Price Zimmer ’14 | Staff Writer

After a strong start to its second season, “Once Upon a Time” delivered an impressive second episode, “We Are Both”, in which everything seemed to click.

After the two major leads Snow White/Mary Margaret and Emma Swan, played by Ginnifer Goodwin and Jennifer Morrison respectively, are stranded in the remnants of the Enchanted Forest with no way back to Storybrooke in last week’s episode, “We Are Both” focuses on the rest of the cast, which was on full display.

However, special attention must be brought to how the show handled the antagonist, The Evil Queen/Regina Mills played by Lana Parrilla, and how she comes to realize that she has become her mother, the person she promised herself she never wanted to be. This allows her to have a genuine moment of self-reflection and character growth, which was not gimmicky in the least.

While in the past, “Once Upon a Time” has relied too heavily on flashbacks to The Enchanted Forest for developing the story, the flashbacks are used tastefully and draw a nice parallel to the actions of Regina’s mother in the past and her actions in the present.

The show also creatively explained why no one is willing to leave Storybrooke, a solution that is just horrible enough to rebuke any rash decisions a character may make, but still leaves the door open for future development.

Prince Charming, played by Josh Dallas, has a strong episode as he has to raise the spirits of the townsfolk, without Snow White or Emma Swan, and also deal with a situation between Regina and Harry. He also meets the Mad Hatter, though their meeting does not end well, he will be involved in some future quest to get “Snow” and Emma back to Storybrooke.

Rumpelstiltskin/Mr. Gold played by Robert Carlyle, showed some emotional depth in Storybrooke, becoming angry when he realizes he cannot leave the city boundaries to save his son. His flashback appearance is not bad, but the poorly done makeup for his character definitely distracts and takes away from Carlyle’s performance.

All in all, this was a strong episode and proved this show not only has a story to tell after the curse was lifted last season, but has enough depth in writing and characters to not need the main female leads, Snow White and Emma Swan, to have any major role in an episode whatsoever. A very well crafted and executed episode, that fully deserves an “A”.