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My OUAT Rewatch -- S5E16 -- Our Decay

Link to Rewatch Review and Ranking archive

Oh good, a Zelena centric. Just what I wanted right after a Hook centric.

Oh yeah, Belle is back too. I’ll get to her later. And I’ll once again be using the strike out at certain points for those who can’t deal with my comments, and this will probably be a frequent thing until the end of Season 6.

But first . . . .

So basically they didn’t want Zelena murdering someone ON SCREEN so they made they Scarecrow CGI because are we really gonna get mad at her killing a CGI thing?

This show, I swear . . . . .

Honestly, aside from the Rumbelle scene (hold onto your butts for my commentary on that), I really don’t remember this episode. I think this is really where my full-on rage watching kicked in, and I also know, based on a combination of memory and my archive, that by this time I was well into hosting a weekly chat session called “Once Upon a Gripe” where we just bitched about the show while it played in the background. I think I stopped it somewhere in S6 when I just lost interest in even bitching about this shit in live chat.

But anyhow, I wanted to revisit April 2016 me to see what she has to say about this episode.

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/142213166482/honestly-all-the-people-hating-on-rumbelle-right

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/142235268987/friendly-reminder-zelena-did-this

And oh lord, the ABC CS Advisory Board . . . . . . good times!

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/142241735707/so-a-cs-stan-on-the-abc-advisory-board

Remember when I got kicked off that board because some shitty little CS fan got butt hurt because I didn’t fawn all over them?

Remember when I got back on stealthily and posted on here what the now fully CS worship space was saying? (That’s coming!)

Remember when that ENTIRE SITE got deleted and here we still are in 2020 during a pandemic?

But anyhow . . . . . I digress . . . . so this episode . . . .

I mean . . . . once again . . . . it hit the GOALS litmus test for OUAT episodes at this point . . . . it didn’t totally suck . . . .

The Scarecrow CGI aside . . . . . I really didn’t totally hate the Zelena/Hades stuff. And hey, was that Zelena actually having character development?

Not that I give a shit -- still hate her, still not sorry -- but at least it’s more than the pirate, who is literally YELLING AT A TEENAGE BOY while he offers . . . . what exactly?

Sit down and STFU, you useless lamp.

Also there was a side thing with Snowing using a ghost phone booth to talk to baby Neal or something stupid like that. Whatever.

But let’s go on to the Rumbelle stuff, shall we? This is where the “ermagod I can’t deal with anything bad being said about perfect pwincess Belle even if it’s correct and true” folks need to bail . . . . . you’ve been warned.

April 2016 me sums it up rather well:

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/142479018702/here-is-my-frustration-with-the-rumbelle-scene

Except this line:

I believe there will be more to this and we haven’t seen the full context of this episode.

Current me to 2016 me:

Get a clue, stop holding onto hope, you idiot. No there’s not more, no you HAVE seen the full context. THIS WAS IT. And it’s bullshit.

But for an even better take, let’s visit the review of this episode that Lily Sparks posted (the one that the CS twits above where bitching about):

http://www.tv.com/news/once-upon-a-time-our-decay-review-jump-start-my-heart-145972732916/

I’d like to point out this line -- I’m serious Belle fans, back away or be sorry, and this are the words of Lily Sparks, NOT ME. Also I agree with every single fucking word:

In other words: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFOvOQ8xLv4

Preach it, babe!

But anyhow, let’s look at this little section of the Lily Sparks review (pretend there is a strike out here, Belle fans):

This speech was completely refreshing. Just Rumple saying, guess what, I'm the Dark One, I love it, don't ask me to change, just effing get on board the Dark One train and let's own this effing town.

There's a potential analysis here that he's basically an abusive spouse who, once his wife is entrapped by pregnancy, feels free to revel in the darkest side of his nature. But I'm actually going to reject this analysis, because Belle tried to legit stab Rumple, so if anyone here is abusive it's her. She also constantly threatens to leave in an effort to control his behavior which is incredibly toxic, no matter how well intentioned, and she actually has left him now what, four times? Yet she always comes back thirsty for more. So maybe it's time for all of us, including Belle, to face the fact she's into emotional chaos, toxic relationships, and bad boys.

BOOM! Italics emphasis is mine, by the way.

I really don’t need to say anymore. Lily Sparks hit the nail on the head perfectly.

Here, have a post-episode one-shot to fix this shit (literally my last EVER fix-it because I was DONE not too long after this):

https://celticheartedfangirl.tumblr.com/post/142247070882/honesty-rumbelle-one-shot

BTW, fun fact: During the filming of the Rumbelle scene, Emilie was super duper pregnant. And it took them forever to get through the scene because Rumple tells her she’s pregnant and even as far apart as they were standing her belly was touching him. Even watching the scene you can see them both kind of snicker and it’s probably the best take they could get.

Also fun fact: Did any of the takes they didn’t use show up on the DVD deleted scenes? Of course they didn’t.