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I woke up really early this morning so please excuse if this doesn’t make sense.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about different interpretations of love on Once. Still gonna write that meta but I think it’ll probably happen later in the first half after we get more episodes. But here’s something that came to me after I read about what Neal did with Roland:
I’m sure most of us have heard of 1 Corinthians 13:4-7? It’s read 99% of the time at every wedding because it talks about love, what is and what it is not. So, a few things have popped out at me about how it relates to both Hook and Neal.
Okay, so let’s look at the first line:
Love is patient, love is kind.
This is Hook. He is definitely falling in love with Emma but we’ve also seen, especially in Lost Girl, that he is patient with her. (when she was trying to unlock Pan’s map). He probably knew all along what it took to unlock the map and could have easily told her what to do, but Emma had to figure it out for herself. He is and has always been patient with her whereas he is almost snippy with everyone else.
Skip a little further and we get to the part that parallels Neal:
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking
It is the self-seeking part that most reminds me of Neal. Yes, he is finding his way back to Emma but look at how he finding his way back to her. He’s using magic, the one thing he’s hated since he was a kid and used Robin Hood’s most prized possession, his four year old son to get him to Neverland. No matter how you look at it, he is acting selfishly and disregarding safer ways to get what he wants done. And he’s taking shortcuts in order to accomplish his happy ending and we all know magic comes with a price and most certainly, Neal and probably cute little Roland will pay this price later.
I especially love how on one the recent interviews with JMO at NYCC post panel, she compares Hook and Neal’s actions.
Hook is the one that is helping her right now. Hook is the one that’s present. He’s the one who’s sort of surprising by following through with what he promises to do. And seems to be doing this very selflessly instead of selfishly. And she’s definitely taken aback by how different he is than she expected.
Love does not delight in evil
Neal teaming up with his dad cannot be a good thing. Rumpelstiltskin is a loose canon on the island. He’s separated from the others and who knows what he will do to accomplish his task. He knows about the prophecy and has an idea of what it means but Neal doesn’t. But right now, it seems like Neal is becoming more and more like father, taking the easy way through magic to get what he wants. This will not end well for him. And I doubt very much Emma would approve of him using a 4 year old boy to get to her.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Again, we come back to Hook and how he’s been so far with Emma. We saw him give her Bae’s sword in The Heart of the Truest Believer. He didn’t need too. He knows that Emma can take care of herself but she also needed closure as far as Neal was concerned. And she is beginning to trust him and is beginning to have hope again and it must be an awesome feeling on Emma’s part for someone to look at her and have faith in her. And it is because of Hook’s support that Emma’s going to persevere and find Henry.
Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
We’ve seen faith, hope and love as three major themes on OUAT. It’s what Snowing’s ‘I will always find you’ means and I can see this slowly becoming reality with Hook and Emma.
How’s that for an analysis?