Reply To: OUAT and the portrayal of class

You’re definitely on to something…but I’m not sure it’s quite that straightforward. The lower-class origin stories are used primarily to make otherwise unlovable characters more sympathetic. Rumple is, I think, a key example here–but giving Cora a poverty-stricken background, where she’s snubbed by royals like Eva, is about all there is to make her even slightly sympathetic. (I LOVE the character as a part of the ensemble but still don’t have much sympathy for her.) If being from a poor background is something that makes a character more likeable/sympathetic, I don’t think we’re seeing quite the dynamic of being punished for rising above one’s station. I think it’s something more complicated.

And we could look for a bit at the other side of the coin. There’s George, who is evil but presumably born into royalty; Eva, who was very unkind in her youth; Leopold, who may have been a great king and father but not a good husband to Regina; Gerda, who made some very questionable decisions as ruler of Arendelle; Xavier, who was out-and-out horrible; and the Jones brothers’ unnamed king who sent them to retrieve a horrific weapon. To the best of my knowledge, all these rulers were born into their positions and yet were villainous (or at the very least, hurt people that they should have loved and protected).

Regina and Rumple are possibly the most interesting comparisons for this. Regina was born to a prince, making her of royal lineage (heck, Xavier’s her grandpa), and while people questioned her legitimacy as ruler over Snow White’s, nobody ever questions the fact that she has the title of Queen. Right now she might be heroing, but she’s done some of the most horrific stuff in the show–yet she’s sympathetic. Awful things happen to her but not because of her station–mostly because her Mom is awful and she gives in to her darker side.

Meanwhile, Rumple starts from abject poverty, and gets himself a castle and plays chess with the lives of the royals around him…and awful things happen to him both before and after he gains power/money, most of them because he also gives into his darker side.

I don’t think the correlation is quite strong enough to support the claim that poor people have to stay in their place or be punished. Henry’s various parentage includes peasants and royals, and while he’s been through a lot, I don’t think we see him being punished for either side of the equation.