No I can’t hold it in anymore. People who complain that Emma and Killian got boring after they got together (mainly season 5 and 6 and mainly Emma) are my biggest pet peeve.
Emma’s rough exterior was because she experienced a lifetime of trauma. She was constantly abandoned/cast aside by people she cared about. For 28 years she believed her parents gave her up, and for her entire childhood she was living in the foster system or on the streets. When she was still a literal child she was betrayed by a person she loved and was sent to prison pregnant where she sat in that trauma for eleven months without a semblance of justice. She was hardened at such a young age and as seen in the show, it manifested itself into impenetrable walls that made her closed off and snippy. Yes, she was a badass when she chopped down Regina’s apple tree and slammed that guy’s head into a steering wheel (he really deserved it). But many of her badass interactions were because of her walls that made her so closed off. She only had herself to rely on, so obviously all of the stunts she pulled looked so awesome because she only had herself and her strength that was created through years and years of trauma.
What’s cooler? A person scaling a cliff all by themself without help of any kind, or a person using ropes and a partner or many partners to achieve the same result? Many people would choose the first one. But what’s safer? The second. It may not look cooler, but there’s no doubt in my mind that the second person would feel completely safe with people to rely on. And then if you put yourself in that situation, you would choose help. Right?
Well when Emma realized that she had that help (mainly in season 4/5), she damn well took that help.
“The only one who saves me is me.” That quote has Emma coolness written all over it, but her tone of voice when she says “Hook” right before just shows how surprised she was that people- that HE actually came back to save her. AGAIN, no less. In New York, she looked genuinely surprised when he said “I came back to save you” because nobody had come back for her before. Absolutely nobody.
Emma is a badass and will always be a badass, but her hesitance to trust anyone and everyone makes her appear MORE badass because she only had herself. Then, she suddenly didn’t have to rely on herself anymore when she got closer to Killian (yes, she did have her parents before, but even then the only thing on her mind was to run far away and take Henry with her because it was safer. And because it was safer, she would have less fear about being put in a situation where she had to trust other people to do something that she previously only did for herself. ‘You want something done right, you have to do it yourself’)
AND THATS NOT EVEN COUNTING THE EMOTIONAL ASPECT.
Scenes where Emma opened up in season 1-most of 3 is like finding an emotional needle in a trauma infused haystack. She only opened up because she had to, and ‘had to’ most commonly meant ‘to get her son back’. She opened up about feeling like an orphan because she needed a magical map to find her son. She told Neal she wished he was dead because she had to unlock a cage, or else her son wouldn’t have a father, not because she wanted to. She didn’t want to face all the trauma he caused her, but she had to. She opened up to Henry in season 1 about a foster family giving her up because she couldn’t deal with how he was complaining about a family that she desperately wanted. It was a necessity for her to make Henry understand that his life was not unfair. (Though that was before Regina acted like a total bitch to her).
But then when she and Killian got together, or even just got closer to each other, she was opening up to him so much and it made her both more vulnerable, but also stronger emotionally, and being able to be emotionally vulnerable IS badass and such a big step for Emma. Compared to her in season 1, season 4 Emma wouldn’t even recognize herself because look at all the people she trusts and relies on. And not just her family, this random eyeliner-wearing-hook-for-a-hand dude who thinks she’s enough purely because she’s HER. The random dude who’s first priority is HER. Emma has never had that in her entire life. She has never been put first like that, and it must’ve been so amazing for her to be put first by a person who doesn’t need to do so because they’re family, but because she’s HER and he loves HER.
Flash forward to the end of season four, she sacrificed herself to the darkness and trusts the people who love and care about her to save her. THAT IS SO BIG FOR EMMA. THAT IS SO BADASS.
And I feel like the same people who believe that Emma and Killian got boring during and after these seasons neglect to realize that it was fricking traumatic. I always imagined the darkness as something that latches on to a person’s suffering and abuses it to their own agenda: to snuff out the light. (Which is exactly what it did to Killian). Emma had that darkness inside of her for the first half of season five and we all saw the tole it took on her. I know some people don’t like how Emma’s voice changed a bit, but that’s how a person who is empty sounds. She was tired and terrified and had to rely on Killian and her family to help her, and Killian was there for her at every step of the way and he helped get rid of the voice inside of her head.
Yes, Henry has always been a rock in her life, but in that season Killian was a fortress that she could lock herself away in and feel safe and loved during a time where she was constantly reliving her suffering.
And then she loses that fortress. One minute he was standing there with the utmost support and the next he was on the floor dying and she was so terrified of losing him that she turned him into the one thing he was desperate to destroy. And then she has to live with this internal conflict of lying to him to preserve the man she loves because she knows he would hate her for doing that to him. But of course she doesn’t want to lie to him, but she doesn’t want to lose him either because she won’t know how to go on.
That changes a person, and I think because OUAT is a magical show, there’s a tendency to downplay the trauma characters go through because it’s magical and it couldn’t happen in real life. It’s difficult to put yourself in the character’s shoes because it requires a lot of imagination to do so. Emma has spent months creating a relationship with Killian. She’s opened herself up in ways that she has never done before and suddenly he’s ripped away from her emotionally because the darkness took control over him, but she was so terrified of losing him that she settled for his physical presence.
That is so fucking traumatic. And because Emma is starting to completely open up, it hurts so much more because she doesn’t have walls to protect her.
And then she has to kill him, and he dies in her arms. The person she’s grown to love and care about dies in her arms and the amount of guilt and sorrow she felt clearly crushed her as seen in the scene of her lying on the couch, holding the ring he gave her, in what was supposed to be the place where she and Killian would live together- the life she wanted so much that she turned him into a dark one to keep him with her. And dark one Killian said a lot of messed up stuff to her (let’s be honest he was self-projecting) that definitely affected her.
Then she finds out that Killian’s entire death was for nothing so she goes back to save him. And she sees the torture and pain he endured because she made him a dark one and that guilt is probably so crushing, and amplified by the fact that she dragged her entire family down here including her son to save him because she was so desperate to see him again.
But when she finally has him back, it’s realized that he can’t go back to the living. She will never get to have that life with him that she wanted and it crushed her.
Yes, at the end of it all, she gets him back in the graveyard, but all of that trauma doesn’t go away.
In no way shape or form should Emma be the same exact person she was after living through that. In no way shape or form should she be EXPECTED to be the same snappy-comeback-armor wearing-badass she used to be because of that emotional and physical trauma she went through.
She is not boring because she relies on other people, and she’s not boring because she’s showing exhaustion or being less ‘badass’ than she used to be. The girl needs a break. She needs a break from the constant bombardment of villains and curses and trauma and in those little moments when she’s alone with Killian, she gets that break and it’s seen every time she smiled and her eyes soften at him. That’s her being happy, not boring. I would so much rather have Captainswan be happy and ‘boring’ than ‘badass’ and severely traumatized because haven’t those guys been through enough?
I didn’t even get to Killian who could fill the ocean with his trauma , but honestly most of the boring comments I’ve seen are directed towards Emma and it makes me so mad because she needs to REST. So what if Killian isn’t as flirty as he was in early seasons. it’s a mask, it’s clearly been a mask since the beginning and he finally has a person who loves him because he’s him (Emma) and a family and basically a brother (David). I for one think that pirate deserves to rest after living in darkness for hundreds of years. And I think he’s been plenty flirting. Uh, pancakes???????? Let the man have a break.
But does this make anyone else mad? Is it just me? I hope it’s not me.
THEYRE LIKE MY BABIES LET THEM BE HAPPY WITHOUT COMMENTING ON THEIR LACK OF BADASSERY PLEASE
Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.
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