shadowkat: (tv slut)
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1. Five wonderful things about shipping Emma Swan/Baelfire on Once Upon a Time

* Swanfire is a cool name
* The writers are pro ship and the ship is laced with loads of irony
* It's not abusive
* they already have a kid and he's 11
* the traditional gender roles have been switched up a bit

If you ever decide to ship a star-crossed romance on a tv series it's a good idea to pick one that is a) not abusive, and b) the writers support. Also helps if it's two grownups who have a history, and aren't under the age of 20 and have an equal footing. If they aren't equals, your ship is doomed. Plus, a kid already out there and part of their family - assures at least some longevity.

2. Once Upon a Time for the uninitiated?

Imagine the characters of all your favorite children's tales mashed up in a grown up adventure story?

Imagine what would happen if the Evil Queen from the Snow White fairy tale survived and decided with a curse created by Rumplestilskin to curse all of the fairy tale and storybook characters - so they are ripped away from their magical realms and thrust into our own? Now take that a step further...the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming hooks up with a thief who happens to be the son of Rumplestilskin, and she has a kid with him, Henry. For complicated reasons, ie. she's 18 and in jail, she gives Henry up for adoption. Rumplestilskin procures Henry for the Evil Queen, not knowing who he is or who his parents are. 11 years later, Henry who figures something is wrong here since no one has changed or aged in 11 years but Henry, obtains a fairy book from his favorite teacher (Snow White) and goes off to find his mom. The mom reluctantly returns with him to Storybrook, where over the course of the season - she meets her parents, and breaks the curse.In the next season they are reunited with Henry's father and Rumple's son (the whole reason that Rumple created the curse), Baelfire, and Baelfire's new fiancee turns out to be an anti-magic covert agent and kidnaps Henry after thrusting an injured and possibly dying Baelfire through a porthole. They grab Henry and jump to Neverland.

S3? Captain Hook, Snow White, Prince Charming, Rumplestilskin, the Evil Queen, and Emma Swan board Hook's ship to sail to Neverland, in order to save Henry from Peter Pan. Meanwhile Baelfire struggles to find his way out of the Enchanted Forest with Mulan, Sleeping Beauty, and Prince Phillip. While Henry flees the Lost Boys and Peter Pan in Neverland.

Oh so much fun. It's like watching a cracky fanfic mashup by the writers worked on Lost, BSG and Buffy.

Also comforting. Because the moral code tends to be "revenge is bad and has consequences", "everyone screws up", and "things work out in the end".


3. Once Upon a Time due to its funky narrative structure, works better when you watch it on DVD without commercials and one episode after another. Scandal is another series that works best in this fashion. It's pure serial. The B story thread is flashbacks, like LOST. It has the same narrative character centric structure that LOST did.

The dialogue is actually really good in some episodes. The best episodes to date, is basically any that focus on Rumplestilskin - in part due to Robert Carylye who like Alan Cummings has the ability to make anything work for him. It also helps that the writers are enamored of the character and wrote it for Carylyle.

Favorite episodes to date?

1. Manhattan (S2) - which is the payoff from the buildup over S1, includes the pivotal moment in Rumple's back story
2. Talhassee (S2) - Emma meets Neal, and works with Hook
3. The Miller's Daughter (S2) - Cora and Rumple - or the Rumplestilskin tale with a twist
4. Pilot - the first episode - where Emma comes to Storybrook
5. Desperate Souls - the Rumplestilskin backstory or how he becomes the Dark One, also reflects on Emma's tale
5. The Hat Trick - the Mad Hatter's Tale and it sheds more light on Emma's back story
6. Red-handed - a twist on Little Red Riding Hood
7. The Land Without Magic
8. The Crocodile (Rumple and Hook's back story)
9. Welcome to Storybrook (reads like a 1980s Stephan King horror story)
10. Second Star to the Right..


Favorite characters:

* Emma
* Baelfire/Neal
* Rumplestilskin/Gold
* Snow White
* Henry
* Charming
* Hook/Killigan

And Regina is growing on me. The actress is quite good.

Ships?

: = platonic or familial
/ = romantic
* = main ones

* Emma/Neal
* Emma:Henry
* Emma:Henry:Neal
* Emma: Rumple
* Rumple:Henry
* Rumple:Baelfire
* Snow:Emma
*Charming:Henry
*Charming:Rumple
*Charming:Emma
*Charming/Snow
Hook/Emma (fling, nothing permanent)
Hook:Baelfire
Hook:Mella
*Hook:Rumpe:Baelfire:Henry:Emma:Snow:Charming
Regina:Emma
Ruby/Whale
Rumple/Cora
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