#ABOUT ;; Baelfire

[apollostrials]

no offense but where’s the scene where regina and neal sit down together to speak about rumplestiltskin and how everything he did to regina—the training, the trauma, and the manipulation and psychological abuse in order to mold her into someone who could serve his purposes—was to go to the land without magic to get baelfire.

where is the scene where the two of them have some trauma dump bonding caused by the same person, the same person who ruined their lives? where is the scene where they speak about henry?

[rumbelle-scream]

imagine swanfire was our endgame and we arrived at gideon's plotline where he's supposed to kill emma, his sister-in-law. 🤣

[sassyandclassy94]

My favorite commissions over the years❤️

[mockiery]

it makes me crazy that like. In 2x06 Tallahassee when they were paralleling Hook and Neal with Emma's distrust, did that have planned that Killian was Neal/Baelfire's guardian and Bae was Killian's (unknowing) kinda stepson for a while? How much did they know about how Killian would've influenced the man Neal became yk? bc if I think about their narrative effects on each other especially in reference to Emma for 2 seconds I go down a spiral

Like I read on the wiki that Colin had been signed on for 5 episodes that could potentially turn into the full season, and Tallahassee is in those 5 but 2x22 And Straight On Til Morning definitely doesn't. was it in the ideas but hadn't been nailed down or did they come up with it later or was it the whole plan bc y'allllllll.

In the Enchanted Forest climbing the beanstalk to steal the golden compass, Emma's distrust of Hook is directly informed by her history with Neal/Baelfire as partners in crime that ended with Neal's betrayal.

Baelfire was on the Jolly Roger for an unspecified amount of time, under Hook's protection, and Killian took a liking to him enough to risk the wrath of Pan by hiding him. He taught him how to sail. He saw Milah and himself in Bae, he wanted to give Bae a home, a family.

Neal is shown on multiple occasions as being incredibly tactful, an effective and creative problem solver with street smarts for days. He doesn't like magic but he can play the game of it without having any. He's a survivor and self-preserver as much as Killian is, and is honestly better at it than Killian for the most part.

Bae lived in Neverland for as long as Killian did or longer, and he did it alone for most of that time, resisting being made a lost boy (at least not indefinitely, theres a lot that we don't know about Neverland character history). You could say he got a lot of his smarts from Rumple if u'd like, but Rumple protected and shielded him from the world, he didn't learn much that helped him survive from his father besides arguing and making deals.

So Bae learned his defining strengths on the fly trying to survive in Neverland and in the real world, and I think Killian would've taught him a lot too, a lot of the foundational stuff. Look at the way Killian enjoys looking after Henry in s3b onward, teaching him sailing, teaching him sword-fighting, busting out weighted die and teaching Henry that it's only cheating if you get caught. Killian sees Bae in Henry and says as much, and he's literally teaching Henry the same thing that he taught Bae with the sailing, and probably everything else. Bae learned thieving in London in the past before he met the Darlings, but u can't tell me he didn't learn plenty of pirate and thieving skills and ideas from Killian.

Emma's distrust of Hook is based in Neal's betrayal. But Neal's strengths and his approach to survival that drove him and Emma into the stolen watch situation in the first place were directly influenced by Killian. When August goes to Neal and tells him who Emma is, what her destiny is, Neal doesn't want to abandon her with nothing to show for it, but he does anyone thanks to August keeping the money. He doesn't know about Emma's pregnancy, he doesn't know that August is not going to be there for her like he asked him to. It's a selfish decision for him to screw her over without saying a word to her, but he's trying to believe August will have her back if he can't. And he wants out of this life of thievery, he'd talked about settling down with her. He wants a simple life, one that isn't on the run from the law or from magic, and he, now knowing Emma's identity and destiny, wants to get away bc now he knows he couldn't have that simple life with her, that her fate cannot be changed.

And August scratches at his insecurity of what life he's living now, that he's bad for Emma. So far he's been an improvement, but now she has family and people that are waiting on her and need her. In his weakness, in his fear, he thinks that he and that Emma aren't going to be able to change from these paths. A doubt that he learned from his father's betrayal and refusal to change for him, and one that he projected onto Killian after learning of his history with Milah and vengeance quest against Rumple.

Baelfire rejects Killian's plea that he stay, that Killian says he can change for Bae, but Baelfire doesn't believe it. He believes Killian only cares for himself and those kinds of people can't change, bc of his father. And Neal misses that he did the same when he betrayed Emma, that it was selfish of him to want to step away without facing her, without checking for himself, without trying harder, all because of her ties to the magical realm he wants nothing to do with.

With Bae's rejection, Killian does a very similar thing. I think he justifies handing Bae over to Pan bc Pan would find Bae anyway, its inevitable and Bae will never forgive him, so Killian might as well get something out of it. Bae doesn't trust him or want to stay with him anyway, might as well burn the bridge that Bae has torn down. With Pan pleased, he can kill Rumplestiltskin better than if Pan isn't happy, and maybe that'll be enough to do well by Bae and Milah, to kill the bastard who crushed Milah's heart for abandoning their son and then promptly abandoned his son anyway.

Neal justifies his betrayal by the fact that it'll be better for Emma in the long run, better for whatever curse bullshit she's destined to fix, and maybe he can see her again once all the magic bullshit he doesn't want anything to do with is done.

So when Emma sees Neal in Killian, she's seeing what Killian helped put there with what he did right and how he failed Bae, the survival instinct and destructive burning of bridges when things turn sideways. In 2x05 Hook flips to help Emma, Snow, and company to get the compass instead of Cora. So at the top of the beanstalk, she knows he'll betray if he sees a better option that suits him, and that's exactly what she thinks Neal did.

Anyway. I just wish the show didn't get weird love-triangle-y with Hook and Neal in s3, these two have way more baggage with each other than just them both crushing on Emma, like. Killian had an immense impact of who Neal became, and I neeeeeeeeded more about that dear god

[stars-and-galaxys]

PERHAPS FATE BROUGHT US TOGETHER

3x15//2x22//Mirror Traps - Hera Lindsay Bird//2x22//Uneven Odds - Sleeping at Last//Isle of the Dogs - Wes Anderson//2x14//5x11//2x22//Bring Him Home - Les Miserables//3x15

[captainshadowgirllostfan]

Do you guys think there was an agenda behind the Blue Fairy helping Baelfire with trying to get rid of the Dark magic of the curse of the Dark One on Rumplestiltskin?

Especially with the way she asked Baelfire if he could, do it? Like she really wanted him to do it.

Pretty ambitious of her to think it could happen. The question isn't if Baelfire is able, in the end of the day, it's Rumplestiltskin's choice and he may love Bae but that doesn't always mean that love will be able to get him to do what deep down he doesn't want too.

But then love is supposed to be about sacrifice.

So idk. Idk what to think of the Blue Fairy. Especially when we saw her in the last episode ruining Nova and Grumpy's happy ending and putting fairies and dwarves into boxes. Neither can love. Both are destined for work and duty.

Why aren't they allowed to love and yet others could? Who is the Blue Fairy to dictate those rules and who created those rules in the first place?

[daisdu]

I actually so so love the trope where a character is so in love with a woman who they cannot be with that they feel a parental connection to her child by someone else, oftentimes a child they’ve never even met

I find it delightful both when the man is generally allied with the child like Hook and Baelfire in OUAT, but also when that relationship inexplicably makes them enemies, like Vlad and Danny in Danny Phantom

I just finished Nona the Ninth and people might disagree with me on this one, but I was getting a little bit of it from Pyrrha about Gideon

[reolf]

Just casually thinking of some of my favourite characters losing their children.

Rumplestilskin and Baelfire/ Neal

Rhaenyra and Lucerys

Neteyam and Neytiri and Jake

( not to mention the parallels between Neteyam’s death and Lucerys’ brother Jacaerys. Both dying at sea protecting their siblings.)

I am not okay.

[ichigotheringbearer]

The great thing about being a fanfiction writer is that you can spend a horrifying amount of time on, say, the Once Upon a Time wiki, and say it's for research and have that somewhat be the truth.

[depressedstressedlemonzest]

Belle finds a scroll that maps out a meteor shower that she wants to see. She asks Rumplestiltskin to join her, but he dismisses her, and the idea. It's not until Jefferson tells Rumple that Belle was asking him out that Rumple entertains the thought of watching the meteor shower with her.

[enchantedxhearts]

Happy boop day, everyone 🥲

[sassyandclassy94]

Mist Haven!Emma headcanon

Emma, unbeknownst to her mother, knows the words to too many bawdy tavern songs and, when under the guise of a peasant woman, joins along when they’re being sung and of course, Baelfire finds it both funny, and endearing

Her parents however, would die if they knew the shenanigans their daughter is up to when not performing her royal duties.

[doerot]

I'm actually so happy they took once upon a time off of netfix bc I was about to give in and rewatch it and I do not need that rn

[detective-prince-bluebottle]

my mum called henry emma swan's son with baelfire and i have never felt such rage

[captainshadowgirllostfan]

"You-You really don't believe" -Henry to Emma when she says goodbye

I have to say, this here, Emma's refusal to believe or not wanting to believe. How she begs Henry to be here in reality. That's something to explore there. Especially since as much as she finds Henry's imagination and belief in magic charming, she and everyone whose cursed finds it disturbing.

I do kind of feel like, or at least it's how I felt when I first started watching the show. I genuinely am truly unsure what the writers meant to do with the Storybrooke curse, but for me, it felt like the curse was a commentary from the writers criticizing the mundaness of normal everyday life and how while fairy tales focus on the concept of happiness and pursueing happiness, our idea of life is not fixated on that. Not anymore. This is why our world is the World Without Magic. Because all there is, is just nothing. Life is just surviving until death and no matter what happens, pursueing something that might give us the possibility of happiness, that highpoint, is not worth it if it inconveniences someone else or cause trouble like with Mary Margaret and David Nolan.

Yeah, I blame David for a majority of how that relationship just crashed, but Mary Margaret wasn't willing to fight. I get it. She was the one most hurt from all of it. One can argue as Snow White, in her own story, she suffered more as well. Snow is very much the backbone of her relationship, and while she does die for her true love, it wasn't about happiness. She doesn't ever do anything for her own happiness. She does it all for love, and love doesn't always equal happiness. Time and again Snow does question why, what's the point when it seems her entire love story is just trying to find Charming, but Charming asks her to have faith in their love.

Mary Margaret, I think, is the personification of the doubt in Snow, that wonders what's the point in fighting. So much has happened to her, and interesting towards the end of the series, most notably with how upset she gets towards Emma when Emma decides all of a sudden to abduct Henry from Storybrooke, she gets very heated towards Emma and her choices. And that's not a Mary Margaret thing to do, because Mary Margaret is never heated. She's always kind and understanding.

But the curse is breaking, and Snow is waking up, and for the first time, the moment Mary Margaret's mouth kissed David Nolan's, she's suddenly living and it's bringing a lot of trouble and suffering. A lot of tumultuous emotions that comes with falling in love and having to experience the person you love disappoint you time and time again. How can you possibly have faith when the world seems to set against you?

And that's the world we live in. The world is set against us. There is no happy ending. There's bills, high rent prices, working a dead-end job that just gets you by, or even if you somehow find yourself lucky to work in a job you love, it becomes joyless, because in the end of the day a job is just for money, to pay the bills and to survive.

And that's our world to survive.

We might find that highpoint, that person that makes us feel joy but when there's obstacles, society and the world teaches us it's not worth it. The only way to live, is to live safe.

And yeah Henry has skipped school, stolen a credit card, and endangered himself, but he did so trying to pursue something he believes in.

And the entire town thinks he's crazy.

Worse Emma believes it's her fault because it seems he started it when she arrived. Not really. He does it because he noticed something and he wants to stop his mom. He might love Regina, but he sees people suffering and in trouble and he's figured out Regina is the cause of that.

His relationship with Regina and his journey to break the curse in a way mirrors his own father's journey to try and break the Dark One's curse by making a deal with Rumple to get out of the Land of Magic and to the Land Without Magic, but unlike Henry, Baelfire views magic as the cause of his father's curse, while Henry believes it is the solution to breaking it.

And Baelfire doesn't hate his dad, he loves his dad, but he hates the hurt his dad inflicts on the people. That matters enough that he's willing to risk both his and his own father's livelihood in order to stop the hurt that his father continues to inflict. So similar to why Henry sets out to find Emma to break the curse, because people are suffering. Why Henry ultimately rejects leaving Storybrooke to stay with Emma, because he didn't bring Emma to just have a new mom, but to break the curse and free everyone.

One could also argue that Henry also isn't happy with Regina which definitely is very likely, and I would definitely wish to see more of Regina and Henry and how their relationship degraded since he was an infant. Regina does love Henry, even Archie sees it, but does she show it in a healthy way...well...

In any case, going back to Emma and why doesn't believe and the purpose of the Storybrooke curse basically stealing happy endings but replacing it with the sort of lives people in our world live in as a criticism to our "reality" and mundane and meaningless our lives are... Emma herself has suffered that curse by living in our world, by enduring the flaws of the foster care system and basically living unloved. Every moment of her life has been a disappointment, and her one high point was Neal and even that was a disappointment in the end. So in a way, when she tells Henry to be in reality, she wants him to realize, life is not like a fairy tale book.

Because in our world there is no happy endings.

People no longer believe in it.

All we can do is survive until we die.

And that's the sad world we live in today.

[the-fallen-blue]

A few minor caveats aside, I think this is pretty close to everything I'd want to say, thank you OP. Especially that last part about campaigning. From a purely practical perspective, without a shred of moral or ethical consideration or any of my own feeling, it seems... shortsighted. Less than a hundred hours ago this show was the absolute darling of queer fandom, a notoriously fervent and loyal fanbase, who were industriously advertising the shit out of it across every possible social media platform. "Watch WoT, it's everything you've been asking for!" was 80% of the tag here on tumblr. The one thing every company in the world will kill for is unforced peer advertising and WoT had it in spades...

... and then overnight it was gone. Even people who still believe the show has merit have gone quiet on the sales pitch out of a combination of, idk, feeling it's in poor taste while people are still so upset and being distracted by arguing with people in fandom about how it's fine, actually. I mean, I know there's a long tail on production and they didn't know what the fandom was going to look like when they actually made this decision, but come the fuck on. It's been twenty-two years since Tara Maclay died, we all saw Clexa go down (in fact your episode writer was at ground zero for Clexa), media reporting was plenty comprehensive for the end of OitNB, anyone in prestige TV should be aware of the relationship between OFMD and its fandom. It's not a secret what happens when you kill a popular queer character! This was a predictable outcome!

And like okay fine maybe you (Rafe, Gillmer, whoever) think that's worth it. You don't need queer word of mouth. The show has mainstream popularity and you're committed to telling the story you want to tell. Breaking your queer fandom in half is an acceptable outcome to you. Or maybe you really thought you were different, and this has taken you by surprise, but life doesn't get takebacks and you've decided to stand by your decision and carry on. Fine, that's not really surprising. It probably won't even cost you anything notable in the long run. But it has cost us a great deal. Even those who don't feel betrayed, who just wanted to get on tumblr and gush about Elayne with the Be'lal nuke on Jeanie or Lanfear's cunty outfits, and instead found hurt friends and defensive mutuals and the sixteen thousandth rehash of the most ancient and exhausting discourse in queer fandom history.

I am not interested in flagellating our own harder than our enemies, or ceding modern fantasy to bloodless white dude rehashes written by risk-averse cishet men, and there are characters and plotlines I care about here other than fishwives. So I will keep watching, if the show is renewed. But the fandom will never be the same. And no matter how you feel about Siuan's death, that's a loss everyone has reason to mourn.

wot relationship status: it's complicated

I have been agonising over Siuan's death pretty much nonstop, but I have come to a sort of detente with it and I want to share my thoughts in response to some of the common fan responses I've seen.

Was Siuan's death simply for Moiraine's character advancement? No, I really don't think so. Her speech was a beautiful, powerful scene. I have seen fans who feel she was dehumanised and denied dignity and that it was a degrading death. I really don't feel thats what we saw on our screens.

Yes, Siuan was subjected to dehumanising treatment; yes, her killers tried to degrade her and remove her dignity. But she was not bowed; she was not broken. She did not beg for her life, or try to appease her captors, or do anything to suggest that they had succeeded in their attempts to remove her dignity. Instead, she fought back. She stood proud, despite their treatment (treatment that reflected much more on them than it did on her). Her strength and bravery made them into the villains even in their own eyes, and her into a hero and a martyr.

The thing I haven't seen talked about is that she almost won. Deposed, stilled, sentenced to death, she still managed to almost talk the Hall down. She managed to instil fear and doubt in Elaida, a woman who never doubted herself a day in her life. We didn't get to see the Sitters present and their stirrings of doubt (I imagine mainly for production reasons so that they can be cast next season) but we absolutely see it on Elaida's face. The only person unaffected is Alviarin, who can see power slipping through her fingers, who can see that any moment the Hall is going to change its mind, which is why she acts when she does.

I liked that Siuan talked about Moiraine - that was part of her being able to finally tell the truth after all these years, to claim Moiraine publicly as she'd never been allowed to do. Anyone who's spent time being forced to hide a queer relationship will recognise the joy and relief she felt in that moment, which I could certainly see on her face. And I don't think the fact that she spoke of Moiraine, the fact that Moiraine gained a desperate determination from her death, means that her death was simply to serve Moiraine's story. I think to only see Moiraine in her death robs Siuan of the dignity and heroism she displayed, and of the triumph of her character.

But that's my in story world response. Do I think they should have done it? Fuck, no. The writers live in the real world; this show is being watched in the real world. I don't think all queer stories should have to be happy - they shouldn't be limited by previous failures in representation. I don't really feel this is a bury your gays moment, not with so much other queer rep on the show. But we all need happy queer stories. Especially right now, in this moment of dire attack on queer and trans rights. Goodness knows I watched the episode at a terrible time in the UK - literally the day before, a horrific court ruling attacking trans rights was announced, the latest in a series of attacks on trans lives in this country. I needed my happy queer WoT world, and my happy queer WoT fandom.

And whilst there was nothing racial about her death within the world of the show, once again we are living in THIS world, and in this world, it feels problematic at best. (though I stand by my point above that Siuan's role was NOT just to further her white girlfriend's story)

I've seen multiple responses, including from the showrunner, saying that Siuan's plot in the books after the coup was a step down for the character. And whilst sure, I can agree that many elements of her plot are shit - they could simply have changed them. NO ONE needed Gareth Byrne, fuck that entire situation, but the writers could simply have changed that. She could have been in Salidar briefly and then gone off to rescue a doorwayed Moiraine. The writers are the ones making the decisions. They could have made different decisions.

I do think that her death will make Egwene's time in the Tower even more meaningful and triumphant; I do think it will make the Salidar storyline feel more poignant; I do think it will haunt Elaida for the rest of her reign; I do think Siuan as a martyr will add to the narrative tapestry of the rest of the show; I do think they're going to kill Moiraine permanently not doorway her and that this makes more sense with Siuan already dead. I just don't feel any of that is enough reason to lose her from the show.

I also understand the production considerations. I am professionally familiar with tv production - I know how crucial cast availability is, especially with a production this size and with the budgets involved. If it was me, I would simply have had Elaida send her off somewhere to be imprisoned. They could have kept her off screen until she was available/could become relevant to the plot.

Does this mean I don't want to see the "end game" that the writers have planned for Siuan and Moiraine? I ABSOLUTELY want to see it. I want them to make this better. I want my fishwives to have as close to a happy ending as they can get. Life is a dream from which we all must wake, and I want them to have time together in that waking, and for us to see them get it right, to see them happy as they have absolutely earned. Whether the show will manage to get that ending right? I have no idea. But I really want them to. I really want to see it.

So basically - I'm still angry, sad, and very very hurt. But I also don't want this to ruin my love of this show. Sometimes I feel we are the harshest to those who actually try. The show is flawed, but it does have a large and diverse cast, people of colour in many key roles, queer people of all varieties, a mix of talent in front of and behind the camera. It might fail sometimes but at least it tries.

I want the show to continue. I want to see my other favourite characters live their stories. I want to see Egwene come into her own, I want to see Nynaeve be the badass she is, I want to watch Elayne figure out how to do things no one had done in 3000 years, I want to see where they are going with Show Min, I want more of perrin, I want Mat to sleep with a dude, pretty please.

I think I'm most angry that this has stripped a lot of the joy of fandom from me, and caused so much pain to so many people. I wanted to be shouting about WoT from the rooftops at the moment - I wanted to be campaigning for renewal. But whilst it has robbed me of that fervour, I still want to see the show survive and thrive. I do want it to be renewed. And I do want my Siuriane end game.