Season 4, Episode 1: A Tale of Two Sisters

 

 

                Sunday marked the start of season 4 for the TV Show, and if your remember back to the end of the last season, we did find out that Winter was coming early to Storybrooke and the Frozen characters would be entering the show. The season premiere opened up with a scene from "long ago" in which Anna and Elsa's parents were on a ship that was about to sink do to bad weather.  Anna and Elsa's mother writes a message in her final moments and puts it in a bottle and throws it into the ocean, saying that they "must know the truth", speaking of course about Anna and Elsa. The episode continues it's pattern of going back and forth between the past times and the present, beginning with the present time where we picked up from the end of Season 3.

               Elsa is shown walking down the street of Storybrooke and noticing a sign for Storybrooke. Meanwhile, problems are brewing for Regina as the long lost wife of Robin Hood, Regina's new boy friend, has returned thanks to Emma, and Regina's anger is near the boiling point. She eventually snaps at everyone, and goes into isolation, only appearing one more time in the episode which I will get to later. Back in the past, Anna and Elsa aremourning the loss of their parents, but also preparing for Anna's wedding. Elsa gives her mother's dress to Anna to wear for the wedding but as Anna is trying it on, Elsa finds a note written by her parents explaining the truth behind their trip that ended up killing them. Anna and Elsa travel to see the trolls in order to get answers as to if the note was real, and discover that they were traviling to the Enchanted Forest. Anna wants to travel alone to the Enchanted Forest, but Elsa refuses to let her go.

             Near the end of the episode, Kristoff is introduced into the story and it is learned that Anna has left on a boat secretly to go to the Enchanted Forest. Back in the present time, Elsa's cover is blown when Leroy is driving and almost runs over Elsa until Elsa freezes the car, than takes off running. Leroy warns Emma and Hook about the new magical person, and they quickly find an ice trail leading to Elsa. However, before they can reach her, Elsa conjours an ice giant who begins terrorizing the town.

            While all of this is going on, Belle and Mr. Gold are on their honeymoon, in a huge estate that seemlingly appeared out of nowhere after the second curse. Gold is hiding that he has the real dagger that controls him, and also finds an interesting piece in the house, that ultimately ends up revealing to be Sorcer Mickey's hat from Fantasia. Back in town, the giant heads to the forst, where Emma, Charming, Hook, and Robin Hood attempt to stop it, but they are all quickly crushed. Regina appears as the beast is about to kill Robin Hood's wife and destroys the beast, showing she still has some good in her. As the episode nears a close, Elsa is shown entering  Gold's shop and retrieving a necklace that belonged to Anna, saying that she "would find her". The final important piece from the episode comes when Regina gets her mirror friend out of jail, and they plan to find the writer of the magical "Once Upon a Time" book and attempt to rewrite fate

 

             There is a lot I liked about this season premiere, but a few things I could have done without so I am going to go right into my top 5 likes and dislikes of the episode. Let's talk about the likes first.

 

This episode had a lot of high points for me, and they far outweighd the bads.

 

1. The first thing I really liked about this episode was Elsa and Anna's new storyline in Storybrooke. The idea for  me of having go missing and Elsa coming to Storybrooke to find her is ingenious to me, and fits the whole idea of the show perfectly, and I am excited to see what the future holds for this story.

 

Number 2: Regina's quest  to find the author of the book. I love this idea. This storyline is definitely going to be one of the bigger ones for me and I am hoping that the writer of the books ends up being a big suprise. Either way, I hope they really hit this story hard and keep it going throughout the season.

 

Number 3: Mickey's Fantasia hat. I am going to be honest, I did not see this coming. I love the idea of adding some classic Disney pieces in, and the idea of combining Rumple Stilkskin with the Sorcerer Hat is truly epic. I am very excited to see what that hat can do.

 

Number 4: Kristoff's Actor. This is an odd one, I know, but just from the shorttime on the screen, I really enjoyed his character. I really think they did a great job of casting his role, and he may end up being one of my favorite characters, possibly even up there with Hook, who I love in the story.

 

Number 5: Not too much Frozen. Don't get me wrong, I love Frozen. However,  I was a little worried that they would focus to much on the Frozen characters and storyline that all of the characters I have come to love in this show would be drowned out. However, in this first episdoe, they did an excellent job of balancing the too, so let's hope that is something that continues

 

Now, on to my dislikes, which were few and far between for this episode. So few that I have a hard time coming up with 5.

 

Number 1: The Evil Queen's return. For me, I am not so sure about this. I think it is probably a good move for the show to have Regina become evil again but I personally was really starting to like her character as a good guy. It seems this season will bring some serious struggle between good and evil for her, but personally, I would rather see the good.

 

Number 2: The Random House that decided to show up. OK, I  know I am grasping at straws here, but how does this huge estate just show up and no one notices it. Like I said, there was not a lot to hate about this episode so I am grasping at straws but the show usually does a good job of filling in the logic holes and this was not one of those times. But  who am I kidding, it really is not that big of a deal.

 

Number 3: Han's hasn't made an appearance yet. This is not really a complaint but more as a disappointment as I was really excited to see him in the show. Hopefully he shows up in the next few episodes as I see him as a pretty awesome bad guy in this season of the show.

 

Number 4: Robin Hood's Wife: For me, her entrance back into the story seemed a little bit odd and forced. I don't necessarily love her character in the story and the whole storyline of Robin Hood, his wife, and Regina is just a bit odd to me.

 

Number 5: Elsa's Multiple Personalities. I am not sure if it is just me, but I feel like Elsa's personality was very odd in this first episode when she was in storybrooke. I couldn't tell if she was there simply for help and was innocent, or if she would end up being a villian. She seemed innocent enough and often scared in the episode, but conjouring the ice giant was weird. I couldnt tell if she meant to conjour it or if it just appeared out of fear. Either way, it will be interesting to see what her actions are like in the next episodes.

 

           Overall, this episode was a good one to start off the season. I give it a solid 9/10, with little room for improvement, as you could see by my picky dislikes.