Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-34924658-20150422012549/@comment-26255666-20150425024654

Sorry for not being more clear about who the response was towards, that was my mistake.

I agree with your "rant" (I think it's just a discussion or opinion, not a rant since it wasn't violently emotional or anything) though and there is an over-characterization of "heroes" and "villains" in this show. Most people don't fall on either extreme and the few that do are rare. (And it wasn't random at all, totally relevant to Regina and whether or not she's a hero or villain.)

It's extreme that Regina has killed so many people but it was incredibly extreme for her mother to rip out her love's heart and crush it in front of her face. It's a rare demented person who wouldn't be greatly affected by something like that one way or another.

I think the "villain"/"hero" concept [should] comes from a place of personal choice. We cant choose what others do to us or what our circumstances are but we can choose how to deal with them. I think it's the accumulation of all of our choices and how we use those choices that determines the hero/villain thing as most people don't flip flop between doing horrible things and being considerate. For example, Snow's mother was vain, conceited and a bully in her youth but she clearly learned from her mistakes and decided to become a better person. Cora on the other hand was bullied but she then reacted by making up lies (about spinning gold) and turning to thievery to cover even other lies (bribe to keep pregnancy secret). She had real love with Rumple and traded it for power and revenge. That's a choice that really shows much more about their character [to me] than "should I or should I not shoot the woman threatening to kill my son?"

The hardest person in the world to have as a villain is one's own mother because she is supposed to be the one who gave you life and loves you more than anything. Regina had to grow up with a mother who didn't love her, didn't teach her how to love, and stole away her chance at love. Now that Regina has love in her life again via Henry, I think it shows that deep down Regina has always been a good person in a horrible circumstance who chose to embrace it instead of fight against it. Your choices do define you but that's why they're your choices, so you can choose for yourself how to respond to situations. No one is perfect but that shouldn't be an excuse to continue making bad decisions that you know bring about nothing but negative results. Emma killed Cruella but I saw it totally justified since she didn't know that Cruella couldn't kill and there is no redemption for a sociopath like Cruella who is biologically/physiologically incapable of remorse and sympathy.