Once Upon A Time
Once Upon A Time isn’t a crime procedural, I’ll give it that. (Looking at you, Grimm.) It has some ambition, apparently, coming from two Lost writers. (Best episode they wrote? I think it’s “The Variable,” although “Greatest Hits” is close.) And, yes, the fairytale premise is interesting if it’s not looked at too terribly closely. But the acting, writing, and editing are all so weak, I find it difficult to believe Once Upon A Time will grow into anything other than another show lingering in DVR hell due to an already busy Sunday night.
The aforementioned producers have said the show won’t focus on a huge mythology, so tonight’s constant exposition dumps won’t be normal. This is a good thing - the premise is confusing once you think about it. (Did our world exist, or did the Evil Queen create it? Did she just plop them into our world? What’s with the weird aging - in other words, how long have they been here? 28 years?) And these aren’t the type of what-is-the-island questions that should be answered over six seasons - I’m willing to drop them if the show moves on, which I think it will.
What this means is it’s tough to see what this show will be next week or next season. If Emma can convince everyone they’re in a fairytale, then the show is putting itself on a clock. If she can’t, watching every week will just be aggravating, since it stagnates character growth (and there’s no mythology to be distracted by). Of course, this is assuming the problems in the pilot will continue to be the main issue, but I’m not sure where else the show can go.
None of this would be much to fret over if the show’s base was stronger. The writing focuses on exposition and characters repeating that exposition, the actors don’t try to give the poor lines much life, and the cinematography and editing has a weird, almost ethereal quality about them that I didn’t care for. If those first two were stronger, I’d be confident everything else would fall into place. Maybe the writing will be better without establishing the premise every episode. Maybe the actors will do better with better material. But I found almost every actor downright wooden in the pilot, to the point of being boring. As usual, that’s my main criticism - I get very little sense of fun here. Everything’s too boring for a story about fairytales coming to life.
The pilot focuses on Emma, who’s quite obviously unfulfilled. A boy, Henry, appears on her doorstep - he’s her son she put up for adoption. She takes him back to his town - Storybrooke (I like how aware Emma is - very Lostian (“Christian Shephard? Seriously?”)) - and everyone there is trapped, unaware, due to a spell from the Evil Queen. We learn this through both Henry, who seemingly knows everything, and the flashbacks, which are something the show needs to figure out.
The structure of a drama series is one of the most important things to set straight from the pilot, even though it usually takes time to figure out how to best utilize this structure. Right now, there’s little life in either timeline, but once we’ve figured out which one is Snow White in the modern one (she’s the teacher who volunteers at a hospital!), there must be a new reason for the flashbacks. And I’d imagine it’ll be a Lost-like character study each episode. This dictates expanding the world of Storybrooke a whole lot, which would be a very good thing, and a fresh analysis of some of the world’s oldest stories. (Which will probably be hit-or-miss.) When I say I don’t know how future episodes will look, it’s mainly due to this uncertainty. Will the flashbacks seem like a waste of time, or will they deepen the characters? A lot of the fun of Lost flashbacks were connecting the dots, and figuring out the mythology. With a lessened backstory, the characters have to be a whole lot stronger than they were in the pilot.
That’s another issue - how do you make Prince Charming an actual character? (Judging by the pilot, make him stupid and a doormat.) Since everyone knows these stories, we already have the archetypes in our minds. Seeing Snow White pregnant doesn’t drastically alter the image I have in my head of her.
The way you do this is by good writing and acting, and Once Upon A Time has neither right now. The one sense of life I got in the pilot was right at the end, where Emma finally understands why Henry kept calling the Evil Queen evil. It’s a strong character moment, and while it’s not groundbreaking television, it absolutely works. (Screw Prince Charming - how do you keep the Evil Queen from not being a one-note character?) Unfortunately, moments like this are sparse throughout the pilot. Still, Once Upon A Time has the potential to add a few more per episode over this season. It’s tough to envision a show like this lasting multiple seasons without growing tiresome - but then again, so did Lost.
