Emma + Baelfire = Swanfire

[kfchimera]

I think Pan worked diagonally with OZ inhabitants or they with him–somehow someone used someone else basically.  Whether it was Pan stealing away agents of the Home Office or what, but maybe there is a missing link.

[Slurpeez]

Here’s Screwball Ninja’s essay on why some people dislike Neal. Keep it mind it’s meant to be sarcastic and explanatory, not anti-Neal.

"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy

[RumplesGirl]

Here’s Screwball Ninja’s essay on why some people dislike Neal. Keep it mind it’s meant to be sarcastic and explanatory, not anti-Neal.

Yeah I read this earlier. I’m not…overly keen on what she has to say. Maybe it’s because I’ve never had a problem loving Neal? And because I don’t see a difference between Bae and Neal. Some of the stuff makes sense and a lot of the problems people have can really be chalked up to writing problems and A and E not focusing on character but on plot and mythology instead.

I get that it’s not supposed to be anti-Neal but at the same time I don’t think it helps the stream of anti-Neal stuff we do see. People can claim that Neal was intentionally written as lackluster/ not given a centric because he’s nothing more than a plot device and I feel like Screwball didn’t really help in that area (if I’m wrong someone point me to a place where she addresses it…)

Ultimately I think it is the writers fault that they made Neal a difficult man to love but it’s because they made someone else EASIER to love through flashbacks and more screentime and y’know..leather. But I sorta think A and E were taken back by how “hard” some people find it to love Neal. They didn’t expect the sorta backlash that came from Nealfire. They love him, they see him as Bae so they figured they didn’t need to do much with Neal’s life because people would just love him. And so they focused on the plot and myth and Neal just fell into–Tamara, GOAT, PP–instead of actually focusing on fleshing Neal out as a character.

Normally I’m super into what Screwball has to write but this essay and her death spoiler essay rubbed me the wrong way. she basically argued that Neal would die because he’s not popular, pretty, handsome enough to live and it *really* angered me

"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"

[RumplesGirl]

I wanted to add more, lol.

So the point Screwball makes that I think is reason numero uno why people don’t like/find it hard to love Neal is that he is so human (I wish she had gone into more detail on this because IMO it’s SUPER IMPORTANT).

People either knew a Neal or are a Neal. I am a Neal. I had to walk away from someone I truly loved because it was the right thing to do. I had to cut out some half dozen people from my life because I thought I was doing the right thing. So when people call Neal an abandon-er I get why Neal thought he was doing the right thing.

On the other hand, people might have known a Neal –someone who hurt them, left them, broke their heart. And so their own personal pasts cloud their judgement when it comes to trying to love/understand Neal (the same can be said with any character on this show, really). But with Neal, he’s not actually a villain but people can’t see him as a hero because–in their eyes–he doesn’t act the way a hero is supposed to act (enter Charming and Snow, the quintessential heroes of ONCE).

Neal exists somewhere in between, dare I say he exists in the human realm. People love the villains because they are mythic–they exist in a mythic universe that is outside my level of understanding. I can empathize the HECK out of Rumple and his abandonment issues and why he feels unworthy to be loved, but I have never murdered or plotted or deceived or manipulated. I’ve never slaughtered an entire village (Regina) or shot a woman in the back or transcended realms for my revenge (Hook). Those actions are on the mythic plane of existence so I can distance myself from their actions while at the same time, feel sympathy/empathy for the character themselves.

People often find Snow and Charming exasperating because they exist at the other end of the mythic spectrum–the constant do gooders who never stop believing and hoping. Their actions are what I should be striving for but am unable to obtain because I am, at the end of the day, human. So they are a constant reminder of my humanity and lack of mythic perfection (we’re all searching for the divine, guys.)

Neal, on the other hand, exists squarely in the middle. He is US. He is almost fully human, despite being from a mythic world. And that’s where the divide for Neal/Bae comes in. Bae was a little hero in his own world and so we expect him to operate by that same system outside of that world (after all, Rumple is still a villain and Snow is still a hero here on Earth) but for many he has fallen short of what they expect because Neal is a creature of a different color. His actions are not mythic–he has never killed, maimed, physically injured, manipulated a situation. All he did was let Emma go. His actions are human. I think I said this a few months ago, so many pages back, but Neal holds up a mirror to the viewer and asks them to look at their own lives. He is a reminder of our own hurt at the hands of others but also how we’ve hurt others. THAT’s why “it’s hard to love Neal.”

Unless you’re us. We love him. But I think we have a greater understanding of his character and what A and E are trying to do with Neal which was introduce a very *human* character into a show that is divided into heroes and villains.

"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"

[lisas]

Slurpeez108 wrote:

Here’s Screwball Ninja’s essay on why some people dislike Neal. Keep it mind it’s meant to be sarcastic and explanatory, not anti-Neal.

Yeah I read this earlier. I’m not…overly keen on what she has to say. Maybe it’s because I’ve never had a problem loving Neal? And because I don’t see a difference between Bae and Neal. Some of the stuff makes sense and a lot of the problems people have can really be chalked up to writing problems and A and E not focusing on character but on plot and mythology instead.

I get that it’s not supposed to be anti-Neal but at the same time I don’t think it helps the stream of anti-Neal stuff we do see. People can claim that Neal was intentionally written as lackluster/ not given a centric because he’s nothing more than a plot device and I feel like Screwball didn’t really help in that area (if I’m wrong someone point me to a place where she addresses it…)

Ultimately I think it is the writers fault that they made Neal a difficult man to love but it’s because they made someone else EASIER to love through flashbacks and more screentime and y’know..leather. But I sorta think A and E were taken back by how “hard” some people find it to love Neal. They didn’t expect the sorta backlash that came from Nealfire. They love him, they see him as Bae so they figured they didn’t need to do much with Neal’s life because people would just love him. And so they focused on the plot and myth and Neal just fell into–Tamara, GOAT, PP–instead of actually focusing on fleshing Neal out as a character.

Normally I’m super into what Screwball has to write but this essay and her death spoiler essay rubbed me the wrong way. she basically argued that Neal would die because he’s not popular, pretty, handsome enough to live and it *really* angered me

Yeah it angered me as well I completely reject her argument on it.

Keeper of Neal/BaelFire's Blood Magic, Neverland Crossbow, FTL Clothes,Room at Granny’s, Charming & Emma’s Father/Daughter Hugs, Henry's Neverland Crossbow, Rumplestlitskin/Mr.Gold's FTL Walking Stick

[lisas]

[quote=244877]Also, Glinda’s character description sounds a lot like Bae’s. Both have maintained their optimism, despite being isolated. Maybe Glinda helped Bae get ‘home’ to Earth when he then met Emma. [/quote]

Head Cannon very much accepted Slurpeez

[quote=244881]Headcanon: accepted, Slurpeez.
I like where this is going. Glinda helped Bae get to Earth to meet Emma–his home. Glinda helped Dorothy get home where she’ll have Henry (Gorham) who will help reunite Emma and Neal[/quote]

I can see it definitely going there RG

Crossing my fingers that we are right

Keeper of Neal/BaelFire's Blood Magic, Neverland Crossbow, FTL Clothes,Room at Granny’s, Charming & Emma’s Father/Daughter Hugs, Henry's Neverland Crossbow, Rumplestlitskin/Mr.Gold's FTL Walking Stick

[Slurpeez]

But I think we have a greater understanding of his character and what A and E are trying to do with Neal which was introduce a very *human* character into a show that is divided into heroes and villains.

YES! I totally agree. I think Neal’s humanity ties into this real, everyday modern fairytale A&E are telling. Remember they said A&E’s story is about how two people who love each other, yet who’ve experienced so much hurt, could possibly come together again. That is a very difficult subject, because it hits so very close to home; broken relationships and broken families are very real. Emma and Neal may have been separated by supernatural elements of a curse, but how they go about reconciling after so much doubt, heartbreak, and misunderstanding is a story that must be told because it shows normal, everyday people that they might get another chance too to make things right. RG is right on the money — Neal is us.

"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy

[Slurpeez]

Have a pretty thing because this could never be posted too many times

x

"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy

[kfchimera]

It’s funny, I wrote a similar thing quite awhile back if you remember, talking about the reasons Neal gets disliked, and Screwball, wonderful as she is,  didn’t really acknowledge the  biggest reasons:   He’s in the way of two ships.  

A few Rumbellers were NOT happy that Rumple was all “You’re my Happy Ending” to Neal.  Screwball seems to be annoyed at Neal for not comforting Belle–yet, its funny because I haven’t seen  anyone annoyed at Belle for not comforting Neal.    That tells you something right there.

I do agree with some of her points far as lack of story/reaction/focus and the taint of “Nikki Palo” storytelling with Greg and Tamara.   Yet those are systematic problems for these writers as Charming, Snow, Henry and even Hook who received a lot of screentime, seem to be curiously underdeveloped for all that.  Instead of developing certain existing things the writers invent new problems (dreamshade, a brother…).  We could have had a scene of Charming, who’s all super-protective Daddy mode, questioning Hook about his deals with Pan.  We could have learned more about Tink through Snow–perhaps  chit-chatting about treehouse care and keeping, while they hunt a boar to help them survive, with Mama Snow doing the same thing Charming’s doing–getting the 411 on Hook if that’s the way the writers wanted to develop the whole “Charmings bond with Hook”.  We the audience could have filled in more substantial things about his time in NL, or perhaps had dialog about Neal /Bae from Hook or Tink.  The writers chose to keep those things obscure so we didnt’ get that.   Even then, if they wanted that fuzzy for future mysterious reasons/triangle building, they could have worked a theme of Emma learning about her parent’s pasts as they learn about hers.

It’s like the choice to use Shadow Belle, rather than the magic mirror idea to have real Belle talking to Rumple.

Anyway, it is what it is, and before Neal came along, much of the “fandom” online apparently hated Henry, Emma and Snow the most!

 

“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?” -- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass

[Slurpeez]

It’s funny, I wrote a similar thing quite awhile back if you remember, talking about the reasons Neal gets disliked, and Screwball, wonderful as she is,  didn’t really acknowledge the  biggest reasons:   He’s in the way of two ships.

Yeah, about that. Some people (not you) think Neal is the obstacle, when really, he’s the one who’s going to get his family HOME. Just saying.

A few Rumbellers were NOT happy that Rumple was all “You’re my Happy Ending” to Neal.  Screwball seems to be annoyed at Neal for not comforting Belle–yet, its funny because I haven’t seen  anyone annoyed at Belle for not comforting Neal.    That tells you something right there.

Good point that no one cries me a river when Neal isn’t comforted like EVER. But as far as Neal and Belle go, I think A&E said we would be seeing Belle and Neal bond so three cheers for that development. Hopefully, a Neal/Belle sibling dynamic will help our lovely Belle fans forgive Neal, since he was in just as much shock and pain as she was, only he didn’t express it because the guy grieves differently than Belle. Rather than crying buckets, he cries on the inside and commends his father for saving all of them.

"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy

[Author]

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