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This is the biggest complaint I have of the show. So many people dismiss complaints as just ramblings of bitter shippers, but really my underlying disgust with the show is how they’ve destroyed their own story. Rumple in season one was written fantastically. Look back at Desperate Souls, Skin Deep, The Return. They all laid out this tale of this complex character. What they have done to him 3B and beyond is horrendous
Yep, all this. And lets also not forget OUAT’s cavalier approach to consent, offensive class politics, increasingly explicit misogyny, problems with representations of racial and gender diversity, and the OOCification of characters for the sake of plot and ratings. But actually, I agree with you — all this, while problematic and sometimes downright offensive, could perhaps be overlooked in a “guilty pleasure” sort of show. And of course, no show is perfect. But it’s the way OUAT seems to have mangled its story’s message, reneging on its own stated moral cartography, while throwing some of its characters under the bus with no care for consistent character development that I personally find particularly disappointing.
My theory is that Emma will use him to pull the stone from the sword, and then he’ll once again sacrifice himself to save Emma toward the end of 5A. They can always have him come back some way in flashbacks if they want to keep Bobby on the show. But I can’t think they have any real story for Rumple other than death
I agree — it’s probably going to be something like that. The problem is that the writers are no longer able to imagine “high stakes” drama outside of wrecked ships and characters giving up their life for the “greater good,” whatever that is at this point. Which is devalued through the completely arbitrary ways some characters come back to life and others don’t. Similarly, some relationships are portrayed as unsalvageable and moribund, while others, with seemingly the same exact problems, shamble on undeterred. And sure, romances breaking up and characters dying are all Big Dramatic Events, but they are also the most common denominator for Euroamerican culture (we’re all pretty obsessed with romantic love and individual mortality.) What’s so disappointing, I think, is that OUAT started somewhere else — with fragile family relationships, the complexity of good/evil and hence of the villains/heroes, and with an interesting play on the cosmology of fairytales — but has gotten more and more reductive and simplistic with each season. The perverse thing with this is that, while I expect OUAT to produce more derivative plot lines and horribly mangled character arcs, I keep hoping I might be wrong. It’s a classic abusive relationship!
[adrotate group="5"]I just really want to know, is thos A&E coming up with what they think is a good romance or are they actually aware of what they are doing????
Ok, so hearing that dialogue, my jaw literally dropped. My first instinct is to climb up on my feminist soapbox and marvel at the degree to which Hook is essentially written as an entitled frabtoy with a savior complex. I mean, safe for a bed sheet toga and a box of flunitrazepam, I’m not sure he can possible come across as any more of a “rapey” narcissist.
On the other hand, are the writers really not aware of what they’re doing? Surely, this is their way to show some ambivalence towards Hook’s feelings for Emma (and rock the CS boat so that it’s not all smooth sailing for that particular ship). This episode is written by Jane Espensen, and while I’m not super impressed with her latest writing choices, I think she actually knows what she’s doing in terms of writing this sort of underlying patriarchy.
Yeah, no, alas they are oblivious, they just think they’re writing an epic love story, or something.
Unless Jane has developed a secret hatred of OUAT, and is essentially sabotaging it from the inside? Now, what I really don’t get is the way that the audience is cheering Hook in this dialogue. I mean, he’s clearly being pretty despicable! Am I missing something?
I so very much hope that they are going to come up with something more creative than having Rumple sacrificing himself again — but who knows. It would be interesting, however, so see Human!Rumple and DO!Rumple have an opportunity for confrontation, and have Human!Rumple finally have a go at overcoming his own darkness, as he helps Emma overcome the DO. Sadly I have zero faith in that happening, since Rumple’s story arc has been methodically train wrecked since he died a hero in S3 — I think it’s quite likely they we will see more “I want my power back” type of writing.
Also, as everyone here said, the cutlass thing is just another example of writing Neal out of the history of the show. But seriously, could we have had another artifact, instead of Hook’s cutlass? This is just another symptom of Rumple’s story being rewritten with Hook at the center of it, rather than Neal. Bleagh.
Thus far parts of this season are recycled plots from previous seasons, so yeah…why not bring up S3A ending and do it again. They’ve already set it up with what you said and the fact that Arthur apparently wants to make SB the new Camelot (like Pan wanting to make SB the new Neverland)
Another example of this is what they seem to be setting up with Zelena — Regina going EQ for no discernible reason is probably only there to push Zelena, the expecting mother, to the brink to avoid being separated from her child. It’s a recycling of Mal and Lily’s story, I suspect, and a cheap way to make Zelena seem more sympathetic. #tried trope
I feel mixed about this episode. Some of the dialogue was quite amusing, but plot-wise it was a bit of a mess
Liked:
“He’s producing Oxygen” LOL
Charming — we’re given some comments by Charming that lends his character much needed depth. He was a lot less milk toast than he usually is, with some occasional bits of unexpected wisdom. Good on him.
Dwarven proletariat beginning to articulate their class struggle. It’s about time.
Dark!Rumple is a trip. “You know, he doesn’t look so good. If I say so myself” and “Crushed his heart under your impractical boot” were some of the most hilarious pieces of dialogue I remember on OUAT. Actually, Hook had some pretty good lines too. “I know that look. The top button turns it on” — what is it with OUAT characters and phones?
Shady Arthur! I don’t think he’s an outright villain however — I suspect the set up here is more MacBeth like, with Guinevere pulling the strings behind the scenes.
Belle seems to be around and active more. Nice to see that.
Lancelot is back!
Mixed:
A fly agaric, really? Much heavy-handed shamanic journey symbolism?
The Dead Marsh and Charming as Frodo. The particular nature and aesthetics of that whole magic mushroom quest seemed completely random to me.
Idiot Squire — seriously, lets publicly run away from the test, and to make it easier to track you, lets wear a bright red cloak. What was that?
Rumple waking up via Hook’s cutlass. Everything that I dislike about the rewriting of the Rumple storyline to make it more Hook centric is captured right there. What about Neal’s blanket?
Disliked:
Regina going all EQ on Zelena. It seemed like a gratuitous regression for Regina’s character. She isn’t tested, she isn’t being put in an impossible situation that might trigger her to revert to her old ways. Sister Z is for all intents and purposes fangless at the moment. So why the gratuitous cruelty? While I strongly dislike Zelena as a character, that interaction seemed to me out of context and a bit OOC for Regina. Way to antagonize the expecting mother and push her over the edge, potentially. They’re setting some desperate gambit for a now “sympathetic” mommy-zeleny to save her baby, probably similarly to what they did with Mal. And for that, they need to make Regina bad again.
Other thoughts:
Hook and Emma’s interaction. I think Emma was actually telling Hook the truth — it seems to me that she is trying to trick the DO entity within her, pretending she is going along with the plan, but in fact playing her own game. So I think that she was being genuine when she was telling Hook she was an open book. Hook’s rejection — and especially the way that dialogue was written, seems to confirm that Hook’s love of Emma is rather, shall we say, conditional on his own sense of his conquest of her.
Adding this part in this thread because I’m less likely to be yelled at here: I find that scene of Emma and Hook to have an undertone of a domestic abuse vibe about it. Because Emma isn’t the woman Hook wants her to be, Emma feels like she has to apologise to him. She wants to talk and have lunch with him “like old times” but he’s not interested. It’s only when she puts on her Sandra dee form (which a lot of us ages ago said didn’t suit the Emma Swan we met in season 1,2 or 3A) that Hook allows her to have lunch with him. It’s like he’s trying to diminish her sense of self-esteem.
Yup on all counts. I think (or rather, hope) that Emma’s playing Hook here, but still. The scene does make me think that @Slurpeez is right — and that this is a conscious decision on the part of the writers to show that Hook’s feelings for Emma become tenuous the moment his own sense of self is put at risk. Whether it’s because he feels less of a man with a more assertive Emma, or whether it’s because he wants her in the redeemer role, rather than as a reminder of his own past doesn’t really matter. It seems to suggest that when push comes to shove, Emma is a prop in the story he’s telling himself about himself. (At this point I’m having a hard time imagining that the writers are suffering from accidental misogyny but who knows with this show)
This leads me to a question I posted in another thread – could Light Emma (Or Light Regina) then forge the sword back together with light magic instead of dark and snuff out the DO curse? Supposedly Emma putting the sword back together with Dark magic would snuff out the light, so why can’t it go the other way?
That’s probably theoretically possible, though I get the sense that in the OUAT universe either tasks (snuffing out the dark or the light) is a fool’s errands. I think the ultimate goal (and only solution) for the hero is to put the two in balance/bring them together.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s Regina…she’s the one being told by Emma to step up as the savior and do what needs to be done.
I think it’s Regina — especially if we assume that DO!Rumple is a portion of Emma’s own consciousness, distorted by the DO curse. Emma is obviously feeling conflicted about seeing Regina “usurping” her role as the savior, so in a sense, it almost seems like DO!Rumple is playing on that insecurity. It has to be someone who’s very much on Emma’s mind already, otherwise the line “we both know who that is” doesn’t make much sense.
Curious who does DO!Rumple’s “Royal We” refer to here — all the DOs that have come before? Are all previous DOs trapped in the dagger? Would “snuffing out the light” with a recombined Excalibur somehow allow them to come out / be released? I’m still missing the motivation — why is Emma going along with the “snuffing out the light” scenario, unless DO!Rumple is essentially promising her that this is another way to unravel the curse?
What RG said except now I think rump will be a force of good who, next season, will be using his knowledge and powers to save Emma. He won’t need to be “redeemed” cause his heart is wiped clean. I think that’s what they will go for. I also think someone will literally her their heart broken(as in crushed)
And it makes me wonder….is it possible for everyone’s hearts to get wiped clean like that?
*sigh* Golly, I hope not. That’s not how character redemption should work. It shouldn’t be because of a plot device (sucking hat, for an example) but because of hard work and making good choices. I mean, I know that sounds simple and un-TV like where we can have SHINY things do all the work for us but…let a girl dream.
All this, y’all. It seems to me that there is a very natural way to reintroduce Rumple: have his “lost soul” come consult Emma as the “angel” on the shoulder, to counterbalance the DO Clippit from Hell Rumple. As in, that would be one way to kill two birds with one stone — reintroducing a redemptive arc for Rumple, and have him battle his own demons as he helps Emma fight the curse. If he succeeds, bringing him back as really redeemed. It would also be a pretty common, recognizable trope, i.e. the “devil” on one shoulder, and the “angel” on the other.
But of course, they probably won’t do that. I’m also really concerned that they’ll take the lazy route, as they have been systematically doing with Rumple since Rumple’s resurrection, and either he will wake up a power hungry jerk again, or he’ll wake up white and fluffy with no work invested into the redemption part. Or he’ll only wake up for thirty seconds to die after a moving speech to Belle.
Based purely on the script, it seems to me like Hook is still being portrayed as Emma’s Mr. Wrong.
Yes but the writers don’t recognize that they are portraying him that way. There’s a disconnect. The writers are just following typical storytelling with bad boys who are never 100% reformed but who get the girl anyway simply because 1) they are hot and 2) women are objects who don’t know their own mind and golly if they just gave the guy a chance, they’d see how great he is! and 3) because gosh darn it, he really loves her and that’s all that matters! They are portraying him as Mr. Wrong (because most women would go screaming into the night if they had this sort of attention) but the writers don’t realize they are portraying him as Mr. Wrong. The things you point out that they are throwing in are great in showing us why he’s all wrong for Emma, but the writers aren’t reading them as such…they are just there for plot and never advanced beyond that episode
Yeah, this disconnect between audience perception and script that @Slurpeez is pointing out has been puzzling me for a while as well. So there’s the one possibility that the writers are just tone deaf — as in, they can no longer see the bigger picture for all the soap suds. On the other hand, there’s the fandom effect: people get on team Hook, team Regina, team Rumple etc. and become really hard to budge, no matter how problematic the character. (Personally, I would actually enjoy seeing convincing redemptive arcs for all three, but I doubt that’s possible at this stage). I guess my critique is not of the character per se — I have too much OUAT fatigue to even muster any serious character dislike at this point — but of the really bizarre, inconsistent, and sometimes downright offensive writing choices that are being made. For example, to go back to that scene where Hook is saying “this isn’t who I am” — a small change would have made that dialogue entirely different, and a lot less ambiguous. Instead of the “this isn’t me” line, something that acknowledges Hook’s past in a moment of character self-reflexivity would have been so much more satisfying. I don’t know, “I can’t be that person anymore, Swan. I have to go.” Or whatever, but something more ambivalent, or self-aware or something. But the dialogue was written this way, and, of all the takes of that scene, which I assume there were multiple versions of, the directing choice fell on the one where Hook’s affect is self-righteous outrage.
So my new pet theory is that the show creators are actually writing to maximize audience polarization. It’s a Gestalt problem, where your brain falls into a perceptual decision, and then you can’t see both sides of the same coin. Like the vase/face paradox.
I’m probably giving them too much credit. Meh. They’re probably just tone deaf.
Okay, one more passing thought on Hook. But I need to discuss his selfishness. It’s rather selfish of the Pirate to waltz into Rumple’s shop and demand to know things from Belle, no? I mean, he’s curious about why TLK wouldn’t work, I understand that and in this case going to Belle is a natural idea. But…but…he doesn’t even inquire after Rumple or how Belle is doing. Instead he insults the love of Belle’s life to her face (bloody crocodile) and doesn’t even ask how she’s coping all while her *husband* is laying there at death’s door! It’s all about him and his needs and his desires and his agenda. It makes their drinking at Granny’s together hollow and not resonate because once again, it’s about Hook’s man pain but at no point does he turn to her and inquire after how she’s doing. I guess I should be fair that no one in SB, apart from Grumpy at the ball, is asking after Belle, but no one is seeking her out either.
Yes! This bothered me so much. And the fact that Belle doesn’t bat an eye at the repeated use of “bloody crocodile” also annoyed me. If someone insults your comatose partner to your face, a natural or logical reaction would be to tell them off. Or smack them upside the head. Certainly not share a drink. The only way this sort of negative comment might work is if Hook and Rumple were some kind of frenemies — rival brothers, for example. This isn’t the case — they are straight up enemies.
To me, this kind of tone deaf writing shows who the real “protagonists” are — Belle and increasingly Rumple are there to accessorize Hook’s redemptive plot. Belle’s motivations as a character are completely ignored and even Emma is occasionally sidelined for the sake of showing Hook’s growth as a character. Also, the whole DO thing is so heavily enmeshed with a rhetoric of addiction and madness, and the way CS is being written from that angle is just plain offensive. Not just because of the double standard around their sexuality, but what’s in fact being portrayed is that Emma is “tempting” Hook back to his own “addictions” — the offer of alcohol and the comment about “the way to man’s heart is through his liver,” while kind of funny, seems very heavy handed symbolism. Hook first refuses the drink, then refuses the physical intimacy precisely because he was there on a mission — to break Emma’s curse. When he failed to do that, he rejects Emma. And yet, when it was Hook getting Emma to drink, or coming on to her, it was something to cheer about — the bad boy helping our innocent and uptight heroine loosen up. But then when it’s the reverse, we get this:
