I spent a little time over the weekend thinking about how the show could have been improved and well...this is what I came up with.
Season One
Changes: Kathryn is now David Nolan's fiancée instead of his wife, so instead of shopping for pregnancy kits she runs into Snow carrying a Modern Bride magazine.
Sydney does not release Belle from Regina's asylum at the end of the season. Instead she remains locked up there for now, completely unknown to Rumple, which keeps Rumple free to enact his plan to save his son which was the whole reason for all of this in the first place! Instead an angry Sydney releases CORA and HOOK from Regina's asylum! That's right they weren't in some weird bubble for the last 28 years in the Enchanted Forest... Regina brought them over and kept them for revenge (Cora) and leverage over Rumple (Hook and Belle)!
Almost as soon as the curse breaks Emma will look down at her sheriff's badge and realize that Regina killed Graham. She will immediately call her out in front of everyone and Regina will flee because (for the moment) she's powerless and Regina will remain mainly a villain for much of the next two or three seasons.
Season Two
Changes: Gold doesn't call the wraith because he doesn't know about Belle (yet). Instead he uses a locator globe to find Bae in New York and makes plans to go and find him. Thus we cut out for now the subplots of Emma and Snow in the Enchanted Forest, climbing the beanstalk and Sleeping Beauty and the red room and skip ahead to Rumple searching for Bae.
Magic is confined to Storybrooke so leaving the town limits takes away your magical power, but I'd leave off all the annoying memory stuff where you have to have a totem to cross the town line and keep your memories. There really were far too much amnesia/false memories going around in this show.
Emma, Gold and Henry travel to New York and meet Bae/Neal much as before. Meanwhile back in Storybrooke Cora is up to her old tricks cozying up to an angry and isolated Regina and offering her help to get Regina's 'happy ending' back all the while making verbal jabs at her failures. Tiny is released much as before and Regina ends up razing the beanfields.
Hook as before uses The Jolly Roger to sail to New York and he stabs Rumple with dreamshade. The rest of that thread plays out much as before with Cora's death at the hands of Snow White.
Hook who knew about Belle...flashback to Regina/Cora teaming up with him in the past where he learns that Belle is the Dark One's weakness. In Storybrooke Hook kidnaps Belle fromk the asylum and drags her across the town line telling Rumple either he crosses the line and loses his magic (so that Hook can kill him) or Hook will kill Belle. Rumple agrees and he crosses the line for a tearful reunion with Belle cut short by Hook demands that they keep it short because his revenge has waited long enough. Belle turns to walk back across the line (at Rumple's urging) and as soon as she turns her back Hook shoots her. Rumple screams and charges Hook, his anger momentarily giving him the strength to knock Hook down, but Hook quickly recovers and beats Rumple up a bit before forcing him to stand and having a last gloat before he shoots him too. But just before he can pull the trigger Emma and Neal come speeding across the line in her yellow bug and they plow into Hook sending him flying through the air to land which a crunch on the pavement. But of course neither he nor Belle is completely dead so Rumple heals Belle once they are back across the town line, while Emma and Neal rush Hook to Storybrooke hospital.
Neal recognizes Hook and says he betrayed him as a child because he wanted to get revenge on his father.
As before Henry is kidnapped by Greg and Tamara and taken to Neverland. Neal is shot and ends up back in The Enchanted Forest (which won't be known until next season of course).
Season Three
Emma meets Hook for the first time in the hospital. Rumple, Emma, Snow, Charming go to Neverland to save Henry. They take Hook out of the hospital, still visibly weakened but able to steer a prate ship, and also Regina who (though still a clear villain out for revenge on Snow at this point) demands as Henry's mother to be included, promising to save her revenge against Snow White for another time.
As before Rumple goes solo once they arrive believing only he can defeat Pan (and also because he doesn't want to reveal who Pan really is and also because he believes his son just died and he feels hopeless).
Neal once again catches a lift with Pan's Shadow to Neverland (having had had an adventure in The Enchanted Forest helping Phillip rescue Aurora and meeting Robin Hood, Maid Marion and adorable Roland who have taken up residence in his dad's castle).
Regina and Hook become rather chummy in Neverland over their mutual revenge plots. Sparks fly; snark ensues. 'Maybe villains can have a happy ending after all'. They doublecross the heroes leading them into a lost boy ambush in exchange for Henry (or so Pan told them). Pan doublecrosses them too and he hands them over to the mermaids who are keen for revenge on Regina for turning one of them into wood when they first arrived in Neverland. But Hook has a friend or two amongst the mermaids and they are set free and returned to The Jolly Roger.
Team Charming survived The Lost Boy attack and have found Neal and they wind up rescuing Henry too(Rumple having been trapped in Pandora's box as before). They go back to The Jolly Roger and have quite the verbal battle with Hook and Regina, but Regina seeing Henry's face can't go through with her plan to kill Snow and they all sail home under a flag of truce.
As before Neal releases Rumple from the box and Pan somehow switches bodies with Henry as Rumple is putting him into Pandora's box. While Neal won't let his father kill Hook, Neal lashes out at Hook saying he remembers how Hook turned him over to Pan.
Back in storybrooke things unfold much as before, but when Rumple (powerless due to the magic cancelling cuff) approaches Pan in the street where Pan is gloating over the curse he just cast, he lunges at Pan who casually fends him off and laughs at him, saying 'maybe he needs a timeout', Pan stabs powerless Rumple in the chest just as Rumple raises his dagger and they two men basically kill each other. Pan turns back into Malcolm as he dies. Rumple kisses him as he dies. Malcolm's body drops dead to the ground, but Rumple's disappears in a cloud of black smoke as Pan's curse rolls into town. Regina realizes that this curse will have no savior written into it (because Pan didn't want one and Rumple wasn't around to write in a loophole) and she once again though far more reluctantly adds in a loophole to the curse that allows Emma and Henry to escape it to keep Henry from being left alone when the rest of them are carried back to The Enchanted Forest. Henry realizes that she does love him after all and they share a tearful goodbye which causes them to just barely escape the curse cloud as they have to speed out of town on squealing tires to outrun it.
Everyone other than Henry and Emma is carried back to The Enchanted Forest by the curse. The Enchanted Forest is a very different place now with only a handful of people left in it both because so many people having been taken in the first curse almost thirty years ago and because the ogres have taken over much of the forest. Our crew teams up with Robin, Marion, Phillip and Aurora (Mulan can either be here as part of Robin's merry band or she can be saved for a better story later) to help drive the Ogres back out of the forest and rebuild their lives as best they can.
Regina and Hook aren't interested in ogres and they go off on their own to Regina's castle where they meet Zelena.
Neal and Belle realize they need help to defeat the ogres and so they go back to Rumple's castle to find a way to bring him back ('no body, means he's not dead). They find the book thanks to the treachery of Lumiere. Neal opens the vault and Rumple returns and Neal is dying and as before he is sort of absorbed into Rumple, though this time the villains turn out to be Hook and Regina with a bit of help from newly discovered sister Zelena.
Finding the Enchanted Forest dull now that there are so few people left to torment and wanting very much to get home to Henry, Regina once again casts the curse, this time with Zelena's help they don't need to kill they thing they love most since that would be Henry for Regina and Zelena doesn't love anyone.
The cast (now including Robin, Marion, the merry men, Aurora and Phillip) returns to Storybrooke, once again everyone has cursed memories, Regina is back to being Mayor and Zelena has a mad as a hatter Gold locked up in her storm cellar. Regina goes to New York and has Emma arrested for kidnapping Henry (using her magical mayoral powers) and she takes Henry back to Storybrooke. However Henry doesn't even know who she is and she realizes that she can't break the curse without Emma. Regina has Emma brought to town in cuffs, which Regina removes as she asks in a suitably contrite manner for Emma's help in breaking the curse.
Emma has no idea what she's talking about since she's still cursed, but eventually Emma kisses Henry and a curse breaks, but only the one Emma and Henry were under since that was actually a different curse (from Pan and Regina) then the one the rest of them are now under. Regina is fine with that, but Henry isn't and he and Regina have a long talk about what it really means to be a hero blah blah blah. Regina finally breaking free of villainy agrees, but as she goes to kiss Henry Zelena poofs him away and stands in his place for a comical shot of Regina kissing Zelena's cheek instead. 'Well that didn't work sister dear. Apparently you don't truly love ME' she said as she too disappears in a poof of smoke.
Then we get the plot of Zelena trying to build a time portal and Neal/Rumple switching places before the truth is finally revealed and Neal dies in Rumple and Emma's arms and finally Regina kisses Henry and breaks the curse for everyone thus finally truly beginning her journey to becoming a hero someday (or at least trying for it) for the love of Henry.
This time it's Regina that kills Zelena (for realsies this time absolutely NO Marion shenanigans!), but the timehole opens anyway and Emma falls through with Hook and again they have their adventure about as before, except it is only at this point that Hook starts to have feelings for Emma and that causes him to start trying to be a better man.
Season Four
Things return to normal for awhile, but while Emma and Henry bond. Regina feeling left out and starts to relapse a bit having daydreams of killing Emma so that she can have Henry all to herself... but her vengeance is cut short by Emma and Henry inviting her to a family dinner. Though it is still obviously awkward between her and Snow (and Rumple and Belle) the WHOLE family sits down to dinner and tries to work through their issues.
Rumple and Belle are married.
Elsa, Anna and Ingrid plot on through town giving Regina and Rumple both a chance to play on team hero.
Belle wants to find a way to save Rumple from the darkness. She reads about Merlin in one of her books and thinks he might be able to help.
The cast uses a bean from Tiny new crop to travel to a Camelot where Arthur(who is actually a good guy) enlists our people's help in defeating the villains Mordred and Morgan le Fay. With the help of our cast, Camelot is saved and Merlin rescued from the tree Morgan le Fay turned him into and we learn more about Merlin's backstory...
To start with...Merlin is from our world. He was a slave who has escaped from Rome) with a friend. He and his friend find 'the grail' friend gets dusted for being disrespectful or something, Merlin drinks and is given eternal life and incredible light magic power. This in a way makes him the anti-Rumple (or Rumple is the anti-Merlin). Merlin still wanting to escape makes a magical rip in reality and travels to a new empty land where he makes a paradise using his magic. But he soon grows lonely so he searches our world for people who are in trouble like he was and he brings them to his new land. Although our world has no natural magic, this land does. Not just Merlin's magic, but on underlining of 'natural magic' that anyone can tap into with the right spells and some practice. This magic is neither good nor bad, but depends on the heart of the person using it. Over time some people learn to tap into this magic, some for good, others evil. One of the good groups becomes the fairies. Others who are evil Merlin banishes from his realm to other new realms, which could be used to explain places like Wonderland and Oz, which were formed to the tastes of the banished evil/crazy magic users. At some point Merlin meets Nimue (but thousands of years ago, not just five hundred), she becomes the first Dark One as before. Merlin creates Excalibur and the dagger is broken from it as before. We get a few glimpses of Dark Ones over the centuries.
Merlin quote...'Someday perhaps there will be a person who's worthy to hold that much power and not let it burn through to darken their soul. But if we can wipe out the darkness, we'll never have to ask that much of anyone'. - 5.7 Nimue
Once back in Storybrooke he and his apprentice pull the darkness out of Rumple and try to put it in the hat, but they miscalculate dreadfully and the hat can't hold all that darkness and so it escapes through town chasing Regina down the street trying to make her the new Dark One until Hook interferes and becomes the new Dark one instead.
Hook challenges Rumple to a duel as before, he heals Rumple's lame leg and much of that plot plays out as before. Except I'd add the ending from Jiminy's Journal and have Emma beat Hook in a duel, Hook dies as the town clock falls on him and Rumple regretfully takes the darkness back because it seem he is the only one who can contain it.
And because Rumple has taken on the dark mantle for the right reasons this somehow turns him into The Light One and The Darkness is finally vanquished and returned down to the dark vault where (hopefully) it will never be released again.
Season Five
Emma and Rumple team up to enter the underworld and rescue Baelfire (Snow, Charming and Regina can come too but they would definitely NOT take Henry along). While in Underbrooke they meet Cora who passes on the news that Zelena is Rumple's daughter (ok not sure if that should be a plot point or not, but I'll leave this here for now). Along the way we get to see all our favorite dead people come back for one last hurrah. We see Pan, Melah, Cruella (not mentioned in my outline but I'm sure an episode or two can still be found for her) Gaston, Hook, Graham, Zelena and of course Baelfire/Neal.
All of whom are trapped in Hades Underworld and prevented from 'moving on'. The dead villains are cool with that since they figure moving on would be bad for them, but the dead heroes would like to leave.
Our heroes break Hades' hold on the dead heroes and Hades allows them to move on in exchange for Zelena agreeing to be his queen.
Rumple, Emma and Neal go on a side quest for ambrosia to bring Neal back from the dead. No Zeus needed for this pair of true love birds.
The season ends with everyone returning from Underbrook, including Baelfire/Neal, only to find the town empty because while they were gone...
Season Six
The Dark Fairy has forced the entire population into mining for dark fairy dust. We get a backstory for The Dark Fairy (or was it Black Fairy? Do I care? Not really) where we learn that she is the oldest fairy in existence and that she was cast out by the other fairies long ago for using dark magic instead of the light stuff that fairies approve of using. Over the centuries she has been kidnapping children because a prophecy said a boy would be her undoing. She has some kind of test she can perform on them to determine if they are the boy she's looking for. At some point in the past she meets Malcolm, probably he is involved somehow with her babynapping empire, and the two of them break yet more fairy laws by getting married and having Rumple. It's only after Rumple is born that The Dairy Fairy realizes that THIS boy is the one she's been afraid of all these centuries and she decides to kill him, but in the end she can't do it and so she banishes herself into a dark realm vowing to wait out the prophecy and never return to the enchanted lands while her son still lives. It turns out she has a long wait ahead of her.
Back in Storybrooke Light One Rumple defeats the Dark Fairy by making her human. She gets to live out her mortal life and our heroes happy beginnings finally begin.
The season will end with a long montage of our familiar characters getting married, having children, watching them grow and then...gasp...our heroes start to grow old (that's right actually growing OLD!) with perhaps even a funeral clip or two for good measure and then we flash to point in the future when only Rumple is left. Still immortal and looking utterly alone (though of course he actually has quite a lot of children and grandchildren still living) until a young women enters from Wonderland AND OTHER PLACES!
Her name is Alice and she is a Stiltskin!
Season Seven
Season seven will be all about Alice (who in my version is something like Rumple's great-grand daughter) who needs Rumple's help to save Wonderland AND OTHER PLACES! from a new Dark One!
That's right The Dark One is back, but this time it's Dr. Facilia (perhaps one day I learn how to spell it) who has used his voodoo powers to find a way into the dark vault and released the darkness held within. Long story short is that Rumple defeats the darkness, saves all the realms and dies in a heroic manner...and is then reunited with the rest of the cast who are waiting for him on the other side with Belle and Baelfire running right to him for an emotional and very happy reunion as the screen fades to credits.
