When 'Once Upon a Time' first started, it was highly addictive and made the most of a truly great and creative premise. Really loved the idea of turning fairy tales on their heads and putting own interpretations on them and the show early on clearly had a ball. Watched it without fail everytime it came on and it was often a highlight of the week. Which was why it was sad when it ran out of ideas and lost its magic in the later seasons.
Although with a few not so great episodes, Seasons 1-4 gave me a lot of pleasures. Season 5 was decent to brilliant from personal opinion in its first half but the quality became uneven in the Underworld arc. Season 6 started off very promisingly, really liked the first three episodes while feeling more mixed on "Strange Case". "Street Rats" however left me quite conflicted. Not a terrible episode by all means, but there is not enough of what makes the show so good when it's on form and it is a good example of the run out of ideas and lost the magic criticisms. Something that can be seen in the decreasing ratings and the relatively mild critical opinions.
There are definitely good things about "Street Rats". As is always the case with 'Once Upon a Time' it is a visually handsome episode, it's photographed beautifully and the settings and costumes have colour and atmosphere without being too dreary or garish. The music is haunting, ethereal and cleverly used with a memorable theme tune.
From personal opinion, the cast mostly do very well with what they had to work with. Rebecca Mader and especially the ever splendid Lana Parrilla come out on top. Deniz Akdeniz, an appropriate diamond in the rough, and Oded Fehr, looking as if he was having fun, do well too. "Street Rats" is at its best with Regina and with the Evil Queen, their scenes having emotion and suspense, also love Zelena. The motherly chat between Emma and Mary Margaret/Snow is the closest the episode gets to having emotional impact and it is poignant. Like the sympathetic role of Archie.
Other episodes do a much better job on the other hand at showing plot progression and character advancing, "Street Rats" felt more an excuse to introduce and show the Aladdin back-story and not doing enough taking what was seen in the previous episodes further. Unfortunately, while not a complete let down the Aladdin backstory felt something of a missed opportunity and like much more should have been done with it considering the hype. Other than some nice development of Aladdin, presented as more than a flawed hero, and an enjoyable if one dimensional portrayal of Jafar, the backstory did lack lustre somewhat, could have set itself apart more from the Disney film and there are ideas here that seemed too derivative of those from other 'Once Upon a Time' episodes, think Hook and Emma and the whole beanstalk story earlier on in the show. The dialogue also seemed particularly forced in an episode full of too much soapy and camp writing and Karen David doesn't have much personality as Shireen/Jasmine.
Hook and Emma have had much more spark to their chemistry before, here it doesn't ignite and seems tired, Hook is bland and lacks swagger and Emma constant secret keeping and lies in this episode makes her far less easy to identify with her. The Charmings are present and at times correct, but with not enough charm or surprises, their material being limited and reactions to situations predictable and too accepting. And then there is Henry, whose reaction to the big secret didn't convince at all, what was actually something shocking didn't seem to be received that shockingly. The story tries to do too much, much of it not explored enough, meaning parts felt over-stuffed, the non-Aladdin back-story parts being bland and rushed and the episode didn't make sense in places. The whole Aladdin and Emma connection was lost on me and the whole thing with the scissors was not a surprise at all.
In summary, rather conflicted feelings here. 5/10 Bethany Cox
