The season 5 premiere of "Once Upon a Time" saw Snow White (Ginnifer Goodwin), Prince Charming (Josh Dallas), Regina (Lana Parrilla) and the others go through a portal to try to save Emma (Jennifer Morrison) after she vanished when she was taken over by the Dark One. They were able to get into Camelot with the help of a portal, but in a twist, the episode ended with a time jump six weeks into the future. The group had no recollection of what happened when they went through the portal, and Emma showed up and told the group that they failed to save her from the darkness.
Following a recent press screening of the premiere episode, co-creator Edward Kitsis said that in the installment, Emma tried to resist the Darkness at first. But she eventually went "full-on Lady Stardust" by the end of the premiere. Kitsis said that season 5 will explain just happened before the time jump and that the new season will explore what makes someone give in to the darkness.
The show will flashback to the time that the characters lost, but Kitsis said, "It's not going to be the whole winter before we catch up, and it's not necessarily everybody at the same time."
"It's going to be very similar to season 3 that we are going to be flashing back to Camelot and then [going back to] present-day Storybrooke," he explained.
Kitsis added that Merlin, Arthur, Guinevere, and Lancelot's origin stories will also be revealed in upcoming episodes. But he clarified that the Storybrooke group and Emma will be the focus of the season.
"We'll see what seems to have happened to her, and explore that mystery and how they can or can't help her," he said.
The season will also explain why Merlin appeared to a young Emma in the premiere at a 1989 screening of "The Sword in the Stone," where he warned her not to pull the sword from the stone. Kitsis said that Merlin will get an origin story to explain why he was there and what Emma has to do with Excalibur.
"Once Upon a Time" airs on Sundays at 8 p.m. on ABC.
