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I really don’t know how I feel about all this. It definitely does take away Emma’s uniqueness to say she is just one of the saviors.
True, if there are several saviors, then it makes me wonder what they’re supposed to have been saviors of anyway. Did Jafar curse Agrabah? Was Aladdin the one to break that curse? Also, it makes me wonder if someone else could become a savior figure in the future — maybe Henry or even Regina. It seems like there were a lot of hints in season 5 about Regina being the next savior.
I’ve also long wondered what Emma is supposed to be the savior of anymore. What is her larger narrative purpose now? She’s supposed to be the protagonist, but she’s not even doing that much saving anymore. Yeah, she broke the first dark curse, but what exactly has been her larger function in the story since then? She hasn’t really done that much and seems to have become diminished and reduced. Hook tried to convince her that Emma saved the town from Zelena and Peter Pan, but that was really Regina and Rumple, respectively. The villains seemed more heroic in S3. Emma did kill Cruella in season 4 to save Henry, but then the writers twisted that heroic act as foreshadowing of Emma going dark, which she did in a bid to spare Regina from being the dark one.
I’m sure Emma is going to be questioning that herself in season 6. JMo posted on Instagram this picture on Emma laying on a therapist’s couch with the caption: “Emma has a lot on her mind lately”
https://www.instagram.com/p/BIfBziwhwcI/I’m 100% sure now that Emma is the one who is going to be getting therapy from Archie, which I’m actually really looking forward to. That woman has got a lot of issues to deal with!
[adrotate group="5"]"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
Because RumBelle serves the narrative function of being the foil to all the other “happy” couples and Rumple serves the narrative function of being the stand-in villain until something bigger and badder comes along.
THAT
"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
All the couples are jut about each other now and the larger family is barely part of the show. Except Emma and Regina, but that is because they are the two most main characters.
Even Regina and Emma’s relationship (though seemingly platonic) is there in the script, and even then, they act like two people who really love each other. I still sometimes wonder if the SQ fans are right about A&E fooling everyone. What if in the last episode Regina, Emma, and Henry just drive off into the sunset in the yellow bug leaving everyone else behind? That probably won’t happen, given Emma and Hook kissing in front of the wedding dress display, but there was a lot of heavy subtext all throughout season 5 (and season 4). Hook coming back from the dead and Robin dying is probably going to mean Emma has immense guilt over it the way she did in S4 when she brought “Marian” back from the past. Also, Emma taking on the dark curse for Regina was pretty clearly paralleled to Lancelot and Gwen, whose story has yet to be resolved, whereas Hook and Emma were paralleled to Arthur and Gwen (pink flowers of doom spring to mind). I’m just throwing it out there.
Before season 5, I would have said no way. The first 2.5 seasons were about SF. Then from S3b to S5, CS has been pushed down our throats for so long. After S5, I’m not so sure anymore because season 5 was pretty bad for Emma and Hook. Yes, he got resurrected and CS was touted as having “true love” by JMo and CO’D at CC, but the way Hook mistreated Emma in S5 is right there in the script. That “true love shove” was deliberately ambiguous. Emma also wasn’t so sure she could be certain of her and Hook’s love being authentic. But as Cyrus told Alice, if it’s really true love you don’t need proof; you just feel it. Also, the act of Emma trying to share her heart with Hook nearly gave her a heart-attack. That was as clear as was the cursed-lips fiasco of S3 that robbed Emma of her TL magic. (That was never addressed by the actors and showrunners as far as I know. I wonder why).
Now Robin Hood is out of the picture, and while it would seem impossible given Hook’s resurrection, Emma and Regina did have a lot of moments. Regina and Emma showed they believed in each other, even when Emma was cursed, whereas Hook basically reacted by trying to send Emma’s entire family to hell. Regina also tried to get Emma to confess something that Emma keeps hidden deep down but got interrupted before Emma could confess something. We, the audience, are left to assume it was Emma’s fear of commitment and moving in with Hook, as she tells him.
But, what if it was something else? What if Emma loves Regina? She certainly acts like it. True love is sacrifice, and Emma certainly sacrificed herself for Regina by taking on the dark one curse. She wanted to spare Regina, who’d worked too hard for her happy ending. Regina then seemed to lose her happy ending when Robin died. Regina risked everything for Emma by going to the UW for Emma’s sake. Emma also promised Regina to get Regina’s happy ending for her. Could Emma be Regina’s happy ending? Regina could still be the one Emma chooses at the very end of the series. We’ve already seen Ruby and Dorothy share TLK so it’s not impossible. All the subtext doesn’t seem so subtext to me anymore. Regina is still Emma’s step-grandma, but when I stand back and think about it objectively, I don’t think the SQ fans sound so crazy. They seem to be onto something.
Regina has has undergone real redemption whereas Hook really hasn’t in my opinion. Emma and Regina went from being enemies, to frenemies, to co-parents, to best friends. Regina and Emma constantly risk their lives for each other and stick by one another, no matter what. I think they’re closer to each other than they ever have been to either guy they’ve dated (excluding Neal and Daniel). Maybe it’s just all bait, but there is a heck of a lot of it. I agree that the hints do at least strongly suggest how much those ladies love each other, as they’ve demonstrated by their actions. Whether the love that Emma and Regina share is the kind of love of platonic best friends, Henry’s co-moms, or step-grandma/step-granddaughter, it clearly exists. A&E have actually managed to confound me this time.
"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
How Titanic Should Have Ended:
"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
@rainbow wrote: Based on the latest spoilers, on the SDCC sneak peek and based on that A&E answer at the article, cross my mind, they probably wont, but if they wont try to parallel Yasmine and Aladdin with Neal and Emma, not in all parts obvious, bc they cant piss Cs fans, but in the sense that they may finally tell why Neal had to leave Emma to be savior, how he couldnt be with her, bc bad things would happen, since they finally going to talk about the savior thing, and by this i dont say they actually planned, simply saying that they some how show Yasmine having left Aladdin to fufill the savior role, bc like Jafar says says, saviors dont have their own happy ending and with A&E saying that thing about Sf or MRJ back for flashbacks, if this wouldnt be an opportunity to show what bad things would happen. It wont happen, but they would have the chance to finally explained or tell than untold story.
Sadly, I think you’re probably right, as I also wrote here. If they brought back MRJ to play Neal in another flashback, it’d probably just be to show why Emma and Neal couldn’t be together because of her being the savior. While it would further vindicate why Neal had to leave Emma in the first place, fans of Hook still wouldn’t see it that way. They’d argue he was just a jerk who abandoned Emma. It’d also be very bittersweet for Neal and Swanfire fans, who already know the true reason Neal gave up his happy ending was so that Emma could find her family. It’d be loving and moving, but all the while, the writers would only use it to reveal that Emma couldn’t be with Neal because of her role as savior and she couldn’t be with Neal now because he’s now dead, and his soul at peace in heaven. She will, however, be able to get her happy ending with Hook because of some magical, ad hoc loophole or plot device similar to when Zeus brought back Hook from the dead for unbelievable reasons. I’m sure I don’t want MRJ to come back just to set up Emma’s future with CS. It’d just be a tease for SF fans, another painful what-might-have-been kind of scenario that the writers will pretend is the way they always intended it to be. I hope MRJ has the sense not to return for that.
"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
While, i do think the show would still have problems. I don’t agree that having a plan and sticking with it would not make the show better. The writers had a plan original. Neal was Henry’s father, Rumpel’s son and Emma’s love interest. That was told to Jennifer before they filmed the pilot. That was the plan and a central point of the show before they filmed the pilot. All sorts of hints were littered throughout the first two seasons, all sorts of character development with Rumpel and Emma was about that, leading to that being a big part of the show. Removing that, fails the plan.
It’ll come as no surprise that I completely agree. There was clearly a plan, and anyone who says otherwise is either fooling herself/himself or just doesn’t understand foreshadowing. A&E not only told JMo who would be the father of Henry, but they also told Bobby Carlyle that the son of Rumple was also Henry’s dad. The actors had that foreknowledge for a clear reason; they used it to inform their portrayal of Emma and Rumple, respectively, in the first two seasons. You can see it all the way back in Desperate Souls when Rumple told Emma that he knew how to spot a desperate soul (also heavy foreshadowing that Emma would eventually become the next dark one, if you ask me). Rumple used the love Emma had for Henry to get what he wanted the way that Zoso used the love Rumple had for Baelfire to get what Zoso wanted. Also, there was this exchange between Rumple and Emma from episode 1×8:
Mr. Gold: Well, look. Your boy might like these, don’t you think? You could play together.
(He holds up a pair of walkie talkies.)
Emma: I don’t-
Mr. Gold: No, please. They… They grow up so fast.
Emma: Thanks.
Mr. Gold: You enjoy these with your boy. Your time together is precious, you know? That’s the thing about children – before you know it, you lose them.It’s an interesting parallel done on purpose. After Manhattan, Desperate Souls is one of my other favorite episodes. It wasn’t a coincidence. It was all planed. I know you don’t need convincing, but some people miss those kinds of season-one connections. The signs don’t have to be invented; they’re right there in the scripts. Other people used to ship “Golden Swan” before they knew Rumple’s son was Henry’s dad, but I think that points to a deeper reality of the show. Both Emma and Rumple already shared a family connection, unbeknownst to either of them, in the form of both loving Henry’s dad. The writers also have said they always planned from the very start who Henry’s dad would be and that Emma would fall in love with Baelfire. They revealed in an interview that they had thought about changing the story after fans figured out that Henry’s dad was also Baelfire after “The Return” but that they decided to remain true to their original plan. They correctly realized then that to change it would have been a disaster.
Why didn’t the showrunners just stick with their guns instead of hitting a reset button in 3b? Their kingdom for a horse. The show could have been better if they had just stuck with the plan. Maybe some of the plot would still have been weak, but I argue that there wouldn’t have been so many OOC moments. It could have been a relatively half-way descent character-driven show rather than the heavily plot-driven show that it has become. The characters became weakened in S3b — which is when the evidence of poor plot holes became especially jarring. Yes, there were instances in season two and even season one in which some of the plot holes were evident, but the show made up for it somewhat with strong characterization, mystery, and interesting parallels. The show also had a reason to exist: break the curse and find Baelfire. After that, it was pretty much down hill. The show really should have ended at 3×11 –only with Neal being able to escape the curse and go with Henry and Emma to NYC because he never was part of the original curse though he was the reason for it.
"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
I think the question before it led to next one about Neal, given the mention of untold stories.
"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
Do you mean the ferris wheel? Yeah, I suppose it could be the amusement park where Neal and Emma had their first date. It’s also where Neal appeared to Emma in that vision in 5×12. But again, what would be the point of doing so now? Maybe Emma is going to remember another flashback of how he impacted her life, but it just adds more salt to the wound to do so.
"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
I understood that A&E meant they might bring back Neal for another flashback. It seemed like the best time to tell those stories would have been in season three before Neal died. I suppose there is some narrative room now that season six is about telling untold stories, which seems to include untold parts of past characters’ tales like Cinderella’s. Now that I dwell on it some more, large parts of Nealfire’s story remain untold like when he came from Neverland to ALWM or what he did after he fled to Canada and ended up in NYC. I suppose it could work to have Neal back to flesh out more of his untold story. However, I’m scared they might retcon his story more, so, much as I might wish to know certain things about Neal’s past, I’d almost rather they left his story untold.
"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
