So this week was a Mary Margaret/Snow White (Ginnifer Goodwin) centric episode. This is the second episode featuring her this season. The first one was “Snow Falls”, which if you recall was a pretty good episode. So without further ado, let’s jump into “7:15 AM”.
The story begins in Storybrooke with Mary Margaret rushing to the coffee shop to see David (Josh Dallas, Prince Charming’s counterpart) who is getting a coffee for himself and for his wife. Emma (Jennifer Morrison) catches her and Mary Margaret admits that she has been kinda sorta stalking David. Guess the secret to Mary Margaret kindness is obsessive-compulsive behavior.
Later, Mary Margaret literally bumps into Kathryn (Anastasia Griffith, Abigail’s Storybrooke counterpart) in the convenience store. All of their things fall to the floor such as Mary Margaret's Apollo bar (Easter egg for all you Lost fans) and Kathryn's home pregnancy test. Regina (Lana Parrilla, Evil Queen's counterpart) stands by and watches it all. Never one to shut up and mind her business, Regina cautions Mary Margaret to be discreet about what she saw. Don’t you just love people who put their two cents in when it’s not warranted and then act like their doing you a favor or that they’re the saintly ones? Yeah, me too.
Back in fairytaleland, Snow finds out from Little Red Riding Hood (Meghan Ory, Ruby's counterpart) that the wedding between Charming and Abigail is on. Snow is hurt and wishes that she had a way to forget Charming. She can’t get him out of her head. Red reluctantly tells her about Rumpelstiltskin (Robert Carlyle, Mr. Gold's counterpart). Snow goes to Rumpel and he gives her a vile with swamp water mixed with her hair. As he playfully shrieks, (seriously, go back and watch this part at the beginning. I cracked up every time he shrieked. He sounded like a maniacal dolphin) he explains that the potion will make her forget her love. In exchange Rumpel keeps a strand of her hair. It’ll be interesting to see what he does with that in the future.
Meanwhile Widmore—I mean King George (Alan Dale) pressures his non-son into marrying Abigail. Charming is still stuck on Snow so he sends a dove out with a love letter that he wrote to find Snow.
Just as Snow is eyeing Rumpel’s potion the dove finds her with Charming’s lette. It asks her to come find him at the castle before the wedding. Snow is delighted. She sneaks into the castle pretending to be a flower vendor but gets caught and locked inside the jail next Grumpy. They both talk about love lost when another dwarf, Stealthy, comes to rescue them both. They all escape but Snow cautions them not to go a certain way because there are guards there. Grumpy and Stealthy ignore her advice and get caught by the guards anyway. Mr. Know-it-all, Stealthy tries to make a run for it and gets shot with an arrow and dies. I guess now we know why Disney never included him in their version of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.
Back in Storybrooke, Mary Margaret is walking by the woods when she finds Charming’s dove tangled in a net. She takes the dove to the animal shelter, where David works. The head vet tells her that the bird is fine but that it needs to reunite with its flock or it’ll be unhappy forever. A determined Mary Margaret sets out to reunite the dove but David warns her not to head out because there’s a storm coming. Now who’s the one not listening to sound advice? I know that she’s a hopeless romantic but seriously!?! In a foolish rush to reunite the dove, she ventures out into the storm and falls off a cliff, hanging on by a root. You can pretty much predict what happens next. David finds her and rescues her. He takes her to an abandoned cabin to escape the storm. It’s at this time that Mary Margaret admits the truth. She tells him why she shows up at the coffee shop every morning at 7:15 AM. To her surprise, he admits that she was also his reason for showing up at 7:15 AM. They have a moment and almost kiss but Mary Margaret pulls back. She asks him how he can do this when Kathryn might be pregnant. That’s when she realizes that he didn’t know about Kathryn. Oops!
The storm ends and Snow runs out to reunite the dove with her flock. She does so and then says goodbye to David, telling him that they must ‘forget’ each other (A little bit of foreshadowing there).
On a side and unrelated note, meddling Regina sends Emma off to investigate the Stranger (Eion Bailey). You remember him right? In the last episode, "True North", he showed up in town on a motorcycle asking for directions to the inn, leaving behind nothing, not even a name. So now Regina is worried about this new face, which is familiar to her but she can’t quite seem to place it. She uses Henry as an excuse, since the Stranger was talking to him earlier, to get Emma to investigate. Emma finds the Stranger and in a scene reminiscent to when she first arrived in town and Graham was suspicious of her, she questions him. She becomes curious about a mysterious case he is carrying. He teases her saying that he ‘s going to make her wait a long time to see what’s in the box but eventually he opens the box anyway in exchange for Emma letting him buy her a drink. (I guess the writers learned from Lost what happens when you make the fans wait too long for answers.) It’s an old fashioned typewriter, which makes me wonder if the Stranger is the writer of Henry’s fairytale book? He then gets up and leaves, saving that drink for another time and leaving his name still a mystery.
Mary Margaret in the meantime, has decided to let David go. She waits until 7:45 AM to get her coffee and to her surprise she is met by David. He waited too. She tries to leave but he tells her that the pregnancy test came back negative. Apparently they can’t take the overwhelming emotions anymore because they kiss right in the middle of the street in broad daylight in clear view of meddling Regina.
Back in fairytaleland, the always honorable Snow comes to the rescue, turning herself in in exchange for Grumpy’s release. She is taken back into custody and met by King George. He tells her that if she doesn’t go to Charming and tell him that she doesn’t love him, that he will kill Charming (because apparently killing her will just make Charming love her more. Classy!) So the only solution is to kill him. Snow is surprised that he would do that to his own son but King George admits to her that Charming is not his son. Question: Why is it that Alan Dale is always trying to ruin the love lives of his children? He’s the consummate businessman who values transactions over true love. He should be the 9th dwarf named Killjoy.
Snow does what George says, breaking both her and Charming’s hearts. She leaves the castle and is met up by the other 7 dwarves. They offer to be her family and convince her to not to take Rumpel’s potion. And here is when the best speech of the episode occurs. Grumpy explains that he wouldn’t want to forget his love or his loss because his pain is what makes him who he is. That’s a great lesson. Have you ever seen Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind? The people in that film erase their memories only to make the same mistakes or choices all over again and again. In every pain there is a lesson and if you don’t learn that lesson you’re doomed to repeat it. Unfortunately, it’s a lesson that Snow can’t bring herself to learn. Just as Grumpy runs to tell her that Charming has called off the wedding and is looking her, a dazed and obliviously happy Snow answers, “who”?
So there you have it. Come back next Sunday for another Once Upon a Time recap.
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