Once Upon a Time Wiki
Don't have an account?
Register
Advertisement
Register
Once Upon a Time Wiki
Once Upon a Time Wiki
3,734
pages
in: Deceased Characters, Creatures, Species,
and 9 more
English

Flying Monkeys

View source
This page is move protected The subject of this article is involved with the Once Upon a Time The subject of this article is or relates to a character The subject of this article is or relates to a creature The subject of this article is male The subject of this article is female The subject of this article is involved with Oz The subject of this article is involved with the Enchanted Forest The subject of this article is involved with the Land Without Magic The subject of this article is involved with Storybrooke The subject of this article is deceased The subject of this article is featured in Season Three of Once Upon a Time The subject of this article is featured in Season Five of Once Upon a Time The subject of this article is featured in Season Seven of Once Upon a Time

What I need is someone who's willing to do whatever I ask without question. Like a trained circus animal.

—Zelena to Walsh src

Flying Monkeys, also known as Winged Monkeys, are a species featured on ABC's Once Upon a Time. They are native to Oz, and first appear in the twelfth episode of the third season.

Flying monkeys are based on the Winged Monkeys[1] from the novel, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

History

Before First Curse

Despite growing up in Oz, Zelena discovers she shares no blood relation to the parents who raised her. She consults the Wizard of Oz for information on her real mother and receives a pair of silver slippers to travel to her birth land. Later, Zelena returns to ask him to let her relive the past so she can change the circumstances of her mother's abandonment. He reasons it's not possible, even with the most powerful of magic, to which she rips off the curtain obscuring him. The Wizard is revealed as a circus huckster who likes putting on a good show and is not mighty and great as he claimed. Zelena makes use of him by transforming him into her loyal pet flying monkey. ("It's Not Easy Being Green")

At some unknown point before Regina undoes Peter Pan's attempt to cast the Dark Curse and shuts off transportation between the Land Without Magic and the realms of story, the Wicked Witch sends the monkey Walsh to the Land Without Magic. He passes for a regular human, setting up a small furniture business, while remaining as the Witch's eyes and ears in the Land Without Magic.("Going Home ," "Heart of Gold")

Before Second Curse

The Wicked Witch of the West, Zelena, begins taking residence in Regina's old palace. Once she receives word from Princess Aurora and Prince Phillip that the old inhabitants of the Enchanted Forest have returned, she sends one of her flying monkeys to extract Regina's blood. The flying monkey ambushes the Queen and Snow White in the woods. It takes her blood, but is warded off by one of the Merry Men's arrows. Afterwards, the Wicked Witch of the West takes the blood from the flying monkey and mixes it into a potion intending to exact revenge on Regina. ("New York City Serenade")

The same flying monkey is sent to attack Regina once more and chases her while she is with the rest of the inhabitants. Mistakenly, the group believes the beast is after Robin Hood's son, Roland, because the boy is standing near Regina. When the flying monkey swoops down, Regina shields Roland and swiftly dispenses of the creature by turning it into a stuffed toy, which she gifts to the boy. ("Witch Hunt")

Approximately four months after Zelena's war with Regina and the others begins, the Wicked Witch instructs her monkey agent in the Land Without Magic, Walsh, to keep an eye on Emma. In his human form, Walsh charms Emma and becomes her boyfriend. This is all in service of Zelena's gambit to give Emma an emotional tether to her life in New York City so she does not return to her previous life and defeat the Witch. ("New York City Serenade," "Heart of Gold")

Despite having obeyed Zelena's orders under duress, Aurora and Prince Phillip admit that the witch wants Snow White's unborn child, and they were forced to keep silent on the matter or risk their own child's life. Directly after, Zelena arrives to make good on her threats by turning the twosome into a pair of flying monkeys. ("A Curious Thing")

During Second Curse

Shortly after the second Dark Curse restores Storybrooke and Hook tracks down Emma in New York City, Walsh proposes to Emma to encourage her to choose her false life in New York City instead of going with Hook and restoring her true memories. Still, Emma is hesitant to accept Walsh's sudden proposal, and eventually realizes she must reject him after she drinks Hook's memory potion. Emma tries to let Walsh down gently, but he reveals his true nature and violently attacks her in flying monkey form. She manages to knock him off the roof with a metal pipe, and the creature disappears in a puff of smoke. ("New York City Serenade")

Under the curse, people who attempt to cross the town line, including Bashful and two other dwarves, mysteriously vanish. It is not immediately clear what becomes of them until Little John attempts to shoot down a wild turkey close to the town line and is carried off by a flying monkey. David, Hook, Robin Hood, and the Merry Men find him unconscious in the woods with a bite from the creature in his shoulder. Little John is rushed to the hospital, where he painfully transforms into a flying monkey, roars at his former friends and flies out the window. ("Witch Hunt")

Since being brought back to life by his son, Neal, and imprisoned by Zelena, Mr. Gold manages to escape on foot. Zelena attempts to summon him with the Dark One's dagger, but he resists due to Neal inhabiting his body. Out of sheer frustration, Zelena sends her flying monkey after her escaped captive. In the woods, the beast tracks down Mr. Gold, but he once again flees. David holds off the flying monkey while Emma chases after Mr. Gold. ("Quiet Minds")

With his lips cursed by Zelena, Hook is ordered to kiss Emma and take away her magic, or Henry will die. Instead of obeying, he conspires to secretly whisk Henry out of town on a boat. Not to be beaten, Zelena catches on and sends her flying monkeys after the boy. While a confused Henry flees, Hook kills several of the beasts by firing bullets. He runs out of ammunition to take out the last one, fortunately, Emma arrives in time to destroy the winged minion. ("A Curious Thing")

After Second Curse
After the second curse is broken, Mary Margaret gives birth to a son, who Zelena kidnaps as the very last ingredient for her time spell. As she prepares to open a portal to the past, David, Emma, Hook, Regina and Robin Hood arrive to stop her. As David attempts to take his child back and Robin Hood goes to retrieve Regina's sacrificed heart, Zelena sends a flying monkey to distract them. Regina defeats Zelena with her new found light magic, and then takes away her sister's pendant. With it, Zelena has no magic anymore, so those she cursed into the form of flying monkeys revert to human. Even though the battle is over, the remaining flying monkey lunges at David, who prepares to behead the beast; only for the winged animal to transform into Little John. Aurora, too, reverts to human, and gives birth the following day. ("Kansas," "There's No Place Like Home")

After Third Curse
After Zelena is banished back to Oz by Regina, she takes Toto prisoner and offers him back to Dorothy as ransom for the silver slippers. Dorothy and Ruby then travel to the field of poppies to make Zelena fall asleep so they can retrieve Toto from her. However, after they have gathered the poppy flower, they are attacked by Zelena's two flying monkeys. In order to outrun them, Ruby transforms into her wolf form, allowing Dorothy to sit on her back, as the two to escape unscathed. ("Ruby Slippers")

Known Flying Monkeys

Trivia

On-Screen Notes

Storybook Notes

Production Notes

Props Notes

Appearances

Note: "Archive" denotes archive footage.

Notes and references

  1. ↑ Spelled with capital letters in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz: "This Golden Cap had a charm. Whoever owned it could call three times upon the Winged Monkeys, who would obey any order they were given. But no person could command these strange creatures more than three times. Twice already the Wicked Witch had used the charm of the Cap. Once was when she had made the Winkies her slaves, and set herself to rule over their country. The Winged Monkeys had helped her do this. The second time was when she had fought against the Great Oz himself, and driven him out of the land of the West. The Winged Monkeys had also helped her in doing this."
  2. ↑ Once Upon A Time - Good Morning Storybrooke [VIDEO]. SpoilerTV (April 3, 2014).
  3. ↑ Mitovich, Matt Webb (May 12, 2014). Once Upon a Time Creators Talk Regina's Blast from the Past, Confirm Season 4's Frozen Twist. TVLine. “TVLINE | And one last bit of housekeeping: All of the friendlies who were turned by Zelena into flying monkeys were returned safely? HOROWITZ | Yes. We saw Aurora smiling happily at the baby naming…. Grumpy explained that she did not give birth to a flying monkey. What happened with her was the pregnancy was put into stasis as she was monkey-fied. Now she's back to where she was.”
  4. ↑ File:319Title.png
  5. ↑ File:312WalshSeesEmma.png
  6. ↑ File:316Showman.png
  7. ↑ File:312MonkeyHitByArrow.png
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 File:101FlyingMonkeys.png
  9. ↑ Once Upon A Time – gargoyle concept. DeviantArt. Retrieved on September 14, 2018. “Design for gargoyle from episode 312 left on the floor - went with flying monkeys instead, which were great fun to cook up too”
    File:312ConceptArt2.png
    File:312ConceptArt6.jpeg
  10. ↑ File:619Key.png
  11. ↑ File:103FlyingMonkeys.png
  12. ↑ File:417HailTheWickedWitch.png
  13. ↑ File:620ChosenMe.png
Deutsch
Community content is available under CC-BY-SA unless otherwise noted.
More Fandoms
Advertisement

Fan Feed

More Once Upon a Time Wiki