ONCE UPON A TIME: Jennifer Morrison, Robert Carlyle, and Georgina Haig on the Fight to Control Emma’s Powers

The Snow Queen has everyone on edge on ONCE UPON A TIME, and one of the unintended consequences of that is that Emma’s already-shaky control of her powers becomes even more unstable.

“The Snow Queen knows how to push her buttons,” ONCE UPON A TIME star Jennifer Morrison (Emma) acknowledged to reporters on set. “And so she knew [Emma] very well at a young age, but she took her memories. So she knows how to get under her skin, she knows what buttons to push to rile her up internally.”

“So very similar to how Elsa has magic that gets out of control when she’s upset…it’s as if my magic follows the same rules: when I’m riled up, when I’m in that much turmoil, when someone is pushing me that hard, things do start to get out of control, and it doesn’t become my choice to use the power,” Morrison continued. “So then I become very afraid I’m going to hurt people I care about because I feel so out of control of it…and I turn to Rumple thinking he’ll be an ally…I would rather be rid of the magic than hurt anyone I care about.”

But Rumple has his own hesitations about helping Emma try to contain — or get rid of — her magic.

“She’s savior magic [and] all magic is different,” Robert Carlyle (Rumple) pointed out. “That’s the thing in our world; savior magic is a different thing. There’s an episode that’s coming up…where he says that, ‘That savior magic won’t go quietly.’ It’s a very different thing. I don’t think he has any intentions of helping Emma in her life. Gold/Rumple, he’s very, he’s selfish, you know. He’s a selfish kind of guy and he’s addicted to the power, he’s addicted to the magic, he’s addicted to his own world. He doesn’t have a lot of time for anyone else. I think that’s what makes the character so interesting. You can hope that he’s gonna be nice, but maybe not.”

And whether Rumple ends up helping Emma or not, she’ll at least have a sympathetic ally in Elsa.

“Because [Elsa]’s gone through it before, she kinda explains it to the other characters,” Georgina Haig (Elsa) teased. “She tries to help Emma deal with it. She’s like, ‘Look, I’ve gone through this. You don’t have to give up your magic. You need to love yourself.’ Because that’s Elsa’s biggest lesson is that she had to learn to love herself, so she tries to impart that to Emma.”

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ONCE UPON A TIME airs Sundays at 8 PM on ABC.

Related:

ONCE UPON A TIME: ‘The Snow Queen’ Photos
ONCE UPON A TIME: Robert Carlyle on Rumple’s Lies to Belle
ONCE UPON A TIME: ‘Family Business’ Photos

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