- This topic has 341 replies, 49 voices, and was last updated 6 years, 1 month ago by
.
-
Posts
-
I mean, did she even stop to ask if her parents were okay about the almost going to Hell thingy? Instead her selfish need to have Hook in her life is driving the story. Question one and question two rest on that idea.
I should note here, before Matt comes in and yells at me, that Adam did release a piece of the script from the finale in which Emma does say that her family doesn’t have to go with her–and they say they will. However, canon is tricky and until it’s on the DVD’s then it’s not canon yet. If it does, we’ll return (I’m sure) to this question. But for now…not in show, not canon. (And here comes @hjbau to explain why even if it’s on the DVD, it’s not canon…)
Narrative and canon are….tricky.
[adrotate group="5"]"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"it’s an odd narrative that speaks not only, IMO, of Emma’s shift in character from strong woman to “Hook’s girlfriend” but the entire shift of the show from family to romantic love.
I just think she can be both a strong woman, and Hook’s gf. And I think she showed both sides of that coin throughout the first half.
I mean, did she even stop to ask if her parents were okay about the almost going to Hell thingy? Instead her selfish need to have Hook in her life is driving the story.
Yup, the whole ending was bizarre. Even if she was Hook crazy, she would still stop for one second to ask her parents and everyone else what to do. It was rushed and they needed to end on them going to the UW. I would be very surprised if we do not get some sort of character interaction between Emma and everyone regarding their trip to the UW when it returns.
Why is it bad to take control and be the “agent.” Maybe he thought she wouldn’t be able to direct her own story and still not succumb to the darkness
I think I’m going to let @nevermore and @slurpeez handle this one because honestly this statement baffles me to the point of silence. No one ever has the right to take over your story (read: life) because they don’t think that you can handle it. That is not a decision they get to make. If you, your very self, turns to someone and says I can no longer handle the day to day living of this world, please direct me henceforth, then okay. You’ve made that choice–and it would be your choice to back out of that decision as well. But, Emma never did that. She never asked Hook to be her agent/dictator of things/controller/whatever word you want to use here.
(technically she asked Regina if anything…and then decides she doesn’t like that and takes back the dagger,which Regina freely gives)
But I should point out that your argument contradicts what Hook says to Emma in 501; that to go dark or not should be her choice, he can’t make it for her (a moment in which I actually raised an eyebrow and said, “wow. that was…okay. that wasn’t actually horrible”) And then he spends the entire rest of the season in the driver seat so there went that moment….
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"I should note here, before Matt comes in and yells at me, that Adam did release a piece of the script from the finale in which Emma does say that her family doesn’t have to go with her–and they say they will. However, canon is tricky and until it’s on the DVD’s then it’s not canon yet. If it does, we’ll return (I’m sure) to this question. But for now…not in show, not canon. (And here comes @hjbau to explain why even if it’s on the DVD, it’s not canon…) Narrative and canon are….tricky.
Ha well there you go. It is tricky. But like, any sane reasonable person would have asked their parents and friends what to do and tell them they don’t have to go. When all of them just willingly are marching in line to go, you could just tell there was a scene they cut out. Like it didn’t have any bearing on Emma’s character for me bc it literally made zero sense and I thought it was pretty obvious they were strapped for time and had to skip some stuff, including the Camelot characters.
But none of that would have happened if Emma hadn’t done what she did. It was her actions that started it all. If she lets him die, Hook doesn’t get controlled by the darkness.
Are you claiming that since Emma betrayed Hook first, she is responsible for Hook betraying her? Are you saying Emma is to blame for Hook trying to kill her family? I find that troublesome, as it seems to be like battered person syndrome. The only thing I said Emma is guilty of is tethering Hook to the sword (which Hook himself considered the worst betrayal), but the rest is on Hook. He still is responsible for what he did as the dark one, in my opinion. To claim that she is at fault for what Hook did is like trying to blame the paramedic who saves a known killer (against his wishes), only for him to then awake, kill a person and then attempt to murder the paramedic’s family in revenge. Moreover, no matter who you place the most blame on, there is no denying there was a lot of betrayal going on. Betrayal isn’t healthy or loving. It’s the opposite of those things.
If you blame Emma for tethering Hook, then I don’t think you can blame Hook.
Yes, I can. I am entirely being consistent with my reasoning. If Emma and Rumple are responsible for what they did as dark ones then so is Hook. He doesn’t get a free pass in my book.
He warned her. He said he would be terrible. And she didn’t listen. I guess it’s hard for me to blame Hook, if Emma is the reason Hook was in that predicament in the first place. They both did very unheroic things, but Hook doesn’t do those things if Emma doesn’t do her thing first.
No offense, but I think your perspective is the one that is inconsistent. You seem to hold Emma and Rumple accountable for their dark deeds but not Hook. Why is that? Just because Hook warned her it doesn’t mean he actually was unable to fight the darkness, as he proved in the end when he fell on on his proverbial and literal sword.
"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
No one ever has the right to take over your story (read: life) because they don’t think that you can handle it. That is not a decision they get to make. If you, your very self, turns to someone and says I can no longer handle the day to day living of this world, please direct me henceforth, then okay. You’ve made that choice–and it would be your choice to back out of that decision as well. But, Emma never did that. She never asked Hook to be her agent/dictator of things/controller/whatever word you want to use here.
I guess I just meant, if he thought she was struggling, he should want to help more. And clearly she was struggling with the voices in her head etc. She never told him not to intervene either. But also, I just didn’t see him as an agent either, at all.
No offense, but I think your perspective is the one that is inconsistent. You seem to hold Emma and Rumple accountable for their dark deeds but not Hook. Why is that?
Let me clarify here, bc I was sort of playing devil’s advocate and trying to see all sides of the argument. My personal beliefs are as follows:
Hook should be held accountable for his actions, however, because he was a worse person than Rumple, the darkness affected him more. Does not give him a free pass, but also for me, it puts an asterisk next to everything he did as the DO bc he obviously would not have done/said the things he did if he was just himself. Everyone including Rumple and Emma should be held accountable. But I just think that everyone is a fast to not want to save Hook because his actions as the DO were the worst. But I almost feel bad. Here’s a guy who was a horrible man. And clearly still has plenty of issues to be resolved, issues the darkness exploited. So his actions were going to be the worst of any DO. But again, I put an asterisk next them because the show, IMO, has shown us Hook trying to be a better person (despite a couple of hiccups), and showing that he cares for Emma. Clearly Hook still has this addiction to the villainy side of him. And yes, Rumple did bad things and I crucify him for it. But when he saved the town, I wanted them to try and save him (or at least I understood why they would want to.) I wanted him to die there but that’s beside the point. When Hook was able to dig down and overcome the darkness in the end, it showed to me how much the darkness was truly affecting him and that it wasn’t the true Hook doing all those terrible things. And when he lets Emma kill him, it makes me want to save him, bc unlike Zelena and other characters, I do think he is redeemable and I do think he cares for Emma.
But I do hold Emma responsible too. She should have let Hook die. But a part of me almost gives more blame for her selfishness because Hook knew what it would do to him. He tried to tell her. He knew he couldn’t control it. And everything could have been avoided if she had just let him die.
Hopefully that sort of gives you an idea of where I stand on this.
Here’s a guy who was a horrible man. And clearly still has plenty of issues to be resolved, issues the darkness exploited. So his actions were going to be the worst of any DO.
Here’s the part that baffles me. If the reason Hook’s actions are so bad as the DO, specifically worse than Emma and Rumple, is because he himself was “Horrible”, why the hell would you root for someone like that to end up with Emma?
I don’t want to get into Hook discussion too much, but it always seemed like Hook was nice to Emma because he wanted her. He tolerated her family because that would put him in her good graces. However, we have seen how unkind he can be to people that aren’t going to affect his standing with Emma as recently as season 4 eg using Belle to blackmail Rumple, roughing up Will for accidentally spilling water on Emma.
If Hook being horrible is the reason why his actions as the dark one are so bad, then why should the audience root for Emma’s relationship with a horrible guy? Just because Hook is nice to Emma and her family because it gets him what he wants doesn’t make him a good person. In fact I think I think it’s quite telling that the moment Hook feels that Emma has betrayed him/displeased him, he turns on her quite viciously.
The darkness may tempt a person to give in to the dark path but it is the person’s choice to give in. We saw Emma fight it until she chose to give into her selfishness of not wanting to let Hook go. Even though Rumple gave in to the darkness early on, we still saw his good side eg saving the children from the ogre war, giving Belle the chance to leave. Hook chose to give into the darkness because it gave him “permission” to be dark. Just like his “cursed” hand gave him permission even though there was nothing wrong with it.
All magic comes with a price!
Keeper of FelixThe darkness may tempt a person to give in to the dark path but it is the person’s choice to give in. We saw Emma fight it until she chose to give into her selfishness of not wanting to let Hook go. Even though Rumple gave in to the darkness early on, we still saw his good side eg saving the children from the ogre war, giving Belle the chance to leave. Hook chose to give into the darkness because it gave him “permission” to be dark. Just like his “cursed” hand gave him permission even though there was nothing wrong with it.
All of this. Hook not behaving that dark at first due to Emma taking his memories, despite the darkness still being in him the entire time they were back in SB, shows he really didn’t have to act like a dark one. Yet, the moment he discovered what Emma did to him in Camelot, he starts acting very dark. Hmmm I wonder why that is? It’s almost like that new discovery gave Hook permission to indulge the darkness. I think @PoM is right on point to compare the situation to when Rumple said the “cursed hand” merely gave Hook an excuse to act out his darker impulses that have always been there, lurking beneath the surface. But, back to Emma, since this is supposed to be a thread about her (again exemplifying the problem of making it about her boyfriend instead of her).
thedarkonedearie wrote:
Why is it bad to take control and be the “agent.” Maybe he thought she wouldn’t be able to direct her own story and still not succumb to the darknessI think I’m going to let @nevermore and @slurpeez handle this one because honestly this statement baffles me to the point of silence. No one ever has the right to take over your story (read: life) because they don’t think that you can handle it. That is not a decision they get to make.
Because this is meant to be a modern fairy tale about Emma, not Hook, who is a secondary character. He was never meant to be the central figure of the tale. Emma has always always been the main heroine of the story. That is why Emma is called the Savior, not Hook. (That is why Emma should’ve been the one to sacrifice herself in S5 finale in my estimation–so that she could finally fulfill her role as Savoir to the fullest extent).
Moreover, when a person gives up agency, she ceases to have a say in her own life or story. Yes, she may have a moment of crisis or be in need of help every now and then, but she ceases to be an interesting individual when she ceases to exert her will or have a say in her own destiny. She ceases to exist except as an ornament or background character in someone else’s story (in this case Hook’s). Instead of the focus being on Emma, the focus instead became about Hook and his inner battle with darkness instead of Emma’s. And that’s the problem.
This is both bad in fiction and in real life, because fiction is both a reflection of society and an influence of it. So it matters when a show, which started off with interesting, capable heroines doing interesting things, becomes about a woman giving up her agency. It matters when young people start to question why it matters if a formerly active woman gives up agency to a man, who then mistreats her and her family. Little girls and young women start to think that this is a good, romantic thing, when actually, in this case, it’s destructive. And that in and of itself is worrisome.
Same works in reverse by the way, since no one has the right to take away another person’s agency. So I don’t promote or believe in reverse discrimination. That is why Belle controlling Rumple with the dagger was a big no no in my book, too. It’s also a no no for Emma to give up control to Regina.
"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
Why is it bad to take control and be the “agent.” Maybe he thought she wouldn’t be able to direct her own story and still not succumb to the darkness.
Ok, I’m just going to jump in for a second here — there are two aspects to this conversation. Going back to @RG’s original query, I think the discussion started with narrative and questions of representation, rather than with in-story character motivations. RG, correct me if I misread you.
If it’s indeed about narrative — i.e., is the show representing Emma Swan as a strong woman? — there are certain conventions for how strong characters are represented in stories. It’s sort of like with painting — if you’re trying to represent a 3D object in 2D, you’re going to use specific techniques to convey volume (say, gradually darker hue for shadows, lighter hues for highlights). Similarly, with a story, there are specific techniques to convey what type of fictional character you’re dealing with. “Agency” — in the sense of one’s capacity to influence the fictional world, but also one’s “proactiveness” is one such convention. Generally, the more agentive the character, the more the audience is willing to identify with them.
Now, the other question you’re raising is about in-story motivation. I think you’re asking “Well, what if someone’s temporarily made vulnerable and finds themselves in a bad spot. Can’t their loved one take over for a bit, and see them safely to the other side?”
Yes, they can. Absolutely. That’s what a good relationship is, right? But that “taking over” — the loved one temporarily adopting the role of the benevolent dictator, if you will — is meaningful in the broader context of the relationship. Hook and Emma’s relationship is not one where Hook is systematically nurturing — he’s simply not that sort of character. (If you want, here’s a really thoughtful recent article on the difference between “rape culture” and “nurturance culture,” written by a guy as a matter of fact, and it’s really insightful). Rather, it’s one that’s been very systematically establishing a gendered power differential between Emma and Hook (with Emma being made “weaker” in order for the appeal of that love story to work). There’s a famous feminist statement, I think by Catherine MacKinnon, which I will PG for the sake of this forum. It goes like this “Man takes woman.” Subject verb object.
Simply put, we have this long-standing convention in our (lets call it Euro-American) culture that goes something like this: “man = strong, manly, and dangerous / woman = weak, pliable, and gentle / man active (RARRGH!), woman passive (*swooon*)”
Sorry if I’m making it sound ridiculous, but that’s the standard romance trope. This isn’t where CS started, but it is, in my opinion, where CS is going, and nowhere more than in 4A. Insofar as Emma/Hook are taking on those attributes, and CS is a variation of this romance trope, then we’re back to the original issue: it’s not that it’s bad to be or not be the agent. It’s that, going back to Emma’s character analysis, this sort of gender configuration depends, structurally, on Emma being weaker than the show was originally trying to sell to us.
The topic ‘Emma Swan Character Analysis’ is closed to new replies.