I think we’ve well established on here that I quite love this show, it is certainly the current fixation, and taking up most of my brain space. So, let’s not waste too much time and try to dive into this quite quickly.
I have watched Once Upon A time numerous times with love. I have a particular love for a one Emma Swan, and just as great a love for her endgame pairing with Killian Jones, so let’s take a look at CaptainSwan, shall we?
As always with any fresh show in a Fortnightly Fixation’s post we start with the boring bits. The admin if you will.
An Introduction
Once Upon A Time is an American fantasy adventure drama series that aired on ABC. The Pilot aired on October 23rd, 2011, and the series continued for seven seasons, concluding on May 18th, 2018. The first six seasons follow the same set of heroes and villains, mainly Emma and her surrounding family, while the 7th season finds itself basically rebooted, in a new city with a new focus.
The series was created by Lost writers Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, who intended for the show to be primarily about hope and optimism. They reportedly conceived the idea for the show before joining the writing staff of Lost but waited until the show was over so they could focus on OUAT.
The show was primarily shot in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The village of Stevetson in Metro Vancouver is known for doubling as the town of Storybrooke, a location you can in fact go visit. Though sets did exist for the outside of some stores. Downtown Vancouver often functioned as places like New York, Boston and Seattle. As all the best shows set in the States are actually shot in Canada.
Once Upon A Time stars Jennifer Morrison as Emma Swan, Ginnifer Goodwin as Snow White, Josh Dallas as Prince Charming, Lana Parrilla as Regina Mills, Robert Carlyle as Mr Gold and Jared S. Gilmore as Henry Mills. Important for this post is the Season 2 addition of Colin O’Donoghue as Killian Jones.
OUAT spawned a spinoff series in the form of Once Upon A Time in Wonderland, which ran for 13 episodes from October 10th, 2013, to April 3rd, 2014.
As always more details of the cast, crew and production of on Once Upon A Time can be found on IMDb.
Both Once Upon A Time and its spinoff can currently be streamed on Disney+ in the UK.
A Summary (Mostly Spoiler Free)
Once Upon A Time follows a one Emma Swan, when a young boy, Henry, shows up at her door. Henry claims to be her son, he also claims that all the fairytale characters you know, and love are trapped in a small town in Maine, in our world, the land without magic. Emma must save them.
The show then proceeds to explore what it would be like for these characters if they were in our world and shows how they develop and grow and find each other.
It also alternates this arc in the land without magic, with an arc in the fantastical magical world of the Enchanted Forest, which is just as fun to see and piece together the parts that brought our characters to Maine.
This is your SPOILER WARNING.
A Guide
I realised in writing this that this is one of those shows where you need a list of reference if you’re reading this without having seen the show. If you’ve seen the show, feel free to skip this section, but if you need a brief reminder because it’s been awhile it’s here for you. If you’re reading this despite not having seen the show, and my spoiler warning, anything you find out you signed up for willingly.
So, really quickly:
- Emma Swan is just Emma Swan, but she is the long-lost daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming
- Snow White in Storybrooke is Mary Margaret Blanchard
- Charming in Storybrooke is David Nolan.
- Killian Jones is the birth name of Captain Hook, with Hook being a moniker he gained after losing his hand.
- Henry Mills is in fact Emma’s son, and also Regina’s adoptive son, who is the Evil Queen.
- Rumplestiltskin in Storybrooke is Mr Gold, he is also Hook’s ‘crocodile’.
Okay, that’s it. Those are all that are mentioned for now.
A Sold Ship
Let’s start easy, shall we?
For one, if he sells his ship to be with you, a ship he has shown time and time again he quite cherishes, you can safely assume that what he has for you is a more than casual feeling. In fact, let us all wish to find our own Captain willing to sell his ship to get to us.
Of course, this moment at which she finds out is the moment she kisses him, for real this time, so clearly, she got the message.
My point? Hook was down HARD.
And Emma, based on her hesitation, and own admittance of fear of losing him, was very close to the same area of feeling as he was. She’s a cautious person, though, so regardless of how deep she may have been, we all know it was going to take some serious pushing to get her to admit it. As Killian so nicely puts it:
“Why can you only admit how you feel when one of us is facing certain death?”
Killian Jones – Once Upon A Time – Episode 520 “Firebird”
A Change to the Good
Their love is a deep one, and I don’t think that’s up for debate. It’s one of those we kind of all wish we could get but know deep down only exists in the fictional worlds of our stories. They, however, live in a world where those fictional stories are fictionally real.
Emma, despite being the face of everything, and the saviour and the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming, is our perspective in the show. She knows as little as we do, and we follow as she figures stuff out, learn with her. Most shows need the mostly clueless character so that exposition can be given with reason, and Emma fits that mould perfectly for OUAT. She is also the only character, aside from Henry, to have been raised completely in ‘our’ world as it were, meaning she has the same realistic expectations of things as we do.
In short: she does not expect a fairytale love. She does, however, get one.
Now, of course, Emma’s expectations are shaped not only by her being of the ‘real’ world, but also of her less than great childhood. Let’s be honest, as far as we can tell, it mostly sucked. She’s not a particularly positive person, and she’s hardly a fully formed adult when we meet her. She has had no examples of some future to aspire to around her growing up, so she expects very little of a world she is isolated in.
Then comes along the man who would sell his ship to get to her again.
As Emma put it in Season 2, she’s not used to people putting her first. Snow and Charming are of course the first ones to do this, being her parents, but Hook is the first one to do so without any familial expectations to do so.
Sure, Emma had started to get used to this experience from Snow and David but having learnt they were her parents there was a sort of expectation, an expectation she was admittedly unfamiliar with, but an expectation nonetheless that they would. They are family after all, regardless of whether you grew up with one, or without one, or a good one or a bad one, there is always sort of an expectation that your parents love will be unconditional. It is a feeling Emma has to get used to, but Snow and Charming make it clear from the beginning that she is someone they cherish, and that clearly they are not the people she thought they might’ve been when she thought her parents were normal people who simply gave her up. Now, granted she could never have expected her parents to be Snow White and Prince Charming, but nevertheless they are clearly good people, so expecting unconditional love from them is a feeling she can get used to. Now, still, her being cautious, this takes her a solid two more seasons, but she gets there is the point.
Hook, however, is the first person to choose her with no obligation to do so. He showed Emma that someone can willingly choose to love you, to care for you, to choose you over and over again, and put you first. He shows he’s committed, because he commits to change for her. He shows up, he puts the work in to show he is worthy of happiness, he’s changing for her. His happiness now is not his revenge, but her.
Killian showed her commitment like she had never felt before. Let’s not forget, regardless of Neal’s return, their conversation, her admittance that she still loved him, as far as she knew he abandoned her. That’s all she felt, and knew back then, and for a decade following. She thought her parents abandoned her, that’s all she knew. The people she had trusted in her life up until now, though sparing and few were people who broke that trust and showed her that no one can be relied upon but herself. Season 5 shows us that a key piece of life advice she took was to armour up and close herself off. So, she did!
Hook entered and dismantled that whole belief.
Sure, her parents and Henry started it. Showing that people beyond herself can be trusted, but she was slow to change, and there’s always that lingering feeling that these people were obligated to do so.
Hook was not. He chose to. Not only did he work hard to earn her trust, and her love, he showed up time and time again showing that he would put her first regardless. Hook helped break down a lot of her armour, and her walls. He helped her open up, and face things she would usually run from, and that includes committing to him. My point? Hook changed her for the better.
That relationship goes two ways, because as stated Emma is the reason Hook works to become a better man, and boy, does he put in the WORK. He realises after their excursion to Neverland, that he’s in this for the long haul. He sells his ship to get back to her, and patiently waits his turn. He waits for her to come to him, because he knows it’s got to be when she’s ready.
When they first meet, he reads her like an open book, and she was very closed off then, more closed off then she is now. So, he understands her, and takes her lead. In the meantime, he works on himself. He wants to become a better man, worthy of her love, and her trust. He shows up when she needs, when she calls. He chases her through time portals, and fights for her life in ice walls, and helps when before no one would’ve asked him to. He’s a handsome rapscallion, but he’s a handsome rapscallion who wants to be a hero, because now happiness is not the dark desire of revenge, but the peaceful existence at the end of a long day’s work of good with the woman he loves. Emma changed Killian for the better.
A Chase Through Realms
Season 5 is the clearest depiction of their dedication and commitment. The last season had ended with Emma finally admitting to Hook that she loves him, in this moment of extreme sacrifice and turmoil. Everyone who loves her, including Hook, then travels desperately across the realms to get to her, to save her from the darkness, and then at the end of that, they all travel to the Underworld to save him.
My personal opinions of the majority of the Underworld arc aside, it ends with a beautiful episode, “Firebird“, which confirms for us one thing: they have True Love. In the show, that is one of the most important forms of magic to be blessed with, it’s powerful. It’s the reason Emma is who she is, after all.
Season 4 was a turning point in the chase and flirtation to the committed relationship, they got to progress and discover and take their time. Build up the relationship that Season 5 was going to test and test it DID.
Season 5 more than puts them THROUGH IT. They have three ‘forever’ goodbyes in one season. They chase each other to three different realms, have their love tested by Greek Gods, by darkness, by ancient sorcerer’s, and long dead brothers, combat each their own internal conflicts and yet hold steadily strong for the other, find the light when there is none and choose each other.
When I say ‘forever’ goodbyes, I mean those scenes where at least one of them is 90% sure the other is going to die, kind of goodbyes. Where they’re pretty sure they’re never going to see them again, sort of thing. That happens, three times this season.
So, if up until then you had had any doubt as to just how far each of them had fallen, this season more than shows you that they are both in this for good now. They have fallen so far, they’re in the Underworld (literally!). Committed, they have surpassed.
This isn’t the last time their love will cross realms, with Season 6 having them separated by such means, by my count, four separate times. Each time they both go to the ends of the world to get back to each other. There is love, there is True Love, and then there is CaptainSwan.
Not to mention, of course, they do get married in Season 6, which sways any doubts that were not covered by the buttloads of subtext, dramatic declarations, and, ya know, the crossing of realms.
An Understanding
They understand each other more than anyone around them. What shows this in the simplest form is how they refer to each other.
Killian calls her ‘Swan’. This is significant because, though ‘Emma’ is her name, it does not belong to her so to speak. It is a name Snow picked, as all mothers do for their kids, and more importantly it is the name in the book. ‘Emma’ is Snow and Charming’s daughter, ‘Emma’ is the Saviour, ‘Emma’ is prophesised to bring the Happy Endings, to participate in the Final Battle. This is all that responsibility that Emma didn’t want when Killian met her. The name ‘Emma’ carries the weight of the expectations bestowed upon her when she was born, never mind when she discovered who she was. ‘Emma’ is the Saviour, but ‘Swan’ is the name she chose. Sure, maybe I’m reading too much into that, because you query how much thought could’ve gone into what Hook calls her from nearly the beginning of their relationship. He’s calling her ‘Swan’ when their flirtation is still one sided! But, one thing is clear about Killian, he read her like an open book from Day One.
It should also be noted that it’s been stated by the creators that the name ‘Swan’ is representative of Emma’s journey and development. Just while we’re talking about it.
Emma, eventually, calls Hook ‘Killian’. She sort of transitions into it, merging between saying Hook and Killian. It starts on their date, I believe, probably prompted from when he shows up without his hook, and with the nickname no longer applying he says she can just call him ‘Killian’. Of course, he gets his hook back, but that doesn’t mean Emma stops calling him ‘Killian’. Like I said she transitions into it mixing between saying ‘Killian’ to his face most of the time, but still occasionally referring to him as ‘Hook’ to her parents. Until we get deep into Season 5, Season 6 and he is just ‘Killian’ almost all of the time.
The significance? Captain Hook is who he became on his quest for revenge. I’m not saying that pre-hook Killian was an angel, but I am saying that it is in becoming Hook that he delved into the depths of his darkness, in his quest to get revenge against ‘the crocodile’ as he says. Emma referring to him as ‘Killian’ shows that she doesn’t see him as Hook anymore, she instead sees the man he wants to be, Killian Jones. The person he is working to become.
For both names, the significance is in the fact that they see each other for who they choose to be, rather than what the world made them. Killian calls Emma by a name she chose, not by a name that comes with the responsibility that she takes a while to bare, to be fair. It is almost a promise that there are no expectations between them. He’s not expecting a saviour, he’s expecting his ‘Swan’. Emma calls Killian by the name of the man he wants to be, rather than the name his revenge gave him. She sees him for his good, it is a representation of belief in him.
It should be said that that belief comes from the fact she didn’t believe herself to be a good person, and now by all accounts she mostly is. She believes if she can change, so can Hook.
She has faith in him, and as such to her he is Killian Jones. Just as to him, she is ‘Swan’, not a saviour.
A Captain and A Saviour
All this to say, Emma Swan and Killian Jones change each other for the better and manage to grow such a deep love and commitment for one another that they would do possibly literally anything to save one another. We would all dream to have someone who was dedicated to us like that.
So, we love them, and we watch them grow, and become close, and remember the shaded backgrounds from which they both come knowing that they have come so far, and neither is a small part in that development for the other. An intertwining love that is to the benefit of both parties is beautiful. They are not flawless people, and they know that and work for the better. It is not a flawless love, but it is perfect, for it aids them to be better.
A Conclusion
Here we go! Another Fortnightly Fixations.
Yes, it is spooky season, and no this is not spooky like I hoped for, but it is my current fixation so we’re not getting any better I’m afraid.
Regardless, I hope it was a fun read. I realise it is yet again an exploration of a love. I’m a romantic, I really like love. This is going to come up again, and again, and again, and so many more times. Just going to have to adapt to it. Thank you, nevertheless, for reading and sticking through. I can only hope it was as interesting to you as it was for me to write.
I hope to see you again in a fortnight for the next installation of Fortnightly Fixations!
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the images, narratives or characters present or referenced in this post. All rights belong to ABC and all other relevant parties.