There’s a difference between Second Chances and Having Mercy….
Having Mercy deals with granting someone their life, but never liking them or acknowledging them ever again simply out of your distaste of their being.
A Second Chance is granted when one, usually a person you have a connection with, is given a chance to redeem themselves and become better people.
No one had a connection to Felix, therefore they only showed mercy. And Regina never wanted to kill Felix once they were back in Storybrooke, just lock him away for the rest of his days….Thus showing mercy!
Zelena was Regina’s only sister, and only living family left! Regina could relate to Zelena, and actually felt sympathy for her sister despite all of her past actions, because her life was ruined too by both Cora and Rumple(who played a SOMEWHAT hand in her wickedness). Thus a second chance is given to her, so that Regina could try to help her sister become a better person, and for them to have a sisterly relationship.
Rumple didn’t have to give Zelena a second chance, but he should have showed her MERCY as Neal would have wanted him to!
How can locking someone up for the rest of their days when they didn’t want to leave their home but you dragged them back to Storybrooke with you anyway be called being merciful? Why didn’t the Nevengers leave Felix in Neverland? They never had to see him again, he would’ve been alive, and without Pan, Felix would not have been a theat. Plus without Felix being there, Pan wouldn’t have been able to cast his curse.
Zelena was far more of a threat than Felix was. She showed no remorse for her actions and, considering she could easily get her powers back just by putting her pendant on, she would be a risk to let free in Storybrooke without 24/7 supervision.
Having mercy and second chances go hand in hand, one can not exist without the other. Locking someone up until the end of their days is not merciful. Often in films, the protagonist won’t kill the antagonist because they want the antagonist to suffer for their crimes. Killing the antagonist would be seen as merciful as it allows them to escape justice and the antagonist doesn’t want to face the consequences of their misdeeds . Likewise, if someone is seriously hurt or ill or suffering, and looks set to go through a slow, agonising, lingering death, it is considered merciful to put them out of their misery and give them a quick painless death.
In Once, George wanted Charming to show mercy and kill him instead of locking him up, but Charming locked him up anyway (In the mines, where George probably starved to death whilst Charming went to Neverland, if the failsafe hadn’t klled him first).
Regina was SHOWING MERCY (since mercy can work both ways, it all depends on what the person receiving the mercy considers merciful) to Zelena by giving her a SECOND CHANCE instead of going “You’ve screwed up, that’s it for you”. However, was it really Regina’s place to decide what happened to Zelena? Regina would’ve been biased because Zelena was her sister plus Regina wasn’t the only one Zelena screwed with. At the very least, it should’ve been a joint decision between Regina and Rumple over what happened to Zelena.
In the EF, Snow got to decide Regina’s fate because it had been her that Regina had been targeting. In Storybrooke, Zelena’s fate should’ve been decided by Regina and Rumple together. Obviously they weren’t going to agree (Rumple wanted to kill her, Regina didn’t) but they should’ve sat down, hashed it out, and come to a compromise over what was to be done therefore giving each of them a sense of validation (and quite possibly would’ve avoided Rumple killing Zelena).
Both Regina and Rumple took the choice away from the other (Regina by using the dagger against Rumple and winding him up further with her hypocritical “heroes don’t kill speech”, then giving the dagger to Belle instead of Rumple therefore denying him his choice) (Rumple by killing Zelena therefore denying Regina her choice to give Zelena a second chance). Neither person was right in what they did, neither person had the sole right to decide Zelena’s fate.
All magic comes with a price!
Keeper of Felix