In Which I Review Once Upon a Time (7x22)

All week long, I have tried to come up with the perfect opening sentence for this blog. This is not just any standard entry; this is the last blog post I'll ever write about Once Upon a Time. Of my three hundred and seventy plus ruminations, the vast majority of them are Once Upon a Time reviews. They range from the ecstatic, head over heels in love reviews of the first half of season three to the blatant hatred and criticism of season five. They capture the highs of awe and lows of heartbreak. I wrote about the Captain Swan wedding and I wrote about Neal's death. I've hated Hook, loved Rumbelle, praised Regina and had complicated feelings over Rumple. But this entry...this entry is the final word I'll ever say about a show that has been a major part of my life for seven years. TV shows are complicated creatures in and of themselves; sure, on the one hand it's just a piece of media that airs once a week for an hour at a time. None of the characters are real and none of the plots are going to change the world. But on the other hand, if you spend enough time with a TV show it can feel like a close friend. You come to know the people who exist in this fictional world and whatever they go through, you go through. It's a move from sympathy to empathy, and a successful show is one that maintains that empathetic relationship with its audience. When looking at the photos for this episode, trying to decide which one would get the spot of honor for this introduction, I went with Snow White and her Prince Charming because that's what I want to remember from all this: I'd like to remember those ecstatic highs of a show I threw myself into, heart and soul. So, then "Leaving Storybrooke." Once more with feeling. 

The Last Page...

Let's just agree here and now that most of this plot is nonsense (what, you thought this post would be nothing but sappy nostalgia?) The Wish Realm and the mechanics of it have never made a lick of sense and the writers did what they do "best": spaghetti writing. Throw ideas at a wall and whatever sticks becomes your plot. I've heard several times that if you let go of the plot of OUAT and just focus on the acting, the campiness, and the themes then it becomes a much better (or at least more palatable) show. I say let's try that and agree, as stated above, that the plot of Young Wish Henry using dark magic to open thousands of portals to suck all the heroes of every realm ever into their own personal hellscape is mostly ridiculous. Instead, let's focus on what this episode was trying to say and trying to do. OUAT liked to hit the same beats over and over again; I've called it recycling in the past because there's only so much you can mine from the hope, faith, and family well before it runs dry and you have to start reusing the same material over again. There's something different about what is happening in this series finale, though, and maybe that's because it's the series finale and by definition none of this material can be used again. If we think critically for a moment, this finale is almost no different than any other finale over the past seven years. There's a big bad villain, some sort of time crunch, one of the family members is in trouble, and it all comes down to sacrifice, hope, and belief in the power of love to save the day. As is tradition, I went back and read my blog for the start of this season to see where we started and compare it to where we ended; in that season seven opening blog, I talked about cyclical story telling and how the writers were trying to graft Henry and Lucy over Emma and Henry and retell season one and not necessarily because they were out of ideas, but because that's how archetypes work. The song remains the same, even if the lyrics have changed. I think that's what the writers are aiming for in this series finale. They want it to be familiar and a tribute to their show, not just to a single season. Snow's really big speech about hope may be cringe inducing (as all her hope speeches tended to be) but it also fits perfectly as the last speech about hope she'll ever give. Regina's coronation as the Queen of the United Realms might be a bit of a head-scratcher--how does one fit all those realms into a tiny corner of Maine and how did the entire town elect Regina without her even realizing an election was happening--but it also is a nice culmination to her character, from an Evil Queen who crashed a wedding to a Good Queen who was crowned the people's hero. Rumple's death has been a long time coming but dying at his own hands by sacrificing himself so a father and child could be reunited while also conquering the Dark One side of himself feels like a lot of plot nonsense fulled by Magical MacGuffins except it's exactly how Rumple's story should end.

...And The Book Closes 

There's history here; there are memories. Emma crashing Regina's coronation, uttering the same lines Regina first uttered at Snow and Charming's wedding? Touching. One final "Madam Mayor" and "Miss Swan?" Heartwarming. Rumple and Belle dancing like they did after their wedding? Tear inducing. Flashing through the greatest hits of OUAT in flashback form as a message of hope is expounded upon by the show's greatest success story like a preacher at a pulpit? Cheesy to the hilt but completely in the wheelhouse of OUAT. This series finale isn't just about the season, it's about the show. It's about what the show has meant to the fictional characters, to the actors, to the crew, and yes, to the audience. Two episodes ago, Young Henry wrote an essay that was meant to cross the fourth wall and speak to the audience, to tell us that magic exists in storytelling. This episodes feels the same. It's yearning, begging, one final time to touch our hearts and ask that we remember it fondly. I cannot say this is a perfect show. I cannot say that it is without faults. Any hope of me claiming its perfection and its place as one of the greats died along with Neal, but maybe it doesn't need to be perfect and go down as "one of the best" for it to still be something magical and powerful. There are episodes and seasons I'll never watch again in their entirety, but buried inside those seasons are nuggets of something good, and it was only if you stuck with it that you saw them. We never had a season in which I did not find at least one thing to praise and rejoice in. The hilarity of the Shattered Sight curse; the Neal and Emma Underworld moment; Hades and Zelena's delightfully fun romance; the musical episode; Rumple giving up a chance to be with Belle so that Alice would not be trapped in a metaphorical immortal tower. It would be so easy for me to hate on this series finale (because, again, plot nonsense) and maybe in a week I'll feel differently, once the heartache of nostalgia has passed. But I don't think so. I think when I sum up my experience with OUAT someday in the future, I'll say it was weird and complicated and sad and heartbreaking and disappointing but also beautiful and wonderful and effective. And that's what TV shows are designed to be; no show is perfect, not even those that go down as "the greatest of all time." What's more important than absolute perfection is how you affect the audience, what kind of conversations you generate with the power of your media. And generate conversations it did; in these blogs I have discussed archetypes, religion, mythology, feminism, agency, motherhood, depictions of women, rape culture, and everything in between. All of those things and the discussion of them is....weird and complicated and sad and heartbreaking and disappointing but also beautiful and wonderful and effective! We contain multitudes and so does this show. This show isn't perfect but I didn't watch it all the way through because I felt like I had to; I did it because I loved it. I failed to come up with the perfect opening sentence for this blog and now I'm struggling to come up with a perfect closer. What's that old cliche? Ah yes...

And so, Emma Swan, Regina Mills, Snow White, Prince Charming, Henry, Cinderella, and Lucy Mills, Rumplestiltskin, Belle French, Neal Cassidy, Zelena, Alice, Robyn and Captain Hook (yes, even you!)...lived happily ever after. The end.

Miscellaneous Notes on Leaving Storybrooke 

--The first image of the last episode is the clocktower reading 8:15. One last time.

--"Intruders!" This was laugh out loud funny. Good thing Granny had her crossbow handy!

–“Is this a dream?” “Well, if it is, it’s an excellent one.” I never really shipped Outlaw Queen but that was a gorgeous segment.

--“If this is how I have to go out, showing you there are people in the world who love you, no matter what you do…then that’s a worthy end for me.”

--The snowglobe is bigger on the inside!

--I’ll never not love a good dreamcatcher on this show, but I really wish Rumple would remember that he has a dead son  he wants to see again; dreamcatchers will always be tied to Neal (and Emma) so that was a perfect time to throw in a Neal reference.

--Using the Dark Curse and pieces of everyone’s heart to bring all the realms to Storybrooke is…extremely meta and weird and I both hate it and love it?

--Lily’s father was Zorro! The writers get the last laugh here; for years fans have hounded them about this dangling plot thread. Be careful what you wish for, I guess.

--I suppose if I have to comment on it: Baby Hope Swan-Jones. The fact that the writers named the baby Hope is eye-roll inducing. They don’t see that baby as a baby but as a concept. That baby isn’t a person, it’s a giant hammer to beat the audience with one final time.

--“I am the strongest version of us….you don’t do the right thing for a reward. You do it because it’s right.

--As is tradition, here are my final thoughts on Season Seven B: Overall it wasn't terrible. That sounds like a backwards compliment but it's not. The issue is narrative bloat. The show was trying to do way too much and have too much plot when it should have focused on the characters. Maybe that's the price for not knowing that the show would be ending when the writing began (I assume) but the stuff that was good--Alice and Robyn, Rumple's redemption, Henry and Regina--was really good. And the stuff that was not good--Facilier, Gothel, Jack/Hansel--was really not good. But that feels...exactly like OUAT.

Final Rating for Season 7B: B

Final episode ranking for Season 7B (from worst to best)

12. Flower Child (7x19)
11. Secret Garden (7x11)
10. Breadcrumbs (7x16)
9. Sisterhood (7x15)
8. A Taste of the Heights (7x12)
7. Homecoming (7x21)
6. Knightfall (7x13)
5. Chosen (7x17)
4. Is This Henry Mills? (7x20)
3. The Girl in the Tower (7x14)
2. The Guardian (7x18)
1. Leaving Storybrooke (7x22)