Season 1, Episode 1:
Pilot
Centric Characters: Prince Charming, Snow White
Next: The Thing You Love Most
Rumplestiltskin: The Queen has created a powerful curse, and it's coming. Soon you'll all be in a prison, just like me, only worse. For your prison, all of our prisons, will be time. For time will stop and we will be trapped someplace horrible where everything we hold dear, everything we love, will be ripped from us while we suffer for all eternity, while the Queen celebrates victorious at last...No more happy endings.
Mary Margaret: Look, I gave the book to him because I want Henry to have the most important thing anyone can have: hope. Believing in even the possibility of a happy ending is a very powerful thing.
FLASHBACK! In the Enchanted Forest, Snow White is awoken from her sleeping curse by Prince Charming's True Love's Kiss, and subsequently are married. The wedding is crashed by the Evil Queen who proclaims that she will end their happiness before vanishing.
Evil Queen: My gift to you is this happy, happy day. For tomorrow, my real work begins. You've made your vows, now I make mine. Soon, everything you love, everything all of you love, will be taken from you. Forever. And out of your suffering will rise my victory. I shall destroy your happiness, if it is the last thing I do.
Ten-year-old Henry Mills arrives in Boston on a Greyhound, reading the same story from a book. Meanwhile, Emma Swan goes on a date, although the lucky lad soon finds out he's been set up: Emma is a bail bondsperson, and easily apprehends him having booted his car beforehand. She returns to her apartment to celebrate her twenty-eighth birthday alone, with a single cupcake. No sooner has she blown out the candle than someone knocks at her door, revealed to be Henry. He pushes past her, saying that he is her son who she gave up for adoption ten years prior. Frustrated and disbelieving, Emma agrees to go with him to his hometown of Storybrooke, Maine, if only to return him and leave.
FLASHBACK! Some months after the wedding, the now-pregnant Snow White is concerned about the Queen's vengeful promise, and convinces Charming to pay a visit to 'him', as doing so can guarantee the safety of their unborn child.
On the way to Storybrooke, Emma questions Henry about his storybook, which he claims to be nonfictional. He tells her that she is in the book, which only garners more Deadpan Snark.
FLASHBACK! Snow and Charming arrive to an underground cell, where Rumplestiltskin is being held. Although a guard warns them to hide their identities, Rumplestiltskin already knows who they are and why they have come. He tells them that the Queen is preparing a curse, which will trap everyone in a prison of time where everything they love will be taken away, but that their unborn child is the only one who can defeat the Queen, and will seek them out on her twenty-eighth birthday. In exchange, Snow fulfills Rumplestiltskin's request of knowing the child's name: Emma.
Arriving in Storybrooke, Henry refuses to tell Emma his home address, but they soon encounter Henry's therapist Dr. Archie Hopper, who directs her to the Mayor's house and tells Henry that it's important to stay honest. After they continue Henry insists that Hopper is cursed with the rest of the town, his true identity being Jiminy Cricket. Cue yet more Deadpan Snarking.
Emma: Right. The lying thing. Thought your nose grew a little bit.
Henry: I'm not Pinocchio!
Emma: Course you're not. 'Cause that would be ridiculous.
Henry: I'm not Pinocchio!
Emma: Course you're not. 'Cause that would be ridiculous.
FLASHBACK! At Snow and Charming's castle, a councilnote discusses how to combat the Queen and her curse. After some arguing, the Blue Fairy arrives with a tree trunk, telling them that it is enchanted and tasks Geppetto with making it into a cabinet, although it comes with the flaw that it can only protect one person from the curse.
Emma returns Henry to Mayor Regina Mills* , who shares a drink and a chat with Emma while Sheriff Graham makes sure Henry's okay. Emma assures Regina that she doesn't mean to intrude on their relationship and will be leaving to Boston promptly. However, her plan to do so is derailed when she sees Henry has left the storybook in her car, and crashes after trying to dodge a wolf at the city line.
FLASHBACK! As Geppetto and Pinocchio prepare the cabinet, Charming tries to convince Snow that she has to be the one to use the cabinet, even though it would mean separating from him for twenty-eight years. Snow suddenly goes into labor as a dark purple and green cloud begins to engulf the landscape: the curse taking effect.
Emma wakes up in a holding cell at the Storybrooke Sheriff Department, where she meets Leroy* and Marco* before Regina arrives to talk to Graham about Henry running off again, and being angrily shocked to see Emma is still in town. Emma promises she had nothing to do with it as indicated by her current location and offers to help find him. After finding that Henry's erased all his emails, Emma uses a recovery tool to find that he recently used a credit card belonging to his teacher, Mary Margaret Blanchard* . They go to the school, where Regina harshly demands information from Mary Margaret, but only gets angrier and storms out upon hearing that Mary Margaret gave Henry the storybook. Emma shares a gentler conversation with Mary Margaret, who suggests that Emma look for Henry at his castle.
FLASHBACK! Right as the cabinet is finished, and with the curse fast approaching, Snow finishes her Maternity Crisis and convinces Charming to send the baby through the cabinet alone. The Queen's soldiers arrive at the castle, and Charming is forced to fight his way to the cabinet, receiving stabs to the shoulder and abdomen in the process. Just before fainting from blood loss, Charming gets Emma into the cabinet where she vanishes.
Emma finds Henry at a castle-shaped playground and returns his book. He begs her to not return him to Regina and leave, saying that life sucks with her, to which Emma returns with her own childhood: as a baby she was left by a freeway and her first foster family sent her back to the system at age three after having a child of their own. She tells Henry that even if he doesn't feel that Regina loves him, he should at least be grateful that he's wanted. Henry tries to tell her that the freeway is not where she was abandoned but where she was transported to from the Enchanted Forest, but she doesn't have it.
FLASHBACK! Snow gets to the workshop where she finds the fallen Charming. The Queen materializes and taunts her.
Evil Queen: Oh, don't worry, dear. In a few moments you won't remember you knew him, let alone loved him.
Snow: Why did you do this?
Evil Queen: Because this is my happy ending.
Snow tells her that Emma has escaped the curse and will be her downfall, but the Queen remains unfazed and triumphant as the curse fills the room.Snow: Why did you do this?
Evil Queen: Because this is my happy ending.
Returning Henry home again, Regina is extremely hostile to Emma and goes so far as to give her a death threat. Emma responds simply by asking if Regina loves Henry, which she affirms. At the Storybrooke General Hospital, Mary Margaret leaves flowers for various patients, including a John Doe. Emma, feeling spiteful towards Regina, decides to check in to Granny's Bed and Breakfast for a week, where she meets a mysterious man named Mr. Gold* , who is there to collect rent from Granny and comments that Emma's name is lovely. As Emma accepts her room key, the clock tower, which had been frozen at 8:15 for decades, moves forward to 8:16.
Tropes
- Action Girl: Snow White is immediately hinted to be this. Emma as well, even in that dress.
- Adorably Precocious Child: How Henry appears to most viewers, with his little badass bookworm look, his optimistic boldness, and his vulnerability.
- Apple for Teacher: In the premiere episode, Mary Margaret Blanchard (the former Snow White banished to the real world with Fake Memories) receives a pear from one of her students. According to a later episode, Mary Margaret doesn't like apples for reasons she has never been able to pin down.
- Badass and Baby: Charming is forced to fight his way through an army of mooks all while he's holding and protecting his new born daughter, Emma.
- Ballroom Blitz: The Evil Queen crashes Snow White and Prince Charming's wedding.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Snow White looks perfectly sweet. Until the queen tries to ruin her wedding.
- Creepy Child: Henry can be a bit creepy in this episode, especially since if you're new coming into the series; his utter confidence in the curse can be rather unsettling. However, he manages to be cute and vulnerable enough for you to like him and root for him.
- The Cynic: Emma, as opposed to her parents.
- Deadpan Snarker: How Emma appears for most of the episode.
- Dramatic Irony: When Emma sadly admits how her own parents abandoned her on a highway, it's Henry who points out what the audience knows, that her parents actually sent her through the wardrobe for her own protection.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: As the pilot episode, there are a number of details here that seem...odd in the context of the rest of the show. Most jarring is Snow's claim that Regina hates her "because I was prettier than her", which while a reference to being the "fairest of them all", a later episode in the season would reveal, Regina has a very different motive for hating Snow, and Snow most definitely knows it by this point in the timeline. No reason for this particular discrepancy has ever been given.
- In a purely cosmetic detail, the cloak Red wears at the Council of Good is much lighter and thinner than the richer, heavier version later on, and is also missing the embroidery. This is especially noticeable in "Red Handed" and the final two episodes of the season (which shows the Council when it is first forming).
- Emotionless Girl: Emma, until her penultimate scene.
- Establishing Character Moment:
- Emma gets two. The first is when she knocks out a fugitive by slamming his head against his steering wheel. The second is when she's alone in her apartment, blowing out the candle on her birthday cupcake.
- Snow's quip, "To be honest, the glass coffin gave me pause," and, especially, unsheathing Charming's sword and brandishing it at Regina at their wedding, establish that she is going to be less meek than some previous versions of Snow White.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: At the Council of Good, Granny can be seen crocheting Emma's baby blanket. Not only does this give her more reason to be there and part of Snow White and Charming's story, it makes it even more resonant that it's her bed-and-breakfast Emma decides to stay at in Storybrooke.
- Genre Savvy: While he's imprisoned in a cell, Rumple directs all the information to Snow; Charming is too busy insulting him and refusing to make deals - Snow, on the other hand, is making deals and, more importantly, getting shit done by getting all the information she and Charming and everyone else need, which is exactly what Rumple wants.
- Hourglass Plot: The episode begins and ends in this manner. The story began with Snow White lying unconscious in a glass coffin, while Charming was in a position to save her. The story ends on the note that the roles are reversed in Storybrook: Charming (presently John Doe) lies in a coma in an enclosed room of glass, while Snow White (Mary Margaret) is in a position to help him somehow.
- The Idealist: Charming compared to Snow White, who is still an idealist but suffering from doubt.
- If You Thought That Was Bad...: Played for Drama. During their conversation at the Castle playground, Henry tells Emma not to take him back to Regina because, as far as he's concerned, life with her "sucks". In response, Emma momentarily loses her composure and sadly lets him know her life was worse. She tells him how she was found on a freeway as a baby instead of left at a hospital, taken in by the foster system, and sent back by her foster family at the age of 3 when they got a child of their own. The way Emma sees it, Henry doesn't have a leg to stand on if a rich, caring adopted mother is his idea of a terrible childhood.
- I'm Standing Right Here: Non-comedic example. Mary Margaret tells Emma that Henry, like all adopted children, struggles with a basic question: "Why would anyone give me away?" She promptly apologizes when it hits her that she just said that to Henry's birth mother.
- Insistent Terminology: Emma is a bail bondsperson.
- Meaningful Echo:
- Archie tells Henry that giving into his dark side is always a bad idea, and then Jiminy Cricket says the same thing to Charming.
- In the flashback, Charming and Snow White agree that letting Emma be the one to enter the Enchanted Wardrobe is all they can do to giver her her best chance. Likewise, in Storybrook, Henry wisely recognizes that Emma put him up for adoption for the very same reason, to give him his "best chance" for happiness.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Emma doesn't believe Henry at all (about Storybrooke being a fairy tale and about Regina being an evil queen) and is about to leave town. Then Regina gets so over-the-top in threatening her if she tries to steal Henry (which, again, wouldn't have been a problem anyway) that she decides whatever's going on in Storybrooke is worth looking into.
- Offscreen Teleportation: Mr. Gold seemingly appears behind Emma in the inn without any of the three people present seeing or hearing him. Granted, Granny and Ruby were distracted by their argument and Emma wasn't really looking out for him, but it's still pretty impressive, considering that he doesn't have magic (especially as, right before he appears, Granny was staring right at Emma, and therefore should have noticed Mr. Gold approaching).
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Emma gives one to her "date".
- Sanity Slippage: It's terribly clear that confinement hasn't exactly done... anything good... to Rumplestiltskin's sanity. Though given later developments in the series, he was probably playing this up a bit.
- Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Or it would have, if not for Regina's smokey misty dematerializing thing.
- Charming probably didn't intend for it to work, seeing as he shouted "HEY!" to make her turn around before throwing it. The action was more of a threatening warning to her than an actual assassination attempt.
- True Love's Kiss: The episode opens with the famous scene of Prince Charming waking Snow White with a kiss.
- Villain Ball: Emma would've simply dropped off Henry and never looked back on Storybrooke. But thanks to Regina's thinly-veiled death-threat to Emma, the latter finds it a red-flag that perhaps she's not the suitable adoptive parent she thought she was.
- Women Are Wiser: Averted. Snow White Hot-Blooded-ly tries to attack the Queen, while Prince Charming tries to talk things out.
