What Happened
The Fairytale Land (past)
- A young woman who looks as stressed as I felt during the midterms of my junior year arrives at her father's mill. He's lazy and she's annoyed, so she has no choice but to do the work herself and bring some bags of flour to the palace.
- At the palace, Princess Eva (Snow's mother!) trips the young woman, causing her to spill flour and snap at Eva. Princess Eva is being escorted by a Prince Henry and his father, the king. The king's a total jerk to the young miller's daughter, making her kneel to Eva and apologize for something that she didn't even do. We find out that the miller's daughter's name... is Cora!
- Cut to a party, but not just any party...a certain kind of party that a certain Andrew Lloyd Webber is fond of...a certain ball...
- That's right, Cora is sneaking in to a masquerade ball, just like the kind everyone dreams their prom will be themed after! Cora, looking stunning as ever in a wondrous shade of crimson, dances and flirts with the prince. It turns out this is a ball for the prince to be sold to whichever princess can offer the highest bid (apparently even medieval fantasty lands can have recessions). After Cora gives us the first use of the word "whoring" in the show's history, she trades partners and winds up with the king.
- The nasty king recognizes her as the miller's daughter. He plans to throw her out, since obviously she can't bid on the prince when she's poor herself. On a spur of the moment (and rather silly, but let's not get too judgy, I'm sure we've all said something dumb before when we've been flustered) decision, Cora proclaims she can spin straw into gold.
- If you haven't been ignoring Western Europe's medieval shenanigans for the last seven hundred years or so, you'll know what happens next. Cora winds up in a tower, locked with a roomful of straw that needs to be gold by the time the king hits his snooze button. Enter Rumpelstiltskin!!!
- He tells Cora that her name isn't very pretty and "sounds like something breaking," but he eventually agrees to teach her to spin straw into gold in exchange for her firstborn child.
"Sounds like EQUALISTS breaking!"
- We then are treated to a rather sensual (and well-made) scene where Rumpelstiltskin teaches Cora that magic is all about emotion. She needs to tap into her anger and think about what she wants...While Rumpelstiltskin gives her a massage, Cora spins gold.
- Cora proves herself to the King and gets to marry Prince Henry. We flash-forward to the night before her wedding. She and Rumpelstiltskin canoodle a bit, and Cora promises that any children she has by Rumpelstiltskin (ONLY by him) will belong to the deal-maker.
- After a conversation with the King that began with Cora intending to kill him and ended with Cora taking her own heart out ( having been told that love is weakness) Cora tells Rumpelstiltskin that she cannot run off with him. That's right, everyone...someone dumped Rump.
You Guys:
- I'm sorry, I couldn't resist, you guys...I was having too much PUN!
You Guys, Part II:
- Okay, now I'm done.
- Baby Regina gets a really fun "Lion King" moment when Cora lifts her up dramatically and everyone at court kneels to her.
Storybrooke (now)- Henry obnoxiously grins while he drives the boat back to town. Within, Emma tells a pained Rumpelstiltskin that they're "family now," so she won't let him die. I cannot tell you how much my mom and I shuddered as we watched this scene. It felt like I was watching a giant spider crawl across the screen...
- Meanwhile, Cora and Regina are listening to Snow and David talk on the phone using a wire tap. (I wonder how many conversation's Regina's heard... ) Cora pushes the wire tap to the ground with more nonchalant than the first Chalant of Non herself, annoyed at the silly "Enchanted Box."
- Before Regina can start explaining that possessed mirrors are no longer the preferred method of talking to your friends, Cora proclaims she needs to kill Rumpelstiltskin with the dagger before he dies of the poison from Hook's hook, or else she won't become the Dark One.
- The Manhattan team arrives back in town. They all squeeze into Rumpelstiltskin's store, where he helps Emma make defenses with invisible chalk.
that's also fueled by her emotions. Regina and Cora promptly bust through the spell, and while the fight
begins, Snow slips out to go on a secret mission: she must get Cora's heart, use the candle from last
episode (which Mr. Gold gave to her) on it, and then somehow put the heart back into Cora.
- While Snow whispers the name and gives the heart to Regina, who has teleported away from the fight briefly (Snow tells her that if Cora finally has a heart again, she will be capable of feeling love for her daughter), Rumpelstiltskin calls the amnesiac Belle and tells her that he loves her. "You find goodness in others, and when it's not there...you create it." That line was beautiful, I'll grudgingly admit.
Rumbelle Fans Everywhere:
The people supporting her are the Captain Swan, Swan Thief, and Wooden Swan fans coming together in a rare moment of camaraderie.
- Cora manages to make her way to Rumpelstiltskin after poofing Neil and Emma into the woods. (Swan Thief fans probably had a field day with that little set-up. I can see the fanfics now... "A Walk in the Woods: The Miller's Daughter Epilogue.")
- She tells him that the reason she took out her heart was because Rumpelstiltskin was Cora's only weakness- the only man she ever loved. Just then, Regina bursts in and shoves the heart into Cora. Cora loves her daughter for one brief moment before collapsing and dying on the ground.
- Snow bursts in, and Regina gives her a death glare of death and deceasement and termination and skulls-and-crossbones.
What I Thought
This was the first time in a long time that I realized my heart was beating faster because of what was happening onscreen. I'm guessing most of us narrowed the character marked for death to either Gold or Cora after the first fifteen minutes, but from that point on the show kept me guessing. I knew that no matter who died, the show would be making a bold move. If Rumpelstiltskin were to die, the show would be getting rid of one of its main protagonists and antagonists, along with the actor who arguably helped cement the show in viewers' minds. Robert Carlyle is one of the biggest reasons this show became popular, at least in my book. He took a character who most of us probably thought of as a silly little imp that didn't even have a Disney movie on his list of accomplishments, and made him into a morally complex, insanely intelligent, rather terrifying force of nature that should be reckoned with. With that in mind, killing him off would have been a tremendous risk that could have changed the course of "Once Upon a Time" forever...
...but with Cora's death, the show has gone down another dark road. Snow White- the first princess in Disney canon, a voice of reason and a symbol of purity and kindness, the mother of the show- has committed murder. People may argue Regina had a hand in it, but that's like saying that the waiter is to blame for an e. coli outbreak if the cook serves up under-cooked meat. Snow killed Cora. It may have been to protect her family and friends, and she probably killed people before in the war...but the lack of a battle setting is sure to make this stand out to her and to the people she knows.
Say what you will about her, but you certainly can't call Snow "passive" anymore.
This was gutsy of the show, considering the wide age range of the audience. I'm really pleased that the writers were allowed to do this, and I'm really looking forward to seeing how Snow develops from here on out. This was unpredictable, this was game-changing, and this was good character development that didn't feel forced. Give me more, "Once Upon a Time." Give me more.
My Score:
9/10.
That's for keeping us guessing and taking a chance that payed off.
My Questions:
-How is everyone going to react to this? Who will be judgy, who will be concerned, who will grit their teeth and tell her that she chose the lesser of two evils?
-Where is August and why doesn't anyone care?
-How many times this season has a heart been ripped out of someone's chest? Somebody needs to make a montage set to Taio Cruz's "Break Your Heart."
Next Episode:
Consequences...
(Disclaimer: As always, I've used a lot of gifs, memes, photos, and cultural references in this review/recap. None of them are mine! If you or someone you know owns/made own of the gifs/photos/etc., comment below and let me know- I'll take it down, if that's what you wish. I don't claim ownership of any of them, I just browse Tumblr and other websites for stuff that could fit into my blog and its reviews/recaps. Also, I own none of the media I reference. "Once Upon a Time" belongs to ABC , "The Phantom of the Opera" belongs to Andrew Lloyd Weber, "The Legend of Korra" belongs to Nickelodeon, "The Emperor's New Groove" belongs to Disney, "Game of Thrones" belongs to HBO, I don't know Jennifer Lawrence, etc., etc...I own nothing! This blog is for entertainment purposes only!!! Also, this show is written, acted, produced and made by people far more successful than me thus far in my life. I really do like it, and I only critique because I care! I know far less about the world than I pretentiously seem to.)
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