Recap / Once Upon A Time In Wonderland S 1 E 8 Home

Back when Alice and Cyrus were together in Wonderland, Cyrus and Alice once went on a date to see the falling stars of Wonderland. As they sat under the stars, Alice noticed a small compass that Cyrus carried. Cyrus revealed that this compass was a gift from his mother, which used to direct him back home to her. Alice is surprised to learn that Cyrus was not always a genie but was once an ordinary man who was cursed to live in a genie bottle. They were suddenly attacked by three men hunting for a genie. Alice managed to fight them off but was seriously wounded.

Today in Wonderland, Alice and the Knave watch as the Red Queen’s guards search the forest for Cyrus. Alice tells Will that she and Cyrus had a safehouse in Wonderland, and that must be where Cyrus is headed.

As Cyrus runs through the forest, he is caught in a vine trap that hoists him off the ground. Cyrus' struggles are overheard by Tweedledum, who can hear what is going on through the grapevine. As he goes off to tell the Red Queen, he sees his brother sneaking around and carrying something suspicious, which he then hands off to Jafar.

Tweedledum goes to the Red Queen and tells her everything. She is very upset when she hears that Tweedledee gave something to Jafar. The Queen then looks inside a box where she had been keeping the genie bottle and finds it to be empty.

Alice tells Will that they need to talk to the White Rabbit and arrange to get out of Wonderland as quickly as possible after they find Cyrus. Will doesn’t think they can trust the Rabbit, since they know he has been working for the Red Queen, but Alice is sure that he wouldn’t have betrayed them without a reason.Alice remembers that back when she was wounded by the genie-hunters, Cyrus carried her to the White Rabbit’s house, and the Rabbit’s wife helped heal her with a poultice.

The Red Queen catches Cyrus and puts him in her coach. She drives away with him, telling him he will soon be reunited with his bottle.

Jafar is about to add the third genie bottle to his collection, but when he examines it closely, he realizes that it is a fake. Infuriated at being thwarted, he smashes the bottle.

The White Rabbit’s house appears to be abandoned, with an overgrown lawn and vegetables that have gone bad, but Alice suspects that the Rabbit is only pretending to be away to mislead anyone who might come after him. Sure enough, when Alice kicks open the door she finds the Rabbit inside, looking very woebegone.

White Rabbit: Do what you want with me. Everyone else has.

When Alice tells him they will need his help to get out of Wonderland with Cyrus, the White Rabbit explains that the Red Queen has been holding his family hostage. This is the reason why he betrayed Alice, and if he helps Alice and Cyrus escape, the Queen will blame him for it. Alice suggests that they save his family first, but the White Rabbit has no idea where they are being kept. This gives Will an idea.

Will/Knave: I might not know where the Queen stashed something important, but I do know where Anastasia might.

Meanwhile, The Red Queen takes Cyrus to an abandoned caravan. Hidden inside beneath a pile of old clothes and knickknacks is the real genie bottle. The Red Queen shows Cyrus the bottle, and tells him he has a big decision to make.

With dread, Cyrus thinks back to how the rabbits saved Alice. Though Alice would recover, the White Rabbit had told Cyrus that their adventurous lifestyle should not continue, for Alice’s safety. Cyrus assured the Rabbit that Alice had agreed to it, but the White Rabbit said that if his family were in danger, he would do anything to protect them, and what Alice really needed was a safe place to call home.

At the Red Queen’s castle, Jafar storms in, staff in hand. To Jafar’s surprise, the palace is practically abandoned. All he finds is a box with his name on it. When he opens the box, he finds Tweedledee’s head inside.

Tweedledee: I think she’s on to us!

Jafar searches the Queen’s room and takes one of her golden hairs from her comb. Then he flies away on his carpet and destroys the castle.

As Anastasia rides away with Cyrus in her coach, she sees her castle crumbling from a distance.

Cyrus: Jafar’s on your side of the board, your majesty. It looks like you’re running out of moves.

Anastasia/Red Queen: He may have destroyed a few pieces, but in the game of chess there’s only one queen, and she’s more important than them all put together.

Cyrus: Perhaps. But it doesn’t look like Jafar’s playing games.

Anastasia/Red Queen: Neither am I. Now tell me, where is Alice?

Cyrus: Why would I ever tell you that?

Anastasia/Red Queen: Because she’s going to be found. The only question is whether it’s going to be by him…or us. The choice is yours

Cyrus remembers that after the White Rabbit warned him about the danger he was putting Alice through, he visited the Caterpillar and asked to make a deal with him, offering his magical compass in exchange for a way to disappear.

Alice, Will, and the White Rabbit arrive at the abandoned caravan. Will explains that he and Anastasia used to live in the caravan when they first came to Wonderland. It made for a great hiding place. Though the genie bottle is already gone, Will finds the White Rabbit’s family hidden in the wagon. The Rabbit family is reunited, and the White Rabbit offers to take Alice wherever she wants to go. Alice asks to go to the Outlands, where she says Cyrus will be going.At the same time, Cyrus tells Anastasia that Alice will be looking for him in the Outlands. As they ride along, Cyrus tries to analyze Anastasia, and figure out what she really wants. As a genie, Cyrus has a gift for reading people, but Anastasia’s motives are still hidden.

In his magical laboratory, Jafar uses the strand of Anastasia’s hair to create a tracer cloud to hunt her down and kill her.

In the past, after Alice reassured Cyrus that she still wanted to keep adventuring with him, he showed her what he had got for her: a magical tent, invisible from the outside but a comfortable place to live on the inside. This tent could serve as their safehouse that they could always return to between adventures.Alice’s group arrives at the Outlands and Alice takes them to the invisible tent. Unfortunately, there’s no sign of Cyrus. Alice and Will start arguing over what happened and what they should do next, but then Cyrus arrives, and he and Alice are finally reunited. Alice hugs Cyrus passionately, but is soon shocked to see that the Red Queen is there too. Cyrus says she’s going to help them, but Alice and Will are dumbfounded by this news. Anastasia points up at the tracer cloud and warns them that Jafar is after them. She says she is no longer partnered with Jafar, but Will refuses to believe anything she says.

Anastasia/Red Queen: We can argue all we like when we get out of Wonderland, but for now, dig, bunny!

Will/Knave: I’m not going anywhere with her.

(Thunder rumbles)

Cyrus: We may not have a choice.

Alice: What if Will’s right? What if this is an elaborate ruse?

Anastasia/Red Queen: Alice, what more do you want me to do?! I brought you a bloody genie!

Alice: You took him from me too!

Anastasia/Red Queen: Alice, you need to trust me.

Alice: I will never trust you.

Cyrus: Alice… (he reaches for her hand)

Alice: (Softly) Tell me why. Why you did all of this? Why you made an alliance with a madman, and I’ll go. But I need a reason. I need something.

Anastasia/Red Queen: …I thought he could get me what I want.

Alice: And what was that?

Will/Knave: You’ve got everything! What more could you need?

Anastasia/Red Queen: You, Will. I wanted you. I want you back.

Will/Knave: More lies.

Anastasia/Red Queen: No, I’m telling the truth now, I’m telling the truth.

Will/Knave: You had me. All of me. My heart, my soul, my life, and you tossed me aside like a piece of rubbish. All for a little red crown.

Anastasia says she has seen her mistake, and that the reason she allied with Jafar was in the hope that by rewriting the laws of magic she could change the past and go back to a time when Will still loved her. Will listens to her pleading and tears without even a flicker of emotion. After all the pain he suffered from her betrayal, he refuses to love her again. Unfortunately, all this time spent arguing has allowed the tracer cloud to get dangerously close.

Anastasia/Red Queen: You don’t have to accept my apologies, but you do have to accept my warning. The genie’s here, the bottle’s here, the wish is here. What do you think Jafar’s gonna do when he arrives, eh?

Alice: We’ll go, and you’ll have to answer to him!

Anastasia/Red Queen: No, ‘cause you’re forgetting something. I have the bottle.

Alice: (Drawing her sword) Which I’ll gladly relieve you of!

Anastasia/Red Queen: (Disarms Alice with a spell) Alice, there is no time to fight, there’s only time to die. We need to leave. We have to leave! Please, I’m telling the truth!

Alice and Will still refuse to trust Anastasia, but Cyrus suddenly does. He senses that this was Anastasia’s secret wish that he nearly sensed when they were riding in the coach together. Convinced enough for the moment, Alice yells for the Rabbit to take them anywhere away from here, but it’s too late. The tracer cloud is in range, and it unleashes it’s lightning bolt at the Red Queen. She deflects the bolt with the genie bottle, but the bolt bounces and hits Will. As Will collapses in agony, so does Alice, as a result of her first wish that if the Knave died, so would she. Cyrus begs Alice to use her last wish to save herself, but she refuses to put Cyrus back in the bottle. Fortunately, Will remembers that Alice had promised him her last wish if he reunited her and Cyrus, meaning the last wish is his to make. Will wishes for Alice’s suffering to end.

There is a flash of magic, and Alice recovers. To Cyrus’ amazement, he remains outside instead of going back in the bottle, and the genie bracelets disappear from his wrists, signifying that he is free and no longer a genie. The White Rabbit realizes that Alice’s suffering was caused by her and Cyrus not being able to be together, so when Will wished for her suffering to end, the wish cured Cyrus of being a genie! Overjoyed, Cyrus looks for the Knave, but Will is nowhere to be seen. As the group looks around in dismay, they also realize the genie bottle has disappeared.

Will wakes up to find himself trapped inside the bottle as the new genie. The bottle floats away down the river and over a waterfall.

Tropes

• Be Careful What You Wish For: Alice’s first wish that she would die if the Knave died finally comes back to bite her. When Will is struck by lightning, Alice starts to die too, and only another wish is able to save her.
  • Zig-Zagged with Will’s wish. As Alice is dying, Will wishes to end her suffering, which could easily be misinterpreted as wishing for her to die while doing nothing to save Will’s life, but surprisingly, Will’s wish saves him, Alice, and Cyrus. However, Alice had noted that the bigger the wish, the bigger the consequence, and as a result of his big wish, Will is forced to become the new genie of the bottle.
• Benevolent Genie: Despite Will’s wish being very poorly phrased, it is interpreted in almost as positive a way as possible, saving his and Alice’s life and freeing Cyrus from being a genie. The only consequence is that it forces Will to become the new genie, but the wish was still far more beneficial than negative, considering he was moments away from dying. ^note  It’s possible that the wish had to work this way due to a paradox: Will’s wish could not kill Alice, because a genie’s master is not allowed to wish for someone to die, and if Alice lived, Will had to live too, or this would contradict Alice’s wish that if the Knave died, she would die too, which would create a paradox.
• Caught in a Snare: Cyrus gets caught in a vine trap that hoists him off the ground.
• Freeing the Genie: Will's wish ends up accidentally freeing Cyrus, but it causes Will himself to become bound to the genie bottle.
• Heel–Face Turn: The Red Queen abandons Jafar completely and brings Cyrus to be reunited with Alice.
• I Have Your Wife: The Red Queen has been holding the Rabbit family hostage to coerce the White Rabbit to do her bidding.
• Off with His Head!: Tweedledee loses his head as punishment for spying for Jafar. This doesn’t kill him though.
• Properly Paranoid: The Red Queen has a copy made of the genie bottle which she keeps locked in her closet as a decoy. When Jafar tries to steal the bottle, he ends up getting the fake bottle while the Red Queen keeps the real one. When she learns that he has stolen the fake bottle, she abandons her castle, knowing it’s only a matter of time before Jafar finds out she tricked him and comes after her.
• The Reveal: The Red Queen’s motives are finally revealed. Her reason for wanting to rewrite the laws of magic was so she could change the past and go back to a time when Will still loved her.
• Shoot the Messenger: Averted, but mentioned by the Red Queen when she tells Tweedledum to get away from her before she lashes out at him for giving her bad news.
• Talking Is a Free Action: Downplayed. Because Alice and Will don't trust Anastasia, they spend several minutes arguing while the tracer cloud approaches. Though the cloud gives them plenty of time to talk, it ends up striking before they can get out of Wonderland.
• Villainous Breakdown: Jafar starts to go through one when he realizes that the Red Queen has tricked him.
• World of Pun: News of Cyrus being caught in a vine trap is spread “through the grapevine.”