Regina Mills: an evaluation of both her and her fans
This is long, but I won’t put it under a cut because, you know what? I think the intended audience needs to see it.
I think there is one thing that many Regina fans (and maybe Rumpel fans alike, but I wouldn’t know because I’m not in the Rumpel fandom, I’m in the Regina fandom) often forget. And that it is that Regina, no matter how much she shows remorse, no matter how less of a bad mother she is compared to Cora, no matter how complex and layered she is (which she is, I don’t say this with sarcasm), the evil things she does are still not okay.
I want to be clear, before I get attacked by angry apologists (which I might, anyway) this is not a hate post. Don’t go inboxing me not to tag my hate because there is no hate. I love Regina and she is basically the only reason why I watch OUAT. I want her to have a happy ending. I want Henry to love her. I want her to be forgiven by Snow White (which she technically is?) and by Emma and by everyone.
And there lies the problem. I feel like many Regina fans don’t feel like she needs to be forgiven and that all her actions are justified. Just sit there for a moment, please bear with me. Here’s a brief list of all the bad things she had done, not in chronological order:
- killed her father
- killed her husband
- manipulated a man who loved her just so she could kill her husband
- (NOTE: I hate King Leopold so I’m not exactly defending him either)
- Got the Huntsman to kill Snow
- Took Huntsman’s heart
- Raped him (and NO: I will not accept any arguments that said she didn’t. She forcefully kissed him, and then made her guards take him to her bedchamber. She raped him. Just because she is a woman and he is a man doesn’t make it any less worse if he had raped her. I never want to see that argument again because it is just ignorant and insensitive to all victims)
- Killed Graham with said heart
- Poisoned Snow
- Locked up Charming
- Intended to kill Charming
- Manipulated Jefferson and then left him in Wonderland, separating him and his daughter
- Manipulated Hansel and Gretel while almost getting them eaten by a psychotic blind witch
- killed said psychotic blind witch (and I don’t care if she had it coming, murder is murder)
- Separated Hansel and Gretel from their father
- Put Belle in a sanitarium where she has been alone and isolated for 28 years straight
- Told Rumpelstiltskin that she was dead
- Nearly killed her buddy Maleficent in order to get the curse
- CAST THE CURSE
- Put Henry in therapy to cover the truth up
- Put the Curse before Henry (until the very last episode, I’ll grant you that, and that will be on the GOOD list)
- Lied to Henry
- Tried to make Henry think he was mentally unstable
- Tried to get Gold to kill Kathryn - btw the only person in Storybrooke to ever show any friendship toward Regina
- Tried to frame Mary Margaret for Kathryn’s murder
- Tried to poison Emma
- Keeping a grudge for like what 48 years
- And on the wrong person, I believe. Cora is largely to blame. (I’m waiting for season 2 to clear this up.)
and I MIGHT be missing some stuff there too. Now that’s a long list. And that’s an ugly list. And it’s even uglier when you disregard and ignore or try to justify all of it. “She has a good reason for doing all of that, she’s just misunderstood, she’s been heartbroken.” Yeah, I get that. And while her past makes me want to sob in a corner and hug my baby Regina, it doesn’t give me enough reason why she should do ALL of the above. But hold on, let’s take a look at some of the good things she’s done:
- She raised Henry to be a healthy child. In this respect, she is definitely Henry’s mom. She’s not a perfect one (jesus christ no, never perfect), but her maternal instincts might be a little better than Emma’s
- She cares about Henry’s safety. Whenever his safety is involved it’s when we see her the most vulnerable, and we love that don’t we?
- She saved snow. She used to be a generally good person. I like this because that means somewhere in that gut wrenching evil and need for vengeance, it is still there (and I among many other Regina fans are waiting for it to emerge)
- She saved her father. Albeit the sacrifice she had to make might’ve balanced out that good…
- She gave the Genie a chance to run away.
- IFFY: She’s never killed anyone outright (save that of her father). She’s had some 10 years to plot Snow’s murder, she never took the opportunity. She could’ve just killed her, but she put her to sleep. She could have killed many other people, but she did not. This is IFFY because it’s not like she didn’t do those things out of what was left of the kindness in her heart.
- ALSO IFFY: Iffy because it is questionable….she doesn’t give anyone a really shit life in Storybrooke. Why make Mary Margaret a school teacher? She could have made her be some criminal or something much more sufferable…Iffy because it could either be because she wanted their misery to just drag out or idek this is why I like Regina because she is genuinely a mystery to me sometimes
- My favorite, and why I have the most hope for Henry: she gave up the secret of the curse when Henry ate the turnover, something she tried to protect so much. She just forfeit to Emma the truth, and I think that shows that for once, Regina prioritized Henry over the curse
So hey! She doesn’t do good very often, but she has her moments. But sorry, none of her good moments make her very numerous bad moments disappear.
And you know what? THAT’S OKAY.
So Regina does horrible, horrible shit. It’s OKAY TO LOVE HER. We can love messed up people. It gives them dimension. It gives them a story. Is that not the most important thing about a character? Would you honestly still love Regina as much as you do now if she were 100% pure and innocent and did all good and no wrong? First of all, no such character exists, and if that character exists, no one knows about that character because they’re boring (and no, not even Snow White is 100% pure and innocent. P&I, no exist!)
And I’m not even saying that it’s Regina’s entire fault anyway. The way she was raised and possibly abused by Cora set up her way of life. She learned what she was taught. She was taught that magic is power, that power is what wins.
BUT WAIT THERE’S MORE! The reason why I make this very large post because I see things like
- obviously: people trying to set up Regina as wholly innocent (while not to mention, putting down other characters and setting up a double standard of sorts)
- people calling Henry is a brat for not loving Regina??? “BOO HOO MY MOTHER’S THE EVIL QUEEN”??????? No. Regina took all of Henry’s family and subjected them right under his nose. He has plenty reason to be cross with Regina. (but I do want him to eventually love her. But that’s a whole ‘nother discussion.)
- in one particular case: trying to defend Regina against the accusations of her raping Graham? Just think about that for a moment there, too.
- Just, people not thinking about the things they say.
I mean I guess I get it if it’s in response to character hate, but it’s one thing to retaliate to hate and then truth. If people are legitimately calling Regina out on the bad shit she does, then you have to ACCEPT IT if it is the truth.(if it’s like that one dumb hate post that one person posted on the Lana tag, then, you know, by all means, you have every right to retaliate.)So what I’m asking you, fellow Regals, is to basically PLEASE stop pretending. Stop pretending that your favorite character is exempt from any wrong. Take your character and serve them justice by taking them at full value and not some distorted idealization. Think about what kind of messages that says about you.Also, I don’t see it much because I’m not in the Rumpel fanbase, but you know what, this goes for YOU, TOO, RUMPELLERS.And that will be it. Thanks.
