Defensible or not, Regina now has a truly legitimate reason to despise Snow. Killling Cora herself would have been one thing, but manipulating Regina to kill her own mother by appealing to her already-weakened sense of love?
Once Upon A Time - Season 2 Thread
- Thread starter JD
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Defensible or not, Regina now has a truly legitimate reason to despise Snow. Killling Cora herself would have been one thing, but manipulating Regina to kill her own mother by appealing to her already-weakened sense of love?
This will certainly put an end to Regina's motivation to reform, but she's still committed umpteen atrocities over the course of decades and represented a clear-and-present danger to the main cast and everyone in Storybrook and everyone in the Magic Kingdom, and probably Wonderland and Oz and Narnia and the Federation and the Mushroom Planet and....
There's no going back for Snow because she has a conscience, but her actions are certainly defensible. If she had killed Cora herself, she would have been a soldier; tricking Regina into doing it makes it espionage. Things like that happened in Mission: Impossible all the time.
That was certainly a great scene when Rumpy called Belle and reconciled with Bae. I wonder how far they will go with Rumpy's rehabilitation. Perhaps making Regina completely evil again will free him up to be the good guy.
There's no going back for Snow because she has a conscience, but her actions are certainly defensible. If she had killed Cora herself, she would have been a soldier; tricking Regina into doing it makes it espionage. Things like that happened in Mission: Impossible all the time.
That was certainly a great scene when Rumpy called Belle and reconciled with Bae. I wonder how far they will go with Rumpy's rehabilitation. Perhaps making Regina completely evil again will free him up to be the good guy.
All men are redeemable. But the devil is a woman.
A few episodes back, Snow White made it perfectly clear to Regina that she was not going to be allowed a relationship with Henry. The conflict is irreconcilable. Rumplestiltskin has achieved all his goals, none of which conflicted with any hero. Regina has always failed at everything. Regina is the primary villain, always has been and always will be.
A few episodes back, Snow White made it perfectly clear to Regina that she was not going to be allowed a relationship with Henry. The conflict is irreconcilable. Rumplestiltskin has achieved all his goals, none of which conflicted with any hero. Regina has always failed at everything. Regina is the primary villain, always has been and always will be.
Yeah yeah I know - I was typing fast before I had to run out for the day and didn't have a chance to come back and correct.
But since we're apparently policing each other's posts, it's Rose McGowan, not McGowen.
Killing one to ensure the saving of thousands, possibly millions? Yeah, I'd say that's fairly justified.
I look at it from a D&D alignments perspective. Snow's simply migrated from Lawful Good to Neutral Good or Lawful Neutral at worst. Cora has always been Chatoic Evil. Regina sometimes vacillates between Neutral Evil, Lawful Evil (depending if the laws she's exploiting benefits her) or Chaotic Evil - MAYBE Neutral, bordering on Neutral Good, but only when it comes to Henry - she did try that one time, to her credit, but she's fallen again.
Snow, on her worst day, will never move into the Chaotic or Evil classes. And in the fairytale world of Storybrooke, where the laws of the real world don't really apply, that makes ALL the difference.
Snow, on her worst day, will never move into the Chaotic or Evil classes. And in the fairytale world of Storybrooke, where the laws of the real world don't really apply, that makes ALL the difference.
Is it just me or did anyone else have any issues with the production quality of this episode?It seemed like they relied a lot on green screen in this one, and the camera angles, shot changes, and soundtrack all seemed like they were more suited for a soap opera.That said, I finally joined the 21st century and bought a wide screen TV and this was the first OUAT episode I've seen on it, so maybe they're all like that and I never really noticed on my old TV.
That's probably it. When I first got a widescreen TV, the picture quality looked weird. Your eyes will adjust eventually and what you're seeing will look normal.
Agreed. Cora was a mortal threat to everyone in Storybrooke, and she was aided by Regina. Using Regina to beat Cora might not be very nice, but there are much worse things one could do in the name of saving innocent lives. Regina's suffering over this is not exactly harsh justice considering what she did to her realm and the people in Storybrooke. Let's not forget she cold-bloodedly killed people because she could. Snow only used Regina because she saw it as the best way to accomplish their overall goal, which was to beat Cora.
Now, had she used Henry as her pawn, you could make a much better case for Snow going to the "dark side," but Regina was a willing participant in all this, and Snow just outsmarted her.
Everything on screen suggested that Cora was completely changed by regaining her heart. That is, she no longer posed an imminent threat. Basicaly Snow White killed Cora for shits and giggles.
Snow White may have pretended it was because she didn't think Cora was redeemable, and she was actually trying to trick Regina. But, the thing is, that Snow White is not actually stupid. Regina feeling love for her mother and the desire to be loved back, is someone who's not going back to the Evil Queen. But stomping on Regina's heart big time is very, very satisfying payback. But doing that meant creating an imminent threat in Regina. Which exposes the absurdity of justifying Snow White as responding to an imminent threat.
The idea of luring Regina away from Cora and other temptations with negotiations over visitation etc. seems much less unthinkable to me than it does to them. Henry seemed to turn out pretty well. Now, although the blood ties are supposed to conquer all, Emma and Snow White and Charming rather tend to stick him in the umbrella jug when he's inconvenient. Does he even go to school anymore? Brush his teeth? Go to bed at a reasonable hour?
PS On the general subject of redemption, it seems to me that time is a major factor. Regina did 28 years in Storybrooke as herself and was thereby changed. The ten years raising Henry was part of it, a positive part. Maybe she was more like the warden, but living with the prisoners, she still did time and paid for her past. The others were in some sort of timeless haze. (Or in Charming's case, in a coma.) Rumplestiltskin may or may not have been aware the whole time, but his experience was limping on the faces of the poor.
Snow White may have pretended it was because she didn't think Cora was redeemable, and she was actually trying to trick Regina. But, the thing is, that Snow White is not actually stupid. Regina feeling love for her mother and the desire to be loved back, is someone who's not going back to the Evil Queen. But stomping on Regina's heart big time is very, very satisfying payback. But doing that meant creating an imminent threat in Regina. Which exposes the absurdity of justifying Snow White as responding to an imminent threat.
The idea of luring Regina away from Cora and other temptations with negotiations over visitation etc. seems much less unthinkable to me than it does to them. Henry seemed to turn out pretty well. Now, although the blood ties are supposed to conquer all, Emma and Snow White and Charming rather tend to stick him in the umbrella jug when he's inconvenient. Does he even go to school anymore? Brush his teeth? Go to bed at a reasonable hour?
PS On the general subject of redemption, it seems to me that time is a major factor. Regina did 28 years in Storybrooke as herself and was thereby changed. The ten years raising Henry was part of it, a positive part. Maybe she was more like the warden, but living with the prisoners, she still did time and paid for her past. The others were in some sort of timeless haze. (Or in Charming's case, in a coma.) Rumplestiltskin may or may not have been aware the whole time, but his experience was limping on the faces of the poor.
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Really enjoyed this episode. Cora's backstory was interesting, I didn't expect her relationship to Rumple, although it does make sense given everything we've seen of them. The modern day stuff was good too, with some really good stuff for Rumple and a pretty shocking twist at the end. As for Snow's actions, while killing Cora was definitely a mistake, I think her thought process was perfectly sound. Cora and Regina were a major threat, and at this point had been for years (decades?), so it makes sense that she would get tired of their crap. And I don't see her as being irredeemable at all, she did come to her senses and try to stop Regina at the very end.
As far as Rumple and Cora, we knew he was her teacher, but, yea, I was surprised by the romance, I was fully prepared to believe Bae's mother and Belle were the extent of his romantic life and I certainly didn't expect him to be the only man Cora ever loved (Or that Cora ever loved anyone)
Snow, yea, a mistake in hindsight, but, Cora killed her mother and her beloved Mammy/Maid for giggles, Regina killed her father and they have both caused untold torture, horror and death to the Kingdom/Storybrooke and were on the brink of gaining more power to be an even bigger danger. At that point, pretty much anything goes. Gold is no sweetheart, but, he doesn't actively bring their kind of devastation, and he may be redeemable with Baelfire and now the family connection.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
Not everything on screen.
We saw, in the very same episode, that she was an evil, vindictive bitch even before she ripped out her own heart. Something she only did for the pursuit of power despite being deeply in love with Rumpelstiltskin. What makes you think she wouldn't do the same thing soon after all of this?
As someone else said, what Snow White did wasn't a noble way to go about it, but it was hardly an act of irredeemable evil. It was espionage, pure and simple. She couldn't have gotten close enough to place the heart into Cora in time, so she manipulated another force of pure evil to do the job.
Keep in mind that Regina had most definitely turned back to the dark side at that point, too. She had her chance. Several times.
And, yes, it will be incredibly hypocritical for her to act outraged by what happened considering everything she's done, including manipulating others into performing acts just as vile but only for her personal pleasure/powergrabbing. Nevermind that the ploy Snow enlisted wasn't even close to what Cora herself tried to make her do with the exact same weapon.
Regina gets no sympathy, and Snow doesn't deserve to go to Hell for what she did. Guilt and regret over doing so? Sure, in spades, but only because she is a good person.
If roles were reversed and Regina did the same thing to Snow, she'd just laugh musically and vanish in a puff of smoke. So why should anyone feel bad for that evil twat?
The fact that she didn't. All she had to do was finish Rumplestiltskin off right then and there. Instead she stopped to heart to heart with Regina. Cora could have made herself safe and enjoyed the Hallmark moment just a few minutes later. Incidentally, Snow White's burning the candle first, then dashing off to tell Regina to stop was completely senseless.
Two points. First, replacing the heart accomplished the task of removing the threat from Cora. Which is asserted, but not shown, to be any greater than the threat from Rumplestiltskin. Second, the process creates an imminent threat from Regina, meaning everything said about imminent threats is completely irrelevant, just part of Snow White's rationalizations.
Right, when she killed Snow White in Granny's coffee shop and when she killed Charming at Gold's shop.
I've actually forgotten what Regina's done by way of manipulation, other than the genie/mirror to get rid of that creepy husband.
I'm losing track of the pronoun references here.
I've never understood the notion that getting all emo was redemptive. It may be sincere, but sincerity can be purchased with a little self deception. It's a cheap virtue.
j
Because there is an uncomfortable element of hating Regina more than Rumplestiltskin because she's a "twat."
Actually, I think it could be argued that Gold/Rumpel is the one who caused everything to happen as it did.
It was all of his choices, his cowardice, his manipulation, his teaching Cora and Regina magic that caused all the deaths, the curse - everything can be traced back to Rumpel being a coward son of a coward father who made a choice not to fight - which resulted in the loss of his family which would lead him to take up magic to try to get them back which would lead to deaths and destruction.
Without Rumpel, none of Once would have happened the way it did. He is the key to all of it. Which is probably ultimately why all the stories wind up back with his extended family and those he loves and interacts with.
If one considers the show to be ultimately his story rather than Henry's (as the kid has been pretty much sidelined this season), then it seems to me that the show finale would be that everyone else finally dies in one massive final battle and Rumpel gets one last shot at redemption: to go back and make a different decision than he originally made: to fight in the war and not be a coward. This would change the course of history for the Enchanted Forest, and Storybrooke would never have existed and everyone's lives would take the path they would have if Rumpel hadn't manipulated it all.
I can't seem to recall there being any way for Snow to have seen Cora's alleged "change of heart" once Regina gave it back to her. There was no amount of time for Snow or anyone else for that matter to see how thorough this was, especially given what she'd done before heart or no heart. While this manipulation of Regina to defeat Cora is admittedly a dark turn, I'm not completely uncomfortable with it. I see it as somewhat of the antithesis to Picard's decision on how he could have used Hugh the Borg ... and in the end chose not to.
A new preview for this weekend's episode:
http://tv.yahoo.com/video/once-upon-time-clip-031313-162416389.html
http://tv.yahoo.com/video/once-upon-time-clip-031313-162416389.html
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