Fandom Specific Plot / Once Upon a Time

• A lot of Swan Queen (Emma/Regina) fanfiction will include scenes directly parallel to those of Emma's parents, Snow White and Prince Charming. One especially recurring plotline is Emma being put under a sleeping curse and Regina's kiss waking her up through True Love's Kiss. This will often be done as a last resort when all else has failed.
• Highly common are Adaptational Mundanity AUs with Storybrooke being an ordinary town and the characters having their canon personalities but no magical abilities or parallel realm past.
• In many AUs, Belle isn’t locked up in a ward during the Curse but rather is a relatively free resident of Storybrooke like everyone else. Sometimes, she lives there as Lacey, but many fanfics have her cursed self resemble her real persona a lot more.
• Rumplestiltskin/Belle fanfics, especially those in non-magical AUs, often start with Belle becoming Bae’s nanny or tutor.
• Fics where Regina becomes the Dark One instead of Emma are surprisingly popular. A lot of these are Emma/Regina fics which feature Emma saving Regina through True Love. Though a lot of Regina/Robin fics will follow this plot as well, usually the layout remains the same.
• Fics which feature the Dark Swan (Emma as the Dark One) and Evil Queen (after she is separated from Regina) meeting (usually through time travel) are fairly common. This usually leads to a Villain Team-Up or Dark Romance, depending on the author's shipping preference.
• Role Swap AU fics, where characters swap roles in the show, are popular. Some of the most popular are Regina taking Snow's place (which briefly happened in canon) with Emma as Charming, Hook taking Charming's place while Emma takes Snow's, and Emma as Robin Hood.
• A lot of Emma/Regina fanfics will have Emma take Robin's place as Regina's One True Love. These fics will usually put focus on Regina finding out about Emma's Lyon tattoo, which is used as a stand-in for Robin's lion tattoo.
• Fic where magic isn't real but all in Emma's head is very popular. These usually involve her being put in a coma when she crashes in the pilot. A lot of them have her waking up to find out a lot of the characters from the show are from some sort of hospital.
• High School AUs where the characters are in a modern high school are common. Ones with Emma as a high school senior while either Hook or Regina is her attractive teacher are quite popular. These will almost always have Rumple as the principal, usually with Belle as his assistant. Alternately, if the Rumple/Belle romance is the focus of the plot, Regina will be the strict principal to give the romance some obstacles on the way.
• Quite popular are the Adaptational Mundanity takes on the deal in "Skin Deep", with Rumple offering Belle to work at his shop in exchange for him forgiving her father's debts. Occasionally, he will outright ask her to sleep with or marry him, but he inevitably gets Easily Forgiven for that because Belle is already attracted to him as well.
• Many fanfics have Neal Cassidy and Belle French as close friends (often colleagues or roommates). Such plots are often thick with Dramatic Irony at the start as Neal eagerly gives Belle relationship advice about her much older boyfriend and/or probes her for naughty details, before learning that said boyfriend is his own father and quickly demanding Brain Bleach.
• Yet Another Christmas Carol for anti-villains occurs in various fandoms, but it's an especially popular fanfic plot for Rumplestiltskin, considering that, very much like Scrooge, a) he holds many people in his debt b) he Used to Be a Sweet Kid and an idealistic young man c) he has a sweetheart called Belle and one of his major inner conflicts involves choosing power over his love for her.
• There are quite a few fanfics that employ Decomposite Character and feature Polar Opposite Twins Belle and Lacey. It is also quite possible for one sister to be shipped with Mr. Gold and the other to be paired off with another Robert Carlyle character, usually Nicholas Rush. The sisters are always thick as thieves and each acts as Shipper on Deck for the other’s relationship.
• There are fanfics featuring Lacey (or an original cursed!personality of Belle's) as a sex worker, to allow for a Pretty Woman-style romance with Mr. Gold.
• There are a great number of fanfics that feature crossovers that have other roles the main actors have played exist in the show's multiverse:
  • This mainly takes the form of the Crossover Ship "Rushbelle". These see Belle meet Robert Carlyle's character from Stargate Universe, Nicholas Rush, and falling in love with him. Some of these will also have Nicholas Rush just be one of the many aliases that Rumplestiltskin uses throughout his hundreds of years of life.
  • Due to Jennifer Morrison also starring in House, there are a lot of fics that reveal that during Emma's time on the run, she managed to get through medical school, changed her name to Allison Cameron, and worked for Dr. Gregory House. These fics often feature either the cast of House finding their way to Storybrooke or the Swan-Mills Family (Emma, Henry, and Regina) and occasionally Snow and Charming stopping by the Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital for help.
• A lot of Emma/Regina fanfics will have Henry being a Shipper on Deck for his moms. They often have Henry trying to play matchmaker for them and trying to get them to admit their feelings for each other.
• There are several fanfics where Marian lives and doesn't get killed by Zelena. Notably, shippers love to use this plot either to cause drama for Regina and Robin Hood, as he struggles with his feelings for both, or as a way for those who ship Regina with someone else (Emma, Maleficent, or so on) to get Robin out of the way without delving into Die for Our Ship.
• Fanfics that explore the period mentioned in the final episode of the show where Emma and Regina take Henry on a trip after he graduates high school are very common. These often take the form of Emma and Regina having a summer affair, which ends when they return to Storybrooke due to Emma being married. Whether they end up together afterward or not depends on the fic.
• Emma and Regina having a kid together through a Mystical Pregnancy is a common trope in OUAT fanfics focused on them. A lot of these will also have it so Emma and Hook's daughter is actually Emma and Regina's, often through some short of one night stand, though most are simply them being married and deciding to have a daughter together after Henry leaves home.
• With the show's propensity to incorporate both various fairy tales and various Disney properties into it's lore, many fanfics are basically "the residents of Storybrooke respond to new Disney characters impacting their lives while the flashbacks retell the story of this Disney movie".

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