We Are Family: But Not the Charmings

Hello, Fanaticals! It is Family Tree Day for the show, just not the Charming's. Today is the day for potential family connections, or non-connections. When you consider then insane intricacies of the Charming Family Tree, it really makes you wonder who could really be connected that isn't already established and obvious?

We know that Zelena and Regina are half-sisters, that somehow Ingrid was able to live in the real world and had tried to adopt Emma and wanted a family with her and Elsa (who was biologically her niece), then of course there is Granny and Ruby as well. There are obviously plenty of relations outside of the Charmings, their family just has the craziest and most connections to it; there's even a potential theory to connect it further but we'll touch on that some other time.

What about others that may not actually be connected? Family connections ca run the opposite way, too. Let's dive into these two family (or non-family) theories!

The Huntsman and Red

More commonly known in Storybrooke as Graham the Sherriff and Ruby, there is an interesting theory behind the potential relation between them. They could be one of three things: adopted siblings, blood siblings, or pack siblings. It's a bit of an interesting concept, but there is quite a bit of it that makes sense. Wolves have clearly been a huge part of both of their lives; Ruby is one, and Graham has the one that follows him, and is his friend, with one solid red and one solid black eye.

We never really discover how he came to know the wolf, just that it seems to be ever-present in his life. Something that we do find out is that he was born to humans, but raised by wolves who change shape. However, as we find out through Ruby's story, and subsequentially when we meet her mother and pack, the werewolves are human they just shape shift. They obviously also reproduce because, well, Ruby and her mother. So, it's quite possible that while his parents were "human" at least one or both of them could have been a wolf.

Meanwhile, we find out during Red's story that her mother was a werewolf and an Alpha at that! In Granny's effort to protect her, she hides this fact and had gotten a red cloak to prevent her from changing during the full moon. She shows a bite mark to the village during a meeting, to try and get them to understand to just let the wolf be. She places herself in frount of the door on full moon nights, not to keep the wolf out but everyone else. She protects her so much especially by choosing not to tell her, that it takes until she accidentally eats her own boyfriend that she discovers that SHE is the wolf.

We later hear from Granny when she is talking to Snow that the wolf that bit her was Ruby's grandfather, and that his bite also changed her until it "phased out" of her; quite possibly as she got older and had Ruby's mother. (Which is a totally different theory-type discussion for another time.)

Now, the theory that Graham's parents were wolves can seem a bit far-fetched as it seems a bit obvious due to the connection with Ruby and her mother that being a werewolf actually passes down in genetics and we know that while he had a deep connection with wolves, he did not change into one. However, you also read werewolf stories that can include a non-shape shifter, but in the land of the Enchanted Forest I doubt something like that happens very often.

However, this leaves being adopted siblings or even pack siblings and both can be quite viable. Since we know for a fact that Graham was raised by wolves, he could have either been raised by her mother personally, or other members of her pack. Considering we never know if they met before Storybrooke, and the two aren't seen interacting much until they are under the curse, under which Graham dies, we will never know what the two of them may or may not have known about each other in the Enchanted Forest.

Leopold Was Not Snow's Father

This may seem controversial, but some of it surrounds when we look at Cora's and Zelena's origin stories. In order to process this theory, we have to go back over some history and potential age timelines.

When we first meet Leopold in the episode where Cora gets pregnant with Zelena, he is quite obviously not as young as Eva who Cora calls a child. Leopold looks like he's maybe late 20's/early 30's at earliest. Cora calling her a child can actually be quite possible that there is a bit of an age difference between them when you see them side by side. Originally, Eva was engaged to Leopold from birth; when she showed up to the castle to meet him, she was probably at minimum 16, maybe 18. My money would be closer to 16, as if she had been 18 it would have been more likely that she would have been meeting him to be married immediately, rather than just meeting him in general.

Meanwhile Cora was most definitely at least 18 since she had been a bar maid prior to meeting Leopold; despite that things seem to be more like the older days when our ancestors lived in the forest like that, I still don't fully believe they would have a GIRL working a woman's job. They would want someone who was strong enough to fight off the drunkards. We're looking like she was upwards of maybe 21-25; which would make sense, especially if she was referring to Eva as a child.

The biggest discrepancy though comes between when we see her being taken away from Leopold, and when she is in the castle with Henry. There has to be, at minimum, somewhere close to a year as she was already two months pregnant with Zelena when everything with Eva and Leopold happened and she was very much not pregnant when she went to the castle. That would make a minimum of about 6 to 10 months between her being removed from Leopold's presence to being in the castle with Henry. Regardless of that timeline, it was still before Eva and Leopold married as she was clearly searching for a groom as there was a ball to "purchase" Henry's hand, as Cora had put it; not to mention that she was still titled as "Princess" rather than Queen.

I firmly believe that Eva absolutely remembered Cora, considering that she made a big deal about a little bit of flour on her shoe. However, instead of spreading around what had happened, she made it so Cora was humiliated; made her feel I'm sure a bit like she did when Leopold called off their engagement to marry Cora instead. However, Cora married Henry not long after that and had Regina, so we are looking at Cora now being somewhere between probably 23-27, and honestly, I might even push it as closer to 25-30 as she looks closer to being in her 40's or 50's when Regina meets Snow.

What we DO know when it comes to ages is that Regina is roughly 18 when she saves Snow, I would say as young as 16 if needed but the way she acts it seems like she's a young adult; so maybe upwards of 20? This would put Regina and Snow roughly 8-10 years apart. Using this logic, if Cora married and had Regina within 1-3 years of Zelena that would have put Eva around maybe 20 when Cora had Regina, and Leopold probably closer to late 30's/early 40's. If we go by the two of them being 10 years apart, that puts him up in his 50's by the time Snow was born, and Eva around 30. This is not quite young to be having children, no matter where you live. Also, when we see Eva when Snow is about 8/10, she looks like she is at least in her 40's. Meanwhile, Leopold looks about 60 when he and Regina marry.

We also want to take into consideration that even if we are incorrect with the timeline, things like this generally pass to the male heirs, not female; yet Snow has zero siblings. Anyone with a female first born in this case would try again for a male heir which means she would have at least one sibling.

As we finish looking at the history of ages here, there is a possibility of two things: her parents were old enough they only dealt with having one child or Leopold was potentially infertile, and Snow is not his child. As her parents were a bit older, and he needed an heir, if they had been trying for a while Eva could have easily gone out and found someone to get her pregnant but never say a word; she would be taking a page out of Cora's book when it came to Zelena. Considering what we have seen of how Eva can (or could) be, it honestly wouldn't surprise me if she did that just to make sure that her husband had an heir. Especially for the amount of time throughout the series that something happens and the words "like mother, like daughter" come out.

What are your thoughts about these relation theories? Is it possible for hidden connections; one connecting and one being a darker secret? Come join our community and tell us what you think! Tomorrow, I will be diving into an extremely dark theory alongside some more mildly grey theories. Until then,