Once Upon a Time "Poor Unfortunate Soul" Review: Tentacle Scorn

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http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/vUlB3asXnl6oE8sJ3h_Bxg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTg2O3E9NzU7dz0xMzA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en-US/homerun/cbstv.cbs.com/a164735203a0b14d02b12a27f3eea13c (http://news.yahoo.com/once-upon-time-poor-unfortunate-170300815.html)Once Upon a Time S04E16: "Poor Unfortunate Soul" Guys there are a lot of things we could do for an hour on Sunday evenings. We could memorize William Blake poems to impress our friends during quiet moments by the fireside on camping trips. We could learn survivalist skills that would help us endure civilization's inevitable collapse. We could huff paint. When faced with such varied alternatives, is it really a better choice to watch Once Upon a Time? If every episode were like "Poor Unfortunate Soul" that answer would be a resounding, "NO BITCH, I DON'T THINK SO." Except, of course, for the two minutes on national primetime TV when a man's nose growing magically further and further outward was used in a gritty, dramatic context. Yes, August was tortured via his magical, wooden, extruding, uncomfortably phallic nose. That was maybe one of my favorite moments in television history, and it provided all of the mental confusion of huffing paint with (presumably) none of the brain damage. Aside from this fever dream sequence, "Poor Unfortunate Soul" mostly focused on the story of Ursula, who started life as a very little mermaid whose beautiful voice attracted pirates to spiky rocks, but then she'd stop singing because she believed it was wrong to lure innocent sailors to their death, and then her bro dad King Triton Sr. would pop up in his solid gold armor and yell at her for being a pussy. Here's a shocker for you: Ursula had lost her mom. Those of us who have seen two or three consecutive episodes of this show understand by now that no one and no action is motivated by anything other than parental abandonment. NOTHING is not about parents. Everything in life can be traced back to the fear of a parent leaving or losing a kid, forever and ever. It's universal, it's high-stakes, and it takes the least amount of explanation, so there you go. Anyway, Ursula got so fed up with her dad telling her how to sing/kill people that she stole a giant plastic bracelet from his vault so she could live on land, singing on auto-tune in bars for drunk guys. Then Hook came along and was like, "If you want passage anywhere, hop on board." BUT THEN her dad showed up on Hook's boat and was like, "Hey help me out with my daughter. Use this shell to steal her voice—to be clear, her SINGING VOICE—and I can discourage her from this pop star madness and maybe get her to pursue pre-med. In return I'll give you squid ink, which in some way will help you kill Rumplestiltskin, and you can bet this shit will be returning later in the season to help Storybrooke defeat the dark one." A couple things about this: First off, that shell and everything about it were straight out of Disney's animated The Little Mermaid movie, obviously, except that in the movie, the shell traps the whole damn voice. Not just the "singing voice," which is biologically the exact same thing as the speaking voice. This distinction was extremely crazy and inaccurate to the source material. The Little Mermaid would've been a very different movie if Ariel could've piped up during the "Kiss the Girl" ballad. But I digress. Meanwhile, in a cabin in Storybrooke, all the villains were torturing August so that he'd tell them about the Author. Regina was trying her best to pitch in with a handful of fire, but her heart wasn't really in it. As soon as she had a chance to communicate to the heroes, she did so, puppeting Snow White in a very disturbing moment where Ginnifer Goodwin spoke with Lana Parrilla's voice. I guess the Dark One is savvier about picking up on people using their cell phones than people casting spells, so this was a craftier move? It was certainly a creepier move. Elsewhere Hook approached Ursula and was like, "I can get you your happy ending, just do me some huge favors, like opening a portal and fishing my ship out of the sea." And then we learned that we can now add "tentacle penetration" to the growing list of things that open a portal. Ursula retrieved his boat, it was tiny and in a glass bottle. I don't remember how this happened, but of course it was quickly reversed. And then Hook gave the voice shell back to Ursula, or tried to, but it didn't take, so he pulled a longarm on her. Yes, Hook pulled a gun on a woman who'd never hurt him. He's pretty gallant, that Hook. Ursula threw him overboard and I was like, "Finally. I knew I liked you, Ursula." Next: Page 2 (Continued from Page 1) Meanwhile Rumple returned with some Fairy Bullshit that sort of returned August to Wooden Man status, but then he was back to normal but then also his nose grew whenever he told lies? To be clear, I loved this part. I can't remember the last time I laughed this hard while feeling so unsettled. That was a very sexually aggressive nose; I think Freud would agree. I mean, I know I used this image above but honestly I cannot get over it. Look how happy Robert Carlyle is! To finish the Fairy Tale Land flashback: Hook had been totally cool with giving Ursula a ride, and even explained that her dad had offered this super cool deal and he was turning it down, and then her dad popped up and was like, "Eff you, eff you too, eff all the guys in the tri-corner hats standing behind you, no squid ink for any of you!" So Hook, to retaliate against King Triton Sr., stole Ursula's voice after all. Then he kept the shell in a cubby hole. And Ursula got so mad that she turned her mermaid tail into eight extremely agile CGI tentacles. And just like that, she was ready to rocket to fame in the tentacle porn industry. Anyway, thanks to Regina using Snow's body like a sock puppet, the "heroes" broke into the cabin to rescue August. Snow clobbered Cruella with a frying pan, then Ursula grabbed Snow around the neck and gave her a bunch of suction-cup hickeys, and just as we were all seriously considering changing the channel, Hook came in. Ariel had saved him and then jumped through a portal and retrieved Ursula's father, who hadn't changed breastplates in lo these 30 years, and it was he who ended up returning Ursula's voice. Then they embraced and were like, "Hahaha, how silly of us to be estranged for 30 years LOL let's be family again," and everyone else was like, "Awesome, does this mean you're off the show, Ursula? Just like that? Like three episodes in?" and Ursula was like, "Basically. Or until they need squid ink to handle the Dark One, then they'll probably need me to help or some shit." It all happened so quickly and so clumsily, like when you slip and fall down a short flight of stairs. And I had to contemplate once again: HOW CRAZY EASY IS IT TO CROSS WORLDS WITH MERMAIDS?! Why in the NAME OF HELL did Rumple have to wait for a woman with exactly the right temperament and talent... then slowly train and corrupt her... and then manipulate her into casting a curse to cross over to Earth to get to Baelfire... when he could've accomplished the exact same thing by befriending a mermaid? I beg of you, do not spend precious energy considering that question. You could be learning Latin root nouns in those precious, finite seconds instead. Next: Page 3 (Continued from Page 2) Oh also Regina had this weird dream about killing Robin that she HAD to tell Emma about. Then she asked Emma if Emma would find Robin's email address/pager number/P.O. box for her. Regina, the address for Robin is 1 Hollow Log, Cheatonmewife Falls, Maine. Please send beef jerky. Oh also Hook was like, "Emma you're my happy ending," so all of you who are into that, you know: how thrilling 4 u. Then Ursula was like, "Before I go regress to the exact same situation that made me miserable at age 16, I should tell you Gold's plan: The Author can't give villains their happy endings while the Savior is in the world, so Gold has decided to turn Emma's heart dark forever." "But Emma will still technically exist even if her heart is dark?" Hook asked, puzzled. "At this point, Snow has had a dark spot on her heart for like two seasons or something, and it hasn't kept her from walking through a door that only the purest-hearted people could cross or splitting her heart between herself and Charming, so really how serious is this 'dark heart' crap anyway?" "I'm just the messenger," Ursula sighed heavily. "Look at my plotline as an example and ask yourself: Are you really expecting some Tolstoy to unfold at this point? Are you expecting to be bowled away by some intricate explanation of a larger arc that ties together the last four seasons, the most recent half of which was based on a movie that didn't come out until this show was halfway through its run? Yeah, manage your expectations. We're all here for these awesome actors, the insane Disney references, and the shipping fandoms. TTYL." Meanwhile August explained that the Author was trapped in the Storybook itself. VERY POWERFUL GUY, this Author, getting trapped in an illustration like a Roald Dahl character. Soooooo. It IS intriguing to think of Emma being turned "to the dark side," but I'm sort of peeved that Ursula's storyline is already resolved. Is that how OUAT is going to handle this the rest of Season 4? By resolving each villain one by one with some missing kid or parent? Stay tuned? QUESTIONS: ... Why did Ursula age when Hook and her dad didn't? ... The Author is trapped in the what now? ... August's nose growing: How many nightmares will you have about this? ... What was your favorite part of this episode?



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