The biggest factor to consider is how getting rid of the Split-Seasons will effect this Season. A big criticism with the Split-Seasons was that the pacing was rapid-fire to cram everything into 11-12 episodes. That didn’t allow enough room to breath, and potential plot and character developments were neglected. Maybe there won’t be as many plotholes, and even more quiet character moments that we miss from the earlier Seasons. It should be noted that while Season 1 is still commonly heralded as the best Season by the majority of fans, Season 2’s reception was a lot more divided. There were fans who thought Season 2 was almost or just as good as Season 1, while there were a ton who thought that Season 2 was a huge disappointment. Nonetheless, that was where the show faced its first notable decline in popularity and viewership, and the trend continued with each following Season. Season 4A was the exception thanks to the Frozen hype. Only time will tell how Season 6 fares.
I agree with most of this. RG is right. SB isn’t the biggest reason why it did well in the beginning because obviously we have had storybrooke every season. But here is the difference. We have only had a full season in storybrooke once, and that was Season 1. Half seasons did not do it justice for reasons Matthew Paul stated above. It should have made the story more concise with less fillers, but they still managed to screw a lot of it up.
I’m excited for the possibility the show improves and I think it’s possible because we are getting a full season in storybrooke to flesh out the characters and treat storybrooke itself as a character, instead of just a place only the main characters hang around in. Storybrooke was a new world in and of itself in season 1. It was a world created by the Evil Queen. This world has become stale over the years, mainly because we always get more excited to see what a different realm will look like (Neverland, EF, Oz, Arendelle, Dunbroch, Camelot, Underworld). It seemed even the writers felt this way. This is natural of course. We want to see something new. But the writers forgot about the world that intrigued us from the very beginning, and that’s the town that all the fairy tales we thought we knew were transported to by the Evil Queen to get revenge and power. Making it all about storybrooke again (let’s see the Jolly Roger, the well, the mines, Regina’s crypt of hearts and potions, the town hall, Granny’s, the clock tower, the library, Archie’s office) could potentially bring the show back to what attracted us to it in the first place.
However I will say, they need to make storybrooke relevant and important to the overall plot. In prior seasons it was about breaking the curse in storybrooke. Then it was about potentially leaving storybrooke to go back to the EF. Then it was about intruders from the real world in storybrooke. If they make storybrooke relevant again, introduce new characters who live in the town too but also highlight forgotten main character development and emotions with small story lines and one overarching one for a full season, this one should be better than the last few for sure.