Snow White, also known as Mary Margaret Blanchard is one of the main characters of Once Upon a Time . She is the wife of Prince Charming, the step-daughter of Regina Mills, Emma Swan's biological mother, as well as Prince Neal's, and the maternal grandmother of Henry Mills and Hope Jones and the daughter of King Leopold and Queen Eva. She is also the Mother-in-law of Killian Jones.
She is portrayed by Ginnifer Goodwin, who is also the voice of Judy Hopps, the protagonist of Zootopia.
Before First Curse
Snow White is born in the Enchanted Forest to her father, King Leopold, and her mother, Queen Eva, during a harsh winter. A decade later, the day of her coming-of-age birthday celebration approaches. While the decorations are being prepared, Eva has an heirloom tiara to give her. As they go to retrieve it, they find one of the royal servants, Johanna, trying the tiara on. Immediately, Snow White voices disapproval by stating servants should not wear crowns. Eva is disappointed in her daughter's tone and emphasizes that regardless of if they are royals, every one of their subjects deserve love and respect. When asked the purpose of the upcoming ball, Snow White proudly answers that it's in honor of her own birthday. Rather than that, Eva helps her to see it is to honor the people and show them what a good queen Snow White will be someday. Snow White learns a lesson, to which Eva places the tiara on her daughter's head. While admiring the view, her mother suddenly collapses. Johanna rushes to get a doctor, and after some examination, the cause of the illness cannot be pinpointed. Snow White wishes to cancel the party until her mother is well again, however, Eva insists for the show to go on without her. She is led out of the room by Johanna after seeing her mother cough up blood. Fearing Eva will die, Snow White is in a state of distress until Johanna suggests she go find the Blue Fairy for help by wishing upon a blue star.
Out in the darkness, Snow White tries to locate a blue star in the sky, but the Blue Fairy arrives even when she didn't make a wish. The Blue Fairy has no means of helping Eva, except a type of dark magic in the form of a candle, which sacrifices one person's life so another can live. Snow White rejects the deal as she doesn't wish to use bad means to gain something, but runs back to the palace in tears, admitting to Eva what she couldn't do. Though she believes this makes herself weak, her mother is very proud of Snow White's sign of strength and goodness. As their time together shortens, Eva promises to be with Snow White as long as she has good in her heart. She passes away peacefully as her daughter breaks down into sobs. In preparation for the public mourning ceremony, Snow White changes into a black gown as Johanna places the tiara on her. At the memorial service, she puts a single snowdrop on Eva's chest and then refuses to leave her mother's side, even when everyone else is gone, until Johanna helps her leave the room. Following this, her father returns and Snow White begins traveling a long journey with him. ("The Queen Is Dead")
While on a break in the forest, Snow White is still seated on her horse, as Cora watches nearly. Cora purposely startles the horse into taking off, in which the terrified princess is forced to hold on as her horse gallops onto an estate. Snow's calls for help alert a young woman, Regina, who pulls Snow White to safety. Later, she tells her father about the woman's brave feat. King Leopold, in turn, is so impressed that he proposes to Regina so his daughter can have a stepmother. In the evening, Snow White walks in on Regina kissing a stable boy, Daniel, and runs off to inform her father. Before the princess can get to her father, however, Regina chases her down and explains what she and Daniel have is true love, though her mother Cora will never accept it. Snow is sworn to secrecy but begins to feel sympathy for Cora, who expresses a desire to make Regina happy. Drawing from her own experience in losing her own mother, Snow doesn't wish for Regina to lose hers, and therefore, reveals the truth about Daniel to Cora. Some time later, Snow watches Regina get a fitting for a wedding dress. When she brings up how understanding Cora is, Regina is puzzled by her words. This leads Snow to admit that she told Cora about Daniel and her reasons for doing so. Regina turns away in horrified shock and anger, but she quickly composes herself and instead tells the girl that Daniel ran away, and now she is very happy to marry King Leopold and become her stepmother. Snow, too, is glad things worked out and happily leaves the room, completely oblivious to Regina's rage towards her. ("The Stable Boy")
After Regina marries into the family, Snow White sits in one of the castle rooms as her hair is braided and adorned with flowers by her new stepmother. While admiring the new look, she notices a necklace in Regina's jewelry box. Curiously, the girl inquiries about where the necklace originated from, but Regina doesn't recall. Snow White decides to try it on, and while she is happily admiring the necklace, Regina fantasizes about choking her to death with it. ("We Are Both")
King Leopold, away on a diplomatic mission, leaves his daughter and new wife to tend to the kingdom's affairs. When peasants plead for help about a bandit, Dead Eye, who is terrorizing their villages, Snow White agrees to notify her father, however, Regina gently reasons she can handle it instead. The girl, overcome with fear about taking on this responsibility, chokes out a hasty apology, before fleeing the throne room, much to Regina's veiled satisfaction. Fleeing into the woods, she accidentally falls into a hole, where she is saved by the demi-god Hercules, who needs to complete his Twelve Labors, in order to reach Mount Olympus and become immortal. To help her be the hero her kingdom needs, he persuades her into learning archery from him, because her fear of failing shouldn't keep her from trying. As Hercules teaches her how to hold a bow, he openly flirts with her and tells her about the last Labor he needs to finish, defeating Cerberus. At one village, Snow White shoots an arrow, making it miss Dead Eye and hit a tree, as a warning. She threatens to make the next arrow hit his good eye, and when the bandit dares her to try, she grabs an arrow from her quiver, only to have all the arrows spill out. Snow White fumbles, finally clasping one arrow, when Dead Eye steps on it and tries to bully her into leaving. Using his demi-god ability, Hercules causes a brief earthquake to make the bandit retreat. Miserable over the fiasco, Snow White attempts to break her bow, believing she's not fit to be a queen one day. Drawing from his own past with failure, Hercules tells her about how completing his first Labor almost killed him, but it was from failure that he learned to win. After Snow White looses an arrow that knocks Dead Eye's sword away, she is backed-up by armed villagers, who surround the bandit's men, which forces the outlaws to retreat. While Hercules plans to go after Cerberus, Snow White opts to stay and look out for her kingdom. The two friends, having mutual feelings for each other, say goodbye with a kiss. ("Labor of Love")
When Snow turns fifteen, her father gifts her a trained pony for her birthday. Much to the princess' delight, the pony bows to her, causing her to exclaim happily that "this is my perfect day!" ("Heartless")
At an older age, Snow White masters horseback riding and earns many medals for her tremendous skill. While the princess happily gallops on her favorite horse in a meadow, Regina angrily regards her from inside the stable window. Later, she poisons Snow White's horse with a dose of the sleeping curse. ("Enter the Dragon")
While in the royal gardens, Snow White meets a new friend of her father's, the former Genie of Agrabah, who he invites to his birthday celebration. At the festivity, King Leopold praises his daughter as the fairest one of them all as she greatly reminds him of Eva. A few days after, her father is found murdered in his bed. After a search of his room and the castle, the royal guards discover a Agrabahn viper, which is native to the land the Genie came from. Although he is believed to be responsible, the Genie himself is never found, and none realize he killed King Leopold in order to win the Queen's favor. ("Fruit of the Poisonous Tree")
After her father's sudden death, Snow White goes into mourning while being consoled by Regina. Despite the affection from her stepmother, she knows Regina desires to get rid of her. During an outing in the woods, she talks with a knight but soon realizes he is actually someone Regina sent to kill her. She hits the man, a Huntsman, with a bag of apples and escapes into the forest, though he catches up. When Snow White learns that the Queen sent him to kill her, she disappears to buy herself time to finish a farewell letter to her stepmother. In it, she expresses hopes that her death will bring an end to Regina's suffering and that the subjects of the kingdom will be ruled justly. After the Huntsman finds her again, she hands him the letter and prepares herself for death. Instead, he is moved to tears by her written words and allows her to go. Before this, the Huntsman fashions a whistle for her to use if she ever finds herself in trouble. ("The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter")
Not long after running off, Snow White wanders to a village and seeks shelter inside a chicken coup, to avoid a howling beast she hears outside. At dawn, she steals eggs from the chicken nests, only to be caught by Red Riding Hood. Instead of being upset, the young woman offers her a place to stay. Assuming the name Mary, Snow White later goes with Red Riding Hood to haul water at the well. Once there, they see the bodies of the hunting party, ripped to shreds by a wolf, scattered all around. To keep herself from being publicly recognized, Snow White partially obscures her face with a scarf while attending a town meeting discussing the ravenous wolf; with Granny determining that no one has the power to kill the beast. Returning home, she brings up a boy, Peter, who Red Riding Hood is in love with, though Granny will never allow it since the dangers of the wolf stand in the way. Red Riding Hood prompts a suggestion about killing the creature themselves. Snow White objects but accompanies her for a tracking expedition. They successfully follow the trail of the wolf tracks, though, to their horror, they slowly turn into human footprints leading to Red Riding Hood's cottage. From this, both have reason to believe Peter is the wolf. That evening, Snow White masquerades as Red Riding Hood by putting on her cloak. Red Riding Hood, on the other hand, breaks the news to Peter in the woods. Snow White is caught by Granny but insists Red Riding Hood and Peter are truly in love. To her confusion, Granny is horrified at the vulnerable situation Peter is left in. On the way there, Snow White is told Red Riding Hood is the wolf and without the cloak, she has no control over transforming. They arrive too late to save Peter, who has already been killed and eaten by wolf Red Riding Hood, but Granny is able to shoot a silver arrow to knock her out. Snow White puts the cloak over Red Riding Hood to turn her back to human, who comes back disoriented until catching a glimpse of what she did to Peter. There is no time to grieve as a hunting party approaches, so Granny stays behind to hold them off while the two girls escape into the night. ("Red-Handed")
Through the woods, they are pursued by the Queen's knights, which Snow White realizes from seeing a wanted poster of herself. They manage to hide out of sight, but Red Riding Hood is terrified that a tear in her cloak will force her to transform again, so she sends Snow White away. She comes back to look for Red Riding Hood and finds a den that is home to other shapeshifting wolves. When she enters, one of the shape-shifters, Quinn, attacks her for intruding, but Red Riding Hood convinces the leader of the tribe, Anita, and the other members of the pack that Snow White means no harm. She is permitted to stay and learns Red Riding Hood has eagerly embraced herself as a wolf and wishes to stay with the tribe. The peaceful moment is wrecked by the appearance of the Queen's knights. In the middle of the disruption, Quinn is struck and killed by one of the knights. Directly after, Anita mournfully tends to Quinn's body and angrily blames Snow White for his death. She begins strangling her as an act of vengeance, though Red Riding Hood shape shifts to defend her friend. As the mother-daughter pair fight, Anita accidentally impales herself on a spike and dies. After Anita is buried, Snow White and Red Riding Hood pay their respects to her grave. Before they resume their journey together, she thanks Snow White for the constant support of both halves of herself as wolf and human. ("Child of the Moon")
In time, Snow accumulates money from selling her some of her old family heirlooms. She interests a nobleman in a brooch, but when he only offers a measly three coppers, she tries to up the price because of its value, only to accept his original payment when he appears to recognize her as Snow White. After she meets up with the Blue Fairy, they are attacked by a masked Woodcutter, a bounty hunter hired by the nobleman to capture Snow and bring her to the Queen. They scare off the man, but Snow is terrified by the run-in, professing that she needs to leave the kingdom right away. Blue insists otherwise because the kingdom's people love and need her, however, Snow doesn't see how love can help with anything. Upon parting ways from Blue, Snow lets down her guard around a stray dog, with the Woodcutter capturing her afterwards and placing her in a locked cart. She attempts to escape, and David tries to help her, but he is soon forced into a fight with the Woodcutter. During this, the Woodcutter punctures a hole in the cart, allowing Snow to grab his arm and hold him back, while David kills him. David prepares to break Snow out, however, she prevents him from seeing her face, in fear if he knows her true identity, the Queen will hurt him. As they talk, she learns he is headed to Longbourn to sell his farm because he doesn't have the funds to keep it anymore. Snow helps him by giving him her money, and decides she can steal from a rich nobleman to survive. David questions if this is something she can do on her own, to which she confirms that since she has his support, she won't be alone. As she passes him the coins from her bag, their hands touch, unknowingly creating the first spark of true love, which grows into a sapling. ("Heartless")
Eventually becoming a skilled bandit, Snow becomes wanted by the Queen for false crimes, such as treason and killing King Leopold. While squatting in one of the outer villages, she befriends the inhabitants. After receiving a tip that the Queen's soldiers had discovered her location, Snow White flees. Soon after, she rescues a peasant woman named Wilma from being executed by the Queen's men. Wilma succumbs to fever due to the soldiers' rusty blades, and is cared for by Snow White in the forest. She tells the woman about how Regina saved her as a little girl; revealing that her faith in people and their goodness resulted from this one connection. When Wilma has fully recovered, she and Snow begin traveling through the woods, where Snow declares that she harbors no hatred towards the Queen and would be willing to let her back in and be a family again if she is sincere about changing. Unfortunately, the two arrive at a village, which Snow White previously stayed, and come across a hill of the inhabitants' corpses. Realizing the Queen had all of them killed, a horrified Snow retracts her prior statement about the Queen, and attests there is absolutely no good left in that woman. Strangely, Wilma mentions the matter in how Regina saved Snow White, although this was never brought up in their prior discussion. Snow White, tipped off by this, quickly raises her bow to Wilma, recognizing her as Regina in disguise. Regina fesses up, before attempting to use magic, but nothing works, so she flees from Snow White, who reluctantly lets her go. ("The Evil Queen")
Original timeline
Wanting to save enough money to leave the kingdom for elsewhere, Snow White learns to survive by stealing valuables from carriages owned by the Queen. During one outing, she mistakes a passing carriage as belonging to the Queen's and purposely fells a tree to block the road. While the soldiers are checking the tree, she snatches a bag of jewels before fleeing on horseback. She is chased down by a man, who wrestles her to the ground, and flips her over to see the face of the person he is dealing with. He is dazed to see she is a woman, to which Snow White uses the moment to smash his chin with a rock and escape on his horse. She looks back with a satisfied smirk when the man shouts that he will find her. Snow White sells the jewels to the trolls on the Troll Bridge for gold. Outside her makeshift home, she is caught in a net trap. The man she previously stole from steps forward to introduce himself as Prince James, though Snow White sarcastically dubs him Prince Charming. He agrees not to turn her into the Queen if she returns his stolen ring. Though it's already been sold to the trolls, she has no choice but to help him. On the way there, he takes away her vial of fairy dust, which she was saving to use on the Queen, as the substance can transform an adversity into something harmless. When questioned about her wanted status, she alludes to having destroyed the Queen's happiness. At a stream, Snow White requests a sip of water, but when he allows it, she clocks him and runs away only to be cornered by the Queen's knights. With her vial of dust gone, she is nearly killed but saved by Prince Charming. Since he helped her, she decides to take him to the Troll Bridge. They try to bargain for the ring, but the trolls find it suspicious she wants a refund. From fishing through Prince Charming's things, they see the wanted poster and attack him while Snow White flees. After reaching a safe distance, she turns around, expecting that Prince Charming got away as well, but sees he is entrapped by the trolls. She saves him by throwing fairy dust on the trolls; turning them into bugs. The two leave and reach an intersection where they must part. Snow White hands back his ring but jokingly tries it on for a moment, though she states it's not her style. With the terms of their agreement satisfied, they both leave in opposite directions. ("Snow Falls")
Altered timeline
In the altered timeline, Snow does not get the chance to rob Prince Charming of their gold after seeing an unnamed woman (who she does not know is her daughter) and runs away. She goes to Blackbeard for a proposition to get out of the Enchanted Forest, however, Snow never gets the chance. She is later captured by Charming, who demands for the Ring that Snow does not have. Instead, they go to rescue their unknown daughter Emma after Hook (disguised as Prince Charles) from Regina. However, when they go to rescue Emma, Snow breaks away and goes to kill Regina, but she stops her from doing anything and kills her. However, Snow is able to escape via the Dark Fairy's dust by turning them into a lady bug. When she returns to normal, Emma hugs SNow, but she looks at her confused and Emma now realizes that she can't spend a day without her mother.
. With the Blue Fairy's help, she is restored to human. To Snow White's confusion, Princess Leia is overjoyed to see her alive. The next morning, she offers to refill Prince Charming's water canteen, but actually makes off with his ring. He finds her at a bridge where they are attacked by trolls. When Prince Charming is trapped, Snow White saves him by threatening to turn the trolls into bugs, and they believe her, though she is bluffing with sand instead of fairy dust. At their parting, Snow White jokingly tries on his ring but declares it's not her style. With the terms of their agreement satisfied, they both leave in opposite directions. ("Snow Drifts", "There's No Place Like Home")
During First Curse
After First Curse
Gallery
Notes
- Ginnifer Goodwin had to wear a wig in flashbacks as Snow White.