319 episode notes (and a pretty awesome cracktheory)
By request, here are my thoughts on 319. They are kind of long and honestly, I found a TON of shippy stuff in this episode. Some I found on first watch, some via discussion, and some via rewatch. A few of the ideas are not originally mine, I will try my best to credit those when I come across them.
First of all, my roomie pointed out that this was a surprisingly Neal-centric episode. Yep, he appears in the end, but there are other shout-outs. Non-SwanFirey, they have drawn this Robin-Regina/SF parallel, and they had Regina say about Robin, “He’s a thief, which means he’s not to be trusted.” They have heavily paralleled Robin as thief and Neal as thief earlier this half-season (with Belle in either 312 or 313,) so it was interesting to have that line and then have Neal “save the day” by the end.
We have already covered the car bit, but I am so in love with it, I am going to cover it again –
Henry said to Emma, “I need your keys. I left mine in the room and if I’m going to be a prisoner I’d like to have my gameboy.” Of course, we all know his plan was to steal her car and go back to NYC. What’s the best way to steal a car? Well, Dad told Mom it’s to ask for the keys…
From 2×06 – “Impressive. But really, you could’ve just asked me for the keys.”
A&E wrote this. They didn’t include that out of happenstance; the SF family is their babies and they included that for a purpose. It wasn’t accidental. Plus, he’s a prisoner now? Yep, no history there. Continuing on the Dad shout-outs, when Henry is at the car, Hook asks where he’s off to.
Henry – “Nowhere.”
Hook – “You’re in an awful big hurry to be going nowhere.”
Henry – “Fine, I’m going home.”
Hook – “You’re running away.”
So to Henry, the bug is a means to the end of “home.” Sounds like someone else we know. And he’s running away?
Going back to 2×17 –
Neal – “Yeah, he’s in the bathroom right now. I’m just gunna go home and pack. Not bad for day three as a dad if I do say so myself.”
Emma – “Wait, where’s his backpack?”
Neal – “I don’t know, he took it with him.”
Emma – “To the bathroom? Did you really fall for that? He’s your son.
Neal – “He’s running.”
And then there is this, when Henry tries to get into the bug, chock full of symbolism for our tiny family –
“I don’t care what you think.” *opens door*
*Hook slams it.* “Well, you should. ’cause I’ve got a better way.”
So, Hook prevents Henry from using the method of his heritage to get “home,” and instead presents him with a “better way?” (Really, stolen dinghy with a right-hand pirate?) How’d that work out for you, Hook? Hit us over the head with symbolism there, writers. (Stolen car, good. Stolen boat, bad. Wait… I’m not sure that’s what they were going for. Nevermind!! LOL!!!)
And, while I was looking for the “running” quote last night, I stumbled upon one other thing. I took Henry’s mention of pizza to Regina at face-value while watching, because, you know, New York and pizza. And if there hadn’t been SO much other stuff in this episode, I would say I was stretching. But Henry says the following to Regina – “New York was awesome. The pizza… the Yankees, my school…”
So the FIRST thing he mentions about NYC is the pizza. Huh. When have we heard NYC pizza discussed before?
2×15 –
Neal: So, uh…You like pizza?
Henry: Yeah. L-let me guess. You’re gonna tell me the best pizza’s in New York and I gotta try it, right?
Neal: Actually, it’s in the Kingdom of Damarian on the north shore of the Dragon Fields of Zorn. Nah, it’s in New York. Here, let’s get you a slice.
Huh. So turns out that’s a Neal thing too. But it’s not the only time it’s mentioned. Yesterday I felt like I needed to watch that last SF scene – not the death, the scene before it in the woods. So last night, after I found the above pizza conversation, I went ahead and queued it up. And look what I found.
From 3×15 –
Neal: So New York, huh?
Emma: We like the pizza!
Neal: Did Henry like it?
Emma: He LOVES pizza.
Neal: No, I meant living in the city.
Apparently NYC pizza is a SF thing. Who knew! I did not, until I stumbled onto it last night. Of the last two minutes of screentime for SF, several lines of it were dedicated to NYC pizza.
Going back to that conversation with Regina, there is also this interesting item, when Henry is talking about math – “Pretty good, not Stephen Hawking good.”
It seemed a little curious to me, but I am not overly familiar with his works. A quick review tells me enough he primarily works with black holes and dabbles in a bit of timey-wimey stuff. Sounds like we’re on a theme.
With that, we have the items Slurpeez pointed out –
Regina to Snowing – “It’s not like you invented the wheel.”
And of course, Rumple’s “Round and round the circle of time, racing towards the finish line.”
(I’d like to posture that although I agree with Slurpeez’ interpretation of finish line = season finale, it might additionally mean the finish of the triangle of doom.)
Changing subject, what do you all think of this curious piece? Zelena said to Hook, “Take away her magic, Captain, or the next rose will be on her little brat’s grave.” Then we DID see another rose – on a grave nonetheless – but it was not on her child’s, but her love’s. I am not sure what to make of it. The only thing I can think is that I am sure Zelena’s threat to Henry is because he is Emma’s TL, but perhaps she has underestimated that Emma has two TLs, since she has focused on the Hook-Emma relationship.
Another curious piece – “Now I have two. Two minds. Mining time. Digging deeper in the grime.”
His other riddles make sense – one with regards to the door, one with regards to time. I understand the first part, but what of the second? Is it that he’s mining and digging deeper in himself so that Neal can pop out?
I guess I’m alone in this, but I loved the reverse parallels. Regina casting the curse not to harm Snowing, but to help them. The casting of the curse causing her sorrow, not joy. Then, she opted to save them with the heart-splitting business. And of course, the Regina-Henry TLK to break the curse. He may be SF’s kid through and through, but Regina IS his Mom and I’m glad they continue to reinforce that.
(I didn’t necessarily love the PLOT, the whole murder and heart-dividing, but I loved the reverse parallels. That was one of my favorite things about early 3B, taking the show and flipping it on its head – everyone remembered their true identities but not their recent past, Emma believed but not Henry, etc.)
Speaking of curse-casting, there was this little parallel line, from Zelena to Snow – “You’ll be too busy looking for your husband. You won’t even know about his sacrifice. Just endlessly wondering where he could be, always fearing the worst.” Uhm. Replace “husband” with “love” (or other descriptor of choice) and who does that describe? Certainly not Snow, whose half-hearted husband was right there next to her. Who spent the first few episodes looking for their TL, not knowing about his sacrifice, wondering where he could be and fearing the worst? “Where’s Neal? Is he a monkey? Where’s Neal? Where’s Neal? Have you found him yet?” Yeah. Emma. HELLO PARALLEL. WHY PARALLEL WHY?!?!
Zelena follows that up with – “Pay attention, sis. This is how you take away a happy ending.” Yep. Sure is. Buttheads.
(So again, how is this Emma’s fairytale if you have robbed her of a happy ending?)
Cracktheory:
(Warning, this is kind of cracky, pretty shipper-y, and – coming from me – unsurprisingly optimistic. Worst, it is IMO actually plausible and perhaps not so much of a crack theory at all, I’m actually kind of excited that this might be the way they are going, so if you are in a spot where you can’t have a glimmer of hope now, you might not want to read. As always with theories, even if they are partially right, they are never entirely on the money so I don’t want anyone to be sad because this is undoubtedly better than what the trolls will give us!) Spoilered out NOT due to spoilers, but to hide it more easily from those who prefer to have No Hope.
Glinda said in the episode that the necklace could only be removed by someone with light magic. Glinda didn’t it had to be Emma. “But only a purveyor of the strongest light magic would be able to accomplish such a thing.” “Light magic.” “Magic created from love.”
What if the key to getting that necklace and defeating is not Emma at all, but Henry?
I can forsee a scene where Zelena kidnaps Henry again – she’s already threatened to – and this time, they aren’t able to get him free. (Perhaps it’s because Emma’s magic freed him last time, but in the interim, we’ve had the cursed CS kiss and therefore Emma has no more magic?) In an act of desperation, Henry claws up, catches the necklace, and yanks – off it comes. Someone – Charming maybe – would say, “I thought only Emma could take the necklace?” and Snow, with her knowing Snow smile, would reply, “No, Glinda said it had to be someone born of true love.” *cue massive SF feels*
It would be a reallllly nice way to settle Emma’s TL triangle issues without Emma having to “choose…”
I started pondering this, and am convinced it is highly plausible. They are all about doing the unexpected. If we walk into a battle scene again, all viewers are going to expect Emma to be the one who saves them. And if Emma has no magic due to the cursed kiss… viewers will think it’s the end, Henry is done for. And then BAM he can save himself. I can also see this as being Zelena’s weakness, that she knew Emma was dangerous due to her status of having TL light magic, but not considering that perhaps she wasn’t the only one with that status.
Further corroboration is that in 315 they stated the necklace was “born of true love.” Same episode, they noted that the dark one was “made, born out of the – well – darkness.” I always felt “born out of true love” was a really odd way to describe a metallic pendant, but if it is a euphemism for Henry… that kid WAS born out of true love and it would be a hugely unexpected way to confirm SF’s True Love status. You also have the heart of the truest believer business, whereby Henry was apparently super-magical because he came from a line of light and dark magic. While Neal is not dark magic, his Papa certainly is, and those two lines in the same episode hearken back to that theme we hit on in 3A.
Additionally, in the boathouse, when Snow and Charming were explaining their conversation with Glinda to Emma, we got the following dialogue – “”Zelena’s weakness is light magic.” The shot then cuts to Regina holding HENRY before cutting to Emma. Snow continued, “It’s clear now, more than ever – you are the only one who can defeat her,” which so perfectly sets up for the audience to be looking for Emma to defeat her, and Henry’s defeat being a total surprise.
Two other thoughts with regards to Henry being a magical TL baby – I wonder if we’ve already seen the clues. Back in 3A, we had Henry giving his own heart. They never came straight out and said, “Like Emma, Henry’s a TL baby, so his heart can’t be taken, but it can be given,” they just conveniently scooted around it by having Pan enchant his hand. Secondly, I am wondering if bright light white-hot Henry – whom everyone assumed was Emma’s magic freeing him – was Henry’s powerful TL magic freeing himself? That piece is a little more cracky, but I just kind of wonder.
Perhaps, whether we get MO322 or not, we’ll get this as a nice consolation prize. If Hook’s cursed kiss takes away Emma’s “born of true love” magic, yet Henry HAS “born of true love” magic, that is a pretty clear triangle end without it being a contrived triangle.
Since Oz has been conceptualized since the beginning, I can see this all coming to pass… they’ve always known this is how they’d resolve the triangle (whomever the third triangle player was, since we know they’d planned alternate third corners.) It’s kinda awesome, honestly. (Of course then it raises the question of – if Charming couldn’t die in Pilot, since it meant Snow could never have her happy ending – how does Emma get hers? Maybe MO322, maybe the plan for S4 is to examine how you get your happy ending if your TL is dead, who knows.) I’ve been wondering lately with all of the focus on Emma’s magic when we’d find out about Henry’s, and this seems like an ideal way to do it.
Plus, it’s a bit of a poetic justice to Emma trying to shut the kid out and shuffling him aside the whole time they’re in town and then he saves them all in the end.
Last couple of items (as I am struggling not to be late to work,) they had Rumple utter, “Memories are pain. Pain is strength.” But then – they showed that love is strength, as Neal uses his love for Emma and Henry to bust out of his Daddio and send the potion off yonder.
By the way, I am wondering if the quill – black hawk feather? “Change a hawk to a little white dove…”
Henry – “Operation: Cobra is back on.” Emma – “I’m not sure it ever ended.”
Operation: Cobra is to bring back the happy endings? Cool. Let’s do it. #HopeforRogueBison, here we come.
Cause this story needs some mending & a better happy ending...