@Cherish wrote:
Just have her be responsible for her own actions and grow from them. Don’t excuse them and try to rationalize them. Evil isn’t rational, so trying to make sense of Regina’s most evil deeds is kind of useless. I don’t expect the writers to justify or excuse Rumpel killing his wife or killing his maid. So, why do it with Regina?
Regina’s more human than Rumple. That’s the reason I find her actions harder to excuse than Rumple’s. This ep was the first time when I legit felt heartache for Regina. Doesn’t mean I automatically excuse what she’s done though, because the whole way along, she’s made bad choices that she needs to be held accountable for. But I did feel her pain when Daniel was attacking her and she had to kill him. That moment was a nice little contrast to the scene where she killed her father. Back then, he was begging for his life, and here, Daniel was begging for his death.
Anyway, it sucks for Regina that they set her up to become Rumple’s monster. She was manipulated by the master. Jefferson was manipulated by Rumple too. They were both pawns in his game, Jefferson seduced by his paycheque and Regina by her lust for power and inability to let Daniel go.
But if this was indeed the incident that caused Regina to later punish Jefferson, that means she’s wrongly punished someone for the second time. First it was Snow, who was clearly manipulated by Cora, but Regina still blamed Snow. Then it was Jefferson who was clearly manipulated by Rumple, but Regina still blamed Jefferson.
Jefferson is someone who wasn’t exactly squeaky clean, but there came a point in his life where he had a reality check and realised what was truly important and changed his focus, even if it meant collecting fungus and living on the poverty line. Regina’s moment like that should have been, (if it hadn’t come beforehand), when she was standing there thinking about killing her father. But she still made the wrong choice and killed him. I can’t easily excuse that.