Once Upon a Time – Help us Emma. You’re our only hope.

This episode kind of gave us a new-found respect for trees didn’t it, that they could magically transport people from one world to another? But apparently arboreal magic only comes in limited quantities because, for whatever reason, the magic wardrobe carved from the enchanted tree (I kept waiting for a lion to appear since we already have a witch in the form of the Evil Queen) could only transport two people out of Fairy Tale Land in order to evade the Evil Queen’s curse.

How did the Blue Fairy know this about the wardrobe? How is it possible that the wardrobe is limited by anything other than who can fit inside it? Or that the thing only works twice?

Also, how does the Blue Fairy, along with that round table of fairy tale all-stars, know that Snow White was Madonna carrying “The Savior” who would save everyone from Fairy Tale Land from the Evil Queen’s wrath? I didn’t see any wise men, stable boys or archangels visiting the newborn baby or lingering near Snow White when she was giving birth. And as far as we know David is her dad. Are we supposed to just buy this, that the Blue Fairy knows exactly how much magic is in the tree and which person, Emma, could save them?

While I’m intrigued by August/Pinocchio’s story — that his father bargained to spare him from the Evil Queen’s curse (lest he be transformed back into a wooden toy) and launched into the real, non-magical world — he’s done a lousy job of trying to persuade Emma that they’re both cut from the same cloth, so to speak. (Why couldn’t she see his wooden leg?) Also cool was the fact that August didn’t realize that he really should locate Emma until his leg started hurting, which happened to be the moment Emma decided to remain in Storybrooke and when the Evil Queen’s curse began to lose its power.

It makes sense for Emma to look at August like he’s off his rocker because no one has proven to her that Fairy Tale Land is anything more than a literary construct in a children’s book. Likewise, it is reasonable that Emma would want to squire Henry away from the evil clutches of his adopted mother Regina, who set Mary Margaret up for a false murder charge. And the two should be able to leave Storybrooke because both were spared the impact of the curse. Remember, in the pilot episode, Henry did show up in Boston after all.

How the Fairy Tale characters who are aware that they are Fairy Tale characters (Pinocchio, Rumplestiltskin, Henry knows he’s related to them) are going to shake Emma out of her denial is going to prove pivotal to whether Once Upon a Time is ultimately taking us on a smart and entertaining journey or whether it’s going to pull the rug out from under us and become farcical. The final episodes need to be logical outgrowths of everything that’s come before or they’ll lose people.

But things like David lapping up Regina’s lasagna like he’s Garfield the cat don’t help matters. Given everything that Regina’s done — including set up David’s lover to take the fall for the faux murder of David’s wife — how could David fall for Regina’s woe-is-me manipulations and have dinner with her? It doesn’t make sense and neither does David buying Regina’s tale about how she rescued him from near death. A dim bulb that David.

After weaving nearly every character’s backstories together, there’s a lot riding on the creative outcome of this first season. Hopefully the show’s fans aren’t, as Emma told August, “all screwed.”

Clacked by Meredith O'Brien
on Apr 30, 2012 @ 14:52 EST5EDT