Once Upon a Time
Those words are the ever-clichéd openers to our most classic 'fairy tales' (which don't always involve fairies), but they also form the title to a very enthralling and exceedingly cleverly done show. This actually ties into my previous post rather nicely, because I have people on my speech team to thank for turning me onto this show. Well, it was in drama class one day last semester when there was a quite interesting discussion occurring about this series, and I was intrigued. (A lot of the same people were in drama class as were on the speech team.) I had heard of this series before, but drama class inspired me to go and watch it on the ever-magical Netflix, and I am so glad I did--it's an amazing series.
Before I go into talking about the series, I think I should first put this warning here: unlike I did with Macbeth, I'm not going to have all my spoiler alerts clearly marked in this post, so consider this a general spoiler alert warning for the post. I'm going to discuss what I know about the series so far, and so if you're watching it, then it will depend on how far in you are what constitutes a spoiler for you, and so I will just forewarn you, all my readership, that this post may contain spoilers for you. As of tonight (why did you watch Once Upon a Time tonight, Vivi, when you had blog posts to do? Well, I should warn you, this series is addicting. One must watch. One must know what happens. One must see what can possibly come next.) I have watched through season three, episode two of the series, but I also know a little more than I should because of what I heard in the original conversation regarding the series. I have known, from the outset, that Peter Pan is darkly evil and Captain Hook is only sort of evil and actually rather likeable, and, in the estimation of my fellow drama students, he is rumored to be quite attractive. Oh, and if I heard correctly, it sounds like he dies. In the conversation I overheard, it sounded like the group discussing the matter was lamenting his sad, tragic loss.
Of course, on this show, they have a clever tendency to make it appear as though someone is dead or lost, and the characters believe it is so, but then that character turns out to not be dead and reappears later to the astonishment of everyone. They have fooled me... well, at least once with this. At the moment Jiminy's the only example I can think of for this, but I feel sure there were others. So maybe he's not dead. I don't know the circumstances, only what I've heard, because I haven't seen this happen. I may have heard wrong, too; I'm not certain.
But that's one of the reasons this show is so great: it is exquisitely, intricately, cleverly, deviously done. Every milimeter of the plot is infinitesimally complex and shows the impressive intelligence of its writers. The character development is, from the outset, innately complicated, because they are developing two characters in one. You see, the basis of the show is that all these characters from the fairy tale land have fallen under a curse and transported to the modern world, where they don't know who they really are. Each episode has at least two storylines happening at once, typically one in the fairy tale land, technically referred to as "the enchanted forest", and one in the modern world, in their own fairy-tale-creature town, called "storybrooke" (hint hint everyone in the town is from stories hint hint). So one character is seen in two different time periods in two different worlds with two different lives at once, but they are still the same basic person, and so the characterization process goes on in their previous world and in their current world all at once. It's very smart, how they do it.
Another good thing about this series is how everyone has motives for everything. Also, not one single villain is ever pure evil. The wicked queen, a variant of who I portrayed today (though my variant was pretty wimpy and shallow and superficial and unintelligent next to her), does not hate Snow White simply because she is told that Snow is prettier than her, but rather because Snow was manipulated into giving up a secret Regina (the wicked queen's name; I know, she actually has a name besides 'queen', crazy, right?) had charged her with protecting, and because Snow was easily tricked into telling the secret, Regina's true love was murdered by her mother. (And, while Regina's mother, Cora, is literally heartless, even she isn't a flat, empty villain with naught but cruelty in her empty chest cavity. She once had a love, too, she just betrayed it herself. While Cora is understandable, though, her demise is not saddening or pitiable because she made all her own wrong choices and sank her own ship. She ripped out her own heart so she wouldn't choose love over power. She died regretful and sad, and it was directly a result of her own folly. (I'm like 99% sure she, for one, is genuinely irreversibly dead. Snow actually killed her. I'll get to that. Maybe. It's getting late.))
Rumpelstiltskin is my favorite quote-un-quote "villain". Actually, I find him more attractive than Hook, myself. I think he and Belle get their own blog post later. For now, suffice to express, en Caps lock, that I LOVE RUMPLESTILTSKIN AND BELLE TOGETHER!!!
The show makes sparing and well-done allusions to the "real"-world telling of the tales, as well. In the episode we most recently watched, Baelfire, Rumplestiltskin's son (biological, not pilfered in a deal involving straw and gold. We'll get to all that later. Maybe. If not, just watch the show, 'tis awesome.) is talking to Mulan about the movie she's in. To which she, being in the enchanted forest, replies, "what's a movie?". These little comparisons add light notes of humor and yet also ask the questions we want and need to be asked of what the characters think of our interpretations of them. Oh, and we also saw today Hook asking Emma (the central character and essential connection between the magic and non-magic worlds. She's the one who breaks the curse. Oh, yeah, by the way, the curse gets broken. Season one finale. Even before Hook comes along. This series is way too complex for this little blog post. I should've, like, had a plan going in or something. My blog posts are more sporadic and spontaneous than an improv performance. Anyway, watch the series. Then my blog post might make some measure of sense to you.) what the story interpretation of him looks like. He wants to know how attractive cartoon him is. Emma says something to the lines of, "well, he's quite attractive, if you like waxy mustaches and perms." Hook, cleverly gathering from her expression and tone of voice, replies, "I take it perms are a bad thing?" clearly befuddled and quite amusing to we, the audience who knows just what Emma's talking about.
This series is so awesome and intricate and wonderfully done, I could go on for many more blog posts summarizing and analyzing it and such, and I probably will do at least one more on Rumpel and Belle, but for now, I think I need to stop. I'm probably leaving you all more befuddled than a fairy-tale character in Maine, but perchance in this way you can gain some understanding of the story through your confusion. The Lande beyond the violet mist knows we are just one of many lands and mysterious places out and about, and today we admired a spectacularly done conglomeration of tales from other lands.
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