Once upon a time, there was a show that featured fairy tale characters living in a small New England town. It started off quite strong, but quickly got so complicated that the writers started to struggle to keep track of every character’s idiosyncrasies and intertwining storylines. Thus, the show remained fun to watch, but descended into an unsalvageable mess full of plot holes.

Of course, we’re talking about Once Upon A Time, ABC’s seven-season hit show where beloved childhood characters scheme, cooperate, turn evil, turn good again, perish in each other’s arms, and come right back to life. From 2011 until 2018, Once Upon a Time entertained viewers for 153 episodes featuring live-action interpretations of beloved Disney and fairy tale characters. However, even the most loyal fans can’t help but notice the many ludicrous gaps in logic where the show’s writers seem to forget about the rules of Storybrooke and its magical denizens.

Some of these are small and easily explained away. Others are so obvious that even loyal, longtime viewers can't help but laugh about them. Maybe they’re not too serious-- after all, Once Upon a Time's premise includes the idea that Rumplestiltskin owns a town where Little Red Riding Hood works in a diner. It’s not a very serious show! 

Still, for those fans who know that a show can be super fun and also full of plot holes, here is a rundown of 20 Plot Holes In Once Upon A Time That Fans Can’t Get Over.

What happens to Ruby?

Ruby gave Dorothy True Love’s Kiss in season five of Once Upon A Time. The show ran for two more seasons, so what happened to Ruby afterward? Did she and Dorothy live happily ever after? For a character who had been introduced in the pilot episode, Ruby disappears quickly and with very little wrap-up.

Fans of Storybrooke’s favorite werewolf party girl were disappointed that she didn’t get a better conclusion. That said, she did play an important role in the series and eventually got the girl. Maybe the writers felt like that was all she needed to be happy and satisfied in her world. No word on whether she ever made it to Boston, although we can imagine that she and Dorothy eventually get an apartment together.

Storybrooke disappears when Greg brings the police

Storybrooke is supposed to be cut off from the whole world. However, Greg and his dad happen to find it, and if something can be found once, then it can be found multiple times. It’s true that Greg is just a kid when this happens, but at the same time, he’s a really competent kid who knows what he’s doing when he brings the police back to where Storybrooke was.

Without its magic, how does Storybrooke disappear? Regina couldn’t have accomplished that at the moment. The town isn’t moving around. If we assume that Greg brought the police back to the right spot, then it seems weird that he wasn’t able to get into the town again.  

Good Regina keeps the hearts

Regina has a fine collection of hearts when Once Upon a Time begins. She uses them for deeply nefarious purposes, of course, because why else would you hold someone’s heart hostage?

Considering the fact that we never see her return the hearts once she turns good, it seems possible that she just likes having them around. Maybe they make good night lights or statement pieces. Maybe she’s a hoarder who’s intimidated by the sheer number of hearts she’d have to give back. It would have been nice if the show cleared this up, because it seems hard to believe that some of the folks whose hearts Regina tore out wouldn’t have come to see her to request that their stolen organs be replaced.

Nobody returns to the Enchanted Forest

These storybook characters all grew up in the world that contains the Enchanted Forest. There’s a portal that could send them home, where they would be much more comfortable and, in many cases, welcome in lavish royal courts. Why aren’t the residents of Storybrooke going back?

A few of them might be happier in their original spaces, where at least they wouldn’t have to hide who they are, and wouldn’t have to deal with all of Storybrooke’s drama. Although it’s possible that they’ve become attached to sliced bread and flushing toilets, it seems silly that nobody thinks to bring these conveniences back home and make a mint on sandwiches and plumbing.

Emma’s ability to detect lies disappears

Yes, Emma has several magic powers, including magical location and pyrokinesis. She also states that she can detect lies. However, it’s not clear if this skill is even a little bit real. For example, in season 2, episode 12, she misses the fact that the stranger lied about what he saw prior to the crash. This seems like an easy get for someone who can sense a lie.

There are some possible explanations here. First of all, Emma’s ability to detect lies could be non-magical, or even anecdotal. Or, considering that this is Once Upon a Time, the writers could have forgotten she could do this and accidentally written over it to serve the plot.

Cora’s heart should be blackened

Consider the fact that Snow White’s heart starts to turn black when she does evil things. It seems as though evil hearts literally shrivel into lumps of coal in this universe. Fair enough. It’s a show about magic and fairy tales and in it, disembodied hearts can follow their own rules. But why, in that case, does Cora’s heart look so normal when Snow White holds it in her hand in season 5, episode 12?

Cora tried to destroy an innocent, for goodness’ sake. You don’t get much more evil than that. If anyone’s heart should look like a malignant tumor, it’s Cora’s. Yet when Snow holds that heart in her hand, it’s pink and quite normal. So much for consistency.

The Furies are inconsistent

Furies are scary nightmare creatures who come to exact the price of magic. We meet one when our heroes use forbidden magic to save Robin’s life, and the ensuring fracas is something of a big deal. After all that drama, you’d expect a Fury to appear every time someone’s brought back from the brink of death, or especially from death itself. Not so!

Hook gets resurrected, too, and in a similar way to Robin. No Fury comes for him, and as the series goes on, it becomes abundantly clear that no Fury is going to stick its spooky CGI head into Storybrooke ever again. Maybe the destruction of the one that was after Robin put the other Furies off fairy tale heroes for good.

Where Mary Margaret got the Once Upon a Time storybook

It’s wonderful that Henry gets the Once Upon a Time storybook. That plot point certainly makes seven seasons of storytelling possible. There’s only one problem: where did Mary Margaret get the thing?

Regina and Gold hardly seem sloppy enough to just let it randomly manifest on Snow White’s bookshelf, or to happen to get lost in a box full of book donations, or even to float around Storybrooke in the possession of any character for long. Considering that the book is often in proximity to Regina, it’s weird that she doesn’t find and destroy it. The storybook is a convenient plot point that’s never explained, and thus becomes a plot hole.

Tamara electrocutes August

It’s a well-known scientific fact that wood does not conduct electricity. Electrical weapons like tasers work on human beings because human beings aren’t made of wood. August, however, is an actual life-sized wooden puppet when Tamara zaps him. If anything, his ability to resist electricity ought to be a superpower.

August could have nipped the whole Tamara situation right in the bud just by being made of a nonconductive material. If we assume that Tamara’s taser is really so powerful that it can destroy a person, then maybe it would have been more plausible for August to catch fire. We have a feeling that the show’s writers may have slept through a few science classes in high school.

There’s no way to get goods in and out of Storybrooke

There’s not much in Storybrooke. There’s pretty much just Granny’s, where everybody seems to eat, and a gas station. It’s low on big-box stores and since it’s closed off from the world at the beginning of season one, it seems unlikely that major delivery services are available to ship in things like new clothing, building material and, well, food! In fact, with so few businesses in town, there can’t be much money going around to buy what few goods there would have to be in a place to which no supplier could deliver.

It begs the question of where Storybrooke’s stuff comes from, especially the modern-day conveniences. Maybe there’s a factory in Storybrooke that we never see.