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tomeandflickcorner · 8 years ago

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OUAT Episode Analysis- A Wondrous Place

Well, overall, this episode wasn’t quite as bad as I was expecting it to be. Sure, there were moments when I got annoyed, especially during the Storybrooke scenes, but it wasn’t quite reaching ‘throwing my bucket of popcorn at the screen’ annoyed.

Thanks to Gideon’s interference, the Nautilus is sent through an underwater portal, with Killian still inside. And our pirate prince is freaking out. Because he knows Emma better than anyone, and knows her abandonment issues are going to start kicking in if he doesn’t come home that night. But Nemo tells Killian that a return trip is impossible, as the Nautilus’ ability to travel through underwater portals is fueled by Kraken Blood. And that unexpected trip used up the last of their supply. Basically, they’ve got a DeLorean without the Plutonium. So Killian, refusing to accept this, is all ‘so let’s just get some more Kraken Blood, then.’ And Nemo is like ‘Are you crazy? We’re supposed to run away from Krakens, not chase them down.’ Which makes me wonder how they managed to get Kraken Blood in the first place. Maybe Kraken Blood is a marketable item in the nautical trade market? Either way, Killian is not to be deterred, because he absolutely HAS to get back to Emma pronto. Of course, when they do find a Kraken, their efforts at obtaining some of its blood are inadvertently thwarted by Aladdin and Jasmine. Turns out, when they left Storybrooke with Jasmine’s wish to be taken to Agrabah, they ended up in the Enchanted Forest. The only clue Jasmine had was the appearance of a diamond ring, which was apparently the most treasured item from the royal treasure hold. More on that later. Anyway, after Aladdin and Jasmine go on for a bit, with Aladdin throwing in some flirty banter, they end up on a rowboat. See, Jasmine feels the fact that her wish simply brought the ring to her was a reminder that she failed to protect her kingdom and she should just accept defeat and give up. So she decides to take a rowboat out and, after wishing for Aladdin’s freedom from the genie spell, she’ll drop the lamp into the ocean where it won’t harm anyone again. But they end up rowing right into the path of the Nautilus, thereby messing up the attempt at getting some Kraken Blood. So Killian drags them on board. After shouting at them for a bit for ruining his chance at getting back to Emma, they come up with a new plan. This one involves them locating Jafar. Because apparently, since he made Agrabah disappear, he can help send Killian back to Storybrooke somehow? I admit I don’t really follow the logic here. But Killian, upon hearing how Jafar has a vengeful soul, comes up with the idea of tracking Jafar down with Nemo’s magic spearhead thing.

Here the episode kind of segues for a bit, with both Jasmine and then Aladdin seeking Killian out for personal counsel. Jasmine is upset because she feels like she acted like a coward when her people needed her the most and doesn’t feel like she’s worthy to be called a hero, and Aladdin is basically ‘hey do you think Jasmine likes likes me? But Killian is in full-blown Tunnel Vision mode and only cares about getting back to Emma as soon as possible. So he’s all ‘mate, I’m not a bloody matchmaker! When did people start seeing me as a marriage counselor? I can barely communicate properly with my True Love! How do you expect me to solve your relationship problems?!’ Also, I love how many times this episode throws the word ‘hero’ around, especially in terms of Killian. The script is practically beating Killian over the head at this point, saying ‘dude, you’re a bonafide hero now. And we’re gonna keep calling you that until you start believing it.’

At this point, Nemo steps in, announcing the Kraken badly damaged the Nautilus hull or something, and that it’s going to sink. And they can’t get to the escape hatch because the corridor leading to that room is already flooded. Or something to that effect. While the nautical charts do show there’s an island nearby, the submarine is too badly damaged to get there in time. So Jasmine uses her second wish, getting Genie Aladdin to transport them all to the island. (I’m hoping that wish picked up the rest of the crew, too. Because if they only brought Nemo and Liam 2.0 along and just left everyone else behind on a sinking submarine, it would have been a jerk move.) When they reach shore, Nemo and Liam 2.0 decide it’s time to part ways with Killian, Jasmine and Aladdin, because they plan to find a way to raise the sunken Nautilus. Not sure how they plan on doing that, but it’s apparently not impossible, as there are a few YouTube videos on the subject. So Killian bids farewell to the two men, even having a brief moment with Liam 2.0. On the one hand, I really like seeing the proof that Killian developed a good relationship with his half-brother, and the two even share a goodbye hug. On the other, why exactly can’t Nemo and Liam 2.0 stick around? Doesn’t Killian deserve to have friends outside of Emma, Henry and his future in-laws? I mean, given the current situation with Gideon and the obvious conflict of interest, his friendship with Belle is probably on the rocks right now.

Anyway, Killian, Aladdin and Jasmine manage to track Jafar down to a run-down shack. But their initial belief that the shack belongs to Jafar is quickly corrected when Ariel shows up. Turns out, this was the place where she and Eric have settled. Personally, I do question why they’re still living on Hangman’s Island, considering Eric has a kingdom waiting for him (unless that was also hit by the second Dark Curse). I’m just saying, since Ariel stated in passing that Eric was off visiting some landlubber friends, the island is clearly inhabited by other people. Which means there’s most likely some sort of sea commerce going on, with trade ships visiting the island on a regular basis. Couldn’t Eric and Ariel have hitched a ride with someone? (I’m not going to comment on how Blackbeard claimed the island he left Eric on was deserted, because the man was a full-blown pirate. It’s not that far-fetched to think he was lying about that detail.)

So Ariel’s back, and she is happy to see her visitors, even giving Killian a hug in greeting. Which is a nice improvement. I wouldn’t have been happy if she continued the slapping thing. Especially since I don’t think he deserved the slap he got in ‘Poor Unfortunate Soul.’ But Ariel apparently also knows Jasmine. That story is explained in the Flashback portion of the episode. Based on the dialogue, it apparently goes back to the opening sequence from the S6 premiere. After leaving Aladdin with his hand tremors, Jafar returned to Agrabah to gloat about the state of Savior Aladdin. He arrives just as the Sultan was trying to convince Jasmine to choose a husband to help secure the kingdom from the threat of Jafar. When Jafar arrives, he tells Jasmine that if she doesn’t agree to marry him, he will destroy Agrabah. Hoping to find Aladdin, Jasmine slips out of the palace. While she’s searching the marketplace, she sees a thief running by, being chased by an angry merchant. Thinking it was Aladdin, Jasmine follows, only to discover the thief was actually Ariel, who had somehow found a magic necklace that, as long as she wore it, she could have legs and her voice back. (This was after EQ Regina stole Ariel’s voice as punishment for helping Snow escape.)

Ariel explains that she’s been looking for Eric ever since the events of that S3 flashback, and Jasmine, being an all-around nice person, agrees to help her. They take a magic carpet ride over the city, and Ariel spots flags bearing Eric’s royal coat of arms. But when Jasmine and Ariel enter into Eric’s tent, it’s eventually revealed that the man standing before them is actually Jafar in disguise. Why he chose to disguise himself as Eric, I can’t say. He once again gives Jasmine his ultimatum, stating she has until sundown to decide. He also magically sends Ariel away, but not before she secretly steals a flask of some magic powder from him, which he’d used earlier to turn a man into a wooden staff. Jasmine eventually decides to give in to Jafar’s demand, wanting to save her people. In the process, she hands over the diamond ring from the royal crown jewels, which was meant to be given to her chosen husband. But once he has possession of the ring, Jafar decides to basically pull an Alderaan on her. He tells Jasmine that her kingdom had a magical protection around it, and he wouldn’t have been able to harm it like he’d been threatening to. Until she handed over the diamond ring. To punish Jasmine for falling for his trick, Jafar makes the entire city of Agrabah disappear.

Getting back to the main story, it’s revealed that Ariel somehow managed to obtain Jafar’s Genie Bottle. (Horry for the show acknowledging the events of the Wonderland spinoff, by the way. They even make references to how Jafar was the illegitimate son of a sultan.) But when they pull Jafar out of his bottle and he sees Jasmine and Aladdin in front of him, he reveals he managed to break the genie spell of servitude that Nyx placed on him. Somehow. Jafar then magically knocks out Ariel, Aladdin and Killian and proceeds to gloat to Jasmine, telling her that she failed her people horribly before revealing that Agrabah was actually sealed away within the Diamond Ring. So when Jasmine wished that Genie Aladdin take her to Agrabah, it brought the ring to her.

After a few more moments of pointless dialogue, Jasmine manages to fake Jafar out by throwing the bottle of magic powder, the one Ariel stole from him in the flashback, at him. At first, it looks like her effort was wasted, as the bottle landed harmlessly at his feet. But when Jafar starts to laugh at her, Jasmine reveals she snuck out a handful of the stuff and hurls in into his face. As a result, Jafar is turned into a wooden staff. The moment Jafar is defeated, Ariel, Aladdin and Killian wake up. So, it’s now all happy smiles all around, with Jasmine’s self-confidence restored. Aladdin suggests that Jasmine use her last genie wish to restore Agrabah, but Jasmine refuses, stating she plans to keep her promise and use her last wish to free Genie Aladdin. This results in the two sharing TLK, which ends up restoring Agrabah to its original state. It also apparently frees Aladdin from his genie servitude.

All in all, this whole storyline seemed rather dull and pointless to me. What was the point of that little flashback story? Yes, it explained what happened to Agrabah and all, but it just seemed like a drawn out way to do it. Even Ariel’s presence in the flashback seemed to serve no purpose. The only thing it did was explain why Ariel had that bottle of Jafar’s magic powder in her possession. But they could have come up with another way for Jasmine to get it in time to use it on Jafar. This was pretty much The Bear King all over again, but with the subplot of Killian wanting to get back to Emma thrown in to keep it relevant to the overall plot. But maybe this whole thing was supposed to be a big metaphor for Killian, with him seeing Jasmine thinking she was no longer worthy to be called a hero because of a past mistake and then regaining her confidence.

While Jasmine and Aladdin’s contribution to the show seems to be over (even though they seemed to have abandoned the plan to explore the whole Savior mythos and what it means to be one), Killian still doesn’t have a way to get back to Emma. But Ariel reveals she has mermaid magic on hand, pulling out a small seashell. Remembering that he has a shellphone necklace back home (and yay for the fact that the term shellphone is now 100% canon), Killian sees his chance to send a message back to Emma.

Speaking of Emma, she is not doing well, just as Killian feared. Turns out Leroy saw Killian get onto the Nautilus, and because it sailed off almost immediately afterward, Emma now believes that Killian left on his own. Of course, I don’t blame her for believing that, considering what was going on at the time. They had a fight, she told him to come back when he figured stuff out, and now he’s apparently did what she asked. There was nothing really substantial to make her doubt he left on his own accord. Especially since no one found his abandoned bag of clothes and whatnot. (I’m guessing he left it on the ground when he went to tell Nemo he changed his mind. I didn’t see anything to suggest he brought it onto the Nautilus, which makes me think he left it sitting outside.)

My problem with the Storybrooke scenes lies with everyone else. The only one who isn’t getting a side-eye from me this episode is Charming. While he is clearly reeling from learning that Killian was the one who killed Robert, the moment he hears Killian apparently skipped town, he pushes aside his feelings and focuses on Emma’s pain. At the same time, he doesn’t push her into talking about it. And when Emma decides to focus on doing some filing work at the Sheriff Station, he simply volunteers to help her file. I really think that, if Emma spent the rest of the episode with Charming, she probably would have slowly started to realize that something wasn’t quite right. Because when she’s later seen moving all of Killian’s belongings to the shed out back, she’s able to see that he left some pretty important stuff behind. Like his flask, spyglass and Liam’s ring. Even if Killian had left on his own, the fact that he left these items behind indicated he planned to come back, and that he wasn’t gone for good. This was like someone leaving their credit cards and such behind. Maybe, if Emma had been left to her own devices for this episode, she might have realized that. But sadly, she wasn’t allowed to process things at her own pace. Because Regina decided to butt in and announce that a new bar opened up and it would be the perfect time to throw a Girls Night Out for her, Emma and Snow. And when Emma stated straight out that she wasn’t interested in going out drinking, Regina blatantly ignored her wishes and tricked her into coming out to the new bar in town by making up a story about a bar fight. While I suppose it could be argued that Regina was trying to help Emma, she was going about it in the worst possible way. That’s something I’ve noticed with this show. They don’t really acknowledge that talking it out isn’t the only way to grieve when something bad happens.

Now, I hope you’ll forgive me, but I’m going to go off on a brief PSA. If we believe the theory developed by Howard Gardner, a person’s intelligence isn’t limited to a single ability. There are eight classifications of intelligence. One person might have good logical-mathematical intelligence, another might be strong in verbal-linguistic intelligence. A third person might find musical-rhythmic and harmonic intelligence to be their strong point. Each of these people are intelligent in their own right, and one form if intelligence isn’t less valid than another. There are also different ways to learn and study new information. Some people learn by reading textbooks or using flashcards, another might learn best through hands-on experience, or through visual learning. Again, each method is relevant, and there is no right way. It all comes down to what works for the individual. The same is true when it comes to mourning and grieving. But Emma’s so-called support system in this episode seems to feel that if Emma isn’t talking about her feelings, then it means she’s burying her head in the sand or something. But that is just not true. Everyone processes things differently. Emma seems to be the type of person who needs to be proactive in her grief. And that’s perfectly okay. To her, keeping herself busy might be therapeutic to her. And just because she isn’t actively talking about her problem doesn’t mean she’s not dealing with it. She might very well be processing everything in her head. But because Regina and Snow tricked her into coming out to the bar and virtually nagged her into talking about her feelings, she wasn’t given the chance she needed to think things through and figure it out for herself. As a result of being rushed through this, Emma came to the conclusion that Killian probably didn’t love her anymore, and that she should make an effort to move on.

So, while Snow and Regina probably had their hearts in the right place, they really should have respected Emma’s wishes to be left alone. By disregarding her feelings, they only ended up making the situation worse for her. For those reasons, Regina had no right to refer to her and Snow as Emma’s real friends.

In fact, I sort of wonder if this Girls Night Out was organized with Emma’s feelings in mind at all. As Emma pointed out in this episode, Regina was supposed to be looking into ways of breaking Snowing’s Sleeping Curse. You know, taking some responsibility for her Evil Side’s actions? How much you wanna bet that Regina only read one page in her spellbook and decided she was bored and deserved a break? And when she heard about the Emma and Killian situation, she decided to use that as an excuse.

And Snow really was no better. I give her half a point because, hey, she’s actually physically in the same room as Emma. That’s a marked improvement considering she’s been virtually ignoring Emma’s existence as of late. But sadly, she doesn’t take advantage of that. And instead of talking to Emma, or even spouting out one of those hope speeches she’s known for, she spends the evening focused on her own problems involving the ongoing Sleeping Curse that’s keeping her and Charming apart. And then she proceeds to get drunk and plays darts with some Vikings. So, once again, while Drunk Snow is certainly entertaining to watch, the moment is marred by the fact that, even when she’s physically with Emma, she’s still not able to actually be there for her daughter. Boy, I miss the Emma/Snow relationship of 2A. Whatever happened to Snow’s vow to keep Emma from feeling like an orphan? You know, the one she made at the end of ‘Lost Girl?’ I guess she forgot about that vow somewhere between Baby Neal and her decision to adopt Regina as her new daughter.

And then there’s Henry. On the one hand, I get that he’s probably hurting over the fact that Killian seemed to have left town, too. After all, he liked Killian, and the man was practically his stepfather. So he’s probably grieving in his own way. And it was such a typical teenager thing to do to not do what his mother asked him to do when she gave him the task of moving Killain’s things to the shed out back. But at the same time, he couldn’t be bothered to say more than two words to his mother? I mean, this is the kid who threw together a gift basket for Regina when her week-long relationship with Robin hit a roadblock. But when his birth mother had a fight with a man she fully intended to marry, the same man she went down to hell for, he can’t put down the iPod for more than five seconds?

It’s just really frustrating to watch. Again, I understand how Emma’s first instinct would be to believe Killian really left without a word. But it’s the fact that everyone else is fully accepting that viewpoint too. Only Emma has the abandonment issues. You would think that someone would have helped her realize that Killian hadn’t left for good. But instead, everyone just seems to take up this ‘well, he’s gone for good’ attitude. So of course that’s not going to help Emma much. And if Emma was starting to question the possibility that he wasn’t going to come back after seeing he left his personal belongings behind, Regina and Snow’s interference just disrupted that process, making Emma vulnerable again. Which made it all too easy for her to believe that Killian no longer loved her when the barkeeper spouted off that story about snubbed lovers. Honestly, Regina and Snow should have just left Emma alone, or let Charming be the one to comfort her. Because he was the one who had the right idea- just give Emma room to breathe and process things at her own pace. Maybe if they had allowed her that, Emma might have realized something didn’t add up on her own. But because they didn’t, Emma was virtually rushed into making a conclusion, and therefore made the wrong one.

Anyway, when Emma gets home that night, she sees that Henry hadn’t brought Killian’s sea chest out to the shed like she’d asked. So she morosely decides to do so herself. As she’s taking it out, however, she starts hearing Killian’s voice calling her name. Investigating, she opens the sea chest and finds Killian’s shellphone necklace.

I have no complaints about the scene that follows. Through the shellphone, Killian gives a heartfelt speech, explaining that he didn’t leave on his own and that he’s trying desperately to find a way back. And all of Emma’s misery completely vanishes as she listens to Killian’s message, getting the reassurance she needed that he hadn’t abandoned her after all. It’s a huge testament to the chemistry between these actors. They’re not even physically together, but they’re still able to show how deeply these two characters love each other. And it’s so nice to hear Emma and Killian verbalize the fact that they love each other again. I don’t think we got an actual ‘I love you’ all season. And it’s nice to hear them say it again.

Unfortunately, Emma finds she cannot respond to Killian’s message and let him know she’s heard him. Because something is blocking her voice from getting through. It turns out the whole night at the bar was a big trap, and the bartender was Gideon in disguise.

Now, here’s Gideon’s master plan. He separated Emma and Killian because he wanted Emma to believe Killian deserted her. And he told her that whole story about the snubbed lover because he wanted her to cry, so he could collect her tears. And with the tears of a Savior, he’s able to prevent Killian from taking a portal back to Storybrooke. He proceeds to tell Emma that if she agrees to help him kill the Black Fairy, then he’ll consider ending the enchantment that keeps Killian away. Well, that is one convoluted plan, isn’t it? But of course, there is one gaping question. Why didn’t he just simply ask for Emma’a help? There was no need to take all these extra steps. It’s like going through the alphabet backwards to reach the letter B. Dude, have you forgotten Emma is a hero and the Savior? If you just told her the Black Fairy was enslaving kids and whatnot, she’d kinda be duty-bound to help you on principle. There was absolutely no need to essentially twist her arm like this to get her help. What is it with villains and their inability to simply ask for help? Why do they insist on making things more difficult than they have to be? But I suppose it’s not that surprising, considering who Gideon’s father is. This is one thorny apple that clearly didn’t fall far from the tree. And it’s one more reason why I get discouraged when Henry starts to idolize his sperm donor. Kid, this is not the bloodline you should be celebrating.

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