In were we finally learn what's in the box (and it's kind of dissapointing considering how much I've been obsessing about it - so thank god the rest of the episode isn't)

Nope. Nope. NOPE. Nope. NOPENOPENOPE.

- First of all: why are they letting Hook goof around out in the open? GUYS. SOMEONE LOCK HIM UP. HE IS STILL PRETTY FUCKING DANGEROUS. SNOW. CHARMING. LEROY. ANYONE. GET ON THAT.

- I was not hooked on the whole 'Baelfire being Henry's real dad' thing at the start. Then came Neal, and then... I was a little more inclined towards the possibilites of it. I still hoped. After this episode? I... I kind of really like it, guys. Because in the bar, he and Emma were talking about fate and for fucks sake - Emma was meant to break the curse. The curse that was designed to find Bae. Call it intentional, call it magic going haywire or just plain part-of-the-whole plan: Emma was going to meet Bae. Emma and Bae are the two central points of this entire curse - without Bae, no curse, without Emma, no curse being broken. And who ultimately made sure that the curse would be broken?

Their son. Henry.

Fuck you all, but I love me some full-circle storytelling, and this was done wonderfully.

- And then this bit:
'So Rumplestiltskin is Henry's grandfather?... But I'm his grandfather!'
'You can have more than one'

- Does Regina seem drugged to anyone else? Her interactions with Cora, especially in their last scene, had to me a very huge vibe of 'puppeteer and puppet'. The way she sort of spoke a little sluggishly, the way she tilted her head. She acts and looks more vulnerable in general when she's around Cora, which of course leads back to the whole 'abusive past' thing and everything but... okay, maybe I'm just looking for ways to explain Regina's incredibly stupid decisions while justifying the fact that I still have hope for her? It's going down the drain pretty quickly though.

- I felt like I couldn't breathe for most of this episode. Finding out that Neal was Baelfire really wasn't a shock. But everything was just so heartwrenching. Emma's reaction to seeing him and their talk. Her tip-toeing around everything. Rumplestiltskin's backstory (how cute was he and Milah in the start?). Neal and Rumplestiltskin talking - which really just went wrong right from the start. You don't blackmail your son into talking to you Rumple! You lost points there already. And then offering to use magic? I know he means it. I know he's trying. But he is claiming to have changed in front of a man who only keeps seeing proof that he hasn't. Rumplestiltskin's very words betray each other, and it is testimony to have nervous and desperate he is: he can't talk his own son into a deal. Not anymore. Only deal he broke, and there were too many consequences to count.

- Also? Neal is completely justified in not wanting to talk to his father. It is his right not to want to ever see the man again. He needs to see actual proof that Rumplestiltskin has changed for the better - and I want to point out that he hasn't changed not yet: he's on the path, but he is miles from his destination yet.

- I kind of liked the Seer? Maybe it was the hair. Maybe I have been watching too many Guillermo del Toro movies, but I liked the macabre way she was made (also some of the best CGI on this show, who normally has a really bad track record with this)

- Seeing how Rumplestiltskin really became a cripple was... god. No, I can't comment much on it. I will say this: Milah was too hard on him. Milah was not perfect. But there is another way one can look at it now: she was also dissapointed in Rumple. Because the man she believed she loved clearly wanted to be something more, something better, and in her eyes, he let not just her and their son down, he let himself down. She's a headstrong woman, and she's not able to respect a man like that, she just isn't. I'm not making excuses for Milah's wrong-doings any more than I am making excuses for Rumpelstiltskin's: I'm saying they both have reasons, they're both human and they both screwed up. Milah is not a worse person than Rumple and she did not deserve to die.

- I just... I really sort of want a Neal/Emma endgame, but I don't want them to kiss and make-out all the time, I want there to be epic battles and destiny and yelling at each other in corners, and then in the last episode (if they both survive) we get a kiss and they're all like: 'you still suck', but they still kind of love each other and Henry has a whole family

- (god that whole paragrahp was so naive WHAT AM I THINKING. I am going to regret that so much later on...)

- Henry continues to be made of unicorns and kittens. No, really, I swear: if I ever got a kid, I would want her or him to be just like Henry. YOU PRECIOUS BABY. GOD I LOVE YOU SO MUCH.

- And yes, I caught the final lines of the episode. Yes, I know what it implies. I know what they're doing, the writers. And... no. Just no. Do you know why? Because it's not unlikely that... that he will do it. That he will try to hurt Henry. He is that desperate, if he thinks it will somehow work, will somehow give him Bae back, will somehow give him back everything he ever lost. He could do it. He would do it. If driven far enough. So I repeat: No. Just no.



- WHERE THE FUCK IS AUGUST???