Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-3038174-20131122121540/@comment-28899430-20160815161330

In context, the characters are still caught up in a sort of loop. For each cycle we have:

1. Rumple in some way incapacitated

2. General impending danger (and dwarf running down the street announcing it).

3. Specific, but collateral, danger for a child, regardless of whether said child has a 'destiny predicted'. Regina didn't have any specific hate for baby Emma. She only planned to kill her when she realized that Emma would one day break the curse. When Regina countered Pan's curse, it would have left Henry orphaned and alone, but that wasn't the goal. Similarly, Zelena didn't want to harm baby Neal specifically, she wanted to go back in time and he was an ingredient. So... threatened, but not targetted.

4. Someone sent to a Land Without Magic who will later come back to save the day.

5. Someone sent to bring back the Savior, KNOWING that's what they're doing, even if they don't know all the specifics.

6. Curse keeps most people restricted to their town or to other magical realms, with consequences of differing severities for anyone who attempts to leave.

7. Memories significantly impacted, but to varying degrees.

8. True Love plays significant role in defeating the current threat.

But each time that the cycle plays out, it reboots. Which makes me think that the Dark Curse isn't broken. It's breaking. And until something gets resolved, whether it's unity and redemption for all, defeating Rumple, going back in time to stop something from happening that started everything going wrong in the first place (I doubt this one: Stop Rumple from killing Zoso and instead command him to stop the Ogres War so Bae isn't drafted and... Bae doesn't go through the portal. Rumple never learns to spin straw into gold, so Cora is executed, so no Regina... Eva lives, Snow marries someone who is not a humble shepherd masquerading as a prince... We already HAD our Back to the Future 2-parter. I don't think they're going back to that well.)... the cycle is going to keep rebooting. I think the 'final battle' will be when they finally break out of the pattern.