A Few Notes on “Ruby Slippers” (Once Upon a Time)

This past week’s episode of Once Upon a Time, in terms of a plotline long promised by the showrunners, was a mixed bag for me.  Some aspects of it felt really annoying and cop-out-ish, while I felt others were executed well.  Spoilers ahead.

So, in the first half of the season, when Mulan and Red suddenly appeared back on the show in the fairyback for a random, non-arc-related episode, I know I’m not the only one who thought I knew where they were going with it.  At this point, The Powers That Be had already gone on record promising an upcoming LGBTQ relationship, and the return of Mulan – who disappeared from the show immediately after outing herself to the audience over two seasons ago – obviously seemed relevant.  It’s true that I still wonder about what might-have-been with her and Aurora, and that Red (who’d also been absent for a long time) had never given any indication that she might be queer, but 1) with Phillip as her True Love, the ship has definitely sailed re:  Aurora, and 2) the first meeting between Mulan and Red felt pretty charged to me, so I was open to it.

Fast-forward to this week, with Mulan and Red surfacing again after an additional half-season absence.  We find out they’ve been traveling together all this time and have landed in Oz (How?  Goodness knows anymore with this show,) and the promised LGBTQ romance does indeed happen… but Mulan isn’t a part of it.  Instead, it’s Red and Dorothy, who Red meets, falls in love with, and has a curse-breaking True Love’s Kiss with in the course of one episode.  The storyline has its good points, but overall, I feel like I got a bait-and-switch.

To be fair, the show may have felt it disingenuous to pair up the only two queer women, and so kept Mulan and Red as friends and brought in Dorothy for the latter.  I can also buy that they may have a classic “fairytale romance” for the couple, complete with insta-love.  For me, though, neither reason is worth going this route instead of Mulan/Red.  True, we only see Mulan and Red interacting in one previous episode, but we do see them working/fighting alongside each other and seeming to make a connection.  Beyond that, we know both Red and Mulan individually from seasons past, so we can go much further in connecting dots between them because we’re already invested in them.  Dorothy, however, joins the story in her second appearance on the show.  We don’t know her or why Red would be drawn to her (and frankly, she’s so abrasive in their early scenes together that I really don’t know why Red is into her.)  Not to mention, Dorothy’s guest-star status makes the already-slim chance of repeat appearances from the couple even slimmer.  And finally, while I’m ultimately happy that Red found her True Love, when will it be frickin’ Mulan’s turn?  She’s so great, and I’d really like to see someone love her.

What I did like is how the characters react overall in the storyline.  Upon realizing how deeply she cares for Dorothy, Red is surprised but not bewildered/ashamed/etc.  She’s afraid to tell Dorothy how she feels, but mainly because she thinks Dorothy is freaked about Red being a werewolf.  The fact that they’re both women is never brought up as a concern or hindrance.  Similarly, Snow easily recognizes Red’s love for Dorothy and is nothing but happy for her friend, speaking poignantly about taking a chance on love.  I also like that it’s clear Mulan and Red are just friends; though I still would have preferred Mulan, at least her poor heart isn’t getting broken again.  And of course, props from the show for not holding back, either from the initial True Love’s Kiss or the ladies’ making out post-love-declaration.