fuckyeahmelancholy:

Regina: (being tortured) *Resists giving away information until the last possible moment, finds out who her torturers are, their numbers, what they’re trying to do, and their motivation*

Mary-Margaret: (being tortured) I think I smell sardines?

(via bigdreams-stubbornheart)

“I’ll teach you everything you need to know. But first, I need you to do something for me.”

“What?”

“I need you to marry the king.”

“Why?”

“Because I need you to be queen, dearie. Simple as that.”

“But I was going to learn magic to be free.”

“Power is freedom, dearie.”

“No. I won’t do it. I’ll run away.”

“Run away with what? And who exactly do you know who could help you? Deal with it, dearie. I’m all you have. You want to be free? You have to do it my way.”

If I could pinpoint when I stopped watching OUAT for the story and only watched for Regina, I’d say it was “The Outsider.”

Up until “The Cricket Game” (and including that episode), I was hooked. I was looking forward to each episode despite some of the problems I had before then with Hook’s general sleaziness, the dropped plot threads, and so on.

But from “The Outsider” onward, something changed. I started dreading rather than looking forward to each episode. I stopped caring about anybody other than Regina, and even then I was more like, “OK, how the fuck are they gonna make her suffer now?” rather than, “I wonder what she’s going to do next.”

Although there were a few bright spots in the latter half of this season (“Welcome to Storybrooke” springs to mind), my viewing experience this season has been pretty disappointing. So much so that I’m going to skip Season 3 unless it’s one of those “Regina is fucking awesome” episodes.

I wish I could put my finger on exactly what went wrong, but I can’t.

Can anybody help me out here?

(Something that originally started as part of the spinoff I was doing but could easily be adapted to another story.)

This person doesn’t have to be a little green Muppet, but they should be someone it’s easy to underestimate upon first viewing.

QUOTES

“Whoever you learned that from taught you spells but not magic.”

“Teaching her is gonna be harder than teaching an absolute beginner. A beginner knows nothing and can do nothing. She has to unlearn everything then learn everything all over again.”

“In the beginning, magic wasn’t a thing you got from books. In fact, magic is older than writing. Where was I? Oh yeah. Magic wasn’t spell books and fairy dust. In the old days, people would go all by themselves to the wilderness, or the desert, the mountains, the sea, with no supplies but their own knowledge and strength. They’d stay there until something happened that awakened them. A lot of them died or just went missing, but the ones who came back were never the same. They became wise and powerful teachers and leaders of their people. What happened? Well, same thing that always does, I suppose. Instead of seeking their own answers, people wanted others to give the answers to them.”

“Of course the whole universe is but a speck in the Turtle’s eye. I thought everyone knew that.”

“Magic is art and science and religion put together.”

Pinky Pie (My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic), “Evil Enchantress”

bitsyvon:

‘Regina never rests’ from Fred’s twitter.
Just love those two goofballs!!

Head canon: Regina vandalizes all Snow White images and memorabilia.

(via corasparasol)

That post about The Golden Child got me thinking about giving Kiana a bigger role in Regina’s post-Storybrooke journey.

I was thinking that, like the Golden Child, Kiana has spiritual powers she’s developed as a result of being raised by monks.

Perhaps there is a threat coming to the realm from the spirit world (some kind of powerful demon sealed by the monks who lived in that temple centuries ago?). So the monks tell Kiana that she, along with the other young people at the temple, must leave the monastery so that they could reseal the wards without being a danger to anyone else. During this time of absence, the young adults are instructed to learn as much as they can and to spread the teachings of their spiritual tradition. Each of them has dreams telling them to go in different directions to different parts of the world, so they wind up getting separated from each other. 

(The truth, which would be revealed at the end of the “season,” is that the monks sent Kiana away to protect her. They knew that when the demon/entity escaped the seal they would not stand a chance against it. So, rather than allow everyone to be killed and their spiritual tradition to die out, they send Kiana away with the rest of the young people. Most of the young people from the temple wind up getting corrupted or killed by agents of the demon/entity the monks died in their attempt to keep it from the world.)

Now alone, Kiana has to make her way in the world and gets herself into some ridiculous trouble. This is partly because she has no clue about the social and political conventions of the society she finds herself in. Her irreverent attitude towards authority doesn’t help either. She’s also far too curious for her own good.

One day, Kiana manages to get herself into some deep trouble, and winds up in a tiny cell all by herself. Unsure of what to do, she meditates as the monks taught her, and she is granted a vision. The vision shows her the thoughts and memories of someone who can protect her and guide her through the world as she tries to carry out the monks’ last request. She sees a person who was deeply wounded by her experiences, who has done terrible things out of ignorance or fear. But she also sees strength, loyalty, determination, caring, hidden wisdom, and a tremendous capacity for love.

“She’s perfect,” mutters Kiana in her trance.

Meanwhile, Regina wakes up from sleep when a strange light appears in the room. She follows the light to its source and sees a figure in a meditative pose floating in mid-air. The figure exudes joy and laughter and wonder. There is purity and wisdom and kindness too. Regina feels herself wanting to preserve and protect it, feelings she hasn’t had since she was the center of Henry’s world. What kind of magic is this? She walks forward into the light coming from the figure.

“She’s perfect,” she hears a voice say from the depths of her mind.

eshusplayground:

Somebody: Regina raped Graham!

Others: *like, reblog, comment*

Me: Why do so many people pay attention to a flagrantly fantastical situation and not to the very eerie real-world aspects of marital rape and spouse abuse between Leopold and Regina? (ETA: and the very creepy incest/sexual abuse vibe between Cora and Regina) What does that say about what we believe about rape?

E-crickets: *chirp*

As I talked about over here (and some other folks explained here), the way fandom talks about mental illness when it comes to Regina leaves a really bad taste in my mouth. From the haters, it’s sociopath and psychopath and all that jazz. From the lovers it’s this or that personality disorder or clinical diagnosis.

Now, I get that people often interpret Regina’s character a certain way because it connects to their own experiences. I really get that. However, there is something that feels really off about the way Regina gets talked about when it comes to mental illness. It’s very subtle, so it’s hard to express, so I’ll do my best to explain where things feel off.

I do believe that there’s a lot that’s empowering about being able to put a name onto what’s happening to us within ourselves. However, I am far more cautious about projecting hegemonic definitions of mental illness onto a [queer] woman of color for reasons that this blog post and the comments get into. 

This is especially jarring when we compare how often Regina gets pathologized compared to other really popular characters on the show, especially Rumplestiltskin and even Snow White.

Let me be clear: this woman does need serious help and has needed it for a very long time. However, I believe it’s crucial to note the difference between Regina’s behavior and mindset as a response to some really fucked up circumstances (Cora, Leopold, Rumplestiltskin, racism, misogyny) and Regina’s behavior and mindset as proof that there is something fundamentally broken and wrong with her.

Is there a way to talk about the toll that trauma, abuse, and systemic oppression have taken on Regina’s psyche without pathologizing or dehumanizing her?

(ETA: I talked more about this from a community organizing perspective over here.)

(ETA 2: Read this. Just fucking read it.)

Despite Rumplestiltskin being the Dark One, he’s actually terrified of Regina because she is potentially more powerful than him and she doesn’t need a dagger to do it. Thus he deliberately did not teach her as much or as quickly as he could have because this hamstrings her ability to pose a threat and keeps her dependent on him.

What happens when she finds this out? What would she do? Where would she seek to fill in the gaps Rumplestiltskin purposefully left in her training? How would she learn and grow?

Regina enters from the front door. She makes her way through the living room, heading toward the kitchen, where she sees a plain woman about the same age as Regina sitting at the kitchen table reading “The Neverending Story.” This is the AUTHOR.

achippedheart:

The curse on new Fantasyland had been broken. Everyone in the Magic Kingdom was overjoyed, except…

— Promo for Disney’s new Fantasyland (x)

Head canon: Regina writes Ariel/Ursula femslash

(via sinful-obsessions)