The driving force of the story is the social divide between the rich and poor, and the government's failure to answer the needs of the latter. Ironically, this differentiates from Bill Willingham's conservative views that also include the notions of limited government.
As a counterpoint to the above, the game also contains examples of people of all walks of life not being wise with their money, and learning the consequences of it the hard way. Beauty and Beast lose most of Bigby's sympathy when he learns that their debt problems started because they were still trying to live like royalty ("used to a certain lifestyle" is the phrase they used), Toad's increasing hypocrisy with his constant griping about the cost of Glamours for his family when he has recently bought himself a sportscar, and the abject patheticness of Crane when his embezzlement habits are exposed.
In a closely related vein, entitlement and unreasonable expectations of aid from the little people to government is addressed. Bigby constantly gets yelled at for not helping people when they first got in tight spots, when often those same people didn't call him in the first place, and were uncooperative when he was trying to solve the problem.
And yet, at the same time, it also shows how this mistrust makes sense from their perspective. A number of references are made to Fables calling for help and receiving none, or of Bigby's "help" causing more harm than good. A major theme seems to be how this mutual lack of cooperation is a vicious cycle.
And it seems that the government is understaffed, because the only people who can financially support it (ie, Bluebeard) are the ones who also have their own agenda. The inefficiency of the government leads to corruption (ie, Crane pocketing extra cash), which in turn leads to the poorer citizens turning elsewhere to sustain themselves.
Base-Breaking Character: Bloody Mary. To some she is well received due to her menacing and charismatic entrance whose sadism brings in a much needed darker tone for the upcoming threat Bigby and his allies will soon come up against. Others find her introduction over the top, one-dimensional, and overly reliant on cheesy villain monologues to the point of Narm (she spouts about six one-liners in a row as she's leaving at the end of Episode 3, each of which could serve perfectly well to end the conservation). Her detracters softened on her during the finale where she reveals her true form and shows us exactly why she is called 'Bloody Mary'.
In the ending, Mr. Toad is sent to the farm regardless of your own decision in the matter, and even if you gave him money to pay for a glamour. Some feel that this is an utter copout for Telltale like the decision didn't even matter, while others feel it's another anvilicious lesson about how government works and how sometimes, good intentioned workers get their hands tied by the system they work in. It's also worth noting that in the comics Toad was living at the farm, so he was destined to end up there regardless.
A small one over Erin Yvette voicing Snow White. She's either considered fitting for the role, or others, often readers of the original comic, find it clashing entirely with what they imagined she sounded like, and a third group can't unhear her as Molly.
Yeah you don't really need to slap Georgie Porgie around or smash any of his stuff, but it's pretty god damned satisfying.
Heck, even showing restraint and not going to town on his property is pretty satisfying in its own right, since he'll still freak out.
It especially cathartic to keep punching Georgie even while he's bleeding to death after the reveal that he was the one who murdered Faith and Lilly. You can even chose to tell him that he deserves worse and he won't even argue, with the prompt saying he will take that to his grave.
Likewise, you get a chance of paying the Tweedles back for all the crap they've been pulling in Episode 3.
There are also opportunities to punch both Crane and the Crooked Man when you put each under arrest.
All the options to permanently deal with the Crooked Man are very satisfying. If you take the non-violent option he will be turned in a bird and unable to speak, and while most players will probably find the option to tear off his head in front of everyone too brutal, there is still the option to throw him down the Wishing Well after he makes one last desperate attempt to kill Bigby. Heck, if you’re okay with the town and Snow White being mad at you, you don't even have to take the Crooked Man in, you can just strangle him right on the spot if you are so inclined.
The seemingly-benevolent Crooked Man is a ruthless crime boss and the major source of Fabletown's corruption. Controlling much of Fabletown's supply of glamour, the Crooked Man uses desperate citizens' needs to manipulate them into indebting themselves to him, at which point he forces them to repay him with outrageous prices, having them killed if they can't pay him back. The Crooked Man also runs the Puddin' N' Pie strip club, which is a front for his prostitution ring where the girls are forced to be sex workers under threat of decapitation by magical ribbons which also magically prevent them from speaking, using Georgie Porgie as a pimp, and forcing the beaten girls to work in his sweatshops. When Sheriff Bigby Wolf confronts him, the Crooked Man tries to pin everything on Georgie and tries to have Bigby killed. After being arrested, and ultimately found guilty, The Crooked Man attempts to throw Bigby down the Witching Well.
In the comic prequel, The Knave of Hearts is a vile misogynist responsible for the creation of Bloody Mary thanks to his torment of her. Wanted by the Wonderland authorities for thievery, the Knave plans to escape any form of justice by selling a glass baby on the Black Market in exchange for an escape from law enforcement. Seducing dozens of women via mirrors across the world, the Knave supernaturally impregnates them all in the hopes their reflections will birth his glass baby, turning downright abusive to his lovers even as the pregnancy process usually kills them. When young Mary comes closest to successfully completing her birthing, the Knave grows impatient and carves the glass baby right out of Mary, tearing out the umbilical cord with his teeth and leaving the gutted, traumatized Mary for dead. The Knave is flippant to the fact that his glass baby will be destroyed as part of his deal to save his own hide, and even when his plans are foiled, the Knave goes on to gain a new lover for him to abuse and drive a victim of the Crooked Man's to suicide.
Continuity Lockout: Averted; its nature as a prequel prevents a lot of need to read the comics it's based on, and the Book of Fables does a good job of explaining what certain terms mean, and helps people unfamiliar with the source material to understand the story.
Cult Classic: While the other visual adventure games by Telltale were also well received, many of them depended of the fame of the property they came from. Like Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead or more mainstream DC comics properties, Fables is not unknown but its presence is comparatively minuscule, that paired with an incredibly stylish design and a solid plot and characters, guarantees its cult classic place amongst that era of Telltale games..
Genius Bonus: Knowledge of a wide variety of fairy tales and folklore will certainly come in handy. When was the last time you heard a reference to "Donkeyskin/Thousand-Furs"?
Fridge Horror: Then realize that Fables can only come back from the dead if Muggles remember them.
Good Bad Bugs: In Episode 3, as Bigby wolfs out and the camera briefly cuts to the Tweedles, the shotgun in Dum's hands throbs a bit, making it look like Dum's hands are shaking and he's crapping his pants.
A lot of the ribbing and snarky exchanges between Bigby and Colin in episode 1 becomes rather grim given Colin's gruesome fate in comics later down the timeline. Especially Bigby's possible comments about how Colin should be back on the Farm since being taken back to the Farm ends up being what gets him killed, due to his bastard brothers wanting to start a revolt.
It gets worse in episode 4, where Bigby is forced to choose between sticking up for Colin or sending him back to the Farm.
Related: at one point in the game, Bigby and Beast end up in a fight where you can have Bigby deliver a violent beatdown on him. In recent events in the comic, a Brainwashed and Crazy Bigby ends up murdering Beast.
Any scene between Bigby and Ichabod Crane can also come off as this when the only story featuring Crane in the comic has Bigby killing him in the end as Crane planned to betray Fabletown.
Iron Woobie: Bigby Wolf. He's attempting to pull a genuine Heel–Face Turn, but nobody gives him a chance. However, that doesn't stop him from carrying out his job. Fortunately, it's possible to give Bigby acceptance among the Fables depending on how you play him.
Grendel and the Woodsman. Bigby if the player plays him as a Jerk with a Heart of Gold. Crane seemed to be this, but episode 2 reveals that it's a ruse.
Georgie Porgie can be seen as this in episode 5.
Bloody Mary's backstory reveals that she used to bea timid girl before becoming a Psycho for Hire. Though the extent of sympathy for her varies from person to person.
Like You Would Really Do It: Telltale and Vertigo made it clear that the game was canon in the comic timeline, meaning anyone who's read any of Fables will know that Snow White wasn't actually dead.
Memetic Badass: The game's front cover does this for Bigby Wolf.
Memetic Mutation: [Glass Him] note A misleading prompt in the first episode often confused by players as buying the Woodsman a drink leads to Bigby smashing a glass over his head, mostly because Glassing isn't a very well known slang term.
Moment of Awesome: It has to be the appearance of Bigby's fourth and final form — an 8 foot tall Big Bad Wolf. It's absolutely breathtaking.
Bloody Mary is so over-the-top that she almost comes off as a tryhard desperately attempting to prove that she's a badass than just naturally being one. The fact that she has to basically cheat to beat Bigby in the alleyway fight does her no favors.
When Bigby transforms into full wolf form in episode 5, a lot of his growls are clearly lion or tiger growls instead of wolf growls.
Nausea Fuel: In Episode 3, Bloody Mary breaks Bigby's arm to the point of an exposed fracture. It's not pretty to look at.
The first sequence of Episode 4 is resetting your broken arm. It takes several attempts.
Vivian's death scene, her head just... slides off.
The Magic Mirror can see all and know all, if it is asked your name.
Bloody Mary can travel through mirrors anytime she wants.
Porting Disaster: The Xbox 360 version of the game wasn't tested well.
For the Season Pass, it seems when Episode 2 came out, players discovered that they couldn't access the option that let them get Episode 2 for free. Cue backlash, especially from Irish and Kiwi gamers who were still sore over The Walking Dead.
When the disc version was released, anyone who bought it immediately discovered that it was extremely laggy, to the point of being literally unplayable. Cutscenes were extremely jittery, Quick Time Events would disappear before you even saw them, making action scenes unwinnable in most cases.
The Scrappy: Toad to some. He's an absolute jackass who also has shades of hypocrisy (like buying a sports car while heavily in debt and in need of a Glamour for him and his kid, and spying on Bigby with the Magic Mirror in Episode 2).
Stoic Woobie: Flycatcher doesn't convey much emotion, but the game makes it clear that he's had it rough.
Combines this with Never Trust a Trailer. The trailer for episode 4 hinted at Bluebeard taking over as deputy mayor. This never actually occurs, which can be viewed as a missed opportunity for some.
Detective Brannigan's file in the Tweedle's office can easily lead to speculation that she will return. She never does.
Vivian. There's a somber scene in episode 5 where she talks about not wanting to be the person she is. The problem is that not only has she cursed the women who work for her and Georgie into not being able to speak about the details of their employment, she also uses her ribbons to keep them enslaved. Her speech about how hard her life has been comes off as a pathetic attempt to justify her horrendous actions, and her death can easily come across as too little, too late.
Villain Decay: In the span of a few minutes in episode 5, the Crooked Man goes from an impressive, intimidating manipulative bastard to an unimpressive coward during his trial as soon as Nerissa speaks up against him.
What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Despite being a videogame about fairy tales and having an awesome picture of a wolfman on the cover, this game is not appropriate for younger kids. In short, the game has tons of blood, swearing, gritty violence, prostitution, explicit nudity, corruption, mafia symbolism, harsh political realities, and a game full of detective case work. Not exactly the kind of topics you'd expect from Mother Goose.
Lawrence is the poster boy of just what can happen to a fairy tale character when forced into the real world. Lawrence goes from Prince Charming for Faith's Happily Ever After to an unemployed, impoverished destitute who is aware that his wife has become a prostitute to survive. Lawrence even attempts suicide, thinking that dying could allow Faith to pursue a better quality of life.
Toad Junior just can't seem to catch a break. His father yells at him frequently, and he has been traumatized twice so far in the game; the first time being when Tweedledee breaks into the Toads' house and threatens to kill him if Toad tells Bigby anything (including hitting him if you went to Lawrence's place first), and then when he discovers the decapitated body of Lily at the bottom of the East River. The final kick happens when he ends up being forced to go to the Farm, thanks to his dad.
Nerissa, one of the dancers at the Pudding and Pie strip club. She's also known as the Little Mermaid. Not only is she trapped in a miserable, demeaning job with a boss that makes scum look good, but just as it was in her original (rather miserable) tale, every step she takes makes her feel like she's walking on glass.
Holly, even to some degree. Aside from being a troll, Holly is just an average bartender. A bartender whose place gets wrecked after Bigby and Grendel smack each other around. Not even a day later, the same person comes back to tell her her missing sister has turned up dead. Then - no matter whether Bigby promised to help or not - she has to find out that her sisters corpse was thrown into the Wishing Well and thus can't be burned according to troll burial rites. Followed by her getting shot by a shotgun when trying to protect said ritual. Talk about a Trauma Conga Line...
Episode 3 introduces Flycatcher, the Prince-turned-frog whose wife and children were killed in the Homelands, and who takes odd jobs doing custodial work to keep his mind off his personal troubles.And Crane unceremoniously fired him from the Woodlands, meaning he has a severe case of Because You Were Nice to Me towards the Tweedles.
Snow White herself has definite Woobie tendencies, she's just so much more together than the others that she doesn't elicit the same amount of sympathy. First, her evil aunt tried to have her killed. Then, she was kidnapped by the seven dwarves and forced to be their sex slave. And then her husband cheated on her with her little sister.
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