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Once Upon A Time Debuted Its First Same-Sex Relationship & Fans Are Divided

Shannon Carlin
April 18, 2016, 6:45 PM
The fairy-tale-world of ABC's Once Upon a Time now looks a bit more like our real one, thanks to a new same-sex relationship. On Sunday night's episode of the show, fans saw Dorothy and Ruby share a kiss — a first for the series, which is currently in its fifth season. But as Mic reports, fans are split on whether the kiss shared by the couple, already being dubbed "Ruby Slippers," marks a step in the right direction for LGBT representation. Some fans felt the love story was forced, with many claiming on Twitter that it was unnecessary, rushed, or worse — lazy storytelling. One fan even outlined what led to the lip-lock, which included Dorothy's dog Toto being stolen before the characters shared a true love's kiss. "Wether [sic] you ship it or not ruby slippers is rushed and will be forgotten after this episode," one fan tweeted. "It's not fair representation it's lazy."
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While some may have felt it was rushed, the kiss was promised by the show's creators before the season even started. At the time, producers did not reveal which two characters would be involved — though many hoped it would be Emma Swan and the Evil Queen, #SwanQueen — but promised to introduce a same-sex relationship that would be handled like any other love story on the series. “We want the show to reflect the world as it is now,” executive producer Adam Horowitz told Entertainment Weekly in 2015. Some fans did feel that the kiss between Ruby and Dorothy achieved the producers' goal in some small, important way, and publicly thanked the creators.
But the consensus among fans seemed to be that Once Upon a Time would need to do more in the future to show that it cares about LGBT representation and not just ratings. "Don't be satisfied with #RubySlippers because it's NOT enough," one fan tweeted. "But it was necessary." The show's co-creators, Horowitz and Eddy Kitsis, have not detailed what is to come for this new couple. But they did tell The Hollywood Reporter after the episode aired, “True love's kiss has been a staple of this show since the beginning. This past Sunday's episode was just another example of how in a fairy tale, as in life, love is love."
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