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[adrotate group="5"]"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"
My god. Someone find me this person so I can give them an award for “the most accurate thing on the internet.”
here’s the thing about swanfire and character development. for emma, neal (in her life in any capacity) is the hard choice. because hard choices and nuanced, complex, emotionally difficult relationships don’t always come wrapped in leather and soaked in a hero/villian dichotomy. sometimes it’s knowing that if you’re capable of love and being loved so much, you’re capable of the opposite as well. sometimes it’s knowing that love doesn’t protect you from crappy things happening, that sometimes love can take away pain, but sometimes love and pain coexist. emma puts up walls to keep herself from getting hurt. it’s one of the first things we learn about emma swan. she’s been so hurt by not having people there— her parents, neal, having to give up henry— that it’s easier to just not let them in anymore. emma’s season 1 arc culminated in her fully accepting her role in henry’s life— going from barely being able to call him by name in the pilot to an i love you, and i think her overall emotional arc is similar— it’s Emma Swan Learns to Deal With Her Crap. Emma loves Neal. Emma will probably always love Neal. Emma was scared by the fact that not only did she never stop loving him, but he never stopped loving her, and they still went through all this crap. That hurts and it’s scary and him being back in her life means she can’t shut down as the past. For Emma, being able to reconcile the relationship they had, the hurt they went through, and any current relationship— friendship, romantic, even strictly co-parenting— means taking down those walls and dealing with things. That’s not a thing that’s easy, but it’s something I think is the cornerstone of Emma’s development in every major relationship in her life. for neal, emma’s a gamechanger. emma’s the thing in his life that makes him want to tear down the lesson we saw him learn as baelfire: you can create all the connections you want, but ultimately, you’re going to be alone. neal is very, very, very resilient. his father becomes this monster, he finds a way out of it. his father abandons him and he’s left alone on the streets, he’s taken in by the darlings and is able to consider them family. he leaves the darlings to protect their family, is taken in by Hook and is eventually able to trust him as a father figure. He’s turned over to the lost boys by Hook, and he manages to hold on to enough hope to find a way out of Neverland. He finds Emma and plans to make a home with her, and surprise, she’s got to break a curse that’ll lead her to the family she’s always been looking for—her real home. and this is what breaks him. the next time he attempts to move on, with tamara, it’s not the same type of moving on— he hurt emma, he lost that connection, he doesn’t get it back, it’s stupid to think he could want it back. i do think he thought he could have some kind of a good life with her, but i think it was a result of a much more jaded form of resilience. 3A broke that down. Neal opened s3 with the determination to get back to the family he should have had. and he closed it losing them again. But this time he says it’s not over. I’ll see you both again. And I think ultimately, that’s what his arc is about—learning to be 14 year old Baelfire fighting to stay with his family again. tl;dr, but for me this is why it works narratively— because they’re ultimately built into each other’s arcs and their relationship is based on actual, mutual, simultaneous character development.
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(edited for language issues) *insert a million GIFS of people clapping*Reposting in case people didn’t get to read it the first time round
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"Wow. That was a lot longer than I planned it to be but I’ve been slightly distracted by Grey’s and Scandal tonight so I had to type things up fast during commercials. Sorry if something doesn’t make sense, LOL
*Applauds Heather’s essay!*
Just a little more amo supporting Neal/Oz theory. 🙂
I like the theory of Neal being in Oz ….though I’m uncertain about him actually being the wizard.
"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
I’m glad you guys enjoyed my epic essay! 😀
Love Schmacky’s edits! More #BOOM less gloom!!!!!! 😀
#MoreBOOMLessGloom(Neal & Emma) | You could still be…
"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
Joy!
https://twitter.com/MRaymondJames/status/439277805415583744
#Boom!"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
Just goes to show that it pays to keep hope alive! He lives! And MRJ has been filming in studio and likely because Neal is in Oz with Belle and Rumple! *Floof family feels!* Neal’s story is all about the hope, home, family, and love. He’s going to save his Papa and then find his way home to his son and Emma. Joy comes in the morning!
Neal: “Tell Emma I’m alive and that I love her!”
"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
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