First plot line this week is David and Killian. David has
been running around all sleep deprived, hallucinating about the ghost of his
dead father and resisting bringing Snow out of her curse so he can obsess over
this
It’s possibly you will remember that the Evil Queen
showed David that his father didn’t get killed while drunk and showed him his
dad’s lucky coin as proof.
This means lots of focusing on David’s past. Which I’m
sure everyone is super eager to be part of.
So way back when David’s poor poor family had twins but
couldn’t afford medication when they both became ill. Rumple shows up with
medication and offers to save one child in exchange for the other to offer King
George who is in need of a spare heir
This still makes more sense than the proposed American
healthcare system.
They accept and this is how evil twin David goes off with
King George while sappy twin James stays with the farmer and becomes the fluffy
tiresome Charming we know and loathe. His dad became an alcoholic, possibly in
response to losing his child, until he heard that king George was looking for
James: he’d been abducted. Dad decides to make things right by going to grab
the child they lost. I appreciate the sentiment but if you’re a self-admitted
useless dad to one son, I don’t think adding a second son to the mix is going
to do much more than make you twice as poor a father.
In the modern world this is where Killian and David team
up to try and find out what happened to his dad for the 3 members of the
audience who care. Killian has another motive – he wants David to approve of
him because he intends to propose to Emma; he’s worried that David doesn’t
accept he’s changed, still sees him as an evil pirate and generally isn’t good
enough for Emma
Ok conflicted feelings. I get Killian want to prove to
David – well, to everyone, but especially the Charmings since they’re held up
on the pedestal of goodness (except
that whole sacrificing of babies things – NEVER OVER THAT GUYS!) and
acceptance by them is like an official seal on Killian’s redemption. I can also
understand him wanting to be accepted by Emma’s family, that’s natural. But
this whole “father’s blessing” is such patriarchal bullshit. There’s no sense
of needing Snow White’s Blessing and she’s the Purest Baby seller of them all.
Never mind that Emma is the same age of David or he wasn’t there for any of his
childhood and barely. Never mind that Emma is a person.
I just loathe this trope. And I don’t care how old
fashioned Killian is, Killian knows Emma. He knows better
So Killian follows David around trying to prove he’s good
and redeemed – which David keeps delivering gut punches by telling him he needs
the amoral pirate which is why he turned to Killian. Ouch. He even has Killian
lie to Emma so he can steal some spell supplies. Ouch, double ouch.
Using magic (ineptly) and interviewing August for
memories from his Pleasure Island days – they get Daddy Charming’s history. He
went looking for James, refusing alcohol when offered, until Pinocchio (as
August was then) led him to James who had run away because he didn’t want to
become a knight. Daddy Charming tries to bring him home – but is intercepted by
king George. He pleads for his son – and George arranges for Daddy Charming to
be taken into the woods, covered in booze and murdered to look like a drunken
mugging. James ends up back with George.
David decides to go for a full revenge on George, wanting
to stab him to death (he’s currently imprisoned in Storybrooke) and Killian
desperately tries to stop him – for the sake of his family, his legacy and
because of Killian’s hard lessons about revenge not being healthy. David briefly
restrains him but eventually Killian stops David becoming a murderer and saves
George
David is pretty devastated – because his dad was a good
man, who resisted temptation, who did everything right and he still failed. It
wasn’t enough to win the goal.
And now to the endless heartbreak that is Regina. She has
her Robin but she’s beginning to doubt what that meant. Mary Margaret points
out to Regina that she has no idea who this Robin is, he could be anyone.
I agreed with Snow White.
They follow through other conflicts – like telling Robin
about the baby this Robin has which he doesn’t (Zelena is especially troubled
by this stranger swooping in and claiming parental rights over her baby –
though Robin doesn’t seem that bothered) which Regina insists on telling him in
the name of honesty. She also stops him from murdering the Storybrooke version
of the Sheriff of Nottingham. Regina has to talk him down from murder in the
name of revenge. This is a very different Robin even as Regina also has to
explaine she was totally in favour of dangerous magic and evil she’s now on the
path for redemption and it’s awesome.
And he kisses her
Tragically it means nothing – she describes it as kissing
a statue. Snow White was right
It also means Regina has yet again not got her happy
ending. Worse Robin steals some dangerous artefact from her so he clearly has
nefarious motives. Why
can Regina never catch a break?
Y’know, it occurs to me that this episode with David hits
some of the most annoying things I hate about the Charmings directly. Like
David saying how much he needs Killian to be the pirate: how long have the
Charmings existed while people around them do the grey areas and they stay
ready to be so pure that taking down an enemy causes them to take to their
beds?
But what especially annoys me is what David says to
Killian after Killian stops him killing George – that his father was a good man,
resisted temptation and it didn’t work. He didn’t get rewarded. And that sums
up Charming goodness in a nutshell: they get paid. They get the shinies from
being good. The whole philosophy of the Charmings, being good, hoping,
expecting nice things, being so damn PASSIVE and expecting goodness to just
shower rewards on you irks me no end. It’s easy to be good when you know you
will get a pay off for it. This is why I’m so much more invested in the
redeemed villains in this series – because they’re not going to get rewarded
(see Regina AGAIN) and generally I hate redemption storylines; but they know
they’re not going to get a pay off but they’re trying to be better people anyway.
The Charmings are good on the understanding they will be rewarded for it,
because that’s the RULES in their world. You’re good. You endure. Any bad stuff
you experience is temporary. Your reward is inevitable. Good gets a payday when
you’re a Charming. David can barely even concede of a good person not succeeding
because he was good
David is a grown man who has only just realised that the
World Is Not Fair.
