Once Upon a Time: Poor Unfortunate Soul (4x16)

Great stuff. One of the best episodes we've had in a long time. It also had a lot of minute detail and plot elements, so I'll try to get everything down in the plot summary.

In the past, we see Hook on the Jolly Roger with his men. Their ship nearly hits rocks and goes down, due to the deadly sound of mermaid song. Poseidon, the King of the Seas, chastises his daughter Ursula for letting the ship go. Ursula says that she wants to make people happy with her singing, like her mother used to do. Turns out, Ursula's mother was killed by a pirate, and now Poseidon only lets Ursula sing to lure sailors to their deaths. Ursula does not want to live under her father's tyranny any longer, so she steals something that will allow her to walk on land. In a bar, Hook hears her singing and recognizes the voice. He buys her a drink to thank her for sparing his ship. She reveals her story to Hook, and Hook offers her passage to wherever she'd like to go, as a thank you.

Poseidon shows up and tells Hook to take Ursula's singing voice away with a magic shell. That way, he won't lose his daughter. In exchange, Poseidon offers to give Hook a vial of squid ink, which can help him to defeat Rumplestiltskin. Hook tells Ursula what Poseidon offered him. He has another plan, though. He wants Ursula to steal the squid ink from her father, and then he'll take her wherever she wants to go. The plan goes off without a hitch, until Poseidon shows up. He takes the squid ink back and casts it into the ocean. Hook, enraged at his lots opportunity for revenge, takes Ursula's singing voice from her, so that Poseidon can never use it again. Ursula now hates her father but also hates Hook and all men. She decides to cast magic on herself to make her more powerful even than her father. She thus becomes Ursula the Sea Witch.

Back in Storybrooke, the villains try to interrogate August about the Author. He holds out under torture for a while, and then caves and says he has research about the Author in his trailer. Rumple goes to look, but when he comes back he says that he actually didn't look - he knows August was lying. He uses a bit of Fairy magic to turn August back into a puppet - but he then immediately changes back to his human appearance. One puppet-like feature remains, though. His nose will still grow when he tells a lie. August is forced to confess that the Sorcerer trapped the Author behind a wooden door, but that he doesn't know where the door is, except that it's in Storybrooke.

Earlier, Regina was able to get a message to the others that announced that August was back to his old self, and also that Rumple is back in Storybrooke. When they talk to Belle, Belle says that she gave the dagger to Hook. When Hook denies ever having it, they realize that Rumple has the dagger, and that Belle has been manipulated once again. Hook thinks that he can learn Rumple's true plan if he goes to Ursula. If he can give her back her happy ending, then she'll exchange it for information about Rumple.

Hook meets with Ursula, and they strike the deal. Ursula uses her magic to create a portal back to the Enchanted Forest to fetch the Jolly Roger. It ends up being tiny, and stuffed into a bottle. Hook goes to Will, who has something from Wonderland that can make it grow back to normal size. That done, Hook and Ursula go aboard the ship. Hook fetches Ursula's singing voice, but Ursula cannot access it and get it back. Furious with Hook for giving her false hope, she tosses him into the water. Luckily, Ariel saves him. Turns out, the ship was shrunk down by Elsa, because Blackbeard had been using it to terrorize lots of people from Arendelle. Ariel got caught inside the bottle inadvertently.

Emma, Mary Margaret and David all rescue August from Cruella, who was keeping watch while Rumple, Maleficent, and Regina all went looking for the magic door in the Sorcerer's palace. Ursula shows up to stop the good guys from leaving, but then Hook enters. Ariel fetched Poseidon from his world and brought him to apologize to Ursula. Since he was the one to enchant the magic sea shell, he's the only one with the power to give Ursula back her singing voice. He does so, and Ursula happily decides to go back with her father. She does tell Hook Rumple's full plan, though, in honor of their deal. It turns out that the Author can't give the villains their happy endings in Storybrooke, because Emma, the Savior, was the one to give all the heroes their happy endings. Rumple and the others will need to get rid of the Savior before they can get the Author to help them. The way to do that? Corrupt Emma and turn her to the ways of Darkness.

Earlier, Regina had a dream where she was reunited with Robin, but then the Evil Queen version of herself showed up. Regina tells Emma about the dream, and asks if Emma will help her to track down a phone number to contact Robin. Emma says of course she'll help. Emma and Hook talk about how all of the villains eventually lose their happy endings. Hook is afraid of losing his own happy ending, which is being with Emma. Emma, overcome, kisses him. August tells Regina, Emma, and Henry that he was able to sidestep Rumple's questions to avoid telling him where the magical door was kept. Turns out, it's in the book. The page bearing the picture of the door is the actual door. The Author is trapped in the book.

Okay. To start with, I think this episode had a few problems. The main one that I see is the confusion in Ursula's back story. Several of the elements were like Ariel's back story from Disney's The Little Mermaid, and it got a little bit confusing for that reason. At what point did Ursula take on the role that we know her as? In what way is she a villain?

Also, there were a few spots where the dialogue went on too long. At the beginning, we had Hook talking to Smee about Pan, in an awkward attempt to remind us where in his story line we're supposed to be. Ariel gave an awkward little recap of how she found Eric after what Hook did to her the last time. Even Emma's line about Hook's happy ending was too on the nose. It was obvious that Hook was going to say "it's you!" and Emma's obliviousness wasn't in fitting with her character.

Lastly: why did they choose to use a different actress for young Ursula? I didn't mind it, and they did a good job finding someone who looked similar, but it was sort of strange. After all, they've used the same actors for back stories with everybody else, even Cora. Why not for Ursula too?

Given the complexities in this episode, I was surprised by how not-crowded it felt. Everything had its place, and it all came together in an interesting way. In earlier reviews, I complained that the three villainesses all seemed kind of homogeneous, and that was luckily fixed here by giving Ursula her own episode. I'm sure Cruella's story is coming up! Let's talk about some of the things I really loved.

Regina and Emma's friendship gets better and better. Can you picture the Regina of a few seasons ago opening up to Emma and being vulnerable with her? Hell no! But here, we see Regina telling Emma about her dream and asking for her help. So sweet.

Of course, the Emma/Hook stuff was golden. First, there's Emma's utter faith in Killian. She knows that he's not a villain any more. When Ursula walked into the room to stop them from rescuing August, Emma was so worried about Hook! That was adorable! The look of relief on her face when he walked in the door was just precious. And, of course, there's the whole "Don't you know, Emma? It's you." My heart just melts whenever Killian calls her "Emma." And that kiss... so sweet, so gentle. Gosh, these two just slay me.

August! I loved August and Emma's reunion. It was so sweet. They didn't put too much focus on it, but you could feel the shared history and love between them. I hope August sticks around, because I've missed him so much.

It was cool to see Ernie Hudson as Poseidon. Not the kind of role I would have expected for him, but cool nonetheless!

The twist about the Author being trapped in the book is excellent. It opens up a whole new area for exploration. We already have precedent that characters from books exist in their own worlds, what with Frankenstein. I can't wait to see what this means. Will our heroes need to travel into the book world?

The last thing I want to mention is the great details about the other worlds that popped up in this episode. Ariel turns up because of something Elsa did to the Jolly Roger back in Arendelle, and only a potion provided by Will, from Wonderland, can restore the ship to normal. These were small details that went by really fast, but I loved them.

I think I'll stop there. Emma's journey into Darkness has yet to begin, but I'm sure it's going to be deliciously angst-y when it does!

8.5/10