Once Upon A Time Is Back But First Let Us Recap

Time to play last minute catch up before the end of our 2 week recess from Once Upon a Time!

Mary Margaret got dark in both her back story and Maine incarnation the last three weeks. Two weeks ago, we were introduced to loveless, changed Snow White. She’s mean to dwarfs, hates parakeets, and is out for some murderous revenge. The Heart of Darkness episode showed us the aftermath of Rumpelstiltskin’s Charming-be-gone potion, though tantalizingly gave us no further insight into what exactly Snow did to the Queen to make their relationship less than loving.

Despite an awkward Dwarf intervention, Snow White did attempt to murder her evil step mother by means of a magical bow from her old buddy Rumpelstiltskin, but this was all post conflict. For some reason, this also meant she had to be really mean to the seven dudes that took her in for free. Then Charming broke the loveless spell after a few kiss attempts, and being hit by Snow’s magical arrow for no explained reason. It was refreshing to have “true love’s kiss” not be the answer to everyone’s problems, for once. In the most recent episode, we also got a view of Snow White as an adorable, honest little girl that is terrible at riding horses. Her charming and naive moments both as a little girl and as her father’s pet differentiate her so much from the bad ass that she becomes, I’m dying to know how that change came about. The show has yet to deliver.

During our recess from recaps, Emma Swan moved along very little as a character, but had a few “adventures.” Mary Margaret escaped after finding one of Regina’s Skeleton keys in her cell, and Emma goes on a secretive chase. She is then kidnapped by the saddest single dad in Fairy Tale, and the only character whose name and personality entirely carried over to Storybrooke. Interestingly, there have been a couple of moments when Regina seems to be unsure herself what is going on in Storybrooke, or who everyone is. Yet this character knows everything. This story line also opens up the possibility that there are other pathways and links to and from Fairy Tale. Unfortunately, we will probably never see this extremely powerful character again.

We will miss you dreamy Mad Hatter with your overly stylish fashion sense.

Inside his big ol’ house (after being drugged and tied up) Emma discovers Mary Margaret. After some failed escape attempts, their captor Jefferson (the Mad Hatter), demands that Emma use her secret magic to make a hat to help him return to Fairy Tale and his daughter. She succeeds, but in a way that leaves Emma once again skeptical.

Which brings me to another question: are all fathers in Fairy Tale single parents? So far we have our beloved Rumpelstiltskin, Han and Gretel’s unfortunate papa, and now the Mad Hatter himself. Do the men in this stories have no reason to do any good, but for children they fathered? Also, where are all these ladies running off to?

While Emma supposedly “admitted” that Mary Margaret’s Snow White counterpart is her mother, she said it while in fear for her and her bestie’s life from a deranged gentleman that had kidnapped both of them. So we once again got nowhere on that front. That essentially sums up Hat Trick. Well, we also learned that Jefferson definitely knows the Snow Queen tale, producing some questions on time lines. If he knows what’s going on, why has he waited all this time to surface and return to Fairy Tale, unless Fairy Tale is happening simultaneously, somehow. (Mind blown, I know.) Oh, and Rumpelstiltskin is in league with Regina. We think?

We also learned that the Snow Queen’s heartless attitude comes from the abusive social climber that she calls mom. We witnessed some pretty horrifying magical abuse in last week’s episode The Stable Boy. How do you combat an abuser who can magically bind you at will? Once Upon a Time does not address this. One of the strangest aspects of OUAT is the shrug and move on attitude of a lot of the more horrifying aspects of the show. We are dealing with characters that are straight up evil, and do positively evil things, yet there seems to be no sure-fire path to justice. Even in the supposedly Utopian Fairy Tale. For instance, when Graham began having flashbacks and the history of Regina’s power over him came to light, he was immediately killed off, and just about disappeared from the show entirely within a few minutes of the next episode. While we have yet to get a hint of any abuse towards Henry, we know that Regina raped and imprisoned Graham in Fairy Tale. In Storybrooke, she prolonged this abuse by seducing him while he was in his amnesic state.

Regina’s turn for the homicidal is understandable after her own mother murders the love of her life. However, I would have expected her to lose more of her mind after seeing that, and her slowness in taking revenge on Snow for revealing elopement plans to her abusive mother is never explained. It might be safest to assume that some of Snow’s survival skills were in fact taught to her by the more able-bodied Regina, which would make for an interesting twist in their relationship: Snow White eludes the Queen for so long thanks to training she received from the stepmother that sought to murder her. However, I have a feeling that the badassery that is Princess Snow White will never be explained.

That’s essentially what’s going on with our lady triumvirate at this point. Thankfully, David Nolan has all but disappeared from recent story lines. Regina did a really good job with that one. Honestly, I can’t see how they’re going to rectify this fairy tale after all that has happened.

Tonight’s episode will apparently offer us the answer, while giving some insight into the elusive Mr. Booth. If Mary Margaret takes that man back, the next recap is going to be all the angry fire I know you’ve been missing.