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I still don’t get why Regina had to pay a price of a life for a life. I know “magic always comes with a price” but Rumple used his dark magic to heal Dr. Whale, Baelfire and Belle, but they didn’t have to pay for it. So the idea of the fury coming to collect its payment after Emma healed Robin on behalf of Regina doesn’t really add up.
This!!! I don’t get it either. I suppose, because PLOT, as @RG would say.
Healing magic is not too expensive, I think. It costs more for a fatal wound, like when Snow used/didn’t use the candle–Eva & Rumple couldn’t just be cured by simple magic; someone had to die if they were to live.
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I guess what all three have in common is that there was some sort of magical(?) poison involved. (Was the poison meant to kill Rumple magical? I don’t remember). For Rumple, the lethality didn’t come from the wound, as much as from the magic of the poison. Eva was just slowly poisoned by Cora. But in the case of Robin, the poison was meant for Regina, specifically. In all other respects, Robin looked like he got stabbed in the spleen — as far as OUAT is usually concerned, a totally fixable condition by anyone able to wield the least bit of magic. The price of a “life” in this case seems entirely aberrant in this case. Meh. *shrugs*
Emma and Regina will probably both go down in the Winter Finale, kinda like how Rumplestilskin killed Peter Pan by sacrificing himself….Regina killing/freeing Emma by sacrificing herself and both of them being taken down by Charon into the Underworld, setting up 5B to be Operation Save SwanQueen…..which in turn would be the ultimate baiting Adam and Eddy have ever done, but I’m willing to bet in an attempt to increase their ratings, they’re willing to do.
That seems very likely to me. And if this is the direction they take, I won’t be surprised if Regina develops a capacity for light magic by the end of it all.
Also, judging by A&E’s thing with that whole redemption through motherhood trope, I’d bet a cookie that by the end of the show, Regina is expecting (in a similar vein that everyone in the show seems to be heading towards the “second chances” baby, especially if they incorporate Emilie’s pregnancy into the plot).
[adrotate group="5"]I think both Arthur and Guinevere are shady. As to the affair — is it possible that Arthur has ‘forgotten’ about it? Seems like you can buy amnesia spells on discount in OUAT.
I know everyone’s talking about Emma ending up in the Underworld hanging with Hades, but maybe it’ll be Regina instead? I know that Emma dying would be part of her Saviour hero myth arc, but it’s almost getting to the point where you could make a drinking game out of when “Saviour” is used in relation to Regina, and we’re only two eps in, so maybe she’s gonna get her own death and ressurection arc in order to make her fully redeemed?
I can see that. Of course, the moral of the story might be that handsome is as handsome does, in that “Savior” is less of a particular person with innate qualities, and more of a job, and whoever steps up to it. I think they’re setting up Regina’s redemption arc to be, indeed, one from Evil Queen to Savior, but if she eclipses Emma in that role, what would be Emma’s outcome? My guess is — from Outcast/Orphan to Savior to Dark One to Normal — isn’t normal/average what Emma always wanted?
On the one hand, Hook actually surprised me in his ability to turn her down. Maybe he has come a long way. However, his total rejection of Emma sorta contrasts with Belle’s acceptance and unconditional love of dark one Rumple S1-S3a. As Belle warned Hook “it’s a lot easier to hate a dark one than it is to love one.” I get why he’s taken aback, why he doesn’t want her that way. But it does make it seem like Emma with sexual appetite = fallen woman.
Exactly. Hey, the gender asymmetries are always going to be there. My quibble with the writers is that they aren’t actually thinking things through (surprise!). I can appreciate a reformed Hook fighting to try to get the “authentic” Emma back. But in the context of Emma coming on to him, and Hook saying “this isn’t you,” reads to me like Hook saying “Hold your horses, sweetheart. *I’m* the one doing the chasing.”
There is any number of ways to have written that scene. They could have made it into a dialogue about the happenings in the town. Or about their relationship. An atypically cynical attitude that would have made Emma’s Dark One persona come through. But all we’re left with is an equation of DO Emma = weird platinum blond dye job = skin tight dress = sexually aggressive=potentially evil psychopath. I get it that A&E’s formative years coincided with the Basic Instinct era, but this is just tiresome.
I agree about Rumple — his awkwardness was precisely what made him so sympathetic in Skin Deep (I still think that episode was pure genius). On the other hand, there was something mildly uncomfortable about his relationship with Cora, but then again, unlike Emma with Hook, Cora was game for most of it. Point is, with Rumple there has never been a dynamic of sexual aggressiveness in the way that Dark!Swan is being portrayed. We don’t know about any other DOs (I don’t want to think too hard about Zoso on that front), but my point is, it somehow was never part of package, until Emma. Come to think of it, there is an interesting parallel with Belle. “Evil” Belle/Lacy is, of course, explicitly sexual. Ugh, OUAT! Why do I keep watching you?
review
Oh my goodness, brilliant.
Then, having risked her soul to make Regina happy she was contractually obligated to attack Hook with her lips. Obviously he was repulsed.
That, right there, was a totally bizarre moment. Why precisely did Emma feel the need to suddenly make out with Hook? Also, unsolicited advances are only Ok when perpetrated by the wish fulfillment character, but not OK when it’s the now “tainted” heroine. Because, Dark One cooties, and all that.
The show continues to get more and more misogynistic
This. Although, now that I think about it, it isn’t straight forwardly misogynist, which makes its gender politics particularly… what’s the word I’m looking for? Perfidious? Some popular shows (Walking Dead or Breaking Bad, I’m looking at you) are just straightforwardly misogynist, no bones about it. Something like Game of Thrones is too, but for a slightly different reasons, since it’s supposed to portray a patriarchal, brutally misogynist world. But OUAT claims to be all about strong female characters, but it just seems that the writers feel deeply ambivalent about what that might look like.
(Then again, are there any US-made shows that have an uncomplicatedly positive, nonjudgmental, or at least non-handwringy attitude about female sexuality more generally? I think it’s our culture, y’all)
It was light magic. I posted a screen shot…somewhere. *hunts*
Aha, thank you. Ok, so… light magic incurs a price? I’m confused. Lets assume that since Emma’s now DO, all of her magic is in fact dark, and comes with a price. So maybe despite the “white magic” CGI, she still used dark magic and hence got a little bit scaly — so that’s one kind of price (that is, a bit of her humanity since evil on this show correlates with skin conditions). Or did she go scaly because he enjoyed using the dark magic?
On the other hand, one could interpret it as if Emma is the one who payed the price for Regina — whereas it really should have been Regina who payed the price for healing Robin with her own life or life essence or something. {It seems like Tutorial Rumple said as much} But then why on earth did the Fury need to come collect?
Unless I’ve totally forgotten my Greek mythology, aren’t Furies/Erinyes agents of justice, of sorts?
Yes. But I think the writers might be pulling from the Illiad, broadly at least, when it states that the Erinyes are “those who beneath the earth punish whosoever has sworn a false oath.” You swear that you’ll pay the price (like Regina unintentionally does by asking Emma to save Robin) but it’s a false one because you never intended to pay the price.
Yes I wondered this too. The problem is that Regina was the oathbreaker, not Robin. And if we are going to be specific, the actual oathbreaker is Emma for failing to mention that there is a price to her magic. Which is odd. Looked like light magic to me though it could just be healing magic. I vaguely recall Rumple healing someone at one point though can’t recall if there was a price.
Yes, I agree that they could easily set up Hades/Underworld foreshadowing without pulling out a Fury. But these writers never quite know when to ease up off that throttle.
LOLZ! Truer words…
If (if if if) The Underworld is coming next and Emma goes down to it, then I suspect they’re going to double up on their Greek myths in which Hook becomes an Orpheus stand in and Snow becomes Demeter.
Ha, I’ll add my cookies to this theory. Actually, considering the connection between the Hades myths and the Beauty and the Beast fairytale, I wouldn’t be surprised if this is also how we’re going to get Rumples out of that coma — perhaps his soul is wandering the underworld. (It’s unclear to me whether he’ll make it). It would be a logical way to tie in several plot lines together
And the snuffing out the light seems to happen no matter how much love you’re being given from your friends and family.
Unless, we’re talking about some kind of global light snuffing, like all goodness is thereby abolished, and what we have going forth is not the battle of good and evil, but the battle of the bad and the worse. (And then OUAT will naturally morph int0 Game of Thrones)
Imma join you in the stupid corner, because it made no sense to me either. Last week the bit with Regina getting the wand back wasn’t explained in any logical way, and this week it was the hand holding that made the Fury for bye bye for some unexplained reason. Wish they’d put a bit more effort into making their big resolutions of the bad thing actually make sense.
I’ll join the stupid corner too. The fury to me seems unnecessary in the sense that I don’t quite understand what links the fury as depicted on OUAT with Charon and the Underworld or Hades for that matter. Unless I’ve totally forgotten my Greek mythology, aren’t Furies/Erinyes agents of justice, of sorts? As in, they judge and punish wrong-doers for their wrong-doings? Unless, that is, by Fury we mean Harpy, and Robin Hood has done some bad juju himself, and got snatched as a result. It just makes no sense that the Fury would be collecting a debt that Regina incurred by using magic. Furies are not, as far as I know, in the business of delivering souls to the underworld. Playing with the mythology is one thing, but this just seems a little random.
I agree that they’re heavily foreshadowing Hades – and actually, I look forward to this. I just hope that they don’t make him into a one-dimensional villain or have him be the origin of the Dark One curse somehow. The trickery with Persephone and pomegranate seeds aside, dude gets such a bad rep for no good reason. Sure, it’s an unfortunate gig he’s got, but someone’s gotta do it.
Considering that there’s been a lot of pop-culture Hades lately (all the Titans stuff, Lost Girl, Olympus), I wouldn’t be at all surprised if OUAT jumped on that particular bandwagon, Disney aside. They’re strategic that way. *cough cough* Frozen *cough*
Hmm, feeling a bit mixed on this one.
Liked:
Pacing. I appreciate that they aren’t dragging out the BIG PLOT points/twists until our eyes bleed and we die of stagnation.
JMo, as DarkSwan. Absolutely nails it. There’s an interesting depth there, where I can’t help but wonder if she’s pulling strings — it almost felt like she was goading Regina to step up to the savior role, rather than doubting or belittling her. In the same way that Bobby’s Rumple always had that depth beneath the demented jester persona, JMo also brings layers to the role in a different way, but sort of to the same effect. Cool stuff.
Belle. A sober, efficient, emotionally more centered Belle that’s not flailing between plucky, geeky, and vulnerable, as the writers’ mashup of sexy librarian with manic dream pixie is a character I can get behind. Or maybe Emilie is still getting the same kind of writing, but decided to do something different with it affect-wise. Actually, I think that’s what it is — she’s still the google search anthropomorphized, but she gets a bit more dialogue, and is doing very nicely with it.
Some TLK explanations, including Emma’s “this is who I am now.” That actually makes sense in terms of how the DO curse might operate with one’s psychology.
Charming and Snow seem to have a bit of their Season 1 oomph back.
Gwen — up to no good, are we? Ze plot thickens.
Charron. Is Hades next?
Meh:
Some of the costumes and jewelry were horrific and gaudy. And yet Hook is still wearing a pirate outfit. Henceforth to be known as Hook (TM).
The ball more generally. Underwhelming.
Camelot CGI. Looks like something that fell out of a McDonalds happy meal.
Disliked
This, right here:
Yes but you know what really bothered me? “Lady Mary Margaret” Okay, 1) she’s Snow White and 2) She’s a Queen in the Enchanted Forest. GAAAAAAA
Why the Fury plot? What was the point of that? The whole implicit equation between the price of magic and forgetting to tip the ferryman feels like mixed metaphors to me. Why is the Fury carrying off Robin to the underworld? This seems like fusing Greek and Norse mythology, (Greek furies as agents of vengeance vs valkyries carrying the souls of slain warriors to Valhalla). I think having a more subtle kind of threat — even someone like a creepy ferryman appearing to Robin and enticing him to step into the boat — would have been more interesting, and more effective plot-wise than yet another flying screechy CGI critter.
And on that topic, why is Robin such a hapless nincompoop? Shouldn’t he be able to kick some butt? I’m not impressed by the way their relationship is progressively reframed into Regina being the mother figure to him. Is it just me, or did it use to be more balanced?
So magic has a price, except when it doesn’t. Or is it that only Dark Magic has a price?
And the biggest of all — the last scene. Thank you, Rumple-DO_Tutorial for that kind explanation of what Emma might be able to do with the sword and dagger, but I’m unclear as to what would motivate her to do it. I mean, the DO has always been held back by all these annoying things like love and family — but held back from what, exactly? I mean, the goal of “snuffing out all light” or whatever the sword would do, seems like a rather abstract, academic one to me. Unless it’s for the Evilzzzz, but that seems a little out of character.
