Monday , March 18 2024
There's some "family business" going on in Storybrooke this Sunday on "Once Upon a Time"

‘Once Upon a Time’ – Previewing ‘Family Business’

November 2, Once Upon a Time airs “Family Business,” which will explore Belle’s (Emilie de Ravin) back story, and, it seems will begin unfolding the revelation that the dagger Belle holds in her possession is not the genuine Dark One dagger, but a fake. Maybe we’ll finally begin to learn why Mr. Gold (Robert Carlyle) has been such a nasty piece of work lately. We also learn, in the process, that Belle and Anna have a past in Arendelle, in which Belle seeks to discover lost memories about the fate of her mother.

In the meantime, Emma (Jennifer Morrison) continues to be perplexed about her lost connection to the Snow Queen (Elizabeth Mitchell), who, it was revealed last week, had been Emma’s foster mother. Why had the Snow Queen erased Emma’s memories? And how is it that the two women obviously have met in Storybrooke, yet Emma can remember nothing of it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwz6esNmI3w

But the Snow Queen is in hiding, doing who-knows-what with that mirror she’s nicked off of the Evil Queen (Lana Parrilla). Why go to all that trouble for a glass shard? And what does Snow Queen’s fractured mirror do? Maybe it will all tie together by mid-season, or maybe it’s a red herring. Or something. By the way, I really loved Lana’s performance in last week’s episode. From snark to real introspection, and it was nice to finally see her get some screen time.

Getting back to Belle for a moment, we learn that she attempts to use the dagger (the fake dagger, of course) to force a reluctant Rumplestiltskin into into disclosing the Snow Queen’s whereabouts. Hmm. So Belle isn’t above using the Dark One dagger? How unlike her (and we can’t blame it on the dagger, because it’s a fake). Maybe it has a placebo effect, drawing her towards magic, even if the object, itself, isn’t magical? Again, hmmm.

And what, oh, what shall transpire when she figures out she hasn’t got the real dagger? Or will Rumple pretend it is, in fact, the real dagger and play along with Belle to expand the charade? We shall see. I know Rumple is now the evil villain-designate, and any good in his history has been erased like a it was embedded in an Etch-A-Sketch, but maybe, just maybe, we’ll find the method to this madness. People keep trying to convince me to wait and see. That there’s more to Mr. Gold’s evil turn than meets the eye. What do you all think?

Don’t forget to tune in tonight, October 28, to Let’s Talk TV on the Blogcritics Radio Network at 8:00 ET (or listen later on the podcast). We’ll discuss last week’s episode and the forthcoming ‘Family’ episode airing November 2 at 8:00 p.m. ET on ABC.
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About Barbara Barnett

A Jewish mother and (young 🙃) grandmother, Barbara Barnett is an author and professional Hazzan (Cantor). A member of the Conservative Movement's Cantors Assembly and the Jewish Renewal movement's clergy association OHALAH, the clergy association of the Jewish Renewal movement. In her other life, she is a critically acclaimed fantasy/science fiction author as well as the author of a non-fiction exploration of the TV series House, M.D. and contributor to the book Spiritual Pregnancy. She Publisher/Executive Editor of Blogcritics, (blogcritics.org).

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3 comments

  1. I suspect that the glass shards will tie into why Belle is using the dagger. In the original Andersen story, a shard in the eye made the victim paranoid and suspicious. Given Belle’s previous reluctance to use the dagger even when Rumpel asked her to do so–as well as the fact that she, better than anyone else, would be in a position to know how Zelena’s control did a number on Rumpel emotionally and psychologically–, it’s the only thing that really makes sense.

  2. While it remains to be seen exactly how they will adopt and spin the idea of the mirror from the original Snow Queen fairy tale, future episode titles such as “Smash the Mirror” and “Shard in the Eye” suggest this aspect will become prominent. In the original tale the mirror was created by an evil sprite and caused those who looked in it to see only ugliness. Here is a brief quote from the story of what happens once it falls and is broken and how that might play out…

    “…fell to the earth, where it was dashed in a hundred million and more pieces. And now it worked much more evil than before; for some of these pieces were hardly so large as a grain of sand, and they flew about in the wide world, and when they got into people’s eyes, there they stayed; and then people saw everything perverted, or only had an eye for that which was evil. This happened because the very smallest bit had the same power which the whole mirror had possessed. Some persons even got a splinter in their heart, and then it made one shudder, for their heart became like a lump of ice. Some of the broken pieces were so large that they were used for windowpanes, through which one could not see one’s friends. Other pieces were put in spectacles; and that was a sad affair when people put on their glasses to see well and rightly. Then the wicked sprite laughed till he almost choked, for all this tickled his fancy. “