Once Upon a Time in Wonderland: "To Catch a Thief"
Also known as the penultimate episode of what is (as has now been confirmed) the first and only season of Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. Personally, I’m glad that there’s only going to be a single season. I was under the impression that this was the game-plan right from the start: to create a spin-off that was not only self-contained, but with a beginning, middle and end. I’ve enjoyed this show and loved the characters, but I’d prefer it to get a decent send-off with a certain amount of closure (not ruling out the possibility of a few familiar faces popping up in the mother-show) than have it stretched out beyond its use-by date.
And just as though it actually read my review from last week, the show decided to grant my wish and give me details of the first Will/Alice meeting, as well as the whole backstory of Alice stealing back his heart for him. And I loved what we saw! That was exactly what I would have expected from the two of them: exasperation and fondness, with Will playing the big brother to Alice’s little sister. Though at the same time, I like that it’s not exactly sibling-esque but simply matey. We really don’t get enough of these strictly platonic male/female friendships, and it was at the very heart of this episode, not just in the flashbacks but the A-plot as well.
With Anastasia out of commission and Cyrus side-lined to a certain extent, the bond between Will and Alice comes to the fore. In a bid to save Anastasia’s life, Will tries to steal the snake staff so that Jafar can continue with his plan to break the laws of magic - citing his loyalty to Alice’s quest to save Cyrus as reason enough to let him do so, conveniently ignoring that there’s a world of difference between saving a genie’s life to prevent an evil sorcerer from world domination, and helping an evil sorcerer achieve world domination in order to save a woman’s life.
But it’s seeing Alice’s life at risk that brings him back to reason, which is a lovely touch (even if they did have to rather clumsily plug a plot-hole that had already established Will couldn’t swim). Having once challenged Alice with the question of whether she would do anything to save Cyrus, even if it meant making others suffer, Will now finds himself in the same position, and decides that he can’t go through with it. And the universe rewards him by opening up another opportunity to save Anastasia: the Jabberwocky turns up and tells them that Amara might be able to bring Anastasia back to life.
The Jabberwocky lost me a little bit in this episode. Once again Jafar seems to have the edge over her (and I was really looking forward to him struggling to keep his composure in her presence; or at least keeping her under control) and the writers have hastily inserted some “not so bad” qualities into her (and what are the odds she’s going to somehow turn out to be the Penelope that Will mentioned in the tavern to Alice?)
The thing is, I believe what she says, that evil isn’t born; it’s made. That is, I believe it in real life. But in fairytales... I dunno, sometimes I just feel that there has to be some level of primal, unexplainable, irredeemable evil at work in the world. Not every villain can have a sob story to explain (and on this show, often excuse) their terrible behaviour. It’s okay to have creatures or even people who are just plain bad, and here I liked the idea that the Jabberwocky would end up being something so terrifying that it was beyond even Jafar’s capacity to control. Yet with this episode, she’s completely lost that eerie unknowability that made her so striking in her first appearance.
The final sequence was action-packed, but a little choppy. Much like omitting the actual rescue of Alice in the river, we’re given no indication of when and how the trio restored Amara at the well, and the plan to get into Jafar’s vicinity seemed to be based entirely on luck. Jafar would have to trust that the Jabberwocky had really captured Cyrus, Alice would have to remember the counting sequence that she’d figured out all those years ago, Jafar would have to summon Will at exactly that moment, Cyrus would be taken up to Jafar’s chamber instead of thrown in the nearest dungeon, and that Amara would have to be powerful enough to defeat Jafar. To be honest I’m not entirely sure what they were planning to do, and Cyrus seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time wriggling his hands out of that rope.
And I have no idea what they want to do with Jafar’s dad or why their plan hinged on freeing him. He'll no doubt prove to be important in the finale, but I think there’s a chance he’ll turn out to be a clumsy Deus Ex Machina. I mean honestly, the man killed his own son, and yet now we’re meant to buy that he’s one of the good guys? How does that work? And the first time we saw Amara, wasn’t she a villain? All of Agrabah seemed to be terrified of her, and she killed an innocent farmhand just to teach Jafar a lesson. Yet now she’s a good guy too? I get the feeling there are going to be more than a few plot-holes left in the wake of the finale.
Miscellaneous
There was some nice continuity in regards to Alice’s pink dress, her desire to collect proof of Wonderland for her father, and what exactly she was doing just a few moments before stumbling over Cyrus’s bottle. I like to think that she and Will did plenty of adventuring together, just as I hope Alice herself was independently exploring Wonderland before meeting Will. There are still significant stretches of time in this chronology, and maybe fan-fic can help fill in some of the blanks.
Sadly, it doesn’t look as though we’re going to get any decent Cyrus/Will interaction this late in the game, but what we got was fairly good: Cyrus trying to talk Will out of stealing the staff, only to get punched in the face, and later magnanimously refusing to punch him back because Will would no doubt be knocked entirely unconscious. I like that neither one is strictly lover or fighter, but a mix of both.
Both of Will/Alice’s first meetings seemed to be based at least a little on Charming/Snow’s initial encounters (being held at sword-point in the forest, followed by getting trapped in a giant net). Heck, even Anastasia in her glass coffin was very reminiscent of Snow White. The difference was that in this case, Alice had the upperhand both times.
Rewind for that hand gesture/facial expression when Will tells Alice that he didn’t realize “what it all entailed” when he got his heart yanked out. It’s priceless, but it’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it.
Cyrus’s brothers had the worst poker-faces of all time when Jafar asked them if they knew Amara, but once again I applaud the casting agent: when Jafar told them that he “just wanted to look at them”, you could tell that he was clearly seeing their resemblance to their mother.
I’m glad Flashback!Alice came to the conclusion on her own that keeping Will’s heart was not something that heroes do, regardless of how well she treated him. Free will and mind control, non-consensual relationships and power imbalances are always tricky territory with me (insert requisite Merlin reference in which the titular character was constantly manipulating Arthur’s mind and body, usually for shits or giggles). I was agitated even when Alice was simply mucking about in the forest, making Will flap his arms for her. Not cool, Alice.
Of course, that’s very ironic considering that Alice spent the greater part of her relationship with Cyrus as her bound-genie, but at least the show didn’t delve into the implications of that. Despite being bound to the lamp, Cyrus always seemed to have free will in all other respects, and there was no indication that his behaviour was in any way influenced by Alice. He was a slave to the bottle, not her. Still, now that I come to think about it, the idea of agency and self-ownership has been a pretty major theme in this spin-off, not just in the presence of so many genies, but in Will’s heart being taken from his chest and Jafar’s overall quest to control every aspect of the universe.
“Let’s just say, I’ll see you soon.” D’aww. I’m going to miss those two most of all. And I loved that moment when Cyrus’s injury was felt by Alice on the stairs. Whether Morgana/Morgause or Demona/Macbeth or Draco/Einon (ten points if you get all those references), I’ve always loved long-distance physical/mental connections between two people, and this was one shot particularly well.
And for the finale - well, if Jafar can indeed resurrect the dead, make people fall in love, and turn back time, it looks as though we’re going to get a pretty spectacular finale (it’ll be hard for the mother-show to stop a threat like that). With Cyrus and Anastasia out of commission, it looks like it’ll be down to Will and Alice to stop him, which has a nice “full circle” quality about it. They started this adventure, now they have to finish it.