Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-34924658-20161031211322/@comment-34657163-20180222011011

I feel Cora's rise to power made enough sense (maybe except for becoming the Queen of Hearts, but if iirc that was explained in OUAT in Wonderland). It was implied her and Rumple's relationship was over a longer time period than Zelena's single day of learning (the necklace is the only other explanation for her rapid growth, then she probably just experimented a bunch while working on her time travel spell).