Once Upon a Time - The Apprentice - Review: "Blatant fanservice badly executed"

So that was disappointing: after a few very highly entertaining episodes OUAT crawled back to some of its worst habits: not much of a plot progression, too much setup, roundup logic, stale dialogue, among other things. OUAT sometimes bring some of these elements into its storytelling and it makes it clunky, but most of the times it has a lot of things going for it that allow me to just let them slide. But during this episode it was really hard for me to ignore those flaws.

For starters, it was really, really slow. There is next to no action, mostly talking and those dialogue were pretty much stale and clichéd. There are some remarkable lines- see the stray observation section-, but during most of the episode what is said is beyond predictable, like drama 101. Lines such as “unlike me, you haven’t changed one bit” or “Don’t say I didn’t warn you” make the direction for the episode all the more clear and makes it less surprising and less enjoyable.

And let’s face it; this week’s episode was almost all about Emma and Hook’s date. Actually, it was all about fanservice and stating- once again- why these two can’t be together like a normal couple. Remember last season when Zelena cursed Hook’s lips so he couldn’t kiss Emma? It’s essentially the same thing, only with a lot of blackmailing and some pseudo-psychological effects on Hook.

The writers were so set into putting barriers for Emma and Hook only because they can’t concieve them as a normal couple; even while Emma has decided to leave her issues aside and just thrust herself into this possible relationship with Hook there must be something to done to ruin it. Instead of building a stable and likeable couple like the writers have up until now, Andrew Chambliss & Dana Horgan- this week’s writers- decided to go the cliché way: give them more obstacles!

Why? If Emma and Hook are going to be a couple, let them be. If they have to break up let it be by real issues instead of forced out plots and farfetched manipulation. Seriously, it’s beyond clichéd, it has been done by thousands of fantasy series before this one and every time it becomes more and more annoying.

The reason I find this week’s plot so weak is because we’ve seen Hook being a good man; in his flashback episode, he was an honorable man before he lost his brother, and even after he lost him and he became a pirate, was he ever really that bad before he lost his hand? The worst I remember of him is stealing Rumple’s wife- whom wanted to ditch Rumple anyway-. Things like teaming up with Cora and killing Black Beard came after he lost his hands, so his worst deeds came after he lost the hand, ergo it doesn’t really make much sense that he’d revert to the worst version of himself because of a hand.

And even if he did, isn’t he in a place in which he would be able to handle it? That’s when the psychological effects shown by his hand are actually just pseudo-psychological; it shouldn’t have affected him at all.

He faced his own darkness before and changed. I don’t buy that this is Hook’s true nature and that he is having such a hard time facing it, because he already faced it before and changed: upon change we become much more suited and equipped to deal with our past demons. So even if his hands was actually cursed- which was not in the end- he should have handled it much better than he did onscreen.

In the end it was all a psychological trap made by Rumplestiltskin, which is understable considering their past history, so obviously Rumple would be thrilled to make him suffer a little- even while he promised Neal to be better than that, better than the villain he played during the episode-. The whole blackmailing game between Hook and Rumple became stale as the episode progressed. At some point they were just rambling words, trying to make sense of something that became confusing and hard to follow; it didn’t flow naturally, it was forced in order to work out for the plot.

By the way, Will/Knave of Hearts is still around town, but his story gets no development whatsoever. He crashes Emma’s date, he gets and Alice in Wonderland book and gets arrested. That’s not saying much and his character was really underused and only only served the plot of the week, which was quite weak.

So, is there something that isn’t a complete disaster on this week’s episode? The Flashback, and even then we have some serious issues.

Anna’s quest on the Enchanted Forest comes at early end as she finds Rumple and asks for help. She falls on Rumple’s manipulation and she agrees to his terms.
She goes to a man’s house to give him something that looks like poison; she doesn’t, then it turns out that liquid was actually going to save the man from becoming a rat. Anna and Rumple go back there, and Rumple corners her as she signed a contract which traps her unless she kills Rumple. Tested against her own darkness, Anna turns away and gives Rumple what he needs; a tear from someone who faced darkness and turned away.

This whole plot keeps Anna as a cartoonish character; while Elsa had a chance to go beyond her Frozen persona on the last two weeks, Anna stays pretty much the same person that we knew on Frozen- aside from the fact that she knows swordplay-. I still find her adorable, but we need to see more to her, and I seriously don’t see how this “turning away from darkness” is any different from what we’ve already seen of her. There's really no progress to her character whatsoever.

What’s interesting is that Anna gets a chance to grab Rumple’s dagger- in the silliest yet somewhat funny sequence I’ve seen- when the rat falls on Rumple’s face. Then she makes him promise he will turn the rat back to a human and that she will be sent back with what’s the item that’s keeping the sorceress’ hat sealed.

We know Rumple got to it somehow, so his story with Anna is not over, and I can only wonder what’s going to happen when he gets to Arendelle and meets up with Elsa, Snow Queen and everyone else. That looks very promising, chaotic and interesting, and I really want to get there.

Back in Storybrooke, Rumple has the hat and he tricks Hook into helping him using it to trap the man who used to guard it. Cue to even more blackmailing mumbling, which basically sums up like this: Hook has to beware of Rumple because he now has dirt on him.

The episode ends with its most promising sequence, when Henry decides to help Regina move forward with their operation; after trying in vain to find a cure for Marian, Henry and Regina start talking about happy endings, and how Rumple got one, so Henry suggest he should go undercover, cue to him to ask for a job there, being Rumple’s apprentice, and he starts by sweeping.


Is that a wink to the audience? Do you think Henry will take on Mickey’s role on Fantasia? It would probably be the most interesting thing the show has ever done with him- yet again, I thought that too when he had the heart of the truest beliver and that was a huge let down. Hopefully though, as Jared S. Gilmore proves to be a more skilled actor now than ever, this storyline could be actually kind of great.

So there is promise, there are some moments worth sticking for, some great humor (see stray observations below), but as a whole I felt this episode was pretty lackluster, slow paced and almost endless boredom and that’s OUAT biggest sin considering it usually settles for a more fast paced storytelling with great humor, good acting and great dramatic scenes when it gets the right timing to pull them off. None of those great OUAT qualities are in shown in this episode.

Grade: C-

Stray Observations:

-Trying out something new: I’ll be sticking the grade on the first image so you all know it before handed. Let me know if you like it!

Now, the funny bits!
-Rumple: “I see that blackmailing brings out the romantic in you.”

-David: “I wasn’t too hard on her was I?”
Elsa: “You should have seen me when Kristoff started dating Anna. It was the first time in my entire life that I made someone sweat.”

-Snow: “She seems happy.”
David: “I think she really is changed.”
Emma: “I can hear you guys.”

-Anna to Kristoff: “You smell wonderful.”
Cue to Sven’s constant sniffing.

Now, onto some other stuff:

-Am I the only one who would read the entire contract with Rumplestinskin before signing it? It may be incredibly long, but hey, there’s a lot at risk there. By the way, I once read the terms & agreement contract of Norton Anti-virus out of boredom, so I’d take the time.

-Was that a “Lady and the Tramp” reference at the italian place?

-I may love Fantasia, but not even the references and a flashback centered around it can’t lift this mediocre episode.

-By the way, Hook’s new outfit looks great!

-Emma keeps Knave on jail for crushing her date… well, she says that but we know it’s because he’s shady to him.

-By the way, sorry about not replying anything on the comment section of my last review, I had a lot on my plate during the weekend. I love to talk with you guys. I did notice how much you defended the Snow Queen’s logic and some of you made some interesting points, but I still think that it was quite a dumb plan to begin with.
Also, I can imagine many of you disagreeing with the grade, but here’s the thing: I love OUAT, and because I love it I won’t go easy on it when it delivers an episode that I consider bad. I explained above all the reasons I disliked it, but it’s not an attack on the show, they are things that didn’t work for me, so don’t take it too personally.

-So tell me why you liked me and feel free to disagree with this review as a whole; I may come to appreciate the episode better, that has happened before- I once gave a Community episode a D+ grade and upon discussion I came to see the episode as C material, so that could happen. Convince me!

-The promo for next week’s episode does look promising though.

About the Author - Pablo

I'm currently studying Psychology while also writing fantasy books (one already published in my home country, Chile, you can check it out on the facebook icon). I watch many different types of shows, including my favorites Revenge, Game of Thrones, Once Upon a Time and about 23 more. Currently writing reviews for Once Upon a Time, The 100, Community and Marry Me

Recent Reviews (All Reviews)