A thought about Gerard’s scene in Episode 18, which is: Elody watches the conversation between Gerard and Rapunzel.
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Princess Elody is a tactical motherfucker, so even when these cool young women approach her and say all the right things, things that make sense, she doesn’t fully buy in. Not at face value.
When they talk about princes, it’s somehow both completely flippant and with caustic derision — like these young men were props meant to move the plot along, sole owners of agency in stories that weren’t even titled after them. (Elody wonders about their treatment of the princes as the fairies’ deux es machina, wonders about how easy it is to “kill a lot of princes” as Snow White explains. And by their own logic, how likely is it, really, that the princes are cardboard cutouts if Cinderella is so sure her stepmother, not even royalty, has her own book?)
There’s evidence to the contrary of this in her story specifically, which she has no trouble recounting. There’s no way her prince was meant to pacify her into an idyllic life, because he’s a layabout! He’s unreliable! And sure, he’s charming and fun, yes, he tried to pull her away from the war table, but that wasn’t because of any scheming to get her to stay in line, it was just because he wanted attention. He’s frivolous, he’s not a monster, she says. She’s so passionate in her defense of Gerard’s personhood that she almost misses the shared look of the princesses, the glint in Rapunzel’s eye.
Let us show you, Rapunzel says, what a monster looks like.
The scrying ritual is completed quickly and without fuss. Rapunzel stares into a mirror that ripples like water, and then, on the other side, there he is. More froglike than he’s ever been.
“You’re a prince, friends are probably pretty expendable, right? How many friends have you really had, other than Elody?”
Now hold on, Elody wants to say, that’s goading him. That’s not fair. Cinderella puts a firm hand on her shoulder and shakes her head no, to stay quiet, to wait it out. Elody bites her tongue and waits for Gerard to prove one of them right.
“Your friends seem to really value you as a person. I’m sure it’s a comfort to know that they’re not just sort of putting up with you because you’ll tag along and swing your sword, prove a little bit useful.”
Gerard has snowball fights with his friends. He has friends? He has a dedicated workout buddy? She’s not sure he’s ever been dedicated to anything, except for gossip... or her. Now that she thinks about it, he has always been unquestionably devoted to her, hasn’t he?
“I have seen some titanic feats of strength from my companions the Beast, Cinderella, Snow White. Truly impressive acts of heroism.
I do not think I have seen any of my sisters strain more greatly than the Princess Elody to find something kind to say about you.”
Elody does open her mouth to speak this time, which turns out to be a huge mistake when a writhing mass of knotted hair wraps around the lower half of her face. Not to constrict, only to silence. A pit forms in her stomach at the thought that Rapunzel might not be lying, that in trying to defend Gerard she only condemned the worst of him.
“Yes... I don’t... I don’t doubt that.”
Her heart breaks for the second time.
“But I haven't seen the Princess Elody in a while, and I think it's telling that I'm seeing you in this lake and not her or any of the other princesses. I think you’re... manipulating people, or not telling them the full truth.”
Her eyes dart to the other princesses. Snow White’s expression remains unchanged, though Cinderella’s darkens slightly. When Rapunzel speaks again, it does not escape Elody’s notice that she doesn’t acknowledge what Gerard pointed out; she deflects. Elody is getting angrier, now, tugging at the hair around her jaw, hardly even hearing the next bit until a third voice speaks up, says the Princess Elody cares for you deeply.
“Not quite the same thing.”
“It's not, but seeing as the last thing she saw of me was me running away after I had already done that, I’m grateful that she still cares for me at all.”
The hair gathering around her tenses. Elody was brought here to see that, when Gerard thought nobody else could hear, he would prove himself to be just an agent of the fairies, or an empty vessel, or a selfish monster. What she’s seeing is none of those things. But she’s also not seeing the man she knew as her husband: he’s grown and changed, almost become someone else entirely. She wants to call out to Gerard. She wants to get to know him all over again.
“Gerard,” Rapunzel hisses, “what do you think the odds are that it got into Elody's head that the virtuous thing to do was to fall in love with a cold and slimy frog, and that every kindness she has paid you in your life has been a testament to her charity, rather than anything about you that would bring her joy?”
Elody freezes.
“I don't know that I can answer that.”
“It doesn’t seem very fair to Elody that you can’t.”
“... I agree.”
The image in the mirror of the man who will never be a man again ripples and vanishes. Elody’s hands have fallen away from the hair around her face, which is convenient, as she finds herself suddenly holding a book. The hair recedes, and she doesn’t register what it is Rapunzel is saying to try and placate her, because the book in her hands is a slim volume, bound in her favorite shade of green and embossed in golden ink.
On the front is the title — The Princess Elody.
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Okay, I wouldn’t change a thing of course, but like…
Gerard, my man, my frog, dude. You just asked the sword if Elody loved you. When that bitch Rapunzel taunts you about whether or not Elody ever loved you for real, or just did what she did out of pity, or duty, or a sense of it being the right thing to do? You’re still holding the damn sword. Ask the fucking sword.
I personally sincerely doubt that the truth is that Elody never loved Gerard. I don’t think our frog was so duped, so blind, that he loved this woman so strongly, that he gave up every part of himself for her, and she had never loved him in return at all.
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