TV Recap: Once Upon a Time 4-16 - Best Laid Plans

Wow!  That was a lot to take in this week.  So let’s get to it.

Our flashback finds Snow and Charming trying to determine whether their child will be good or bad.  They go to a unicorn for help because holding its horn will give them a vision.  And Charming sees a sweet and good child.  However, Snow sees their child ripping out Snow’s heart.  When Snow says, “But I’m your mother,” the teen replies, “I don’t care.”

While they are walking home trying to figure out what their competing visions mean, they meet a peddler who warns them about Mal’s nesting down the road (literally since she’s laid an egg) and sends them to someone who can provide answers – the Sorcerer’s Apprentice.  When they reach his cottage, they learn that the baby could be good or bad, and there is no way to guarantee it.

Well, there is one way, a spell that will send the potential for evil in their unborn child into another vessel – another unborn child.  And so Snow and Charming decide to steal Mal’s egg and use that as the vessel.  They get past Mal’s two guards (Cruella and Ursula) and manage to steal the egg from the dragon Mal.  However, she turns into her human form and pleads for them to return the egg.  They say they will – as soon as the spell is enacted.

However, once the Apprentice finishes the spell, he announces that they must send the egg far away since it will be so evil they don’t want it anywhere near them.  He opens a portal to swallow the egg.  Cruella and Ursula show up to take the egg back, and the two witches plus the egg wind up swallowed.  So that’s how Cruella and Ursula wound up in our world outside of the curse.

The final scene of the flashback shows us Charming and Snow trying to deal with their guilty consciences.  Charming finally explains to Snow that they must be better than they were before to overcome the evil they’ve just done and stay the heroes they want to be.

Meanwhile, in Storybrooke…

August gets sick and is taken to the Blue Fairy, aka Mother Superior, who explains that he has had too many form changing spells enacted on him and he has to fight off the most recent on his own.  Emma has to explain to a jealous Hook that he has nothing to fear from August as a rival, but that August is one of her friends from a time in her life when she didn’t make friends easily.

Meanwhile, there’s the question of what to do with the page that has the author imprisoned in it.  Regina doesn’t want to take the original page back to Gold and the others for obvious reasons, so Emma conjures up a forgery.  It’s close, but not quite as good as the one in the book, but Regina hits on a different solution.  She takes a picture of the page and assumes that will keep them hunting for the door that doesn’t really exist in Sleepyside.

Just one problem, Gold takes one look at the picture and realizes that magic is involved even via the photograph.  He knows what it means, too, the author is trapped in the page.  Mal puts the town under a sleeping curse so that they can go steal the real page.

The curse doesn’t work on those who have already been under a sleeping curse, however, meaning that Mary Margaret, David, and Henry are all awake.  Henry quickly realizes what is going on and takes off for the Sorcerer’s house to try to hide.  Mary Margaret and David have been off trying to deal with Hook’s news that Gold wants to turn Emma dark.  Their secret is eating at Mary Margaret and she doesn’t know what to do about it.  She even hates that they’ve been lying to Emma.

Our villains plus Regina realize that Henry has taken off to hide the book, so Regina goes to get it from him, only Gold sends Cruella and Mal off to make sure she does whatever it takes to get that page.  Regina isn’t thrilled to see them show up just as she finds Henry, but Henry figures out the message that Regina is trying to tell him and he gives Regina the fake page, keeping the real one for himself.

Gold sees right through the fake page, however, and considers it proof that Regina has been working under cover.  He uses magic to knock her unconscious and takes her to the vault where he does something to her that will basically make her a sleeper for him.  Something will trigger Regina turning into Gold’s slave, and we don’t know what it is.

Meanwhile, Mary Margaret and David have shown up at the Sorcerer’s house where Henry is still hiding.  He’s found the key that locks the Author from the book, but instead of letting the Author out, Mary Margaret and David have decided to destroy the page.  They talk Henry into turning everything over to them.  Before they can destroy the page, Mary Margaret’s conscious gets the better of her, even talking about her heart turning dark.  But she doesn’t think the darkness in her heart started when she killed Cora, she thinks it was as a result of stealing Mal’s baby all those years ago.  It is time to come clean to Emma, so they take the book and go.

At some point, the town must have awakened from the curse because Emma, Hook, and everyone else is awake in the next scene.  Emma doesn’t react well to the story, leaving the house after having the conversation from Snow’s vision.  A pleading Mary Margaret says, “But I’m your mother” to which Emma replies, “I don’t care.”

A while later, Hook comes and finds Emma, who is staring at the page.  August is awake and doing well!  Mary Margaret and David are with him.  Emma is not ready to forgive them, but at least she has opened up to Hook again.

We have two other scenes to talk about before we get to the final scene.

First, while Cruella and Mal were following Regina to get the page, Gold went to his shop to visit Belle.  She was under the sleeping curse, but he picked her up and set her on a couch.  He then told her that the price for all the magic he’s use has come back to get him.  He is going to try to undo that and come back to her.

Meanwhile, near the end, Mal demands to know what became of her child.  Gold warns her that it might cause more pain for her, but she wants to know.  Gold offers her a glimpse of 30 years ago when the baby was adopted.  Her new father decided to name her Lily.

So, for the final scene, Emma goes to visit the recovering August.  Mary Margaret and David are there, and Emma is not happy about hat, but she still shows August the page and the key.  August then warns her that this Author was different.  While there have been many through the years (including one named Walt), the reason this Author was trapped in the book was because he was starting to create the stories, not merely record them like a historian, and the earlier Authors, would.  In fact, we see the Sorcerer’s Apprentice trapping the author in the book after complaining about what the Apprentice had been forced to do by the Author in this week’s flashback.  (The Author’s response?  It made a better story.)  But Emma doesn’t care.  She uses the key and frees the Author so she can get answers about what the bombshell her parents have just told her means for her life.

The Author?  Oh, he’s the peddler who had sent Snow and Charming to the Apprentice in the flashback.  Emma demands answers, but the Author manages to flee the room and disappear into Storybrooke.

End episode.  For two weeks!

There’s a lot to process in this episode.  Fortunately, Emma talked about her first real friend, Lily, early in the episode, so I was able to make that connection.  The girl she met and hung out with before going to the Snow Queen’s foster home is Mal’s daughter?  Interesting.  Can’t wait to see how we track her down (because you just know she’s going to show up in Storybrooke before the season is over).  But, the real question is, how evil is she since Emma can obvious be turned to evil.  At least Gold thinks she can be.

Why did this author start manipulating the story?  How did he even get that power?  And what will he do to the town now that he is free?

What did Gold do to Regina?  What is her trigger?  And how long will it take people to figure out what is happening after she becomes Gold’s slave?  I’m guessing Henry will figure it out first after their silent communication about the page in front of Cruella and Mal.

And did we know Henry’s middle name was Daniel, aka the Stable Boy, before?  That sounded like news to me, and I like it.

What is Gold talking about when he talks about the consequences of all his magic?  He was holding his heart, so it seems like a medical problem.  But I thought he was immortal as The Dark One until someone plunges the dagger into his heart.  What was that all about?

I’m beginning to wonder if Emma will truly turn evil.  For the first time, I started to question it since I’ve thought that was where she was going all along this half of the season.  Obviously, she’s mad at her parents and will have to work through that, but might she not turn evil?  That would be quite a twist, wouldn’t it, since they seem to be leading up to it.  If she does, will Regina be in any shape to help her on the road back to good?  Or will Lily be the one to do that?  Again, that would be an interesting twist since Lily is supposed to be the evil one.

I already can’t wait for the episode the Sunday after Easter to see how they continue the story.  So many possibilities to come from what we’ve learned so far, and I can’t wait to see where they actually do go with this story.

Thoughts?  Theories?  Questions?  Hit me up in the comments.