Monday, April 7, 2014

Once Upon a Time 3.16: "It's Not Easy Being Green"

“Be careful. It is one thing to wonder about your past but another to become envious of the things you cannot have.”
- The Wizard

If you couldn’t tell from the title of this week’s episode, we finally get some backstory on Zelena. We find a couple walking towards Oz when a tornado hits and a baby in a basket falls at their feet. The babe produces some pretty powerful magic which freaks the man out but his wife brushes it off as nerves. Years later, we see Zelena shaving her father (like she told Rumple about a few weeks back) and she accidentally conjures a cloth when she nicks him with the blade. He tells her the truth that he’s not her real father. Hurt, she goes off to find the Wizard to see if he can help her find a family who wants her. The Wizard tells her about Cora and Regina and Rumple. Zelena goes from excited about learning about her family to jealous and furious that Regina got everything she never had. So the Wizard gifts her with magic slippers (not ruby ones in case you were wondering) and she goes to the Enchanted Forest where Rumple sees her do some magic. He tests her abilities a bit by making her find him blind folded using her magic and he’s quite impressed. He may have found a better witch to cast his curse.

Back in Storybrooke we have a very somber funeral for Neal. I’ll be honest, I got teary eyed but I didn’t cry as much as I was expecting. Various members of the extended Mills/Charming family (along with Hook and Belle) shovel a bit of dirt into the grave. At the wake Hook finds Emma through darts with extreme accuracy. She’s livid with Zelena and Hook suggests she dull the pain with some rum since vengeance isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. He offers to take charge of Henry for a bit to bond and see if telling him about Neal as a boy helps him come to terms with his dad’s passing. And it might just help our mouthy pirate mourn, too. Regina and Tink chat over Robin Hood and Tink gets miffed when it appears Regina is throwing away her second chance with her gorgeous and sweet soul mate. No sooner have Hook and Henry left but Zelena busts in and promptly drops the “Regina is my baby sister” bombshell. She suggest Regina find something to verify her words because they’re going to have a showdown and the whole town’s invited.

Hook takes Henry to his boat (Henry remarks that all of Emma’s friends seem to have boats) and he explains that he and Neal were friends way back in the day and he’ll tell him all about it. They spend the day hanging out on the Jolly Roger, tying knots and stuff and when it finally gets dark, Hook brings out his sextant, intent on teaching Henry how to navigate by the stars. Henry isn’t interested though. He wants the pirate to cut the crap because the more people say about Neal, the less he believes it. So Hook has a very honest moment with Henry where he explains that he met Neal right after he’d lost his father and that seems to get through to Henry.

Elsewhere in town, after the Charmings and Tink start badgering Regina about whether Zelena’s bombshell could be true, she takes off and finds a letter that gets her really upset. So she ends up in the woods. And who should happen upon her but one Robin Hood. She allows him to read the letter (once he’s nicked it from her pocket)and she explains that for years she thought the letter from Rumple to Cora complimenting Cora’s first born was about her. Now she knows it’s about Zelena and if Rumple thinks Zelena is so powerful, then Regina is screwed. Speaking of Rumple, Belle thinks she might be able to get through to him sans dagger and take him out of the equation for the big showdown. But Zelena is one step ahead of them and strings Belle along for a few minutes. Luckily no one gets hurt (at least not physically) and Rumple delivers a warning that if they try to interfere again, Rumple will kill them all.

That night, Regina and Zelena get into it. Regina calls out her big sister on her jealousy. And as they duke it out in the streets of Storybrooke, we see that in the Enchanted Forest, Zelena’s jealousy is literally turning her green. She even goes as far as trying to kill Regina. It turns out Rumple was testing her and he proclaims that since the thing she loves most is him, she’s too dangerous to enact his curse. Pissed off, she clicks her heels back to Oz and demands help from the Wizard. She wants to go back and change the past. Now I’m hoping for a little continuity here. I mean we saw the lengths Jafar went to in order to change the past on “Wonderland”. I hope it’s not so simple for her to change it now. But she debunks the Wizard as a hokey fraud named Walsh (so that’s where Emma’s would-be fiancé came from). She’s got no use for him in his human form and so the flying monkey was born. Oh, and she goes completely green. Guess envy really can do that do a girl. Who knew?

Back in Storybrooke, we see that Zelena was after Regina’s heart but the Queen doesn’t have her ticker in her chest. She’s left it under guard by Robin Hood in the woods. And as she mulls over Zelena’s words (and probably Tink’s as well), she entrust her heart a little longer in Robin’s care. I have to say these two have amazing chemistry. I know they’re dancing around things right now but even that is tantalizing. Regina deserves some happiness after all the progress she’s made. As things die down, Hook brings Henry home and Emma thinks him. He points out that there is more of Neal in Henry than Emma realizes and again implores her to tell Henry the truth (aka get his memories back). She just says goodnight and he forlornly leaves. And down in the cellar, Zelena gloats that once she has her sister’s heart, she’s going to go back and chance things so that Regina is never born and Zelena is the one who gets everything she ever wanted. Can we please just get a Charming/Mills united front ass kicking and just kill her off already? I mean, I’m really liking the Wicked arc for the most part (I do think Neverland went on a bit too long) but come on. She’s so annoying! Next week, we get to find out what happened to Hook during everyone’s missing year and if the preview is anything to go by it involved a lot of women.

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