Episode Report Card Cindy McLennan: B+ | 116 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT PANdora's Box
By Cindy McLennan | Season 3 | Episode 10 | Aired on 12.08.2013
This isn't the first time that Once Upon A Time has squandered emotional resonance. The sad thing is, on this show, there is so much potential for emotional pay-off, that it is low-hanging fruit, ripe, delicious, and left uneaten in favor of fast food. Far too often, that fruit falls to the ground, only to be crushed by the plodding hoofs of plot. Often, the audience is supposed to accept that these moments happen off screen. This audience member is tired of accepting that. Where Ariel is concerned, however, it didn't even happen off screen. Ariel and Eric have no more of a relationship than you have with that hot person you got to dance with at that nightclub, that one time.
That vented, let's move on. Watching Ariel and Eric kiss moves Belle to tears. Of course, since Belle's own twu wuv is an exercise in Stockholm Syndrome, I don't know what I'm expecting. Thank goodness the focus changes. Look, up in the sky. It's a bird. It's a plane. It's a flying pirate ship. We're finally off Neverland, folks. Hurrah! Belle whispers, "He's back." The title card features Medusa, because why not.
Sidebar: Some audience members take issue with the fact that the magically protected Storybrooke is accessible to those aboard the Jolly Roger. I do not. Gold crafted the protection spell. While he assumed he'd have to die on Neverland, they set out for Neverland in order to bring Henry back to Storybrooke. I imagine the protection spell was only to keep outsiders from finding Storybrooke. This isn't something I need explained on screen.
By the time the Jolly Roger docks, the townsfolk have gathered to greet the less than conquering heroes. There are loving slow-mo shots of each person leaving the ship, which put me in mind of the passengers of Oceanic 815 disembarking in the Sideways reality, on Lost. The problem is, that scene, even though it wasn't real, meant something, because it was rewarding to have that what-if moment, with all the people (some, by then, dead) who suffered so on Craphole Island. It made me want to hug them all, maybe even Frogurt.
On Once Upon A Time, as Operation Cobra Rescue, etc. leave the Jolly Roger, I want to scold Emma, Regina, and Gold (at least), for not realizing that the boy who looks like Henry is actually Panry (i.e. Pan in Henry's body). I can't get into all the reunion embraces between the returnees and townsfolk like Belle, Granny, Grumpy, etc., because they're all being fooled. It figures that when Once Upon A Time finally delivers some heartfelt payoff, that is payoff is every bit as false as Tamara's "love" for Neal. Sigh.