For the first iteration of Lady Tremaine, see Lady Tremaine (The Price of Gold). For the first iteration of Rapunzel, see Rapunzel (The Tower). For the fairytale, see "Rapunzel (fairytale)". |
Lady Rapunzel Tremaine, currently known as Victoria Belfrey, is a character on ABC's Once Upon a Time. She débuts in the first episode of the seventh season and is portrayed by starring cast member Gabrielle Anwar and guest star Meegan Warner.
Rapunzel Tremaine is based on the stepmother from the fairytale, "Cinderella," and on Lady Tremaine from the Disney film Cinderella and its direct-to-video sequel Cinderella III: A Twist in Time. She is also based on the titular character from the fairytale "Rapunzel," and on the character of the same name from the Disney film Tangled.
History
In the New Enchanted Forest, Rapunzel has two daughters, Drizella and Anastasia, with her husband Marcus Tremaine. During a lean season, while Marcus is sick and the children are extremely hungry, Rapunzel travels to Gothel's Garden to find some radishes to feed her family. Gothel catches her and agrees to heal her husband and keep their children healthy if she gives her something in return. Out of desperation, Rapunzel agrees to "anything," prompting Gothel to use magic to lock her up in a tower, thereby exchanging her freedom for her family's safety. ("One Little Tear")
After being imprisoned for six years, Rapunzel uses her long hair to her benefit by cutting it off and strapping it to a hook so she can scale down the tower to escape. She succeeds in doing so, and then returns home, guided by floating lanterns which, unknown to her, were her youngest daughter Drizella's idea, though Anastasia is the one who releases the lanterns. However, Rapunzel finds out that her husband has remarried to Cecelia and adopted her daughter, Ella. Despite the complicated circumstances, Rapunzel is allowed to stay at the manor, working as a servant, where she can see her daughters. While Anastasia shows unwavering devotion for her, Rapunzel is upset by Drizella's distant behavior with her, though Marcus assures her that given time, Drizella will come to love her as she was very little when Rapunzel disappeared. Marcus then returns Rapunzel's old cloak, which he kept during the years she was gone. When asked by Rapunzel, Marcus admits he still loves her but that he is committed to Cecelia and Ella. Distraught, Rapunzel is left alone before Gothel reappears and tempts Rapunzel with a mushroom to curse Cecelia and make her disappear. At first, Rapunzel rejects this offer as she claims she would never hurt an innocent person. During Drizella's birthday party, Rapunzel serves the guests as Cecelia tries to persuade her not to work on her daughter's birthday. She tells Marcus about Drizella's lukewarm response to her gift and expresses how much she feels like an outcast around her own family. After seeing Drizella's favoritism towards Cecelia, she gets increasingly jealous and poisons Cecelia's drink, causing the woman to flee to New Wonderland. Her husband chases after her but, after one year,[nb 2] he eventually gives up after assuming she no longer loves him and returns to Rapunzel. ("One Little Tear," "Secret Garden"}
During a wintery day, Rapunzel and Marcus watch Anastasia, Drizella, and Ella build a snowman on a frozen pond. Marcus, recognizing how much Rapunzel has sacrificed for their family, vows to do the same for her. The pair become engrossed with each other and nearly share a kiss, not noticing anything amiss, until Anastasia and Ella both fall into the water when the ice cracks beneath them. Rapunzel watches on in horror, clutching hands with Drizella, as Marcus jumps into the water to save the girls, however, he rescues Ella since he could only grab one of them. Eventually, Anastasia's body is recovered but she is already dead. Unable to let go of her beloved daughter, whom she believes had the purest heart, Rapunzel gains help from Gothel to preserve Anastasia so that she still has one breath left in her body, with hopes of reviving her one day. It is then that Gothel reveals the mushroom was a ploy to gauge if Rapunzel was pure enough to become the Guardian, but as she is not, she considers that someone else of Rapunzel's bloodline, perhaps Anastasia, is. Upon learning Gothel intends to put her daughter in the tower, Rapunzel turns the tables on the witch by using her own magic to lock her in the prison. ("One Little Tear")
Unable to forgive Marcus for saving Ella over Anastasia, Rapunzel - now known as Lady Tremaine - eventually conspires with a prince to have Marcus killed. After her husband's death, Tremaine has Ella installed in their home as a maid, where she bestows her with the mocking nickname "Cinderella". ("Hyperion Heights," "The Garden of Forking Paths")
At one point, Lady Tremaine has an encounter with Hook from the Wish Realm. ("A Pirate's Life")
On the night of a royal ball, Tremaine kidnaps Cinderella's Fairy Godmother and uses her to show Drizella what it means to have power. Drizella grows excitable when she sees her mother possess the fairy's wand and asks to use it, however, Tremaine warns her to never rely on magic as power since it can be taken from her. Instead, Tremaine asserts that fear is the true power because it lasts forever. She proves this by loftily testing out the wand on the fairy, who turns into a pile of dust. Tremaine then asks her daughter to remind Cinderella to clean up the mess if she returns. During the ball, she looks on from the sidelines as Drizella partakes in a waltz. At some point in the evening, the prince, who is the same one who aided Tremaine with murdering Cinderella's father, rejects Drizella as a potential consort. This causes Tremaine to set her sights on pairing her daughter with the prince's brother Prince Gregor, who likes Drizella. Tremaine, knowing Cinderella intends to kill the prince for murdering her father, believes this will aid in her plans for Drizella. When Cinderella finds herself incapable of finishing the job, Tremaine delivers a fatal stab to the prince before alerting the guards that her stepdaughter has murdered him, however, Cinderella manages to escape with Henry's help. ("Hyperion Heights," "Wake Up Call")
As Henry is surrounded in the forest by the royal guards, Tremaine arrives to question him about Cinderella's whereabouts and agrees to let him go if he hands over her stepdaughter's glass slipper. Henry states he hid it somewhere else before pulling out a bottle and using it to call for help from his family. Despite Tremaine's demand that he be stopped, Henry's summons is already sent out by the time the guards draw their swords on him. Later, Tremaine keeps Henry as a captive in Cinderella's old room, taunting him about how this is the closest he will get to her. She tasks Drizella with forcing Henry into revealing where the glass slipper is hidden and then killing him. Drizella stutters, expressing concern about why that is necessary, although Tremaine snaps at her for questioning her and simply tells her to do it. ("A Pirate's Life")
Later on, Tremaine discovers Henry has the Heart of the Truest Believer and that he is the perfect candidate to sacrifice for Anastasia's revival. At some time after Cinderella joins the Resistance who are trying to end her stepmother's tyranny, Tremaine moves the coffin housing Anastasia's body into the manor, along with large amounts of magic and weapons from the king's vault as if she is preparing for battle. The Resistance finds out about all of this, and after Cinderella finds out about the coffin, she sneaks off to confront Tremaine about it. Cinderella, realizing Tremaine is not done making her pay for her daughter's death, asks her to get it over with and to not hurt her friends. Tremaine admits she still needs something from her before her revenge goes full circle, and then makes her look into the coffin. Cinderella is surprised to see Anastasia's body is perfectly preserved, which Tremaine explains is necessary until Cinderella gives her Henry's heart to bring back her stepsister. Cinderella refuses, but Tremaine enchants her hand with a heart-ripping ability and warns her to follow orders or everyone in the Resistance will die. Despite this harsh ultimatum, the enchantment on Cinderella is luckily later undone by Regina. ("The Garden of Forking Paths")
With Tremaine unable to get Henry's heart, she sets her sights on sacrificing Drizella's pure heart once she has belief in her heart. Drizella, who is tired of doing things in the hopes of winning her mother's approval, seeks magic by a broken tower in order to be free of her, however, she ends up learning how to use her own magic under Regina's instruction, causing her heart to be full of belief. Regina catches on to Tremaine's machinations and spies on her as she uses the Fairy Godmother's wand to give herself the power to rip out a heart. Tremaine then practices this new ability on Anastasia's body by extracting her heart before putting it back into her. Realizing her mother intends to take her heart for Anastasia and will never come to love her, Drizella gets help from her Prince Gregor to kill Tremaine. However, as Gregor prepares to end Tremaine, Regina freezes him and tries to talk Drizella out of her plan, but instead, Drizella kills Gregor to darken her own heart. Tremaine reacts with disdain towards Drizella's elation over rendering her heart useless to her, while her daughter vows to cast the Dark Curse and make every aspect of her life a living hell of pain and suffering. ("Wake Up Call")
In an effort to stop Drizella from casting the curse, Tremaine eventually comes to aid the heroes by providing a drop of her blood so they can set a trap for her daughter. Drizella unknowingly walks into it, but before she turns completely into stone, she vows to be back in eight years to enact the curse. ("The Eighth Witch")
Eight years later, after Drizella has been freed by Gothel and her coven of witches, Tremaine arrives at a summoning altar, where Drizella is preparing for the curse. She warns her daughter of the dangers of trusting Gothel, who is only using her for her own gain. Ignoring this advice, Drizella instead reveals her mother to be cursed to believe she herself cast the curse in an effort to regain Anastasia and when that happens, she intends to rip her precious daughter away from her. She then prevents Tremaine from speaking any further by casting a sleeping spell on her. Soon after when Drizella coerces Regina into casting the curse to save Henry's life, Tremaine is swept away by the curse to Hyperion Heights along with everyone else. ("The Eighth Witch")After Regina cast Drizella's curse to save Henry's life, Lady Tremaine becomes Victoria Belfrey, the stubborn and cruel CEO of Belfrey Developments in Hyperion Heights. However, contrary to other inhabitants of the neighborhood, she retains her memories of her past life in the New Enchanted Forest and has fake memories of casting the curse herself to save Anastasia's life. In the Land Without Magic, Victoria uses her position in push some of the cursed residents of Hyperion Heights out of town so that they will not remember each other, such as Roni's sister Kelly West and Mr. Samdi. Victoria is the stepmother of Jacinda, Cinderella's cursed counterpart, and is quite unhappy with her granddaughter living with Jacinda, who she sees as unreliable. ("Hyperion Heights," "The Garden of Forking Paths," "The Eighth Witch," "Secret Garden," "A Taste of the Heights")
The day before Roni will sign her bar over to Victoria, Lucy is also supposed to come visit her grandmother but is late because she snuck out to find Henry, her father. As Victoria arrives at Belfrey Towers, Ivy, her daughter and personal assistant, updates her on this development and promises to try to find Lucy, to which Victoria responds by telling her to stop trying and start succeeding. She then heads to Roni's, where Jacinda is returning Henry's laptop to him after Lucy stole it, and reprimands Jacinda for day drinking, reminding her that that is how she ended up with Lucy in the first place. Victoria informs Jacinda that she will be taking full custody of Lucy, much to her stepdaughter's dismay. After Jacinda storms out, Henry remarks to Victoria that he understands why Lucy thinks Jacinda is Cinderella, insulting Victoria, who warns him to stay out of her family's business. Jacinda decides to run away with Lucy, so Victoria plots to stop them, heading to the police station and ordering Officer Rogers to help her. Henry, whose car was stolen, overhears her demands and realizes where Jacinda must be. Victoria persuades him to tell her, promising that she wants what is best for Lucy and Jacinda and that she will help him find his car if he helps her. Henry reveals that Jacinda wants to live on Bainbridge Island with Lucy and Victoria sends Rogers and Ivy to retrieve them. Because of Rogers' success in helping her, Victoria puts a good word about Rogers at the station, causing him to be promoted to Detective. Later, Victoria arrives at Roni's bar to watch Roni sign the bar over, but Roni changes her mind, having been inspired by Jacinda's attempts to stand up to Victoria. Victoria is forced to listen as Roni expresses hope in the future and that she considers the bar her home before she tears up the contract. Infuriated, she swears that Roni will regret her decision, but the bar owner responds that regret isn't really her thing and watches as Victoria storms out. ("Hyperion Heights")
At some point after losing Lucy, Jacinda faces a custody case against Victoria, who convinces her not to fight her or she will lose. Jacinda, too afraid of this coming true, does not pursue the case, effectively forfeiting her daughter to Victoria. ("Pretty in Blue")
Upon coming out of her office from a business meeting, Victoria is met by Jacinda, who just found out that Lucy's recital has become a charity event with an admission ticket costing $550. Jacinda begs her stepmother to be lenient, both because her paycheck won't cover the cost and that she is trying her best to get her life in order, but Victoria coldly tells her that second chances are earned, not given. Later, Victoria receives a bouquet of hyacinths along with an accompanying card from Lucy who tells her about the flowers blooming in the old community gardens. She tasks Detectives Weaver and Rogers with driving Henry out of Hyperion Heights, however, after Henry ends up helping Jacinda secure a job at the charity event so she can see Lucy, Victoria demands that they do something to make him go away even if it means incriminating him on false charges. Rogers seemingly carries out an order from Weaver to implicate Henry for theft by slipping Victoria's bracelet into his apron, but Henry is exonerated when he reveals his pocket only has a keychain in it, proving Rogers disobeyed Weaver. At her office, Victoria openly criticizes Weaver for his failure to do what she asked, while Weaver expresses little care for her reprimand, stating that she neither owns or controls him and that while their goals have aligned in the past, they won't always. After Weaver walks out, Victoria is left to stew over his defiance of her. ("A Pirate's Life")
Under the pretense of demolishing the old garden and build new condos in its place, Victoria's actual motive is to unearth the ground beneath it and retrieve her younger daughter Anastasia's preserved body. She learns about Lucy and Jacinda secretly exchanging letters by leaving them for each other in the wishing well, and on the same day the garden is to be decimated, she arrives at the location with the demolition team and catches Jacinda in the midst of dropping off a letter. Jacinda asks her to reconsider for Lucy's sake, but Victoria insists it's too late and simply tells her to leave or risk being buried alive. As Jacinda is collecting signatures for a petition to save the garden, Victoria promises her a tempting deal: a newly built condo for her and Lucy if she burns the petitions. Lucy, witnessing what her mother has done, protests that she would rather be apart from her than together if Jacinda is going to give up. While Jacinda is heartbroken at her daughter's reaction, Victoria barely conceals a smile at the dispute. That night, after regaining the coffin with Anastasia's body in it, Victoria takes it with her to the top floor inside Belfrey Towers, where she visits her prisoner, a witch named Gothel, whose cursed named is Eloise Gardener. She wants the woman's help with enacting her plans of making Lucy surrender her belief willingly as a way to resurrect Anastasia, but Eloise refuses despite the latter's attempt at intimidating her. Eloise cautions that Victoria may succeed in breaking Lucy's belief and reviving her daughter, but she will still have to deal with her afterward. ("The Garden of Forking Paths")
After Victoria gets into her car, she is spooked when Tilly pops up from the backseat and asks her whether it's better to be feared than loved. Victoria questions who she is, but Tilly has her own question for her, inquiring about how she and everyone else got to Hyperion Heights. Tilly then drops the question altogether and becomes interested in who Victoria is under her "mask," before reaching as if to pull the woman's face away, but Victoria pepper sprays her to force her out of the car. In the bag Tilly leaves behind, Victoria finds Weaver's business card, indicating that she is one of the detective's street informants, as well as a bottle of pill medication that Tilly stopped taking recently. She pressures Weaver to persuade Tilly into taking the pills to restabilize herself before she becomes too dangerous, but Weaver is reluctant since her request doesn't align with his interests. Seeing as Weaver doesn't want to do it, Victoria implies that she can expose his many corruptive deeds and earn him a place in prison. Weaver warns her against threatening him, though she expresses no qualms about doing so and pushes him to choose who he'd rather go down: him or Tilly. Victoria later pays a visit to Weaver at the hospital, where he is recovering after being shot by Tilly. She is disappointed to learn he has let Tilly go, to which Weaver explains having gotten Tilly to resume taking her pills and thus she is no longer a public menace. When Victoria challenges him by reminding him she has evidence to expose his corruption, Weaver hints he found something else more important than that and purposely ends his sentence by calling her "dearie," which indicates he remembers himself now. Victoria questions him further about what he found, though Weaver only cautions her to choose her next step wisely as anything she does to him will no longer harm him. ("Beauty")
Having more difficulty than she expected with breaking Lucy's belief, Victoria visits Eloise again and tries to bribe her with tea in exchange for information. Eloise suggests Victoria is looking at things the wrong way because belief can only be removed if it's severed at the root, but she refuses to give any more specifics unless Victoria provides her with her "special tea". After this meeting, Victoria sends Ivy to pick up the necessary herbs, all the while remaining secretive about what she needs them for. She also informs Sabine that she is increasing her rent by 8% and nonchalantly suggests it's a family discount, to which an annoyed Sabine declares her intent to fight back and not be intimidated by her. Ivy returns with the procured herbs, but when she expresses curiosity about where her mother is headed with them, Victoria cautions her to stop both her questions and complaining and start doing her job before she decides to hire another assistant to take her place. Victoria then goes to see Eloise at the top floor, but while she is still in the elevator, Ivy uses the security camera to spy on her and then phones Henry to tell him she has a lead on her mother's schemes. Learning that Sabine's beignets are earning her a lot of money, Victoria samples one of the tasty pastries before calling one of her associates, Ralph, to wreck the business. Although Ralph successfully causes a fire to burn everything, Rogers investigates the incident and tells Sabine of his suspicions that Victoria is behind it. That night, Ivy comes to her mother's office offering to help her in any way as she seems to have had a bad day. Victoria dryly remarks on her kind gesture and talks about the dream of guiding and caring for a daughter who she could lean on in the same way someday, however, she laments that not all daughters are created equal and Ivy would do best to realize just how badly she is failing right now and that she will continue to fail. Seemingly without Victoria's knowledge, Ivy visits Eloise, whom she is in a secret alliance with and boasts to her about having fooled her mother thus far. ("Greenbacks")
In her office, Victoria is nursing a migraine when Ivy comes in to check up on her. She suggests the cause may be artificial sugar that Ivy put in her coffee, but her daughter assures her she always puts the real kind in. Ivy ponders if the pollen in the hyacinth flowers in the office are the reason and offers to take them away, with Victoria consenting to the suggestion if it'll stop her from hearing her grating voice. ("Wake Up Call")
As Victoria scolds her granddaughter for sneaking out into town without her permission, Lucy expresses little care about getting caught, to which an enraged Victoria grounds her by sending her to her room. Lucy defiantly tells her grandmother that she can punish her now, however, when her parents break the curse and her family is reunited, Victoria will be the one left all alone. Afterward, Victoria brings tea to Eloise again, during which she admits Lucy is still stubbornly clinging to her belief though she is sure she can wear the girl down in time. She then notices a speck of dirt on the ground and begins to suspect Eloise has had a visitor other than her. Victoria checks footage from the elevator security camera, which shows someone wearing black pumps exiting the floor where Eloise is being kept but the screen goes to static, obscuring her from seeing the person's face. Going by a hunch, Victoria goes to Ivy's work desk and fishes around under it until she discovers a pair of heels that match the ones she saw. Weaver arrives to tell her that Rogers is dangerously close to solving the Eloise Gardener case. In turn, she pushes him to take care of the situation or she'll find someone who will do it in a more permanent fashion. Victoria confronts Eloise for pretending to help her this whole time and demands to know when she woke Drizella up. Eloise admits Drizella has always been awake and reveals her daughter wishes to make her suffer. reminds her of the true nature of the ivy plant, which can't grow unless it clings to something else, namely Eloise, and vows to bring her down so Ivy will have no one left to rely on. After Victoria has moved Eloise to another building, she is cornered by Rogers, who handcuffs her to a railing while he busts open a nearby closet and rescues Eloise. During Victoria's arrest, she is led by police officers to a cruiser, where Ivy feigns sadness over her mother's situation before smugly taunting her for being a prisoner while Eloise is free. As Victoria is placed in the police car by an officer, she angrily denounces her daughter for unleashing someone who is more dangerous than she can fathom. Ivy, not taking her advice seriously, simply smirks at her mother's downfall. With Victoria in jail and unable to act as Lucy's legal guardian, the child is later taken in by social services. ("Eloise Gardener")
In the prison visiting room, Ivy unsuccessfully tries to intimidate Victoria into revealing Anastasia's whereabouts. The two trade terse words, with Ivy expressing resentment for her favoritism towards Anastasia and Victoria mocking Ivy for not getting enough hugs from her. After Ivy leaves, Weaver prepares to recuff Victoria and return her to her holding cell. Victoria, with other plans in mind, tries to entice him into a deal by mentioning his prolificacy for collecting things, the wife he is separated from, and the dagger he has. She then questions him on how his search for the Guardian is going and agrees to give him all the necessary information if he helps her with reviving Anastasia. Weaver steps forward, seemingly to recuff her, but instead reattaches it on his belt as he tells her that the deal is on. Once Weaver has gotten the judge to drop the charges because Rogers didn't have a warrant, Victoria walks out of the station, where Rogers has a brief confrontation with Weaver before the latter joins Victoria in her car. Armed with paperwork from the custody case, Victoria shows up at Jacinda's apartment to formally relinquish Lucy to her. She explains she had been testing Jacinda at the time she had challenged her in the custody battle all those years ago hoping she would fight back, but Jacinda had not. However, Victoria is pleased Jacinda got Nick's help with regaining Lucy and persuades her stepdaughter that being locked up has made her realize Lucy belongs with her mother. For the next stop, Victoria leads Weaver into a mausoleum, and despite knowing they are being tailed by Ivy, she ignores her. She retrieves a bag from one pullout slot, which contains the storybook that will help her draw out Lucy's belief and ultimately aid in her reunion with Anastasia. Weaver shares his experience of having a son who thought as little of him as Ivy does of Victoria but he never stopped trying to fix things with him. Victoria dryly congratulates him for that before chiding him for comparing his grief to hers as he has no idea what she's been through, however, Weaver asserts he does because he's known the longing for reunion and paid the cost for it. In turn, Victoria refuses to stop now that she has a way and states dispassionately that Ivy hasn't been her daughter for a long time. Weaver asks for his end of their deal now that he's helped her, but she tells him he'll get it after Anastasia is back. Victoria allows Lucy to read her story from the book before bringing her to see a comatose Anastasia. She attempts to open Lucy's eyes to the reality of this fairytale, as she once sacrificed everything for her family and did not get a happy ending, but Lucy insists people can if they work for it and stubbornly believes she and her parents will get that in the end. Victoria shatters these hopes by playing a recorded video of Jacinda and Nick kissing to prove Henry means nothing to her mother, especially since Henry has already left town and that no matter how hard Lucy believes, her dream of a reunited family won't happen. As Lucy sheds tears of grief and lets go of her belief, one of her tears fall onto the storybook, which Victoria collects and drips onto Anastasia's body, resurrecting her, while elsewhere in Hyperion Heights, Lucy collapses in Jacinda's arms. ("One Little Tear")
As Victoria observes Anastasia happily watching cartoons in her hospital room, Weaver entices her into allowing him to test Anastasia to see if she is the Guardian, in exchange for protecting her from Gothel and Ivy, who both want the girl for her magic. Victoria joins Weaver and Anastasia at the police station evidence room, where Anastasia is presented with knives and asked to determine if any of them have magic. After Anastasia causes all the knives to fly and pierce a cabinet, she speculates that there is magic in there, which turns out to be correct as Weaver pulls out the Dark One Dagger from inside. However, when Gothel arrives, Anastasia loses control of her power, causing her to knock Gothel, Weaver, and Victoria unconscious. Anastasia flees and runs into Ivy, who pretends to be working with Victoria and gives her a pair of bracelets to dampen her powers. Sometime during this, Victoria is imprisoned in a pit by Gothel and later sees Ivy falling down into the same enclosure after Gothel pushes her in. ("The Eighth Witch")
When Anastasia shows no interest in helping Gothel with her coven and instead wants to be with her mother, Gothel pulls Victoria up from the pit to reveal her many crimes to her daughter. Of all of them, Victoria admits she did those things to ensure her family was whole again, but in the worst of her actions, she reveals she put Lucy to sleep to restore Anastasia. After a horrified Anastasia runs off, Gothel gloats to Victoria about her daughter finding a better mother in her now. Victoria begins forming an angry retort just as Gothel unceremoniously drops her back down into the pit. As Victoria fumbles around the well for a way out, Ivy sarcastically remarks she could use a fairy godmother. Victoria insists Ivy stop being petty in order to rectify her own mistake in trusting Gothel, who stole her magic and is likely done with her, seeing as Ivy is now trapped in a pit with nowhere to go. With a well-aimed shoe heel, Victoria manages to hit the trigger for the rope pulley which allows her and Ivy to be lifted out of the well. Victoria suggests that while they have not always seen eye to eye, they have accomplished great things from being aligned together and proposes they work together to defeat Gothel and save Anastasia. Ivy scoffs over her mother's rare display of kindness, which, of course, is only because of her sister, and how she has never once looked at her as someone deserving of her love. Victoria insists she has never done anything to deserve it, however, Ivy informs her the lanterns that led Victoria home all those years ago was her idea, not Anastasia's. With this secret revealed, Ivy storms off as a shocked Victoria is left behind. Victoria finds Roni and Kelly at the bar, where she intimidates them with a gun in order to get the Resurrection Amulet from them. She agrees she was willing to sacrifice Lucy because of her own desperation to save her own child, but to prove she is no monster, she needs the amulet so Gothel can restore Lucy. Roni warns that the cost of using the amulet is too high, but Victoria, not knowing that a life must be sacrificed for it to work, says that when it comes to their children, there is no such thing. ("Secret Garden")
At the botanical garden greenhouse, Victoria arrives to hand over the amulet to Gothel, who then has Anastasia infuse her magic into it. After Anastasia is dismissed, Gothel summons Ivy into the ritual circle, revealing her intent to drain her life in exchange for Lucy's. As Gothel begins the ritual, Ivy accuses her mother of planning this all along and that this is what she always wanted, while Victoria pleads ignorance. A panicked Victoria tries to make Gothel stop, but when the witch does not, she charges into the circle to push Ivy out so she can take her place as the sacrifice instead. Watching Gothel restart the ritual, only this time draining away Victoria's life force, a weakened Ivy manages to question her mother's actions, to which Victoria apologizes for being so focused on one daughter when she already had Ivy by her side all this time. Upon choking out one last apology, Victoria collapses and tries to be reassuring to Ivy, who weeps and witnesses her mother take her last breath. ("Secret Garden")
Victoria's body is later buried in the town cemetery, which Lucy visits to place blue hyacinth flowers on the headstone. In the first episode of Henry's podcast H-Town, he talks about the lingering mystery of Victoria's untimely death and what secrets she took with her to the grave. ("A Taste of the Heights")
At the gravesite where Victoria's body is interred, Roni suspects the woman was buried with the storybook that she once showed Lucy. Roni digs up the grave to regain the book, which she and Lucy use in an attempt to restore Henry's belief. ("Is This Henry Mills?")Magical Abilities
Limited Abilities
- Blood Magic - Use of one's own or another's blood for various and more advanced spells that can only be broken by someone of the same bloodline.
- Shapeshifting - Ability to petrify anyone who is from a certain bloodline who enters a specific area or rune.
- Fairy Magic - Use of fairy dust and/or fairies' wands to do magic.
- Age Manipulation - Ability to accelerate or reverse the aging process or a pregnancy.
Family
Unknown | Cecelia † | Marcus Tremaine † | Rapunzel Tremaine † Victoria Belfrey † | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CinderellaJacinda Vidrio | Henry Mills | Anastasia | DrizellaIvy Belfrey | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Lucy | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Notes:
- Solid lines denote blood parent-child relationships
- Dashed lines denote marriage relationships that result in offspring
- † denotes the deceased
- Rapunzel was Marcus Tremaine's first wife before he was married to Cecelia
Trivia
Etymology
- The last name "Tremaine" comes from Rapunzel's husband after they got married. ("One Little Tear")
- The last name "Belfrey" is a reference to the word "belfry," which is part of a bell tower or steeple in which bells are housed. Victoria is the CEO of Belfrey Towers, and her original counterpart was also locked up in a tower.
Character Notes
- According to Cecelia, Rapunzel makes "the best lavender lemonade north of the bayou". ("One Little Tear")
- She is one of two second iterations to have more than one first iteration, the other being Jack.
Production Notes
- The casting announcement for her younger self states that she "will find herself magically trapped in a tower by an evil sorceress. Feisty and full of pluck, she will do whatever it takes to break this spell and make the sorceress who imprisoned her pay for those crimes".[1]
- At the San Diego Comic-Con 2017, Gabrielle Anwar described Lady Tremaine as "very unpleasant," stating that she had not "yet found much of her redeeming qualities to her". She added that she is "notoriously outrageous," and thought "she resents just about everything, everybody".[2]
- According to Gabrielle Anwar, Victoria is Lady Tremaine but in a contemporary world. She also added that "she's still using the same chronic manipulations and desperately unkind puppeteering of her stepchild in the shape of materialism and physical control of her life and her daughter's life".[3]
- The two actors who play Anastasia's mother pronounce her name differently. Meegan Warner, who plays young Rapunzel, pronounces Anastasia's name with a long A sound in the third syllable, while Gabrielle Anwar, who plays adult Rapunzel, pronounces it with a short O sound in the third syllable.
Disney
- Victoria's short brown hair is similar to Rapunzel's hairstyle at the end of Tangled.
- The words that Lady Tremaine says to use the Fairy Godmother's wand, "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo," come from the Cinderella film. ("Hyperion Heights")
- When Victoria finds out about Jacinda and Sabine's pop-up beignet shop, she calls an unseen character named Ralph and tells him to "wreck it," a reference to the film Wreck-It Ralph. ("Greenbacks")
Popular Culture
- The scene where Victoria enters Belfrey Towers in "Hyperion Heights" is a homage to the 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada, in which Meryl Streep's Miranda Priestly enters the Runway building in a similar way.
- Glenn Close's Cruella De Vil has a similar scene and entrance in the live-action film 101 Dalmatians.
Set Dressing
- Her car license plate is VB1.[4] ("Hyperion Heights" et al.)
Costume Notes
- The black coat Victoria wears while attempting to revive Anastasia[5] and during the events leading up to her death[6] is the same coat Regina Mills wears during and after the first dark curse in "Snow Falls,"[7] "The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter,"[8] "7:15 A.M.,"[9] "Queen of Hearts,"[10] "Welcome to Storybrooke,"[11] "Lacey,"[12] and "And Straight On 'Til Morning,"[13] during her time in Neverland in "The Heart of the Truest Believer,"[14] "Think Lovely Thoughts,"[15] "Save Henry"[16] and when she returns home in "The New Neverland".[17] ("One Little Tear," "The Eighth Witch," "Secret Garden")
- Fiona also wears the coat while Storybrooke is under her dark curse in "The Final Battle Part 1"[18] and "The Final Battle Part 2".[19]
Goofs
- Victoria mentions Regina casting the Dark Curse in "The Eighth Witch" to save Henry. However, part of the curse was that Victoria would believe she was the one who cast it to save Anastasia and she is never shown onscreen learning otherwise. ("Secret Garden")
Appearances
Once Upon a Time: Season Seven | ||||||||||
"Hyperion Heights": | "A Pirate's Life": | "The Garden of Forking Paths": | "Beauty": | "Greenbacks": | "Wake Up Call": | "Eloise Gardener": | "Pretty in Blue": | "One Little Tear": | "The Eighth Witch": | "Secret Garden": |
Appears | Appears | Appears | Appears | Appears | Appears | Appears | Mentioned | Appears | Appears | Appears |
"A Taste of the Heights": | "Knightfall": | "The Girl in the Tower": | "Sisterhood": | "Breadcrumbs": | "Chosen": | "The Guardian": | "Flower Child": | "Is This Henry Mills?": | "Homecoming": | "Leaving Storybrooke": |
Mentioned | Mentioned | Mentioned | Mentioned | Absent | Absent | Absent | Absent | Mentioned | Absent | Absent |
Other Appearances | ||||||||||
|
Centric Listing | ||||||||||
|
See Also
References
Notes
- ↑ In "Eloise Gardener," while Victoria and Lucy are in Belfrey Towers, Victoria says to Lucy, "You can go downstairs to your room. You're grounded." This means that Lucy, and Victoria (who was given custody of Lucy), both live in Belfrey Towers.
- ↑ As stated by Cinderella in "Pretty in Blue," Marcus searched Cecelia for an entire year before giving up on her.