Right. So I FINALLY have my review of Manhattan done. I find that writing up my thoughts gets harder the longer I wait since my head fills with other people's thoughts - this week I didn't have much choice since I was ill for a few days, but I'm going see if I can some sort of review up on Monday from now on while the New Episode Feeling is still fresh. After all, if I have other meta thoughts or ideas about the episode I can always write another post! Because this is ridiculous having an episode review hanging over my head for a week and making it difficult to do other fun fandomy things when I'm on-line and in the mood.

So...Manhattan. Or as it can otherwise be known: The episode where we find out we are mired in fate and prophecies and Henry's family tree gets a lot more complicated.

You know, there’s not a ton I remember about my father that doesn’t suck, but he used to tell me that there are no coincidences. Everything that happens happens by design, and there’s nothing we can do about it. Forces greater than us conspire to make it happen. -- Neal

What is a fantasy show without a good dollop of prophecy? Up until now we have only had the barest hints of fate having a hand. Even Rumpelstiltskin's ability see the future was, at best, ambiguous. As soon as we found out that he planned the curse and wrote the damn thing it was easy to see how he could know about Emma and how the curse would be broken. But in this episode we learn a bit more. That he knew all along someone else would cast the curse and someone else would break the curse. The secret was figuring out WHO and WHEN. And all the pesty details in between.

Seer: Your wife will bear you a son, but your actions on the battlefield tomorrow will leave him fatherless.
Rum: I'm going to die? No, no, no. You must tell me how I can stop that happening.
Seer: You can't.
Rum: Then I'm done helping you.
Seer: For now. Someday you'll help me again.

How much is seen and how much is free will? Rumpel clearly became a fatalist after he hobbled himself and he passed that fatalism onto his son. But then was Rumpel always destined to become the Dark One? The seer CLEARLY saw he could be and manipulated him into taking that path. He would not have hobbled himself without her prophecy so maybe at point he had two roads ahead of him. One where he dies in battle never knowing he had a son and Milah is one of the many honored widows in town. In this future Bae grows up the son of a hero, a far different fate than to grow up the son of a coward whether the coward is in the picture or not. And there is the second road which he took. Which the seer made sure he took. Did she want the curse cast? Was there some force encouraging her? Or was it more personal? She knew he would take her burden and so he did.

But first he had to lose his son and however much he may have regretted ever since, it doesn't matter to Bae. What matters is that he let go. It seems as though the years of Rumpel trying to find his son again have been balanced on Bae's part by years of anger and resentment hardening into utter rejection. If he had not known Emma and Emma wasn't there to find him, Bae would have kept running. And Rumpelstiltskin KNEW that. He didn't know they had a history but his deal was for her to get Bae to talk to him. With his gift of prophecy we can believe that he already knew that somehow she would succeed.

And I think we can also believe that this is NOT the first time he has gotten close to Bae. How else would he know that Bae has been running for a very long time if Rumpel has not been chasing him? If he has not almost found him before and failed? For that matter how much would Bae know about what Rumpel does to those who break deals if he didn't also have some knowledge of what Rumpel has been up to over these past few centuries? But Rumpel was fated to never succeed until he made the curse and until the boy appeared to lead him. That must have been very frustrating! No matter how many times Rumpel tried something else - a bean, ruby slippers, a portal, Bae slipped away again or the item itself slipped away before he could use it.

Before I go into my notes about the episode, I want to take moment and praise the acting in this episode. All three of our main characters in the confrontations - Emma, Neal, and Rumpel - were completely spot on. Even Henry, since he was given more to work with than usual, did an excellent job. Emma in particular went from complete shock which allowed her vulnerability and younger self to come out then to anger as she took control of herself and finally had all her walls up again with Neal at the end. And of course I completely adored everything Robert Carlyle did in the episode, both in the flashbacks and in the confrontations with both Emma and Neal. He was excellent right down to the little nod and look of shocked understanding when he figured out that Henry was his grandson. It was just a little motion and a step back but it spoke volumes.

Notes:

• I know a lot of people still hate Milah or even hate her more but I actually understand her more than I did and I have more sympathy for her. She lives in a place where your reputation is everything and to have someone deliberately destroy that reputation knowing that they would then be shunned and relegated to extreme poverty, well, it makes sense that she was angry and that the anger eventually destroyed everything good in their marriage. Just as his new reputation for being a coward destroyed any chance of them having financial stability.

• Unfortunately a scene in this episode from Rumpel's childhood was cut which showed why the seer's words hit him so hard and why he was basically driven to hobble himself. He is not just a coward (in fact I don't think he was coward until he took people's taunts into himself and spent so many years being despised as a coward). The cut scene shows Rumpel watch his father get murdered in front of him while the father was trying to sneak out of town ahead of his debtors. I have no idea why they cut this since it is PIVOTAL in understanding why Rumpel could not risk anything which would separate him from Baelfire and why he would never consider leaving town. So many things make sense now!

• As I mentioned in the body of my review, I do think we are going to find out that there were a lot more attempts to find Bae and that Bae hasn't always been in our world. If he has been running for a long time and Rumpel knows it I don't doubt he did some realm jumping. This is a feeling I got as I watched the episode.

• Belle still being in the hospital and getting variously drugged and knocked out each week had been damn well be a plot point. Even then it's barely acceptable. Why the hell is she not being guarded at least? What if Regina decided to kill her? Does anyone think he was kidding about flattening the place if she was harmed?

• I loved Henry acting as lookout when Gold decided to break in. Really Emma? After hundreds of years and a giant curse you thought he would shrug and give up? His answer to her about getting arrested made me laugh. He'll have to testify and against me and then we'll be reunited. Hee.

• And when he got angry with Emma? Oh...yes. I liked that. I have a bit of a thing for Robert Carlyle in a crazed, murderous rage. (Which is good, considering his career. *g*) I also loved that Emma wasn't backing down. She was ready to get into it with him and I don't know who would have won. I wasn't sure how I felt about him accepting her initial lie but I loved that he figured it out very quick.

• Grandpa Rumpel. I've been waiting for that and we got some excellent scenes between the two of them this episode. Yeah, it was followed by a flashback showing us a vow to kill the boy who led him to his son. But I'm not ever going to buy that he would kill his grandson. Family is WAY TOO important to Rumpel. I could possibly believe him being tempted in a crisis situation.

• The Rumpel who made the vow is a very different man than the one we have in the present. He has gone down many paths and has learned much about the 'gift' he took. The future is like a puzzle with missing pieces - difficult to read and never, never what you think.

• Charming is rather dim sometimes but I did appreciate his little conversation with Snow. It brought some much needed humor to the episode. And I really want to see them have Thanksgiving together! They are not in their land yet - no reason not have turkey and stuffing and wine and sniping.

• It was rather amazing how different Robert Carlyle looked when he was young and happy Rumpel. To see him smiling and striding into the house, he was almost a completely new person. And I suppose in a way this was a completely new version of Rumpel. We have never seen him happy before.

• Also, his home was nicely furnished and comfortable. Let's contrast this to the home in The Crocodile and then to the home in Desperate Souls. Every year they got poorer and their lives became smaller and meaner. While Milah was still around they could hold onto a few comforts (with whatever money she brought in), but once she was gone, they spiraled down to point where they had NOTHING LEFT. This helps me understand Rumpel's desperation better. Once he listened to that seer there was no way out. He was going to become the Dark One.

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