OUAT - Season 5.1, The Dark Swan
Sep. 28th, 2015 10:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatAnyone still watching this show but me? Did last season alienate everyone?
Not a bad episode. Although their twists are getting a bit predictable. Mainly because television writers post 2001, seem to like to go to that dark place with their characters. Instead of showing a story where the hero successfully wards off evil, they go the opposite direction and show how the hero becomes consumed by it or gives in to it, and the consequences of that. Which the first time it happens, whoa, can't believe you did that. Now, oh they are so going to do that. Note to writers, the plot arc of the hero going evil has been done to death now.
OTOH...I like the trope and am rather interested to see how they get there, and what the results are.
OUAT has interesting narrative structure, albeit not the best execution. That's the problem with playing with narrative structure, if you aren't a master - then well it feels clumsy. But hey, broadcast television, I have low expectations going in. Also at this point, the series has become so insanely plotty, that I'm ignoring the plot holes.
It feels like the writers are doing a mash-up of Swan Lake (the white swan devolves into the black swan due to betrayal, pressure, and manipulation by others, losing her mind to madness), Sword in the Stone, and Brave (the Disney film about a Girl's relationship with her Bearish mother).
The narrative trick here - is that our heroes went to save Emma, the Savior, from being devoured whole by the Dark One's magic. So far so good. They get there in time. They stop her from crushing Merida's (the girl from Brave) heart, and Emma and Merida appear to bond due to Emma's choice and act of mercy. Then King Arthur rides up and whisks them to Camelot. They enter the castle. Six weeks later, they are plopped back in Storybrook, in fancy Camelot costumes, but no memory of what happened.
Emma shows up revealing herself as the Dark One. She looks completely different. (In that she now has a sexy cool black leather pants suit, perfectly coiffed hair, white makeup, and cold blue lipstick, as an aside why do the evil characters get the best costumes?) She turns the current sheriff, a disposable dwarf, to stone. And tells the befuddled and bewildered friends who'd come to rescue her from darkness that they'd failed miserably, and she's brought them back to Storybrook so that she can punish them for what they did to her. Leaving them all to wonder WTF happened. Particularly since the last thing they remember -- was helping Emma make the right choice, and Emma giving Regina the dagger to ensure that Regina would do what must be done, and prevent Emma from hurting those she cares about.
I'm guessing that the characters personal issues and various agendas probably got in the way -- and they may have used Emma to help themselves, justifying it as being for the greater good?
At any rate, the story this year will be two-fold, how did Emma become the Dark One, What happened in Camelot, and how are the Storybrook characters going to reverse it. Also what in the heck will she do to them and why?
All rather intriguing. The writers are obsessed with how power corrupts people. Or misuses of power does. And the idea that evil isn't born but made, that we create our own monsters. Snow inadertently created Regina, and in the alternate verse where Snow was evil, Regina inadvertently created Snow.
Or had a hand in it. But at the end of the day -- it's the characters own desires and choices that doom them. In the world of Storybrook - your actions define who you become.
Oh this plot recap is hilarious.
Not a bad episode. Although their twists are getting a bit predictable. Mainly because television writers post 2001, seem to like to go to that dark place with their characters. Instead of showing a story where the hero successfully wards off evil, they go the opposite direction and show how the hero becomes consumed by it or gives in to it, and the consequences of that. Which the first time it happens, whoa, can't believe you did that. Now, oh they are so going to do that. Note to writers, the plot arc of the hero going evil has been done to death now.
OTOH...I like the trope and am rather interested to see how they get there, and what the results are.
OUAT has interesting narrative structure, albeit not the best execution. That's the problem with playing with narrative structure, if you aren't a master - then well it feels clumsy. But hey, broadcast television, I have low expectations going in. Also at this point, the series has become so insanely plotty, that I'm ignoring the plot holes.
It feels like the writers are doing a mash-up of Swan Lake (the white swan devolves into the black swan due to betrayal, pressure, and manipulation by others, losing her mind to madness), Sword in the Stone, and Brave (the Disney film about a Girl's relationship with her Bearish mother).
The narrative trick here - is that our heroes went to save Emma, the Savior, from being devoured whole by the Dark One's magic. So far so good. They get there in time. They stop her from crushing Merida's (the girl from Brave) heart, and Emma and Merida appear to bond due to Emma's choice and act of mercy. Then King Arthur rides up and whisks them to Camelot. They enter the castle. Six weeks later, they are plopped back in Storybrook, in fancy Camelot costumes, but no memory of what happened.
Emma shows up revealing herself as the Dark One. She looks completely different. (In that she now has a sexy cool black leather pants suit, perfectly coiffed hair, white makeup, and cold blue lipstick, as an aside why do the evil characters get the best costumes?) She turns the current sheriff, a disposable dwarf, to stone. And tells the befuddled and bewildered friends who'd come to rescue her from darkness that they'd failed miserably, and she's brought them back to Storybrook so that she can punish them for what they did to her. Leaving them all to wonder WTF happened. Particularly since the last thing they remember -- was helping Emma make the right choice, and Emma giving Regina the dagger to ensure that Regina would do what must be done, and prevent Emma from hurting those she cares about.
I'm guessing that the characters personal issues and various agendas probably got in the way -- and they may have used Emma to help themselves, justifying it as being for the greater good?
At any rate, the story this year will be two-fold, how did Emma become the Dark One, What happened in Camelot, and how are the Storybrook characters going to reverse it. Also what in the heck will she do to them and why?
All rather intriguing. The writers are obsessed with how power corrupts people. Or misuses of power does. And the idea that evil isn't born but made, that we create our own monsters. Snow inadertently created Regina, and in the alternate verse where Snow was evil, Regina inadvertently created Snow.
Or had a hand in it. But at the end of the day -- it's the characters own desires and choices that doom them. In the world of Storybrook - your actions define who you become.
Oh this plot recap is hilarious.
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Date: 2015-09-29 02:00 am (UTC)