Once Upon A Time -- A Land Without Magic No More

The first few minutes of the finale were pretty surprising. I didn't think Emma would suddenly believe or Regina would admit everything. I was pleasantly surprised. It's always nice when a writer doesn't do the predictable.

While watching Emma in this episode, it reminded me of the fact that the writers of Lost originally wanted a female lead to be hero, but ABC wouldn't give it a green light unless the show was built around the Jack Shephard character instead. All the fairy tale characters trapped in Storybrooke are like the plane crash passengers stranded on the island. And instead of a plane crash they've been trapped in Storybrooke by a curse. So it's kind of like the writers are doing the story they wanted to tell on Lost with Once Upon A Time.

The episode opens with, who else, Charming. He's trying to escape his cell to rescue his beloved Snow. Regina has her palace guard remove Charming from his cell to take him to be executed. One of the palace guard's help Charming to escape. It's the Huntsman. He tells Charming he gave his heart to protect Snow and for Charming to find her and this in a nutshell it's what's beginning to tick me off. The way everyone is willing to fall on a blade just for these two. It's starting to make me sick. Sorry, these two are just not all that.

Regina arrives and the Huntsman covers for Charming, but Regina sees where Charming is in her mirror. She uses her magic to put him in the Infinite Forrest. Charming keeps walking and ends up back in the same spot. Rump also shows up offering to help him, but he turns his nose up at making any kind of a deal with Rump.

This may have been my favorite scene of the finale. The big dashing hero got his butt whupped by Rump. Literally. They engage in a sword fight and during it Rump smacks Charming on the rump with his sword and even catches sword between his fingers. Better go take some more lessons before you mess in the big leagues, Shephard Boy. Charming finally agrees to a deal with Rump. Rump has made Charming's mother's ring into a beacon to lead him back to his beloved Snow. Rump even throws in a spanking new Prince outfit for free without making him sign away his firstborn child like he made Ella do. All Charming has to do in return is hide Rump's Faberge' egg containing his vial of true love. Of course, where Rump wants it hidden is going to be a bit difficult. He wants Charming to hide it inside of Malfecient's belly. Charming wants to know why Rump is helping him, and Rump replies he likes what true love can produce.

I refuse to believe Charming and Snow have the bestest love in all the land. I think Rump could have made his curse and true love potion just as easily with Ella and Thomas' strands of hair. The problem is they hadn't screwed someone over bad enough that they'd want to level a curse on all of Fairy Tale Land just to get back at them. Rump needed someone to want revenge badly enough they'd be willing to curse the land. It's the real reason Rump helped Charming find his precious Snow and break the curse of the apple: so Regina would be so desperate for revenge she'd be willing to do anything to get it.

When Charming goes to Malfecient's castle he's wondering how he's supposed to shove this big metal egg down her throat. Talk about something being big enough to choke a horse. Lucky for Charming that Malfecient takes her true form, which is a dragon. He ultimately jumps on Mal's back and seems to shove the metal egg through a gill looking thing on the side of her neck. Then he jumps through a window and escapes.

What follows next is the opening scene we saw in the first episode. Charming is riding to Snow, he finds her in her glass casket and he kisses her awake. It's kind of interesting how my feelings about these two have changed. I remember being so enchanted by them as a couple that first episode, now I'm pretty much over it after having their greatest love of all shoved down my throat 24/7. And I'm really over the moldy over-used, "I'll always find you," line. It lost its charm along with them.

I also have a big problem with Snow declaring they're going to take back the kingdom from Regina and King Charlie Widmore. Okay, maybe Snow has some right to Regina's throne, but the fake Pretender Prince has no right to King Charlie Widmore's throne. He's a peasant. He has as much right to that throne as Grumpy does. So, sweetie, marry the fraud and put his butt on your Daddy's throne, but just because King Charlie Widmore isn't enthralled by you and your great love gives you no right to sit What's His Name's [we don't even know] fraudulent butt on King Charlie Widmore's throne.

In Storybrooke, Emma has rushed The Brat to the hospital. Dr. Whale says there's no sign he's been poisoned and lo and behold Emma suddenly believes in magic. She picks up the Once Upon A Time book and is inundated with flashbacks of Mommy and Daddy. I thought after the way she resisted to believe the truth her sudden believing wasn't all that believable. I was surprised when Regina showed up and she admitted everything. Regina also tells Emma that Gold is really Rumpelstiltskin.

They go and see Rump and he tells them he put a drop of true love in the curse as an escape clause. He tells the ladies they need to recover the Faberge' egg containing the vial of true love. Regina trapped Malfecient into some dungeon and she has to lower Emma down to fight the dragon. Rump gives Emma her Daddy's sword to take her on.

I really loved how Rump tricked Princess Emma out of giving him the egg containing true love. He tied Regina up and claimed she left Emma down in the dungeon to rot. Having no choice she has to throw the Faberge' egg up to him and while she's climbing he takes off. That's when Regina says a mouthful: that Rump has basically played them all. He sure did. That's why he's the best villain on this show. They're all just his puppets and he's pulling the strings.

Regina better watch out for Rump, because he's about to find out that she's been keeping Belle imprisoned for the last 28 years. She screws over Jefferson again, refusing to deliver what she promised to him and brags there's nothing he can do to her. Guess again, Your Majesty. Jefferson knows all about Regina keeping Belle prisoner in the hospital and he breaks her out. He says he can't go to Rump, but sends her to him, saying to tell him that Regina has been keeping her a prisoner all these years. This time, sweetie, you're not going to get away with screwing him over.

After that, I'm more convinced than ever that Jefferson is Bae. He can't go to Rump because he's afraid Rump will figure out who he is. And I can understand why. As a child, Rump killed someone for accidentally bumping into his leg. He doesn't want that in his life or in Grace's. He just wants to live an ordinary magic-free life with his daughter.

In other Storybrooke news, when Emma came to visit August, she witnessed him turn completely into wood. David also said adios to MM and was heading out of town. Lucky for him just as he was about to cross the Storybrooke county line the curse was broken and he remembered his past.

Regina and Emma return to the hospital and Dr. Whale says The Brat has met his maker. I knew they wouldn't kill The Brat off. We couldn't be that lucky, not to mention they're not going to kill a kid. I completely called it on Twitter before it happened that Emma would kiss him and The Brat would wake-up.

I don't know if the kid that plays The Brat is just a one-note actor that is incapable of putting any subtext into his performance, which is a shame considering all the other wonderful child actors the show has cast in other parts. Or maybe it's the writers who write The Brat as never having any kind of feelings for Regina even though she raised him. Whatever the case when Regina is crying and telling him she loves him the little creep has no reaction. He's got Mommy Emma now and he could care less. Makes me wish they'd really killed this brat off.

Of course, I can't say I've been very impressed with Jennifer Morrison either. Emma comes off as a bit one-note, herself, with the tough macho act. So maybe it's perfect that both these one-note characters are mother and son. Think the best thing that could happen to Regina is losing this ungrateful brat who turned on her and has no loyalty or gratitude for Regina loving and raising him while his precious bio mom couldn't wait to dump his ass.

I really hate that the writers are taking the stand that because Regina isn't his bio-mom she's not really The Brat's mother. They even had Rump tell Regina that dead beat mommy, Emma, was his real mother, and she was basically nothing. That all the years Regina raised this brat means nothing because Bio Mom is back. Sorry, but Regina has been more of a mother to The Brat than Emma has. So maybe The Brat's attitude towards Regina is more a combination of the writers if you're not the bio mom you're nothing mentality and the kid's one-note acting performance. Whatever the case, the less of this kid the better. Especially when they're so many other better child characters than Ho-Hum Henry.

Once the curse is lifted all the fairy tale characters remember who they are. I was very curious what Dr. Whale was remembering. Of course, Mother I'm So Superior To You aka The Blue Fairy couldn't wait to get in Regina's face telling her she'd better run now they all remember. I so wish BF had been the fairy Rump had whacked. She's just as big a user as Rump and Regina to get what she wants but she acts like she's so much better than them. I wanted her dead for wanting the targets of the curse, Snow and Charming, to be able to escape it while everyone else had to stay behind and pay for something the Charmings did. That alone is reason enough for this broad to meet her maker.

Snow and Charming are reunited and at this point I could really care less. I found Rump and Belle's reunion far superior. He turned around from his counter and couldn't believe she was standing there. He had to touch her to make sure she was real and told her he would protect her. When she asked if she knew him, he said no, but she will. Then he took Belle out to the well. That's when Belle remembered who he was and told him she loved him and he told her he loved her back. Unfortunately, love wasn't all that Rump wanted. He wanted his power back. He poured the true love potion into the well and a purple smoke rose from it and spread throughout Storybrooke.

Regina, who was crying in The Brat's room, goes over to the window and sees what's coming and she smiles. Game on, bitches. Here's hope the first person Regina goes after is BF for disrespecting her.

In the town square, the clock stops at the exact time it started up with the arrival of Emma. Has Rump unleashed a new curse or was the curse never really broken? Emma's appearance in town got the time running, again. And her kissing The Brat awake made everyone's memory return. But none of them were transported back to Fairy Tale Land. They were still stuck in Storybrooke. Rump said the only way to end the curse was for Emma to die and maybe that's the truth.

Whatever the case it seems Storybrooke is a land without magic no longer. Rump has brought magic back to it. Of course, the question is is it because he misses the power it gave him or is he doing it for self-preservation now that everyone has their memory back. In Fairy Tale Land they'd had him imprisoned and if he has his magic back he can make sure that doesn't happen again.

Here's hoping that next season Jefferson, Belle and Ruby are made regulars. I definitely want to see more of their characters and a whole lot less of the not-so-charming Charmings.