Emma (Jennifer Morrsion) hopes Henry (Jared Gilmore) recovers after her lack of faith leads to his hospitalization.

“It’s not the destination, it’s the journey,” or some variation of that cliche was drilled into me as a kid so that I would develop patience, and not be so results-oriented: “I want this, I want that,” and the like. And it’s useful, because when you embrace that value you’re less likely to be disappointed. Sure, if you invest mightily in a project you want to see it succeed, but if the process was rewarding in itself, then you won’t walk away like you’ve wasted your efforts.

As a viewer of “Once Upon A Time,” I cannot speak for all, but in my enjoyment of the breakneck speed conclusion, I wondered if the journey that led me to this satisfying destination was tainting it. Almost as if I had such a traumatic flight en route to a luxury resort on a tropical island that it soured me on the whole paradise thing. While I’m sure I could find a way to enjoy soaking up some rays and bathing in pristine waters, this finale wasn’t so mind-blowing that I’d forgotten how pissed I was on the way over. Last week, I talked about being that proverbial kid who always need to pee in the back seat, whining incessantly, “Are we there yet?” Now, I feel like the spoiled kid who got the Christmas present he wanted, but upon receiving it doesn’t want it as badly, Because I waited so long for it lost its allure. I saw the commercials every day after school and the desire for it became pathological. When Mom said I would get it for Christmas, I danced around for what seemed like forever and passed the time imagining what it would be like to call it my own. Then the day came and I wanted something else more.

That feeling of getting almost exactly what you wanted, but not being as thrilled with it as you’d imagined you would was my overwhelming emotion watching the conclusion to OUAT’s first season. The isolated fairybacks, whose relevance eluded us got connections that were more than tenuous at best, magic got context and concrete boundaries instead of fluid, willy-nilly usage and the emotional toll on the characters was palpable. Withholding these methods of engagement doesn’t seem fruitful to me, especially when you need to convince your viewers that 22 episodes are a worthy investment. I understand the storytelling advantages inherent in character by character flashbacks, but for me the real world arc was dragging its heels so that its development would sync up that of the Fairy Tale Land. But Storybrooke is the aftermath, the fallout from these FTL events. Being beholden to those fairybacks serves no narrative purpose.

The “Lost” formula was successful for a reason, but the application of it was sloppy. Yes, an episode of “Lost” would focus primarily on one character through flashbacks and they would become more fleshed out in the current timeline as a result, but the world didn’t stop so that we could get to know them. For example, in the Grumpy episode, what did we glean from having Grumpy crush on a nun and sell candles? Yeah, nothing. That contributed zero to the direction of the arc. And while the relevance of certain threads like The Mad Hatter’s and Belle’s were given heft in the finale, many other detours remained a distraction, the part of the magician’s trick where they subtly get you to draw your focus away so that you’ll miss the manipulation. Shoehorning a “see wasn’t that worth it, kids?” into one pretty thrilling day trip, does not make this television show a worthwhile “vacation.” To me, it’s a case of lazy parents who are putting off presents until the holiday so they don’t have to deal with it now. And they hope that by making it special, the excruciating wait will be forgotten. Sorry, I remember the bumpy ride to Disneyworld or the painfully drawn out months that preceded the most wonderful time of the year.

Let’s get down to logistics. there was a lot to be delighted about. And while promises are not always kept on this show, we end on a note that would suggest OUAT won’t just be meandering in The Infinite Forest in its follow-up season. In the FTL, we begin where we left off, with Snow White poisoned and Charming trapped. While being escorted to his execution, Charming busts out his apparent military training as he totally owns the Evil Queen’s guards. However, as he turns down the hall a guard points his bow and arrow at him, and another guard boxes him in. Awaiting an arrow in the chest, the guard fires and hits his own man instead. Why did the guard help him? Well, because that guard is the Huntsman a.k.a Sheriff Graham. I got nervous they were bringing him back from the dead as some ploy, but then I remembered that in FTL you have the luxury of living after your heart is ripped out of you and crushed in someone’s hands.

Emma rushes Henry to the hospital and Dr. Whale asks her how this happened. She now does believe in Henry so she screams that he ate a poisoned apple turnover! Emma’s insistence was kind of hilarious, because for once she gets to feel how ridiculous it is to explain this to a non-believer. As the kid goes comatose, she touches his book and she’s flooded with memories of the FTL. It feels cheap. I understand that belief is powerful, and the point is that her son being in immortal danger is and should be a galvanizing force, but seeing “magic” as a catalyst again brings out the groans in me. Regina flurries in and Emma goes ape. She shoves Regina in a supply closet and throws her around. Well, it’s about damn time! I know it makes sense that Emma would only get some fight in her now that she believes, but Regina could have used some roughing up a while ago. Regina admits that it’s all true and that it was poisoned to make Emma fall asleep. The brief moment where we see Regina’s desperation to keep her son is touching, but most emotional moments are breezed through and not given time to ferment because, as I said, the answers are shoehorned in and it’s a mad dash to revelations. Regina says they must consult the only other person in Storybrooke who knows magic. Emma guesses Gold, but then Regina delivers the laugher line: “Actually, he goes by Rumpelstiltskin.”

Lost in the forest, Charming bumps into Rumpy who enchants his mother’s ring to help find Snow. On one condition. He must insert a potion, carefully encased in a golden egg, into “the belly of the beast…for a rainy day” (hehe). The potion, of course, is that true love potion I was excited about. Eeerily enough, the potion was made from strands of Charming and Snow’s hair. We also get a gem of a line about what Rumpelstiltskin knows of true love (obviously referring to Belle): “It was a brief flicker of light amidst a notion of darkness. Badass.

Continuing with the overt parallelism, in the following real world scene, Gold tells Emma about the nature of the curse, and the reason why she is the anointed savior, the safety valve. He put one drop of true love’s potion onto the parchment of the curse, meaning that she, the product of true love, is the one glimmer of hope in all that misery. See, that’s cool. I like that. As I’ve mentioned, I’m a sucker for true love, but it also follows through on what I have been asking for, some guidelines for how magic can be used, instead of being deployed when it’s convenient. We get the punchline too for the “rainy day” joke when Emma replies, “Well it’s stormy as a bitch, where is it?” Gold smiles with that Rumpy, mischievous grin and gives Emma her father’s sword.

We get another Spark Notes version of emotion when both Regina and Emma say their potential goodbyes to Henry. There’s some good acting, they just aren’t afforded time to linger with the severity of the situation. Like when Regina’s goodbye is abruptly cut off by Jefferson creeping in the shadows, waiting for his deal to be honored where he doesn’t remember his old life. But their deal is null and void since Emma is still awake. Jefferson doesn’t take this loophole well and seems to have the face of a schemer.

Emma stalls a bit to visit August with an obligatory, “You were right!” He can’t open the door though because at this point, he’s mostly wood (giggity) and as his face, the last remnant of humanity turns, he tells Emma that he has the faith she can save them all. Emma then meets Regina at the post office where she has a secret lair (surprise, surprise) with an elevator that will take her to Maleficent. We all know it’s gonna be a dragon, but they’re coy about it like it will be some big reveal. But anyone with a working knowledge of fairy tales knew that was coming, right? Anyway, Emma assures her majesty that the only reason she’s not dead is she needs her help. But if Henry dies, she does too. See, Emma with some bite is awesome, more please!

Our double duty dragon battles ensue, with father and daughter trying to accomplish opposite goals. While the CGI dragon was impressive, it was depressing to see how horrible the green screen scenery was. All the effort put in to those sword fights and gorgeous fire-breathers, and it’s downplayed by a really artificial looking castle. At any rate, having both battles at the same time felt like overkill, like I was in an anteroom waiting for the real action to start, but it looked damn good. And we get a couple standout moments from Emma’s bout: she pulls out her gun because she is clumsy with a sword; and she chucks the sword at the dragon as the prince did in the Disney film.

Charming finds Snow with his GPS ring and then asks for her hand. It was a nice touch for Goodwin to say, “What do you think?” playing off the knowledge that we obviously knew where this was headed. Egg in hand, Emma gets stalled in the elevator and screams up to Regina only for Gold to answer. He says to throw up the egg before she climbs up. Boneheaded move. Once up there, she sees that Gold gagged Regina, and that upon catching the egg, Gold ran off. It’s then when Regina and Emma both receive messages. Henry’s dead. Now, fair warning. This is horrible. But did anyone else HOPE he stayed dead. I’m not a proponent of child murder per say, BUT man would that add some urgency or what, huh? I’m sorry. I’m a terrible person and should be ashamed. I will let the record show though, that losing Jared Gilmore as a child actor would not be the worst thing. There’s a reason he didn’t stick around on “Mad Men.”

While Henry was going into cardiac arrest, Jefferson uses the chaos to slip downstairs to the mental institution wing. As revenge against Regina, he frees Belle and tells her to go seek out Mr. Gold and tell him that Regina locked her up. Why he couldn’t escort her, I don’t know. Late for tea, maybe? Yeah, I suck. So, when Gold opens the egg at his shop and Belle strolls in, he’s astonished. If there was one sentiment that sang in this episode it was that reunion. Emile de Ravin and Robert Carlyle killed it. Even if we got only one episode of them together, I thought their reuniting was more triumphant than even Snow and Charming’s, and we follow them along their treacherous journey all season.

As Emma stares shocked at Henry’s lifeless body, we can hear her exasperated breaths. She’s torn up, knowing that her lack of faith, not necessarily in fairy tales but in her son, was to blame is a heavy burden. But she pours her love into an “I love you,” and a kiss on his forehead and true love’s kiss radiates throughout Storybrooke, jolting Henry awake and reigniting the memories in all the former fairy tale characters’ heads. Again, seeing Belle remember how she loved Rumpy beats out even David turning around from leaving Storybrooke to hold Mary/Snow in his arms again. On the opposite end of the spectrum, everyone also remembers how they hate Regina, and while she would love to stay and be grateful Henry’s alive, she ducks out ready for a mob and cries into Henry’s pillow instead. That sounds a bit stalkerish though when you say it out loud, doesn’t it? Hm.

Despite having love reintroduced into his life, Rumpy hasn’t abandoned his lust for power. He leads Belle to the magical well we were introduced to in “What Happened to Frederick.” This was the well with water that can bring back what you’ve lost. Now we also have the nugget in our minds that Rumpelstiltskin told the prince he’s invested in true love, especially the powerful concoction Charming and Snow have, because of what its magic creates. With that veiled threat in my mind we see Rumpy pour the contents of true love’s vial into the well and a billowy, purple smoke blasts through town. I was intrigued that Henry knew it was bad right away. I mean, as we know from “Lost,” smoke of any color is bad, but considering that the return of magic was what the kid wanted, it’s curious how the idea of magic in the real world is so frightening. As Rumpy manically informs his new/old beauty, “Magic is power,” but couldn’t that power be acquired by the good guys? I suppose it’s interesting too because the other Sunday show I review, “Game of Thrones,” is also dealing with the perils of magic in its second season, so maybe this is an admirable direction for reinvigorating this series.

Regardless, the realization of their past while remaining in the real world is almost exactly what I was calling for. I didn’t want this to be adventure time in FTL, and I’m glad Kitsis/Horowitz got the memo. Now that the characters know, there’s more opportunity to seize their own destiny instead of being servile prisoners of the EQ. And the devilish grin upon her face when the smoke tumbled through suggested to me that Henry’s dalliance with death hasn’t softened her. I’ve already addressed my quibbles ad nauseum, but now props must go out to the writers for lurching ahead with this runaway train instead of trying desperately to slow it down. It’s reassuring to know—although still infuriating to a degree that it wasn’t apparent earlier— that there was a finite plan and trajectory.

The callbacks were pleasant, and at points even fun and sweet. Because we wandered aimlessly so much, I didn’t realize how much I cared about Belle, but on a practical level to have less space and time wasted was refreshing. Still, there needs to be a concerted effort to pace the season just like this episode. Obviously, don’t show your hand, but making us aware of what’s important wouldn’t hurt. It’s not a spoiler to say, for example, that Emma is the drop of true love Rumpy put into the curse as a safety valve. That’s more informative than just “she’s the savior.” In a fantasy world, we need structure and rules just as necessarily as we do in the real world. Because like our fairy tale counterparts in Storybrooke, we’re only human, so let’s respect that and not pretend we’re don’t need things like love to stay alive.

The Evil Queen (Lana Parilla) teases Charming (Josh Dallas) by showing him her secret weapon: a poisoned apple.

Emma doesn’t seem so stubborn to me now. I’m having just as much trouble believing this whole curse thing and I’ve known from the beginning it’s “real.”

At this point, I thought all the rules had been established. There’s no magic in this world, Emma’s the only one who can break the curse and no one but Emma can leave Storybrooke. Well, it turns out we weren’t given all the facts. Apparently, Emma, the one person who could break this spell, the one person who has a chance of “bringing back the happy endings” as Henry so nauseatingly put it, cannot be killed by Regina. Why? Well, because that would break the curse. Wait, run that by me again? The Queen was so distraught about Snow White’s “happy ending” that she enacted a curse that would have a GIGANTIC loophole? Or, the curse is virtually indestructible as long as people don’t act predictably. Let me explain.

Here’s how this looks, from afar. The queen can hardly do anything to stop Emma, or she can do anything except kill Emma. My whole Faith vs. Reason argument has some teeth now. The only thing stopping Emma from saving everyone, and inversely the glue that keep Regina’s curse airtight is faith. As Regina’s dream forewarned (shot in the cheesiest, most cliche manner imaginable, and so goddamn obvious), the danger isn’t that Emma has the magic to reverse the curse, it’s the idea that she could rile everyone up to turn on her. As Mr. Gold surmises, “They will be looking for blood.” If Emma suddenly believes Regina is the Evil Queen and that Henry’s beloved book is true, then she is that magnetic figure who could conjure up a good ol’ fashioned mob. But of course Regina can’t eliminate this rabble-rouser that could make the whole town call for her death. Why? Because Rumpelstiltskin said so. Um, okay. Then why would she agree to that?

On the flip side, even if Emma turns a corner and starts to trust her son and believe that fairy tales are possible, all our vile EQ has to do is not kill Emma and evade death herself. And here’s where my whole “religious allegory” theory gets interesting. The only way Emma can ensure her friends live to see their happy endings is to sacrifice herself. If she can provoke Regina to kill her, that is. She would be the savior in the most Biblical sense, because she absolved the sins of these non-believers so that they could be happy again. Or, it becomes the most boring game of chicken EVER. “You’re not gonna kill me! I bet you won’t!” But then there’s the matter of, will Emma killing Regina effectively end the curse, anyway? And one question for Mr. Gold/Rumpelstiltskin. If you want the curse to be broken now, because your son isn’t in Storybrooke like you’d hoped, or whatever your motivation is this week, why don’t you just…reverse it? I mean for god’s sake, it’s your freaking curse! Wouldn’t you know how it works?

Our problem here is MAGIC. Magic as a solution to a problem is lazy and a great way to obliterate the tension in drama. Most great conflict is derived from choice. The easy way or the hard way. Good or evil. Life and death. But when the safety valve of magic is present, there’s always a way out. And I suspect that next week, with the astronomical success this show has had, Emma won’t be saving the day and reversing the curse. Then what would the show be? Fairy Tale Adventure Hour. No thanks. What I’m guessing happens is that some version of the reset button is pressed. Like the Joker and Batman (but not nearly as compelling or twisted) they will “do this dance forever.”

And does anyone else find it odd that Emma’s supposed to save everyone, but none of us know what that means? Yes, it would mean ending the curse, but is it simply a matter of “waking everyone up” like Desmond did on “LOST?” Once Emma gets wise, what does she do with that knowledge? That’s why my sacrificial lamb theory seems to be the only plausible solution. If it’s true, that’s a hell of a twist on happily ever after, but it would feel like a hell of a waste. Some felt that way about “LOST,” and for some that’s justifiable, but this has been way too frustrating of a ride to endure for some spiritual, metaphorical payoff. I wouldn’t mind if OUAT was like an acid trip, some out of body experience that won’t become clear until I’ve come back down to earth. But this show feels like less of a hallucinogenic high and more like someone giving me poor directions. Yeah, yeah. It’s the journey not the destination. Well on this journey the kids keep needing to stop to pee and screaming, “Are we there yet?!”

And that’s my masterful little segue into the actual car trip that starts the episode. After Regina’s “in case you didn’t know Regina was anxious about death” dream that spoon-fed us Regina’s current mental state, we pick up inside Emma’s car where she plans to take Henry far away from his wretched mother. Heart’s in the right place, but oh my could that backfire. Henry, for once, is the voice of reason. Well, his “reasons” involve saving everybody, but he knows his bio-mom is solving her problems by running and he jerks the wheel, veering them off the road. They aren’t hurt, but Emma gets the message and turns around.

Mary Margaret is rightfully pissed off that Emma would have left without saying goodbye to her “family.” She specifically calls Emma out for reverting, which I’m glad someone mentioned since I was fascinated by last week’s regression. Emma realizes she has to figure out what’s best for Henry so she does coffee with Dr. Hopper. He doesn’t definitively say that Henry’s better off with Emma versus Regina—I’m guessing his reluctance isn’t entirely genuine since he used this exact scenario as leverage for his job against Regina earlier in the season—but he’s certain this war of theirs can only be harmful to the kid’s psyche (especially since he already thinks I’m Jiminy Cricket and you’re….Jesus I guess).

After being rejected by Gold (ain’t no magic powerful enough to get me to help you win babe), Regina seeks her own magical ace in the hole to tip the scales. She enlists The Mad Hatter. I’ll give points to the writers for a creative way to summon him—a calling card attached to his daughter’s bicycle. Of course he watches her even though she doesn’t know who he is. Her request is that he use his hat, which she has been kept from him (for obvious reasons like extortion), to travel back to Fairy Tale Land to retrieve something for her. What does he get in return? His memory wiped. He’ll have no recollection of the daughter he lost. Again, I’m a sucker for psychology so this request of his intrigued me. When we get a glimpse into how much of a rouse their “happiness” was in the FTL, I’m mystified. When we’re back to broad battles of good vs. evil, curses with conditions, and fairy warfare (more on that next) they lose me.

Our fairyback this week consists of a failed rescue mission and the quintessential Snow White tale of the apple. Last we saw, Prince James had been captured by his adoptive father, King George. For his treason—refusing to marry King Midas’ daughter—he’ll be guillotined. But as the blade drops it turns to water. The EQ herself storms in and buys Charming off the king’s hands. She is using him as bait to lure Snow White. So there’s strike one against the rescue. I knew the whole time she’d fail! If she wanted Snow to come and get him, why would she make it so easy? Come on, people. Think with your brain. Strike two against the rescue mission, terrible castle CGI. Though I love seeing cute girls kick butt, whether it’s Ginnifer Goodwin or Scarlett Johansson in The Avengers (SO GOOD btw), I’m sold. But the castle backdrop was a laughingstock. And strike three? Fairies. Dear Lord, the fairies. When the whole dwarves yielding pickaxes and Snow White going MMA on the royal guards is negated by pretty fairies in a flying V dropping glitter bombs, it just robs a fight sequence of its cool factor INSTANTLY.

Once Snow arrives at the cell and discovers that Granny’s Admiral Ackbar impression was right (for those who don’t get the reference watch Star Wars for crying out loud, but the line is “It’s a trap!”), the Evil Queen interrupts their cross-magic mirror reunion with the most unnecessary line the show may have ever used, “I had to stop you. I have no interest in cleaning tongue marks off my mirror.” Ew, Regina. Why’d you have to go and get all nasty. Their love is pure. Why you gotta dirty it up like that? So EQ makes things awkward and then defines what a parlay is (who hasn’t seen at least ONE pirate movie) and they agree to meet where “it all began,” which is ominous before the commercial break speak for “where you saw me and my stable boy kissing.”

At their meeting, Regina guilts Snow about how she was the worst child ever because she couldn’t keep a goddamn secret. She shows her Daniel’s grave, blames her for her mother ripping out his heart (again, I think her beef is with mom) and tells her she can pay penance if she eats her poison apple. Skeptical, (because, well, it sounds like it might kill her), Snow asks why should she? Regina replies, because I’ll kill your boyfriend if you don’t. Damn, she’s sneaky! So Snow willingly eats the apple and turns into “a tomb to house all her regrets.” So, wannabe Shakespeare talk for “she’s in a coma.” This sets us up for the pilot where Charming kisses her awake (DISCLAIMER: This does not work on most coma patients).

Conveniently, when Mad Hatter opens the portal to retrieve the famed apple—which was so painfully telegraphed when he said, “Maybe I can reach through and grab something. But it has to be small enough to fit in my hand.” HAHAHA—it’s just been chewed on by Snow and has rolled downhill into the magical sinkhole they made. It was a nice touch that the magical catalyst they needed was the ring her stable boy proposed to her with, I must say. Then Regina bakes it into an apple turnover that she gives to Emma after they agree on a rough custody agreement. This leads into what I thought was the best scene because despite Henry’s atrocious overacting, it was the most grounded in reality. Emma tells Henry that she is leaving Storybrooke, but that she’ll visit and the kid is devastated. No matter the reason, separating a kid from love is just cruel and it got to me. Then Henry eyes the turnover and makes a desperate move for his mama. He bites into it to prove the curse is real and he drops to the floor. If Emma still has trouble buying into the book now, I think she’s swimming DEEP in denial river.

This final twist was sure to make many a viewer gasp, and I agree with it as an apt way to appeal to Emma’s issues with believing, whether in herself or in something she can’t figure out—after all she’s an expert in lie detection. Still, the mechanics that got us here are shoddy. The boundaries under which magic manifests in this world are a permeable membrane that allows in any deus ex machine it pleases. When a fleet of fairy bombers can take out a couple dozen knights, it’s no longer magical. Doubt and disbelief are what make those moments where we see the beyond all the more enchanting.When wicked curses start resembling contracts, it’s clear they’ve lost sight of why we love fairy tales. It’s about beating the odds, not rigging the game.

P.S. “Once Upon A Time,” I know it’s a season finale preview, but the “Requiem for a Dream” theme music was a little much. You already take this whole fairy tale, cross-dimesion epic too seriously, no need for more theatrics.

Geppetto (Tony Amendola) cradles his son, Pinocchio, after he's transformed from a puppet into a real boy.

Emma is the only thing standing in the way of happily ever after. All she has to do is believe in love, in magic, and in herself, and all that was lost will be returned. So August should be able to provide that faith, right? I mean, he’s clearly a charmer with a rad bike and a way with words. Why wouldn’t she become inspired to take on the Evil Queen, save her son, and by breaking the curse, reassemble a once thriving land? Well, it’s a little more complicated than that. And while some fans are surely screaming at their screens in frustration, this hitch in the plan is the best twist Kitsis/Horowitz have provided so far.

I know I’ve sounded like a broken record, or the boy who cried “LOST,” but the resemblance is uncanny after last night’s episode. Faith vs. Reason was the central conflict that guided the contentious relationship between LOST’s main two protagonists, Jack and Locke. That same dichotomy has been tapped into here. Except the battle between philosophies is an internal struggle for Emma. What if like LOST, this show isn’t about the answers. Maybe it’s less about the happily ever after and more about the question, what is happiness? Emma denies her destiny as August pleads for her to see what’s right in front of her. He’s proven to her that her whole life has led to this moment where she can save everyone from misery. And admirably, the writers stick to their character’s guns and say, “Well that’s too much of a burden, I don’t want that.”

So the question then becomes, how will they be saved if not by the savior? God damn, it’s got the same religious overtones LOST did too! LOST SPOILER ALERT! Lost ends with all of the Flight 815ers exiting a church into a blinding light that represents the after life. Could the trajectory of OUAT lead to the resurrection of the chosen one? I don’t think the parallels are arbitrary, either. The connection goes deeper than just shared writers. There’s LOST references and allusions in nearly every episode, and this was no exception. When August mentions the day the clocks start moving again, the day he started having shooting pains in his leg, what time was it? 8:15 A.M. Flight 815, people? And when August (a.k.a Pinocchio, which I’ll get back to) falls out of the tree into a new world without magic, a plane flies overhead. Coincidence? Even if the writers are screwing with us or just paying homage, the legacy of that show looms large here as the emphasis seems to be steering towards questions and not answers.

But it wasn’t only my empty wishes for a LOST reincarnation that made this easily one of the top three episodes of the series, but a fairyback that reminded me why this technique can be so effective. When the writers use the familiarity with the tales to their advantage it often allows them some creative space to beef up these characters. August and Geppetto owned this episode with their emotionally resonant reunion as well as the ways in which their selfishness altered the future irrevocably.

We’re transported to the tail-end of Pinocchio’s legend where he and Geppetto are evading the monstrous whale. Pinocchio pleads with Geppetto to use their life saver to save himself. He’ll be fine since he’s wooden and can float. The scene incorporates the best CGI I’ve seen on this show, and I can only speculate that the viewership has something to do with that. The quality was cinematic and it’s timed with the recent declaration of the Nielsen ratings—OUAT is the most watched new drama.Washed up on shore, Geppetto sees an unconscious Pinocchio and cries for his revival. The Blue Fairy descends upon them and grants his wish by turning Pinocchio into a real boy. The only condition of his boyhood is to always be brave, truthful and unselfish. These terms create a underlying tension in the real world since this must be involved in August’s sickness.

In the real world, Emma’s on a mission for Henry. She decides she’ll hire Gold as her attorney and assures Mary Margaret that she’s ready for motherly responsibilities. August, after installing a medieval lock on their door to keep out Regina, implores Emma to see the bigger picture, to have faith that he can help her get her kid back. Her response: “My kid needs me, I don’t have time for faith,” is a preview of her breakdown at episode’s end. Realizing his influence on her is weak, August meets with Gold, asking him to deny her counsel so that she’ll run to him. When Gold laughs at the idea he can be trusted, we’re reminded of Pinocchio’s propensity to bend the truth. For me, this was an instance where OUAT proved it can do subtle with its parallel worlds.

Fast forward to the end of the FTL, when the Blue Fairy requests Geppetto build a wardrobe out of the last enchanted tree to house a pregnant Snow White and her husband, Charming. The child, as the prophecy goes, will restore the magical realm. But Geppetto afraid for his boy’s safety, bargains to have Pinocchio take the second spot in the tree. Jiminy tries to talk him out of this foolishness, the child should not be without its parents. Geppetto nastily refers to the cricket’s horrid beginnings by saying he will help him like he helped his parents—a callback to “That Still Small Voice” where we learn that Jiminy’s parents killed Geppetto’s parents for their belongings. The Blue Fairy grants his wish anyway, and allows Pinocchio to take Charming’s place.

August whisks Emma away on his hog out of Storybrooke to tell his story. Is the reason they aren’t hurt because they were protected by the enchanted tree? Anyway, he brings her to a diner that causes Emma anxiety. The reason why is that’s where she was found as a baby. August then drops the bomb that the seven year-old boy who discovered her was him! Unconvinced, he uses details that weren’t reported by the papers like the blanket she had with her name monogrammed on it. Then he tells her how they arrived in this world through their tree portal and that her fate’s to save them all. Thinking he’s got some screws loose, Emma starts to walk away when August falls to the ground in searing pain. He explains that his sickness is actually him returning to his old wooden form. It’s punishment for not being there when Emma first settled in Storybrooke. August had lost his way and was tempted by Phuket—the real world equivalent of Pleasure Island (and the place where Jack ran away to in “Lost.” Seriously, I can keep going). Now he’s paying the steep price for not being the guardian she needed.

Pinocchio ends up being appointed Emma’s guardian because Snow does not go with her newborn in the tree. Due to a premature birth, Pinocchio and Geppetto are told he must give up his spot so that mother and child will be together. Geppetto obviously, disobeys. He instead makes Pinocchio promise to be the child’s protector. Jiminy warns of the temptations he’ll face (Thai prostitutes, it’s gotta be) in this new world without magic, but as long as he’s brave, truthful, and unselfish he’ll be fine. But as we know, August eventually abandons his charge when his overbearing and unloving foster parents give him reason to ditch. It’s a cheap excuse, but no matter the cause it wasn’t smart to entrust a seven year-old with a baby’s care, so it was inevitable.

Emma’s reluctance persists when August shows Emma his wooden leg and her ignorance is so powerful that it distorts what she sees, a real human leg. She doesn’t want to save everyone, she doesn’t want that responsibility, and Jennifer Morrison sells me on her psychology here that she’s looked out for herself for so long that she isn’t ready to be a savior. The only person she is willing to rescue is her boy right now. Therefore after her confrontation with August, she makes the rash decision to walkie-talkie Henry and ask if he wants to escape Regina. The boy says “More than anything” and she peels off, ready to run from all the madness of this town and to deny her destiny. On some level, I wonder if she does believe, but is too afraid to fail.

This complexity has eluded Emma in the past because we thought she had no backbone. Turns out she has the capacity to be the hero they’ve been waiting for (but didn’t know it) and she’s just too insecure and dependent on reason for her survival. This direction for Emma and the series is excellent. I’m not sure how long it can sustain itself, however knowing the once inevitable return to glory may be thwarted not by evil but by good standing by is a refreshing take on what I was beginning to suspect was a stale, but fun series. Now it has the legs to become something thrilling, yet layered with sophistication to contemplate. Can happiness be found in Storybrooke if the savior never comes to take them to FTL/Heaven?

I even appreciated the sidebar this week as Regina is killed with kindness. When she comes to school to sour Mary Margaret’s return, her wickedness is rejected by Mary Margaret’s forgiveness. Ginnifer Goodwin delivers these chilly lines like only she could, sweetly yet viciously: “Your life must be so incredibly sad that you only experience joy from ruining others’ happiness.” Damn Mary Margaert, that’s way too cold. You can tell that the words follow Regina, hitting hard enough that she seeks the affection of Mary Margaret’s former lover, David.

Her engine won’t start so David offers her a lift and she insists he stay for dinner. After David devours his lasagna he delivers his second groaner line in two weeks, “You really know how to work some magic.” That much cheese is just unhealthy. Regina then recounts the day she found David. I noticed the parallels between how both August and Regina failed to make strong connections with “how I found you” stories. I’m not sure they relate, but maybe it has to with the fact that both Emma and David need to find themselves, their true idenities, and on some level they reject others thinking they know them? Well, Regina misreads David’s graciousness as a green light and he denies her advance when she leans in for a kiss. My impression is it wasn’t just a way to get back at Mary Margaret and that she is devastatingly lonely. When she throws the wine glass at the mirror it’s a tip off. It must remind her that the one person who adored her (her “mirror” Sidney Glass) is behind bars, and nobody else out there loves her. She needs David, even if it’s just his pity, but she may have squandered that by asking for too much.

“The Stranger” ends on a hopeful note when my thesis that the series may take the route of “finding happiness without happily ever after” gets an affirmation. August stumbles upon his dad’s clock shop and lends him some pointers. Geppetto says August’s father must be proud and August wonders if that’s true with all the mistakes he’s made along the way. Geppetto delivers the icing on the cake, “You realize your mistake and try to fix it. If I had a son that would be enough for me.” Brimming with pride and overwhelmed by his father’s indirect forgiveness, August volunteers to be Marco’s (Geppetto’s alter ego) assistant. He accepts and its such a moving moment. August has for all intents and purposes failed his father, but the man accepts him without knowing him, unconditionally. That’s not fake or manufactured, that’s real, and a byproduct of a wonderful fairyback that didn’t need to justify itself with forced parallels. It belonged by being what this show is at its core, a romanticizing of human relationships and the magic comes from them.

It was imperfect, but it accomplished everything you would hope an episode of OUAT would. It was innocent, fun, mesmerizing, inspiring, while still making us fearful that good may not win this time. Henry has faith, Emma has reason not to, and in the final two episodes OUAT asks us, what about you?

August's (Eion Bailey) identity is shrouded in fog as he searches for some magic in Storybrooke.

Three weeks ago now, “The Stable Boy” billed itself as the big reveal. It was going to answer the supposedly essential question of why the hell the Evil Queen hated Snow White so damn much. I thought the episode had its redeeming qualities—the girl who played Young Snow White, Bailee Madison, was a dead wringer for a younger Ginnifer Goodwin for one—but I was unsatisfied with the answer, which was just a variation of the usual conflict in Fairy Tale Land: lost love.

However, after seeing tonight’s episode I appreciate the brunt approach of that episode even more. Though creatively the backstory was stale, at least that question isn’t being dangled before me anymore. “The Return” is the perfect name for this episode because it took all the momentum back to where we started. In the real world, more questions heaped on the existing ones and virtually everything returned to the status quo. Thought the appearance of not-dead Kathryn would mean Emma’s one step closer to exposing Regina? Nope. Lovesick puppy Sidney Glass fabricates a confession that absolves Regina of any suspicion. Thought you might find out who exactly August is? Well, for a while that looked like a sure thing, then the rug was pulled out from under us. Oh, and were you wondering what would motivate Mr. Gold/Rumpelstiltskin to play for both teams (No, not like he’s bisexual. Like he’s helped both Emma and Regina sabotage one another)? That just gets all fogged up. And remember when Emma promised she was finally gonna start playing dirty to take down Regina? Well, she does that again. Except this time she explicitly mentions that she’ll take back her son. All right! Some finite goals, that’s progress, right?

Truthfully, it’s starting to feel like this whole season has been one long pre-game warmup for this last stretch of episodes. Most fairybacks have involved characters with little-to-no importance concerning the big picture: Red Riding Hood, Belle (will she ever be released from the basement of the hospital?), Cinderella, Mad Hatter, Grumpy and the list goes on and on. While some of these offbeat episodes have been engaging, the fairybacks I have been most drawn to are the ones that have impacted the main players. If it hasn’t revolved around Rumpelstiltskin, Snow White, Charming or Regina, it’s difficult to get invested because I hardly know them in another context. And ironically, because so much airtime has been occupied by ancillary characters, I feel like I don’t know as much about the stars as I should.

And if Kitsis/Horowitz should have learned one lesson from their time on LOST, it’s that the saving grace of a show with an intricate mythology, one that will create more questions each week than it resolves, is compelling characters. While I still get a kick out of the sardonic delivery of Jennifer Morrison, Emma is a nobody. She has trust issues, she’s good at detective work, and she’s grown to love her son, Henry. Did I miss anything? And while Mary Margaret and David may be the most multi-dimensional characters, they’re thrown into the same situations. Mary Margaret wants him in her life, then David messes up his chance. A repetitive ride could be thrilling, but there’s no sense of danger since we already know how this on-again/off-again relationship ends. Happily ever after does not get my heart racing.

While I feel harsh for beating up on OUAT like this, I wouldn’t be so hypersensitive if I didn’t think the ingredients for a heckuva show were here, especially when I don’t believe OUAT’s ambitions are similar to that of LOST. I could be wrong, but LOST was inherently a more avant-garde show. It employed religious allegories, time travel, and electromagnetism in an effort to create a dense universe that would say something about the very meaning of our insignificant lives. To me, OUAT is a recycling of old material, inherently less adventurous. But its source material is rich enough that you could create something entertaining and even enlightening if you wanted. But fun seems to be the target for his show. And I don’t want or need it to be more than that. Still, I feel like I’m being asked to forgive A LOT before I can just sit back and enjoy.

Now that the 700-word, I mean pound, gorilla is off my back, I’ll admit to being impressed with some of what transpired tonight even if upon reflection it felt empty. While watching I did a few double takes, and possibly even puddled a bit for Rumpelstiltskin. We began with August’s leg twitching something fierce, the pain seeming unrelenting. He joins his buddy Henry to get Operation: Cobra rolling. Although, August is slightly dishonest in that he uses Henry to tend to a personal matter. With Henry diverting Gold’s attention in the store, August scours the office. Gold finds him eventually and pretends to have gotten lost. Suspicious, Gold breaks into August’s room at the B+B and finds a drawing of the infamous dagger that had given him his dark powers as Rumpelstiltskin.

In the FTL, those dark powers are alarming Rumpy’s son Baelfire. While he used his influence to bring the Ogre Wars to a truce, he also become ruthless in protecting his son, turning one passerby into a snail just to crush him. Understandably, Baelfire wants to find a way to reverse this enchantment that has turned his dad into a malevolent force. Rumpy’s sure that the magic is irreversible. Only if he’s killed by the dagger will the power be transferred to another soul. Determined, “Bae” makes his dad promise that if he finds another way, he’ll oblige. Immediately, it was clear to me that this was the “one deal” he tells Regina about earlier in the episode, the only deal he’s ever broken.

Now weary of this stranger that Emma describes hilariously as “A typewriter wrapped in an enigma wrapped in stubble” (there were many moments actually where I thought the writers might have been mocking themselves or at least their stiffly rendered characters), Gold tails him. He follows him to Mother Superior. After threatening to double the rent on the nuns—I keep forgetting he’s like the Trump of Storybrooke—she tells him that August sought counsel. He’s come to town searching for his father, and may have found him. Emma, in an almost insultingly observed B-plot, confronts Sidney Glass about the bug he installed in her office. When she realizes that he’s loyal to her because he’s in love with her, she shrugs it off, “Fine. Whatever.” Emma really was the comic relief for my frustration with this hamster wheel of an episode.

Baelfire racks his brain for a cure and consults his friend, Morraine. She suggests a great force of good magic, The Blue Fairy. The boy summons the fairy and she says she cannot return his father to who he was, but she can send them to a place where dark magic has no power. She produces a magic bean that she says he and his papa must follow if Rumpy’s to be restored to his old self. This sets us up for a devastating scene, possibly the best of the episode, where Baelfire plants the bean and a green vortex appears. Baelfire begs for his father to join him, but his cowardice gets the best of him. He had originally sought this power so he could protect his son, but now he’s so consumed with maintaining that power, he’s lost sight of what matters. He lets go of his son’s hand and Baelfire’s sucked in, and the portal closes. His cries afterward where he regrets not joining his son really were gut-wreching and possibly the most genuine emotion shown by someone not named Ginnier Goodwin, Jennifer Morrison or Josh Dallas throughout the course of the show. Good on ya, Robert Carlyle.

After an appointment with Dr. Hopper (oh yeah, him), Gold gets up the nerve to confront the man he believes is his son. And I’ll admit, Eion Bailey had me fooled too. When he said, “I guess all the lying can stop…Papa” I thought it was a done deal. But to Bailey’s credit he played spurned little boy as a grown man quite convincingly. And I thought, YES, this is what I waiting for. Real juice, real crossover of the fairyback and real world events. Then Rumpelstiltskin dug up the dagger and handed it to August to prove he has changed, and all the emotionally resonant material was killed by August turning the dagger back on his “dad.” Dammit is right. August isn’t Baelfire after all. That’s next week apparently. Why must you tease me with a huge development and then yank it away! The only real news of note is August is dying, and he needed the dagger’s magic to heal him. But as Gold points out, magic doesn’t exist here. That was the condition of the curse, which, obviously, was made by Rumpy himself so he could find his son. So while I’m glad Rumpy has a solid motivation, it doesn’t explain why he’d want to serve as a double agent. How does that help him reunite with his son? Enigma wrapped in enigma.

On the sidelines we had another Mary/David “It’s Over” moment. Oh can’t those crazy kids just kiss and make up! There’s also the classic case of using dialogue to convey overt thematic ties. When Mary talks about something out there keeping them apart and David replies, “Like dark forces?” I audibly groaned. I guess it was a nice change of pace to have David supply the groaner instead of the EQ. It was just so inauthentic, it was unforgivable. And yet, the exchange was almost redeemed by Mary’s chilling comeback to David’s “But I love you.” She twisted the proverbial dagger with “And that’s what makes it so sad.” See, that was honest and real, not tailored to relay exposition and reiterate a message. Why can’t we have more like that?!” says the oft-burned critic in the corner.

Although Giancarlo Esposito’s pathetic admission as Sidney was a deadpan mumble delight, I couldn’t help but think well, Emma’s gonna get angry that she’s been thwarted once again and promise to go Sarah Palin-rogue on her ass and it won’t happen. And yet, the finale approaches. SOMETHING must happen. And while I can appreciate how networks operate, and the need for monumental finales, couldn’t Emma have grown a tad more aware, shown some savvy or gone off the hinges just a smidge so that we wouldn’t come to expect disappointment from the anointed “savior?” I mean, I bet there were the haters who thought Jesus was just some hotshot carpenter, but I bet even he wouldn’t have put up with Regina’s B.S for this long. Sorry for the sacrilege, I just hope that regardless of how she changes the game, it feels like the tectonic plates have shifted. I’ll confess to at least loving how she categorized Regina as setting the board so no one could win, and promising she would play an entirely different game. Even if it feels like a campaign pledge, it was rhetorical candy. If only this episode could have been sweet till the last morsel. Instead, I felt manipulated like I was Pinocchio (who I presumed August would be as I mentioned in the comments last time to Mystic), and I don’t want no strings on me. Maybe The Blue Fairy will grant my wish…

Barbara Hershey stars as the mother who turns her daughter, Regina (Lana Parilla), into a wicked queen.

Well, there you have it, folks. The question that OUAT has insisted you have been begging for an answer to “why does The Evil Queen (EQ) hate Snow White so gosh darn much?” has FINALLY been answered! Rumpelstiltskin be praised! And what gift of enlightenment have our overlord writers bestowed upon us meager humans?

*Clears throat*

EQ used to be a delightful girl Regina who loved to ride horses bareback, and her mother was less than encouraging of her choices in recreation because they weren’t bringing her any closer to snagging a rich, upper class husband. But the reason she hasn’t gotten married is she is in love with the stable boy. Likes riding bareback, indeed. Anyway, Regina (her name in Fairy Tale Land too, I guess) doesn’t trust her mom, Cora (Barbara Hershey, amping up her camp factor) will approve since marrying him would be a step down on the social ladder.

Cut to Regina riding her beloved horse through the hillside after a a secret rendezvous with Daniel, the horse poop-scooping hunk, and suddenly a horse whizzes past with a little girl holding onto the reins for dear life. Regina rescues the child and the girl thanks her repeatedly for saving her life. They exchange pleasantries and—BOOM!—it’s a young Snow White.

I’ll just leave that tantalizing bit of mindf**k dangling there. Meanwhile, in Storybrooke, we’re transported a week into the past where Gold feeds Regina the plan to frame Snow for Kathryn’s murder. The only tidbit that I found revelatory was that the goal is not incarceration. Since they can’t jail her in the modest cells at the Sheriff’s office, she would have to be transported to some correctional facility outside of Storybrooke. But anyone who leaves Storybrooke, croaks. Also, Gold planted that key, as insurance, so that if she tried to flee, it would yield the same result. I knew that Gold was involved and guessed he was the Machiavellian mind behind it all, but there had to have been a more eloquent way to dump that information without an abrupt flashback.

At any rate, Regina stops by for a visit to Mary Margaret’s cell, just to rub her face in her misery. I dug that Regina was showing her vengeful self in a more sinister way, because usually she’s just twirling her mustache throwing banana peels in front of Emma. Her taunting felt more human, more grounded in bitterness. Whether that cold worldview is justified by the fairyback is something I’ll debate strongly, but it was good to see Regina as less of a prankster of more of a heartless woman out to deprive others of the happiness that was ripped from her.

Alan Dale also makes an appearance as District Attorney Spencer (not sure how this is an appropriate alter ego to King George, but whatever) to conduct a pre-trial interview of Mary Margaret. He grills her about how angry she must have been when Kathryn slapped her in public, and Mary starts off calm, sure that she didn’t want Kathryn “gone.” After recounting the ways in which her reputation was ruined though, Mary cracks. It fell pretty short of the realism achieved in “Law and Order” interrogations, but that’s mostly OUAT operating out of its comfort zone.

Grateful that Snow was saved from being trampled by her own horse (one of the most undignified ways to die), King Leopold uses Regina’s heroism as an excuse to cure his loneliness and proposes to the unsuspecting young lady. This was one instance where I flat out refused to suspend disbelief. I sympathize with a father who wants his kid to grow up with a mom. Hell, I even can feel for a man who misses a woman’s touch. What man doesn’t, like, all the time. But he has NEVER seen her in his life, didn’t even buy her dinner first, and lets face it—all she did was what any decent human being would do! Maybe we wouldn’t have been as flashy about it, but if I saw a kid clinging to a wild horse I would certainly call the police. So because she’s decent, and available, she’s it! I can forgive fairy tale contrivances like magic or fate, or true love (well, because that’s real, duh), but not behavior that disregards all logic and reason. If Leopold were high off his ass, maybe. Otherwise, no. Obviously, the ladder-climbing mother accepts the proposal.

Immediately, Regina runs to Daniel, the wannabe Brokeback Mountain man, and implores that they run away together. Considering you can’t say no to King Leopold, and her mother would surely use her powers (Oh yeah, she can  shoot stuff from her hands too) to keep the arrangement intact. Then Daniel proposes himself and as they lock lips to seal their union, and Snow stumbles into the stable. Indignant about what she’s witnessed she makes a mad dash for the woods and eventually Regina catches up. She schools Snow on true love and the kid perks up at the idea of such a powerful magic and swears she will keep her secret.

Speaking of powerful magic, what kind of sorcery did the casting department use to find a kid who looks so remarkably like Ginnifer Goodwin? And it doesn’t stop at an uncanny likeness. She nails the mannerisms, the expressions, even her speech patterns. It’s as if she studied Goodwin for months in preparation. Gotta hand it to them, they either lucked out big time or, someone in casting needs a significant raise. Bravo to this impressive young actress, Bailey Madison!

Emma’s investigation hits a snag, and August swings by and sees that she’s “grasping at straws.” He then starts into an awfully pedantic, but surprisingly astute lecture. He likens her detective skills to his writing: “If you get stuck, go back and reread, you might find a nugget of inspiration in what you’ve already done.” Emma acknowledges his wisdom and decides that with her new perspective she should visit the scene of the crime. Lo and behold, at the hole where Red dug up Kathryn’s heart she finds a shard from a shovel and bets it’s Regina’s. With Henry as inside man—a stellar moment of comedy is when he uses his Operation: Cobra code words and Emma admits, “Uh, I left my codebook at home”—she matches the shard to the shovel, but in painfully predictable fashion, when she comes back with a search warrant (the parameters of which are clearly fabricated) the shovel is missing. Shocker! Emma suspects August, her accomplice, squealed and he’s rightfully offended, but I feel like most viewers, myself included, knew that there were eyes and ears somewhere that tipped Regina off.

Then after some pressure from Cora whining about how she and Regina have drifted apart, the inevitable occurs. Reasoning that Regina shouldn’t lose her mother like she did, Snow divulges the secret upon which Regina’s future wrath hinges upon. Just as Regina is about to ride off into the night with Daniel, the horse and lady whisperer, Cora storms into the stable ready to shut it down. Regina pleads and pleads for her to be a loving parent and put her happiness first. It sure seems like a futile effort to argue with someone who says things like, “After all the sacrifices I’ve made!” and “It’s not your life, it’s mine!” Still, the couple falls for her calm and suddenly supportive demeanor. And as she relaying advice to Daniel about parenthood, she goes all barbarian and rips his heart out, crushing it into sand. She won’t console her daughter either, ranting instead about how “love is weakness, but power endures.”

This cutthroat attitude carries over to Storybrooke where Regina relishes in victory making Mary Margaret beg for her freedom. As I’ve already mentioned, this is the real-world evil I was hoping for, wielding her influence to make her enemies whimper in submission. It was the first time that I was sort of excited by her shenanigans, though I wish she was actually more in control since Gold could easily make the whole apparatus crumble from under her with how much she has depended on him. The showstopping moment is when she wipes away Mary Margaret’s tears as she screams that she’s innocent and doesn’t deserve this. Regina’s comforting words? “Oh I know, but you do deserve this.” Damn, it’s chilly in here.

In the coda to EQ’s evolution, she’s being fitted for her wedding gown and Snow says she’ll look beautiful for Daniel. The lightbulb goes off, and she asks Snow if she told her mother. In rare villainous form, she hides her disdain and assures Snow she isn’t mad. Under her breath she snarls, “I should have let her die on that horse.” As vital as it is for EQ to turn her vengeance upon Snow, I wanted real reason to question the princess’ squeaky clean image. I mean, although it was “true love,” her real-world counterpart is a mistress. Let’s give Snow some imperfections! Instead, she’s duped by Cora into believing she can trust her with the information. She’s still an innocent and does not deserve this crusade to destroy her. Cora deserves that and more! But EQ’s motivations for not turning on her mother are never explained. I assume some FTL equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome where the victim sympathizes with the aggressor, but that wasn’t on screen and it should be if this is the impetus for, well, everything that has happened.

In the final scenes, my suspicions were confirmed. Sidney Glass hid a bug in a vase he delivered to the sheriff’s office, which I remember seemed random, but it was subtle enough that I did forget about it, so well played, OUAT. Completely out of the blue though was the reveal of an alive Kathryn appearing in the alley behind Granny’s! I guess that means no more trial, which means no more bogus attempts at a legal drama, and tons of possibilities concerning how Gold pulled it off. He has to be the one behind her reappearance, right? He mentioned he could still “perform some miracles” to Emma.While I have my apprehensions about another character being motivated to do evil in the name of lost love, there were moments where I found myself unwillingly sucked in.

By surprising me with elevations in Lana Parilla’s performance, promise in Eion Bailey’s turn as August, the mysterious writer, and catching me off guard with the final twist, OUAT was able to balance out the absurdity of the fairyback where motivations did not match the vicious tone. For talking me off the ledge with trickery, OUAT effectively creates what Cora suggests may be the “fading illusion” of true love possessing the magic necessary to bring the show back from the depths.

The Mad Hatter (Sebastian Stan) takes his daughter to market in an Alice in Wonderland-themed episode.

This week’s OUAT prompted me to do something it hasn’t often. Think, real hard. I pondered an idea that hadn’t even entered my realm of possibility since the first frames of the pilot. What if…Fairy Tale Land (FTL) doesn’t exist?

I understand it seems like a given, the whole premise of the show centers around The Curse that has imprisoned them in “our world,” but what if that world is just imagination? What if it’s just a memory of a time that never was? “Lost” has tested the boundaries of alternate timelines/dimensions and life and death before, why not now? Heck, what if Storybrooke isn’t real? What if that isn’t reality, meaning an external world outside sensory experience, and they’re trapped in an psychological illusion, a la “The Matrix?” OUAT has proven to be a much more “accessible” program than “Lost” was, but could Kitsis/Horowitz be secretly constructing another sci-fi mindf**k?

Probably not. But even if the show is influencing the mere consideration that’s a huge positive. Since the pilot set up the structure of the two universes—one in the past and one in the present, existing as two separate worlds (even that is shaky when you think about the existence of magic and remnants of FTL materializing in the real world)—that relationship has gone unquestioned and untested. Until last week, when FTL memories bled into real world factuality.

This week expedited that bleeding by introducing the Mad Hatter a.k.a Jefferson (Sebastian Stan). In Storybrooke, Jefferson is a lonely man in a mansion who knows about The Curse, and believes his only way back to FTL is through his magic hat (which normally serves as a portal to Wonderland). During his real world stay he hasn’t been able to make a hat that works. The magic is absent. But he believes the good sheriff, Emma, is his glimmer of hope. When she came to town, the clocks started working (I guess they hadn’t been for like, ever) and this was proof to Jefferson that she possessed magic and he’s had a telescope fixed on her office ever since. That’s a normal reaction, right?

So, when Emma goes out looking for escaped suspect Mary Margaret, he walks along the road waiting to stage an accident. He’s not one of those freeloaders trying to get a settlement, he wants to earn the sympathy of Sheriff Emma and a ride home so he can drug and kidnap her. And well, that’s basically what happens. And surprise, surprise: Mary Margaret is there too, all tied up and stuff! It is worth noting though, that after Emma has been subdued by the sleepy tea (tea’s his thing, remember) she wakes up bound and gagged, but escapes from her restraints wicked easily. It was kinda badass. She uses her mouth to move a pillow to the floor, stomps on it so a tea cup falls off the coffee table, then uses the jagged edge to cut herself free. Where has resourceful Emma been all this time? Now I’m much more sold on her leading a police force if she can evade capture so well.

Over in FTL, it’s a hard knock life for a retired Mad Hatter who is also named Jefferson (more shattering of boundaries!). He’s a poor fellow who struggles to provide for his daughter, Grace, and she’s his whole world. So when the the Evil Queen (EQ) comes knocking, asking him for a favor that requires his special talents, he’s tempted. EQ could ensure that Grace never want for anything, but he decides abandoning Grace would be more detrimental than their current financial woes. Still in need of his skills, EQ (whose fairyback look was absolutely boobtastic this week) manipulates him by disguising as an old woman selling a stuffed rabbit at the marketplace. Grace thinks it would be a perfect addition to her dinner party (HA!) but Dad’s short. The cruel, masquerading queen doesn’t allow him to haggle and denies the girl her toy. This inspires the change of heart within Jefferson to help out EQ—just this once—in order to better his daughter’s life.

At the manor, cunning Jefferson intercepts the ladies as they escape, holding them at gunpoint. He forces Emma to tie up Mary Margaret again. He directs Emma to another room where he relays his Curse knowledge. Emma is still in denial, despite Henry’s insistence and frankly some damning evidence. Clearly, Jeff’s creep factor is through the roof, but we know he’s right and not crazy. But we’ve been conditioned to trust Emma’s judgment, and though he is separated from his daughter—she belongs to another family in Storybrooke that he spies on with his other telescope—a sane person doesn’t hold people at gunpoint to get what he wants: unless you’re Liam Neeson from “Taken,” or Jack Bauer on “24,” or…pretty much every man searching for his family in the movies or TV, ever. Therefore, I’m inclined to not believe him, but that would defy one of the fundamental truths of the show. The psychopath does make a salient point, however, about the dialectic of stories and truth and how the distinction is blurry at best. He also makes a poignant critique about how most people seek out a magical solution for their problems, but refuse to believe in magic. These sorts of philosophical questions are uncharted waters for OUAT, and probably too heady for its audience and too loaded for its breezy subject matter, but their bold attempt did not go unrecognized.

While holding Emma hostage, demanding she use her apparent “magic” to make his hats work again, he’s also escorting the EQ to Wonderland. She needs to retrieve something the Queen of Hearts stole from her. Upon entering, a expertly CGI-ed hookah-smoking caterpillar appears atop a giant mushroom, but then it speaks and CORNFEST 2012 begins. Roger Daltry (of The Who) lends his voice, and what do you guess he says? “Who…are you?” Am I the only one who finds this to be just the WORST case of needlessness? He literally says one line and it’s one of his song lyrics, and an unnecessary piece of dialogue in the first place? I know their budget has seen an influx due to ratings and it’s done wonders for their VFX, but REALLY? Rant over.

Jefferson and EQ approach the Queen Of Hearts’ maze, and we learn suddenly that the EQ can shoot fireballs from her hands. I wish they would outline exactly what her powers are, because at this point I assume she can get out of most situations. What she retrieves after she burns through to the center of the maze is her father, in a box. No, I’m not just making things up! This, however means tragedy for Jeff. Only the same amount that entered can leave Wonderland, and EQ has no qualms about swapping him out for daddy dearest. An odd detail, EQ shows remorse in her face when she breaks the news that he’s stuck, but her words convey cruelty, saying if he really loved his daughter he never would have left her, a bitter pill to swallow. ALICE IN WONDERLAND REFERENCES ALL DAY! Sorry.

Captured by the Queen of Hearts’ men, Jefferson initially withholds information of how he arrived in Wonderland, but then in a too-hot-for-TV move, a knight cuts his head off. But alas, no blood and he lives. They promise to reattach his body only when he shares the truth, so he tells them about the hat. Turns out to be a bad move since now he’s trapped in Wonderland until he can make the Queen of Hearts a new hat. And he lacks the magic necessary. So we’re left with the haunting image of Jefferson surrounded by mountains of misfires and mounds of failures.

Emma starts to question Jeff’s madness as she tries to craft him a magical hat, and she seems to empathize with his quest to reunite with his kid. We’re also treated to some weird chemistry between the two. Their breathy speech and close proximity imply they could kiss at any moment, but it might just be the palpable desperation on their tongues. And just as we start to believe Emma believes, she whacks him upside the head with his telescope. After a struggle, Mary Margaret kicks him out the window. When they look below to see the damage, his body is gone and his hat is bottom up. Did the hat work? Has he crossed over? No, John Edward get out of here! Oh, that’s a reference to the TV medium John Edward…oh never mind.

Flipping Mary Margaret the keys, she gives her the choice to run or trust that she’ll exonerate her. She implores she also stay because she doesn’t want to lose her family, “or friends or whatever.” So they hurry Mary Margaret back to the cell before Regina knows she left and Regina scolds Mr. Gold for not holding up his end of the bargain. Shocker of shockers, she was behind the planted key and Gold put it there. Apparently, he’s a double agent, which makes sense given he never scratches a back that won’t scratch him back, but I do believe he has taken a side. I’m unsure which, but my money is on him wanting to usurp Regina.

Our final scene is with Emma and Henry at a school playground. Grace, whose name is Paige in the real world walks by. Emma recognizes her from mad man’s telescope and asks Henry if she can inspect his book. The picture of Grace is a side profile, so there’s no guaranteeing a match, but Emma requests she keep the book. Is she FINALLY believing? It seems like this is the season’s ambition is to finally turn that tide, but I hope not. There needs to be a bigger payoff then “Emma’s on our team!” For the most part though, this was a harmless episode. It neither excited me, nor incited my wrath save a absurd use of a rock legend. It was equal parts detoured into Wonderland and focused on the main story. I’m anxious for the trial to be over and so relieved that next week they’ll finally address: what did Snow White do to ruin EQ’s life? They have laid such importance on this event that it will be hard for them to live up to expectations.

Sebastian Stan owned his spotlight this week, not overselling the madness or drowning out the established voices. Though Mad Hatter’s fairyback was par for the OUAT course, using a child as motivation, I liked that Jefferson acknowledged that the Curse is not being in the real world, it’s being separated from the ones you love. That detail might prove important later on. I could imagine a difficult decision down the road where a character might have to choose between the worlds. All speculation now, but thematically it’s significant that we have this consistency in message for the fairybacks. It’s an acute lens through which we can view them going forward. For keeping the ball rolling on the “bleeding realties” track and for maintaining a grave tone without frolicking into cheesy sentimentality territory, as the series unapologetically tends to, I’ll give credit where credit is due: there’s some magic in Storybrooke.

Snow White (Ginnifer Goodwin) gets in touch with the evil within, thirsty for the Evil Queen's blood.

I know these “Lost” alum love literary allusions, but this title seemed a little strong. I mean, does Ginnifer Goodwin seem like what Joseph Conrad had in mind for Kurtz?

Minor gripes aside, last night’s flirtation with evil was both infuriating and entertaining as hell. Some of the more annoying tendencies return, such as Regina’s groan-worthy fare and Henry, being Henry. And then there’s Snow White: a take-no-prisoners, pick-axe wielding, knight-torturing woman after my own heart. The slow reveal where she sings to a bluebird just to lure in it and swat at it with her broom was probably one of their best deployments of comedy yet. Turns out a Charming-size hole in her heart is the cause of her bitter ‘tude, but I gotta say: it was a major turn-on. Ginnifer Goodwin’s “dark side” was a pleasant surprise, even if it was a result of denying her true self. Most of the allure came from the pure unpredictability of what she would do to achieve her vengeful ends. I also yearned throughout the episode for her unadulterated brutality because the rest was so distastefully sugar-coated. The bad habit of repeating dialogue in both realms to emphasize a thematic tie was a well they drew from several times and only elicited obnoxious eye rolls from yours truly.

Lazy writing would be the wrong diagnosis. In my “professional” opinion, it stemmed from the blurring lines of reality that arose in last night’s moon-gravity leap forward in the overarching plot. Though the implication of this cross-world channeling was important to clarify, I felt that they underestimated their audience. Networks tend to do this, but I expected Kitsis/Horowitz to know better after working on such an experimental and innovative network show (in case you’re new, I liked “Lost,” and they wrote for “Lost”…moving on). Beat you over the head lines like “She has had her heart broken, and that can make you do unspeakable things” and “Sometimes evil stares us right in the face and we don’t even realize it,” call attention to themselves in the worst way. Like that kid who gets no love from their high-expectation parents so s/he seeks validation from everyone else. Look everyone, I’m doing something clever with parallelism—and irony!

With the help of CGI Jiminy Cricket (could you imagine if it was a dude in a costume? Hilarious.) the seven dwarves stage an intervention, where even Happy relays his grievances (she broke his mug!) and they force her to move out unless she starts to return to her old gleeful self. Snow agrees to leave, but not for their benefit: she wants head to roll. The queen’s gotta pay for (allegedly) killing her daddy, so she slings her pick-axe over her shoulder to hunt down the evil bi-otch. Moments later, she trips up a horse-riding knight and legit tortures him for information on the queen’s whereabouts. Her threatening monologue about diamonds and how they’re impervious to damage was awesomely diabolical. When she explains that her pickaxe, from the dwarf mines, is the only blade that can cut through a diamond (“So imagine what it could do to your soft flesh!) was the the sort of cutting-edge (pun intended) menace a writer dreams of having the opportunity to employ in dialogue. And the delight shows, especially in Goodwin’s cold delivery.

In the real world, Emma’s forced to book Mary Margaret to keep up appearances and not attract Regina’s wrath. And frankly, the evidence is piling against her. Her fingerprints are all over the box that likely contains Kathryn’s heart, AND said container is her jewelry box. Emma firmly believes in Mary Margaret’s innocence, but she needs to exonerate her dutifully or she’ll doom her friend to prison. Here’s where everyone’s least favorite precocious, fairy-tale zealot, Henry butts in, hoping to find the evidence that will vindicate his teacher. When he inspects the apartment with Emma, however, they find the murder weapon stashed in a heating vent. Discouraged, Henry seeks answers at the bottom of a mug of hot chocolate. Then the artist formerly known as Mysterious Biker Dude a.k.a August (ew) comforts the boy by professing his faith in The Book. In fact, he divulges to the kid his purpose in Storybrooke is to help Emma “see the light.” Essentially he is OUAT’s version of Desmond (am I right, Losties?) shepherding lost souls. He springs Henry into action, convincing him that with solid proof Emma will rally around his cause (Operation Cobra or “The lamest military operation name ever.”).

Back in FTL, Grumpy confronts Snow as she’s stripping the clothes off the knight (oh Ginnifer, how you tickle my fancy) and insists she let him help. He recommends seeking the counsel of Rumpelstiltskin since his potion is what altered her personality. She has no intentions of being cured, but she wonders if he can aid her in her mission. Rumpy does bestow a bow upon Snow that supposedly never misses it’s target, free of charge. Rumpy slyly assures her, “I’m invested in your future.” He never explains why he took her hair during their least deal (for the potion), but he drops a hint when he rambles on about how the only magic he hasn’t been able to bottle up is love. And if he could, he would be all-powerful. It’s a tidbit that intrigued me more than most they inserted into last night’s narrative because anything that empowers Rumpy means that EQ (the Evil Queen) will be unseated as the biggest of the baddies which is definitely my MO. I mean, Regina was seen skinning an apple with a pocket knife in this episode. A villain doesn’t get any more hammy than that.

Storybrooke alter-ego Mr. Gold also offers his assistance to Snow White’s doppelganger, Mary Margaret, agreeing to be  her legal counsel. Mary accepts, but like her counterpart she’s uneasy that he’s representing her gratis. He recites the identical forewarning, “I’m invested in your future,” furthering my defeated feeling that OUAT cares very little about my sensitivities toward cheesiness. Also in the business of clearing Mary’s good name (although for the first time in forever people start referring to her as Ms. Blanchard, why?) is David, who visits Dr.Hopper the town shrink hoping he can extract the memories he’s lost during his blackouts. Under hypnosis, he upholds the motif of channeling the FTL and believes that his memory of insisting Snow not kill the Queen is actually him imploring Mary not to kill Kathryn. WHOOPSIE!

Prince Charming also confronts Rumpelstiltskin (after Red creates a kickass diversion from the pursuing royal guards when her inner wolf comes out to play), strong-arming him for a cure to Snow’s personality disorder. When he confirms that true love’s kiss is the only antidote, the prince rushes to find her before her assassination attempt. He doesn’t leave, however, without striking a deal with Rumpy for her whereabouts, giving him his cloak in return. The imp is dubious about the value it possesses, but bear with with me on that. After a first attempt fails because he didn’t remind her of who she used to be, Jiminy Cricket appears fro a pep talk, and upon the second try (if at first you don’t succeed, kids, keep stalking that girl!) he restores Snow’s memory after sacrificing himself by jumping in front of the arrow. His willingness to die before she slips into darkness touches her so deeply, enhancing the magic of that pivotal smooch.

Charming’s immediately captured though, putting a damper on their reunion, but Snow vows that she “will always find [him]!” After genuinely apologizing to her dwarf buddies, they join her in the crusade to rescue her true love and the warm and fuzzy Snow returns! Thankfully, the disappearance of cutthroat Snow did not disappoint me, because both Josh Dallas and Ginnifer Goodwin bring their A-game in establishing chemistry, so you’re as adamant about their love triumphing over evil as they are, and that empathy that is proving essential to the overall investment in the show’s momentum.

The real world plot wraps up just as cathartically, but in the opposite direction of ‘”feel-good.” After heeding August’s advice to seek guidance from The Book, Henry surmises that the Queen’s key will open any lock. So he smuggles away his “mom’s” keys (resourceful little bugger, ain’t he?) and coerces Emma into testing it out. When the key opens the apartment door, Emma’s intuition of a set-up is reaffirmed. She ensures Emma that despite the DNA test confirming that it was Kathryn’s heart, that she will do whatever it takes to free her, proving her gall by striking up an alliance with Mr. Gold. Mary’s tempted by circumstance though when she finds the cell key beneath her bed (planted by Regina no doubt). And after David visits and admits to his increasing suspicion, due of his mixed-up memories, (a biting critique against the validity of hypnosis, huh?) she breaks down, banishing her true love. He resolve weakened, she uses the key to break out, obviously complicating any effort of Emma’s or Mr. Gold’s to absolve her.

The bigger payoff, for me, came before that final frame that reveals Mary’s empty cell. In the FTL, we see Rumpy drop Snow’s hair and a thread from Charming’s cloak into a flask. The result is some sort of illuminated bond, which signifies that his purpose of collecting random personal items was indeed malicious. He now has successfully bottled love, elevating him to an omnipotence that would seem impenetrable. What this means in the larger context is unclear, but I like the prospects if he now has a leg up on the insufferable Evil Queen.

This development, among many others, affirmed my faith that we may be moving toward less isolated “fairy tale of the week” departures and have arrived at the sturdier backbone of the series. Not all of OUAT’s ventures into folklore have been pointless, but meandering has become tedious considering how many episodes in we are. Although the hand-holding insulted my intelligence, I’m thankful there is a trajectory that I can grab onto and follow. A drama centered around fairy tales with no stakes is too self-indulgent to enjoy; and with newfound purpose, I’m more likely to tolerate such heavily lathered-on “significance. Though I wish the writers would stop being so keen to point it out. To be clear, my issue isn’t with the idea of the borders of Storybrooke and FTL becoming indistinct, but when its added only to stroke the ego of the brain trust and to be “clever for clever’s sake,” I can’t get behind that. But the risk-taking drove character action, so with cautious optimism I’ll encourage the less dawdling, more uninhibited get-it-done approach.

For unveiling the series’ dark side, while evolving the premise and capitalizing on the crucial draw of the show—the connection between Emma, Mary and David becoming a family unit again, and unifying to take down Regina—this week’s episode earned my respect, despite testing my patience with cliched repetition. B, for more badass mofo Snow!

Snow White (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Red Riding Hood (Meghan Ory) hunt down the BIg Bad Wolf.

Can a 44-minute drama be salvaged by a final 15-ish minutes of badassery when the first 30-ish of shlock made me want to be anywhere else but in front of my television?

I was preparing my most epic of rants near the halfway mark. I was ready to bash the show’s inability to brand itself: who are you OUAT? Are you the cornball cheesefest parade of Disney characters masquerading as a mystery drama? Or are you the genre-bending brain child of LOST creators that uses parallel worlds and fairy tales to challenge our conceptions of good and evil and “happily ever after?”

But then my mind was blown a bit, and I jumped off the pulpit. OUAT isn’t ambitious, no matter how much I want it to be. There will still be overarching themes, subtext, and symbolism; but this should not be mistaken for an attempt to televise high-end children’s literature. The success of this show hinges on how fun and inventive the fairy tale allusions are, week-to-week. Let’s face it, not much headway has been made in “Operation Cobra” a.k.a Tell Storybrooke residents they used to be fairy tale characters. To be frank, most of the real world happenings that have earned their keep had to do with relationships and next to nothing with mythology. The last time I can recall a significant development in understanding the connection between FTL (Fairy Tale Land) and present day Storybrooke was Regina’s collection o’ hearts that she stows underground.

Therefore, with so much “riding” on the subversion of  familiar legends, Red needed to blow the house down (see what I did there?). At first I was underwhelmed and even perturbed. She whined about Granny’s overprotectiveness—she hatched down all the doors and sat by the fire with a freaking crossbow—because she was separated from the handsome meathead, Peter. Granny justifies her tyranny claiming she had a run-in with The Wolf as a child. It slaughtered all the men in her clan and left her scarred, emotionally and physically (bite marks on her arm).

When Red finds Snow White in her chicken coop, her reclusive lifestyle is shaken up. When Snow hears that the wolf’s terrorism is keeping her from true love, Snow’s romantic tendencies arise and she’s adamant that Red must overcome. With puppy love blinding her, Red decides they’ll scour the woods for the wolf during the day, since he’ll probably be taking his savage beast nap. As Red follows the tracks (by scent, the first clue) their fear heightens as they discover the remnants of a massacre, several blooded bodies strewn over a white snow blanket. Part of my annoyance was how they hyped up this wolf so damn much. They kept panning back and forth to both their awestricken faces, and saying things like, “What kind of monster are we dealing with!” and none of the horror felt earned.

The tracks lead them back to the cottage and it becomes clear that Red’s puppy love is actually werewolf love as he was the last person other than them (other big hint I missed) that would have come footprints leading there. Then more over-dramatization: “This is so bad.” “So do something!” “You’re right, I have to.” I mean, come on, that’s just awful, and uninspired, and just a waste of script. Then overwrought dialogue just becomes ridiculous when Red informs Peter of his supposed alter ego and her plan to spend every night with him helping him cope with his ferocious ailment. “All we have to do is tie you up during the wolf’s time. I know where to find rope!” Oh, how resourceful you are Red Riding Hood. It’s a plan that ensures disaster.

Across the dimensional planes, or however they eventually explain it, Emma is conducting her static investigation of Kathryn’s disappearance. After David’s extravagant and public arrest, Emma simply releases him because she’s the human lie detector and she can’t charge him with anything. Red’s Storybrooke self, Ruby, quits her job at Granny’s diner because she totally like, oppressive: giving her more work and junk. Emma takes her under her wing and Mary offers their place while she figures out her future. She tries her hand at policework (despite Henry’s repeated suggestions that she try a messenger job, because he’s the prince of irony and thinks he’s clever, but he’s just a precocious little twerp) and helps Emma track David, who since his release from police custody has been spotted in the woods in a catatonic state or “dreamwalk” state by Mary Margaret.

When Ruby happens upon David he’s passed out. They jolt him awake, and he has no recollection of the past day. Emma gets a hunch that he might have wandered to the toll bridge like he did last time he “dreamwalked.” Aiming to boost Ruby’s self-esteem, she sends her on the erran and what Ruby finds nearly paralyzes her with fear. Remember those tiny treasure chests of hearts I mentioned before? Well, it’s one of those, with Kathryn’s heart inside! Duh duh DUH!

Snow, under the alias of Mary (because OUAT’s goal this week was to make me groan as many times as possible), covers for Red as she tends to Peter the wolf (ugh, seriously). But when Granny pulls back the red hood and doesn’t find Red, she panics. The reason for her captivity wasn’t to keep her from love at all. Are your ready? RED IS THE WOLF! THE RED CAPE WAS MADE BY A WIZARD TO STOP HER TRANSFORMATION! Yeah, they fooled me on that one. I knew it wasn’t Peter, but I suspected Granny since she described with such precision how the wolf decimated her family. Turns out my instinct was right, and Granny passed on the werewolf gene and withheld the secret so she wouldn’t have to shoulder that burden. Crossbow-yielding Granny does subdue her, but not before she’s ripped her boyfriend to shreds with her teeth (a man’s worst nightmare). Obviously, this traumatizes Red, but we leave her in agony and I fully approve of this. As I’ve mentioned, I LOVE when FTL goes dark. I’m the eternal optimist and it would be awesome if the show ended up going the route of championing the real world, where fairy tales are possible without the aid of sorcery and just the magic of love. Yeah, it’s shameful how sappy I am.

Turns out the awesome 180s don’t end in FTL. Emma reveals that the box was marked up with not David, but Mary  Margaret’s fingerprints! I’m not at all convinced that my sweetheart Ginnifer Goodwin is capable of murder, and we already know those boxes belong to Regina. I’ll admit I’m digging the ruthlessness the Evil Queen has displayed with this act, as opposed to her usual nails-on-a-blackboard fits of wrath. There isn’t as much suspense here as they’d like to think, all we need to know is how she planted the prints and what motivation she has to frame Mary Margaret for this crime.

Ruby ends her rebellious phase and returns to Granny, resolved to never encounter a human heart buried in the ground ever again. Nothing like gore to make you run back to Grandma. She evens cleans up her appearance ditching her booty shorts, belly-baring tops and red streaks in her hair for flannel, jeans and a more professionally styled hairdo. Granny takes her back, admitting she only wanted to assign her more duties so she could prepare her to take over the diner when she’s gone. I have to at least commend the writers for one of their more subtle, less wink-wink, parallels. Ruby, like Red, discovers a side of her she didn’t know she had, but chooses to suppress her sleuthing skills in exchange for a humble existence with those she loves. Granted Red’s dark side is more tragic, but I believe extrapolating and exaggerating the woes of their real-world counterparts should be the objective of the fairybacks, therefore I condone its usage this week.

It’s hard to ignore the utter irrelevance and lack of bite (I’m so darn pun-ny!) of the majority of this episode though. A twist done right, can be masterful, but I had no desire to invest in where Red’s story was going until her genetic monstrosity was uncovered. Perhaps if her adoration for Peter felt less fleeting, or if her defiance of Granny were less juvenile and rooted in a purer ambition I might have cared, but when you’re focusing on a fringe character whom you’re hardly invested in, motivation becomes key. And it was clear to me they glossed over it and were banking on their audience sticking around, feeling their viewership would be vindicated in the final revelations. Though they certainly altered my perception of the episode, my memory of time wasted was not erased. My main issue was illustrated perfectly in one particular scene, where Henry explains to Emma that Ruby has a lot to offer because she’s goddamn Red Riding Hood (my words). Emma replies, “Yeah, she’s pretty badass.” And by that point, I had not seen that in the slightest. At that point, in both worlds,  she was a timid girl on a defiant kick, with little ambition other than to stick it to Granny and have people affirm that’s special. If I don’t believe that she has any fight in her, why would I take it on good faith that she would prove herself to be vicious?

Much of last night was spent confirming what is needless and infuriating about the Once Upon A Time premise: obvious allusions, character of the week structure, and unfounded causes for alarm in the seemingly low-stakes secluded village of Storybrooke. For a thrilling conclusion with legitimate surprises, and a glimpse of how both worlds can conjure up their own immediacy, I will jack up the grade on an otherwise boring detour from the primary question: when will they find out the truth? Truth is, I guarantee its dragged out past the season finale, but if the fairybacks can offer a more palpable, less tangential interest in their backstories, and they ramp up the tension in the real world it might not matter. But with little to hang on to besides a missing persons investigation, my mind continues to wander. Red’s possession by demon doggy carries a mediocre episode into B- territory.

At the village tavern, Dreamy (Lee Arenberg) is advised by Belle (Emile De Ravin) on the pain inherent in love.

“Once Upon A Time” just might be too damn cheesy for some. Let’s face it, blue and pink fairies floating above the clouds, dropping fairy dust on a giant egg, from which a dwarf is hatched—that’s an acquired taste. That sort of cornball, nonsensical mythology is not necessarily new to “genre” television, but with such a Disney-fied sheen, it might alienate many viewers. But judging by the ratings and the resulting raise in the VFX budget (much more respectable CGI), this concoction seems to be working it’s (brace yourselves) magic.

Tonight’s formula didn’t quite work for me, mostly due to the absurd love story at the center of the episode. The actors were troopers (genre vet Amy Acker as Nova the fairy, and Lee Arenberg as Dreamy/Grumpy) who didn’t mock the material and tried to inject genuine, and not overblown, feeling into a largely forgettable story. It’s upsetting too, because as I’ve begrudgingly foretold, I love me a good true-love-conquers-all tale. But since Snow White met up with the dwarves in “7:15 AM” (one of the best episodes so far by the way) we’ve known that Grumpy was once “blinded by love.” We knew that somehow the relationship would be doomed and his “Dreamy-ness” would be shattered. I’m bumming myself out with how cynical that sounds, but it’s true. I found it hard to root for a relationship that I knew wasn’t exactly “Too Big To Fail.”

Also, to be even more of a killjoy, Dreamy never really loved her. When Nova clumsily spilled her fairy dust on him, she accidentally made him fated to fall for her. Now, we could get into a lengthy discussion of which came first, the dust or the egg (rimshot). Sorry, I had to. But no, seriously, I would gladly hear an argument that maybe the fate of Dreamy and Nova’s love pre-destined her dropping the fairy dust and it randomly falling on his egg, but this felt less Romeo and Juliet (us and our destined love against the world) and more like mythical negligence. And even if you disagree, and feel like nothing can tear at the fabric of this dwarf-fairy union, fine. But in terms of storytelling, this dramatic irony didn’t work for me.

Using Romeo and Juliet again, yes it’s stated blankly in the prologue that they will die, but that’s a play with layers of tragedy to unravel. It doesn’t become less enjoyable once the end is spoiled, it becomes all the more intriguing. There’s the fighting families, there’s the flawed nature of both lovers, and I don’t think Shakespeare makes the argument that these were two people who belonged together. They were two kids who fell head over heels and let their conceptions of love overwhelm them and cloud their reason. Dreamy and Nova can’t be together because…dwarves are culturally denied the right to love? Because Dreamy feels Nova should put her career first? Actually, now that I think of it, that was less of a tragedy and more of a commentary about the shift in our modern conceptions of love, wasn’t it? NAH.

Regardless, the show would be hard pressed to trump their own use of dramatic irony in the instance of Snow White/ Prince Charming. Here the construction is the opposite. There is less of a tragic element because we know they WILL end up together. But where the engagement happens is the multi-episode arc in which they get together against all odds. Since we’re clueless as to how they get together, the writers are free to orchestrate a intricate, obstacle-riddled path to their happily ever after. Where my investment starts is when Snow and Charming start to experience the painful longing, and they question whether the fight is worth it. You want to convince me that true love exists? Integrate it’s spell into parts of our world. Use emotional anguish, use hopelessness, and use that resilience that keeps you from quitting on someone because losing them would kill you, even though you’re already dying, just to see that someone again. Even in the age that equates optimism with weakness, happy endings work. They just need to be earned. And so do the sappy ones, you won’t gain my appreciation just by denying Dreamy his dream.

Dreamy’s Storybrooke doppellanger is Leroy, the town drunk (because in the real world, if you’re a grouch it’s because you drink too damn much). Generally, a grump (surprise, surprise), Leroy is bitten by the love bug. Of course, he can’t have her because she is the real world equivalent of an untouchable fairy—a nun. As Mary Margaret berates, “Could you possibly pick anyone less available?” Not gonna lie, I lolled. Anywho, he’s smitten with her prudish and naive charm and offers to help sell candles to raise money for the nuns’ rent, which slightly sketched me out. He joins Mary Margaret in the effort, but they sell zero candles because they’re social pariahs. It’s all very biblical actually. Afraid to disappoint Astrid (the nun that has seduced him into paying his rent…still sketchy) Leroy lies and says he sold all of them, $5,000 worth. So how will the town drunk and town harlot sell all the candles before it’s too late? Tune in next week…or paragraph. Either way.

Well after searching for the answer at the bottom of a glass, our kooky friend, Leroy decides to take an ax (ah, subtle link between the worlds) to the transformer, putting out all the lights for blocks. So, basically, they threatened them into buying candles. Huh. This show is dark. Astrid is impressed though, but nothing really becomes of it because, well she is a nun. So they live happily, but celibately ever after.

Relegated to not nearly enough screen time is the matter of Kathryn’s disappearance. Emma investigates the scene, and even calls the law school, and determines that she was definitely abducted somehow. When she interrogates David, she feels he is honest when he says that he hasn’t talked to her at all since the accident. But when Regina pulls the phone records, it tells a different story. Emma must then go against her instincts and her allegiances and take David away in her squad car as a suspect. The episode ends on this “cliffhanger,” but it felt extremely anti-climactic. He isn’t being arrested. She has evidence that he might have lied (he could have pocket dialed), but nothing linking him to the crime yet. Why Mary Margaret was looking on as if her world had come crashing down seemed like forcing emotion out of the preliminary stages of this investigation.

In addition, there was a detail that bothered me. I understand that Emma operates alone, in a small town, but when you have a case where a wife goes missing, wouldn’t the side chick be the first one you question? I understand Mary Margaret is her mother-friend, but you have to hold up the integrity of the law. At least go through the formality of asking her questions even if you are going to ignore the answers. Jot some stuff on a notepad, help her come up with an alibi, SOMETHING! When Sidney Glass mentioned this explicitly, I was irate. They just completely dismissed it, like “No, I know her, she’s a good person.” SO?!

Implausibility was a huge issue for me here. I’m willing to suspend disbelief so that I can enjoy an artful mythology or relatable characters, but disregard for logic? I can forgive dwarves hatching out of eggs (which in hindsight was kinda awesome, and a clever way to explain their work-dedicated life without some half-assed slavery allegory). What I can’t forgive is manufactured feeling. Is destroying a transformer supposed to be a romantic gesture? It’s not only illegal, but irresponsible. Candles don’t solve the problems of food going bad in the refrigerator. And what if the hospital was within that radius? I hope he sells some extra candles to pay for the generator! And as I mentioned already, I was impressed with the actors who played Nova and Dreamy-turned-Grumpy, but as written there wasn’t nearly enough payoff for me to get my “Awwwws” from the him brandishing a new ax that dubs him Grumpy. Plus, I saw it coming a mile away once I saw that he was originally dubbed Dreamy in the same manner.

It’s not impossible to make me care about a dwarf and a fairy falling madly in love, but when you explicitly discount their feelings by saying it was conjured by fairy dust, how am I supposed to feel the magic? For falling short of the expectations they had raised in recent weeks, of delicately rendered love stories and dynamic flashbacks with sophisticated spins on the childhood standards, I must regretfully whistle as I work to forgive the dull stone they mined this week. But knowing what Kitsis/Horowitz are capable of, and looking ahead at a sexy, Red Riding Hood fairyback next week, I’m sure the gleam will be restored. Until then, C+

Emma (Jennifer Morrison) hesitates, but eventually hops on the stranger's (Elon Bailey) bike as Granny watches.

Despite shifting social opinions on love, commitment, monogamy and sexual liberation, one commandment has stood the test of time and atheism: thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife.

In recent weeks, I’ve expressed my allegiance to the Mary Margaret/David pairing. Shall we call them Mavid? Yes, let’s. Well, Mavid has honed in on the thread of my fabric that is a hopeless romantic and they’ve yanked at it with all their might. However, the consequences of their love have a mighty wide ripple effect in both Storybrooke and in Fairy Tale Land (FTL) as Snow White and Charming.

In Storybrooke, their romance gets the stigmatized label of an affair. David is married to Kathryn, whom he doesn’t love, but more importantly he doesn’t care for enough to tell her that. This is where my ties to Mavid become tenuous. Forbidden love carries with it an air of thrill and the danger can really ramp up the sexual tension, but it loses its luster when eventually the unsuspecting “others” find out, and that infatuation is quickly converted into a burdensome shame. Having been wrapped up in a doomed relationship myself, I felt for Mary Margaret. It’s tough to let go when you feel like loosening your grip on someone means losing hold of who you are. But in her case, she’s not just lying to herself she’s lying to his wife. You’re aiding and abetting a broken promise. This dishonesty seems totally contradictory to the kind-hearted, thoughtful Mary we have come to know over thirteen episodes, but it could all be forgiven if when the heat of the moment reaches its boiling point, Mary can make the right decision instead of the easy one.

Tonight’s episode was about this self-destructive inner turmoil we call love, and the havoc it wreaks upon the emotions of every one involved. FTL serves not as the painfully obvious parallel this week, but as an alternative (and we aren’t browbeaten about ‘the point’ through ‘wink wink’ dialogue). What if both Kathryn and David decided to stop dancing around each others’ feelings, and followed their hearts? Often times, I have said FTL appears to be grimmer than reality, and redemption is sought in Storybrooke, but tonight the karmic tale plays out in small town Maine, while more typically, beasts are conquered in the alternate universe.

Kathryn drops a bit of a bomb on David when she reveals that she had applied to law school while he was still taking his really long nap. That’s what a coma is, right? She has received her acceptance letter and was accepted to an unnamed school in Boston. Well which is it? New England Law? Harvard? I’m way too close to the situation being a resident, I apologize. His reaction is dismay since this means no more sneaking around with cutie-patootie. When he goes to “clear his head” with Mary, I’m vindicated when my girl tells him to face facts. She insists he tell Kathryn the truth or he has made his choice, there is no “them” anymore.

David’s alter ego James (awful alternative to Charming) is running from marriage too. As explained in “7:15 A.M,”  he and King Midas’ daughter Abigail (Kathryn’s FTL identity) are betrothed per an agreement to unify the two kingdoms. Charming says screw political alliances and holds steadfast to his principle that he can’t marry someone he doesn’t love. Abigail’s henchmen intercept him and they bury the hatchet. See, in this universe Kathryn’s alter ego has a true love as well that isn’t him: a fellow named Frederick, who was paralyzed in gold after throwing himself on the cursed Midas when their caravan was ambushed. It discomforted me at first, the implication being made through the juxtaposition of stories that David and Kathryn’s marriage was always loveless, but Kathryn admits as much to Regina later. It troubled me still, because I found this to be inconsistent. When we first met David, fresh after his super long nap time, his personality was split. Half of him still loved Kathryn and the other was engrossed with Mary Margaret. At the time I assumed it was an internal conflict between his present self and the memories of his FTL past, but now the whole idea that he ever truly loved Kathryn pre-coma has been abandoned. Kathryn disavows that idea when she says, “He never looked at me like he looks at her.” I’m not sure which I would prefer, but I wish OUAT had simply stuck with one so that I didn’t end my sense of loyalty wasn’t so scatterbrained.

When David confronts Kathryn he acts much less honorably than his royal self. In a doubly deceptive ploy, he tells Kathryn that he can’t go to Boston because he can’t make a connection with her (stinky load of horses**t, huh?). Not only does he neglect to mention he loves someone else, but he promised Mary Margaret he’d tell the truth. What a scumbag. I loved it. I’m all for making these fairy tale conceits of good and evil less stark by employing duplicitous characters. As much as the romance between Mary and David sent my heart aflutter, it was the most I’d ever enjoyed David oddly, when I stopped liking him. Not only does he incite a rage within Kathryn when she finds out from Regina instead, but he brings shame upon the woman he professes to love. His wife not only slaps her in front of her students, but the reverberations of it spreads hateful murmurs all over town and TRAMP is tagged on her station wagon. The humiliation gives rise to courage, and Mary Margaret asserts that the relationship has become too destructive, a refreshing concept considering how in FTL men and women risk their lives for an elevated ideal of true love. Even if the relationship is predestined, this wrench in the plan felt like the most convincing way to veer off course (foreshadowing, lol).

A legend of the mystical properties of water elicits the more direct collision of worlds this week. A magical lake called Something-Lame with the power to bring back something you’ve lost serves as the answer to reviving Princess Abigail’s true love, Frederick. The guardian of the lake is predictably a siren, the obvious metaphor for temptation. The seductress takes the form of Snow White, and at first he is entrapped by her kiss. But when she says she loves him he senses the inauthenticity and wriggles away from her seaweed grasp and stabs her. Abigail then pours the lake water over statue Frederick and he’s restored to lively Frederick again. I could care less about Freddy though. He served as an adequate motivation/plot device for Charming to confront his hopelessness towards reuniting with Snow, but he came off as kind of a wuss, despite slaying the beast. He entered into a knowingly risky situation figuring that he had nothing else to live for, so he would fight for someone else’s true love since he can’t secure his own? Kind of a suicidal mess, no? Ultimately, he realized that true love is not something you give up on, but initially his misplaced sense of sacrifice came off as less than valiantly. Otherwise, the fairyback felt inconsequential, taking us back to where we left off with “7:15 A.M,” extending the scene only slightly to show him and Red Riding Hood galloping away from his “father’s” hot, arrow-firing pursuit. It actually confused me about the timeline of these fairybacks and made me wonder how long Snow has been with the dwarves to this point.

The water-induced recovery in Storybrooke was that of The Book. Yes, Henry’s book that contains all the tales of its inhabitants’ former lives. We as an audience are privy to the truth, which is that Mysterious Biker/Writer Dude, who finally gives up his name (August W. Booth, ew), had it at the end of “Fruit of the Poisonous Tree.” It was unclear, to me anyway, whether he was simply repairing the book or if he added new pages, but nonetheless he strategically places the book in a gutter underneath Emma’s car after making her drink some well water that, according to legend, comes from a magical lake. Does this mean that FTL lies underneath the town as was alluded to in “That Still Small Voice? (the 5th episode way back in November)” The writers sure seem to be suggesting it. I also thought when August started with his didactic monologue about ancient cultures worshipping water it was terribly misplaced, but Kitsis/Horowitz were part of many such preachings on “LOST” so that type of speech was bound to seep in at some time. But where “LOST” was tonally very spiritual, “Once Upon A Time” should stick to its lighter, mythic tone.

Kathryn’s mature realization that she never loved David as deeply as Mary Margaret, and only pretended to, set in motion some shady events. First, Regina steals a letter Kathryn left for David giving her blessing of Mavid (think it will catch on? I’s okay I know it’s lame) and subsequently burns it. Then, when Kathryn leaves town to study law in Boston and find her real true love, her car is found by a passerby swerved into the woods, but with no body inside! The cut to Regina’s sinister stare implies she had something to do with it, but how? Too much slight of hand is taking place in those last moments for me to enjoy the ride (pun intended). The strings are visible and the manipulation, like the show itself in its lower points, is far from subtle. For me, the sweet and somber note of Emma lying beside Mary Margaret in bed as Mary cries over her rough decision to end it with David, was the preferable ending. Not only do I buy into the acting styles of Morrison and Goodwin more than Lana Parilla as Regina/Evil Queen, but their struggles gel more with the core of the episode’s thematic ambition. Ending on Regina’s Machiavellian mischief was just a calculated network cliffhanger, and I should have expected that by now.

As I’ve admitted ad nauseum, I’m a sucker for a good ole fashioned faith-in-true-love hour, so this episode reeled me in easily, but by messing with the formula gave me reason to stick around. The VFX were FAR better than in episodes past; between the siren sequence and the horseback chases I was moderately impressed. All the same, this fairyback didn’t captivate me like those with Rumpelstiltskin ruining people’s lives have (I’m a bitter, bitter man) and the butchering of the mood at the end soured me from being more forgiving. For further developing already likable characters into flawed and relatable characters, and providing a noteworthy tale of tough choices—when is love worth the fight and when is it just killing you—I can’t ignore the progress my relationship with this series is making. I won’t pretend it was the real thing, so a not-quite-true love deserves a B.

Rumpelstiltskin (Robert Carlyle) whisks his new housekeeper Belle (Emile de Ravin) away from her father.

My viewing experience of “Once Upon A Time” is tainted, by expectation. I want it to be LOST. It’s creators want it to be LOST, and it never will be.

Last week I gladly declared that OUAT had found its identity and had squandered many of its pretensions and simply tried to be a damn good time. But this week, Kitsis/Horowitz seemed like a needy child tugging at its mother’s pant leg. I thought they were beyond seeking approval. All the Easter eggs and insider jokes like the Apollo Bars and the McCutcheon whiskey were just tributes to the landmark series they took part in. However with Emile de Ravin’s appearance as Belle (yes, of Beauty and the Beast fame) I wonder if Eddy Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, harbor a repressed need to catch lightning in a bottle again.

Surely, De Ravin’s guest appearance is simply an isolated homage, and lofty aspirations haven’t bogged down this creative team. Except, LOST is not the only acclaimed drama to catch OUAT’s wandering eye. They’ve snatched talent like Jennifer Morrison from “House,” Giancarlo Esposito from “Breaking Bad,” and tonight they made a “Game of Thrones” pun by naming a flower shop, “Game of Thorns.” I can’t decide whether it is endearing or desperate.

Much like some classic LOST episodes, tonight’s OUAT was a reveal episode. There was still a fairyback, one brought to life thanks to all those Disney rights! Ah, ABC, you treat them well. And there was “progress” in Storybrooke. But the real meat of the plot came during a two minute interaction between Mr. Gold and Regina where it was finally acknowledged that they both know of their former lives and evil power struggle. She goes all Destiny’s Child, “Say your name!” And he admits to awareness of “other worlds.” This wasn’t presented as a huge deal, it wasn’t even the final reveal of the episode, but it is a revelation with implications for the series at large. It is out in the open now, and if he knows the questions become, will he be a roadblock for Emma and Henry’s plans to enlighten the townsfolk (for my Losties, “Desmond-style”) or could he prove a formidable ally?

I was predisposed to be enthralled with tonight’s fairyback. Beauty and the Beast is almost certainly in my top three Disney flicks of all time (excluding Pixar) and Claire was one of my many beloved Oceanic 815ers so Emile de Ravin had me hooked with little effort. We’re introduced to the heroine as she stews by her father’s side, worried their village will be sacked as the Ogre Wars rage on (Am I the only one who would be fascinated by a detailed history of the events leading up to these wars?). I was mildly disappointed her dad was a rich, lordly fellow instead of an eccentric inventor. Anyway, Rumpelstiltskin appears as the solution to their suffering, promising to save their town in exchange for Belle’s services as his permanent housekeeper. Her betrothed, Gaston, insists she stay, but Belle is intent on breaking away from the social constraints of womanhood, seizing the opportunity to be heroic. She elects to go with Rumpy, much to his delight.

In the real world, there was much less interesting fare. Mr. Gold is robbed by a florist, Mr. French, after Gold nabs his van as collateral. Gold seems awfully upset over one particular item that Sheriff Swan hadn’t yet recovered and threatens that if she doesn’t detain Mr. French, he will get to him first. When he does, he beats the florist with his cane for information on the whereabouts of this item. He starts screaming about “her” and how it’s his fault that, “she is gone.” When he refuses to divulge the entire truth to Emma, he is cuffed.

In a Storybrooke subplot, Ashley returns. Who? Oh, that pregnant girl who is Cinderella in Fairy Tale Land (FTL). She’s overtired from taking care of the baby because her baby daddy Shawn is always at work being the breadwinner. Ruby (FTL identity: Red Riding Hood) suggest that she and Mary Margaret join her for a ladies night on the town. Both agree, especially Mary Margaret who’s once again unsatisfied by only being a part-time lover to David, who is still carrying on with his wife, Kathryn. I normally care about those two lovebirds, but the developments felt so wedged in, that I became detached. Next week their affair will come to a head when Kathryn finds out.

At Rumpy’s castle, Belles settles in after feeling initially weary about handing over her life to a “monster.” But as the “tale as old as time” foretold, Rumpy begins to treat her nicely, even pardoning her when she chips a cup. This is of course an allusion to “Chip” from Disney’s incarnation of the tale. You might say this reference made me groan, but I shall not complain as I promised last week. Rumpy begins to fall for her first, turning Gaston into a rose for his sweetheart when he comes to her rescue. Then, Belle’s opinion of her master (kinky) shifts when she falls from a ladder into his arms (the editing and VFX in this scene are ATROCIOUS). She begins to probe him for information about his past, when he was a man. She yearns to know the man she will serve forever better. In a move to test her affection for him, Rumpy asks Belle to go into town for more straw. If she comes back, he will tell her the story of the son he lost. He expressed that he expects her to never come back.

On her journey she runs into the Evil Queen. EQ informs her that her master’s curse will be broken, and his humanity restored if he receives true love’s kiss. Knowing that his beastly features and evil within can be eroded she returns to him. But when she shares true love’s kiss with Rumpy, he resists the change. He suspects her to be an agent of the EQ, trying to remove his powers, to weaken him. For her treason, Belle is thrown in the dungeon. After a tantrum in which the only glassware spared is the chipped cup, he releases her, never wanting to see her again. She calls him a coward as his son had when he killed to protect him, a genuine callback and reference that felt the most organic and essential of any they’ve attempted.

Shakeups in Storybrooke abound when Ashley accepts Shawn’s marriage proposal and Mary Margaret bumps into David. He hands her a V-day card, but accidentally hands her one addressed to Kathryn. This tips the scales for MM and she observes that they will find a way to be together, but this isn’t it. Back at SBPD, Regina bribes Emma with a half hour visit with Henry (this wouldn’t strike her as odd…awful sheriff….and where’s mystery writer/biker dude?) in order to converse with Mr. Gold. She confesses to encouraging Mr. French to rob him, asking that he bring her back…his chipped cup. She held this as leverage so that Gold would speak his FTL name. It’s a fun scene that recalls the legend that surrounds his name. As I mentioned before, this revelation that they both know could add a layer of mixed allegiances or simply heighten the risks involved in Emma and Henry’s pursuit of the truth.

While Rumpy slumps at his spindle over his reluctance to allow love in his heart, for fear of rejection, EQ visits hoping they can strike another deal. When he is not in the mood he accuses her outright of ruining their relationship. She cryptically answers that she had nothing to do with “that tragedy.” Puzzled, Rumps asks of what she speaks. EQ shares that upon returning home, her father had shunned her. He learned of her love for “The Beast” and has banished to a tower where clerics will cleanse her soul. Distraught, she threw herself out of the tower, falling to her death. This explains the sentimental value surrounding the cup in the real world, it’s all he had left of her. Or so he thinks. The very last scene of the episode shows Regina entering a secret wing of the hospital where “Belle” is locked up. What repercussions could this have for their eternal power struggle? I’m unsure, but again it opens up the dimensions for the real world adding a darker tinge to the episodes to follow. Gold, like EQ may not want to go back to FTL, but they want to vanquish each other. The more moral ambiguity that can be infused in these classics, the better. And with the sporadic investment in real world proceedings before this, another reason to care wouldn’t hurt.

Nearly all the real world happenings felt inconsequential. This irrelevant quality took a sharp 180 toward the end, but I can’t discount my utter boredom beforehand. Ashley had been gone for so long, her engagement felt like a formality. And when I start feeling blase about any plot point that involves Mary Margaret you know it hasn’t been well rendered. Despite these clear narrative shortcomings, it was pleasant to step into the world of “Beauty and the Beast” again, and it’s always a pleasure to watch Emile de Ravin smile sheepishly at me (ok, in my general direction). For it’s sheer entertainment value, and for effectively (and finally) incorporating the gritty, tragic elements of the FTL futility into the thrust of the Storybrooke setting, OUAT regresses but swings its pendulum in a positive direction with a B-.

King Leopold (Richard Schiff of "The West Wing") dotes on his daughter, Snow (Ginnifer Goodwin).

Is there anything freer than knowing exactly who you are? You have nothing to prove, because your expectations are much more reasonable and whenever you create, or work, or do what it is you do, you do it with a exactness that no one else could ever conceive of.

Well, “OUAT,” I believe, has found that sweet spot. They have embraced an identity, and it falls short of many great shows on television. I can provide you with 10 better written shows, and I can find you ten shows that I certainly look up to more for their innovation and artistry. Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz worked on one of those before, “LOST.” If you have read my reviews you know how much I adored, and still carry great affection for, that show. Despite it being the one show my dad and I will never watch together, and while my opinions contrasts with those who loathed the final five minutes of the series finale so severely that it ruined the entire journey before it, it is undoubtedly, one for the history books. OUAT, will never be LOST. OUAT wishes they had the privilege of “LOST’s” club of flaws. However, OUAT has a lightness to it now, as if they have dropped the burden of expectations and have decided to care less about being great, and want to a force of its own will. “Once Upon A Time” will make me groan weekly with its insisting witticisms connecting their dual realms, but beyond today I will note them no longer (but seriously, referring to a plan to expose Regina as reaching for the fruit of the poisonous tree, COME ON!) because it’s charming just how little they wish to please me. And now that they have stopped catering to some false sense of importance, it has become more enjoyable, more effortlessly engaging, and more goddamed fun.

Although tonight, my patience was tried within mere minutes of the still lame title sequence (this isn’t a haunted house show, let’s be real). Lana Parilla is a clearly attractive woman in her own right, and I’m sure come Emmy season I will be scraping my jaw off the floor after she has walked onto the red carpet, but any chemistry we had has been killed by her shrewish attitude on the show. I’m sure that is how she has been directed to be, but why couldn’t she be more seductive. Isn’t the purest evil the kind that sneaks up behind you because you trusted it would never harm you? Well, it seems the show may be in the business of granting wishes. I say this not just because “The Genie” from Aladdin lore is the subject of tonight’s fairyback, but because in said fairyback, the Queen effectively seduced me.

But not before she made my balls shrink up inside me with condescensions like, “He’ll have a cracked cranium if you aren’t careful,” or “It’s time to be responsible Ms. Swan.” These gems and more are a part of a barrage of berating remarks by Regina, aimed at Emma, after she finds her and Henry playing at a now dilapidated playground (Henry’s castle) after the storm hit it. Emma, initially, is willing to let her usual overreaching roll off. Then she hits up Granny’s. Here we find Gus (damn, still not Breaking Bad, huh), I mean Sidney Glass, editor of the Storybrooke Mirror throwing back whiskeys for breakfast. Turns out he has a grudge with Regina too. After he was humiliated at the sheriff elections he decided to expose her for the corrupt mayor she is, to no avail. She found him out and fired him. Now, Sidney’s looking to partner up with Emma to take her down through some good old dirt-digging. Emma declines, claiming she wants to take her down without getting her hands dirty, but when she sees Henry’s playground is demolished and his book (THE BOOK) missing from its hiding place, she decides all bets are off.

As mentioned, we meet Genie this week who is Sidney’s alter ego (played by the supremely talented Giancarlo Esposito, who found his career-defining role as Gus in AMC’s “Breaking Bad”). As we know from prior installments (so don’t be shocked) Sidney is the magic mirror to Regina’s Evil Queen. This sets up easily the show’s most effective twist on conventional fairy tales, The Genie becomes the mirror. And despite this nugget not being concealed, I was still enthralled by the how of it all. The genie is summoned from the lamp and appears before King Leopold, father of Snow White. Esposito’s take on Genie is refreshing, he too wishes to be broken from the shackles of his gig, but this Genie isn’t masking his longing with cheer and improvisational humor. This guy is unenthused and apathetic. He recites his spiel about his magic’s limitations sans gusto. Being a kind royal, who wants for nothing (though it’s much easier to be humble when you’re royalty though) Leopold wishes for Genie’s freedom, a gesture that delights our not-so-blue friend. With his second wish he grants that his third wish be given to the Genie to use. Genie is again grateful, but asserts he will never use it. He’s granted 1001 wishes, and all of them have had grave consequences. Without much purpose to pair with his newfound liberty, Leopold offers to make him a member of his court where he’s certain he’ll find the one wish Genie cannot grant for himself, true love.

Making a brief appearance in the real world is Mary Margaret who meets up with David for a surprise picnic at the place where they first met, the ever-romantic toll bridge. Mary Margaret, amidst a flurry of kisses, wonders if they should face the reality that he is married, but David just wants to love her guilt-free so they push worry off to tomorrow. Mary Margaret also delivers possibly the funniest line of the night, when she see Sidney and Emma sifting through public records to discover any seeds of wrongdoing: “Yeah, maybe you’re doing something wrong, but if it’s right and it’s meant to be, does that make you a bad person?” Ha! Oh, Mary Margaret, even when you’re a mistress tortured by guilt and shame, you’re cute as a button. Meanwhile, Sidney seems convinced that this $50,000 of unappropriated funds will be the Mayor’s undoing, the “crack in the mirror” (ughhhhh…but I’m letting go…). When Emma questions why Sidney ever got in her pocket in the first place he more organically alludes to the parallel story, “I used to think she was a different person.”

Here we start to feel for Evil Queen (EQ). At some festivity, we see the King waxing philosophic about his daughter’s unmatched beauty, but then he strikes at EQ’s self-esteem saying Snow is a constant reminder of his “fairest of them all” first wife, and her mother. EQ has no place in his court, or in his heart. She is trapped in an essentially loveless marriage, or at least one where she will always play second fiddle. Genie runs after her into her courtyard where the soon-to-be poisonous apple tree grows. He lifts her spirits by gifting her a mirror, so that she may see what he sees, the true “fairest of them all.”

In Storybrooke, Emma confronts Regina directly about the missing funds. Regina is quick with an alibi, saying the record of the transaction was burned in the fire that got her elected. While leaning against her desk, Emma plants a bug so she can intercept some clue of where she allocated the money. When she overhears a phone call about a roadside meeting, she and Sidney spring into action. While heading to the location, the brakes fail on Emma’s car and Sidney immediately notices they were tampered with and that Regina must have discovered the bug. Coincidentally, Mr. Gold is out by the roadside. He informs them that the mayor met with him to buy his land. He also warns about emotional entanglements, and how they can distort the truth and people will get hurt. Unconvinced, Emma heads for Regina’s office and breaks in. She gathers any files related to the land grab off her computer, but not before running into Regina herself. Emma, quick-witted, conjures up a tale about a teenage prank that Sidney had witnessed. Across town, we also get a short glimpse of Mysterious Writer/ Biker Dude who bumps into Henry who is trying to record the details of THE BOOK, in case it isn’t found. When “Oh Precocious One” grills the man with the box about why he is here, he mocks the child, “Stuff.”

The Evil Queen’s father makes a surprise visit, dropping in on Genie when he expected a rendezvous with the Queen. The King has pilfered his wife’s diary and has knowledge about a man who has stolen her heart. He recognizes that he can never love EQ like she deserves, but he’s still aghast at her betrayal. He charges Genie, whom he trusts, to sniff out this mystery man. In response, EQ’s father has come to deliver his daughter a package, a way out of this prison of a life, an escape from her own form of servitude. When she opens the box we find two Agrabah vipers. For those with a working knowledge of Disney, Agrabah is the homeland of the Genie. EQ’s plan is to kill herself with one venomous bite, but Genie stops her. Clearly enamored with her, he offers to kill the king himself by setting the vipers loose on him. In this scene in particular we see another side of Regina/EQ, one who is stricken with sadness, but oozes sensuality as she brushes against Genie’s cheek and embraces him for his selflessness: a deep contrast to the shrill, unabashedly evil Regina that has inhabited every other episode. The added dimension is well executed and goes a long way to establishing a character we can invest in instead of just emphatically opposing.

Then the entanglements Mr. Gold forewarned of begin to unravel. At a city council meeting, Emma and Syndey speak up, exposing Regina’s plans to build a second home in the woods with taxpayer money. Unphased, Regina retorts she is indeed building a house. A PLAYHOUSE. OH SNAP! She circumvented the city governance so she could get the project underway quicker, so that the town’s children would have a safe place to play. Disgraced and defeated, Emma loses not just her plot for revenge, but Henry as well. Regina blackmails Emma with evidence that she did truly break-in to her office and bans her from seeing Henry for an undetermined period of time. The one ray of hope she clings to is that Sidney is her ally now, and no longer Regina’s spy. Earlier, he had pulled out a shoebox of photos he had taken of Emma while under Regina’s employ, tracking Emma’s every move so she could prevent her from getting close to Henry.

With a powerful ally, Emma has the strength she needs to stand up to Regina when the time is right. Except, the last scene of the episode suggest differently. Sidney is seated before a mirror in Regina’s office and he reports that “she bought it,” he has earned Emma’s trust and holds a tape recordings of all their meetings. Regina is as unstoppable as ever, now she can track the sheriff’s every move and will always be one step ahead. What seemed like a foregone conclusion, Emma’s penetration of Regina’s facade, now seems improbable. With a well-established network of watchful eyes, Regina seems to have an unrelinquishing grasp on her power, and Emma. Although, mysterious writer/biker dude may be the thorn in her side. We get a quick glimpse of the all-important box, the one that last week held a typewriter. Now it holds… THE BOOK! WHAAAAATTTTT? Stay tuned, as they say.

The twist with the most payoff though, was in the fairyback. Genie sicks the vipers on his dear friend and they both dig their fangs into his neck causing an almost instant death. In his last moments though, Genie expresses his regret. He acknowledges that he’s forever indebted for the freedom the king granted him, but that he had to do the same for his queen, and break her chains as well. And as the king’s life is sucked out, he reminds Genie of another way he could have freed her. His last wish from the map. Damn. Either Genie was too gosh darn stubborn or too caught up to use it, but that would have been a more civil route to go. When he rushes to his love’s side to tell her the good news, she appears in more despair than before. The guards know the vipers are of Genie’s homeland, and that he will be executed. She offers him safe passage, but Genie is connecting the dots. Of all the snakes she could have picked, she picked those from Agrabah. She set him up. She never loved him at all, and used him to kill the king. EQ acknowledges this, and erases any possibility he could ever be in her life. But Genie has his one last trick up his lamp. He uses his last wish to grant that he will be by her side always, and that every day he will look upon her. And the magic of FTL does grant him this. He is to be stuck inside her mirror for the rest of his life. The show has introduced a litany of grim ways that magic has haunted these characters that have relied on it for solutions to their ills, but never has it been more tragic than when this man, recently freed, is once again enslaved. But this time, it was of his own will. He could not live without her, now he certainly cannot.

“7:15 A.M” delivered for me last week, but with this episode coming in consecutive weeks, I’m sure that it was no fluke. Appealing to pathos once again, the show struck a chord by sticking with the cliched but proven conceit that love can be the grandest magic in the world, but it can also inflict the greatest of pains. The fate of unrequited love has never been pretty, and I’m glad OUAT was bold enough to confront it. For the second week in a row I have reason to celebrate the achievements of a series that has labored through much of its first few months for my approval, and frankly the approval of many critics. But I’m confident that this week many others will be singing it’s praises. Surely, Regina cannot become a totally different character and will continue to thwart any of my attempts to like her or root for her success, but I can’t imagine this show is striving for that sort of moral ambiguity. At any rate, for this week I was again delighted to delve into both worlds (more so with the FTL because of the world-building and tragedy), and I’m excited for where the series can go from here in defying expectation now that they are ironically freed from its constraints. For allowing the captivating Giancarlo Esposito the space to play, for expanding our conception of the Queen’s capabilities, and for feeling like the gust of fresh air the show set out to be at its inception, OUAT repeats its success with a second straight triumph over my preconceived notions. I mean, the dialogue is still wooden; and much of my interest in the real world activity is riding on potential plot threads, my parallel investment in the FTL, and my admiration for a few performances. No buts about it though, the “fruits” of their labor have earned them a B+.

Snow White (Ginnifer Goodwin) looking so darling it hurts, as a dove delivers her a message from her true love.

Readers, as I have mentioned in previous posts, I feel like we have a good thing going. I can share with you all the kinds of things one doesn’t divulge at dinner parties. I can open up to you with no fear of reprisal. Therefore, it is without hesitation that I confess to you…I’m a sucker for love stories. Yes, it’s true. I come off like a cynic, someone without a soft spot, someone who shuns things like cuddling and soul mates (because only those who believe in fate find pleasure in holding loved ones in their arms…icky). When you break down my grisly exterior, however, you will find a man who always cries at the end of The Notebook. A man who just last night screamed at his television while watching “Lost in Translation,” “What did Bill Murray whisper to Scarlett Johansson goddamit!” I am also the type of man who would dig tonight’s episode. One filled with the pain of unrequited affections, as well as the kind of forbidden romance you only find in fairy—son of a gun.

Needless to say, if they were looking for some good pub they came to the right…well, let’s pretend I have clout…critic. I was additionally surprised I enjoyed this episode so much because after last week’s turd in a punchbowl I was dreading this week. Perhaps if I watched previews I would have known we’d return to the only thing I’m invested in, Mary & David/Snow & Charming. Exacerbating my bias was the fact that Championship Sunday was as thrilling as its been in years. Both games decided by a field goal, one missed and one made. The second game was even in overtime. I found religion today and my Lord is the NFL. So how could this shaky family drama possibly hold my attention? First, by featuring the show’s best (never mind cutest) actors and by providing us with reasons to care about a relationship we already know is destined.

We resume with whom last week left us, scratching our heads, The Stranger. Or as I call him, Mysterious Biker Dude. Dude is fixing his chopper outside Regina and Henry’s residence when Oh Precocious One inquires as to what he is doing here? Dude smugly answers, “Fixing my bike,” and divulges no more information. Regina seems legitimately concerned that she doesn’t know who this guy is. Maybe he’s not connected with FTL (Fairy Tale Land) in any way? Also, there’s the whole stranger talking to my kid angle, so she may be onto something. From there, we enter the abode of the strong, sure-assured females (in all seriousness I suppose we should commend OUAT for portraying women with such agency in a show centered around stories that reenforce the most basic gender expectations) that save the show from vacuous oblivion, Mary Margaret and Emma. Mary Margaret wakes up in a tizzy because she is late. She claims she promised some of her students she’d help them with their science fair project (isn’t that cheating!) before school at 7:15. Emma scoffs that they can wait, and with one of the better lines, Mary replies, “Uh, we’re building a volcano.” Ha, because that’s a big deal, but not really. Get it? Okay, so I find Ginnifer Goodwin to be adorable. Sue me!

Turns out she isn’t meeting up with her students. Shocker, right? She sits down with a book at the coffee shop and pretends to read. Lo and behold, David walks through the door.She’s stalking him! How adorable! He says good morning, she asks how his job at the animal shelter is, he says the apes haven’t taken over yet. HA! Oh what a charming fellow. Well I’ll be they did it again! In FTL, he IS Charming. Oh dear. Anyway, she plays it off like it’s no thang and Emma walks in wondering where that volcano is. Mary fesses up that she comes at 7:15 A.M so that she can run into him. Aw…honey, he’s gonna file a restraining order! No, but Emma is much more supportive. She commiserates that love is indeed, the worst, and Mary sends us into the other realm with a you-can’t-miss-it cue: “I wish there was a magic cure.” Bet you can guess what the fairyback is about!

Thankfully, it isn’t quite that simplistic. We meet up with Snow as she is delivered her food run by Little Red Riding Hood. She also sneaks her intel about the upcoming royal wedding, in which “the love of her life whom she met but once” is the bridegroom. Snow agonizes like Mary about trying to forget that sexy-ass man. Red alludes that there might be a way, but chickens out. Snow then reminds her that she helped her when no one else would. This intrigued me because obviously the way to avoid becoming stale is to reinvent the familiar tales within an original mythology. The idea that there is an interconnectedness seems to be coming into focus so I don’t mind the vague references, for now. Not so surprisingly, good ole Rumpelstiltskin is the man with the drugs she needs to forget that one night stand with the rugged woodsman. When she finds Rumpy in a not at all shady dock covered in fog he provides her with a potion that will not only mend her broken heart, but she will forget who he is entirely. All he asks for is a strand of her hair. Either Rumpy has become a pedophile or maybe we should keep that in the back of our minds. Before she scurries off though, the impish dealmaker leaves her with parting words of wisdom, “Love is the most powerful magic there is. Love has killed more than any disease.”

Next, we pop in on the man of the hour, Prince James, who is peering out on his balcony broodingly. King George (Alan Dale, who played the wealthy and powerful Charles Widmore on “Lost”) presents him with a peace offering, a crown crafted by King Midas, his soon to be father-in-law. As fans of the show may remember, four episodes ago Prince James agreed to marry Kind Midas’ daughter Abigail as a show of good faith that they would enter an allegiance that benefits the prosperity of both kingdoms. James is sprung on Snow though, and resents his adoptive father for forcing him into forsaking her. He mocks the Midas crown rebuking that, “You could feed the kingdom for an entire winter with that crown.” Ugh, so he’s one of those annoying 99 percenters, huh? In all seriousness, I was mildly enthralled by the politics of it all, and how the King talked about the responsibility that comes with all that wealth. On another show, it might have carried more weight, but here it establishes the futility of Snow and Charming ever resuming their tryst. Ever persistent, James sends a dove with a letter for Snow. Like carrier pigeons, but more regal. The note reaches Snow just before she is about to down her potion. What she reads gives her renewed faith that they can be together, despite the odds. He asks her to come to his room that night so he knows she feels as strongly as he does.

While Mary is shopping for Apollo chocolate bars (a nod to the made-up brand featured in “Lost”) she bumps into Kathryn, David’s wife. As they sort through their stuff she stumbles upon a pregnancy test. She leaves and goes to clear her by walking though the woods (aw, the parallels) and hears a dove trapped in some wiring. It’s the same goddamn dove isn’t it. Yup, and even cheesier, when she brings the injured bird to the animal shelter (wait David works th—I know!) the doctor tells her that physically the bird will heal, but this particular dove is of a breed that develops highly monogamous relationships. If not reunited with her flock, she will be forever alone. Oh my god! The bird is just like MARY! Yeah, that hammer in your head isn’t a headache, it’s OUAT writers cramming in a metaphor.

Mary runs off, feeling akin to the bird’s struggle (I don’t know why their paths don’t intersect, like, at all) wanting to give the dove a chance at finding its loved ones. Mary slips and falls, barely hanging on to a cliff’s edge when DAVID ARRIVES! Convenient, yes. But he apparently followed her out of concern from the shelter. The cliff being a metaphor for her hanging onto feelings for David though? Kind of a stretch, don’t you think? Then like clockwork the rain comes down and they take shelter in an abandoned cabin. At this point, I grew worried this might be the beginning of a tremendously high-budget porno. Instead, Mary admits why she’s been so distant. It’s too painful to see him when they can’t be together. And yet she tortures herself by going to the coffee shop ay 7:15 every morning to see him. He laughs. “I go to the coffee shop at 7:15 every morning to see you.” My eyes rolled and I recited the line as he said it. Clearly telegraphed. And yet, it worked.

I can’t explain it, I just care about these darn kids, and I want them to be happy. The chemistry between the actors is palpable, Ginnifer is ridiculously cute as mentioned, and honestly they didn’t have to try so hard. As the kiss we all needed to relive our sexual tension was upon us, Mary thwarted it. She can’t break up Kathryn and David especially when they might be having a baby. David was unaware, but it changes things. They have to forget each other. Despite the new stakes, he resists. He explains the duality inside him in obvious terms that allude to the curse, but it nails the sentiment for me as it evokes the central question of the series thus far, “Who’s to say which one is real?” I won’t detail this theory again, but I still hope the show is moving toward this question about whether happily ever afters are not all they are cracked up to be, and that maybe it is only in the “real world” that we can find something genuinely worthwhile.

As Snow attempts to sneak into King George’s castle, Snow is locked up. Her cellmate? GRUMPY (Lee Arenberg, as seen in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies)! Grumpy tells Snow a hell of a tale about how he ended up there, blinded by love, and due to their instantaneous camaraderie, he breaks her out when his pal, Stealthy (the awesomest eight dwarf) springs him. As luck would have it, the eight dwarf doesn’t last long (gee, wonder what the point was cutting them to seven) and is killed by an arrow. Snow leverages Grumpy’s freedom for her own capture and King George presents her with an impossible choice. Either she tells the Prince that she does not love him, or Charming gets the ax. He reasons that if an assassin kills the Prince he will be viewed as a martyr and Midas will keep the alliance in his sacrifice. Because she doesn’t want to harm the one she loves, Snow lets him down easy. Not at all actually. “Fill your heart with love for someone else, someone who can love you the way I never have. The way I never will.” BOOM. He cries, she cries when she walks away, but she gains friends in the now seven dwarves. Grumpy also offers up some pretty sound advice for the grieving beauty, “I don’t want want my pain erased. It’s what makes me who I am. It makes me…Grumpy.” Yeah, it’s hokey. And when it’s supposed to be heartfelt you are focused on the pun, but it is an apt lesson about heartbreak.

While all the heartbreaking and mending is happening we do learn a bit about The Stranger too. Played by Eion Bailey,  he’s a charismatic fellow, but he’s also a sarcastic bastard. Perfect for Emma, who has a witty repartee with him. He agrees to tell her what is in his case if she shows him hers. Nah, but he does want to buy her a drink sometime. So she agrees and he reveals a typewriter. He’s a pretentious douchebag writer who stills uses a typewriter. He finds inspiration in the whimsy of Storybrooke, I guess. But when Emma asks if he has been there before, he evades the question.

The episode that jerked my heart around then ends with two last rips at my sensitivity and further emasculates me by making me care. Kathryn and David attempt to reconcile in a touching scene where both put their cards on the table and agree to do marriage counseling with Dr. Hopper/Jiminy Cricket. He also makes the conscious choice to avoid the coffee shop at 7:15. Mary, reluctantly does the same, Emma holding her hand through it. When they both decided enough time has passed it is 7:45, and they both run into each other anyway. Again, OBVIOUS metaphor for fate, but it was exactly the sort of chance resolution we all wanted deep down. They realize it is useless, they can’t avoid each other. What follows is both exactly what I might have dreamed of and not what I wanted at all. David blurts out, “Kathryn isn’t pregnant,” and with that particular barrier gone they kiss like it’s Smooch City, spinning around like nobody is watching, except someone totally is! Regina! How could they be so careless! Clearly, both of them aren’t concerned about Kathryn at all. It sort of invalidated the whole struggle before that with such an easy payoff, that didn’t involve any real shifts in circumstance from where we started. Except Regina’s got blackmail to spare. What a witch.

But then they did this. Prince Charming atop his trusty steed speeds through the forest and happens upon Snow’s cottage. Red Riding Hood is there instead and he professes that it matters not what Snow said, he won’t give up. If it wasn’t meant to be, he would seem mad clingy. The wedding is off! Cut to the dwarves hovel, where Grumpy rushes in to Snow’s bedroom to give her the great news that the and that her love awaits. Snow appears groggy. She turns to him. “Who?” She tried to find solace at the bottom of the vial. Completely ignoring Grumpy’s whole spiel about using the pain to make you stronger, she gave in and downed the whole love vaccine. NOW WHAT?

This was my favorite episode so far. No doubt. Here’s why. In ten episodes, I’ve come to terms with a few things. One, for whatever reason, the effects on this show make “Lost”  look like a feature film. This week, when they were walking through the caverns under the castle, and when the Prince rode his horse through the woods, the edges around the actors was ablaze with digital blur. Second, the dialogue is corny as hell. And not subtle. The juxtapostion of the worlds will be pointed out brutally, as if I forgot what show I was watching. And subtext will likely be zero to none. Actually, I hope it will be from hereon. The metaphors they tried in this episode were laughably inelegant. The bird, the storm, the cliff. I practically wrote those in fourth grade. But regardless of all these shortcomings I enjoyed the time spent. There were sudden reversals of fortune, there was an ending in the FTL that felt a tad Shakespearean in how it seemed tragically unavoidable, and above all it made me care about Mary/David & Snow/Charming to an embarrassing degree that I wouldn’t acknowledge outside this column. If OUAT can keep me invested in what becomes of these people, as their journey towards salvation or simple happiness becomes murky on the horizon, I will stay the course. This show will probably never be great, or win a prestigious award, but if it accomplishes this level of legitimate   feeling regularly it will be fun, and a hit, among a wide range of audiences. If this were a show with higher expectations this would be marked down more severely for its inattention to detail, but for its most appealing episode to date and for making me break down as if Taylor Swift were my gospel, I begrudgingly admit this was a B+.

Love triangles. Desperate women. Desperate men. Lots of tears. It sounds more fitting for 3 p.m. on ABC, but it all comes together on the screen in “He’s Just Not That Into You,” a fictional story based on a non-fiction advice book “He’s Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys” by Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo.

Let me save you two hours: If you’re a single guy (me) you’re going to come out of this movie feeling hopeless (though why you’d go see this movie, I do not know). If you’re a single girl, you’ll come out of this movie with a rejuvenated sense of hope. If you’re gay, you’ll just laugh (the gay angle makes more sense after you see the movie). And if you’re a guy in a relationship going to see this movie with your girlfriend, you’re not going to get any that night.

Try to absorb all this:

The movie opens on Gigi, (Ginnifer Goodwin) a desperately single woman who goes out with greasy real estate agent Conor (Kevin Connolly). Conor never calls Gigi after their first date, but Gigi sits by the phone hoping beyond hope that he’ll call. She eventually decides to “casually stroll into” Conor’s usual bar hangout where she meets bar manager Alex (Justin Long — the Mac guy) who takes poor Gigi under his wing, explaining, deftly and darkly, the true nature of guy-girl interactions.

Queue Ben (Bradley Cooper) and Janine (Jennifer Connelly), the token married couple in the film. They are pouring their yuppie dollars into renovating brownstone when Ben gets tempted by a yoga instructor-come-singer named Anna (Scarlett Johansson). Conor is in love with Anna, and they are technically dating, but Anna treats Conor like a best friend — ergo, she doesn’t screw him anymore. Anna gets bad advice from her best friend Mary (Drew Barrymore) who works in advertising sales for a gay lifestyle magazine. Anna decides to pursue the married Ben.

Then we have Neil (Ben Affleck) and Beth (Jennifer Aniston) who have been together for seven years but aren’t married, despite Beth’s desire and the fact that all her sisters are already married off. Neil is Ben’s best friend.

Finally, Mary is struggling with her own pseudo-single-ness, dealing with guys that text message, web chat, and MySpace her instead of call. Facebook would have made the movie seem less “2005.”

The whole shtick takes place in modern Baltimore, and it’s nice to see a city besides New York and Los Angeles portrayed.

The movie has an undoubtedly all-star cast. Affleck and Aniston seem like elder statesmen, and each give strong performances. In many ways, this is a break out film for both Justin Long and Ginnifer Goodwin. “He’s Just Not That Into You” was the #1 movie Friday night, with more than $10.5 million coming in at the box office.

Goodwin was (albeit purposefully) a little annoying, and Long seems to try just a bit too hard to sell his character as a chick magnet, but it’s obvious as the baton gets passed to these two young stars and that we have more to expect from them down the line.

The movie was full of “awwww’s” and hateful hisses from the largely female audience which really got emotionally invested in the film. It was a bit too long at 2:10, but that’s not surprising considering how many stories the ending had to tie up.

Scarlett Johansson plays a skank surprisingly well and comes off particularly sexy, even for her, and especially considering the shockingly wholesome temperature of the entire movie.

It’s a total chick flick, and “He’s Just Not That Into You” isn’t a movie made to please critics.

Playing to its base it does well.