Once Upon A Time: Heart of Darkness

I love this show. Have I mentioned that before? I FREAKIN' LOVE THIS SHOW!
Seriously, this show could not be any better. Perfect writers, perfect cast, perfect directors, perfect acting...If this show was a person, I would marry it!

Okay, lets begin!


In Storybrooke, poor Mary Margaret is sitting in jail.
Regina and Emma question her about the heart. It's revealed that the box the heart was in is Mary's jewelery box! That's not at all good.
In a very cryptic statement, Regina reveals to Mary that she knows what it's like to lose someone you love and be publicly humiliated. She says it 'put me in a very dark place. It changed me'. This is obviously a reference to whatever it was Snow did to her in Fairytale Land! She also says to Emma that having your heart broken can 'make you do unspeakable things.' This makes me believe we're getting closer to the reveal, folks! I'm thinking the next Regina/Evil Queen episode will explain all! (Which I believe is episode 18, but don't quote me on that)

Emma returns to Mary's apartment where she's looking for signs of a break-in. Henry shows up and they find a hunting knife hidden in a heating grate. Coincidentally, it was a hunting knife that carved the heart out of the chest of whoever it was in before it was put in the box.
This is DEFINITELY not looking good for Mary.

Henry runs into August at the diner. And in a big reveal, August tells Henry he believes the book is real! And after tonight, I'm ready to reveal something myself! Keep reading...My thoughts are posted below, as always!

David goes to see Regina, and in another bit of foreshadowing, Regina tells him, "Evil isn't born. It's made." Again the writers are throwing us little tidbits of Regina's episode to come! Exciting!

Back at the jail, Emma tells Mary that she believes her but she should think about hiring a lawyer.
Who walks in at that perfect moment? Why, Mr. Gold, of course!
Apparently he's a lawyer, too! How convenient!
Snow accepts his services but tells Gold she can't pay him. Gold explains that he'll defend her for free because, "I'm invested in your future."

David goes to see Archie (Yay! I missed Archie!) to see if he can help remember what happened during the blackouts.

Henry shows up at Mary's apartment and shows Emma a ring of keys he stole from Regina. Emma tries a key and it fits, opening the door. And now Emma agrees...Regina MUST be the one framing Mary!

Archie puts David under hypnosis and we actually SEE flashes of David remembering when he was Charming!! That was AMAZING!
Archie wakes him up quickly because he was too far under and David runs off.
He goes to see Mary at the jail and tells her what he remembered.
....Which wasn't a good thing. At all.
He remembers being in the woods with her and saying, "Don't kill her."...So of course, he thinks he was talking about Kathryn. David has lost faith in Mary and Mary is devastated.


Mary decides making her bed might be a good idea....even in jail she's neat and tidy...and while she's doing that she finds a key. The key just happens to open her cell door.
Emma walks in and Mary hides the key from her. Emma tells her that the results are back and the heart does indeed belong to Kathryn. Oh, no!
Emma tells Mary that she knows Regina is the one framing her but she has no proof. She tells Mary to have faith in her and she'll find a way to prove that Regina is behind everything.

Emma then goes to see Mr. Gold and tells him her thoughts about Regina. She asks him for help and he agrees, telling her, "Regina is powerful but something tells me...you're more powerful than you know."
AGAIN with the vague references! I love this show! ;)

And in the last scene we see Mary's cell door wide open...with Mary nowhere to be seen.
Dun dun DUN!


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Over in Fairytale Land, we start with Red and Charming taking on some of the Evil Queen's men. Red, in an awesome moment, tells Charming to find Snow and she gives him a head start...and give a quick glance to the full moon. GO RED!

Flash to Snow, who's actually humming one of Snow White's Disney songs! Nice touch!
Er...but this isn't the Snow we've come to know and love! Apparently old Rumpy's little potion has changed Snow into a not-so-nice person! Even Happy isn't at all happy with her!
The dwarfs decide to have an intervention... and call in dear Jiminy to help! Aw, I love Jiminy!
Of course, the intervention doesn't work and Snow decides she needs to kill the Evil Queen.

Grumpy follows Snow into the forest and convinces her to go to Rumple.
Rumple explains that Snow has changed because she has a hole in heart where love used to be....and there's no cure for her. There's no potion that can bring back true love. Love can't be bottled.
Snow then asks Rumple for help killing the Queen. He gives her a bow and a map of the route to the Queen's summer house.
Rumple giggles like a maniac...which will always make me giggle along with him. I've said it a billion times, and I'll say it a billion more...Robert Carlysle is AMAZING in this role!!! I just adore Rumple!

Snow asks Rumple what he wants for payment. Last time she took a strand of her hair. This time Rumple says he wants nothing because, "I'm invested in your future." Deja vu!

Charming tracks Snow to Rumple's, but arrives after she's left. Rumple tells him that true love's kiss will break the spell on Snow. Then, in exchange for Charming's cloak, Rumple tells him that Snow is on her way to the Queen's Highway and gives him the same map he gave Snow.
Rumple tells him to hurry because if Snow kills the Queen, she'll become as evil as the Queen herself. Charming says Snow could never become that evil and Rumple replies, 'Evil isn't born, dearie. It's made.'
Again with the deja vu!


Next we see Snow in the forest, preparing to kill the Queen. Charming comes up from behind and plants a kiss on her...but it doesn't break the spell. Snow bashes Charming in the head and knocks him out cold.
He comes to...tied to a tree. Charming tries to convince her that they're in love, but she leaves him there and goes to wait for the Queen to arrive, ripe for killing.

Jiminy finds Charming and gnaws him free. Jiminy tells him that Snow can't remember him because she can't remember HERSELF. I love Jiminy.

Snow spies the Queen and as she shoots, Charming jumps in the way and takes the arrow to the shoulder.

She realizes that he took the arrow to save her from a life of darkness. She kisses him and.......SHE REMEMBERS! AND I CRY! ;)
The Queen's soldiers find them and take Charming away in a cage. "I will find you! I will always find you..."
Man, they just can't get a break!

In an absolutely beautiful scene, Snow goes back to the cabin and apologizes to the dwarfs. Again, Lee Arenberg is at his best when Grumpy stands with a look of pure adoration on his face and simply says, "It's you." Yes, that got me bawling again.
The seven crowd around Snow and welcome her back, but she can't stay. She has to rescue Charming.
And in another frickin' AWESOME scene, Grumpy tells her she can't do it alone....and luckily she doesn't have to! "Let's show that king what Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs can REALLY do!" YEAH! I can't wait to see some dwarfs kick-butt!

And in the last scene, we see my darling Rumple searching David's cloak for the exact thing I KNEW he wanted it for.
One single hair.
He drops it into the beaker with Snow's hair and, voila! He's bottled love!
Whoa!

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Yet again, another BRILLIANT episode! Wonderfully strong performances by all, especially Team 7 and Robert Carlyle!
I loved the similarities...Rumple and Regina both saying, "Evil isn't born. It's made." and then both Rumple and Gold saying to Snow and Mary, "I'm invested in your future."
I also loved the opposites in the timelines. Charming having complete faith that Snow would never do anything evil, but David losing that same faith in Mary.

We also learn that very deep hypnosis can bring memories of Fairytale Land out. Very interesting!

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Now, as mentioned above, here's my reveal:
I believe August is Rumple's son, Baelfire, all grown up.

I don't know how he's grown or how he left Fairytale Land or how he found Storybrooke, but my money is on Baelfire, especially after the line, "As real as I am". That leads me to believe that he knows the stories are real because he was IN the stories.

Why Baelfire? Well, he kind of looks like the child we saw, for one.
Secondly, I think whoever he is has to be someone close to Rumple...perhaps with a little grudge against him, which his son would certainly have, but also would want to help him and make him 'normal' again.
Third, who would have grown up on that book? We've seen Gold's shop. Did the book originate there? If so, did Bael read it as a child? Did he even possibly have a hand in writing it? Who would know all those stories? Rumple. Would he tell them to his son as bedtime stories, perhaps?

Of course, I'm probably way off...but you asked! ;)



And now, what questions do we have after this episode?(So, so many!)
-Who is August?
-What does August have to do with Emma?
-How does August know Emma?
-How will August make Emma believe?
-How did August know Emma was in Storybrooke? (Assuming that's what brought him there)
-What did Regina do to Kathryn?
-Who put the key in Mary's cell?
-What does Gold/Rumple mean by, "I'm invested in your future"?
-What will Rumple do with the bottle of love?
-Where's Mary?
-How will Team 7 and Snow get Charming out of jail?

Highlights: 
-Red's scene at the very beginning. I LOVED that they tied the last episode with this one like that!
-Jiminy!
-David remembering Fairytale Land!
-Rumple. Every single scene with Rumple.
-The last scene with Snow and the dwarfs. That was so perfect!
-Grumpy's face when he realized Snow was herself again.

And now I'm going to do something a bit different!
Here's the promo for next week's episode, 'Hat Trick'!

Alice in Wonderland? The Mad Hatter?! Oh THIS is going to ROCK!

See you back here next week, Oncers!