I think that Adam and Eddy actually think people want to see Hook on this show when they are incorrect about that.

I'll be very surprised if the show goes past Season 7. Moving it to Friday nights is the first nail in the coffin because most people know Friday night is where shows go to die.

I'm going to be honest and admit I'm not very excited about the upcoming season anymore and don't know if I will be watching. I'll probably give it a chance, but I'm not thrilled that everything will be revolving around an adult Henry. Henry was always one of my least favorite characters on the show, so there's that. I'm not sure if my love for Killian and Rumple will keep me interested or not. It's enough to get me to give it a chance, but I'm not sure if I'll stick around. I'm also not thrilled about the Cinderella re-cast. I get why they did it, but I feel detached from Cinderella now. They should have introduced another character that they haven't used before to be Henry's love interest like Moana and Pocahontas.

It was a smart choice to reboot the show, but I think they're going about it all wrong.

They probably should have quit while they were ahead. They wouldn't have gotten too many complaints if they'd just ended at Season 6. It felt basically conclusive, which is preferable to when a show gets canceled prematurely.

Recall that the showrunners' last show, Lost, ended after six seasons, when it brought the story to a close. The ending infuriated a lot of fans, but I don't think the OUAT Season 6 end suffered from the same problems. It was contrived, sure, but contrivance was a systematic problem with the entire show. At least there wasn't some massive shark-jump, like there arguably was with Lost; it wrapped up the story fairly neatly, in my view, without any huge shift in tone or direction.

The end of Lost is awesome and completely in keeping with the show. Also, the showrunners of Ouat just wrote for LOST, they weren't in creative control of that show. I think the biggest problem with the reboot of Ouat is that it now has a male protagonist instead of a female one. I think that they have to create some really interesting female characters and introduce them fast.

I mention the two shows together because there are a remarkable number of similarities between them--the constant shifts between past and present, the gradually unfolding mythology, the conceit of people trapped in an alternate reality with no memory of their past selves. That's not to mention the numerous Lost references in OUAT and the many Lost regulars who make an appearance, including one actress in the main cast of both shows (Emilie de Ravin). It was clearly built on the same storytelling template and meant to remind viewers of the earlier show.

The end of Lost has always been very polarizing, so all I'll say about it here is this: whatever you think about how the show wrapped up its story, there was a fairly sharp change in tone in the sixth and final season, and in the last two seasons roughly half of the main characters are killed off.

OUAT's sixth season wraps up the story without taking such a radical shift in direction. It's an inferior show in a lot of ways--more childish, with almost none of the psychological realism and moral complexity of the earlier show--but up to now it hasn't really done anything that could be construed as jumping the shark. Now, with this "reboot," I fear that it has.

Personally, i think having a contrived love triangle in Season 3 as well as the introduction of Frozen in Season 4 were both jump the shark moments. Though, if you just mean jump the shark as in something bizarre happening, i still thinking Emma getting together with Captain Hook is the first time the show really went off the rails.

I think shark-jumping in its original sense (going back to the fateful episode of Happy Days that inspired the term) means not just something bizarre but a blatant gimmick designed to call attention to itself in a shameless ploy to boost a show's ratings. One of the problems in identifying that in OUAT is that the show had weird "WTF?" elements throughout its entire run. You could argue the show was already jumping the shark in its decision to have Regina turn good (which starts to happen at the end of Season 1). But stuff like that was a characteristic of the show from the start, so it didn't feel jarring in quite the way shark-jumping usually does. (I can see your point about the Frozen thing, but even then it didn't come out of nowhere; since the show is on ABC, which is owned by Disney, they have full rights to all the Disney characters, and even by the first season they gave us Jiminy Cricket, Maleficent, and Belle. They were just a bit more blatant about it when they got into Frozen.)

Well, in my opinion, having a love triangle with your protagonist and the father of her child and the villain Captain Hook was a jarring moment that was done in an attempt to boost ratings. It just makes no sense storywise and still doesn't. Also, the use of Frozen was the first time they had an arc be about characters other then the central characters of the story and they did it because Frozen was popular and it would boost their ratings. Both things were mistakes and both things jumped the shark. There are even things about the Frozen arc i like, but the way it was done was a mistake. Their lack of ability to do anything interesting with those characters because it might contradict future Frozen movies just held them back and it created a string of really bad arcs that continued to not develop the real main characters on the show. The love triangle and Neal's death was the beginning of the end; the half seasons with pointless backstories about characters no one cares about that started with Frozen, was the shows death.

I liked that Emma and Hook got together because I enjoyed seeing them breaking away from the old cliche that baby's father equals happy ending with said father. In the real world, people don't always end up living happily ever after with their children's fathers. Blended families are more common than ever, and I enjoyed seeing that added in.

I do agree with the rest of your post. There were so many missed opportunities in the writing department that I lost count around Season 4/5. The Frozen, Camelot, and Underworld Arcs had the potential to be really great but fell flat. Although I'm a Captain Swan fan, I think their relationship development would have been a whole lot more interesting if Neal hadn't been killed off. That was the lazy way out in getting them together. They could have still gotten together with Neal alive, and his presence would have enriched the storylines for a few other characters (particularly Rumple and Henry).

The reason i don't think they should have gotten together is because Hook is just a terrible person, in my opinion. The same for Rumpel and Regina. Belle should not date Rumpel. No one should date Regina. Emma should not date Hook. For me, it isn't about Emma getting together with the father of her child, though storywise that was clearly where the show was leading. The problem is that Emma got with someone that was a villain who was attempting to kill her and separate her from her loved ones forever and he never treated her right. It was done because the show decided Hook was more attractive and that putting him and Emma together would boost the ratings of the show. That is what jumping the shark is. It is doing something crazy in order to boost ratings and that is what taking Hook the villain in Season 2 and turning him into Emma, their protagonist's, love interest in the next season was all about. It was a failed attempt at boosting ratings.

Though, by all means love it. I don't actually care about that. I care about proper character growth and proper story arcs and the show just making sense and they could have made it better then what it was, but they didn't. They didn't change Hook's character. He is exactly the same now as he was then. He just started dating Emma even though that makes no sense. Just like Regina started being part of the heroes and joining them at family dinners even though that made no sense. It is just random, bad writing, with no development, that is done because the show is trying to boost ratings.

@Kylopod said:

They probably should have quit while they were ahead. They wouldn't have gotten too many complaints if they'd just ended at Season 6. It felt basically conclusive, which is preferable to when a show gets canceled prematurely.

I totally agree and I actually thought that musical episode was the series finale, did not know it was returning and moving to Friday time slot =

Adult Henry? I think he actually does look like he could be boy Henry all grown up, but...I don't know, I just wasn't feeling it....and if Hook is there-then where is Emma?

@MirrorMask said:

It was a smart choice to reboot the show, but I think they're going about it all wrong.

I'm really interested in knowing, What do you think they should have done?

@ScorpionQ2 said:

@MirrorMask said:

It was a smart choice to reboot the show, but I think they're going about it all wrong.

I'm really interested in knowing, What do you think they should have done?

First, they waited too long to reboot. Emma, Regina, Snow White, etc should have only been a few seasons (3 at most) then they should have focused on another storyline. They could have still done Frozen, but they wouldn't have had to try and incorporate the Swans. The show would be an anthology.

@MirrorMask said:

First, they waited too long to reboot. Emma, Regina, Snow White, etc should have only been a few seasons (3 at most) then they should have focused on another storyline. They could have still done Frozen, but they wouldn't have had to try and incorporate the Swans. The show would be an anthology.