Once Upon A Time

Out of all of the new shows I had decided to watch this year, it comes as so surprise that the one show I have kept up with the most is the show from the same producers as Lost – Once Upon A Time.   The show is about a boy, Henry, who believes that his town – Storybrooke, Maine – is really the Enchanted Forest and everyone has forgotten who they are. He came to that idea from a book he was given by his teacher, Mary Margaret who Henry believes is really Snow White.  He believes his adoptive mother, Regina, is really the Evil Queen, his therapist is Jiminy Cricket, the John Doe in the hospital is Prince Charming, and the one who can save everything is Emma, his birth mother who gave him up for adoption 10 years ago. And did I mention that Henry believes Emma to be the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming?  Henry also believes that the Evil Queen cast a curse on the whole Enchanted Forest which is why they can’t remember who they are.

Still with me? Good. Let’s move on.

Emma Swan (Jennifer Morrison, House) is caught up in the whirlwind of her son’s story and ends up staying in Storybrooke after witnessing Henry’s adoptive mother’s attitude and behavior around him. Her maternal instincts come through finally.  No one in Storybrooke knows who they are so of course, Emma and Henry are trying to help them remember.  Emma didn’t believe it at first but she is starting to come around especially with the recent events that have happened (I am not spoiling the fall/winter finale that just happened. You will have to watch it for yourself.)  Each episode takes us into a portion of one fairy tale character’s back story.  The Evil Queen, Snow White, Rumpelstiltskin, Jiminy Cricket, Cinderella, and The Huntsman have all been shown once.  Prince Charming has been shown twice and again I will not tell you why. It will ruin the story.  Just like Lost, Once Upon a Time in its use of flashbacks as little tiny droplets of information (not too much, and not too little)are just enough to keep your mind active for a week and wanting to watch the next episode. 

What makes this show great is that it isn’t predictable.  No one is safe and anything can happen. There are good moments where good does triumph over evil – this is a fairy tale story of course.  But as of right now, Evil is still getting the upper hand in the grand scheme of the curse. Regina seems like she is the only one that knows the truth, since she was in fact the one who cast the curse to bring everyone to Storybrooke.  It was her revenge against Snow White for ruining everything, which funny enough Snow White agrees that she did ruin the Queen’s life.  But now I am getting ahead of myself.  Even the traditional fairy tale stories we know and love, those are not predictable because one twist in the story changes the whole outcome. And for me, that is what is keeping me coming back every Sunday night; that little twist that changes each character’s story both in the Enchanted Forest and Storybrooke.

As you can tell, this show is wonderful. I was a little skeptical about it at the beginning – fairy tales have not done very well on screen in the past. Even though the viewers has been dropping over the past few weeks, this past Sunday’s episode I believe will leave the show on a high note until it comes back on January 8^th.  It is magical, suspenseful, mysterious and exciting. Everything a good mystery should be.  I can’t wait to see if Emma does fully accept the fact that her son is 100% right and everyone doesn’t remember who they really are. I can’t wait to see if Mary Margaret and John Doe can find each other and realize their love for each other despite the curse and Regina’s meddling. But the most interesting part that I can’t wait to see is, if everyone starts to believe and remember that they are a part of the Enchanted Forest, what happens to Henry? He isn’t in the book.  Ponder that until the next time.