Season 1 of the new family fantasy series Once Upon a Time written by LOST writers Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz was somewhat promising. Starring Jennifer Morris and Ginnifer Goodwin, the show had family appeal, charm, and enough intrigue to keep you watching. Plus the occasional reference to LOST sent my fanatic heart a flutter. It combined all the classic storybook children’s characters into one giant bedtime conglomeration and sent them to our magic-less world. Since ABC is owned by Disney, there was free reign to use the likenesses of characters like Belle and Maleficent...and I’ll admit it was cute, at first.
Though the show features some semi big names in Morris and Goodwin, the best actor by far is Robert Carlyle--a theatre trained actor (another formulaic takeaway from LOST’s Terry O’Quinn and Michael Emerson) who is INCREDIBLE as Mr. Gold...but just plain weird as Rumplestiltskin with his little high pitched laugh and nasty teeth.
The second season leaves the characters still stuck in Storybrook but now they all remember who they are. Snow and Emma have been thrown BACK to the land of magic, which has had it’s own troubles while everyone else was caught in a time-warp curse daze cast by the Evil Queen Regina. They’ve started introducing more obscure Disney character’s...and while I’m liking the saucy Capt. Hook that looks a little more Jack-Sparrow than Dustin Hoffman with the guy-liner, I draw the line at Mulan (who apparently does not reside in Sui Dynasty China, but has been fighting alongside and simultaneously fallen in love with Sleeping Beauty’s Prince Phillip). The storyline of storytime has grown convoluted and confusing.
I feel like Disney is hosting a high school reunion and everyone is invited, including kids from other schools they never hung out with, and messing up the order of things. And it looks like it’s not stopping there: In a recent episode entitled “The Doctor” --who ended up being Dr. Frankenstein--but who I originally thought was The Wizard of Oz since they referenced him several times as a “Wizard of Sorts” from a different land and his costume looked like it walked straight off the set of Wicked. Understandably this was probably the episode that aired around Halloween, but I’m having enough trouble keeping classic story tales AND Disney story-lines straight, I don’t need Boris Karloff and Gene Roddenberry showing up in my dreams. Which reminds me, they have yet to introduce Willy Wonka--who probably has a tiff with Jack the Pumpkin King for sleeping with Pocahontas.
Peace out ABC, I’m done.
Megan Geilman has had an on-again-off-again relationship with television since she was young and her parents occasionally let her stay up to watch Star Trek and X-Files. She recently relocated to beautiful San Clemente, CA with her husband, unborn child, and design business. She lives a half mile from the beach and plans on eating a lot of avocados. She occasionally blogs at http://ratedgforgeilman.blogspot.com andhttp://megangeilmandesign.blogspot.com
I think my initial issue with this show was the intro, "EVERY storybook character you've EVER known." Really? I've read a lot of books, and honestly, that sounds like a really awful idea. Guess that proved true.
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