Where Once Upon A Time went wrong: part 1
This Sunday, March 1, I will not be joining the rest of the fandom of which I once was a member for the return of Once Upon A Time. A year ago, I never would have considered this decision. But ever since that first episode of the third season's second half, this show I loved once upon a time was twisted and corrupted. What made it unique and a breath of fresh air in the midst of all the immoral garbage that clouds TV screens these days no longer exists. I may be a bit dramatic, but I am incredibly disappointed in the outcome of this modern fairytale twist. Why? I’ll just start with one of the many things that irk me about the direction of this show.
I'll start with the an in depth study of where the writers went wrong in regards to the character of the pirate, Hook, Killian Jones. Everything that has occurred in regards to Hook since the beginning of season 3 is enough to drive me up the wall. Hook's storyline, like most characters in the show, had a lot of potential. And his story could have included redemption. I'm not against that. What I am strongly opposed to is romanticizing the actions, words, and motivations of his villainous character. His lack of character coherency is mind boggling. Where the audience was left off in his story at the end of season 2 was centered about Baelfire and his guilt. And everything about Baelfire/Neal makes me mad, but I'll get to that later. His character was given depth when we saw true regret and sorrow on his face when he heard of Baelfire's passing and in the flashbacks, his slight reserve when he betrays him. It was an interesting thought, him mentoring the son of his lost love and his enemy. With this said, it is clear that Hook and Baelfire parted on bad terms, all of which was HOOK'S fault. His motives for this sad departure were purely selfish. So returning back to the present, being the only one carrying this heavy and painful knowledge, he is understandably upset about Neal. NONE of this has to do with Emma... except for when he later joins the crew to save Henry, who is NEAL'S son. When Hook is out at sea about to leave everyone in the town to die, he looks down and sees the markings he drew when teaching Baelfire to sail. It is in this moment that he decides to turn back, to honor Baelfire's memory. When hearing of Henry's abduction, he guides the crew to Neverland to find BAELFIRE'S boy. Had this story continued consistently, Hook would help Henry motivated in part by guilt about Neal and the other part hopefully to be a good person. He also would learn to be understanding of Emma's traumatic emotional state and let. her. be. He would be kind to Neal when he finds him and he would apologize for his terrible past betrayal. His story would continue on from there in this fashion and he could or could not end up with Emma.
The other option following his storyline in Neverland and forever after is that he acts in the exact same way as he has the last season and a half, but he is FRAMED as the villain that he is. His possessive desires and intentions would would be condemned rather than condoned and Emma would see right through him, as that would actually be in character. The fact that a woman who has major trust issues trusts him in season 4 is incredibly out of character. And she is trusting a liar who keeps half of the truth to himself. I'm not saying he has to be purely good or purely evil. I like characters who make mistakes, obviously, because I love Neal so much. What I want is for his consistently wrong and immoral actions to be seen as such and that he'll be considered a hero only if he actually does a good thing without getting anything out of it for himself. He needs to do something selflessly. If I wrote down everything wrong about Hook and all the inconsistencies of his storyline, it would result in the length of a book, so I'll leave this here.
I will continue soon the rest of my many thoughts on this subject