once-upon-a-ouat

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On a Once Upon a Time rewatch and I keep thinking bout how funny it would’ve been if, to disprove the curse to Henry, Emma and Mary Margaret did a DNA test.

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OUAT Week 2024 Day 6 - What If

When Emma and Snow fall through the portal into the EF, they find a community of people who escaped the Curse by traveling to another realm to return only after the Curse was cast and everyone in the EF at the time was ripped away. They hid their plan from Snow and David to ensure Regina wouldn't find a way to foil it. In her anger and the grief of having to confront the life she lost, Snow doesn't realize Cora has been watching them and manipulating Emma into doing exactly what she wants. Having come from Wonderland in search of a way to cross over to Storybrooke and find Regina, Cora follows them through the portal unobstructed.

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OUAT Week 2024 Day 1 - Favorite Character

I'm a bit late but the inspiration struck when I had written it off as impossible. Regina's story spoke to me at the time with her rage, hurt and defiance and even now that we've both moved on I still see a lot of myself in her. I'm glad she found a happy ending and her family, and I'll always hold her in my heart as the complex, interesting character that she is.

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Drizella: Fine, how do I get these morons to like me?

Ella: ...

Henry: ...

Regina: ...

Drizella: Don't call them morons?

Regina: Good instinct!

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For @darkpoisonouslove

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Thanks for doing all the work that I didn't feel like doing! 😆

Yeah, the spiky castle still represents everything I talked about so the meta I wrote out is still valid.

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In reply to this reblog

Okay, I checked wiki and apparently the summer palace only appeared in the New Neverland, but it’s also mentioned in 1x07 and Regina rides towards it in 1x16. Leopold had it built after marrying Eva. The wiki says that the main, spiky castle is the same one that Cora tries to steal from in bleeding through, so since Leopold and Eva weren’t married at that point, I guess it was from Leopold’s side of the family.

Yes, Snow and Charming took over King George’s castle and that is the one we see in the Pilot and other episodes set during their ruling of the Kingdom.

And yep, Regina only gained possession of the spiky castle and the summer palace after Leopold died, apparently. It’s interesting that that is the same castle her mum almost stole from and I think it was where Cora and Eva met, so the castle tied those families together even back then.

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I might be wrong as to which one is the summer palace. I always thought that the spiky one was the summer palace but the scenes with Regina, Snow and Leopold they have are all shot there. So that might just be the normal palace and the one in which Snow and David are in the pilot is George's castle? Idk. I still think that if Regina got the spiky castle because she married Leopold, it makes sense that the same also held true for Eva. (Or maybe it only came into Regina's possession after Leopold was killed.) But regardless of that, the point still stands because Eva and Regina are filling the exact same roles; I just accidentally hijacked someone else's post. Sorry, OP!

the ouat pilot is so funny because they designed regina’s palace with the whole evil queen thing in mind but then when the show got picked up and they actually had to think about the backstory and about how regina married into the palace, the design makes absolutely no sense. like “hi, i’m Good Kind™️ King Leopold and this is my Pure-as-Snow daughter, and this is our SCARY FOREBODING SPIKE CASTLE”

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Okay, but this is literally A Feature, not a flaw. Iirc they even said that that was the summer palace that belonged to Queen Eva? Which makes it even better because "oh, look at scary castle belonging to scary villain" becomes "this is just the hottest new design that any royal would pay for". AND to top it off, you can derive some symbolism and parallels between Eva and Regina.

Because of Eva, Cora had to return to her life of poverty and abandon Zelena, which then led to her having Regina at all AND to Eva having both Snow and the castle because she married Leopold instead of Cora. Eva used to be an extremely flawed individual but she matured and bettered herself, yet she still finds her end by Cora's hand due to her past misdeeds. Which directly leads to her castle becoming Regina's castle. Regina, who did not want a castle and a crown but only wanted to run away with the poor guy that she was in love with. Regina, who used to be a good person but the loss she suffered by her mother's hand twisted her and made her the Evil Queen.

The castle would have gone to Cora but because Eva interfered, Cora had Regina instead. And then Cora forced the events into a direction where Regina ended up in possession of the castle, which was the last thing she wanted. She practically got it as a consolation prize for having her soul ripped out. Which leads us back to Cora having her soul ripped out when she lost everything she wanted (represented by the castle) but instead of finding comfort and happiness, and improvement in becoming Regina's mother (like Eva probably did in becoming Snow's mother), she pushed her desires onto Regina. The weight of the castle (and crown) Cora forced on her broke Regina and made her into the Evil Queen you'd instantly assume lives in that castle.

Almost as if the castle would have suited young Eva's less-than-graceful personality which left such a deep mark on Cora that Eva's development as a person couldn't save her and Regina's goodness was lost too to the bad blood between Cora and Eva. But Eva's goodness persisted in Snow and that eventually led to Regina finding the right path again, which is perfectly marked by that scene where Snow tells Regina that they're taking the castle back and she's going with them whether she likes it or not. And the whole thing with the castle almost starts to look intentional (but we all know it wasn't; I'm not arguing against that).

the ouat pilot is so funny because they designed regina’s palace with the whole evil queen thing in mind but then when the show got picked up and they actually had to think about the backstory and about how regina married into the palace, the design makes absolutely no sense. like “hi, i’m Good Kind™️ King Leopold and this is my Pure-as-Snow daughter, and this is our SCARY FOREBODING SPIKE CASTLE”

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Your opinion on Regina's happy ending in ouat? Do you think it was good or not? Do you think she get everything she wanted/deserved? Would you've change something if you could?

TL;DR: I intensely dislike it because it made no narrative sense.

If you really look at it closely, the ending is, first of all, problematic. They showed Regina making the decision of one last Curse to unite the realms on her own and they never implied that she consulted any of the people from those realms if they agreed with this. I mean, sure, it would make sense that people would support this decision but I don't believe for a second that it would be accepted unanimously with no complaints. It's the same issue from season 2 when all the characters were super set on going back to their old land even though the new one they were in provided way more conveniences and opportunities. Everyone acted like a hive mind and that wasn't believable there and it's not believable in season 7 either. Which makes it problematic because Regina is once again making people (who were against the union of all realms) miserable through the Curse. On the surface it seems like a nice contrast to the beginning of the show when she cursed people to be separated and miserable. But if you look closely, it's once again a decision that disregards people's opinions and agency, at least the way they showed it since they didn't take care to imply that there was general consensus in support of her last Curse.

Then there is the problem of Regina's season 7 ending being practically the same as her season 6 ending. Let's review this. In season 7 Regina is pronounced The Good Queen because she is recognized by the people of all realms as their leader who has their best interests in mind. This is completely insignificant because a) the people from other realms have not been terrorized by her (despite the "I've conquered entire realms in less time" remark and the implication that she traveled to other worlds in 6x02 because we never saw any meaningful exploration of this) aka to the people of all realms except the og EF she was never The Evil Queen and b) the point that I talked about above. So them pronouncing her The Good Queen doesn't really matter all that much, especially because she didn't do too much to help the people of Hyperion Heights but I'll get to that too. So essentially, the coronation tells us that the people of all the realms have recognized her as their queen even though she probably violated the wishes of at least some of them by casting the last Dark Curse without consulting anyone on the matter. And it also tells us that the people of Storybrooke/og EF have accepted her redemption and trust her to be their leader... which is the exact same thing that the finale of season 6 told us about Regina's arc when they showed that people now wanted her to be mayor. I am overwhelmed by the meaning packed into this coronation. That is, the lack of meaning.

Look, I do really like the idea of paralleling 1x01 with 7x22 and having the coronation for Regina as The Good Queen at the same place where she ruined Snowing's wedding as The Evil Queen and threatened with the Curse. But they did not in any way set it up properly. Regina is seen trying to help the people of Hyperion Heights... while she's Roni. While she's cursed and doesn't remember who she is. As soon as she remembers everything, her number 1 priority becomes Henry. They do try to imply she's trying to protect everyone from the Curse and Gothel's genocide plans but what they actually SHOW us is that Regina is only thinking about her family and mainly Henry. Whatever she did to help in the EF 2.0 was also because of Henry and him staying for Ella. Regina literally abandoned her responsibilities as leader of Storybrooke just to stay with Henry. Everyone trusting her to make her Queen of the United Realms in light of that seems like a very bad decision on their part. She's stated her priorities clearly and it's obvious that the people don't take the lead.

Imo her focus on Henry is extremely hurtful of her arc. The thing is that Regina became a monster because she equated her ability to love and her worthiness with Daniel. His death led to extreme self-hatred and she only saw past that once Henry came into her life. But the thing is that her sense of self-worth and self-acceptance still hinges on Henry. Season 6 tried to do something there but the writing is so bad that it was completely unsuccessful. Proof A - Regina almost sent everything to hell the second she saw Robin aka she still needs external validation of her worthiness (and the Evil Queen's happy ending being Robin also plays into that idea). Proof B - Regina abandoning all of her responsibilities to stay with Henry (and the scene where they're talking in 7x02 even spells that out when it implies that without Henry Regina isn't content with her life). She hasn't really grown regarding defining herself outside the people whose love of her she decides to build her entire sense of self-worth on. Plus, being this unable to let go of your child is not healthy.

And this brings me to Facilier being killed off. I'd say that the main reason they did that was to show that Regina has grown and doesn't need a love interest anymore to feel worthy of love and acceptance... and it fails spectacularly because, like I said, there is plenty of evidence that she still bases her entire sense of self on external validation which is further supported by their need to dub her The Good Queen instead of allowing her to be herself. Now Regina has never wanted to be queen. And frankly, I never saw her growing into it. She is all too devoted to Henry and to changing herself for his sake and for her own! She wanted to be better because she believed her happy ending would only come when she redeemed herself. And her idea of a happy ending at the time was Robin. That literally never changed. Not even after his death. And they keep stating that through her focus on Henry! Regina still needs someone in her life to make her feel worthy and loved. They kind of tried to give her that through the love of the people by making her queen but that does not feel like a natural answer to her needs.

If you ask me, they would have done much better to keep Facilier around and make her do what Belle couldn't with Rumple. They should have made her state clear boundaries and show that even though she's in love, she has truly learned goodness for goodness' sake. Then they would have demonstrated that she does not, in fact, need external validation as badly anymore and she has truly redeemed herself. And they could have given her her happy ending with Facilier because it would have been earned then. She would've proven she has found self-love and a stable moral compass and does not NEED anyone's love; she simply wants it.

So in conclusion, the ending was disrespectful not just to Regina's character, but also to all the other characters thanks to the unfortunate implications made about her lack of development. I love season 7 but when it comes to Regina's arc throughout it, they really dropped the ball (although I also blame everything that happened in season 6 for that because it established an awful foundation to build upon).

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Here - there's a ton of fics listed with the description for each. Happy reading!

Hiii

So I’m new to the OUAT fandom/fic scene and I was going through the tag and saw your account. I was just wondering if you could point me in the direction of some SwanQueen fics? I was specifically looking for canon compliant SwanQueen fics that follow the series from the start but anything will do 😁

Thank you!! And feel free to ignore this if you don’t want to answer

i cannot, i don't have a ton of free time to read fics sadly!

however i have a lot of followers who love swan queen and can hopefully help you out!

anyone have swan queen fic recs for anon???

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I was thinking back to the scene where Regina tells Robin that Marian isn't actually Marian and I have to say that I definitely misinterpreted Robin's reaction there. He doesn't believe Regina at first and I always read it as him not trusting her enough to believe her but it's not that. He's literally in denial because he knows what Regina doesn't - that "Marian" is pregnant. He knows that he had sex with this woman and she's carrying his child and he cannot comprehend the thought that she's not who he thought she was, that he has been raped and deceived in a most horrifying way. His reaction has nothing to do with Regina. It's just a coping mechanism because he is hoping that Regina is wrong. He cannot handle it if her words turn out to be true.

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Looks like we're going to have to sail our ship pretty much on our own because so far we're the only ones with the Regina x Kathryn agenda. But do you have any specific thoughts on what you would've liked to see explored with the two of them?

I thought as much D’:. I hope there’s some fic out there for them. It’s on my list of ships to search for.

I would have loved if the show explored a tumultuous friendship post-curse break with Kathryn and Regina. After their feelings for each other would slip out during an intense argument, I’d have liked to have seen the relationship blossom into a passionate love/hate, rocky romance.

I’d have liked to see what Regina wanted to do to Kathryn and the traumatising results of that desire explored, with Kathryn being righteously very angry at first, and Regina taking a while to admit she was wrong. She’d eventually admit that part of the reason she wanted to hurt Kathryn was that that’s just her reaction to loving someone and not knowing what to do with that love. (Lol)

I think Kathryn would ultimately forgive Regina but she’d need some sessions with Archie and an explanation and sincere apology from Regina to get to that point.

I’d have loved to have seen Kathryn trying to help Regina fight her darkness, if only for Henry’s sake. But she’d really want Regina to be better for Regina’s sake as well, and so that they could all be happy together, without hurting anyone else.

An s1 au where Kathryn and Regina were a thing would have been awesome too. I feel like every season would be improved if they were romantic interests. Regina could have benefitted from genuine love and support from an adult with her best interests at heart in earlier seasons. A conscience, if you will.

And I’d have loved to have seen how Kathryn would’ve reacted to Cora, and for Cora to have tried to manipulate or hurt Kathryn in order to break Regina. So yeah, all the nice things xD.

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Guys, the fact that we have polls now makes me want to actually return to my OUAT rewatch so that I can make the most insane polls like "Which of these parallels do you think has more narrative significance?" or "Here are two episodes with a similar theme: which one did it better?"

...Once I finish watching all the other things that I'm watching. *sigh*

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O.K so it looks like these are diamonds. Which is actually pretty cool that like Rumple could turn things into gold, she could do the same only with diamonds. venivincivivez mentioned that it’s been said that Dark!Emma will have a thing for diamonds (this is the source)

So as a chemist I find that very interesting because diamonds are not just beautiful, they are unbreakable. One of the most strong crystals in nature. Which I believe is something that Dark!Emma would wish to relate to.

But that’s not even the most interesting thing about diamonds. Did you know that the diamond itself is not that beautiful, but actually looks like a glass? What makes diamonds beautiful and sparkly at different colors are actually little metal impurities that get stuck with in it. So you see, what’s make it beautiful is actually the defects within it. Which is something Dark!Emma would be related to as well. I think she’s gonna feel like she has been “miss perfect” for too long and that it prevented her from shining. 

So I don’t know if that’s the case, but if it is there is also a meaning behind this little fact, as usual.