Fairy tales are supposed to end “Happily Ever After”, so what happens when they don’t? Abc’s Once Upon A Time explores just such a possibility every Sunday night.

In the town of Storybrooke Maine, our beloved fairy tale characters are trapped within a curse cast by the wicked Queen. The curse has erased their memory of who they once were (Snow White, Prince Charming, Rumpelstiltskin, Jiminy Cricket, and more) and replaced it with false memories of being ordinary citizens with ordinary lives. Those ordinary lives all seem to be quietly lacking the one thing that would have made them truly whole and happy. They are cursed to never find their “Happily Ever After”.

Within the town of Storybrooke, time is frozen and people find their memories hazy when they try to recall how long they have lived there, how they came to meet the other citizens, or attempt to remember being anywhere else. Frozen in time, the town clock has never chimed… until Emma Swan arrives to change the fate of those trapped within the curse.  Emma is the birth mother of Mayor Regina’s adopted son Henry and according to him, she is also the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming, and the only person who can break the curse his adoptive mother cast. Emma is the only outsider to have ever come to Storybrooke and Regina (a.k.a. Wicked Queen), feels immediately threatened by her and does all she can to try and run her out of town.

The cast of Once Upon A Time is very well fitting in my opinion as each character seems to have been very carefully chosen. I did not find any character within the show that seemed placed/cast simply on a whim or to “add diversity”, each actor seems to have been chosen for the physical features they possess as well as the acting chops that they might bring to the table.

Ginnifer Goodwin being the best Snow White I have seen in ages. Both her feminine pixie-like qualities and her acting ability are a perfect match for how I always imagined Snow White would be as a live action character. I love the dichotomy of the rugged Snow White who lives in the woods as a fugitive and the quiet, timid, mousy schoolteacher of Mary Margaret Blanchard.

Josh Dallas plays a great Prince Charming to Snow White. His handsome and rugged features, while at odds with the classic portrayal of Prince Charming who is more regal, seem very well placed within this show. They make him a little more lovable somehow. He portrays a charming roguish prince who follows his heart quite well and comes off honest in his emotions.

I have to say, Lana Parilla plays a superb Wicked Queen. She has a sly yet seductive smile, eyes that can go from sultry to icy in seconds, and an angular face that fits well with her role. The Queen’s inner rage, superiority, and entitlement come across crystal clear and her face never fails to show a boiling pit of varied emotions, making her a deeper villain that you almost pity at times.

I think that Robert Carlyle as Rumpelstiltskin is exceedingly sneaky, suspicious, and underhanded. Even his eyes seem sneaky! As if he is constantly plotting something. I find it odd that he seems to need a cane to get around, but it only adds to his mysterious air. You never truly know where Rumpelstiltskin’s allegiances lie, and they can change at any moment. His character is a constant source of intrigue and mystery.

Jennifer Morrison as the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming is a little hard for me to swallow with her as a blonde (yes, yes, I know that the Prince is blonde!), I would have preferred her to go back to her brunette looks for this role. She plays the tough girl who tracks down people for a living. Aside from a few of the gaping mouth facial expressions she gives at times, I like her in this role.

Finally there is Jared Gilmore, who plays young Henry. He comes off very sincere and in my opinion does not feel forced as many child actors often do. He is a torn child who wants to be with is birth mother because he feels that his adoptive mother is an evil person deep down, and he shows it well.

There are so many other great characters/actors in this show, but I can only focus on a few. A few of my other favorites are Red Riding Hood/Ruby (Meghan Ory), The Blind Witch (Patti Allan), definitely Maleficent (Kristin Bauer), and The Huntsman/Sheriff Graham (Jamie Dornan).

Once Upon a Time comes to us from the writers of Lost, Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, who had the following to say about the show:

“Once Upon A Time is, at its core, a story about hope. “For us, that’s what a fairytale is. It’s that ability to think your life will get better. It’s why you buy a lottery ticket—because if you win you get to tell your boss that you’re quitting and you get to move to Paris or wherever and be who you always wanted to be. And that’s Cinderella, right? One day she’s sweeping up and the next she’s going to the ball. Adam and I just wanted to write about something hopeful that for one hour a week allows one to put everything aside and have that feeling that your dreams just may come true.” 

- Edward Kitsis, Co-Creator/Executive Producer

“We kept circling back to the idea of fairytales. The very first stories that you hear when you’re a kid. They’re full of magic and heroics and fear and joy. But we also found fairytales are full of all these unanswered questions. Like why is Grumpy grumpy? Why is Geppetto so lonely that he’d actually carve a little boy out of wood? And did the Evil Queen really try to kill Snow White simply because of vanity? With Once Upon A Time, we set out to explore those questions and not re-tell these stories but attempt to dig beneath what we all know and try to discover something new.”

- Adam Horowitz, Co-Creator/Executive Producer

In a way I am scared that this show comes from the writers of Lost because I kind of hated the way that show ended, here’s hoping they do something better with this show. While I found that Once Upon a Time received some lackluster/negative reviews from the pilot, I really enjoy the show and its unique premise. This is a telling I have not seen before and it feels fresh and revitalized to me. I would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of fairy tales being spun in different ways.

Have you watched the show? What are your thoughts on it?