Once Upon A Time

There's not as much respect for marriage as there used to be, but I've been pleasantly surprised a new favorite show!

A year or so ago, we found a show we loved called "Flash Forward."  There was a part that was disappointing, though.  (Quick premise: Everyone in the world saw 2 minutes of their futures.)  One of the characters in the show saw herself having an affair and was shocked and horrified, so she did everything she could to avoid the man in real life because she wanted to be faithful to her husband.  Sadly, the man did not have the same values and tried multiple times to convince her that it wasn't bad because they loved each other.  In the end, her husband did a few things (including giving in a couple of times to alcoholic tendencies) that caused her to decide perhaps the other man was right. As if to say, if your spouse messes up, it's okay to stop being faithful.  Ridiculous.

A couple of months ago, a new show started called "Suburgatory."  It's kind of an odd show, and we were trying to decide if we liked it.  A little while in, they decided to have a married woman develop a crush on a single dad.  He opposes it, which was good, but the worst part was that the woman is pretty likeable + her husband is always out of town and you kind of even forget that she has one because he's never on the show.  I was freaked out when I found myself almost wishing it would work out between the single dad and the married lady, so we stopped watching it. 

A couple of weeks ago, we decided to start watching ABC's "Once Upon A Time."  Premise: A town is comprised of fairy tale characters, but a witch put a curse on them & none of them remember their fairy tale lives.  Snow White (Mary Margaret in the normal world) and Prince Charming (James) were married and had a baby in the fairy tale world before the curse came.  Well, in the real world, James is recovering after being in a coma and MM is the hospital volunteer helping him.  They fall in love and then find out James was married before going in the coma.  He doesn't remember his wife, and part of him remembers Snow White, which is why he loves MM.  He keeps trying to get her to date him.  It's interesting because he is married and should be faithful to his wife, but he was married to MM first!  Later in the show, he leaves his wife because he doesn't love her, and on the way to meeting MM to see if she wants to date, his memories all come back.  When he gets there to meet her, he says, "I still like you a lot, but now I remember loving [my wife], and I have to honor that.  I'm sorry."

During the entire show, MM and her friend emphasize that he is married and it would be wrong for her to interfere.  She firmly decides not to do anything to come between him and his wife, even though she loves him. Anyway, to make a long story a tiny bit shorter, thank you, ABC, for giving proper respect to the sanctity of marriage and the importance of honoring that commitment.  Not many shows or characters do that these days.  I am very impressed.