Episode Report Card Cindy McLennan: A- | 283 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT Happy Birthday
By Cindy McLennan | Season 2 | Episode 15 | Aired on 2013.03.03
The Fairest of Them All looks out the broken window to see Johanna lying dead on the sidewalk, below. Wracked with pain, Snow's sobs are silent. When Charming takes her in his arms and pulls her back, Snow doubles over. Holding her tight, he looks at the Evil Regals. Before they disappear in twin puffs of purple smoke, Regina smiles. "Well, there you go. You see where good gets you?" Commercial.
Sidebar. There's been a lot of talk about how Snow shouldn't have handed over the dagger. I say nonsense. She had no choice, because she is a fairy tale hero. I mentioned in the show thread, that as far as Snow knows, Johanna is nothing to Cora -- just a pawn. Except for the fact that Cora gets off on evil, Snow has no reason to suspect that Johanna was a goner, either way, because Snow has no clue about Cora's goal: to turn Snow's heart black as coal. Besides, with Rumpy out of the reach of magic, the dagger isn't currently of any use to Snow, so it's perfectly sensible for Snow to hand over the dagger and try to save the one person she thinks can.
Sidebar Part II. Cora has already exhibited so much power in Storybrooke (including poofing herself and others into and out of places, making whole ships invisible, magicking the gun out of David's hand and appearing as other people) that she doesn't need the dagger to beat Snow in this situation, nor does she need it to terrorize the townies or kill them off. Snow knows that in refusing to give Cora the dagger, she would be signing Johanna's death warrant. But don't let your mind stop there, because I'm sure Snow doesn't. Let's say she keeps the dagger and lets Cora kill Johanna. Who is next? Who else would Cora poof up into that tower to use as leverage -- Ruby, Granny, the Dwarfs? She could and would spare no one in her quest. Cora is bound to win this round, no matter what Snow does, so Snow chooses rightly. Besides which, as I also said in the forum, fairy tales are no bastion Utilitarian thought. And honestly, the moment this show goes that way for real, I'm pretty sure I'll fall out of love with it.