ONCE UPON A TIME Belle Lied
Episode 406 “Family Business”
[Photos: Jack Rowand/ABC]
In this episode, there were ogres, a purple rock, and an ice cream truck.
So in this episode, we found out a lot more about Belle than we ever have before. We found out that her mother put material possessions over human life. She was too busy trying to save material goods instead of saving herself and her daughter (whom she kept with her) instead of evacuating when ogres attacked the palace. The material-goods obsessed mother perished. Belle couldn’t remember. So (surprise, surprise), she’s off to see the rock trolls in Arendelle. As many characters and environments as they have to work with, this still seems to be the formula. Introduce a character or characters, then intertwine them with every other character in the story whether it actually fits or not.
But there was a real highlight to the episode. That being Darcey Johnson’s portrayal of Oaken, the shop keeper from Frozen. It’s in his shop that Belle asked where to find the rock trolls. Anna conveniently happened to be there and offered to take her. The two bonded on the trip. On the journey, Belle saw the magic hat box and Anna said she hoped Belle would never run into the guy she stole the box from. Cute nod to the Belle/Rumpel relationship. But it would seem to go against the season premiere when Belle and Mr. Gold went into the house for their honeymoon, Gold noticed the box while Belle paid no mind. Did she not remember? I hope this will be explained.
Grand Pabbie of the rock trolls gave Belle a rock with which she could brew a tea that would restore her memory about her mother. She lost it on the way back when it shattered. This leaves one to wonder if there was ultimately even a point to this whole bit other than to use Belle more and tie in the Frozen world even more. Though it does add a little bit in Storybrooke when Belle said she knew nothing about Anna before pocketing a map of Arendelle to hide it then vowing to find Anna herself. Then in the Snow Queen’s palace, her reflection ridicules her. Should be interesting to see if it’s Belle’s conscience or the magic in the mirror that made that happen.
It was nice to see the core cast together in a room together without the I-actually-hate-you-but-let’s-work-together-anyway attitudes getting in the way. Of course it was to see the video of Emma crossing paths with the snow queen years before. And Henry has his single contribution to the episode by suggesting they look for the ice cream truck. It was found in the woods containing files showing that Ingrid (the Snow Queen) had been following Emma since Emma arrived in Storybrooke, but alas, no ice cream. The whole she’s-been-there-the-whole-time-but-nobody-remembers shtick is getting kinda old at this point.
And of course there needs to be an even greater complication to the massive intertwined family that is practically every character. Elsa showed a scroll that had a prophesy that said the savior (Emma) would become Ingrid’s sister. Isn’t everything a bit convoluted as it is? Emma figured that she and Elsa would be safe from Ingrid planning to freeze everyone, as they would become her happy little family. I’m still waiting to see where Ingrid’s other sister, Helga, comes in, or what powers she might have. (Fire powers maybe?)
Oh, and Regina told Robin he would need to figure out how to fall back in love with Marian. After all, they couldn’t let that slide for one episode. And did I mention SQ got the hat box? Yeah. She took it and put Anna in a cage.
Overall, not the worst episode of the season so far, but still not exactly the best. There are still a lot of questions that need to be answered.
[Show web site at ABC] [Previous Recap: “Breaking Glass”]
