“Once Upon A Time”: Once Is Enuf
I tried, really tried, to watch the premiere last night of “Once Upon A Time” on ABC. I couldn’t make it through: unlike “Desperate Housewives,” which follows it, “Once” doesn’t have a lick of humor. The set-up was exhausting. Storybrooke, Maine, is a town where fairy-tale characters such as Snow White, Rumpelstiltskin, and Jiminy Cricket exist as ordinary citizens, without any memory of their literary heritage. The series, from “Lost” writers Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, jumps back regularly to a sylvan make-believe world where we see Snow White (Big Love’s Ginnifer Goodwin) threatened by the Evil Queen (24’s Lana Parrilla). I’m sure there was much more, but that’s all I had attention span for. “Once” can be classed as a dark fantasy, but there’s already one dark fantasy on Sunday night (“Walking Dead”), and another to return before long (“Game of Thrones”). “Once Upon A Time” isn’t in the league of either.
