Reply To: Emma + Baelfire = Swanfire

The problem with some people is that they expected sweet teenage Bae to grow up into sweet adult Bae. Just think all of your own life experiences. Are you the same type of person? I know I’m not. I’m not completely different, but my 14 year old self was quite different in wants and desires, and even personality, from my thirty-something self. And that was just the result of normal life experiences.

Transfer that to the fictional world and Bae being bombarded with otherworldly experiences on top of being the very human situation of being abandoned by his parents. I’m shocked he’s as well adjusted as he is. He’s lost, at a young age, literally everyone he’s ever cared about and who has cared about him. By the time he gets out of Neverland, it’s no longer unthinkable that sweet little Bae has forever been changed and damaged. And we don’t even know what he’s gone through since leaving Neverland. I suspect my heart will break even more. Fast-forward to his time with Emma and it makes their situation even more heartbreaking for both parties. I see Neal as just as much a victim in all this as Emma is.

All excellent points. I think Neal is amazing simply to have retained his sweetness of spirit, with a bit of a snarky sense of humor, despite the crapy hand the fate has felt him. He’s had to roll with the punches simply to survive, let alone try to perfect his character. True, he may not be the same naive, trusting Baelfire who blindly trusted a sneaky Blue Fairy, but then again he still has the core elements that make Baelfire such a wonderful character: a good heart, a desire to put others first, a determination to try to do the right things, even when the “right” choice is less than clear, and to sacrifice himself. I certainly am not the same person I was even a decade ago, but the core parts of my personality haven’t drastically changed. While my taste in music, my thinking about the world, and my aspirations have changed, I still have a slightly off-beat sense of humor, I still value family, and I’m still a romantic at heart versus a cynic. There are just some foundational elements that make up a persons’s character, and if Bae has managed to hold onto hope of second chance despite all the horrible things life has dealt him (e.g. abandonment issues galore, spending 100 years with a deranged teenager, having to scrape by to survive, heartache, issues of self-worth etc..) then I’d say Neal has actually turned out alright despite everything.

If anyone ever had a good reason to lash out and seek revenge it’s Baelfire, but he didn’t. He may have had to lay low to keep his father and/or PP from finding him, he may have had to steal a car to live in, but he’s never been a villain or someone who only thinks of himself. He gave all the money he had ($20K) to Emma and his car (i.e. his home he was living in), to give her a fresh start whereas he had to begin again with nothing. He is not a man who ever wishes pain on others, but sadly, hasn’t always been able to prevent it from happening. I think Neal is the kind of guy who thinks of others first and wishes he could do more to make sure others didn’t have to suffer. The way he tried so hard to save the Darling children and then for Henry are great examples of that characteristic.