Emma Swan Character Analysis

[AtlanticaDream]

I think we are about to see a big change in Emma. In Queen of Hearts, we saw Hook compare her to the dried up old bean. We then saw that bean become rejuvinated and able to work again through the power of Lake Nostos. Emma also went through these waters, which I think foreshadows that she will also be able to ‘function’ again. She will be able to trust people again.

[schmacky]

I don’t think that it’s literally the water she went through that rejuvenated her but that she herself did it. She realized that love is strength and that gave her power. It rejuvenated her in all different kinds of ways. We’ll be finding out what those ways are in January.

[AtlanticaDream]

Yes I completely agree, it was more of a metaphor sort of thing. Just like the water changed the bean, her trip and all she saw and experienced changed her.

Proud Keeper of the Dinglehoppers

[Myril]

Such a trip to the Enchanted Forest, or what is left of it, certainly has impact on a person. Emma might have started to believe, that what Henry told is true, but think coming to the Enchanted Forest, seeing some magic there happen, experience it as reality is something now making it all more real for Emma. And it was some emotional roller coaster there for her. So of course she is changed.

Will she be able to trust people again? Yes, she already does, let down her guard somewhat, let people closer. She let Henry through her high walls, Mary Margaret as a friend before the curse was broken. Not to forget Graham, although it was more a delicate first attempt to open up again for a love interest, but she did, despite that it ended already in a second so tragically. Doubt she could have defeated Cora for the moment the way she did without all that happening before.

Heros are often send on a quest to not actually safe the world or whoever, but to find themselves.

Don’t think though that Emma is all there yet, that her quest is over, just a part of it. Despite that I said, that she already has begun to trust people again before the curse broke and her trip with her mother to the Post-Apocalpytic Enchanted Forest, Emma still has issues. Her walls might crumble, have become more transparent, but they are not gone. Some things no one overcomes overnight.

edit: of course there are more challenges in the future for Emma to deal with, but think trust issues are still there as well, She sure now has to deal with exploring and handling her power, what does it mean for her and for her family, that Rumple seems to have some bigger thing, plan going on, Cora and Hook coming to Storybrooke, what to make of Regina (wll she ever learn, that Regina did kill Graham for example, how will she react to that?), Henry’s future, sharing or not sharing parental rights with Regina, she herself as mother and daughter, geting to know her father, just to name what immediately comes to my mind.

(and for the sake of more seasons I hope Emma and other characters have to go through some more up and downs in their lives; there is a reason why it is called happy ending, end of story that would be otherwise 😉 )

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[Myril]

Rereading what I wrote 1 1/2 seasons ago reminds me even more how dissatisfying the journey, the quest since has become. They are still doing a lot right with the character IMO, but they have been doing a lot wrong with the journey for Emma.

For starters will think out loud a bit about Emma as daughter.

Many have been expecting Emma’s walls to be crumbled in rather a short time, walls she build up all of her childhood and most of her adult life. I say it again, something like that is not gone over night, not even in a few weeks, a year, it might even be never fully gone. It is a very deep going deep rooted feeling of being alone in the world and that distrusting people is the only possible survival strategy. People with such strong abandonment feelings have a tendency to push people away to avoid being disappointed and let down, strange, because it means one fairly often forces them even to let one down again, thus one is reinforcing feelings one would like to overcome.

One of the very first feelings Emma had was that of being alone, confused, uncomfortable, and no one there to make her feel better, safe, accepted, fed, happy and warm. Her parents are not really to blame for that, they had not much of a choice and Pinocchio was totally overwhelmed with the task given, first responders and some group home can’t ondoe these first hours either nor create much of a better feeling. Emma doesn’t remember it, but the feelings stayed with her. The way we feel comforted or not as toddler has influence on our relationships of any kind for all of our life. We can learn to handle it, deal with it, but it never goes away, it’s creating a kind of basic matrix or emotional vocabulary for our connections to the world around us and other people.

While there were interesting mother-daughter moments with Snow in 2A, after they returned it was like nothing had happened, they seemed to have less connection than ever before. In season 1 Mary Margaret had become a friend (more or less, people like Emma keep even to good friends some distance, if they even have any), they had made a connection in the Enchanted Forest, and then? Nada. In 3A it goes even so far, that she not just regrets to have missed out on seeing Emma growing up, raising her, and wished for a new child to experience that part of motherhood, Snow lacks IMO any understanding of Emma. Okay, one tiny exception, in Lost Girl there was a rare moment of understanding but it was gone like in a second. Snow and Emma could in theory connect even via that share experience of missing out on seeing their child’s first years, though Emma is so lucky to at least now experience Henry turning into a teenager and a set of false memory of raising him, but again, it is like there is nothing. Then there is Bandit Snow, who could share some experience of having to survive while on the run with Emma…

What I’ve seen this season 3 is a Snow, a mother who is so scared of having an adult daughter (right, dearie, it means you’re getting old in a way), that she constantly ignores her or even pushes her away with though a friendly face on the outside, pretending it’s even for her best. In superficial naive manner of true-love-will-always-find-a-way belief Snow doesn’t care much about the complex set of feelings her daughter had for Neal and instead assumed, he was her son’s father, so there had to be something and probably should be something. Right, blood is always thicker than water, what a limiting, exclusive and conservative view on family. This Snow didn’t give Emma any good feelings or reason to feel like having family with her, a home with her. No, in 3B she even snubs Emma for considering that she might be better of just with Henry and far, far away from all the fairy tale nonsense. Snow, who had no choice when Emma was born, failed her now as a mother and friend.

I am okay with Emma being at the end of season 3 at a point in her journey to take more risk in letting people close and closer, but I am not okay, how they brought her to this point. It would have made no difference to me if it hadn’t that much Hook but Neal. I would have loved to see as a counterpoint to the dysfunctional mother-daughter relations of the Mills family (Cora, Regina, Zelena) a somewhat bumpy but nevertheless beginning to work mother and daughter relation between Emma and Snow.

The main character to blame for it not working is IMO Snow, who at least had the experience of having for some of her childhood years a caring mother. Yes, I would expect Snow, who they made a token Gaia, Mother Earth in the pilot, do translate some of her own good family experience to Emma. Well, she did, in season 1 – but somehow that got lost while Snow was cuddling with her Prince Charming wishing and trying for a new baby.

Emma didn’t fail as a daughter, she was there for her family when they needed her regardless her doubts about staying afterwards. Although she decided to give up her powers to safe Hook’s life, but guess she would have done that even for Regina or Archie, that is just how Emma ticks. That Emma can’t be the cuddly toddler anymore for Snow is not Emma’s fault.

Besides that a huge part of it is more of a rant about what they did with the character of Snow, what me irks about how they took Emma a step or more along her journey to a better self, is that the key character now became a man, the possible true love or love interest. It’s such a worn out path. Female heroes often have no mothers at all, they learn fighting and embrace being a hero through mentorship, guidance, teaching or friendship with a man, and often enough even when it’s a fatherly figure there are romantic feelings involved. No, not even Xena is an exception, but at least a man (Ares) had to share the honor with a woman (Gabriele). Wonder Woman learns her skills by her mother and sisters, but still it takes a guy to get her off the island to become a hero in our world. Merida and Frozen with Elsa are more progressive in that, even Maleficent does a somewhat better job. But OUaT has nothing better to do than to turn Emma into just another princess, who is not the classical damsel-in-distress anymore but still can’t find herself and find confidence in herself without some guy holding her hand. What a shame.

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[RumplesGirl]

People with such strong abandonment feelings have a tendency to push people away to avoid being disappointed and let down, strange, because it means one fairly often forces them even to let one down again, thus one is reinforcing feelings one would like to overcome.

As someone with DEEP abandonment issues, I can attest to that. And you’re right, I push people away all the time but then wonder why people leave me. It doesn’t make sense but..that’s how it goes.

Okay, one tiny exception, in Lost Girl there was a rare moment of understanding but it was gone like in a second. Snow and Emma could in theory connect even via that share experience of missing out on seeing their child’s first years, though Emma is so lucky to at least now experience Henry turning into a teenager and a set of false memory of raising him, but again, it is like there is nothing. Then there is Bandit Snow, who could share some experience of having to survive while on the run with Emma…

That moment in Lost Girl was beautiful but it came to absolutely nothing. It was there to give people a Snow/Emma moment but it didn’t continue down the line with the characters. Instead, Emma went back to being distant (though you do not tear down walls in one conversation) and Snow began to wish for another child. I don’t “blame” anyone for this (except the writers) but the fact that it came to nothing and then at the end of the season it’s “mom and dad! you’re my home!” feels out of left field.

But OUaT has nothing better to do than to turn Emma into just another princess, who is not the classical damsel-in-distress anymore but still can’t find herself and find confidence in herself without some guy holding her hand. What a shame.

I said this in another thread but I’ll say it here. Emma Swan was my favorite female on this show. I loved her. Adored her. Defended her. By the end of S3B, I don’t think she’s Emma Swan anymore. And this has NOTHING to do with her romantic entanglements.

Consider this

Season One finale: slays a dragon and declares Henry to be the most important person in her life. Savior+ Mother–that is what Emma Swan is .

Season Two finale: saves the town of SB and then goes after Henry after he’s been kidnapped by GOAT. Savior + Mother. Still keeping in line with who Emma Swan is despite S2’s wonky storytelling

Season Three (particularly S3B): Emma can’t be the Savior, she has nothing to do with taking down Zelena, she is a bystander who is actually ROBBED of her Savior powers and then she breaks history and has to clumsily and hamfistedly fix it. And mother? She doesn’t want Henry to be with his family–including his other mother, she doesn’t want Henry to see his Father when they find Neal, she wants to pull him away from his life.
The season ends with her having “saved” people only after she broke it all (and saving “the wrong person” because she felt super bad about Marian dying) AND she barely mentions Henry during the course of the time travel escapades.

And yes she found her home with her parents but it literally happens over the span of (in show) one or two days. (2 hours for us). One second it’s “I’m leaving. I won’t need magic in NYC” and then “I must stay in SB!” Lightening fast character development that makes me spin

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

[Jenna_B]

I guess I look at OUAT slightly differently, and maybe that’s why I have less issue with her portrayal in 3b.  personally I was glad it wasn’t Emma who saved the day; it was the woman who essentially got them in this “mess” in the beginnng – Regina.  I know a lot of people consider OUaT to be Emma’s story but I much prefer to view it as an ensemble so to have Emma not be the hero this time around, and also be able to screw everything up was ok with me.  (I also don’t pay much attention to timeline so that probably helps)

The reaon the finale works for me is because we’re watching Snowing’s story through the eyes of the daughter they gave up.  Imagine being able to see that.  Imagine the effect it would have on you.  I think Emma’s walls have been comimg down steadily so the going to NY thing seemed more of  a dEfense mechanism than truth

 

 

[RumplesGirl]

The reaon the finale works for me is because we’re watching Snowing’s story through the eyes of the daughter they gave up. Imagine being able to see that. Imagine the effect it would have on you. I think Emma’s walls have been comimg down steadily so the going to NY thing seemed more of a dEfense mechanism than truth

 

Fine walls came down because huge upheaval of emotions. Not how it works in real life if you have deep abandonment issues, but sure…season’s over and A and E need to claim that there was logical development.

I don’t mind that her walls came down. I mind that they had to take away the two defining features of Emma since the Pilot in order to do it.

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

[Phee]

While there were interesting mother-daughter moments with Snow in 2A, after they returned it was like nothing had happened, they seemed to have less connection than ever before.

I recall an interview with Ginny from the last SDCC (I think it was) where she commented that in S2 the action and plot sorta got in the way of Snow and Emma really exploring their relationship. She didn’t flat out say that she was disappointed with how it went, but you could tell by how she said that they were really looking forward to finally delving into their relationship in S3 that she’d been disappointed. Makes me wonder how the actresses feel about how S3 ended up playing out as well.

Snow and Emma could in theory connect even via that share experience of missing out on seeing their child’s first years, though Emma is so lucky to at least now experience Henry turning into a teenager and a set of false memory of raising him, but again, it is like there is nothing. Then there is Bandit Snow, who could share some experience of having to survive while on the run with Emma…

There’s so much potential for a really deep connection and understanding between them. It’s so frustrating that the very people who wrote the story that created that potential are just letting it fall by the wayside instead of really getting into it and showing them develop and grow closer in a real way.

This Snow didn’t give Emma any good feelings or reason to feel like having family with her, a home with her. No, in 3B she even snubs Emma for considering that she might be better of just with Henry and far, far away from all the fairy tale nonsense. Snow, who had no choice when Emma was born, failed her now as a mother and friend.

I can’t really fault Snow for what she said to Emma in that moment. Much of the fandom was frustrated with Emma constantly insisting that she was gonna take Henry and leave, and Snow’s line felt to me like that slap that all of us had wanted to give her to make her at least consider that in taking Henry away still without his memories, she would really be separating the whole family again. There are more people’s feelings to consider in this situation. The way Emma had been so steadfast about leaving had been disregarding her parents’ (and Regina’s) feelings entirely, not even acknowledging that those other people had an emotional stake in her decision, and that’s pretty selfish.

(Speaking of Regina, another point where they really dropped the ball in 3B was the complete lack of discourse between both of Henry’s mothers when Emma was deciding what to do with Henry. All we got was a 2 second reaction shot when Regina found out what Emma had been planning and that was the end of it. While I wouldn’t have wanted a rehash of the tug-of-war over which mother Henry belongs with, Regina did have a very real stake in Henry staying in SB or leaving, and she should have been considered and included in that decision making process. I’m not even someone who thought that Regina was a fit mother when the show began, I don’t think that her real world legal rights hold much water considering the actual situation, but by 3B I was actually feeling a tad indignant on her behalf because she’d been kept in the dark about Emma’s insistence to take Henry away again, and Regina’s developed such that I do now really want her to be present in Henry’s life. And during a time when she and Emma were actually spending time together and working together like never before, Emma still kept this MAJOR thing from her.)

The main character to blame for it not working is IMO Snow, who at least had the experience of having for some of her childhood years a caring mother. Yes, I would expect Snow, who they made a token Gaia, Mother Earth in the pilot, do translate some of her own good family experience to Emma. Well, she did, in season 1 – but somehow that got lost while Snow was cuddling with her Prince Charming wishing and trying for a new baby.

Another case of the writers setting up something with lots of potential and then just tossing it away. We didn’t get an evolution of their relationship from friends to mother/daughter, even though, as you say, Snow actually knows some stuff that really could have helped. Instead we got pretty much instant distance between them, with no real remnant of their S1 friendship, which makes the development of their S1 friendship feel like a bit of a waste of time.

That Emma can’t be the cuddly toddler anymore for Snow is not Emma’s fault.

It’s definitely not Emma’s fault in any way that her own relationship with her parents got so messed up. I think Emma has accepted that it is what it is and she’s the same age as her parents and they just missed out on that phase of their lives together. I recall an interview with JMo where she was asked if Emma resented the new baby in any way, and she said that she’d thought long and hard about that issue from Emma’s standpoint, but in the end she couldn’t come up with any animosity for Emma to have towards the baby. I guess having all those memories of raising Henry now, she can appreciate the phases of a parent/child relationship that her own parents missed out on, and she wants them to get to experience that, and they’re getting another chance, so it’s all good from Emma’s point of view.

So I get that Emma wants her parents to have the do-over. And I also get that her parents want the do-over, and I can’t really fault them for that. But I do fault the writers for brushing aside what could have been a compelling and emotional story in order to do the do-over instead.

[Myril]

I guess I look at OUAT slightly differently, and maybe that’s why I have less issue with her portrayal in 3b. personally I was glad it wasn’t Emma who saved the day; it was the woman who essentially got them in this “mess” in the beginnng – Regina.

Regina didn’t get them in the mess, that was Cora and the puppet master of the Dark Curse Rumple, and even Glinda and The Wizard (Walsh) had more of a hand in making Zelena Zelena than Regina had. Zelena did the same stupid thing with Regina that Regina did with Snow, blame her for something that was beyond her control (there are other things Regina can be blamed for but sure not for anything that happened to Zelena before she encountered her this season).

Nevertheless, I was okay with Regina being the one saving the day, town, They promoted 3B as WickedvsEvil, so it amused me when many viewers assumed, following in that the characters, it would be Emma wielding the white magic Glinda was talking about. Now I could see a way the writers could have made that happen while still making Regina the one behind the successful defeating move against Zelena – as Emma’s good mentor, but they shied away from that in the end. I don’t sense conspiracy against SwanQueen here like others do, but have the impression that the writers (subconsciously) might have begun limiting themselves in their writing possibilities to avoid giving even more subtext and avoid feeding more hope for something they have at this point no intention to let happen on screen. I am at a point I would like to cuddle them and assure them, it’s okay, just let it go, fear not. Regina and Emma could develop a great sisterhood, it so doesn’t has to be a romance, and a good sisterhood can come really close to romance in how it looks to other people. Can’t repeat it often enough, I was fine with either versions of Xena and Gabriele relationship, romance or sisterhood, because we had a huge lack of both on screen back then, golly, we still have too little of that. Why do they think shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Rizolli&Ilses, Lost Girl, even think Orphan Black, movies like Brave and Frozen are such a success particular in a certain demography? No, it’s not lesbian/bisexual women alone, far from. And Emma needs a friend, she needs a mentor. Right, Regina tried umpteenth times to kill her family and tried to kill her, so what? If they would give Regina a real “redemption” arc and not the cheap circus clown version they are doing so far, it could be one of the epic stories of OUaT.

They are doing a lot right with Emma, the characer’s psychological profile still is rather realistic and interesting, but they do so much wrong with her journey, her story. It’s not that they do let her change and grow even, I am mostly okay with where Emma is now emotionally, it is how they get her there.

It’s neither about making this Emma’s show, OUaT always has been more of an ensemble show from the pilot on, so there is not one single main character everything revolves around (not even Regina as some by now think). It’s not about who gets more screentime nor who is the hero of the day or of season’s final. Funny enough Emma was the hero of the season’s final even, again.

When the show started it started has stories about empowerment, and mostly about female empowerment, hope, love, belief in one’s self and trusting others as key ingredients. Sorry guys, but the men were supporting characters, exception Rumple. Nothing wrong with being supporting character, and they had even some depth (Mad Hater! Graham, Charming, Grumpy where not cardboard characters), guys are not that used to take a back seat in fantasy realms, but in Once they did at first. There was Emma, Snow, Cinderella, Gretel, Nova, Red, Granny, Belle a bit, even Regina in a twisted way. I don’t care if that was the showrunners intention or more accidentally, it was what made part of the charm of season 1. And it was often not men empowering the women, it was in Storybrooke mostly Emma, and Emma grew with that experience, while in the EF flashbacks Snow had some hand in things or the women manage quite well on their own, not to mention her great, wonderful friendship between Red and Snow.

And then the show turned into a boys action figure adventure toy shop story. Hey, I loved playing with action figures, trains and matchbox cars as kid while I never understood why playing with dolls and Barbie should be any fun , I was a tomboy, I get it. But I am a woman now and one who wants to hear and tell stories of female empowerment – with matchbox cars and action figures who could even look like Barbie if they have to.

By now Emma is more old style doll Barbie though, independent career Barbie maybe, but still a doll and needing her Ken to be complete. And that annoys me.

Single female heroes alone don’t make the change, it’s about women empowering each other as much. Disney Animation and movies seem to get that a bit better recently, better than OUaT. Come on, Ridley Scott and Sarah Connor graced our screens as lone female (Western style) heroes 20 years ago, Princess Leia had her twin brother at least, but it’s time for some more female power.

The problem and what frustrates me about Emma’s character development is, that they developed Emma’s relations with men, Hook, Neal, her father, but barely to not at all her relations with women. Red could have been a great friend, so I don’t understand, why they had no use for her from 2B on. But if not Red then there were Cinderella or in 3 maybe Tinkerbell (IMO not Belle though, as it is, Belle lives in her own soap bubble, another frustrating waste of a female character), even Mulan or Aurora could have been possibilities if they wanted to. There was a little with Regina, but as said above, they (unconsciously) limit that development. And Emma and Snow is a total fail by now, no matter the schmalz in the season 3 final, even Neal had more development with Emma than Snow. And now that Snow has a baby, I don’t see this change in season 4.

I think Emma’s walls have been comimg down steadily so the going to NY thing seemed more of a dEfense mechanism than truth

It was a defense mechanism, but that doesn’t mean she was not serious about it. New York was Emma’s Land of Oz, a colorful candy fantasy world promising to be better than anything she had so far. Storybrooke was dry, greyish dark and painful Kansas in her mind. Then Emma was taken by a time “twister” back into the past of her parents, where she first messed things up – kinda like Dorothy in the movie, making friends and foes with it, Emma then had to walk her yellow brick road, pick up some important lessons on the way and repaire the damage she did, encounters the Wizard, aka Rumple, who makes promises to bring her back, but turns out he is a fraud and can’t do it, but in the end Emma manages it on her own, brings herself and Hook and with them Marian back to the presence. And picked up some new danger on the way, but that is for season 4 to tell.

The final was great to watch, most of it, and loved how Emma was allowed to be more colorful herself, aka express more visible emotions (she does show them otherwise too, but obviously too subtle for some in the audience to notice). One thing though this final didn’t manage to explain to me: why Emma should have felt that much different about Storybrooke being her home, Snowing, her parents actually being her family and not just some blood related fairy tale heroes. Seeing them met is not enough to explain that change to me. The Problem was never IMO that Emma had no loving, caring feelings for them, but that she didn’t trust them, didn’t feel like she could entrust them with her life, rely on them, let go around them. The trip in time gave me no reason, why Emma now should have more trust in the present time. Snow and Charming did nothing. They have now reduced the problem to a problem of how Emma was approaching things, made it her fault alone that she had no sense for what home means. As much as I agree that it is always important, how a person approaches things and it can help to change that, we’re talking relationship here, and that always takes two to tango. I saw nothing happening on the side of Snow, and little on the side of Charming.

A&E have geeky story ideas, they even have an idea where character development should go, but they don’t get these elements together. The plot is not character driven, nor are the characters plot driven, there is little connection between these story telling elements.

@Phee: I agree with much what you said, except some things in the mothers-son, Emma-Regina-Henry triangle, but have to come back to that later.

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