Season 3, Episode 17:
The Jolly Roger
While Emma decides to resume her magical training with Regina and Mary Margaret and David attempt to bond with Henry, Hook is enlisted to help a washed-up Ariel in finding the missing Prince Eric.
Meanwhile in the Enchanted Forest of a year ago, the pirate must perform the same mission for Ariel...who has brought him news that his ship the Jolly Roger is in the hands of a pirate even more ruthless than he is.
Tropes
- And Your Little Dog, Too!: Appropriately enough, Zelena uses this threat against Killian—that if he doesn't do her bidding and kiss Emma, she will threaten all those Emma loves, including Henry, his last connection to Neal.
- But for Me, It Was Tuesday: When Ariel catches Hook in the streets and insists he will pay for what he did to her, he has to ask her "what particular grievance" she's referring to.
- Contrived Coincidence: Almost as soon as he goes into the back of Gold's shop, Hook stumbles upon Eric's cloak—not just any item to help Ariel, but one he has good reason to remember after having damaged it and being read the riot act about it by her during their earlier journey together.
- Couch Gag: The title card features David's truck.
- Curse: Zelena is able to place one on Hook thanks to his selfish desire to help Ariel and expunge his guilt—that if he kisses Emma, she will be robbed of her magic.
- Everyone Can See It: According to Regina, everyone can tell that Emma and Hook have something going on, or at least that he is "yearning."
- From a Certain Point of View: Nothing Hook says about Ariel and Eric after he comes back to the loft is untrue, but it leaves out Zelena's duplicity and his role in it—which is why when Snow and Emma praise him for it, it just makes it worse.
- Glamour: Storybrooke Ariel was actually Zelena in disguise all along.
- Hookers and Blow: Smee and the other members of the crew hire a streetwalker for Hook. As proof of his Character Development, he pretends to go off with her, only to send her away with extra payment.
- Love Hurts: Hook tries to claim this as the reason a ship matters more to him than helping Ariel. He later admits he was lying to both her and himself.
- My Greatest Failure/My Greatest Second Chance: How Hook views betraying Ariel to get back the Jolly Roger, and how he views helping her find Eric in Storybrooke. The latter ends up subverted thanks to Zelena.
- Mythology Gag:
- Blackbeard's costume and hair are similar to the version of Captain Hook depicted in the Disney animated Peter Pan.
- The sequence of Ariel and Eric meeting on the beach, as seen through the magic mirror, is a direct live-action copy of a similar one in the Disney animated The Little Mermaid.
- Not Me This Time: When Ariel accuses Hook of kidnapping Eric, Hook notes "Kidnapping a prince does sound like something I would do, but I'm afraid you've got the wrong pirate."
- "Reason You Suck" Speech: Ariel gives a fairly blistering one to Hook, twice. The second one becomes even worse once she reveals she's really Zelena.
- Sadistic Choice:
- Blackbeard forces one on Hook—let him live and have the Jolly Roger (thus proving he's "gone soft") and he'll reveal where Eric is, or kill him and reclaim his ship but doom Eric and Ariel to separation.
- Zelena forces one on him too—kiss Emma and deprive her of her magic which is needed to save the day (and which Zelena strangely fears), or watch helplessly as she kills all those Emma loves.
- The Easy Way or the Hard Way: When Blackbeard won't tell Hook where Eric is, Hook threatens him by saying "I can either make this painful, or quite painful."
- This Is Reality: Amusingly, Regina invokes this when talking about committing to magic.
- Training from Hell: Unsurprisingly, this is Regina's manner of teaching Emma, complete with a literal Die or Fly moment.
- You and What Army?: Said word for word by the knights Hook and his men accost on the road to steal the gold they're guarding. The response is to reveal all the men surrounding them in the woods with fire-tipped arrows. This all turns out to be a Backup Bluff set up by Smee.
- You Keep Telling Yourself That: Hook continues to insist he is a heartless pirate and will never be anything else, that he cannot change who he is or what he has done. Blackbeard accuses and Ariel believes otherwise (at least at first). Ironically, the moment he is finally willing to believe it and prove it is ruined by Zelena's curse.
