More on Once Upon A Time
Oct. 4th, 2012 09:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pktechgirlbackupOnce Upon a Time is really grew on me. It rewards thought. Moreover, I'm beginning to think that a lot of the things I originally took as flaws to be gotten past were deliberate choices trying to convey a message.
For example, I don't like Prince Charming in either world. In the first episode, he has the following conversation with Snow White:
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"You're thinking about what the Queen said, aren't you? Snow, please, I can't keep having this conversation"
I don't know about you, but being yelled at for the content of conversations I did not initiate or participate in is not part of my happily ever after. The prince's real world counterpart is worse. He is married to someone not Snow White, and is totally trying to work it out with her while having an affair with Snow White and telling her he's his true love. I thought that the writers were trying to pointlessly extend the drama by keeping Charming and Snow apart, but maybe they were actually trying to say something about the value and truthiness of this particular love.
My little feminist shoulder angel took issue with heralding Cinderella as a model of class mobility and The Power to Change One's Destiny (that was not subtext. Snow White actually said that out loud, which is extra weird when you learn that her husband, Prince Charming, is in fact a sheep herder who got promoted, Prince and the Pauper style). Maybe she was supposed to. Maybe we're being told what a shitty world this is, especially given later stories about people locked out of happiness via the caste system (Dreamy became Grumpy when he was disallowed from running away with his True Love, Illyria from Angel). True Love and bootstrap-based-ascension appear to be reserved for people willing to make a deal with Rumpelstilskin.
And then there's Belle. I want to like Beauty and the Beast because Belle is the Disney princess that most resembles me, but both the Disney version and the original are horrible stories about the power of Stockholm syndrome, with large doses of the redemptive power of love, which is not a thing. The Once Upon A Time version explicitly confirms that Belle and the monster (actually Rumplestiltskin) are in True Love, but it doesn't matter, because Rumpelstiltskin's actions are still horrible. Later on, you learn it's more complicated than that, but I don't think it dilutes the message because it doesn't change anything from Belle's perspective.
I am not entirely convinced the show is doing this intentionally. It is awfully subtle. On the other hand, several of the writer/producers are affiliated with Whedon shows (and one director started on The Shield), and the show's three biggest characters are all women. Exact Bedchel test passing rate depends on whether how you count a 10 year old boy as a conversation topic, but even when they're talking about men, the focus is on the women. With the exception of Rumplestiltskin, the male characters are plot objects, ciphers, and refrigerator occupants. And even if it's not strictly intentional, it may be consistent enough that I can enjoy the show by applying my own interpretation, like Glee.
The two worst traits continue to be the child's lack of trauma over his evil queen mother (did you know evil queen is a pop-psych type of narcissist?), and the protagonist's complete and utter willingness to trust everyone, in the face of both genre savvy and a life that should have left her anything but. These both annoy me.
If I had to pick two themes for OUaT, it would parental love and acceptance of one's fate. I cannot tell you the number of times a character has struck a bargain with someone clearly untrustworthy, and justified it by "I don't have a choice." I don't think I need to bring back the spoiler tag to protect you all from the fact that this doesn't work any better than going double or nothing in blackjack. If the characters simply accepted how bad things were, that fixing them would be slow work, and certain things were irreplaceable, they would ultimately be happier.
I don't know how much I have to say on the parental love thing, because I have nothing to add to it. It's very well done, in an area that, for all it's importance, gets a lot less attention than romantic love in media.
For example, I don't like Prince Charming in either world. In the first episode, he has the following conversation with Snow White:
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"You're thinking about what the Queen said, aren't you? Snow, please, I can't keep having this conversation"
I don't know about you, but being yelled at for the content of conversations I did not initiate or participate in is not part of my happily ever after. The prince's real world counterpart is worse. He is married to someone not Snow White, and is totally trying to work it out with her while having an affair with Snow White and telling her he's his true love. I thought that the writers were trying to pointlessly extend the drama by keeping Charming and Snow apart, but maybe they were actually trying to say something about the value and truthiness of this particular love.
My little feminist shoulder angel took issue with heralding Cinderella as a model of class mobility and The Power to Change One's Destiny (that was not subtext. Snow White actually said that out loud, which is extra weird when you learn that her husband, Prince Charming, is in fact a sheep herder who got promoted, Prince and the Pauper style). Maybe she was supposed to. Maybe we're being told what a shitty world this is, especially given later stories about people locked out of happiness via the caste system (Dreamy became Grumpy when he was disallowed from running away with his True Love, Illyria from Angel). True Love and bootstrap-based-ascension appear to be reserved for people willing to make a deal with Rumpelstilskin.
And then there's Belle. I want to like Beauty and the Beast because Belle is the Disney princess that most resembles me, but both the Disney version and the original are horrible stories about the power of Stockholm syndrome, with large doses of the redemptive power of love, which is not a thing. The Once Upon A Time version explicitly confirms that Belle and the monster (actually Rumplestiltskin) are in True Love, but it doesn't matter, because Rumpelstiltskin's actions are still horrible. Later on, you learn it's more complicated than that, but I don't think it dilutes the message because it doesn't change anything from Belle's perspective.
I am not entirely convinced the show is doing this intentionally. It is awfully subtle. On the other hand, several of the writer/producers are affiliated with Whedon shows (and one director started on The Shield), and the show's three biggest characters are all women. Exact Bedchel test passing rate depends on whether how you count a 10 year old boy as a conversation topic, but even when they're talking about men, the focus is on the women. With the exception of Rumplestiltskin, the male characters are plot objects, ciphers, and refrigerator occupants. And even if it's not strictly intentional, it may be consistent enough that I can enjoy the show by applying my own interpretation, like Glee.
The two worst traits continue to be the child's lack of trauma over his evil queen mother (did you know evil queen is a pop-psych type of narcissist?), and the protagonist's complete and utter willingness to trust everyone, in the face of both genre savvy and a life that should have left her anything but. These both annoy me.
If I had to pick two themes for OUaT, it would parental love and acceptance of one's fate. I cannot tell you the number of times a character has struck a bargain with someone clearly untrustworthy, and justified it by "I don't have a choice." I don't think I need to bring back the spoiler tag to protect you all from the fact that this doesn't work any better than going double or nothing in blackjack. If the characters simply accepted how bad things were, that fixing them would be slow work, and certain things were irreplaceable, they would ultimately be happier.
I don't know how much I have to say on the parental love thing, because I have nothing to add to it. It's very well done, in an area that, for all it's importance, gets a lot less attention than romantic love in media.
