Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who’s got the suckiest life of them all? It’s going to take a disaster to convince anyone in Storybrooke that the answer isn’t “Me, me, me.” Once upon a time season 4 episode 7 wrap up us each is entrenched in her own little world. They bump against one another in flares of conflict and then retreat to brood over their peerless misery. Add in the inevitable tragic back story of our most recent Big Bad, and the viewer is left exhausted.
Emma is upset about her parents giving so much attention to their newborn son when she was “abandoned” as a child. Didn’t we already resolve the abandonment issues like three years ago? Well never mind that, because the important part is that Emma is upset and she is losing control of her powers. She presumes that her family thinks she’s a monster because Snow looks sort of freaked out when she explodes a building. Then she runs off to panic about it all by herself, because that’s always a good idea.
Robin Hood has decided he’s done with the almost-dead Marian and he’s going back to Regina. Unfortunately, Regina has now taken on a noble role and tells him no. But then he starts kissing her and she just goes with it, possibly hoping he’ll get it out of his system and get his wishy-washy cheating ass out of there.
Elsa’s lines continue to be variations on “Where’s Anna?” and “Oh no my powers!”
Rumple appears to have completely regressed into villainy because of dead Neal. He is now planning to take over the world. Finally having a wife and a family and a positive role in his community just isn’t doing it for him.
Is anyone else feeling the urge to smack these people? Please tell me, because this episode is so packed with rampaging emotions I can’t even tell how to feel anymore.
On the bright side, Charming gets clocked by a lamppost but takes it like a champ. Good job Charming.
In flashbacks, the Snow Queen is a young girl named Ingrid who discovers her destructive powers and secludes herself for fear that people will hate her or she will hurt someone. Luckily she has two supportive younger sisters, Helga and Gerda. But Ingrid is the pessimistic sort and fends off their assurances, insisting that her powers are going to be a source of disaster if she doesn’t keep them under wraps. With that attitude, it’s no wonder her claims become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Ingrid trades her and her sisters’ ribbons symbols of their solidarity with Rumple for gloves to control her powers and an urn that can be used to trap her if it ever becomes necessary. Later, when the Duke of Weselton makes unwanted advances on her, she shoots ice at him but accidentally hits her sister Helga. Helga freezes and crumbles into ice cubes. When Gerda learns what Ingrid has done, Ingrid pleads for understanding, but Gerda traps her in the urn.
The relationship between the sisters is nice, if a little saccharine. The part where Helga takes Ingrid’s side rather than her suitor the Duke’s is especially great. But the majority of this plotline involves Ingrid’s unfounded worrying, up until her worst fears come true suddenly and spectacularly. We’ve got inseparable sisters; then one sister accidentally kills another; then the third turns on the first. It’s high drama du jour, spoon-fed right to us.
