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Mulan may have been the exception; she earned her heroine status though being an awesome warrior
Mulan I’ll give you since, at present, we’ll stick with her Disney story as background. She’s woefully underdeveloped in OUAT terms, though.
the Wonderland daughter show had plenty of great examples
(reasons #2575 that WL was better than what OUAT has become)
Anastasia, despite being poor and turning into the Red Queen for a time, actually found redemption and became a good ruler in her own right.
Yes but she did become a villain in order to not be poor anymore. She was redeemed, yes (beautifully and wonderfully) but her villainy did stem from her initial poverty with Will.
[adrotate group="5"]"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"Also, Cyrus and Alice. Niether were royalty but were the main heroes of the tail.
Alice was a gentleman’s daughter, though. Not royalty but definitely not the poor working class.
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"My point is that I think the intention (if not the effect) of giving so many villains impoverished origin stories is to make the villains more sympathetic, rather than to show that they’re being punished for rising above their station.
“This guy’s a real jerk. Nobody will feel sorry for him when we kill him off, and we want to show that evil is made yadda yadda. I know! Let’s make his childhood miserable!” That’s the pattern I’m seeing.
Keeper of Belle's Gold magic, sand dollar, cloaks, purple FTL outfit, spell scroll, library key, copy of Romeo and Juliet, and cry-muffling pillow, Rumple's doll, overcoat, and strength, and The Timeline. My spreadsheet: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6r8CySCCWd9R0RUNm4xR3RhMEU/view?usp=sharing
<p style=”box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; color: #404040; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, serif; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: #e6e6e6;”>Mulan</p>
The thing that distinguishes Mulan from the others is that she never tried to be anything but a warrior. Yes, if you know the Disney backstory then you know that she struggles with both being a woman and being from a humble village. But if you don’t, then Mulan is simply a devoted bodyguard — she is rewarded for knowing her place. Same as Charming.Right, that’s exactly the problem. I agree with @RG — the kicker isn’t necessarily that OUAT has a class issue. It’s that it’s not aware that it has a class issue (or a gender issue, or a race issue and on we go), and THAT is the thing that unites all the different critiques I’ve seen articulated in the fandom, and notably on these forums. Portrayal of class stratification isn’t the same as the naturalization of class stratification. For example, if I’m reading A. Dumas, I’m not going to expect a commentary on class consciousness. But if I’m reading contemporary fantasy, I’m likely to look for that in-between the lines metacommentary on the type of society it describes.
You’re right. There could stand to be more meta-analysis. But I think it’s just more the case that A&E love to “twist” stories. This goes back to a point that @Josephine made in another thread. In S1, it was a fun sort of twist to make Rumple into the Beast and Cinderella’s fairy-godmother and Ruby into the Wolf. Yet, in S3, the show became markedly darker. They love to slant stuff so that white looks black and black looks white. They love to make heroes into villains and villains into heroes. That is why Peter Pan became the villain, and Hook appeared to be more sympathetic. Now the writers are doing the same thing to King Arthur. Traditionally, he’s supposed to be the good guy we all root for, but he’s now been bent into some sort of deviant and corrupt king. In S3, Snow and Charming were made to look like the villains for casting the second dark curse and Regina into the savior who broke it. It’s how A&E roll. My critique has less to do with just class portrayal but more with them totally defacing my beloved childhood characters. They want to tarnish the white night, but if they keep knocking everyone off of their pedestals, who are we meant to root for? The mass murderer?
"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
Well…yes. Right now we’re supposed to be rooting for Regina (who IS a mass murderer, redeemed or not) above all. At least…that’s how the show looks to me. (I’m still rooting for Belle and Rumple (who is also a mass murderer, I know).)
Keeper of Belle's Gold magic, sand dollar, cloaks, purple FTL outfit, spell scroll, library key, copy of Romeo and Juliet, and cry-muffling pillow, Rumple's doll, overcoat, and strength, and The Timeline. My spreadsheet: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6r8CySCCWd9R0RUNm4xR3RhMEU/view?usp=sharing
My critique has less to do with just class portrayal but more with them totally defacing my beloved childhood characters. They want to tarnish the white night, but if they keep knocking everyone off of their pedestals, who are we meant to root for? The mass murderer?
Well…yes. Right now we’re supposed to be rooting for Regina (who IS a mass murderer, redeemed or not) above all. At least…that’s how the show looks to me. (I’m still rooting for Belle and Rumple (who is also a mass murderer, I know).)
Yup. And in the vein of the whole class argument, if they make Rumple into a power hungry creep AGAIN, when it makes no sense at all, I’m gonna quit 😉
They want to tarnish the white night, but if they keep knocking everyone off of their pedestals, who are we meant to root for? The mass murderer?
Basically what Keb said.
The writers want us to root for those they think are “redeemed” (whether or not the character is a matter of much spirited debate, as you know) while simultaneously showing that the heroes aren’t really all that heroic (#SnowingBecameBabySnatchers)
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"Holy smokes this thread blew up! Everyone is making really interesting and valid points. I will try to contribute a more substantial response in the morning when I am less tired because I think this is a really important discussion to be having. In general I think A&E are aware of some of the problematic issues in their show. Issues around consent and rape for example they HAVE to be aware of based on a few of the lines between Robin and Zelena in her cell a few episodes back, but they skirt around them and don’t address them appropriately – which I think is because they still want to try and keep things “disney” while also having some plot twists and keeping things a bit dramatic or “interesting.” (In the case of zelena and robin (or Regina and Graham) – it is gross and HUGELY problematic.) I think they are aware, I just don’t think they are that concerned with addressing them in a sensitive and constructive manner in the stories they want to tell. It’s like they want to dip their toe in a bit with some of these things but not address them full on, which is even worse. The show won’t acknowledge the larger consequences of presenting these issues and not unpacking them properly, which I think is because at the end of the day they still want to tell the disney fairytales just shaken up a bit to “keep it interesting.”
Overall a lot of the issues around class stem from them showing stories that are supposed to happen in feudal societies. What is interesting is that they brought these stories to the modern world and they could use that storyline to unpack some of the class issues of the original fairytales, but it remains largely a missed opportunity and as others in this thread have pointed out gets glossed over along with many problematic themes.
The writers want us to root for those they think are “redeemed” (whether or not the character is a matter of much spirited debate, as you know) while simultaneously showing that the heroes aren’t really all that heroic (#SnowingBecameBabySnatchers)
@RG, THIS!! THIS Yes! Exactly – the whole snowing kidnapping Lily story was so horrible and I mostly just try to forget this part of the story happened. How could Snow feel so guilty about killing Cora that she wanted Regina to kill her and NOT feel nearly as remorseful about causing a mother to lose her child!? Mal thought her child probably died and was surprised to see she survived – seriously you can’t get more innocent than a newborn (or hatching/freshly hatched?) baby – but destroying their lives (mother and daughter) no big deal ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ you move on so long as you promise to not be dumb and only good….. ugh that story.
"To leave an enemy without an answer, say these words to him: Aglaria Pidhol garia Ananus Qepta" and blow in his direction; then he will not know which way he is headed and cannot answer you." - Swedish Trollproverb
Okay, just reread my post and this is why I shouldn’t write long responses when it is midnight and I am beat. In short, I think the show is somewhat aware that they present certain issues in a problematic manner, I just think they aren’t fully aware of HOW problematic it is and thus are not too concerned with addressing it.
"To leave an enemy without an answer, say these words to him: Aglaria Pidhol garia Ananus Qepta" and blow in his direction; then he will not know which way he is headed and cannot answer you." - Swedish Trollproverb
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