While it sounds cliche, part of the appeal of the show, at least for me, since the beginning has been its message about happy endings, hope and family finding each other.
Not cliche. And I wholeheartedly agree. These are fairy tales, after all. And while I know that most of the original ones are slightly horrifying in nature, the mindset of the vast majority of the people watching know that when anything starts with “Once upon a time,” it ends with “and they all lived happily ever after”
I think SwanFire has always been endgame since its conception when it was planned for Baelfire to be the father of Henry. Neal, Emma and Henry are all family, and as Henry said, his family always finds each other.
Yes. I mean, A and E told both Bobby and JMo about Baelfire from the start
I think there were always going to be obstacles for Neal and Emma to overcome, such as the dark curse, the hurt about Neal letting her go, the misconceptions about why Neal left, Neal’s fake fiancé, and now the triangle of doom with Hook.
What is a love story without a dragon or two?
The more important point is that Emma needs to face a series of emotional and supernatural hurdles before she can find hope to get her own happy ending, which we know, is the dream of Tallahassee with Neal and with Henry
The Heroes journey. ’round and ’round and back home again, emotionally healed. Storyteller and I had an entire thread about Emma’s hero journey using Joseph Campbell’s structure. (maybe I’ll find it again)
I think Hook could just be a major distraction and an excuse for Emma to try and sweep her insecurities and fears under the rug rather than to face them head on. Only when Emma actually starts to deal with her issues will she move past them.
Yes I am accepting that while it would be nice (for both sides) if this triangle of doom were resolved before the 3 month break, that’s a pipe dream. And it’s going to be a rocky few episodes of 3.2 but I think KFC might be on to something with the whole “314 anniversary” thing.