Fighting a dragon… Giving up her magic… Becoming the dark one… Marching into hell with the intent to split her heart…
These things are easy for Emma Swan – she’s an action girl. There’s no thought, no struggle, no fear of losing love involved when taking action to protect the people she loves.
But saying “I love you” – that was the hardest thing for her wasn’t it?
Until now. Armor off. Walls down. Ready to take ALL the next steps. And to enjoy all the good moments of their future together.
Fighting a dragon… Giving up her magic… Becoming the dark one… Marching into hell with the intent to split her heart…
These things are easy for Emma Swan – she’s an action girl. There’s no thought, no struggle, no fear of losing love involved when taking action to protect the people she loves.
But saying “I love you” – that was the hardest thing for her wasn’t it?
Until now. Armor off. Walls down. Ready to take ALL the next steps. And to enjoy all the good moments of their future together.
It’s like she’s telling him so much more than just “I love you.” She’s telling him that she can do this, she isn’t scared anymore. He won her heart, as he promised he would, and done so in spectacular fashion. He’s taught her to appreciate the quiet moments, to not back down from a fight, no matter how scary, because love is worth it. And she’s triumphant now, loves him completely, her true love, and she wants him to know she’s all in. It may just be 3 words falling from her lips, but they encompass every moment since they met, all of them leading up to this; all the tears and the hugs and the angry words and the apologies. All of it leads to that smile on her face when she tells him “I love you.”
And this little smile on his face, the absolute happiness and that little bit of disbelief that will always live in Killian Jones because a woman as wonderful as Emma Swan loves him. It’s beautiful and so uniquely them. It’s all this fellow orphan has ever wanted, he’s put in the time, stood up and died, sacrificed himself when it mattered and changed, for the better, to be what this woman deserves, what he deserves; a hero, but even better than that, a good man.
I just…love them. Bless to Jen and Colin for their amazing acting this season, showing that true love isn’t always pretty, that it’s hard and complicated and not always selfless, but at the end of the day…it’s so worth it.
New York City Serenade is honestly such an amazing episode because literally Emma is comfortable in her life and in love with some guy and has this really nice apartment and is a committed mother, but even without her real memories, she still chooses Killian Jones, she still chooses to believe in what he’s saying, and trust him, despite all the reasons she comes up with as to why she shouldn’t. Even before they were a couple, they were still choosing to put their faith in each other. That’s how you OTP.
You know one of the things I love about Captain Swan? They are two of the fiercest, most badass people in any realm and yet together, they are the most adorable, affectionate, adoring couple ever.
Emma is the Savior. This is the woman who flat out told the very first dark one that she wasn’t nothing. That she was never nothing. She doesn’t let anybody tell her what to do or who to be. She takes no crap, not from her parents, not from villains or powerful adversaries, not from Killian.
Killian is one of the most infamous pirate captains in all fairy tale history. He goes toe to toe with dark ones and GODS. He gets threatened by some of the most powerful beings of all time and never fails to sass them back. He has literally been tortured, killed, hit by a car, had his heart ripped from his chest, and yet he still keeps on surviving.
Yet, you get these two in a quiet situation with one another and they are nothing but kisses and hand-holding and cheek presses and nuzzling and gentle touches. They are flirty banter and whispered words of comfort and love.
I always found this moment in Captain Swan’s history extremely special. If anyone was to ask me to rank a top 10 scene, this scene would be up there because I always found it so beautiful.
This is what I’m talking about;
I always felt this was Emma finally allowing herself and going there, thinking about what it would be like if they did get together. I know, it’s a lot of extrapolation just from one look.
But we got episode 5×21, and this;
And all of a sudden one of my favorite scenes ever becomes even more special because I always wondered when it was that Emma might have accepted that she was in love with Killian, or fell in love with him, and I always felt that the ball was when all of this happened for her.
I know the book was put there as a plot point for when the pages Killian sent about how to defeat Hades came from the Underworld. But you know, the book didn’t have to be open, and Emma didn’t have to be looking at that picture, because Emma is a modern girl, and I’m pretty sure she has pictures of them together in her phone, and she could have been looking at those while the book was right next to her.
But she went back to a moment where she was emotionally vulnerable with him, and where her walls were down, and she took the time to really see him like she hadn’t since she left him at the town line.
And this for me makes the ball so much more precious.
I bet you are staring at the above dates in confusion but I swear they serve a purpose for this Nerd Moment. Those dates are attributed to the dates that Aristotle’s Symposium came to be. The philosophical text focus primarily on love and discussed by men at a “drinking party” as the praise the Eros, a god of love. One of the most famous and well known sections of the Symposium is where Aristotle has Aristophanes give his speech on love. Aristophanes says that his speech will explain why people feel “whole” when they have found their love partner.
In the beginning human creatures where spherical creatures with two faces and two sets of limbs but they were turned away from each other. The creatures were extremely powerful and Zeus did not like that. He thought of blasting them with a thunderbolt but liked their offerings too much so he split them. The men/men which came from the sun were split,the women/women which came from the earth were split and the androgynous, men/women which came from the moon were split. The creatures became a being with one body, face, set of limbs and a shared soul. It is said when a pair meets it’s actual other half they are lost and amazed at the love, intimacy and friendship they have. They are even unable to explain the desire to be with one another or the connection they have. He goes on the say that human nature was originally one as we were a whole being, and the desire and pursuit of the finding our whole is called love.
The idea of the soulmate has evolved but the foundation remains the same. We hold onto the idea of feeling whole when we find the other half but more has been added to the notion such:
The feeling of making ourselves and the other person better.
We can be our authentic self with them.
There is an immediate intense connection.
They can feel the other person.
We feel at “home” with them.
You can always be honest with the other.
Feeling awakened by the other person.
There is a desire to be with one another no matter what.
There are plenty more but we don’t need to go into to much detail as we have watched many of the added ideas throughout the seasons with Emma and Killian’s interaction.
Last Rites showed us one of the fundamental points of this idea, that those who are the person’s other half can feel connected. We have witnessed this before in season 1 with Snow and Charming and now we see it with Emma and Killian. While being realms apart, Emma and Killian knew that the other could only move on by helping each other out in their mission to destroy Hades. The connection while not as intense as Charming feeling Snow falling under the sleeping curse when she bite into the apple, Captain Swan could feel that the other soul, half, person, needed them to aide in their journey to the next step in their journey. To them it appeared as it was meant to be a solo journey but the end aka the CS reunion proved otherwise.
First things first, I can watch the reunion, and this scene forever. It’s just so very beautiful, and makes me sigh with contentment.
This kiss though, this kiss is sort of amazing (a word I have used a lot this season). First, Emma pounces. It’s half Neverland kiss, and half what Killian does when he’s the one initiating a kiss.
But the single thing that gets to me is the second edit from the top. It’s like they’re already close, there’s no space between their bodies, but the way they hang on even more tightly, it’s like they just can’t be close enough, so they pull each other impossibly closer and tighter, even though they can’t even be any nearer than they are in that moment.
Give me all the Captain Swan. I will never get enough of them.
“Taking rum to his grave was heartbreakingly emotional, but top it off with Morrison’s incredibly raw cries, and we’re left ugly crying. It’s always phenomenal to see a callback to their very first meeting with Killian taking care of her wounds using rum, and Emma leaving a flask behind because she feels he’d love the smell more than roses. In this way, she was choosing to heal him. A gorgeous display of how far they’ve come by healing each other’s wounds.” –mgcircles (Once Upon A Time 5×21 “Last Rites” Recap)
“And thereby, instead of a kiss, it’s impeccably beautiful that Killian and Emma are fortified as True Love through a choice.
Emma’s choice to save Killian as opposed to her own heart brought to light the very fact that they’re two souls who’d perpetually fight for one another. They’d die for one another. And most importantly, they don’t know how to give up on one another. (…) A kiss did not need to seal the deal because the truth is, what Killian and Emma have surpasses logic, and it seems only fitting that when the “Product of True Love” finds love, it’d be incomparable to anything else.” – MGcircles Media, Once Upon A Time 5×20 “ Firebird” Recap (@wedlakeserenities)
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