Once upon a Time 3.04
Oct. 21st, 2013 07:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakIn which the multigenerational plot thickens.
I continue to be thrilled by the show's Evil!Peter Pan, idea and execution, and Neverland (ditto). We got some tasty new bits of information here. So Neverland used to be powered and visited by the dreams of children. (Works v. v. well with Barrie, btw.) Then Pan made the step from hanging out with dreaming children to actually kidnapping waking ones. Also, one of my big questions got answered, to wit, is OuaT!Peter Pan a magical entity from the get go or was he, like Barrie's, human once? Rumplestilskin kindly fills us in that they were children at the same time (we'll undoubtedly get the relevant flashbacks at some climactic turn this season), at which point Pan was still human, which also gives us a temporal reference point. It also makes me modify my what-does-Pan-really-need-Henry-for speculation from "magical power source" to "magical power source and possible successor.
"All children grow up. All children, save one." Henry once was Peter Pan in reverse: during the Storybrooke he grew up in, no children grew up, no children, save one. So basically for Henry to end up as an eternal child would be his worst earlier childhood nightmare. The show in previous seasons touched on the horror of not changing or reversing: for example, Rumplestilskin's original idea of father/son reconciliation, which was magically changing Neal back to teenage Baelfire before anything traumatic happened, and Neal's strong reaction. Here in this episode which treats to a flashback to the times between Rumple becoming the Dark One and losing his son, we get a far earlier Rumplestilskin, but the fear-of-loss derived clinging and unwillingness to allow for change in his son is already here. That Bae, like Milah, wants to see the world and have adventures must have hit just where it hurt. BTW I appreciate that for all the strong father son stuff in the episode, we get several reminders of Milah as well, most pointedly by Hook who doesn't see Baelfire/Neal as his father's son, but as his mother's.
The question of not having faith (and Neverland runs on faith): Rumplestilskin in the past, when he's unwilling to risk faith in his son staying with him voluntarily, and Neal in the present, unwilling to risk his son on his father's reformation. The great thing about this show is that you can see where both of them are coming from, even without the previouslies including the reminder of the most traumatic event of young Baelfire's life, his father clinging to the dagger and letting go of him. And of course, Rumplestilskin, king of self sabotage, by his typically convolutedly clever method of hiding his dagger made it impossible for himself to give Neal the demonstration that would have convinced him.
Trivia:
- Of course this Peter Pan is also the Pied Piper
- my instinct is that Pan is lying when he says he allowed Bae to leave way back when, but it makes sense for him to bluff about that
- otoh of course if you really can't leave Neverland without Peter Pan's permission, then the key could be the change as to who is Peter Pan; since Henry actually becoming the new Pan would be depressing, see above, I am wondering whether that couldn't be Rumplestilskin's undoing, but then again any Rumple depowerment (or in this case, finite role change) isn't likely to happen before they end the show - I can't see the producers letting go of Robert Carlyle before that
- ditto, btw, for Lara Parilla and Regina, who'd otherwise also be a candidate to make the self sacrifice, substituting herself for Henry as successor if I'm right about this successor thing, which would also work thematically
- because Regina has only lately started to emotionally grow up and was an abused and abusive child for most of her existence
I continue to be thrilled by the show's Evil!Peter Pan, idea and execution, and Neverland (ditto). We got some tasty new bits of information here. So Neverland used to be powered and visited by the dreams of children. (Works v. v. well with Barrie, btw.) Then Pan made the step from hanging out with dreaming children to actually kidnapping waking ones. Also, one of my big questions got answered, to wit, is OuaT!Peter Pan a magical entity from the get go or was he, like Barrie's, human once? Rumplestilskin kindly fills us in that they were children at the same time (we'll undoubtedly get the relevant flashbacks at some climactic turn this season), at which point Pan was still human, which also gives us a temporal reference point. It also makes me modify my what-does-Pan-really-need-Henry-for speculation from "magical power source" to "magical power source and possible successor.
"All children grow up. All children, save one." Henry once was Peter Pan in reverse: during the Storybrooke he grew up in, no children grew up, no children, save one. So basically for Henry to end up as an eternal child would be his worst earlier childhood nightmare. The show in previous seasons touched on the horror of not changing or reversing: for example, Rumplestilskin's original idea of father/son reconciliation, which was magically changing Neal back to teenage Baelfire before anything traumatic happened, and Neal's strong reaction. Here in this episode which treats to a flashback to the times between Rumple becoming the Dark One and losing his son, we get a far earlier Rumplestilskin, but the fear-of-loss derived clinging and unwillingness to allow for change in his son is already here. That Bae, like Milah, wants to see the world and have adventures must have hit just where it hurt. BTW I appreciate that for all the strong father son stuff in the episode, we get several reminders of Milah as well, most pointedly by Hook who doesn't see Baelfire/Neal as his father's son, but as his mother's.
The question of not having faith (and Neverland runs on faith): Rumplestilskin in the past, when he's unwilling to risk faith in his son staying with him voluntarily, and Neal in the present, unwilling to risk his son on his father's reformation. The great thing about this show is that you can see where both of them are coming from, even without the previouslies including the reminder of the most traumatic event of young Baelfire's life, his father clinging to the dagger and letting go of him. And of course, Rumplestilskin, king of self sabotage, by his typically convolutedly clever method of hiding his dagger made it impossible for himself to give Neal the demonstration that would have convinced him.
Trivia:
- Of course this Peter Pan is also the Pied Piper
- my instinct is that Pan is lying when he says he allowed Bae to leave way back when, but it makes sense for him to bluff about that
- otoh of course if you really can't leave Neverland without Peter Pan's permission, then the key could be the change as to who is Peter Pan; since Henry actually becoming the new Pan would be depressing, see above, I am wondering whether that couldn't be Rumplestilskin's undoing, but then again any Rumple depowerment (or in this case, finite role change) isn't likely to happen before they end the show - I can't see the producers letting go of Robert Carlyle before that
- ditto, btw, for Lara Parilla and Regina, who'd otherwise also be a candidate to make the self sacrifice, substituting herself for Henry as successor if I'm right about this successor thing, which would also work thematically
- because Regina has only lately started to emotionally grow up and was an abused and abusive child for most of her existence
