thelibrarywitch - Tumblr blog

[thelibrarywitch]

I regret to inform you I’m #belle trash.

[thelibrarywitch]

[thelibrarywitch]

Just re-watched this episode and found myself frustrated anew all these years later. And then I thought “You know...I bet Sieben’s take will be validating” and baby - mwah - it absolutely was.

“ruby slippers” impressions

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

Annnd there goeth the good mood of the last episode.

…yeah, sorry, there’s really not much else to say on this one. And the episode was heavily Ruby-centric, so that should tell you something.

::dreamy sigh::

But yeah, not even my wolf girl could distract me from the big ol’ pile of “wtf”. So… some thoughts under the cut, but be warned, they’re not mainly nice ones.

Keep reading

[thelibrarywitch]

Happy Rumbelle through the seasons – for Fluffapalooza 2019. 

[thelibrarywitch]

Once Upon A Time: Megara

I was always kind of disappointed that OUAT underused/underwrote Meg during the Underworld season. But I’m especially disappointed going back and re-watching and realizing professional lovable sass monster Kasey Rohl played her. Any Once/Magicians fans with me?

(gif from drragons)

Preface: I love Gideon!!!!!

But I’d also love an AU where Meg was the adult version of Rumple/Belle’s baby that Hades was owed. She gets to spend Season Five trying to help her parents save baby-her, working a double agent in true Meg fashion. They somehow fail to rescue her, even though they still defeat Hades. She goes off, Becomes the Black Fairy herself and then comes back in Season Six as the full scale Big Bad.

But I might be blinded by love for Kasey.

[thelibrarywitch]

This is really beautiful.

But also

Did she spell Mother wrong?

I know she was under duress but that looks an awful lot like Mothrr

Her Handsome Hero!!! I’m so emotional, holding this book, which was there at the beginning of Rumbelle and became such an important part of their lives.

It’s a normal sized book, but pretty heavy for its size. The cover is a beautiful teal leather…

This makes me cry…I can’t help thinking of Gideon reading it in the Dark Realm and Rumple caressing it when they had their talk in the clock tower, recalling it as “your mother’s favorite book”.

The pages are filled with the same “language”, same passages.

Here is some info that I find interesting, especially the third paragraph :

**The phrase “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetuer” appears in Microsoft Word online Help. This phrase has the appearance of an intelligent Latin idiom. Actually, it is nonsense.

Although the phrase is nonsense, it does have a long history. The phrase has been used for several centuries by typographers to show the most distinctive features of their fonts. It is used because the letters involved and the letter spacing in those combinations reveal, at their best, the weight, design, and other important features of the typeface.

A 1994 issue of “Before & After” magazine traces “Lorem ipsum …” to a jumbled Latin version of a passage from de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum, a treatise on the theory of ethics written by Cicero in 45 B.C. The passage “Lorem ipsum …” is taken from text that reads, “Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit …,” which translates as, “There is no one who loves pain itself, who seeks after it and wants to have it, simply because it is pain…”**

That is so Rumple and Rumbelle to me…

[thelibrarywitch]

Oh, I think you nail this so beautifully. It doesn’t feel like a fridging because it’s such a respectful, beautiful episode that really takes time with Belle. But Beauty does mean once and for all that Belle probably isn’t going to break out into her own big, surprising narrative totally separate from Rumple. Which, I think for most Rumbelle/Belle fans was a small hope we nursed for years.

The show missed a chance to do more with Belle in the back end of Season 4. That was maybe the make or break moment. There are gestures to it (her friendship with Hook) but if we’d gotten a Belle-centric in the back end, it coulda been...well, gold. (The Outsider and Dark Hollow - Princess Adventure!Belle episodes - are maybe my all time favs.) But I don’t know where there would be room for it with a Maleficent and an Ursula and a Cruella and an Author and a Lily and a Zelena return. 

thedarknessoftheendlessmaze replied to your post ““beauty” impressions”

I have a lot of negative thoughts on this episode & fridging & Belle, Rumple, & Gideon but I will leave those off as requested. I will say that I love Alice so much and she might be the best part of season 7. Did you catch the remark she made about an ex-girlfriend?!! Her rabbit mask was amazing, also I love how in the background of scenes you can see people in Disney Halloween costumes walking around. Yes it may be shameless self-promotion but it’s fun shameless self-promotion!

Oh no, we can totally get into it here. I wrote that paragraph at 2am in the morning, and it’s now 10. I’m good to go. I just didn’t want to put on my critical audience pants (they go well with the analytical hat) while I was still running high on all the fan-emotions. No need to rain on my own parade, as it were, I know I’ll come down by myself sooner or later.

I’ll be tagging negative/critical discussions of the episode with “#beauty discussion” so people can filter them out if they so choose

I’ll start, shall I? Because I’m really torn on the whole thing. I think my ideal Rumbelle-ending would have been Rumple ditching the curse (somehow), and the two of them riding off into the sunset. In a perfect world, so to speak.

At the same time, I do think there’s a place for stories about death and loss, and this show has both hit and missed on those before, but it’s always been an interesting journey to watch. I don’t mind them telling one of these stories about Belle and Rumple, but I still get an iffy feeling about it and I think it’s less because of this specific episode and more because of how Belle’s character has been treated throughout the rest of the show.

She was never really “allowed” to have her own arc or goals, for one. For the most part, she was an extension, catalyst, and sometimes obstacle in Rumple’s story. And I think that’s what makes this so grating for me.

As an aside: while Belle’s death clearly has the goal of motivating Rumple into action, I don’t think it fits the “technical” definition of fridging. She didn’t die for shock value, and no emphasis was placed on her suffering (because she didn’t suffer, obviously; she just died of old age after a long and happy life). I’m almost certain that if she’d been a fully fleshed-out minor character in her own right, my personal problems with this development would vanish.

By the way: if it’s unclear what I mean by “fully fleshed out minor character”, please compare and contrast the way the narrative and the camera treated Zelena vs how it treated Belle. And I’m not saying that to dump on Zelena, she just makes for an excellent example. She started out as a foil for another character (Regina), but the screentime she had gave her a fleshed-out backstory, explored her issues and motivation (”Where Bluebirds Fly” is a good example), and let her have other relationships. (Granted, she’s maybe not a great example for that, because… well. The whole Robin disaster.) Belle, on the other hand, had most of her character development centred around Rumple, and a cynical person might say that the only time she existed as a separate character was when the narrative wanted to tell us that Rumple was unequivocably in the wrong, and had her yell at him. It wasn’t the best way to flesh out Belle’s character, in my opinion.

re: the bolded part–I thought I did and then I couldn’t find it again! Thank you for letting me know it wasn’t just a representation-starved hallucination! : D

And yeah, the costumes were a lot of fun–I spent a good bit of the episode scanning the background to see if I’d recognise anyone.

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

[thelibrarywitch]

Thought this was real and literally gasped. Absolutely stunning.

Belle and Ogilvy

This is my first Ogilvelle manip, and it’s freely inspired by the characters from Homecoming by @emospritelet

[thelibrarywitch]

Also, somehow this is the first time I’ve noticed that parts of the Destiny look like they could be a Tardis console. This is an AU I would be into.

I have been a Bobby fan for how many years now and this is the first I’m seeing these ridiculous continuity pics from SGU.

[thelibrarywitch]

To me the “problem” with Grace is the same as the “problem” with Joyce on Buffy. It’s hard (for me) to totally appreciate/empathize with a character who is out of the loop on the shows’ bigger mysteries and therefore is actively pulling against the protagonists getting answers or meeting their goals. I end up just finding the character arc tiresome even if they are totally in the right. (I don’t want to punch anybody though!)

I actually don’t blame Grace for yelling at Ben. Everyone is too damn hard on her. I’d freak out if my son was at a place with explosives and weapons. Ben should’ve brought him home or called her.

Her explaining what it was like during those 5 years, buying a headstone for her son…

If anyone watched that scene and wanted to actually punch her like I’ve seen…what the actual fuck is wrong with you?

[thelibrarywitch]

Slightly better quality from the actual bidding page seems to confirm it’s Oaken’s! So funny, so bizarre. I like to imagine that means some part of their travels were spent making amends.

screenshot from here

[thelibrarywitch]

This might be a little negative so I’m putting under a cut.

Gotta say, I find some of the stuff in this episode to be kind of a bitter pill to swallow as a lover of the Charming-Swan family dynamic. It’s not out of character at all, I do buy it, but there’s something sad about the Charmings willingness to be like “Welp (dusts off cloak), Regina said there’s nothing we can do so let’s make the most of this new life.” Like I said, it’s in character - Snow was willing to stay behind in Neverland alone with Charming and they did, like, put her through a portal in the first place. They also do LOVE being kingdom leaders and I’m not surprised they’re embracing it. There’s also just a narrative requirement that they serve as a foil for Neal’s dangerous refusal to accept reality and Regina’s devastation over a Henry-less future. Still, now that I’ve argued against myself, it does feel like this is leaning into certain worse qualities of the Charmings over others. My favorite versions of these characters are the “Sorry Charming, I’m jumping into this portal after my daughter” Snow and the “She might be grownup but I’m still her father” Charming.

And Emma’s simultaneous “My parents are back? And in trouble? So I have to go back to Storybrooke? Ugh. Fine-ah.”

I know she’s dealing with the devastation of realizing her nice New York life wasn’t real, but she doesn’t feel particularly compelled to check up on them and that seems...cold to me. Not closed-off (which is, duh, her whole deal) just cold. And I know a really sweet moment is coming at the end of the season, but I don’t know if the show ever really gives us the “Ohhhh, this is how the three of us can be a family” catharsis that the heartbreaking set up in the pilot warrants. At some point, it just becomes about “Family” as a general concept that involves many extended people. Unless I’m mis-remembering, the growth in this three-person-parent-child-relationship starts to slow around now and gets put on the backburner for the rest of the series.

[thelibrarywitch]

The only reason I can imagine Rumple doing something vaguely social like eating outdoors in Storybrooke is to potentially catch a passing glimpse of Belle.

“street rats” impressions

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

Today on Once Upon a Time: Being the Saviour is… bad, actually.

shitty retirement plan, too…

Alright, I will admit it: I had a bit of fatigue set in with this show. Especially during 5B, because, well, can you blame me? (Add some real-life nonsense to that and you get quite a lot of fatigue, but that’s neither here nor there.) But season 6 has actually given me some confidence that these plots are building up to something worthwhile. …some more than others, to be fair. (::grumbly shipper-noises can be heard in the distance::) Still, it’s made me want to put on my analytical hat and just, y'know, dig into stuff a little.

But under the cut.

Keep reading

[thelibrarywitch]

This. I madly loved the episode but also, oh my god, do British people really think we all talk through our nose like that?

Finally watching this week’s Doctor Who and enjoying the episode but…

Oh God the fake Southern accents are soooooooo bad. Is this how British people feel constantly when Gwyneth Paltrow or Renee Zellweger try to be English? 

[thelibrarywitch]

I almost buy the protection spell as a concept because Rumple does have a tendency to send Belle away from the action when she’s in danger - going to sleep in the shop when the Snow Queen’s mirror is raining down, getting her out of town when the Dark Ones are coming, etc. But in execution it doesn’t work at all. The way he talks about trapping her on the ship, the way he talks about her loving him again “out of necessity” - this menacing, dismissive dialogue set off my nope nope nope alarms.

You freaken nailed it with the point about unproductive arguing. Seeing these characters at cross purposes - since you love them both - could be super interesting. But it’s just not new or layered or ... particularly grounded.

“the strange case” impressions

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

Again, a case of “wow, I wonder who this episode is going to be about!”

no, I wasn’t really wondering. my, but that fridge is sure getting crowded, isn’t it?

It’s nice to see that I still have a reliable douche-radar.

This episode… ::sigh:: See, I really liked it, except for the parts I hated with a burning passion. It’s a weird mix, and I’ll try to unpack that under the cut.

Keep reading

[thelibrarywitch]

This is my favorite thing Emma ever does in the whole show. And I know that’s ridiculous but I just find Jennifer Morrison’s delivery of the directions to Henry to be so, so funny.

And in general, this, to me, is Emma at her absolute best. Still a little tough, a little in denial about her own emotions, but she’s brave and she’s loyal to her family and she’s always trying to be a better person.

Also, damn, I was a Swanfire shipper in Season Three but the chemistry is off the charts in all their interactions this season. And I cannot believe how charming and kind and chill but also a little rough Neal is. Ah, what could have been.

#smooth

[thelibrarywitch]

Belle wearing the trousers in the family