Once Upon a Time: Season 1, Episode 5 – That Still Small Voice

This week’s episode of Once Upon a Time opens with a boy pickpocketing several unknowing viewers of a puppet show. As he’s telling that he “might not want to be bad” anymore, he pulls out a cricket and says he wants to be like them because crickets are free. His parents reply, you are free, Jiminy. We flash to the real world, and Henry is visiting Dr. Hopper, who is asking Henry why he thinks that he must be Jiminy Cricket. (I love that we are seeing back stories to every character. I hope they continue to develop each character’s past, both in the real world and the fantasy world.)

Meanwhile, Emma is starting her new job as the sheriff’s deputy. Right when she puts on her badge, and earthquake (or something) breaks out and the phones start ringing. It turns out that some old mining tunnels collapsed. Regina arrives saying that they will demolish the area and pave it, which upsets Henry who thinks that something is hidden down there. Regina threatens Dr. Hopper saying she will fire him and destroy his career unless he crushes Henry’s “delusions.” He does as he’s told and tells Henry that if he doesn’t stop, he will have to be locked away. Henry appear’s at Emma’s door crying, causing her to storm into Dr. Hopper’s office to yell at him. Henry, still upset, ventures into the mines alone.

In the fantasy world, Jiminy visits Rumpelstiltskin telling him he wants to be free. He gives Jiminy a potion, telling him to give it to his parents, upon which time Rumpelstiltskin will come to collect. (Yet another character indebted to him.) Jiminy is too slow, though, and his parents switch that vial with another one that they give to an innocent family. (It turns them into…puppets?) (On a side note, Jiminy had met the son of this couple earlier, and the boy gave him his umbrella during a rainstorm.)

While Henry is in the mines, they start to collapse. Dr. Hopper chases after him, but Emma is too slow. When Dr. Hopper finds Henry, Henry runs away, apparently having found something. (It turns out to be a weirdly shaped piece of glass.) They discover an old miners lift, and just as they are getting it to work, Regina orders that some explosives be blown above ground, causing Henry and Dr. Hopper to fall back down. The two of them have a lengthy heart-to-heart. Above ground, the air shaft is discovered and Emma volunteers to be lowered down to get them. Once everyone is back above ground safely, Dr. Hopper confronts Regina and says he will continue treating Henry his own way.

Back in the fantasy world, Jiminy emotionally leaves the scene of the crime, and beings to wish on a star. And what do you know, the Blue Fairy comes along! She says, however, that Jiminy’s wish (to bring back the boy’s now dead parents) cannot come true. The Blue Fairy asks what would wish to be, if he could, and even though he doesn’t saying anything, she turns him into a cricket. He asks what the boy’s name was so he can help him. And…it’s Geppetto. In the last moments, Regina is shown holding the strange piece of glass that Henry found underground. She drops it back through the mine shaft, and it lands in a forrest in the fantasy world.

Honestly, that moment was the best moment of what was a rather dull episode. Up until this week, I’ve been really enjoying the show. This week’s episode, however, I found slow moving (even though I enjoyed that we got to see the Blue Fairy and Jiminy Cricket as a boy.) However, the idea that we now know that the two worlds are literally on top of each other opens the season up to great new expectations.