#anti baelfire

[jfksfanaccount]

It’s hating Neal Cassidy hours. Did Henry ever ask him why Emma made him out to be a firefighter who died instead of the truth? Did Neal tell him what he actually was, and what he did to the two of them? Or did he brush him off, the same way he brushed off Emma when she was telling him about how much he hurt her, and he didn’t want to hear it.

I wonder how old Henry was when he asked Emma how they met, and how upset he got. Or maybe he already got the information from the time of the 2nd Curse in New York. In which case, I’m glad he got to be angry at his dad before he died.

Sorry that got kinda dark. On every rewatch, I get so upset at how almost everyone in Emma’s life makes her feel like she needs to forgive Neal when she really doesn’t need to, and he doesn’t deserve it

[roonil-wazlib-in-the-tardis]

Oh my God. Oh my God oh my God ohmygodohmygod am I in the upside down what the fuck is going on I'm in a OUAT Facebook group and there are people fighting for their lives in the comments to defend the fact that Neal, in his 20s, who is literally actually a couple centuries old, was in a relationship with 16 YEAR OLD EMMA.

She was 16

16

They keep whining about how it would be the same age gap if they were teenagers.

THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TWO MINORS AND A GROWN ASS ADULT DATING A MINOR

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK

THEY ARE SHAMELESSLY DEFENDING PEOPLE IN THEIR 20S DATING MINORS.

WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. FUCK.

THEY'RE COMPARING IT TO CAPTAIN SWAN.

2.

GROWN.

CONSENTING.

ADULTS.

Anyway Neal Cassidy is actually scum and I can't believe that it's been like 10 years and we still have to have this argument.

[ouatnextgen]

Prince Squared/ Sleeping Princes Ship Headcanons

This is one of my OUAT Next-Gen ships, Neal (or Leo, as I call him) Nolan and Prince Philip II (or PJ for short)

I've always liked the idea of these two ending up together. Snow White and Prince Charming's son with Sleeping Beauty and Prince Philip's son? Makes sense, right?

Tropes: Rivals to lovers || Opposites attract || Hardcore denial || Flirting as a joke that turns real || Each think they’re the only one with feelings || Both think they don’t deserve the other 

Songs: Clarity- Zedd || Next to Me- Imagine Dragons || A Rush of Blood to the Head- Coldplay || Before You Go- Lewis Capaldi || Broken- lovleytheband || High Dive- Andrew McMahon

Headcanons Under the Cut: (All pre-relationship)

They’ve been friends since they were babies, but aren’t as close as Gideon and Hope.

They started rivaling each other at the ripe-old-age of eight, after PJ beat Leo at the third-grade spelling bee. (winning word was “irony”) 

Leo caught feelings first, in middle school. PJ didn’t start crushing until their freshman year of high school.

Leo is a jock and a “straight-A” student, while PJ is a theater kid and a “slacker” (he has dyspraxia so it’s not really his fault) so they don’t cross paths in school a lot.

They started really bonding late freshman year, when they had detention together, (Leo for starting a fight, PJ for skipping class), Breakfast Club style.

They like to hang out behind the school, just by themselves without any of their other friends.

Leo helps PJ with his homework, and PJ helps Leo with his social life.

Leo calls PJ “Philip” or “Philip Jr.” to annoy him, and “shy guy” when he’s being soft. Similarly, PJ calls Leo “Leopold” or “Your Royal Annoyingness” to annoy him, and “golden boy” when he’s being nice.

PJ knows how Leo feels about his first name, and always corrects people when they call him “Neal.”

PJ is one (1) inch taller than Leo, and lords it over him all the time.

Meanwhile, Leo is three months older than PJ, and lords that over him all the time.

PJ is very touchy-feely, throwing his arm around Leo’s shoulder, or bumping into him if they’re walking. Leo is more reserved, and does the same only if they’re alone.

PJ has dated two guys before. Leo hasn’t dated anyone.

Leo is just coming to terms with the fact that he’s Not Straight after compheting for a while, but PJ, who has a lesbian godmother in the form of Mulan, has known since he hit puberty that he’s gay.

Everyone knows that they have crushes on each other (except for themselves).

Snow and Aurora have a bet going on for how long it will take for them to get together.

[boosyboo9206]

The one thing that I will never forgive Once Upon a Time for is killing off Neal.

Not because I'm a swanthief/swanfire shipper and wanted them together so bad. But because killing him off was complete and total fan service to pave the way for captain swan.

I'm not the biggest fan of captain swan because, honestly, they're a little toxic for each other. But, also, because Hook's only purpose after a season or two was only Emma.

At least, for Neal, he had other purposes. Henry's Dad. Rumple's son - literally his humanity and the whole reason Rumple did everything he did. He was friends with Belle. And Wendy. He had reasons to exist outside of Emma and could have completely moved on from her in time and find someone else.

They could have had a healthy co-parenting relationship and been friends. And, while it would have been nice to, at least, see them try a romantic relationship again, the time had totally passed. There's too much history and pain and things that happened for them to work. So her not wanting to try again with him and be with Hook could have still happened.

Killing off Neal was a copout and fan service and a terrible choice. They also totally ruined Hook by not giving him a purpose outside of Emma after/around, like, season 3.

[wastingstarsss]

So I’m thinking too hard about Rumple again (surprise surprise) and holy fuck. OUAT really tried to convince us that crippling yourself and (most likely) walking home on that broken leg so your son doesn’t grow up fatherless was the act of a coward. That’s insane. And like- Rumple has to live with that forever. I mean Yh as Mr Gold he can use magic to walk without a cane but I bet the ache is still there, and if not he’s always gonna at least know that he did that. He broke his body for his son. It’s essentially branding himself, and what is branding usually associated with? Villainy. The branding of a villain. BUT! HES! NOT! A! COWARD! SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE FOLKS AT THE BACK

[clericxhood777]

No, actually, why on my fifth re-watch of OUAT did I notice that Emma went from the masc to femme when she started dating Killian. You won't see that shit with Regina or Neal. The embraced who she is, but she felt more insecure and more femme with Killian. Idfk, but it's more telling tbh. She's not herself around Killian. Again, FORCED RELATIONSHIP FOR NO FUCKING REASON Maybe, it's due to the fact that I'm in way too many fandoms and tend to pick this shit up, but low-key what's with misogynistic tropes in media 😭

[oautincorrectquotes]

Neal: *Pulls up in a random car*

Emma: Whos car is that?

Neal: I don't know, it wasn't locked.

[rumbelle-scream]

something just connected in my brain reading this rumbelle fic with hook/neal side pair... hook did love baelfire, it's canon. that's his stepson, really. son of the woman he loved. a boy he taught himself. a man he'll miss. i missed that part of the story by being mad that the show went off the rails. it's cute.

[themeepyfreak]

One of the reasons that I could never warm up to Hook that is completely glossed over in the fandom is how much he screwed Baelfire over with seemingly no remorse. The narrative tries so hard to write off Hook as a good person and Baelfire’s friend in the later seasons that I don’t think people really don’t understand how despicable his actions were.

First, he either convinced Bae’s mother to leave her family or assisted in Bae’s mother leaving her family. I don’t blame Hook too much for that since the majority of the blame is definitely on Milah, but Hook didn’t need to antagonize Rumple and threaten Bae’s only other parent. (They did have Hook address that this was wrong of him on the show though which is more than they usually do.) And even if Hook told Bae that they wanted to go back for him, the truth is that they did not. Bae was 4-6 years old when Milah left, and Rumple killed Milah when Bae was 14 years old in London, so Hook and Milah were together for 8-10 years (common law married at the very least) in which they never actually came back for Bae or even informed him that his mother was alive. If Rumple hadn’t become the Dark One, Bae would have died fighting the Ogres, and there would have been nobody to come back to. I doubt they actually had any intentions of going back to Bae; Hook just said that to give Bae a more positive outlook on the mother that abandoned him.

Then, he built up Bae’s trust for the sole purpose of gaining information to kill his father. He did save Bae from the mermaids and sheltered him for a while, but all of his niceness (until he got attached to Bae) was to gain Bae’s trust so that Bae could give information on his father. Hook’s friendship with Bae that they boast about in later seasons was dependent on a lie and mostly faked on one side.

His main offense that is glossed over the most in canon is that he abandoned Bae and sold him out to Pan. This is debatably one of the worst abandonments in the show, and it is never talked about.

- First, Hook does this within the same day that Bae found out about his mom abandoning him and his dad killing his mom (rubbing salt into the wound). And despite how it appears in the show, this was not a split second decision since Hook (or his crew) had to physically call up the Lost Boys to get Bae. The Lost Boys were mainly on the island and didn’t lurk near the ship without being prompted (or else Bae couldn’t have been on deck when Hook was playing friends with him in fear of being seen). When Hook was giving his “I can change” speech to Bae, the Lost Boys were already called or else they wouldn’t have been there immediately afterwards. Maybe Hook would have hidden Bae if Bae agreed, but he had already sold Bae out by that point.

- Second (and why this abandonment is one of the worst), Hook intentionally sold Bae to a known psychopath that he knew would mentally, physically, and emotionally torture him. Hook knows the Lost Boys and how bad Pan is. That’s why he and his crew are always on the ship rather than on the island. That’s why he tries to avoid Neverland even if he is stuck in the realm. That’s why he hides Bae from the Lost Boys in the first place. Not to mention that selling Bae out was for a selfish reason (to be in Pan’s favor and gain access out of Neverland) and can’t even be argued as being in Bae’s best interests.

- Third, knowing where Bae was and that Bae was suffering, Hook left Bae in Neverland for centuries, perpetuating the initial abandonment. How do you think it felt for Bae to see Hook enter and leave the island/realm over and over again for hundreds of years, leaving Bae on Neverland over and over again? (Part of me wonders whether that’s why Pan let Hook off the island in the first place, to be able to lord about it to Bae.) I strongly suspect that Bae tried to petition to or stowaway with Hook (since he was trying to escape), but Hook refused him and turned him back to Pan (since Hook was in Pan’s employ) which had to hurt worse.

Maybe I could let it go if Hook showed remorse or it was addressed in canon, but instead, the opposite happened. Hook painted this picture of him and Bae as friends (even though most of their friendship was Hook using Bae for information) to bond with Emma after Bae “died”. He lied by omission of all the pain he caused Bae which is never clarified in canon. After Bae actually dies, he tries to rewrite his and Bae’s history again when describing their “friendship” to Henry. And the worst part is that nobody can contest it since Bae is dead in all of these scenes.

Not to mention that when they find out that Bae is alive in Neverland (which Hook did not seem happy about in the slightest), Hook decides to go after Emma, the woman that he knows Bae loves and that loves Bae (since Emma wasn’t quiet about that at all). They are trying to find Henry, and Hook is purposely baiting Bae with talks of his and Emma’s “dalliance” (which implies way more than a kiss). Hook makes it into a competition, as if Emma is a trophy, and continues pursuing Emma in front of Bae even though Emma said “No” countless times. And despite supposedly backing out of the competition after Neverland, he still continues to harass Emma until they kiss immediately after Bae dies and get together in the end. Whether you’re a Swanfire fan or not, the entire thing is rude and disrespectful to Bae.

[sassyandclassy94]

Words of Comfort

In my own personal SwanFire Storybrooke AU, because of the custody arrangement Baelfire would spend some time with Milah until he’s 17 (he would start to make excuses to not see her). Anyway, in my AU, he has low self esteem and self-confidence issues and Milah’s the main reason for that.

She’s always making him feel like he’s useless/worthless, belittling his dreams and goals, and once he begins dating Emma, she pretty much tells him in so many words that she’s too good for him and if they do end up marrying, it’ll never last. He doesn’t ever say much or talk about it but Rumpel has an idea of what’s up. Why? Because after almost every unfortunate weekend spent with his mother Bae would come home in a sad, depressed state; withdrawing from his father and drawing as a way of privately expressing his feelings. He also knows because Milah did the same to him while they were married: belittling everything about him every chance she got. Her emotional abuse and the neglect of their son was the reason they divorced. Before the divorce, her abuse was always toward Rumpel. Now, it was directed at Baelfire. Perhaps looking at him and being around him made her feel guilty but he didn’t care. It angered him that Milah would treat their own son like that. Almost every visit ended with a very heated phone call, always concluding with Milah denying her behavior, blaming Rumpel for Baelfire’s ‘mental problems’ before she hung up abruptly.

More on AO3

[moonbeamnights]

OUAT AU that I need in my life: Milah the selkie. Because this woman has the most selkie whose human husband stole her seal coat and now she's trapped vibes that you can possibly have without actually being a selkie. And Rumple totally just... Would Do That.

Also the Millian in this AU! Killian going with her to look for the seal skin or finding it himself and giving it back, just helping her find it either way 🥺 The romance!

[rumbelle-scream]

[SIGHS IN COMPLETE DISAPPOINTMENT]

Henry never had an actual dad. Emma never even had closure (even in the afterlife she still needed him.) Rumple couldn't even reconcile with his son.

Did Neal, who resurrected his father to go back to TLWM, ever reunite with his son and the woman he loves? No. <<Who did, however? Who the fuck did, in his place?>>

It's not like Baelfire is a character who despises magic and was tempted by it (in resurrecting Rumple) or anything. Not like that's the plot or any somesuch. It's not like Neal Cassidy is Baelfire who experienced what it's like to fight magic, and to live without it. It's not like he's comfortable with his cunning more than magic, or anything. It's definitely not like he taught Emma what a magic-escapist can do. It's not like he's the person who was Emma's most trusted until he betrayed her, and it's not like he didn't truly escape magic.

And it's not like that's his character arc, or that he and Emma are intertwined or whatever. It's not like we need a character arc, even. Just kill Neal off, put in Loverboy (because we won't actually deliver on that 'lOvE tRIanGLe'), then make it make sense. We need a cashgrab more than plot.

Ten years later, and I’m still upset that they killed Neal in ouat

[ouatsnark]

Thoughts on the blow confession?

'If this show completely changes captain hook into Killian Jones, he has no right to be in this show. OUAT is a fairy tale based show that is based on famous fairytale characters and Killian Jones isn't a fairytale Character. Only Captain Hook.'

I personally think it's bullshit.

Because If Killian Jones doesn't belong in the show, none of the characters do.

Regina Mills? Nope. Gone.

Baelfire and Henry? Hella gone?

Emma. Guess what, she's gone too.

Literally no one in the show is the actual character through and through as they're known. That's the whole fricking point. Why is it only targeted at Hook?

I LOVE it when anti-Killian Jones people think they're writing something so profound but you can tell they really haven't thought it through ... or they simply cant because either their bias blinds them or they really are just this stupid.

It's obviously only targeted at Killian because whomever confessed their stupidity here thinks he is in the way of their ship.

But, yes, you're right. The whole point was to take popular fairy tales, give them a little twist and expand on them. Aside from Frozen... I think Anna and Elsa were the closes to their origins... all of the other characters had something major that was different about them. OUAT even added original characters in so, yeah, what about those?

People are insane when they think they have to search for more ways to hate a character. It's OK not to like Killian Jones. But to jump through all these leaps of logic to do so is just psycho.

[themattress]

OUAT Observation

In retrospect, Season 2 was a Sophomore Slump that Once Upon a Time was never truly able to recover from, despite all of Season 3′s best efforts. However, while the show would certainly get worse than how it was in Season 2, there’s still a fascinating uniqueness to how it went off the rails. This is pretty much the only season (other than the final one due to the sudden cancellation) where I feel they had a road map going into it that they just trashed.

For those who don’t know what I mean, it’s been confirmed that with each season renewal there is a session between the writers where the new season’s road map is created, which is then utilized when they reconvene that Summer to actually start writing the season. And the road map for Season 2 was clearly going smoothly for its first 6 episodes; everything felt tight and naturally flowing. But then we hit “Child of the Moon”, where not only did the requisite centric for new season regular Megan Ory and her Red/Ruby character get forcibly cobbled together with the teased Albert Spencer plotline, but a development was made that ensured Emma and Snow’s quest in the Enchanted Forest would come to its conclusion two episodes later, in time for the Winter break. I highly doubt this was originally planned; it feels like the idea going into Season 2 was for that quest to end closer to the middle of the season, with the discovery of Baelfire/Neal in Manhattan occurring closer to the climax...after all, the season opened with a sequence all about him in that part of New York City. Just as Season 1 opened with the Curse being cast and ended with the Curse being broken, Season 2 was to open with Neal as the focus and end with him as the focus. And, well, it still does...kind of.

After this alteration, the season was on track to have Neal found in the middle of the season, and it would conclude either with a battle against Cora or against Regina who spirals out of control following Cora’s death. After all, before “Manhattan”, the focus was still on the threat Cora posed, especially now that Regina had joined up with her, and it was still continuing focus on plotlines and characters the season had set up (Hook and Smee, Mulan and Philip, Red/Ruby, Dr. Frankenstein and his monsterified brother, Anton/Tiny the Giant, all of the core characters’ personal arcs, etc.), plus threads that could be pursued in the following season (Emma’s magic, Snow and Charming’s disagreement on whether to stay in Storybrooke or not, Belle’s amnesia, Greg Mendell, etc.) But it was at the time of making “Manhattan” that a bombshell dropped: A&E, perhaps due to their usage of Hook and Smee being met with acclaim, were granted full rights to use everything else from Peter Pan. And because they had a passion for that property and the ideas they had for it, they just burned the season’s road map altogether and redirected it toward ending with everyone going off to Neverland.

So many decisions made were centered around this choice: the removal of the scene with Rumple’s father in “Manhattan” since their plans for that character immediately changed, the whole “the boy will be your undoing” prophecy being geared specifically toward the Neverland situation, Neal knowing Hook and it being set up that he was a Lost Boy in Neverland, Neal’s fiancée Tamara being introduced to be the “Her” that Greg Mendell was in touch with and revelation that they’re anti-magic activists unknowingly working for Peter Pan, and literally every single plot thread that had no place in the Neverland story either being dropped altogether (Red/Ruby, the Frankenstein stuff, Emma further awakening her magic powers, and any on-screen resolution to restoring Philip’s soul) or wrapped up as hastily and anticlimactically as possible (the darkness in Snow’s heart, August’s situation, the magic beans, Belle’s memory loss and new cursed identity, and Regina’s status as the villain).

Because of this rush, there wasn’t enough time to properly think through or flesh out a lot of the story decisions being made, which - along with A&E’s skewed morality - made “Welcome to Storybrooke” through “The Evil Queen” such an aimless, unpleasant slog to sit through. Another consequence is that one of the writers who had been there since the beginning, Ian Goldberg, jumped ship, clearly more interested in working with the setting and characters the show already had and resenting the sudden directional shift A&E had forced upon everyone.

Despite all of this, I want to stress that everyone involved was still trying the best that they could which still was able to shine through (ex: “Welcome to Storybrooke has some chillingly good direction, music and acting, and even in the moments it’s not intentionally trying to be “Lacey” is a highly funny episode, as are parts of “The Evil Queen”.) And as much as it pains me to admit, A&E were totally justified in wanting to get to Neverland ASAP, since the Neverland Saga ended up providing so many things the show and its characters were in desperate need of, the dark take on the Peter Pan story was very clever and interesting, and doing it right then allowed them to cast Robbie Kay as Peter Pan while he was still the right age for it, and he gave one of the greatest villainous performances in the entire series.

In the end, Season 2 and its messy storyline is what it is. Not entirely good, not entirely bad, but certainly entirely interesting and something that I look back on more fondly overtime.

[oautincorrectquotes]

Neal: I won a new phone in a race.

Emma: Huh? What kind of race let's you win a phone?

Neal: A race between the store owner, the cop, and me.

[insanelydeadlybookcollector]

I loved his season 2 death. The predeath monologue (backhanded and opposite to his and Emma's perideath confessions though it may be) felt like a real death, like there would be no coming back, like we could mourn and move on.

In your opinion, what was the biggest lost opportunity on OUAT?

I mean, Neal is the obvious answer, though I am going to come in with a hot take that things might have been better if he had died sooner than he did.

If he had actually disappeared into a portal at the end of season two as some kind of heroic sacrifice and everybody who mattered to him had to actually deal with his death and the fact that their time together was cut too short... that would have been fine. Emma would have regressed a little in terms of her openness--because even if people aren't always going to let you down, you can still lose them. Henry would have to cope with only knowing a little bit about his father and wanting to know more. Snow, Charming and Regina try to comfort Emma and Henry and don't know what to do. Even Hook might be useful in this scenario, connecting with Emma about lost love, connecting with Henry over knowing Bae in Neverland. (And also about knowing Henry's grandmother, because that's never brought up. Which I get, but still. A kid might want to know that his dad's mother was a pirate.)

And of course Gold. Rumple had 300 years of working to get his son back and then when he finds him, Bae hates him and then he dies. How does a man come back from that? In the real show, he goes off to Neverland on a suicide mission, determined to give his life to save Bae's son. Then Neal is alive and they reconcile--but what if that doesn't happen? What if Rumpelstiltskin has really, finally, lost everything? How does the Dark One live with that? How does Belle cope with her True Love suffering so much and also probably becoming truly dangerous?

This is all a bummer of course, and I understand why ABC wasn't going to go in that direction. But if Neal couldn't live, is it too much to ask that his death mattered? That's the real insult of season 3b (and season 4a), that everyone just acted like this vital part of the story... never existed