The Blue Fairy has never really sat well with me. It’s not that I don’t think she’s trustworthy. I do really think that she is a force for good and wants others to use magic responsibly (if they use it at all) and to be mindful of the costs associated with such power. But I don’t think a character has to be bad to be unlikable (nor does the reverse have to be true, ahem…). There are plenty of “character alignment” charts floating around for OUAT and I think the one that I found to be most accurate put the Blue Fairy in the spot of “Lawful Good”. This made the most sense out of any of the other options I’d seen (Henry, for example) for a variety of reasons. When I think about that class, I think of the classic example of that class, the Paladin.
Paladins are powered by goodness and virtue, so much so that if their actions are repeatedly not good (evil) and not lawful (chaotic) it will detract from their abilities. This is mirrored a bit with the Blue Fairy, who is incapable of using her powers unless certain stringent conditions are in place. As much as she and everyone around her wanted to save Pinocchio, she couldn’t do so unless his actions had met the requirements of being “selfless, brave, and true”. It is a power set that comes with a very strict set of conditions, and as such it means that her magic can’t be counted on 100% of the time.
That, coupled with the often overlooked “lawful” part of her character’s nature means that other characters are going to avoid her or leave her out of the picture from time to time. There have been several cases where a character has pursued a “good” course of action that wasn’t “lawful”. (Breaking the law to enforce the law- Emma does this a lot.) That is the sort of action that the Blue Fairy can’t abide. Henry has difficulty with this concept as well, but in his case it’s because he’s a young idealist. The Blue Fairy has lived long enough to know that sometimes things don’t always work out that way. For her, this is more of a self imposed limitation, not one that she has yet to grow out of. Because of this, she’s often not involved in the actions of the main set of characters, because they often deal in shades of grey. (This happens a lot in roleplaying games as well. It’s really common to have to hide your chaotic or evil actions from a Paladin in the group. Often the Paladin ends up having to make changes to the character. It can be a difficult class to play in many groups for this reason.)
The one time we’ve seen the Blue Fairy stray from this course was during the FTL sequence with Gepetto. She told a direct lie in order to make the deal with him and send Pinocchio through the portal, but this is the only case we’ve seen such an action from her. It was also probably the most interesting of her plotlines and the time I personally found her the most interesting and likable. It’s not a hidden agenda that makes her unlikable, it’s her general inflexibility.
Regarding Sydney- I think it is safe to say that even if he’d had his memories while in Storybrooke his actions wouldn’t have changed at all. His love for Regina was the sad sort that accepts even abuse from his loved one, because that is still a form of attention. Even if he’d been able to remember how she’d used him in the past I think he would have still found himself working for her. After all, even after he saw how she used him and framed him for the King’s death, his wish was still to be at her side. He knew then that she didn’t love him, but he still wanted to be with her.
"Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him."
