Once Upon A Time

Ursula probably isn't crazy, just bitter, so she talks to the fish.

maybe Cruella's just drunk all the time and the other two keep her around for entertainment and to make bitchy comments

I've been reading interviews and such and the writers have hinted that Cruella will indeed have some kind of animal-based magic. And it will be "dark".

Animal mind control anyone?

So splash is true: everyone in this show use magic, we have 10 magic user in this show.

when this show become so magic happy?

Fairy tales are typically about magic. And princesses.

I want to know when they became so Disney happy. Disney didn't start out out with a famous Rumplestiltskin or Hansel and Gretel.

This season. While there was some clear Disney inspiration early on, they were their own thing and approached things from a decisively un-Disney direction even when adapting the same characters Disney has. However, they made a deal with Disney to get the Frozen characters into it, so now Disney is genuinely affiliated with OUAT.

As a result, there is a noticeable distinction between the Frozen characters and the rest of the cast, as everyone is a twisted and altered portrayal, but the Frozen characters are 100% Straight Adaptations of the film proper. The addition of the Sorcerer's Apprentice^LISTEN who even gets turned into a Mouse at one point just to make sure we all understand he's Mickey and this is Fantasia as well as this subplot to find the Author^HEY who was Pinocchio back in season one, but I guess the plot forgot about that also seemed to have been brought about by the Disney deal, and now we have this alliance of Ursula, Maleficent, and Cruella, two of which are pre-established albeit minor roles in OUAT but are suddenly dressing and behaving more in-line with their Disney versions.

The first three seasons of OUAT were their own animal, but now it looks like Disney is here to stay. YMMV on whether that is a good or bad thing. Personally, it concerns me, but I'm a Smallville fan; I've been through this before where new developments behind the scenes result in the characters having their characterization and setting abruptly replaced with something more like the source material and less like the characters and show we've been watching for seven years, so any pessimism on my part is once-bitten twice-shy hesitance.

edited 16th Dec '14 12:40:21 PM by TobiasDrake

Season 1 was nice because I liked the Snow White story and all the classic fairy tales were pretty good.

The first half of Season 2 wasn't as fun because Emma and Mary Margaret spent too much time in the Enchanted Forest. But, at least there was Cora...while the second half was rather disappointing because the "Home Office" was just Pan and his Lost Boys

The first half Season 3 was lame for all the time they spent trudging through Neverland just to find out that Pan was Rumplestiltskin's father which I hardly believed, and the second half was okay because Zelena was pretty cool. At least until Gold killed her.

And finally the first half of this season was pretty good, because Anna was cute and Ingrid was sweet. Elsa meanwhile was just too serious...but I loved the last episode when Belle pushed Gold out of the town.

Soon we'll see how this Queens of Darkness arc goes.

I personally liked the Pan arc, mostly because Pan was well played IMO.

Also, I think the Disneyfication has been a long time coming. I'm pretty sure the writers have wanted Cruella on the show since the beginning. I think they also wanted Aladdin and Jasmine, though right now they settled on having Jafar as the Big Bad of the spinoff. So yeah, most of it is happening now, but also a lot of it has been in the works for a while.

Also, I like Maleficent's look more here than in season 1. The Brown and Purple just didn't gel with me. And Ursula was more like her Disney counterpart when Regina was playing her in season 3. Lana Parilla's Pat Carroll impression was dead-on IMO. Merrin Dungey ha a couple of CGI tentacles and some residual bitchiness.

edited 16th Dec '14 2:36:28 PM by Sisi

I loved the Pan arc. I've long believed that Peter Pan is the kind of character who could just as easily be the villain of the piece as the hero with a well-done Perspective Flip. The little boy who never wants to grow up is just as much an avatar of reckless irresponsibility and selfish indulgence as he is of freedom and enjoyment.

Also it gave us Hook, who is my absolute favorite character in this show. He's OUAT's Spike.

edited 16th Dec '14 2:07:53 PM by TobiasDrake

I wish Pan just at least looked more like Rumple's father.

But I like Hook too. Even though he's lived way past his story he still goes well with Emma somehow.

And I like how he interacts with modern technology.

I honestly think that after season 1 was a hit and the creators started getting access to more fairytales, they got more and more corporate control. and Disney is sort of a monster. so odds are this was probably inevitable in a Disney-owned fairytale show.

...also I really wish they hadn't killed off the Blue Fairy. I wish they'd done something more creative with her. it'd be nice to have some more good magic users around? yeah.

I know is magic happy, but I just think is way to much now, almost all villian use magic:Regina,rumple,cora,Pan,zelena and now Ingrid

And I just saw rumple talk with Ingrid...and yet again, his charm with the lady work as usual, you weren kidding about Rumple success with women, pretty good for a coward

In this show, a villain without magic against hero(es) with magic is just too much of an unequal fight unless the villain has an army at their back. Especially now that Regina's one of the heroes. Thus, we get villains who use magic.

edited 22nd Dec '14 8:58:11 PM by WarriorEowyn

Maybe, but there have be only magic user as villians, its seen there is no other way, but anyway it should get used to

In fact, the complaint about how male chararter dosent do anything in this show is because, rumple aside, all magic user have been women....

Now im not implying anything sexist, just that this show depends a little to much in magic to my liking

Van Helsing for Big Bad of Season 5. I've said it before and I'll say it again; Van Helsing leading a group of Horror-themed non magic-types would be an awesome and original lineup of villains we'd never see coming. I'll write up a Five Bad Band right now.

Big Bad: Van Helsing

The Dragon: The Invisible Man

Evil Genius and Token Good Teammate: Frankenstein (who gets roped in somehow)

The Brute: Mr. Hyde/Dr. Jekyll

The Dark Chick: Ichabod Crane or Dorian Gray

The Invisible Man was like searching for a magical cure from Rumple but was instead cursed to be permanently invisible. Ichabod or Dorian both walk away from their stories trapped or defeated by magic (ambiguously, in Ichabod's case) and Hyde's just out to prove science's superiority, and Van Helsing's all Knight Templar Burn the Witch! to everything.

But none of that will ever happen. :'(

edited 22nd Dec '14 11:23:44 PM by HisInfernalMajesty

That...is a really good idea. Not sure about the teammates aside from Van Helsing, but the general concept could be a strong plotline.

I was quite disappointed when "The Home Office" turned out to be Peter Pan rather than a Muggle organization that was aware of magic and sorcerers and wanted to fight against them. The former was a far more compelling idea to me - some X-Files-like government agency takes notice of Storybrook et al, regards them as a threat, and wants to deal with them.

edited 22nd Dec '14 11:57:25 PM by WarriorEowyn

I don't know if I added here or not, but the writers stated that they will give Cruella magic of some kind involving animals in some way. Personally I think it's some kind of animal mind control.

I liked the idea of them being sort of like Torchwood.

Finally finished the Mid-Season Finale.

Wow... I'm sort of impressed how they handled Rumple/Belle. I mean, sure, she's technically right for the wrong reasons about some things, but she throws him and his abusive relationship out.

I-... Brava Miss Belle.

Same. This is how I wanted Rumpel's lies, manipulations, and flagrant abuses of Belle's trust to end, but not how I expected it to. Good on you, Belle. And good on you, showrunners.

I'm curious as to where Rumple will go from here however.

He's lost his son, Belle, and his power, the three things he valued most.

That's a triple whammy of suckitude.

It looks like becoming the villain of season 4.5 is where he's going from here. His power and Belle are both things he can reclaim by force - or at least, believe he can, especially since it was his power that got him Belle in the first place - and I wouldn't necessarily discount his son as something he can try to take back by force either. Rumpel has hit rock bottom. From here, he can either a) try to fix his life by changing the ways that brought him here, or b) try to fix his life by force, and he looks to be going the latter route.

He is perfectly poised to find a way to return to Storybrooke, and when he comes back, it will be with a vengeance.

edited 26th Dec '14 10:00:13 AM by TobiasDrake

I just... don't know where this is going to end up going.

I mean, this is an interesting direction and it works. I just feel like it flies in the face of everything done in Season 1.5 to Season 3. Sure, evil Rumple is fine, but it feels like we past the point to actually be doing that kind of a plot. The Point of No Return was before Season 3 at least.

So, Belle and Rumple are broken up and I think he crossed the line of 'Why would you take him back' for Belle, so... did we really just perminantly break up Beauty and the Beast??? That... leaves an odd taste in my mouth.

Well, in the meantime, we need to develop Belle's character so she has something to do outside of Rumple. At the moment, her character entirely revolves around him. If he's going to be in the shadows for most of S4.5 and hopefully dealt with by the end, she needs something to evolve to.

Unless the plan on killing her off, which wouldn't surprise me, but that would be a very bad move.

Not sure what they're doing with Robin and Regina. I assume they're coming back, but it seems pointless in doing so because.... then leaving the town was just a forced clifhanger drama.

It's not like this show is a stranger to pointless cliffhangers.

Remember when Storybrooke had to be destroyed, returning everyone to the Enchanted Forest forever? The heart-wrenching last farewell to Emma and Henry, who would stay behind in the real world and never see any of them again?

And then the entire town was back one episode later?

It was a year for the characters.

and tbh, I think Emma needed that year. It's just sad that we saw so little of it from her perspective. it's really impacted Henry and Emma both tho, I think. Emma had a year where she was actually completely happy; Henry got raised by someone who wasn't Regina. and while those memories may not have been entirely real, they still feel real, I think.

...everyone got hugely impacted by this year and we saw so little of it is the major thing.