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Charming stopping Snow from murdering Regina. Two villainous women saved, and one of them redeemed. Snow would not have come back to the light side from that murder.
Hmm, Snow is a little different — she’s miles from a femme fatale stereotype, which is I think what @sierraleone’s post was describing. Regina’s redeemed, yes, but again, not by virtue of a man, but by virtue of her own work.
AKA’s example of Will and Anastasia does work though.
[adrotate group="5"]We have all these stories of women and girls trying to redeem “bad” boys. Because they are worth it, I guess. But never the way around. Heck, it is hard for men to even fall in love with them. Women are somehow not worth the effort, or are irredeemable (at least by a lover’s love, kids is a whole other story). Men that do fall in love with these women are dupes and weak and not going to be loved back. But boy do we love a story where the woman preservers against such difficulties.
That’s a great analysis, @sierraleone — I think you’re absolutely right. But I think this is also why Belle’s character is undergoing trope cycling. The narrative of the girl saving the bad boy usually has a self-limiting shelf-life. In fact, once the boy is “saved” by your garden variety dream pixie girl, there is nothing else to say. This is why they keep cycling Rumple — they really don’t know what do with him, and as a result, they have to cycle Belle too, each time through a new, even more appalling stereotype.
I’m trying to think about any counterexamples of the man saving the “villainous” woman and literally nothing comes to mind. I also think it’s very interesting that the standard turn of phrase that covers the female archetype you’re describing — the femme fatale — is already, linguistically, one where the resolution is predetermined to be tragic.
On a different note: @RG, how would you parse stereotype/trope from archetype? I think some of the problems with OUAT I’m trying to zero in on is that characters toggle between archetypes and cliches, but I can’t quite put my finger on what makes an archetype not a cliche.
It’s because she’s never really felt like a solid character.
Exactly. As a result, I think Belle has become a placeholder for a series of facile, progressively more and more irritating stereotypes: Belle the maid with the heart of gold (cough cough, no pun); Belle the damsel in distress; Belle the “smart because can spew out random facts” hot librarian; and now Belle the mobster’s hysterical trophy wife. At each turn, the writers have failed to engage with, or try to subvert any of these tired tropes — instead, they’ve just moved onto the next, even worse one.
To add insult to injury, the plot meant to hold these together is pretty preposterous too.
Ugh, alright, I’ll throw in my 2c. This relationship is a hurling, screeching, flaming train wreck of a thing, and while part of me is almost curious to see how A&E are going to pretzel it back to life — which, mark my words, they will — a much bigger part of me is not looking forward to what will be inevitably a botched and unsatisfying revival.
If I can sidestep the abuse issue for a second, because I think it’s a complicated question, and @Slurpeez dealt with some of that upthread … The problem is with Rumple’s narrative function, and with the way the show has “timed” Rumbelle’s breakups and reunions in such a way that Belle is always dumping Rumple when he’s at his “lowest” both morally and power-wise, and taking him back when he’s at his more powerful/evil/self-satisfied. This season, we have Rumple in full mid-life crisis mode: complete with the haircut, the affair with his former student, and the whole “I wanna be bad shtick” (maybe we’ll get the red Porsche later). But he’s also meant to become a father again, and that is one huge emotional vulnerability for his character. So actually it’s not surprising that Belle is throwing insults and being emotionally nasty to him — that’s the MO. Even if she doesn’t realize it, the timing of her rejections is systematic, and makes her seem like she’s subconsciously sensing the weakness and inflecting emotional pain, but is attracted to/come back for the power. This doesn’t accord with her ideology, for sure, but in practice, the more Belle is being portrayed as an irrational, hysterical shrew — as she is in this season — the more her more positive qualities (seeing the best in people and forgiving them) recede to the background or just come across as whimsy, rather than actual moral commitment. This also dovetails with the fact that she’s seemingly willing to use Rumple’s magic and lean on him for emotional support when she’s feeling low or threatened, but dumps him as soon as she has a leg over him.And there’s no reason to think that this pattern will stop in the future, at least based on the spoilers. To me, using the pregnancy as a reward/weapon system is especially abhorrent: if she’s concerned for the child and wants out, she needs to stop advertising to Rumple that she’s going to take the child “so far away that he’ll never find them” — for one thing, that’s one deeply ineffective way of getting herself out of Rumple’s orbit. The way to do it is to lull him into not even thinking she might leave, and then sneaking out when he doesn’t expect. So either Belle is an idiot, or she’s a manipulator, or both. This brings me to my last point.
What I find unforgivable in the way they’ve been writing Belle is that they seem to be drawing a whole lot on an old Victorian, extremely misogynist stereotype of women. Belle is naive and moralistic, but simultaneously “subconsciously” cunning/materialistic in a way that makes her a bigot, but so profoundly lacking in self awareness that she can’t see the contradictions. Think Mrs. Bennett in Pride and Prejudice.
Also, this post isn’t meant to be a defense of Rumple. At this point, forget difficult to love, he’s difficult not to loathe. And that’s partly because his character’s likability as a potentially redeemable anti-hero hinges on Belle liking him, and being likable herself. That function used to be occupied by Neal, but they killed him and largely forgot about him, so there’s that. Anyway, since neither is the case, even if they “fix” Rumbelle, they can’t fix the characters. So actually, I don’t particularly care if they are together or not. As far as I’m concerned the train wreck Rumbelle can keep on hurling down the tracks, spitting fire and brimstone — these two amply deserve each other.
Rumple hurting children was actually pretty taboo at one point.
I don’t think we’ve ever seen Rumple steal kids for any other reason than serving as a black market adoption agency, so this is new. Didn’t Zelena use baby Neal for a spell? And technically Snowing used Lily for the infamous darkness dump spell, right?
More abstractly, I’m under the impression that OUAT is trying to “reset” the B&B storyline to the pre-domesticated phase of the beast, and make Rumple scary/creepy again, but it’s not working very well because the writing for Rumple has been such crap in the last few seasons, and because it’s way too much retcon (though Bobby does do “emotionally tortured” so well I almost want to be convinced that he could pull it off). The dynamic in this scene reminds me a little bit of the French version of the B&B, with Vincent Cassel, where the beast really is a bit of a violent creep (though it’s Vincent Cassel, so you forgive him).
When the brothel girl beat up that other host who was assigned to be a human for awhile in the underground complex, i thought, if that can be done, a host thinks another host is a guest, then could the guns be reassigned in a similar way so they can kill the guests and then the host be reassigned to kill the guests just with a flip of a switch. Obviously we have now seen Bernard kill a human, but he is one of the older designed humans, right? So that is different.
Good questions. And wow, that episode.
Ok, as I understand it, there seems to be two “fail safe” mechanisms that prevent the hosts from hurting the guests. The first is that for some reason the guns they are issued don’t work on humans. In the pilot, doesn’t Teddy literally riddle the Man in Black with bullets, to absolutely zero effect? So there’s that. The second thing is that some hosts seem to be unable to actually kill a living thing. Hence they made a big deal out of both Dolores and Teddy just letting flies crawl all over their face, until Dolores, following her progressive changes, smacks one absentmindedly.
So, guns. I think all Westworld guns are “fakes” probably as much to protect guests from hosts as to protect guests from other guests, in case one of them decides to go on a killing rampage, or a stray bullet hits someone who “matters.” It’s like very realistic paintball.
At the same time, hosts could theoretically hurt guests with anything that isn’t a firearm, as we’ve seen with Bernard. I think the trick with Bernard is that, you’re right, he’s a very old host (that picture/design is clearly him), and that he is, essentially, completely loyal to Ford’s commands. But I do think it opens up new questions about who else might be a host wandering around topside. It’s very Blade Runner — there too the question was always whether the protagonist was also a “replicant,” unbeknownst to himself.
After watching that teaser, my first thought wasn’t “Rumple has gone too far.” It was “A&E have gone too far in milking this for drama, and bending the relationship (and both characters) into something utterly awful and pretty nonsensical. And are still somehow expecting the audience to keep engaged.” The Rumbelle writing has gotten so bad and so repetitive that I think at this point it actually breaks the 4th wall in a way that none of the camp and over the top ridiculousness of EQ and assorted villains manages.
I honestly think they’ve gone completely overboard with this. And it’d be one thing if they were virtuoso writers and had their audience’s unlimited trust. Then fine. But they can’t even develop their easy storylines. And as wonderful as Lana’s acting is, even EQ’s narrative impact diminishes from being caught up in this soap opera. I never thought that Rumbelle of all things would be the thing that makes me want to stop watching this show. I’m fine with a sad ending for them, but the drama needs to be believable and compelling. Whatever this is is not it. This is the writing equivalent of forcing us to chew someone else’s stale chewing gum.
I don’t know. Maybe 6/10? Some aspects were really good. But it still doesn’t seem to be going anywhere at all. This season is just shuffling in place. I find it really hard to get excited about this show these days.
Liked
I really enjoyed the Snow/Charming routine. It was absolutely lovely.
Ok, this episode was major SQ bait. But I actually enjoyed it. It’s always nice to see Emma and Regina team up and pep talk at each other.
Mirror world was aesthetically neat
Meh
Henry. Jared Gilmore does fine with what he’s given. But the writing… oh dear. The show runners need to stop writing him like their idea of what they would be like if they were 16 again. Seriously, 16 Candles?
Jasmine and Aladdin. What, precisely, is their point?
Disliked
What is this horror show that is Rumbelle nowadays? I actually find it uncomfortable to watch, the abuse and hate on both sides is just… Ugh. I just want it to stop. Also, it’s not just Rumple (who has become truly horrifying), Belle is also bizarre, and part of it is Emilie’s acting. Is it just me, or did her acting in that Granny’s scene when she’s talking to Aladdin seem a bit… off?
Dragon — most stereotyped character ever. Sigh.
A bit stressed and distracted from OUAT by other issues last week. As for this season, I’d say it’s bit alright, if a little flat. I don’t have too many criticisms but it’s failing to ignite the passion of the old days. The main reason I still watch it is the fun of discussing it here.
Pretty much agree on all points.
Baaaaad thing!! Conversation is fun! If OUAT fails to inspire, let’s talk about other shows!
I know. The best thing I can say about this season is that it’s perfectly adequate. What other shows are people watching? I’m also on the Westworld and Timeless bandwagon, though missed an episode of the latter. Any books/movies worth picking up?
Here’s why this show gives me fits. Based on what Host!Mini!Ford said, it sounds like Arnold was advocating for mass robot genocide in order to free the Hosts. BUT does that make any sense given that Hosts are really robots that can be rebuilt and reprogrammed?
See, I read the the exact opposite way — I thought that maybe Arnold is advocating for mass guest genocide, precisely because the killers are, mostly, the guests, and it’s almost like he’s saying being killers is in their nature (i.e. they cannot be reprogrammed). Like it is in the nature of a predator (dog) to kill. The hosts, we know, can be anything, they are not overdetermined in the same way.
