Library Witch

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

Annnd there goeth the good mood of the last episode.

…yeah, sorry, there’s really not much else to say on this one. And the episode was heavily Ruby-centric, so that should tell you something.

::dreamy sigh::

But yeah, not even my wolf girl could distract me from the big ol’ pile of “wtf”. So… some thoughts under the cut, but be warned, they’re not mainly nice ones.

Her Handsome Hero!!! I’m so emotional, holding this book, which was there at the beginning of Rumbelle and became such an important part of their lives.

It’s a normal sized book, but pretty heavy for its size. The cover is a beautiful teal leather…

This makes me cry…I can’t help thinking of Gideon reading it in the Dark Realm and Rumple caressing it when they had their talk in the clock tower, recalling it as “your mother’s favorite book”.

The pages are filled with the same “language”, same passages.

Here is some info that I find interesting, especially the third paragraph :

**The phrase “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetuer” appears in Microsoft Word online Help. This phrase has the appearance of an intelligent Latin idiom. Actually, it is nonsense.

Although the phrase is nonsense, it does have a long history. The phrase has been used for several centuries by typographers to show the most distinctive features of their fonts. It is used because the letters involved and the letter spacing in those combinations reveal, at their best, the weight, design, and other important features of the typeface.

A 1994 issue of “Before & After” magazine traces “Lorem ipsum …” to a jumbled Latin version of a passage from de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum, a treatise on the theory of ethics written by Cicero in 45 B.C. The passage “Lorem ipsum …” is taken from text that reads, “Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit …,” which translates as, “There is no one who loves pain itself, who seeks after it and wants to have it, simply because it is pain…”**

But also

Did she spell Mother wrong?

I have a lot of negative thoughts on this episode & fridging & Belle, Rumple, & Gideon but I will leave those off as requested. I will say that I love Alice so much and she might be the best part of season 7. Did you catch the remark she made about an ex-girlfriend?!! Her rabbit mask was amazing, also I love how in the background of scenes you can see people in Disney Halloween costumes walking around. Yes it may be shameless self-promotion but it’s fun shameless self-promotion!

Oh no, we can totally get into it here. I wrote that paragraph at 2am in the morning, and it’s now 10. I’m good to go. I just didn’t want to put on my critical audience pants (they go well with the analytical hat) while I was still running high on all the fan-emotions. No need to rain on my own parade, as it were, I know I’ll come down by myself sooner or later.

I’ll be tagging negative/critical discussions of the episode with “#beauty discussion” so people can filter them out if they so choose

I’ll start, shall I? Because I’m really torn on the whole thing. I think my ideal Rumbelle-ending would have been Rumple ditching the curse (somehow), and the two of them riding off into the sunset. In a perfect world, so to speak.

At the same time, I do think there’s a place for stories about death and loss, and this show has both hit and missed on those before, but it’s always been an interesting journey to watch. I don’t mind them telling one of these stories about Belle and Rumple, but I still get an iffy feeling about it and I think it’s less because of this specific episode and more because of how Belle’s character has been treated throughout the rest of the show.

She was never really “allowed” to have her own arc or goals, for one. For the most part, she was an extension, catalyst, and sometimes obstacle in Rumple’s story. And I think that’s what makes this so grating for me.

As an aside: while Belle’s death clearly has the goal of motivating Rumple into action, I don’t think it fits the “technical” definition of fridging. She didn’t die for shock value, and no emphasis was placed on her suffering (because she didn’t suffer, obviously; she just died of old age after a long and happy life). I’m almost certain that if she’d been a fully fleshed-out minor character in her own right, my personal problems with this development would vanish.

By the way: if it’s unclear what I mean by “fully fleshed out minor character”, please compare and contrast the way the narrative and the camera treated Zelena vs how it treated Belle. And I’m not saying that to dump on Zelena, she just makes for an excellent example. She started out as a foil for another character (Regina), but the screentime she had gave her a fleshed-out backstory, explored her issues and motivation (”Where Bluebirds Fly” is a good example), and let her have other relationships. (Granted, she’s maybe not a great example for that, because… well. The whole Robin disaster.) Belle, on the other hand, had most of her character development centred around Rumple, and a cynical person might say that the only time she existed as a separate character was when the narrative wanted to tell us that Rumple was unequivocably in the wrong, and had her yell at him. It wasn’t the best way to flesh out Belle’s character, in my opinion.

re: the bolded part–I thought I did and then I couldn’t find it again! Thank you for letting me know it wasn’t just a representation-starved hallucination! : D

And yeah, the costumes were a lot of fun–I spent a good bit of the episode scanning the background to see if I’d recognise anyone.

Belle and Ogilvy

Her explaining what it was like during those 5 years, buying a headstone for her son…

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

Today on Once Upon a Time: Being the Saviour is… bad, actually.

shitty retirement plan, too…

Alright, I will admit it: I had a bit of fatigue set in with this show. Especially during 5B, because, well, can you blame me? (Add some real-life nonsense to that and you get quite a lot of fatigue, but that’s neither here nor there.) But season 6 has actually given me some confidence that these plots are building up to something worthwhile. …some more than others, to be fair. (::grumbly shipper-noises can be heard in the distance::) Still, it’s made me want to put on my analytical hat and just, y'know, dig into stuff a little.

But under the cut.

Enjoy the fact that he’s having a hearty meal of what appears to be toast and tap water. I like to imagine that’s all Granny will serve him when he and Belle are on the outs.

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

Again, a case of “wow, I wonder who this episode is going to be about!”

no, I wasn’t really wondering. my, but that fridge is sure getting crowded, isn’t it?

It’s nice to see that I still have a reliable douche-radar.

This episode… ::sigh:: See, I really liked it, except for the parts I hated with a burning passion. It’s a weird mix, and I’ll try to unpack that under the cut.

And in general, this, to me, is Emma at her absolute best. Still a little tough, a little in denial about her own emotions, but she’s brave and she’s loyal to her family and she’s always trying to be a better person.