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“Once Upon A Time” recap (5.04): Sands of Avalon

Previously on Once Upon a Time, David got invited to join King Arthur’s Knights of the Round Table because he failed a quest miserably, Emma almost murdered Merida but then didn’t, and Regina told Camelot she was the Savior to try to save Emma from herself.

A long, long time ago, a tiny cocky boy named Arthur tells a little girl that he had a dream that a tree wizard told him he was going to pull a weapon from a rock and be king someday. For some reason, the girl is into this, and she giggles and smiles at him. A bully shows up and tells Arthur that his dreams are stupid and that this is a broken kingdom that will never have a king so he should just give up now.

But years later, never having forgotten this dream, a grown Arthur pulls Excalibur from the rock and comes back to the broken kingdom that’s now his. He hides the fact that it’s broken for them, and hugs his lady wife, who apparently is into the crazy, saying his quest has only just begun.

Years later, David and David talk about reunited the Dark One dagger with Excalibur and other boring dudestuff while Emma is in her castle room whittling to pass the time.

RumpleVoice tells her to listen to the whispers she hears and they lead her to Regina’s closet, where her dagger is being hidden. Regina’s too smart to just leave it lying around though, so there are some protection spells on it. RumpleVoice tries to convince her she can still magic it free, but Emma throws some magic at him instead. Since he’s not corporeal, the magic flies past him and almost hits a lurking Hook. That sound you hear is the collective groan of disappointment from the #queerytales crew when Hook enters the room unscathed.

Emma tells Hook that she can’t get the RumpleVoice out of her head and then goes catatonic. Her family and friends come in to check on her, worried, but Regina is the most worried of them all. She yells at everyone to stop their yapping and tries to make excuses as to why Emma was in her room in the first place, blaming the dagger and not the gravitational pull between them.

David and Mary Margaret fight about whether they should trust Arthur or Lancelot and Regina poofs out so fast and oh how I wish she took me with her. I would rather watch Regina Mills brush her hair for 20 minutes than listen to David nearly pull something trying to use his broken version of logic.

Flashback Arthur is in a feverish rage, translating symbols and scrolls trying to figure out where the Dark One’s Dagger is. There are just three symbols he can’t decipher: star, eye, sun. Guinevere is worried about him, and just wants him to come outside and dance with her on her birthday. He says he’ll be out in a minute, and she goes out to wait for him. But Lancelot finds her first, asking her to dance as the flower petals he arranged are showered over them. Gwen realizes that Lancelot cares about her and her husband only cares about the Dagger, but they’re interrupted by Arthur, who has solved the fiddle. He’s off to find the Dagger, and tells Lancelot to stay behind and protect the Queen.

Five years later, David goes to see Arthur and confesses that he’ll do anything to destroy the darkness in the Dark One and will help Arthur restore Excalibur. He also tells Arthur all about Emma being the Dark One and Lancelot being back in Camelot/alive because he’s the worst.

In flashback Camelot, Lancelot catches Gwen being shady.

So he joins Gwen, who is using a magic gauntlet to the Dark One’s dagger, since it’s Arthur’s biggest weakness. They find a manhole with symbols on it, and Gwen touches the symbols she remembers Arthur rambling about: star, eye, sun. The manhole opens and the black goo oozes out and turns into a stairwell. For some reason, Lancelot and Gwen think this looks like a fun adventure, and descend into the darkness.

When they reach the bottom of the stairs, Lancelot gets taken in by the black smoke monster from Lost, but Gwen pokes it with a torch and it goes away. Gwen is glad he’s okay, and kisses him in her relief. She apologizes, saying it was a one-time thing, and Lancelot doesn’t try to fight the subject.

Five years later, Arthur asks David to keep the fact that Lancelot is alive from his wife, but she was listening at the door like a creep, so she knows, and says she wants to make Lancelot pay. David is surprised to hear that, but goes with it, bringing out the Dark One Dagger’s box. But it’s empty, which doesn’t make the quickly-unraveling Arthur very happy.

And David’s box is empty because Mary Margaret has the Dagger. She takes it to Granny’s to visit Lancelot, and asks him to help her hide it.

Across the forest, Henry brings Emma and Hook to a stable where they can hide out and be alone, and when they ask whose stable it is, Henry reveals that it’s Violet’s. Emma and Hook recognize the glint in the little man’s eyes, even when Henry insists she’s just a friend. They hide when Violet comes in with a pitchfork, and their eyes almost bug out of their heads when Violet invites him horseback riding with some accidental innuendo.

Emma is sad Henry lied to her about his first crush – the angst of a teenager is stronger than motherhood AND pure darkness.

Emma looks distracted again and Hook asks why; she mentions RumpleVoice again, saying that it’s been haunting her since she landed in Fairytale Land again, but instead of being actually helpful, Hook just takes a page out of Mary Margaret’s book and says he’s sure everything will work itself out.

Flashback to Gwen and Lancelot still following the glowing glove, this time to a door that takes them from underground back out into nature. They find the Dagger, but it’s in a magic cage protected by magic. Rumple appears, laughing at their pedestrian attempt to grab the Dagger. Gwen explains why they’re there, and Rumple offers a trade of a different sort – the gauntlet for some magic sand that will make Excalibur appear whole again; it will be fixed, just not with its original component.

Lancelot is like, “This guy laughs like a rabid hyena, hasn’t washed his hair ever, has questionable dental hygiene, and is literally sparkling…maybe we shouldn’t trust him?” But Guinevere accepts the trade anyway.

Present-day Lancelot leads Mary Margaret back to the vault of the dark one and the now-empty magical dagger cage, but before they can put it inside, Arthur bursts through the magic door. He hold a sword to Mary Margaret’s throat and demands she hand over the Dagger.

Flashback Lancelot and Guinevere part ways after their quest, a little too lovingly for Peeping Arthur’s liking. He is unraveling faster than ever, demanding to know where she was and if she found the dagger she says she was out looking for. When she admits she found it, he comes completely undone, rampaging through her things like a maniac. When he turns his wild eyes on her, she admits that she didn’t obtain the dagger, and tells him what her plan with the magic sand had been. She tells him because she doesn’t want to use magic to trick him into loving her again, but he has to make a choice. He has to stop obsessing over restoring Excalibur or risk his marriage being as broken as his kingdom.

Arthur decides he WILL use magic to trick her into loving him, and sprinkles some sand on her like the sandman. The Sands of Avalon will fix anything, including marriages, so now Guinevere plays the dutiful wife, saying she hasn’t been supportive enough of his quest. And yes, it’s as creepy as it sounds. It’s got a hint of Zelena/Robin to it, because apparently using magic to take away someone’s autonomy/free will is the new memory loss. (But don’t worry, we’ll still have memory loss.)

Pleased with this turn of events, he throws some more sand out his window and fixes his broken kingdom, watching it turn into the majestic Camelot before his eyes. He hasn’t been around a lot, so maybe he hasn’t heard, but magic always comes with a price.

Flash forward to Mary Margaret, giving in to Arthur’s threats and handing over the Dark One’s Dagger. Arthur immediately tries to use it to call the Dark One to him, and that’s how he finds out that the dagger is fake. David bursts through the door, too little too late, saying he had been faking the dope who brought an empty box to the King of Camelot. (But that doesn’t excuse the other billion stupid things he’s done.)

Hook’s solution to Emma being haunted by the voice of pure evil is to take her horseback riding.

At first the horse is spooked, but eventually Hook and his promises that he’ll never give up on her gets Emma on the horse with him, leaving RumpleVoice behind.

The Charmings take Arthur to Granny’s and cuff him to a booth, and Lancelot says it’s time to let Camelot be ruled by its true leader, the Queen. But when Guinevere shows up, she immediately frees Arthur. Lancelot immediately knows something is up, but Gwen uses her dead eyes and robot voice to order Lancelot be taken to the dungeons.

David and Mary Margaret try to blackmail the King and Queen into letting them go, but Gwen uses the Sands of Avalon on them, hoping to fix the stupid within.

Lancelot is taken down to the dungeons of Camelot, and is a little bummed about it, until an angelic voice with a Scottish brogue greets him through the darkness.

Merida says that an enemy of the king is probably a friend of hers, so they’re going to work together.

Back in the castle, Robin worries about Regina’s pacing, but she’s bored by all the testosterone in this episode and misses being in the same room as Emma.

The Charmings come back, saying Arthur is trustworthy and Lancelot isn’t, so he’s in the dungeon. They say their next step should be to help Arthur make Excalibur whole, and Regina is confused because David has never been right before…

Out in the fields, Emma realizes she loves horseback riding and maybe next time she’ll take Regina and give her better stable memories to erase her PTSD about them. Hook is all proud of himself, thinking he solved her RumpleVoice problem, because he’s a poor, simple fool.

Flash even forwarder, to Storybrooke, present day. The Dark Swan has Gold tied up, and he tries to get her to fight the darkness, tries to tell her that her hero is a little more…mayoral than him. Royal, even. But Emma says he’s about as interesting as a plain ball of dough and she’s going to make him into exactly what she needs. With a little help from her secret weapon.

Who knows how long Emma had her tied up to the bumper of her buggy, but she’s not pleased at all. Emma rips out Merida’s heart and forces her to pick up her bow (and apparently gifting her the knowledge of how a car door works in the process). Emma has a coward on her hands and needs the feisty redhead to help her make him-wait for it-BRAVE.

What did you think of “The Broken Kingdom”?

Here are some of our favorite #queerytales tweets from this week:

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