‘Once Upon a Time’ season 5 winter finale reaction: Jennifer Morrison on big Hook twist

Sunday night’s winter finale of “Once Upon a Time” is one that contained a wide myriad of twists, but few made the same sort of impact as seeing what we did from Captain Hook and Emma Swan. It took Hook remembering the truth about his father to realize that he did not want to make that mistake again, and he conquered the darkness at the last second to spare Storybrooke. However, the irony here is that in many ways, the notion of Rumpelstiltskin being a changed man (the reason why standing down was important) is actually not true at all. He is now the Dark One, and Captain Hook effectively allowed himself to die for nothing.

Want some irony on top of irony? As Jennifer Morrison explains to Entertainment Weekly, there is some good coming out of this twist in that it now allows her the chance to save her beloved pirate, which is something that she would not have been able to do previously:

“In the immediacy of him sacrificing himself before she knows about Gold, Emma is in a state of shock and she’s trying to figure out what to do, and doesn’t know if there is a way to get to him … The weird thing about finding out that Gold is the Dark One again is that she’s furious at him, but at the same time, she now has a way to Hook. If he were not the Dark One, she would not have a way to Hook. As much as she’s furious at him, she also is grateful in a weird way that this is giving her a second chance at saving the man that she loves.”

The Underworld is going to bring you everything from Peter Pan to Cora to a mysterious man at the center of it all. Could he be the devil, Hades, or someone else? We’ll get a chance to learn in due time.

For now, head over here to see the Underworld featured big-time in a new promo! You can also sign up over here to have some additional TV news on everything we cover sent right to you, courtesy of our CarterMatt Newsletter. (Photo: ABC.)