which characters you hate? (no flaming or bashing allowed)

[thelonebamf]

If I may dig a little deeper, I like the idea that the curse doesn’t make inverse versions of people, but ‘worst’ versions. Remember, Regina created the town, and created all the characters and lives that her enemies would be living in. The Storybrooke personas are all of the FTL inhabitants seen through her eyes as petty, meaningless little people.

If you think about the way that Regina viewed other characters, I think this makes a lot of sense. Take Snow, for example- Regina thought that Snow’s dedication to goodness was beyond foolish. So Mary Margaret is almost an over-the-top living saint whose life is made up of volunteer hours etc. But Mary Margaret is also very concerned about how others view her. When the town turned against her for the affair, she was unable to stick up for herself, instead crumbling under the weight of their criticism. Perhaps this is because Regina viewed Snow’s desire for goodness to be nothing more than a manipulative way to get people to like and follow her. Mary Margaret could be said to have that within her, but without the inner strength that Snow had in FTL.

The same logic may be applied to other people in the town. The dwarves? Working stiffs. Cinderella, psh- she was just a maid who got a lucky break. Granny of FTL was just a crotchety woman as far as Regina was concerned, and that’s how she exists in Storybrooke. Even Gold, while still afforded “comfort” in his new life was reimagined as an unliked, secluded man who wields power, but is unloved by those around him.

So this brings us back to Belle/Lacey. While I think that the Lacey persona was tailor-made to keep Gold from embracing any goodness within him (at the beginning of episode 19, Regina flat out states that Gold would always choose darkness- I think Lacey is just her insurance policy) I think there’s a bit more to explore in the character with the “worst version” theory- or perhaps we should call it “Regin-a-vision” XD.

Regina knew about the relationship between Gold and Belle in the past. Obviously she wasn’t privy to the details, so she would likely have to come up with her own version of events. (I suppose she must have known some things by way of the mirror that Rumple shouts at at the end of ‘Skin Deep’, but she couldn’t have known everything.) She knows that Belle cared for him enough to try to free him from his curse, and she manipulated Belle using that information. From where Regina stood at that point in time, power was far more important than love- so one can only begin to imagine what she thought of Belle and her potential relationship with Rumple. After all, what kind of girl would be attracted to the Dark One?

The fairy tale version of Beauty and the Beast often receives a lot of criticism because the heroine falls in love with her captor. (Regina even jokes about this- asking what kind of message this sends.) While I believe that Belle’s intentions were always pure, it would be easy for someone like Regina to think that Belle was simply a foolish girl falling for the “bad boy”, as it were. Belle makes the comment to Rumple that she could see the good in him from the start; their relationship in the past is more or less a series of events where either she uncovers some of that, or he reveals it himself. Lo and behold it turns out she was right- and perhaps what makes Belle special is that her sense about people is in fact accurate (or at least as accurate as Emma’s lie detector ability).

However, without that knowledge, Regina likely views the events from a much different perspective. Girl meets bad boy. Girl falls in love with said bad boy. Girl is determined to make him change. ….Things get messy (and then if this was an 80’s movie they’d reunite just in time for prom.) She just created Lacey with the first two bits in mind- the way that she likely viewed Belle when she met her. Even though Regina knows that Belle wanted to bring out the goodness in Rumple, that’s not in Regina’s interests, so she removed it. So what kind of girl likes a bad boy but doesn’t want him to change? Lacey.

…sorry for the mini-essay. ^_^;;

[obisgirl]

@AngieBelle wrote:

I am a huge Belle fan- always have been, since the Disney film came out- and I love the Once version. I don’t think it was the pillow that made her fall for Rumple…it was just the first inkling that maybe he had some feelings. She still believed him to be a monster until the moment when she knew he’d intentionally let Robin Hood go.

I agree. The pillow did not make Belle fall in love with Rumpel.

Very good essay thelonebamf.

[RumplesGirl]

Very well thought out thelonebamf. Also, Regin-a-vision. Fantastic. 😆

Belle (and Beauty and the Beast) was always my favorite Disney movie. It came out when I was 5 and I knew from the first time I saw it that I was supposed to grow up to be Belle (coming up on my 26th birthday and this still applies). From what I hear around the chat room and then here on the forums, it seems that the problem with Belle in ONCE isn’t really *her* but her relationship with Rumple, labeling it as abusive. Somewhere in our lives we lose that little bit of magic that exists in children where we overlook the reality of Belle and her Beast and start to see it in the cold harsh light of reality. Yes, Belle and the Beast are not the normal relationship and we can toss around words like abusive, and Stockholm Syndrome but my response (granted a VERY biased response) is that this is a fairy tale. Larger than life characters who exist in extremes (Belle as an almost over the top good person–not leaving with Robin for instance because of her deal with Rumple) but also exist in a world where hope and redemption are real and achievable. And so while B and B isn’t realistic and in the “real” world would be frowned upon, isnt’ that why so many of love it? Because it doesn’t exist in this world. It exists in that magical place of imagination where even the monsters get a happy ending, where the unloved can find true love in the most unlikely of places.

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

[obisgirl]

I actually cannot stand the mention of Stockholm Syndrome in reference to Belle falling for Rumpel. B/c their relationship is NOT that.

[RumplesGirl]

@obisgirl wrote:

I actually cannot stand the mention of Stockholm Syndrome in reference to Belle falling for Rumpel. B/c their relationship is NOT that.

I agree, but I think it’s what most of us hear when people start trying to pick apart the Rumbelle ship.

I think Belle is a strong independent woman in her own right who, as we saw in Lacey, stood up to Rumple, wasn’t afraid to challenge him. She was a hero, like Rumple told her.
And Rumple isn’t all bad. He may be the Dark One, but you could tell that her crying distressed him and not just because it annoyed him. He truly believes that he can be good because of her. That she can help him fight his darkness. I know I am totally biased in this regard, but I happen to think their relationship is the most interesting of the show. We all know Snow and Charming are true love and because they are both such inherently “good” people, they never had to really deal with this struggle against a darker nature (let’s leave aside Heart of Darkness), so for me they are a beautiful example of what Rumple and Belle can have someday, but I want to watch the journey. And it’s going to be bumpy but it should be.

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

[surayya]

🙄 I never said his giving her the pillow made her fall in love with him, just as I didn’t say disney Belle fell in love with Beast because he rescued her from the wolves- What I did say was the pillow (like disney Beast’s rescue) was when Belle 1st started to think maybe Rumple wasn’t ‘as bad of a beast’ as she 1st thought he was, which is why she told Robin she wasn’t scared of him at all (when you then weigh something like that, against her telling Hook he’s ‘rotten to the core’, when Hook actually has valid reasons for wanting to kill Rumple- you have messed up context)…. it was just one example of the weird context Belle/Rumbelle get put in, which doesn’t always sit right for some people.

I know you guys wont see it the same- she’s one of your favs & like I said I don’t have a problem with the character herself, just the context with which she is used sometimes….it’s a bit like Blue (meant to be this great powerful being, but cant really do squat 9 times out of 10 ) 😉 – I don’t hate or even dislike Blue, just the context she’s used in sometimes also gets frustrating.
So I understand why some people could hate/dislike her.

I’ll add this in here because I’ve read the posts re-Stockholm Syndrome before posting:

Be careful you don’t read Stockholm Syndrome into what people are trying to say (unless they all but call it Stockholm Syndrome 😉 )- it seems you read what I posted before as implying Stockholm Syndrome- yet that thought never once crossed my mind- I don’t see her situation like that at all & the events of Lacey prove that it is not the case at all.

[RumplesGirl]

Be careful you don’t read Stockholm Syndrome into what people are trying to say (unless they all but call it Stockholm Syndrome 😉 )- it seems you read what I posted before as implying Stockholm Syndrome- yet that thought never once crossed my mind- I don’t see her situation like that at all & the events of Lacey prove that it is not the case at all.

Oh goodness, I’m sorry if you thought that aimed at you. It really wasn’t. It’s just what I hear most often from a variety of places when it comes to both Rumbelle and the classic Fairy Tale.

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

[angiebelle]

Yes, the Stockholm Syndrome thing comes up repeatedly in discussions about the Disney princesses and what is “wrong” with them. I’ve heard it for years. People *do* actually call it that. It is one of my biggest pet peeves too!

Sorry, Surayya, you are right- you didn’t say the pillow made her fall in love, just that it triggered a thought. Belle in the Disney film was in very different circumstances from Belle in Once. The beast is actually *trying* to win Belle over in order to break his curse and has confidants. Rumple doesn’t have that little voice in his ear of the enchanted objects. He calls the dungeon her room whereas Beast actually takes her to her room from the dungeon. Rumple has no intention to fall in love.

Belle is not delusional. She stands up to Rumple when she sees something wrong. She has gotten through to him before- she knows that she has an effect on him. He actually treats her rather well after those first few days- she has free roam of the castle. He leaves her alone. He jokes with her. I really love that he protected her from the sheriff’s intentions. He could have just handed her over, but he didn’t.

[thelonebamf]

I’m right there with you Rumplesgirl, Beauty and the Beast was my favorite fairy tale as a child, and I was near the same age when the Disney film came out. Actually, as a kid I sought out pretty much every printed version of the story I could get my little hands on at the library because I liked to see the different versions of the tale (as well as see the different interpretations of the ‘beast’). Really, in the book version of the story the Beast isn’t a bad guy at all. The story is very much a “don’t judge a book by its cover” tale because he is never anything but kind to Beauty. (Well, admittedly he does take her away with him, but she does volunteer when her sisters refuse and that sort of bargain seems par for the course in fairy tales.)

Obviously OUAT is using Disney as a starting point for its stories- and when the Disney BatB movie was being written I guess they couldn’t have some innocent prince be punished for nothing- so they made him a brat. And that’s really all he is- a spoiled brat, not really evil. But he’s not the only one that needs redemption! Belle herself isn’t all that great at the start of the movie. She is distant from those around her and sees herself apart (better perhaps) than the rest of them. True, she lives in a town where an intelligent girl is seen as an oddity, but we have no indication that Belle has ever made the slightest attempt to actually connect with any of the townspeople. She has already judged them as mundane and wants nothing more than to get away. When she opts to go with the Beast, it has nothing to do with seeing goodness within him, it is to save her father- which is admirable, but she has already made her judgement about the Beast. He’s a monster. End of story. (This is why she reacts in such a surprised way when he does her the kindness of giving her a room etc.) So really, the story is a two way street. The Beast has to learn to be kind, and Belle has to learn to see that there is more to people beyond the surface, as she wasn’t just innately gifted with that ability.

I bring all this up because of the whole pillow/life saving debate. Maybe it seems unfair that the two versions of the relationship should have such different starting points. First of all, there are some pretty basic physical things to consider. Rumple- while sort of greenish and scaly is still very much human looking. The Beast- while cuddly and endearing, is more of a… “traditional” beast. It’s natural to empathize more with another person (and to see them as a romantic interest) if… you know, they look like a human being. I realize that’s really pragmatic of me to say- but… there. I said it. (And don’t get me wrong, I’ve always preferred the Beast version to Prince Adam as do most of that fans, haha…)

So on one hand, we have Belle of OUAT who is good at seeing what’s inside a person, and she’s looking at someone who looks much more like a person- so the whole pillow thing isn’t the start of the romance, but the start of their relationship as two people. All it did was show her that Rumple wasn’t devoid of empathy and that he is a person who could be reasoned with to some degree. This all happens in an instant! She doesn’t even get a chance to use her pillow before the Robin Hood events unfold, and that is a very fast track down character development lane. She ends up giving Rumple a hug by the end of it, but it’s friendly and nothing more- although it probably did encourage him to “test the waters” with the library. Still, at this point I don’t think either were looking for romance.

Animated Belle, on the other hand isn’t as good at “reading people” as her live action counterpart. She is also dealing with a larger physical/visual hurdle with her beast. If you remember at the beginning of the movie, she also says “I don’t want to get to know him”- she’s already shut herself off from even thinking about the Beast as a person. She’s standing at a very different place, so it makes logical sense that it was going to take a much bigger thing to get her to perceive the Beast as anything other than a monster. It’s not that he needed to make a bigger gesture to make himself look good- it’s that she needed something more to get her to be *willing* to see.

Regarding the Gold/Hook debate. It does seem cruel for Belle to have said that Hook is “rotten to the core”, but let’s just assume that Belle’s “sense about people” is accurate. Why would she say something like that and yet seem forgiving of Gold/Rumple’s actions when they seem so much worse? Well, we only know so much about Hook’s motivations. We do know that he and Milah were each other’s true loves, and that he is motivated by revenge to kill Gold. All of his actions since Milah’s death have been about seeking revenge. By the show’s moral code- revenge for whatever reason is never good. (And at this point, it’s definitely about revenge and hate- not about lost love.) Even helping Emma and Snow to get back to Storybrooke was all about finding his way to Gold so he could get his vengeance.

Rumplestiltskin, on the other had is sort of the opposite. He’s done a lot of terrible, manipulative things. I mean a lot. From grooming Regina into the Evil Queen to creating the curse to making sure it was enacted- he has a long list of crimes. But as we all know, he’s only ever had one thing on his mind- reuniting with Baelfire. Even taking on the powers of the Dark One was his way of protecting his son. Now, yes- he has clearly faltered on that path (like breaking the deal with his son) and there have been plenty of deals struck and magic cast that had little or nothing to do with his quest, but misguided as his actions have been- at his core, it was for a good reason.

Obviously, the viewer is free to decide whether they agree with that assessment, and I think it’s a strong point of the show that characters like Gold are as complex and inviting of debate. It wouldn’t be any fun otherwise. But I think it’s safe to say that this is the judgement that Belle is making. It’s a very “Did the right thing for the wrong reasons” (Hook) or “Did the wrong thing for the right reasons” (Gold) sort of judgement. You may not agree with her, and that’s fine- but I do think that the series will end up taking her point of view.

Then again, maybe Hook will just surprise everyone and be awesome and they’ll all have cake and frozen lasagna. 🙂

"Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him."

[Keb]

I think the library (and possibly bedroom library–the pillow is totally on the bed/couch in the corner of the scene) was his way of thanking her for stopping him. When he realized what he would have been doing by killing Robin Hood, it hit super close to home. Belle saved him from committing a crime he would have hated himself for later. (You know, more than he already hates himself.)

I’d say it also reflects a blossoming affection for his caretaker, but I think that’s what his logic was in his mind.

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

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