Home › Forums › Once Upon a Time › Character discussion › Favourite legitimate couples › Re: Favourite legitimate couples
KFC, I know I’m already marrying another one of your posts, but I’ll be having torrid affairs on the side with this latest batch. š
I guess I’m mostly disappointed because he learned from Rumple’s mistakes but not Milah’s. He wants to be a better father to Henry because his wasn’t good, but he knew centuries ago that Milah regretted leaving him and never did anything about it. The fact that he did that to someone and chose not to do anything about it when he knows exactly how much it hurts grates me.
I see it differently. What hurt Bae was that they leftānot that they didnāt come back. He didnāt ask them to come back, he wasnāt waiting for them to come, and with Rumpel, he was avoiding him because he had too much anger to ever want to speak to him again. He thought Milah was dead until Hook told him, so that was more complicated. Iāll have to rewatch that scene, but I took out of it that Bae was more angry that Hook lied to him and āstoleā his mother and wanted to kill his father, than he was hurt that Milah had never come back for him.
Just went for a rewatch of that scene, (a few times, so I could get the dialogue right…and now I’m emo…how is it that I can care so little for Milah, and yet my heart breaks when I hear Hook talk about loving her…well played, Mr O’Donoghue)…
Bae: Face me, villain!
Hook: What’s this about, Bae?
Bae: I found this, on your desk. It’s – it’s my mother. How did you get it?
Hook: Bae –
Bae: HOW?! You’re the pirate that killed her!
Hook: I didn’t kill your mother. We fell in love. We ran off together. Your father lied to you, he was too much of a coward to tell you the truth. He tore her heart out, and crushed it in front of me, and I’ve spent every moment since then wanting revenge.
Bae: She abandoned me.
Hook: Not a single day went past when your mother didn’t regret leaving you, Baelfire. We talked about going back for you when you were old enough. Perhaps fate brought us together so I could make good on those plans. We can live the life that Milah wanted for us, as a family.
Bae: NO! Stay back! You used me! You wanted to kill my father!
Hook: Yes, I did.
Bae: You tore apart my family, as sure as if you’d ripped her heart out yourself.
Hook: Bae, don’t –
Bae: Take me back to my real family, the Darlings.
Hook: I – I – I can’t, it’s not possible to leave Neverland. But you could stay here, under my protection –
Bae: I’d rather fend for myself than be with you. I want off this ship, pirate.
Bae didn’t really seem to care that Hook wanted to live out Milah’s happy family on the high seas dream. Even in the later scene, when it was nighttime, (meaning he’d had some time to think about it) and their conversation started out without all the screaming of the daytime scene, when Hook offered again, Bae still wanted no part of it.
Here on the forums, we the audience get pretty upset at her, but Iām not sure Bae was feeling additional pain that she had apparently had the option to come get him and chosen not to do it.
Bae was really young when she’d left, and as such, probably didn’t have a whole lot of clear memories of her. The stuff with his father had more of a lasting impact on him because he was old enough to process and remember it all.
When Gold and Henry talk, Henry thinks all that matters is that the person who left you returns to youābut that is NOT how Neal feels about it, and Gold suspected as much. All that mattered to Neal was that he had been abandoned and betrayedāand as he was not willing to forgive, he really did not believe Emma would either.
Such a great point! He wasn’t even ready to forgive and forget a couple 100 years after the fact, so how could Emma possibly be ready to forgive and forget after only 10 years? From Nealfire’s perspective, he was the Rumple in the situation with Emma – he was the one who let go and left someone alone. Considering how strongly he feels about what his father did, of course he’s gonna project that same hate onto himself in the situation with Emma.
So thereās that moment of hope on his face when he sees her in Manhattan, then it crashes down when he realizesāshe doesnāt know! Itās interesting to see their conversation again, with the knowledge that August has not talked to either of them since the curse broke. He is confused why she tackled him on the street. He doesnāt know who Gold is. Heās angry she brought his father, as if he expected her to understand he has issues with Rumpel. Heās trying to process all of that, in the bar scene, and at the same time, Emma keeps making it clear she did not seek him out to renew their relationship. So he has to explain why he left, see the pain and hurt on her face, knowing thereās nothing he can do or say to get her to forgive.
This is what I’ve been sayin’, HOT MESS for real inside his head in that scene. SO much to process in the space of only about, let’s say 10mins, because they’d had enough time to walk down the street and have drinks poured.
Iām still puzzling through what Neal knew, what August knew, and how much of what they knew was actually true, and when they knew it. The timeline of the curse being broken, versus when Neal got into a romantic serious relationship with Tamara. Was the serious part after he thought the curse was broken but Emma did not come find him? Remember, the curse breaks and several weeks go by while Snow and Emma are trapped in FTL. So we donāt know what Neal was doing in that periodāperhaps he got the postcard and waited, and then just before Manhattan, he and Tamara get engaged.
Oh, good question! Even if she had have known the whole truth, she wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it, on account of being back in FTL. That’s a good guess that perhaps when she didn’t come to find him, he took it as the final sign that she was over it, and then he proposed to Tamara. It’s really not unreasonable for him to have assumed that August had explained things to her, (he was going there with the purpose of making her believe the truth, after all), August could have even given her his address in NYC, and if so, why hadn’t she come? It’s funny, because looking back, we were all, “Why didn’t he go to SB as soon as he got that postcard?!” But looking at it now, it makes perfect sense that he didn’t.
If you go and look at the other couples, you will notice that if you stopped the story in the middle, these couples show lack of faith at times too, until things change and something inspires them to go find the other. Belle meets Grumpy and Mulan, and decides to go fight for Rumpel. Snow drinks a potion to forget Charmingāand he has a tough time getting her back. Charming decides to help Abigail and Fredrick or die trying in the Sirenās lake, because he lost hope. So just because Neal and Emma are not playing their story out in one season, does it mean heās taking too long to show faith? I donāt think so. I think its just that the writers want to drag this out longer.
Excellent point. Even the destined, EPIC, truest love of all, Snowing, had times when their relationship looked pretty much dead in the water.
They can’t resolve either Emma’s or Nealfire’s love lives by this early point in the show’s run. Never mind their love lives even, they can’t have either character have all of their own, personal issues sorted out yet, and those two have a whole bunch of issues that relate to each other, therefore their relationship is currently, understandably, a mess, but that doesn’t rule out the possibility for it to work out in the end. Neither one of them can be allowed to be emotionally well adjusted at this point. In TV land, things have to look dire or the payoff won’t be worth it. Things are currently incredibly dire for them both as individuals, as well as as a couple.
Thereās sacrifice in her parents story tooāand she has seen Nealās willingness to put his life on the line for her at the portal, as well as to give up his own happiness for her. So while I see what youāre saying about wanting someone to fight for herāitās not like Neal has done the opposite at all. He faced his father for her. He grabbed her, while shot, to prevent her falling in the portal. Now that he knows she does still love him, now he can begin to fight to be with her.
Yes! There are multiple facets to these relationships, multiple things Emma has witnessed, and as you say later in your post, at the end of the day, Emma’s own love story will be unique to her, not a mirror of anyone else’s relationship. We do look to our parents’ relationship for signs of what to do, or what not to do, but as with anything in life, we take from it what resonates with us personally, and make our own decisions. Emma has lots of stuff to consider.
Yes, Emma says the choice is importantābut up until the portal she was adamant she was not a choice he could have. So I think we have to wait and see how the rest of it is written. You canāt stop the story in the middle and compare it to a story that finished that romance arc with the wedding.
Indeed, how many times did she say she had no interest? It was obvious that the lady doth protest too much, saying one thing to try and cover up another, but what was he supposed to do with the mixed messages? As to your last sentence in that paragraph: AMEN!
Emma is tough, but she has at times expressed doubt and wanted to quit various thingsāperhaps tied into her moving around so much too. I think she does understand those who feel forced to walk awayāsince she had to do it too and she has now seen what caused Snow and Charming to leave her. She also knows that some fights are too stacked to win or that too many people get hurt if you keep fighting.
Her parents gave her away to give her her best chance. She gave Henry away to give him his best chance. So yes, I think it’s safe to say that she’s well positioned to be able to understand that Nealfire had to give her away for a very good reason too. That doesn’t mean she has to like it, or deny that it hurt her like hell and messed with her head for years, but she does have the perspective to be able to understand the situation for what it is, and not hold it against him at the end of the day.