CATCHING UP: Once Upon a Time – Season Four, Episode Two

We’ll be catching up with Once Upon a Time throughout the day.

–The Editor

First aired October 5, 2014.

Elsa (played by Georgina Haig) believes that her sister, Anna (played by Elizabeth Lail), is somewhere in Storybrooke and she wants answers. She conjures a giant ice wall around town and vows that nobody will leave until Anna is returned to her.

The ice wall causes a town-wide blackout, so Emma (played by Jennifer Morrison), Hook (played by Colin O’Donoghue) and David/Prince Charming (played by Josh Dallas) go to investigate. Emma checks out the wall and finds Elsa, but when the boys come to give her backup, Elsa panics and creates an ice cave that traps her and Emma. She then talks to Hook and David through the police radio and tells them to bring Anna to her or the entire town will be frozen. However, this is a warning, not a threat, because she doesn’t have control over her powers, which is fine for her but Emma is slowly freezing to death. Emma starts to succumb to hypothermia so Elsa tries to keep her awake and talking. The two bond over having magic they can’t control or understand. Elsa has only ever been able to exercise any control because of Anna’s influence and, without her, believes her powers will cause further damage.

I figured the show would portray Elsa as a tortured heroine since that was how she was played in the film version. Now that she has joined up with the main characters, there’s more room for her to grow, like with the bond between her and Emma over their struggles to use their magic. Although Elsa learned pretty quickly how to control her powers, so maybe she can give Emma a few pointers.

It’s funny that she erected the ice wall to keep people in town when they are already trapped because anyone who leaves loses their identities, unless the new curse changed that rule (I’m not too certain about that). I also like that moment where David gets protective over Emma asking about Hook’s intentions toward his daughter. There aren’t many moments showing Emma being parented (probably because they are all the same age).

Flashbacks show Anna’s arrival in Mist Haven/The Enchanted Forest where she goes to David’s farm (long before he became a prince). It turns out he knows Anna’s fiancé, Kristoff (played by Scott Foster), so she went to David for help. But he has problems of his own. His farm is being threatened by the evil warlord Bo Peep (played by Robin Weigert). Bo Peep carries a magical shepherd’s crook that lets her brand people and allows her to always find them wherever they hide. Anna encourages and trains David to fight but he doesn’t find the courage to until Anna is captured by Bo Peep. David defeats her and her guards and sends Anna on her journey where she goes to find the one man who knows more about magic than anyone, Rumplestiltskin (played by Robert Carlyle). In the present, David goes to a local butcher shop where Bo Peep works and takes the shepherd’s crook as a way to find Anna. He tells Elsa that Anna once helped him and he will find her and gives Elsa the encouragement to control her powers and release Emma. Unfortunately, she isn’t able to take down the ice wall because someone else is holding it up, a woman (played by Elizabeth Mitchell) working at the local ice cream parlor is revealed to have powers similar to Elsa in the last scene.

So Anna was on her way to see Rumple around the time she disappeared. I called it. That guy is always mixed up in everything that goes on in The Enchanted Forest, but the episode’s ending made it clear he didn’t hurt her. I know the show always twists around the plots of fairytales, but I would have never guessed Little Bo Peep would be a warlord. The twist that her flock was people she marked instead of sheep was a nice touch, although she did look funny trying to be menacing wearing that girly dress. I’m also curious about how big Storybrooke really is because it seems to grow to accommodate all of the new characters who show up each season. I can’t believe that Bo Peep or Elizabeth Mitchell’s characters have been operating their shops and nobody noticed them until now. But now we know who the villain for the first half of the season is. I’ve always liked Elizabeth Mitchell’s work ever since I saw her on Lost. That icy stare of hers really sells the idea that she’s evil. I can’t wait for the next episode when she goes from handing out ice cream cones to dishing out frozen vengeance.

Back in town, Mary Margaret/Snow White (played by Ginnifer Goodwin) is being pressured by the townspeople to fix the electricity. Because she cast the last curse that brought everyone back to Storybrooke, they consider her to be the new mayor and feel it’s her responsibility to fix the power. However, the pressures of being a new mother and everyone nagging her cause her to yell at them, telling them all to leave. Eventually, she realizes the machines just needed fuel and gets the power back on.

Meanwhile, Henry (played by Jared Gilmore) is upset that his mother, Regina (played by Lana Parilla), doesn’t want to see him. Everyone tells him that she’s just upset over losing Robin Hood (played by Sean Maguire), but Henry refuses to be shut out. He goes to Regina’s house and demands to be let back home and eventually they reconcile.

Mary Margaret’s whole storyline was really just a way to give her more screen time after she had a cameo in the premiere. I did like the way she lost her temper with everyone. She’s usually overly cheerful and optimistic so it was nice (and hilarious) to see her finally snap. The idea that everyone sees her as the mayor could be a potential storyline, maybe an election battle between her and Regina.

Speaking of Regina, I’m sure her reunion with Henry was a way of putting her mission to find the storybook’s author to give villains happy endings on hold while the Frozen plot develops more. That isn’t a bad idea, but I hope the show comes back to it. That would be a huge oversight to introduce a plot like that and then never bring it up again.

Quotes & Thoughts

“I am not magic. I have had eight hours of sleep in the last week. I am breastfeeding and I am exhausted! … I’m starting to get why Regina was evil. It wasn’t her, it was you! You have survived your entire lives without light bulbs. Buy a flashlight!”

Bo Peep was a warlord. You’d think she would travel with her own army and not just two henchmen.

“You did it. You fought and you won.” “Don’t be so surprised. It was your idea.”

Given the way most characters are related to each other most of the time, I’m betting Elizabeth Mitchell’s character is related to Elsa and Anna. She may even be their long-lost mother.

If you enjoyed Manny’s review, you can find the rest of his work right HERE on Sci-Fi Bloggers. You can also follow him on Twitter @KN_Manny.

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