When Once Upon a Time returns for season six, our beloved heroes will have plenty to deal with. Mr. Hyde and the rest of the residents of The Land of Untold Stories will begin their infiltration of Storybrooke. Aladdin will be stopping by for a visit. Oh, and there's the little matter of the Evil Queen, newly separated from her tether to Regina, on the loose.
It's that last dilemma that represents the biggest adjustment to the way of life in Storybrooke—and the biggest threat. "I think the Evil Queen feels betrayed by Regina. She was such a part of her, and then she just got kicked out, so she's not happy about that," Lana Parrilla told E! News at Comic-Con. "But I think she's definitely going to have fun in the process to make everyone pay for it."
Though Regina will be adjusting to a life lived simply as Regina, finally free of her villainous other self, Rebecca Mader reassured fans that Zelena's sister won't lose the spark that made her the character we've come to love. "I don't think Regina will ever be just simply Regina. Regina's always going to be Regina, let's be honest," she said. "That sass isn't going anywhere."
With the two halves of the Regina coin roaming the Earth, it's the people in her life who will be forced to accept the most change. "I'm like, 'I've got a lot of work on my hands, dealing with two of you.' One, that's a lot, all right? But I've got a Regina and an Evil Queen! It's exhausting just thinking about what I've got coming ahead," Mader continued. "Zelena's always wanted a family, and now I've got two for the price of one. It's going to be really interesting dealing with these viscerally different women that absolutely despise each other at the moment. I'm looking forward to exploring those relationships in a really bizarre threesome."
"I think the complicated part is going to be dealing with the Evil Queen because now she has to sort of treat that as a separate entity, and something that doesn't have any of that redemption," Jennifer Morrison added about Emma's struggle adjusting to this new reality. "So it's going to be weird for Emma to balance one version of this person being a good friend and one version of this person being the ultimate enemy."
That said, the character who may have to do the most adapting is Regina's son Henry. "It's interesting because now Henry doesn't just have two moms, he has three moms," Jared Gilmore told us about the character's unique situation. (Regina's his adoptive mother, while Emma's his birth mother.) "Now, if there's a scene with all three of them, it's going to be, ‘Mom, mom, mom.'" To hear more from the cast, including Gilmore's thoughts on how the Evil Queen will challenge Henry's attempt to see the good in everyone, be sure to press play on the video above.
Once Upon a Time returns for season six on Sunday, September 25 at 8 p.m. on ABC.