ripped off her body by her subjects, literally stumbled through mud to find her True Love, and had to beg, plead, and go through a bit of humiliation (and death) before she could get back with Will. I'm still waiting for this equivalent scenario with Regina.

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Hook's rock bottom was getting his revenge only to realize that it was meaningless and didn't make things better and knowing that he'd wasted his life on it -- then finding out he didn't get his revenge, after all, so that he'd wasted his life and made everyone hate him for nothing.

I'd consider Hook's rock bottom to be his physical torture in the Underworld and living with the idea that no one was coming to rescue him for however long it took Emma to get down there, but that's a discussion for the Hook thread.

[Rumsy4]

41 minutes ago, Shanna Marie said:

Having one thing not be the way you want it isn't rock bottom. 

Losing a child forever is hardly "having one thing not be the way you want". One can sympathize with her pain in losing Henry, and as she thought--forever. My issue was that it was painted as solely her price to pay, when other people like Neal and Snowing were going through the same thing. Regina's pain is amplified above that of other people, and she's made to look like some martyr.

It would have been honest storytelling if she really was the only person to pay the price for reversing the Curse she had cast. Maybe everyone made it back to the EF, but Henry didn't remember Regina alone. Then, over the course of the year, Regina would build a relationship with Henry (and Robin), and they would show her earn the True Love Kiss with Henry, and her pain at Marian's appearance would have been better justified.

Edited July 5, 2016 by Rumsy4

[KingOfHearts]

Regina's grief in the Missing Year was legit. Not only did she lose her only child, but also the town she lived in for 30 years and her new persona. Returning to EF, she was once again in the place she was desperate to leave before. My problem with how it was handled was with Snowing's apathy. It was like, "Well, we lost our daughter again, but at least we've got a kingdom to run!" Regina and Neal were the only ones who organically reacted.

Edited July 5, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Curio]

11 minutes ago, KingOfHearts said:

Not only did she lose her only child, but also the town she lived in for 30 years and her new persona. Returning to EF, she was once again in the place she was desperate to leave before. My problem with how it was handled was with Snowing's apathy.

The apathy part is what makes it the REC, though. All of the things you listed could be applied to Neal and Snowing as well, but the show mostly ignored their pain and primarily focused on Regina's. Neal jumped through portals to escape the Enchanted Forest and was forced to go back there, lost Henry, lost Emma, and never properly mourned the loss of his fiancé Tamara. What did Neal get? One flashback episode that handed him the idiot ball and killed him off. Snowing lost Emma again because of a spell Regina concocted, not to mention losing Henry who is also their biological grandson. Henry didn't know who Snow and Charming were when he returned to Storybrooke, but it was treated like a joke and they had to quick make up some cell mates backstory. When Henry didn't know who Regina was, it was swelling violin music and sad eyes.

[Shanna Marie]

While treating losing a child as being just one thing wrong with Regina's life was rather flippant, it is that overall context that makes it hard for me to see that as being a rock-bottom phase in Regina's life. As noted, her grief was given full treatment and was maybe even a bit over-the-top -- a sleeping curse and ripping out her heart to avoid the pain? -- while the others going through the same thing weren't allowed to react at all and were required to provide emotional support and encouragement to her. It also doesn't work in terms of hitting bottom to turn her life around, looking at it in recovery terms, since it doesn't serve as a wake-up call to her. She just goes on and on about her sadness and suffering. She doesn't get a clue in realizing that others are suffering, too, she doesn't realize that she's experiencing what she put others through, she doesn't use it as any impetus to change. It's strictly a woe-is-me situation. Ditto with the way she reacted to Marian's return and to some extent to Robin's death. Even when she does associate her bad fortune with her villainous past, it's not a case of "I may have brought this on myself because I was a bad person, and I need to change," but rather "I need to adjust the rules of the universe that are keeping me from having a happy ending." It almost seemed like she was there initially with Marian, when she saw the mirror vision of her in full Evil Queen mode and stopped her plan to murder Marian and get her out of the way, but they ruined that by following it up with Operation Mongoose and her wanting to get the Author to write her a happy ending (without specifying what that was) rather than her pulling herself together and moving on with her life in a more positive way. She was so close to getting it, but they then took a big swerve, so instead of "my villainous acts in the past are still having consequences in my present, so maybe I need to look at my life and try making amends to prevent even more consequences catching up with me later" they went with "I'm not allowed to be happy because villains don't get happy endings, and I need to get that rule of the universe changed." Which was even more odd given that the rest of her life was pretty good, and she was in a better position than most of the heroes who were supposedly given happy endings.

[KingOfHearts]

Regina's rock bottom was just before the curse, imo. She had no political power, couldn't harm Snowing, and got exiled to Knifington Palace. That was her most desperate stage. (Where Rumple needed her to be to cast the curse). At that point she had the most depression and the least amount of support. She had her father, but she was still willing to kill him. I haven't seen her any lower in any other part of the timeline.

Edited July 5, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Curio]

7 minutes ago, Shanna Marie said:

She was so close to getting it, but they then took a big swerve, so instead of "my villainous acts in the past are still having consequences in my present, so maybe I need to look at my life and try making amends to prevent even more consequences catching up with me later" they went with "I'm not allowed to be happy because villains don't get happy endings, and I need to get that rule of the universe changed."

This is why I'm dreading Season 6 because it seems like such a retread of Operation Dumbass. At least going into Season 4 we didn't know how illogical that plot would end up being, so there was room to speculate about how Regina would bounce back from the Marian/Robin situation. But here we are again with Regina complaining about life never going her way, and instead of accepting that her past actions are giving her proper karmic payback and working hard to make amends, she takes yet another magical shortcut and separates half of her personality away from her body. Regina is a character who would have benefitted from having a shorter series lifespan, but because the show has lasted this long and the writers don't know what to do with a "good" Regina, they keep giving her these huge reset buttons that make her character a lot harder to root for instead of easier to sympathize with.

[TheGreenKnight]

15 hours ago, Curio said:

Maybe everyone has a different definition of rock bottom, but the point I was trying to make is that the show is afraid to truly strip her character down to the most humbling, lowest of points, and for someone who has always lived a relatively spoiled and rich lifestyle and can't seem to go a day without using her magic, it seems like the most logical comeuppance—from a writing perspective—would be a long string of episodes (because this show's timeline is so fast, it would feel like cheating if she only had a comeuppance for a week, which is usually 5 episodes) where she has lost someone close to her, lost her wealth/power status, and lost her magic. Unless she loses all three major categories, it technically isn't a rock bottom because there are other privileged aspects to her lifestyle that make me lose sympathy for her. How am I supposed to feel sorry for a character who has never seen justice for her crimes, and then goes and cries about it into her $1,000+ pillow case from Neiman Marcus? Now if we go into Season 6 and she's just lost Robin, quickly gets transported to a realm where there's no technology, loses her magic and status as Mayor/Queen, and is separated from Henry, that would be my definition of rock bottom.

Apparently. I don't think Regina having wealth and magic precludes her ability to hit rock bottom. This is half the character's story. Cora worked to make her queen and have all these external things (magic, wealth, power, etc.) and yet they are all empty and unsatisfying--you have everything but what you really want and what would make you happy. I don't see the show exploring the differences in social status between the characters in Storybrooke at all, unlike TEF. It doesn't seem to operate like a normal town. We don't really get a grasp of what it means to be Mayor in a place like Storybrooke, especially considering Emma usually leads the charge on all the problems anyway.

15 hours ago, Curio said:

I think the key words here are "and forth." Regina gives back, but she can't take the and forth. I rip on my friends all the time too, but if a person can't make a joke at their own expense, I tend to not be friends with them. The one-liners don't necessarily bother me in theory, it's the walking-on-eggshells the other characters have to do to avoid upsetting her that gets aggravating. If we made a list of all the digs Regina has given other characters and vice versa, the two lists would be heavily uneven. It would be much more entertaining to watch if the lists were split evenly, but they're not because of the REC.

I guess I'm not seeing this "walking on eggshells" thing. Emma and Hook usually do give back. As for why someone like Snow or Charming doesn't, it's because the jabs are not the way their characters work, going by Emma and Snow's friendship in the first season. It's not their personality to do jabs.

12 hours ago, Shanna Marie said:

Plus, she's far from being an outcast or ostracized. Her former victims are being emotionally supportive of her, in spite of the fact that they're going through the same pain she is (and that's definitely not a two-way street, since she doesn't seem to consider that they might be suffering, as well). She's invited to stay in the palace she kicked Snow out of as a co-ruler to present a united front to the kingdom. I have a hard time seeing that as rock bottom.

That's why I see her season 2 arc as rock bottom. She was ostracized then. Rumpel nearly killed her in the premiere. Everyone was only civil with her and not gunning to kill her because of Henry, which is why a villain that united her with the heroes like Pan was needed because there was too much history there for them to just shake hands and become friends. Being at rock bottom is why she was open to a relationship with Cora once she returned, because there was no reason not to at that point. And then the first time she actually wanted a relationship with Cora, she dies.

Snow and Charming (or Emma) not reacting to misc. plot developments while Regina does isn't the fault of the character, but the writers.

[Shanna Marie]

On 7/5/2016 at 10:11 PM, TheGreenKnight said:

Snow and Charming (or Emma) not reacting to misc. plot developments while Regina does isn't the fault of the character, but the writers.

True, but I can fault Regina for being so self-centered that she didn't consider that they might also be feeling pain, whether or not they showed grief. They were in the same situation, and she was so busy emoting about herself that she didn't even think that they might need some comfort. She's also so lacking in empathy that it doesn't seem to have crossed her mind that not only have other people suffered similar pain, but that she's caused it for so many people -- like, say, Jefferson, when she deliberately kept him away from his daughter, first by leaving him stranded in Wonderland and then by the curse, where he was conscious of who he was and had to watch someone else raising his daughter, who didn't remember him.

On 7/5/2016 at 2:25 PM, KingOfHearts said:

Regina's rock bottom was just before the curse, imo. She had no political power, couldn't harm Snowing, and got exiled to Knifington Palace. That was her most desperate stage.

Though she was still in a palace, with her fabulous wardrobe, and with magical powers. And while that would make a good rock bottom in a "point of no return" villain narrative, I'm not sure it works for something that shows a heroic character has suffered so much and just needs to catch a break.

But it is interesting that they didn't really show much of that phase in her life. Really, considering how much of their narrative is "Regina has suffered so much more than everyone else," they show very little of the times when she actually was suffering. The only bits we've seen of the immediate aftermath of Daniel's death and her early marriage to Leopold just showed her getting magic lessons from Rumple and flying around with Tinkerbell. We didn't see her loathing every minute of this marriage she got herself into as part of a long revenge scheme and hating having to endure Leopold's touch and Snow's affection, or we didn't see her trying to at least pretend with Leopold and him ignoring her for Snow, or whatever else went on. We didn't see the war turning against her and George and them losing. As I recall, we cut straight to her being on trial and not her being captured and realizing she'd lost. Then they barely showed any of her life in exile. What we did see, you could easily forget that she was supposedly exiled, since her life didn't seem to have been changed at all. All the stuff with Hook should have happened when she was exiled, since it seemed to have happened right before the curse, but it doesn't look at all different from any other time we saw her. It's like they're so afraid to cause their precious character any pain at all that they can't bring themselves to write the parts of the story where they know she had to be suffering.

[Camera One]

We didn't see her loathing every minute of this marriage she got herself into as part of a long revenge scheme and hating having to endure Leopold's touch and Snow's affection, or we didn't see her trying to at least pretend with Leopold and him ignoring her for Snow, or whatever else went on.

I think we got two flashbacks showing her being "miserable" but both cases just made her look whiny and petty.  One was in "Fruit of the Poisonous Tree" where Leopold was making a speech on his birthday about Snow and her mother while Regina was being "ignored".  The other was Regina pouting at the castle while Snow and Leopold went on a tour of the kingdom.  

I was reading the transcript from "Fruit of the Poisonous Tree", and Regina said this:

Evil Queen: No matter how hard I try to please the King, he will never love me the way he loved his first wife. I’m trapped by the memory of a life they used to share."

This could have been the same problem with Robin/Marian.

[Shanna Marie]

4 minutes ago, Camera One said:

Evil Queen: No matter how hard I try to please the King, he will never love me the way he loved his first wife. I’m trapped by the memory of a life they used to share."

Wasn't that said to the genie? We don't really know how much of what she said or did in that episode was true, since she was conning him into sympathizing with her, then falling in love with her, so she could get him to kill Leopold for her. And that happened after at least a decade into the marriage, when she'd learned magic and apparently had some kind of plan in the works. We haven't seen much, other than the magic lessons, of the early days before she really learned much magic and when she was still probably just working with the vague idea of future revenge.

[Camera One]

Yes, that was said to the Genie.  She tended to say the same story to anyone who would listen.  Was it true that she was a prisoner or did she just like exaggerating?  

To Genie: Yes, it’s from my childhood garden. Well, the tree and I share something in common – neither of us can leave the palace and neither of us truly belongs. No matter how hard I try to please the King, he will never love me the way he loved his first wife. I’m trapped by the memory of a life they used to share.

To Rumple: Regina: Why shouldn’t I? I’m the queen, but practically a prisoner. With a husband whose heart is still with his dead wife and his insipid daughter. It’s intolerable. Nothing to do and nowhere to go. I need freedom. I need options.

To Tink: The only way I can get through it is when she and the king are gone all the time. It’s not a marriage. It’s a farce. I maybe the queen. But alone in this palace I feel like the queen of nothing.

Then again, she also said to Tink: "[Snow]’s a monster. Totally indulgent and adored. She sort of ricochets through life telling people’s secrets. She had my fiance killed.

Edited July 8, 2016 by Camera One

[KAOS Agent]

She was shown helping Maleficent get her groove back. No one seemed to care that she was wandering around to other kingdoms. The prisoner thing seems more metaphorical than literal if we are to take what she's saying at face value. 

Edited July 8, 2016 by KAOS Agent

[Rumsy4]

1 hour ago, Shanna Marie said:

Though she was still in a palace, with her fabulous wardrobe, and with magical powers. And while that would make a good rock bottom in a "point of no return" villain narrative, I'm not sure it works for something that shows a heroic character has suffered so much and just needs to catch a break.

Agreed. Failing to get her revenge on Show White, but continue to have a castle of her own with her jewels, clothes, and black knights (and sex slaves) is not rock bottom of suffering. It was rock bottom as a human being when she cast the Curse, and in fear that infant Emma would break it, tried to get her killed. Although I suppose Regina has had children killed before in her village massacres.

12 minutes ago, KAOS Agent said:

She was shown helping Maleficent get her groove back. No one seemed to care that she was wandering around to other kingdoms. The prisoner thing seems more metaphorical than literal if we are to take what she's saying at face value. 

That's my take on it too. Besides, she was constantly disappearing for magical lessons with Rumple. It is impossible that no one noticed. I'm not doubting that Leo was a neglectful husband, but it is very likely that he gave up trying to get Regina involved becasue she prefered skulking by herself. He primarily married her to be a parent to Snow, and it is clear Regina wasn't doing that. She was cursing Snow's horses to eternal slumber.

Edited July 8, 2016 by Rumsy4

[Shanna Marie]

It's kind of hard to get too worked up about how sad Regina was in her marriage, considering that she chose to marry someone she didn't love so that she could get revenge on his ten-year-old daughter. She banished Cora to Wonderland before the marriage, so no one was making her go through with it. It's a bit much for her to whine about not being treated well when all along, she was learning magic so she could do something to Snow and when she was doing stuff behind their backs, like sneaking off with Rumple, pondering her soulmate, and cursing Snow's horse.

[YaddaYadda]

9 hours ago, Camera One said:

 

I think we got two flashbacks showing her being "miserable" but both cases just made her look whiny and petty.  One was in "Fruit of the Poisonous Tree" where Leopold was making a speech on his birthday about Snow and her mother while Regina was being "ignored".  The other was Regina pouting at the castle while Snow and Leopold went on a tour of the kingdom.  

I was reading the transcript from "Fruit of the Poisonous Tree", and Regina said this:

Evil Queen: No matter how hard I try to please the King, he will never love me the way he loved his first wife. I’m trapped by the memory of a life they used to share."

This could have been the same problem with Robin/Marian.

Except that we already knew he didn't really marry Regina for love. He married her because he wanted a mother for his child. I think that was clear. Was Regina going to love the king as much as she loved Daniel? It's not like that wasn't a thing they both had in common. 

The dialogue always makes her sound like she has the worst luck, but she went into that marriage knowing what the score was. 

[Mari]

I know I've said it before, but they would've had a much better--as well as more sympathetic--motive if Regina had been in love with Leopold, and became angry and bitter as she realized that he would never love her with the strength he loved Eva and Snow.  She could've focused her rage on Snow because Snow accidently caused Leo's death, or because she heard Leopold reassuring Snow that of course he'd always love Eva and Snow the best.  He was merely fond of Regina.

[KingOfHearts]

Quote

Evil Queen: No matter how hard I try to please the King, he will never love me the way he loved his first wife. I’m trapped by the memory of a life they used to share."

She said that when she was attempting to manipulate Sidney. I don't believe it's any real indication she really felt that way. Her complaints to Rumple are probably more accurate. She was bored in the palace because she had little political power and was alone most of the time. She had no desire to connect with Snow because of her resentment toward her. Her actions, such as learning magic and tricking Sidney into killing Leopold, were more about gaining control than being loved.

Quote

Except that we already knew he didn't really marry Regina for love. He married her because he wanted a mother for his child. I think that was clear. Was Regina going to love the king as much as she loved Daniel? It's not like that wasn't a thing they both had in common. 

Let's be real - Regina didn't give a crap about Leopold. She only cared about his position as ruler. His doting of Snow simply rubbed salt in the wounds of her jealousy.

Edited July 8, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Curio]

Regina is one of the most unreliable narrators on the show. I take nearly everything she says with a grain of salt.

[Shanna Marie]

1 minute ago, KingOfHearts said:

She had no desire to connect with Snow because of her resentment toward her.

Yeah, it's hard to feel too much sympathy for her complaints that she felt shut out when she went into the marriage fantasizing about murdering her stepdaughter.

They really should have had her banish Cora after the wedding instead of before so that at least she might have been forced into the marriage and only gained the power to get Cora out of her life later. But since Cora was out of the picture before the wedding, we're left with the fact that Regina chose to marry a man she knew didn't love her and whom she didn't love, in a situation designed to make her a mother to a child she hated and planned to destroy. That leaves her with no room to complain about her marriage being unhappy.

I suppose Regina has had a few moments that might be considered hitting bottom turning points, but she flip flops so badly that they don't seem to stick, and the sad part gets fixed too easily. There was the moment she realized that Henry was as afraid of her and wanting to flee her as she'd been about Cora, which seemed to be a huge wakeup call. Unfortunately, it didn't last for long. Then there was seeing her treatment of Marian in the mirror, which seemed to actually give her self-awareness for about five minutes. Unfortunately, she then went straight to "nothing ever works out for, me, fate is conspiring against me, I'm not allowed to have a happy ending." Regina would be a lot easier to take if her circumstances ever really matched the way she reacts to them. I'd have bought her "villains don't get happy endings" sadness if she had an outcome like a fairy-tale villain. It's hard to buy it when she's living in a mansion, still has magical powers, can apparently decide on a whim whether or not she wants to be mayor, and has all the people she's tormented desperately trying to help her, even as she taunts and insults them.

[KingOfHearts]

16 minutes ago, Curio said:

Regina is one of the most unreliable narrators on the show. I take nearly everything she says with a grain of salt.

Which is sad considering she does most of the talking to the audience. In the group conversations, she's usually the one who identifies important plot points or explains exposition. Then, of course, we get a play-by-play review of her emotions every other episode.

Edited July 8, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Mari]

2 hours ago, Curio said:

Regina is one of the most unreliable narrators on the show. I take nearly everything she says with a grain of salt.

Only a grain?  That seems a mite scant.  :)

[Camera One]

Regina is one of the most unreliable narrators on the show. I take nearly everything she says with a grain of salt.

Stay tuned for Season 7 when we will see the flashback where Leopold and Snow walk around the castle holding pitchforks and laughing maniacally while locking Regina up in a cage.  Hades said he wasn't the Devil, because those two are.  Why else is the castle so pointy... it was the real location of Danté's Inferno.

[Curio]

Sorry to beat a dead horse, but I stumbled upon this quote describing rococo-era children:

Quote

"Young children who were well-bred were taught from an early age by the dancing master not only the complicated steps of the minuet, but exactly how to hold their bodies—how to do every motion—so that by the time they were grown up they could do all of these things and look as if it was natural."

Regina was well-bred. There are thousands of gifs of the Evil Queen walking around with the poise of a dancer. Wearing huge skirts requires balance and grace to maneuver in them. There's no freaking way Regina wouldn't have known how to dance prior to 5x02. You can't give a character a scene like that just because you thought it was adorable and cute in your mental fanfiction, especially when you consider the impact it has on other characters. Research history and know your character's canon, writers.

Edited July 17, 2016 by Curio

[Camera One]

I wonder if we're going to have a sad flashback about why Cora never taught Regina how to dance.  Since we need to have Barbara Hershey back every season.  I can already think of multiple "wouldn't it be cool..." scenarios, bonus points if it makes Leopold, Eva or Snow look bad.

Edited July 17, 2016 by Camera One

[orza]

54 minutes ago, Curio said:

Sorry to beat a dead horse, but I stumbled upon this quote describing rococo-era children:

Regina was well-bred. There are thousands of gifs of the Evil Queen walking around with the poise of a dancer. Wearing huge skirts requires balance and grace to maneuver in them. There's no freaking way Regina wouldn't have known how to dance prior to 5x02. You can't give a character a scene like that just because you thought it was adorable and cute in your mental fanfiction, especially when you consider the impact it has on other characters. Research history and know your character's canon, writers.

That quote refers to a past era in the real world. It says nothing about the fantasy fairytale world of this show. Being able to walking gracefully in a long dress is a different skill than being a graceful dancer. Belle is also a high-born lady and she is ungraceful and clumsy. Emilie de Ravin is proof that years of ballet training don't necessarily make one graceful in daily life. I've seen her stomping ungracefully through the Vancouver airport at least half a dozen times.

The writers can create whatever canon they want for their fairytale characters. It doesn't have to reflect the real world. Quoting an irrelevant source "proves" pretty much nothing.

[Curio]

41 minutes ago, orza said:

That quote refers to a past era in the real world. It says nothing about the fantasy fairytale world of this show.

There was a discussion going on in the Hook thread about this as well. We were debating how closely to our real world should the writers stick to historical facts, like the age a boy becomes a midshipman. I think the general consensus was that because each part of the Enchanted Forest is supposed to mimic a certain real-world time period, it isn't outrageous for us to want the show to follow some of the rules of those time periods as well. Asking for perfect accuracy when it comes to hemlines, military rankings, or weapons that were used may be asking too much, but there's also a reason there isn't any electricity in the Enchanted Forest. Could the writers say screw it to historical fact and force wifi in there even though electricity wasn't widely used until the twentieth century? Sure, nothing is stopping them because the Enchanted Forest isn't technically our world, but we kind of expect the Enchanted Forest to look and feel like the real-world eras fairy tales were based on.

Logic needs to come into play as well, and if they expect the audience to believe a queen has never danced before—even though there's historical precedent that little girls like Regina would have learned to dance based on the era the writers are trying to emulate with their costume designs and props—then it looks sloppy. It would be like asking us to believe Hook doesn't know how to use a compass or David doesn't know how to shear sheep. It's just not logical. 

41 minutes ago, orza said:

Being able to walking gracefully in a long dress is a different skill than being a graceful dancer. Belle is also a high-born lady and she is ungraceful and clumsy.

That's describing Belle's character, though. Regina has never really been shown to be the clumsy type (maybe Belle should have been the one to get a dance lesson from Charming...though she has Rumple for that I suppose), so that's another example of the writers ignoring their own canon. Regina is usually shown to be quite poised and confident when she wears huge, complicated dresses, which should translate well into learning how to dance. They're not the exact same skills, but they kind of go hand-in-hand. (The best runway models also tend to be dancers.) Regina shouldn't have been tripping over her feet and looking dumfounded on the dance floor based on previous visuals of Lana's physical acting. Also, Regina has magic, so this all could have been a moot point.

There's just so many variables at play here for why Regina should be a decent dancer that it seems odd the writers went through so many hoops to make her a bad dancer and slightly clumsy just for one episode. I'm pretty sure we'd all be confused if Regina just woke up one day and said, "I'm going to take scuba diving lessons." Why? Why would she do that? But we shouldn't care because the writers can do whatever the hell they want I guess.

Edited July 17, 2016 by Curio

[Rumsy4]

Besides, Cora would have never stood for it. She was bent on making Regina a queen, and the flashbacks show her to have been a ruthless disciplinarian as a parent. It's impossible Regina was never taught how to dance.

[Camera One]

There are many reasons:

1. Cora signed a contract with Minister Frollo during the Anti-Gypsy Wars and she had to agree to never teach Regina how to dance.

2. Cora was traumatized by an event involving dancing (when Pocahontas tripped her during the fox trot), and so she could never face Regina learning how to dance.

3. Regina's dance lessons triggered memories of Dear Sis Zelena, so Cora had to discontinue them.

4. Regina did have dance lessons but Cora later had to erase her memory because that was about the same time Regina fell in love with Cora's mortal enemy, Mickey Mouse.

Edited July 17, 2016 by Camera One

[Mari]

5 hours ago, orza said:

That quote refers to a past era in the real world. It says nothing about the fantasy fairytale world of this show.  . . .

The writers can create whatever canon they want for their fairytale characters. It doesn't have to reflect the real world. 

Well, yes, they can create whatever canon they want, and it doesn't have to necessarily reflect the real world.  However, art is interactive--we look at what they have the characters say and do, and draw conclusions;  even if they're not necessarily the conclusions A&E would like us to draw.

They can have Regina complain all they want about not being taught to dance.  Until we get a flashback where Cora removed the memory, or is cursed with a spell that doesn't allow her to have her daughter taught to dance, it's most likely that Regina simply lied, in order to get reassurance or sympathy, or to refocus attention on something other than pretending to be Emma in an uncertain situation.

It's simply implausible that the social climbing Cora, who was demonstrated to be a controlling mother that  Regina was terrified of, would not make sure her daughter knew all the things a royal would expect their princess (which Regina was) bride to know.

It's simply implausible that Leopold never once asked her to dance--even at their own wedding dance.  Often?  Probably not.  Never?  Yeah, right.

It's simply implausible that some toady never tried to dance with Queen White, or the Evil Queen, in order to try and curry favor, or seduce the beautiful and lonely queen--especially if Leopold was mostly neglecting her. (Before she got openly scary.)

It's simply implausible that even if by some freak accident all previous dancing memories were removed from Regina's brain and muscle memory, she didn't include that in her Mayor Mills download;  especially considering all the weird little festivals and traditions her Storybrooke included.  

Yes, Snow didn't argue that.  But, unfortunately, Snow has backed up Regina's self-deception and self-centered world-view before.  It's perfectly in character for Snow to just overlook the blatant lie Regina told, in order to help Regina.

 

4 hours ago, Rumsy4 said:

Besides, Cora would have never stood for it. She was bent on making Regina a queen, and the flashbacks show her to have been a ruthless disciplinarian as a parent. It's impossible Regina was never taught how to dance.

Yes.  Exactly.

Edited July 18, 2016 by Mari

[Shanna Marie]

They may not have told us specifically that young girls in that world are taught to dance. However, they've shown us repeatedly that balls are a big deal. We saw the Under the Sea prom in Eric's kingdom, Emma talked about how her parents were always talking about balls, we saw Cinderella's wedding ball, there was Abigail's engagement ball. This is apparently the main form of social life among the upper classes in that world. We also know that Hook, who was an abandoned kid who spent his childhood as a slave on a merchant ship, knows how to dance and has been to balls, probably as part of being an officer in the royal navy (again, going back to the fact that this is the main form of social life). So, if a kid who's spent almost his entire life on ships was expected to learn how to dance and has attended balls, how is it possible that the daughter of a prince whose mother was determined to make her a queen was never taught to dance and never went to a ball? It's essential training for a military officer, but not for a young noblewoman?

[Camera One]

Maybe the Writers believed Regina was a tomboy and she refuted her mother's attempts to get her to learn to dance.  She had a hard knock life, okay?  (cue the song since Regina's also Annie)

Edited July 18, 2016 by Camera One

[Shanna Marie]

7 minutes ago, Camera One said:

Maybe the Writers believed Regina was a tomboy and she refuted her mother's attempts to get her to learn to dance.

That's it! When Cora wiped Regina's memories of playing dress-up and putting on makeup and otherwise being super girly with Zelena, it wiped the girly part of her personality, so she refused to learn to dance (and then grew up to wear sparkly clothes and tons of makeup ...). And somehow, powerful magician Cora, who could force Regina into compliance in everything else, was unable to affect her in that one area of her life.

[KingOfHearts]

If the Evil Queen isn't just a scenery chewer, I'll be okay. If there's a reason for her existence and she isn't just a caricature, I'll give her a shot. In my head I can dream up ways she could be intriguing, but that happens every arc with each new premise. I'm always disappointed with what actually makes it to the screen. If the Evil Queen gives Regina some introspection and shows her how horrible her darkness really was, it could be worth it. But it's TS,TW, so I'm not holding my breath. More than likely she'll be seen as a totally separate entity who was possessing poor, innocent Regina.

[KingOfHearts]

That Regina/Evil Queen "teaser" from SDCC set a good tone, but its message was chaotic. It was saying Regina was super evil, but victimized; trying to do good but failing at it. I get they were trying to highlight her duality, but they didn't do it very well. How am I supposed to have sympathy for her crying face when in the same video we see her burning an innocent at the stake? The song said, "It's a cruel, cruel world", but it's people like Regina that make it that way. I don't understand what the split really means and this teaser didn't offer any clarity. The philosophy is all over the place.

Edited July 26, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Rumsy4]

The teaser trailer was definitely confusing. Are we supposed to feel sorry for half a person? I feel like the writer have made Regina more two-dimensional than ever with this split. I can't take either half of her seriously.

[KingOfHearts]

Three episodes in on 5A, and I realized that the Evil Queen setup was there. All that time we thought the writers were foreshadowing Regina's reversion into darkness. But really it was to highlight her conflict between the light and dark. It was also it remind us EQ was still a thing inside her. I may be giving A&E too much credit here, but I'm pretty sure they were planning on bringing the queen back in some capacity.

Just look at this piece of dialogue from 5x03.

Regina: "You've forgotten who I am - the Evil Queen. I can be a far greater nightmare than you could possibly imagine."

Edited August 28, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[YaddaYadda]

I don't think you're giving them too much credit. I think they knew what they wanted to do, maybe just not how. It's like when they had Rumple impersonate Hook, or Emma telling him how he would be the Dark One if he had killed Rumple. The set up was there. I think a lot of times, we're kind of quick to dismiss certain things.

[KingOfHearts]

The Jekyll/Hyde thing for Regina is not inherently a bad idea. It does show some self-awareness when it comes to the fact that Regina and EQ have been treated as separate entities. But there's a couple things I would change. First, Regina would not be a willing partaker of the Jekyll Juice. The fact she took it by choice (with Emma and Snow's urging) makes it carelessly stupid. If she had been forced by Hyde or Rumple, it would be a more legitimate problem. She would be less of an idiot and more of the victim we all know she's going to be framed as. Secondly, either Regina would unknowingly become the Evil Queen at random times or the Evil Queen would take over completely 24/7. Having them as separate people makes them both boring and there's less at stake. It's cheating the Jekyll/Hyde source material, imo.

I don't have a problem with the concept. I just don't like the choices the writers already made with it.

Edited September 4, 2016 by KingOfHearts

[Camera One]

The concept to me is problematic, because Regina was The Evil Queen.  The Evil Queen was motivated by what happened to Regina before she became evil, and Regina chose to become The Evil Queen.  The current Regina is still governed by all the things she did in the past.  It's not a split personality type situation like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, or even like the Curse personalities, where neither personality was aware of the other.  

So is this a situation of reversion... if so, how is this different from Regina now versus a time-travelling Regina from three years ago?  The bottom line is, how is this going to help Regina's character to develop from here on out?  Does she really need to see her worst literally in front of her eyes in order to start repenting?  If it's the obvious "revelation" that Regina must accept that her evil past is inside of her.... well, duh.  She already knows she has base violent impulses.  

So to me, this is solely plot driven and another way A&E can play with their Evil Queen toy, since I don't see what value this has character-wise for Regina, and it certainly has no character potential for any of the other characters except for being possible roadkill.  I do agree that at the very least, the storyline would be more palatable if Regina hadn't willingly taken the draught.  If The Evil Queen just surfaced randomly, I can only imagine another reworking of "The Cricket Game" where everyone is so mean not believing in her.

Edited September 4, 2016 by Camera One

[Rumsy4]

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

The Graham stuff was Regina at her nastiest (and is STILL the stuff that I find hardest to forgive her for, at least partially because of the way the writers tried to downplay it. I find it all to be really creepy that they wrote one of their main characters to be a rapist, apparently by accident). 

Same here. This is one of the main reasons why I cannot get invested in Regina's Happy Ending. Regina's long-term rape of Graham and mind-raping people into sleeping with people they normally wouldn't during the Curse is to me a bigger stumbling-block than her mass-murders, becasue no one ever brings it up or acknowledges it. I rather think the writers did not/do not see it as rape becasue Regina is a woman. At least with Zelena, even though the word "rape" wasn't used, Robin was allowed to say that he did not consent to sleeping with her. But then, he's dead, and his rapist is raising their child. It's weird how both the Mills women ended up being rapists, and suffered no consequences for it.