Once Upon a Time there was an interesting show that had a flawed but fascinating first season...
However, for as much as I appreciated the powers that be having the guts to break the curse in season one and bring magic to Storybrooke so quickly, it resulted in a show that lost its way. Ironic given the storyline of last night's season finale. Season 2 has been filled with missed opportunities, a slew of new characters that save for Hook and Bae/Neal served little purpose in making Storybrooke more interesting and worse left little room and time for stories that mattered around the primary characters viewers spent all of season one investing in getting to know.
So as season 2 has set us on a course to navigate three separate worlds next season here's my final assessment with my hopes for how the show might pivot back to the show I so easily enjoyed last year.
Characters, characters everywhere, there are so many it's hard to care: OUAT took a page out of their LOST model and established characters and backstories a plenty last year. Then they spent most of season 2 ignoring them (Red, Blue Fairy, Madhatter I am looking at you). August's return was anticlimactic, did Jorge Garcia really need the work so bad that we needed the Giant to grow the magic beans? Cora was introduced and pivotal only to meet a weird, untimely demise once she arrived and festered for a few episodes in Storybrooke. None of those offenses will ever come close to the creators forcing Greg and Tamara upon us for the latter half of this season.
Greg and Tamara are two of the weakest, insipid characters I have come across in recent television. (And that's saying something given the weekend's cancellation blood bath over on NBC.) Their only purpose has been to connect the dots through theories of convenience and bridge plot points that we needed in order to move the action next season back to Neverland and Fairyland. From their genesis to their final move of kidnapping Henry (they just happened to be back in the mines to grab him?) nothing about these two characters possessed logic or story structure. The AWFUL acting only highlighted just how much these two stuck out like a sore thumb and I hope Peter Pan does more than rip away their shadows next season.
To thine ownself be true: I am willing to suspend disbelief with the best of them. LOST and 24 rank among my all time favorite shows. In doing so I expect that the creators will provide a line of plausibility and continuity that supports the frame and context they have built for the show. Far too often this season we watched OUAT go off the rails into a ditch of their own making. Belle's entire Lacey story was pointless. It did not serve Gold, it did not serve Belle's character and her 'dark side' did nothing to advance any of our plotlines. Cora was probably the worst injustice. Her backstory was fascinating but her actions once she got to Storybrooke had no end game that made sense. Suddenly she was obsessed with gaining the Dark One's powers? And don't even get me started on Regina's multiple personality disorder. She's evil, she wants to be good, she wants her mother's approval, she wants revenge, she wants Henry's love. I get dizzy just thinking about it. Look, I am happy to have a villain with a soft spot (see Gold) but poor Lana Parilla had to play her character differently week by week. There was no understanding Regina's drive this season, so when Henry goes to her for sacrificing herself it falls flat because two episodes ago she was talking like a mad woman telling him she was going to kill everyone to save him. And am I alone in not caring that Snow had a black spot on her heart? I mean come on where's the defiant spunky Snow of Fairyland?
Beans beans beans: Finally a moment to bemoan the ridiculous magic beans of convenience. We know nothing about these beans until a full harvest is happening under a cloaking spell. Then everyone in town practically knows about them. Then Regina destroys all but a handful of the beans for herself. Then Greg and Tamara only keep two for good measure? Seriously? The singular most powerful tool in the magic shed and they are undercutting supply? We are suppose to buy that as an audience? Come on. I call bullshit. No I call lazy. Moving on...
Where do we Land?: I don't require my season finales to be gangbuster, jaw dropping cliffhangers. I do want them to be interesting, settle some scores and set me up for the following season. In my opinion OUAT went 1 for 3 last night. I am genuinely interested in what they set up for next season. This concept of a dark Peter Pan intrigued me when they first alluded to it a few episodes back and having the dysfunctional good and evil family set sail for Neverland to work together to save Henry is bound to make for fun dynamics since 90% of the shows best characters are now on Hook's ship. Which leads me to Bae/Neal. I think Bae was the most interesting character to be introduced this season. His connection to the main characters created fertile ground that played out best in the episodes in NYC and last week between Emma and Neal. The second he went into the portal I knew his one way ticket to Fairyland had been punched which made me cranky. It bothered me because it was obvious. It bothered me because it was treated like an afterthought and once again we have isolated a major character from the rest of the action which will require stand alone scenes or yet another subplot. It was less cliffhanger more character dumping and while probably not intended felt as though the creators were saying "Hey, we don't want him dead but we don't know what to do with him yet so lets toss him over in Fairyland and figure it out on the backside." On the upside, with the characters we most care about are in route to Neverland the show efficiently can jettison the mass majority of Storybrooke.
So after what has been a messy season with strokes of real intrigue and fun I have to say Once Upon a Time has a lot of ground to make up to keep me coming back next season. I wholeheartedly agree with the recap over a EW that the biggest difference (and therefore challenge) the show faced was in Season 1 they were focused on a big goal/plot point - break the curse and this season was bogged down with smaller, less pressing (and I would argue less interesting) goals. I think the results have been a muddy mess of a sophomore outing that is going to require discipline and focus to make us invest in not only Henry's fate, but the 'ever after' of the fairytales this show has been built upon.
So my memo to the creators of Once Upon a Time for the summer: 1) Less is More 2) Stay true to what made us love the show and 3) Get rid of Greg and Tamara.
No comments:
Post a Comment