For months, fans of “Once Upon a Time,” ABC’s fairy tale drama, have been eagerly awaiting the network’s new spin-off “Once Upon a Time in Wonderland.” Unfortunately, the new show, which debuted on Oct. 10, shares little in common with the original other than format and name. Both shows feature dual storylines, one set in the present day and the other set in the character’s past, but apart from that, the two shows barely overlap. The few characters which appeared in the original show only did so as guests, and their “Wonderland” versions have been given new actors.<br >
“Wonderland” is much narrower in focus than the original “Once Upon a Time,” centering around Lewis Carroll’s Alice from “Alice in Wonderland” rather than the more generalized fairy tales of the original series. The idea, in theory, is a good one, opening up a more specific batch of characters to build the story around. Theory and practice, however, are completely different things.
The pilot opens with Alice returning from her adventure in Wonderland, only to find that she had been missing, presumed dead by her parents, with no one believing her story. The show cuts to present day, where Alice, played by Sophie Lowe (“Beautiful Kate”), is in a mental institution, where it is revealed that Alice has not been to Wonderland just once, but multiple times. The show cuts again (something that becomes distressingly common in the pilot) to Wonderland, where she is running from troops of the show’s main antagonist, the Red Queen, played by Emma Rigby (“Hollyoaks”).<br >
From here, the show bounces back and forth from the mental institution to Wonderland, introducing viewers to all the varied main and recurring characters of the show, including Peter Gadiot (“The Forbidden Girl”) as Cyrus, who is a genie and Alice’s love interest. Other characters include the White Rabbit, voiced by John Lithgow (“Dexter”), the Knave of Hearts (Michael Socha, “Being Human”), and bizarrely, “Aladdin’s” Jafar (Naveen Andrews, “Lost”). That’s when the show begins to fall into the unfortunate steps of the original show, including the large number of scene cuts and confusing storylines. What began as an interesting, if a little strange, retelling of “Alice in Wonderland” in the modern day devolves into a mashup of Disney characters and Alice characters that have no business being in the same universe.<br >
The actors themselves do a great job portraying their characters, especially Lowe’s Alice and Lithgow’s White Rabbit, and the scenes containing them together are some of the best in the pilot. Other characters are new takes on fairytale characters, such as the Knave of Hearts whose real name indicates that he is actually a character from Robin Hood. How the characters originally met is never explained in the show, leaving the viewer to assume that it is identical to Lewis Carroll’s characters; how the new characters and backgrounds fit into the original tale is not explained, leaving the writers plenty of plot elements for future episodes.<br >
It may be possible to get past the crossovers, but Alice’s martial arts abilities are simply inconceivable. A slim girl taking down five (armed) mental institution guards single handedly while the strapping young Knave of Hearts just sits back and watches, defying the seemingly close relationship between the two. That relationship, along with most of Alice’s previous trips to Wonderland (including how she learned to fight), are not explained in the pilot, but future episodes will likely expand on that history.<br >
That’s not to say that the show doesn’t have its strengths. The depiction of Wonderland itself is extremely well done, accurately capturing the fantastic that, from afar, looks normal. The entire world that is Wonderland serves to make even the most normal characters seem mischievous, which lends itself well to the overall tone of the show. That, and the more focused (if upside-down cliche) storyline make “Wonderland” a better choice than the original, but interested viewers would be better off watching it online on Fridays than wasting a valuable Thursday night slot. “Once Upon a Time in Wonderland” airs on Thursday nights on ABC.