User blog:Rena Charming/Miniview Mash-Up 3

Darkness on the Edge of Town

 * Flashback story - 4 out of 5 stars. It's quite cool that the flashback story in this episode, four seasons into a show that had already, long ago, stopped doing backstory they'd originally planned and started coming up with gimmicks to provide new material to supply the flashbacks, like the year off in the EF (I ramble a lot, don't I?), were able to tie in the new stuff that tends to the current arc with something that dates back to the original premise of the series: the Dark Curse. Turns out Rumple didn't create it himself, which also adds up to what we learned in 1.19. Continuity, fine. Nothing here felt like a retcon.
 * Present-day action - 4 out of 5 stars. Entertaining stuff, sure. Rumple gathering the Queens of Darkness together out there in the real world was a lot of fun, and exactly what 3.12 with Hook should have been more like. I also liked seeing the Storybrookers going about their business, especially Belle and Hook spending some (short-lived) time together.
 * Usage of cast - 4 out of 5 stars. Rumple and the guest stars stole the episode, but the core leads were each well used in their own way. David took a long while to appear, but he factored into the end of the episode. Will was unforgivably absent.
 * Writing - 4 ouf of 5 stars. There was a lot of humor to this episode, that was well-written and delivered by the cast, more so than what we usually get out of this often painfully unfunny show. No severe plot holes or continuity mistakes can be spotted even though the story makes a reference to the original story, and even though the ending was a bit cheesy and Rumple's manipulating of Belle can be a stretch, everything ultimately worked out.

Overall rating: 16/20. The mid-season premiere really has been one of my favorite episodes of the season so far.