While Snow White made some positive progress in one of the storylines in this week’s episode of “Once Upon A Time,” “Heart of Darkness”, her future self in Storybrooke, Mary Margaret, continued to plummet into hot water courtesy of the evil queen, Regina Mills.

Back in the enchanted forest we returned to Snow White and Prince Charming’s back-story. As a result of the potion she took from Rumplestiltskin that rid her of any memory of her true love, Snow has changed. She is cold, mean, and, as her seven dwarf roommates point out, a completely different person. 

Snow refuses to listen to them and decides that the true source of her problems is the evil queen and she must get revenge and kill the queen. Despite Grumpy’s attempts to stop her from going down this dark road, she goes to Rumplestiltskin for help with completing the task. He gives her a map to the queen and a bow and arrow that won’t miss to complete her mission. 

Meanwhile, Prince James/Charming has been tracking Snow after escaping his evil father King George. Charming eventually finds his way to Rumplestiltskin who fills him in on Snow’s intentions and warns him that should she succeed in killing the queen, all of the queen’s evil will be transferred to her. In exchange for this information and the knowledge that true love’s kiss will break the spell of Snow’s memory potion, all Rumplestiltskin requests is Charming’s coat.

The first time Charming catches up with Snow and kisses her all that he gets in return is a punch in the face because she does not remember loving him. But when Charming jumps in the way of the arrow Snow fires at the queen, sacrificing himself to save Snow from turning evil, she is truly moved by his gesture of love. They kiss and she regains her memory. 

Unfortunately, that’s just when King George’s men show up and capture him to take him back to the king. The back-story part of this episode ends with Snow calling after him the couple’s signature promise, “I will always find you,” and then a quick flash to Rumplestiltskin who has combined the DNA from Charming’s jacket with one of Snow White’s hairs to create a true love potion.

Back in Storybrooke Mary Margaret’s faith is diminishing by the hour as evidence in the Kathryn murder continues to pile up against her. First of all, the DNA of the heart has come back and it matches Kathryn’s. Call me optimistic but part of me still wants to believe Kathryn is alive because in the last episode she was seen in they showed that her true love from the past works at the school as like a gym teacher or something. If Emma is supposed to bring back the “Happily Ever After’s” I would like to think that one is still possible for Kathryn. However, finding a cut out heart in a box that matches Kathryn’s DNA does not leave a lot hope for this belief.

The heart was also found was in Mary Margaret’s jewelry box and Emma found a hunter’s knife hidden in the heating vent in Mary Margaret’s room. Mary Margaret is, as expected, freaking out because whoever is framing her is doing a super thorough job. 

If that weren’t enough, stupid David, (Prince Charming), goes to see a psychologist to try and regain the memories from his blackout in the last episode. But instead of remembering those, he sees flashes of the past where he is trying to talk Snow White out of murdering the queen. Of course he figures that he is trying to talk Mary Margaret out of murdering Kathryn. So he goes and flat out asks Mary Margaret if she did it. Darn it David! She stood by you when everyone thought you did it. You know he is so much more likeable in the past than in the present.

Emma at least believes Mary Margaret is innocent and, thanks to Henry, suspects that Regina is the culprit. Henry stole his mom’s mega key ring and showed Emma that there is a key on it that opens her and Mary Margaret’s apartment door. Yay Henry! Henry also has a run in with that mysterious guy who rode into Storybrooke several episodes ago. In this episode he does in fact reveal that he believes that the stories in Henry’s book are true and also wants to convince Emma of it like Henry does. Seriously, who is this guy?

At the end of the episode Emma goes to Mr. Gold, (Rumplestiltskin), for help to do whatever it takes to beat Regina and save Mary Margaret.  Mary Margaret however, has lost hope and escaped from prison with a key she found under her bed. I, like many other viewers, am still very confused as to Rumplestiltskin’s/Mr. Gold’s motives. He clearly did not like the evil queen in the past but gave her knowledge on how to create the epic curse. He clearly is not an ally to Regina in the present and is not under her control or curse. And while he seems to always offer help to present Mary Margaret, David, and Emma, as well as past Snow White and Charming, we know he has an ulterior personal motive. We just have no idea what that is…yet.

 

Reach reporter Geanna C. here