Once Upon a Time
is testing me with a whole lot of personal drama. Killian and David, David’s
father, Regina and Not!Robin with tragedy ensuing no doubt… I’d much rather cut
through some of this. Family angst gives me headaches
So let’s get that out of the way first. Robin continues
his plotting and takes the magic he has stolen from Regina to Zelena because
she wants to break out of Storybrooke and embrace his new future of being a
homeless man with a bow cowering in a corner overwhelmed with culture shock in
New York City. Zelena would also quite like to leave so they decide to make it
so
Regina isn’t a fool and notices Robin’s tampering in time
to join them at the border – but not stop them. If this is what Robin wants, so
be it. And she’s sympathetic to how hard it must be for Robin to adapt with
Storybrooke with everyone expecting him to step into the shoes of a man he most
certainly is not and even to have Regina following him around with puppy dog
eyes. It’s a pretty tough gig for Robin, I get that. Of course it doesn’t help
that robin appears to be a very unpleasant person and we all know how much he
will implode in the outside word
Still Regina agrees to help him. Of course she isn’t
stopping anyone from leaving – the protection spell is and Regina, so far, has
no idea how to remove it.
Zelena and Regina make peace afterwards with Regina having
another round of “it’s all my fault” now deciding she’s failed a test for not
being able to move on (aww c’mon it’s bad enough that the Robin thing blew up
in her face but for her then to use it to add to her “I failed and am terrible”
list) before another round of accepting responsibility for all her evil… and
then noticing the cobra that they turned the Evil Queen into has disappeared
She has caught up with Robin and using some carelessly
spilled potion, breaks the snake spell and is back. Ye
gods Regina can never ever get a break.
We also have Killian who is now So Sad because he
murdered Emma’s granddaddy and now he wants to tell her even though he doesn’t
have to because love. He speaks Archie who is really really annoying. Honestly
his chirpy endless positivity would drive me to drink.
He goes to confess all to Emma – but since she found the
ring he was going to give her (hey, where does Killian get his money from?) she
says “yes” and hijacks his whole confession into a proposal. Awkward.
Argh, moving on from this hot mess it’s time to look at the
ongoing issue around Gideon et al
So time for a bit more of Rumple’s back story back in the
Ogre Wars days. We see a battlefield and Beowulf leading his troops, convinced
he’ll win and be a hero because he has the sword Hrunting which totally
guarantees heroeness.
The problem is it doesn’t guarantee tactical capability –
so we have lots of people with swords attacking giants when they can’t even
reach the knees. They have few archers and really – no spears? I can’t help but
think some pikes or spears may be more useful here.
The battle doesn’t go really well but luckily in steps
Rumplestiltskin with his newly-minted Dark One powers who destroys the ogres.
All of them
We’re constantly told about the power of the Dark One but
I think this is the first time it’s been truly shown: Rumplestilskin is a
portable weapon of pin-point mass destruction.
He’s hailed as a hero for destroying this vast threat to
the kingdom – by everyone except Beowulf because he totally should have been
the hero.
Of course even hailed as a hero, his son Baelfire is
still bullied because his father is a freak. And his son also demands he stop
using magic because of course. Until the villagers report that a monster,
Grendel, is killing people and Beowulf hasn’t returned from killing the beast
so can the Dark One please deal with it, please thanks ‘kay? Baelfire says this
is now an excellent chance for Rumple to prove his heroism without magic
Really Rumple you should have left all these people in
your wake. I would have been sorely tired of them by now as well. This would
totally turn me evil.
So Rumple sets off but decides to make sure he doesn’t
chicken out and use his super duper powers to actually get shit done, he gives
his dagger to his son so he can control him
Rumple, if you had no more power than the ability to make
sarcastic comments, you still don’t hand the power to control you to a
teenager! Fail!Parent. Fail!!!!!
So Rumple arrives and they find out that actually there
is no Grendal, it’s just Beowulf killing people hoping to frame Rumple so he
can then set himself up as the hero he totally deserves to be. This guy needs
to look up the definition of heroism or just be slapped upside the head. He
points out, rightly, that absolutely no-one is going to believe the Dark One
over Beowulf
Instead after a bit of pass-the-parcel with the Dark One dagger (my gods people need to learn to hold on to that thing!) we end up with the dagger in Baelfire’s hands – who orders his dad to kill Beowulf. Behold my point on bad idea
Back home Rumple has Baelfire drink memory tea so he
forgets he just outright had his dad murder someone so he can live with that
and not have to go all dark side. He would rather his son hate him than
remember he did something that evil
And this is the story of Rumple that has been touched on occasionally but never really expanded but really touches on the passive purity of the Charmings as well
Here we have Rumple using dark magic to save people and
being repeatedly condemned for it afterwards. But these people all do turn to
him when they need his power, when they need his help. His power is useful when
people need something, people keep showing up on his doorstep when they need a
deal, people appeal to him when in danger – but then condemn him for his
darkness. In many ways he allows people to stay pure by taking the darkness
onto himself
This is the tone on which we look at the rest of his
painful episode
In the present, Rumple, Belle and Blue Fairy all look for
Gideon who still wants to bring down the Black Fairy (Rumple’s mother). Rumple catches
him trying to claim the hilt of his broken hero sword (this would be Hrunting,
it most certainly is) and promptly uses his vast terrifying power to kidnap
said son.
The then have a bonding moment in the clock tower where
Gideon describes how utterly awful his upbringing was, how the Black Fairy taunted
his helplessness and ability to stand up to her and save people, making him
feel weak, like a coward: very much like Rumple himself, yes the parallels are
there. Gideon wants to embrace the dark side so he will have enough power to
protect those he cares about.
Which sounds very very shiny until Gideon manages to
steal Rumple’s dagger – because Rumple just pulled his memory tea gambit. And
isn’t that classic Rumple? The easy way, the quick, magical fix. Because when
you have this much power it’s just so easy to use it for everything
Honestly someone needs to look at the security around
this dagger
He then orders rumple to not intervene while he goes to
reforge Hruntling, which involves killing the Blue Fairy who forged it (it’s a
hobby, but maybe she should look at whether fixing weapons requires the blood
of the blacksmith).
Rumple manages to join Gideon before he kills Blue… he
can’t stop Gideon and Gideon won’t listen to reason so he decides to kill Blue
for him. That way Gideon stays pure and good. Gideon is super happy, gives
Rumple back his dagger then leaves. Belle joins Rumple who, having had things
explained to her gushes all over Rumple who has been willing to do so much for
their son – even be totally evil so their son doesn’t have to. Why the fact he’s
willing to make this difficult decision shows there may be love and redemption
after all!
…um… the only reason you’re not saying this over Blue’s
body is because she was sucked into the sword. I don’t even know how to address
this. Doing evil which Gideon would do if you didn’t do it does not absolve
him! He’s still responsible for that death! He caused it, he forced it, he is
responsible for it! And praising Rumple for participating and giving some level
of seal of approval to the murder of Blue is… I have no words
Belle are you happy with Rumple being redeemable or are you just stooping to his level?!
This is so very broken I can’t even begin to grasp all
that is wrong with this
I do have to question the logic mind set as well. Rumple
offers to help. Ok, he wants to embrace the darkness so his son doesn’t have
to. Fine. But rather than reforge the sword, kill the Blue Fairy and go after
the Saviour, why not go after the Black Fairy with Rumple? The Dark One – the Uber
Dark One, we’ve just been reminded even when he was much weaker than he is now
he was still a weapon of mass destruction.
