ONCE UPON A TIME: The Thing You Love Most

Once Upon a Time settled into its rhythm in its second episode, focusing on the Evil Queen/Regina and her backstory. The show veered awfully close to Cheese Town for a bit, but righted itself and was back on track by the end of the episode. I’ve decided that the easiest way to recap Once Upon a Time is to analyze the Storybrooke storylines first, then the fairy tale storylines. Trying to recap in the same narrative structure as the episode gives me a headache.

From here until the foreseeable future, Once Upon a Time will use each episode to focus on a specific character in both fairy tale and Storybrooke. This week it was the Evil Queen/Regina, next week it’s Snow White/Mary Margaret, the week after that it’s Rumplestiltskin/Mr. Gold, etc. Obviously we won’t get the character’s entire story in a single episode, but we are starting to learn more about them as the plot unfolds. In “The Thing You Love Most”, we saw the origins of the Dark Curse, met the Evil Queen’s only friend, were given some clues about why she’s so angry with Snow White, and watched her kill her most trusted advisor – her father.

But first: Mommy showdown in Storybrooke! Now that the clock is moving, Madame Mayor is worried. She doesn’t appear to have made the connection between Emma Swan and Snow White yet, but she does know that Emma is a threat to her via Henry. A trip to Emma’s room at the B&B – with a basket of apples! I love it! – to convince Emma to leave town quickly escalates into the two mothers clashing over Henry and his well-being. Regina tries harsher measures and frames Emma for “stealing” Henry’s file from his therapist, Archie Hopper (aka Jiminy Cricket), which lands Emma in jail for the second time in two days. At least she gets a little more face time with the hot Sheriff (who IS he in fairy tale world? I cannot figure this out!) before Mary Margaret bails her out. Emma retaliates against Regina by cutting a branch off her prized apple tree. “Your move.”

After another chat with Henry, Emma’s concern for him increases. She also finds out that Henry thinks Mary Margaret is Snow White, which stuns Emma. If she decides to believe everything Henry is saying about Storybrooke and its citizens, then Mary Margaret is the mother she thought abandoned her.

In addition to not knowing who he is in fairy tale world (The Woodcutter from Red Riding Hood?), the Sheriff’s allegiance in Storybrook are murky. He seems to be close to Regina and willing to do what she says, but after this latest round with Emma, he tells Regina she needs to stop before things escalate and Henry gets hurt. He appears to be genuinely concerned and to be a voice of reason and morality, so maybe he isn’t corrupt? In the interest of resolving their issues and protecting Henry, Regina invites Emma over to apologize. Regina’s office is decorated like a high-end birch forest, a nice nod to her Enchanted Forest counterpart. Emma believes that Regina is sincere in her desire to make amends, and before you know, she’s been tricked into biting the poisoned apple, this time in the form of saying she thinks Henry is crazy for believing everyone is a fairy tale character. Henry hears the whole conversation. “Did I know that my son arrives at my office precisely at 5PM every Thursday so we can go to dinner before his therapy session? Yes. Your move.”

To add insult to injury, Granny evicts Emma from the B&B because she is now “a felon”. Meanwhile, Storybrooke’s local paper The Mirror (run by the Evil Queen’s real world Magic Mirror confidante) has a front page story about Emma’s “drunken” crash into the historical town sign. Can you say smear campaign? Emma is really pissed off now, and whether she really believes him or just wants to stick it to Regina, she finds Henry at his therapist session and tells him that what she told Regina was all part of the plan. “We wanted to throw her off the trail, right? What better way than for her to think we’re non-believers.” Diabolical. The fact that Archie Hopper looks very pleased with this development suggests that despite cooperating with the frame job earlier in the episode, he is more than happy to rebel against Regina.

In fairy tale world, we flash back to the moment the Evil Queen crashes the wedding and informs everyone that this is their last happy day. Back at her castle, her advisor wonders if she might have bitten off just a little more than she can chew by promising to curse everyone in fairy tale land. But no, there is one curse that she can use, the Dark Curse, which she traded to Maleficent for the Sleeping Curse. Enter Kristin Bauer (True Blood‘s Pam) as Maleficent. The “frenemies” begin with some banter before the Evil Queen decides to cut to the chase. She wants the Dark Curse back. But she traded it, fair and square, for the Sleeping Curse, protests Maleficent. The Evil Queen is scornful: “Broken by a kiss,” she huffs.

Now, some information comes out regarding the Evil Queen’s reasons for hating on Snow, but I didn’t quite follow it. Either she was supposed to marry the Prince until Snow showed up, or there was another man she was supposed to marry and that was foiled by Snow. Maleficent notes that the Evil Queen was “that flake of snow’s age” when she was supposed to marry, before Snow ruined it. I’ve seen the next episode, which includes the Prince’s intended bride pre-Snow, and it’s not the Evil Queen. I’m confused. Readers, help me out?

A slightly campy sorceress showdown ensues with the Evil Queen defeating Maleficent. This allows the Queen to get her hands on the Dark Curse, but also refuses to kill Maleficent, her only friend. It’s an admission full of loneliness that makes me think she and Emma have more in common than they realize. In turn, Maleficent advises the Queen not to cast the Dark Curse because “it will create a void you will never be able to fill.” Wise words, but of course the Queen ignores her.  She gathers the “darkest hearts” she knows to help her with the casting, but it doesn’t work, neatly explaining the delay between the wedding and the curse finally coming almost 9 months later.

Enter the all-seeing Rumplestiltskin. The Queen goes to him to find out why the Dark Curse didn’t work and finds out that Snow and her Prince have also been to see the creepy, Gollum-like Rumplestiltskin. He reveals that the baby can break the curse, then bargains with the determined Queen to tell her how to enact the curse in exchange for “a good life” in the new world and any request he asks for as long as he says “please”. Assuming he won’t remember their bargain in the new world, the Evil Queen readily agrees. Something tells me that old Rumple is more powerful than the Queen, however, and I certainly got the sense that Mr. Gold remembered their bargain in Storybrooke.

But the Queen is only concerned with casting the Curse, which he tells her requires the sacrifice of cutting the heart out of “what you love most.” This is where I thought we’d find out who it was that Snow took from her, but after some rather effecting emotional turmoil on her part, we learn that the person the Evil Queen loves most is her father, the trusted advisor we’ve seen throughout the episode. He tries to talk her out of using the Dark Curse, not just to save his own life but for her heart, cautioning her against succumbing to the lure of power. In the end, she chooses power over love and kills him. As the Curse begins to spread across fairy tale land, she goes to her father’s grave and lays a flower there as his name on the tombstone is revealed: Henry.

New characters: Maleficent; Magic Mirror/editor of The Mirror; The Blind Witch (Hansel & Gretel)