Reply To: Emma + Baelfire = Swanfire

[kfchimera]

I wonder, if Neal was absolute  least favorite of more CSers than Hook is least favorite of SFers?  No idea, but he wasn’t in my bottom 5, was below all the main cast, which surprised me because I thought I liked him more than Regina.  Yet I like people he is at odds with, so it might push him down because I like Rumple, Belle and Neal more.  Same with Snow–I like her more than Rumple, but since I don’t hate Regina, it seems like I like Snow less than I do, if that makes sense.

I’m not a “Dearie” or “Regal” or “Hooker” or even a ..what was the name they came up with for Neal? I think it should have been “Homies” to go with Hookers and Hoodies…but I like all the characters and want them generally to be happy, but if it came down to a conflict that could not be resolved –I guess I do like the CharmingStilskin Clan, and to the extent Regina or Hook’s goals don’t conflict with theirs, then want to see them happy too.

I don’t know how the writers are going to resolve the tension in what Neal and Hook want, but I don’t think at this point in the story that they’ve been so clear that Emma loves Hook and doesn’t love Neal or that Neal would be somehow this awful horrible guy to her.

Everytime there’s people questioning Snow about her positive opinions on Neal, it makes me sigh, because Snow is also being positive about Hook and Regina.  She,  knows there’s problems, it isn’t like she’s completely forgotten these things, but she also can tell from what they all went through that they can be on the same side, and work together.  They can find a way to adjust their ideas of what a “happy ending” would be for them in a way that isn’t “I win you lose”.  Once they can get to that point of wanting things that aren’t in conflict so directly, they can get along.

So maybe Neal will start to love someone else but I don’t see him doing that with how he has been written where a decade went along and it took a woman on a mission completely faking everything on her side for him to get engaged.  A real relationship has two people with their own uncertainties, fears of rejection and things like that, and the way Neal is, I can’t see someone else falling for him when so much of his heart is with Emma.  The same with Hook at this point, which is why I’m not on CaptainFairy, but was into Hookriel as I presumed it was a mutual broken hearts thing (and it was the basis of the original inspiration for the Little Mermaid story!).  I’d hoped they wouldn’t take Hook’s feelings from attraction/infatuation into love, but that seems to be what they’re saying on some level Hook thinks he feels.   Yet what a character thinks they feel isn’t necessarily the whole story.

We saw Neal use that globe, thinking about Emma and how he feels, so pretty sure his love is real.  As I said, it’s my view that he’s a loyal character and not the type of guy to fall in love all that easily, despite falling for Tamara’s wiles.  Hook on the other hand, is someone I think that does fall in love easily.  He met Milah for a day and ran away with her.  He met Emma for a few hours more or less, thought she was hot stuff, but not enough to where he trusted her despite her misgivings about him.  So even if he did try to double-deal Cora at the portal fight, he still stuck by Cora’s side in SB and helped her even after Emma saved his life.  He could have more openly told them what he knew but chose to stick to killing Rumple.  Its only after that is empty to him, where he isn’t sure what to do, thinks about Bae, sees Regina’s sacrifice for Henry and asks himself what he wants.  THEN his thoughts turn to Emma, but it is not until he kisses her that he realizes he can move on from Milah.  So everything before then? I think he wasn’t sure what he was doing but she drew him in.

Emma’s made up of True Love, and I think as with Graham, and August, she has an effect on people.  So its quite possible that her magical nature drew in these guys to her, because its not HER as in her personality, as much as it is WHAT she is, but with Neal? He had no idea of that side of her as they were in the Land Without Magic and he did NOT know her destiny.  Even the concept of her destiny wouldn’t have attracted him, had he known because he so wanted to get away from magic at the time.  Once he knew her though, he had such pure love for her that even with all the obstacles, he couldn’t let go of the hope entirely (and it seems to me she felt the same).   He will use magic and cross worlds, even be a bit pushy about using an adorable kid to lure a magical shadow–but he’s still not going to kill people in cold blood to get to her or Henry.  His love for her seems to me to be pure, and for her as a person.  Her love for him parallels it too–she would do a lot for him, despite thinking all these bad things, knowing his father is the Dark One, but she’s not quite at the last point he is of having that faith that they can beat destiny to be together.

It’s not like Neal can find just any girl who’d tolerate his father being what he was, and (because I think the Regina not seeing Henry thing will be fixed) his son’s adopted mother/step-grandma being what she was–nor Emma just any guy to not just put up with it, but to be happy in that situation.  Emma wants Henry to have his family that love him, no matter who they are and what they’ve done.  As long as they DO love him and you know, won’t try to take his heart or kill him or something like that!