Captain Swan vs. Swan Queen

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Ship War
ShipWar: Captain Swan vs Swan Queen
Date(s): 2012 - 2018 (?)
Location: Tumblr, Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, basically anywhere and everywhere fans of OUAT congregate or have congregated.
Fandom: Once Upon A Time
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Captain Swan vs. Swan Queen was a long running ship war between the two most popular Emma Swan juggernaut ships of Once Upon A Time: Captain Swan (Killian Jones/Emma Swan) and Swan Queen (Emma Swan/Regina Mills). Opinions were often strong, which lead to accusations and harassment of the opposing shippers. The ship war was most fervent in the mid-2010s when the show was airing, and although the show ended in 2018, the ship war still somewhat continued for a few years after before fizzling out. Also, because OUAT was targeted towards a younger audience (typically teenagers) this was many young fans' first experience of a ship war.

About

four images of Emma looking uncomfortable around Hook and four images of Emma looking interested in Regina. Text reads "Her reaction to him... Her reaction to her... Can you see the difference? Come on, can't you see that? Swan Queen is simply the best, just accept that'.
Example of a meme directed at Captain Swan shippers from a Swan Queen shipper, creator unknown (approx 2013)

A Sectarian Fandom

Shipping preferences in the OUAT fandom seem to be largely quite sectarian in regards to several of its biggest ships (Captain Swan, Swan Queen, Outlaw Queen, Rumbelle, and Swanfire in particular) at least within online spaces, though whether that enhanced the ship war, or was a result of it, or a mixture of both, is unclear.

Series of Events

Fans began shipping Swan Queen in season 1, it was initially an enemyslash ship, because Emma was the main protagonist and Regina the main antagonist. However, this changed over the course of the series as Emma and Regina slowly became friends and started co-parenting Henry. Early on Swan Queen attracted fans, but was not a dominant ship, because of the large cast of characters there were many competing ships, both canon and fanon.

In season 2 Killian Jones, aka Captain Hook, was introduced. His chemistry with Emma attracted many fans, although in the beginning it was similar to Swan Queen in that it had more of an enemies to lovers vibe, because Killian was not a friend, but a reluctant ally in Neverland. Over the course of the series Killian reforms his ways and becomes Emma's canonical love interest.

During the course of season 2 and the first half of season 3, these two ships rose dramatically in popularity; along with a second competing het ship for Emma, Swanfire (Emma Swan/Neal Cassidy). This is when the ship war ramped up, with all three sides attacking one another. During the second half of season 3 Neal died, to the heartbreak of Swanfire fans, and essentially removing them from the shipping discourse for many fans, and leaving Swan Queen and Captain Swan the two dominant parties in the ship war.

To complicate things further a competing canonical het ship for Regina was introduced, Outlaw Queen (Regina Mills/Robin Hood), in season 3. Outlaw Queen shippers were also often drawn into the ship war, especially in the later seasons.

The ship war was often intense. Though many fans of both ships were considerate with their shipping preferences, there were also some unkind behaviours expressed throughout the existence of the ship war. Ship bashing, as well as character bashing, was frequent. Common accusations, and the target of critical meta, were: "Captain Swan is an abusive relationship[1] and promotes rape culture[2][3]" and "Swan Queen is an abusive relationship[4][5] and is incest[6][7]". There were also harassment through anon messaging on Tumblr, some of which could be quite severe, including things like slurs and wishing death upon the recipient[8][9]; although this seems to have been the behavior of only the most extreme of fans and was not seen as appropriate behavior among most of the CS and SQ shippers.

There were many arguments about which ship could become endgame (since Captain Swan was canon—and eventually married in season 6—while Swan Queen was not). Swan Queen shippers were sometimes called delusional for thinking their ship could ever exist/become canon.[10][11]

The most fervent time for the ship war appears to be 2013-2015[12], or roughly seasons 2 through the first half of season 5. It continued to flare up multiple times in the later seasons, but cooled considerably in season 7, because many of the involved ships and characters were no longer present on the show[13].

Avoiding the Ship War

Despite this, there are many fans who were able to avoid much of the drama and fandom wank through the likes of blocking etc., and some managed to happily ship both in online spaces. In addition, fans of many of the countless smaller ships and rarepairs in the fandom had much less of an issue with involvement in the CS vs. SQ ship war, being able to carve out their own niche in the Once fandom, such as the likes of Red Beauty, Frozen Swan, or Gideon/Roderick.

Involvement of Creators and Actors

Showrunner Involvement

The showrunners and writers where somewhat aware of the ship war, and early on when asked questions about the ships involved would be encouraging, but also very vague about if any particular ship would end up together. Also to some fans it seemed like the writers were creating scenes in the show to cater to specific ships.

Yes the writers are very aware of Swan Queen's existence. The three big Emma ships are Regina/Emma, Hook/Emma, and Neal/Emma. They've addressed it before, and there was a lot of drama over the SDCC panel. They even called it unintentional and that they never played it that way (even though Lana and JMo have had incredible chemistry since season 1). I think it might not have started out as intentional, but that they are slowly 'catering' a little since they realize that the Swan Queen fans are a large fan base.[14]

This changed in the summer of 2013 when at a panel at San Diego Comic Con one of the showrunners, Adam Horowitz, stated that they never had any intention of making Swan Queen a reality, to the great disappoint of the Swan Queen shippers.

Prior to those comments, though, the showrunners had been ambiguous enough in their comments that the Swan Queen fandom blossomed. And the show itself provided sufficient subtext with differing degrees of subtlety that reading a potentially or actually romantic tension between Emma and Regina was not hard if you were looking for it. And a lot of fans were looking for it.... Now at Comic Con, Adam Horowitz was asked directly whether elements in the show that many fans saw as pointing to a Swan Queen romance were “intentional.” He stated unequivocally that that was not the intention of the show creators, and in subsequent tweets, strongly suggested that Swan Queen is a ship that not only was never intended to happen, but will never happen in the future. That’s not a surprise to many of us, but it was disappointing to a lot of SWEN nation, even crushing. I’m not going to address the fury expressed on Twitter and Tumblr about this, although I suspect the “death threats to Adam” may have been exaggerated in some quarters. For many who were already upset, Horowitz’s tweet that there would be an LGBT story in OUAT’s future was even more insulting, as if all Swan Queeners were focused on was the gender of the two characters. It was a tweet that I suppose Horowitz thought would be conciliatory, but one that monumentally misread the situation; he would have done much better just to acknowledge the disappointment of Swan Queen fans and otherwise kept silent.[15]

Many Swan Queen fans felt they had been queerbaited[16].

Actors Involvement

The show's actors were aware of the ship war, and were sometimes harassed by shippers from the opposing sides, usually on Twitter.

[Anonymous ask]
The ouat fandom was so ugly. Swan Queen literally attacked every single ship. It was Swan Queen vs Captain Swan and Outlaw Queen. They'd call anyone that supported Captain Swan a supporter of rape culture, a homophobe, and a racist. Swan Queen fans also attacked everyone on the show accept for Lana. They harassed Sean Maguire so bad he said in an interview he was gonna leave Twitter and they made Jennifer Morrison and Ginnifer Goodwin leave Twitter for the rest of the shows run.
[letoatreides]
yeah I was in the ouat fandom when I was a teenager so I remember it all. swan queen fans were bad but captain swan/outlaw queen fans were just as vicious and ugly[17]
Of course, the OUAT case had shipping wars that overlaid everything, too, with Captain Swan fans being viciously anti-Swann Queen. I understood the reason for why they would dislike Regina and Swann Queen, but it would just go way too far and usually involve personal attacks on Parilla for encouraging her own fans.[18]

Michael Coleman Incident

There was incident on Twitter in December 2013 between the actor Michael Coleman, who had a minor recurring role on the show, and several SQ shippers. He stated "I know for a fact it won’t happen" regarding the Swan Queen ship among other things, responding to angry tweets from shippers, and later referred to potential queer canon ships for the show as a "Toyota", which did not go over well with the fans. The thread blew up to such a degree that the actresses Lana Parilla and Jennifer Morrison, as well as one of the showrunners Adam Horowitz, had to come forward and say the Coleman did not speak for them or the show.[19]

Bigotry Accusations

Accusations of bigotry, particularly homophobia[12] (SQers against CSers) though also racism and xenophobia (regarding Lana Parrilla, who is Latina[20]), and ableism (Killian is missing hand[21]) arose. Accusations of the weaponization of bigotry - using accusations of bigotry as a means of skirting accountability - also sprang up. Some outside observers, as well as many involved with the ships too, suspect a mixture of both.

Fandom Distress

It turned me off the show so much, like I got hate from swanqueen fans saying I was homophobic when I am a bisexual woman. I don’t like the ship because I feel like Regina is always so mean to Emma and it doesn’t work for me. I’m not even a big emma and hook fan, I legit mostly cared about Emma’s relationship with her parents and Henry, that was my main focus of the show in the first few seasons.[12]

It really turned me off from the fandom for a very long time I was a teenager when it was airing with grown women yelling at me in my ask box because of who I casually mentioned shipping[12]

Reflections on the Ship War

Got to say, in all my time in fandom, Ugly Portrait Discourse aside, one of the single most petty, ridiculous ship wars I’ve seen in my entire life had to be the Swanfire VS Captain Swan VS Swan Queen ship wars.

Like, that shit got intense and featured so many weird logical stretches to prove that one ship was the purest on a show where EVERYONE did fucked up things, both intentionally and unintentionally (because the writers were, frankly, kicked out of Writer’s Kindergarten).

Ft. “THIS SET PIECE THAT SHOWS UP FOR TWO SECONDS IS EVIDENCE THAT YOUR SHIP IS SECRETLY THE DEVIL.”[22]

Listen Tumblr and Voltron. The Ship War between Klance and Sheith is nothing to compared to Once Upon a Time Fandom's Ship War between Swan Queen vs Swanfire vs Captain Swan.[23]

There is a HUGE canyon of a divide between people who ship Emma with Regina (known as Swan Queen) and those who ship Emma with Killian (known as Captain Swan). This divide was even more volatile while the show was ongoing, because the Swan Queen fans desperately wanted their ship to happen and the Captain Swan fans enjoyed lording it over them that CS was canon and SQ was never going to happen. Long story short: It wasn’t pleasant, and a lot of people on both sides of the divide acted like complete knobs.
Season 7 actually cooled a lot of it down, because with Emma off the show and Regina and Wish Hook playing lead roles in their own right, both CS and SQ were left behind and fans of Hook and Regina as characters were able to find some common ground and form friendships. Yay, friendship! :)[13]

Further reading

References

  1. ^ "June 2016 post and threaded reblogs". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  2. ^ "OK, time to lay down the TRUTH about CaptainSwan and "Rape Culture"". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  3. ^ "While I can understand the OPs frustrations with having such a harsh accusation being made about their ship". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  4. ^ "whyswanqueenisabusive Tumblr blog". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  5. ^ "I've seen the same rhetoric over and over from antis". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  6. ^ "Tumblr post showing Emma rolling her eyes at many complaints levered at the SwanQueen ship". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  7. ^ "Nov 6, 2015 Tumblr post where a Tumblr receives an anon message claiming SwanQueen is incest". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  8. ^ "October 19th Is A State Of Mind: TW [death threats, ableist slurs]". Archived from the original on 2024-05-18.
  9. ^ "Swan Queen and Captain Swan". Archived from the original on 2024-05-18.
  10. ^ "Yeah you totally cracked their code. *eye roll* Delusional is a strong word but I honestly don't know what to call these people, post on the aanti--swanqueen tumblr". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  11. ^ "Turns out the teacher is a CS shipper cause I ask after class". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  12. ^ a b c d NO SHIP OR FANDOM BASHING but do any of y'all remember the absolute trashfire war between these fandoms on tumblr in like 2013-2015, posted to r/OnceUponATime, Feb 1, 2022
  13. ^ a b "I've been watching OUAT lately and since I kinda fancy Hook I came across your site, March 31, 2019 Tumblr post". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  14. ^ Comment on The Growing "Swan Queen" phenomenon, posted to r/OnceUponATime, March 18, 2014
  15. ^ "The Comic Con Swan Queen kerfuffle". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  16. ^ ""swan queen was THE queerbait ship", June 24, 2023 tweet by sisterlelianas". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  17. ^ "July 18, 2020 tumblr post by letoatreides". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  18. ^ "Comment by Elysium on What community do you guys distance yourself from?, posted to the khinsider.com/forums, October 14, 2020". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  19. ^ "Fandom uproar ensues after 'Once Upon a Time' actor insults shippers, by Aja Romano for the Daily Dot". Archived from the original on 2024-05-18.
  20. ^ "Is jmo homophobic or?? did she Do Something™". Archived from the original on 2024-05-17.
  21. ^ "April 14, 2015 Tumblr post, a thread of posts discusses mocking of Hook for having only one hand". Archived from the original on 2024-05-18.
  22. ^ "January 26, 2021 tumblr post by margridarnauds". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
  23. ^ "October 24, 2018 Tumblr post by sailormew4". Archived from the original on 2024-05-16.
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