Pinocchio, later known as August Wayne Booth, and briefly known as the Stranger, is a character who appears in the ABC fantasy-drama series Once Upon a Time.
He is based on both the character from the original story by Carlo Collodi and the character of the same name from Disney's 1940 film Pinocchio.
History[]
Before the First Curse[]
Pinocchio's original form
Pinocchio is a puppet Geppetto carved from an enchanted tree. As a little boy puppet, he gives his life to save Geppetto from drowning in a storm. As a reward, the Blue Fairy turns Pinocchio into a real boy, promising that the spell will hold so long as he is selfless and good. However, the boy remained mischievous, though he means no harm. The Blue Fairy asks Geppetto to carve another enchanted tree into a magical wardrobe with the ability to save two people, the pregnant Snow White, and Prince James, from the Evil Queen's curse. However, the curse will send everyone else to a land without magic and happy endings.
Pinocchio, who is a real boy because of magic, may turn back into a puppet. Geppetto bargains with the Blue Fairy to use the second spot for Pinocchio instead, and the Blue Fairy lies to the others and says that the wardrobe can only save one. However, Snow White gives birth to Emma. Instead of giving up Pinocchio's spot to Snow as the Blue Fairy asks, Geppetto sends his son ahead and asks him to protect the child and get her to believe when the time is right.
During the First Curse[]
After emerging in the real world, Pinocchio and the infant Emma are taken to an orphanage, where Pinocchio looked after her like a sister. However, he leaves Emma to run away as the man taking care of them was cruel.
August Wayne Booth (Eion Bailey), previously known as The Stranger, is a mysterious young man visiting Storybrooke. He first appears at the end of "True North" after Henry Mills states that no one ever comes to Storybrooke and Emma is the first stranger there. Shortly after, he rides into town on his motorcycle and asks Henry and Emma for directions to a place to stay, but never names himself. He also carries everywhere a large wooden box whose contents are unknown until Emma confronts him at the diner, and he tells her that he will show her what is in the wooden box if she agrees to let him buy her a drink sometime. She agrees, and he shows her that the box contains a typewriter, and he tells her that he is a writer. Later, he is revealed to have possession of Henry's storybook, which was hidden then lost. He finally names himself when he tries to take Emma out for the drink she promised him, but she refuses to let him because she believes a man who will not tell her his name is probably hiding other things.
He is later seen working with the storybook in a dark room: applying chemicals to the pages and reassembling the book. August plants it by Emma's car to make it look like it washed away in a storm; she finds it and returns the book to Henry. He later tells Henry that he believes in the curse and wants to convince Emma that it is real. He later tries to control Mr. Gold with the Dark One's dagger, who is Rumpelstiltskin in the Enchanted Forest. Mr. Gold calls his bluff and threatens to kill him.
August reveals that he is deathly ill and needs magic to get better, so he tried to help Emma bring magic to Storybrooke. However, he believes that Emma will be too late to save him. Gold points out that not even he can help August as there is no magic in Storybrooke and leaves August to find a different way. His illness turns out to be that he is turning back into wood because he broke his promise to Geppetto. Desperate, he conspires with Gold to force Emma to ask August for help to beat Regina. When she does, August takes her out of Storybrooke to tell her his story. He reveals that he is the seven-year-old boy who found the infant Emma. He says he was across the world when Emma decided to stay in Storybrooke and his leg began to feel pain as time began to move forward again. August tries to prove the curse's existence by showing his now-wooden leg, but Emma's denial is so strong that she does not see it as wood. Afterward, he goes to see Marco, who is his father Geppetto and tells him that he failed his father and though he tried to keep his promise, he tried too late.
Marco says that if he had a son, that would be enough. August offers to work as Marco's assistant, though he cannot be paid, stating that he simply likes to fix things. When Emma tries to leave Storybrooke, Henry comes to August, who shows that his arm is also turning into wood and says that soon he will be completely wooden. He gives up on making Emma believe in the curse and wants to spend his remaining time with his father. When Emma finally believes, she goes to August for help. However, August completely turns to wood before her eyes. It is not known whether August's life as Pinocchio had him returning to normal was regained after the curse was lifted.
After the First Curse[]
August in his wooden form.
In the second season premiere, August is seen still laying in his bed at Granny's Bed and Breakfast, and he blinks. Later, Marco is putting up missing posters, believing his son to be lost and still a child. After an uproar in which many citizens, Henry Mills reveals August's true identity to Marco. Marco visits August's room in Granny's but discovers an empty bed. It is revealed later on that after the curse was broken, August was able to move again but was trapped in his wooden form, much like when he was as a child. He had been living in the forest in a trailer, afraid of how everyone, especially Marco, would think of him. Mary Margaret (Snow White) finds him while practicing archery, having accidentally hit him with one of her arrows. He tells her to keep the encounter a secret because of his guilt for selfish actions, which she promises. However, he is found by Tamara, a woman whom he stole money from to cure himself in Hong Kong, who offers him the cure that she managed to take back from him when he robbed her.
Deciding to get the cure, August drives out of Storybrooke to Tamara's apartment in New York using her car. Just as he leaves, he then finds a photo of Tamara with her grandmother, the valuable object she was supposed to give the healer along with the money to receive the cure for her cancer. Remembering the day when he came back to find the healer dead, August realizes that Tamara was the one who killed him and was trying to get August out of Storybrooke. August rushes back to Storybrooke to warn Emma and the others, but is confronted by Tamara herself. He reveals to her that he knew she did not have cancer but was actually after the cure to discover the magic within it.
She quips at this and tells him that he was a weak and selfish man who needed the cure for himself, but August defends himself stating that he never needed magic, but by correcting his mistakes he will break the curse and will start by stopping Tamara. Tamara, in response, shocks him with a taser before he attacks. In his last few moments, August trudges quickly to the others to try and warn them. He is caught by Marco as he falls, as father and son are finally reunited. August apologizes and admits for all his selfish deeds, but finally dies as he is about to tell the group of Tamara's treachery. However, Henry notices that August died admitting his mistakes and doing what he could to help the others, making him selfless, brave, and true. This meant that August could receive a second chance and be revived if this was true. The Blue Fairy quickly tests this, and August is revived, but instead of becoming his own self he reverts to his human form as a child, Pinocchio.
After the Second Curse[]
In the fourth season, the Evil Queen, infiltrating the villains, learns they want to find the Author. On their orders, she kidnaps Pinocchio, and with Maleficent, they take him to a cabin in the woods, where Rumplestiltskin reverts the boy into August with his dagger, hence returning his lost memories so that they can torture him for information about the Author.
Under questioning, August states he obtained research about the Author from the Dragon, but Rumplestiltskin suspects he is lying and steals a potion from the nuns to force him to tell the truth. After being force-fed the concoction, August briefly reverts to wood, which causes his nose to grow for every lie he tells. Eventually, he admits the Sorcerer trapped the Author behind a door. Rumplestiltskin demands to know where the door is, and although August has no idea where it is, he insists Regina knows about a storybook page illustration of the door. While Rumplestiltskin believes the door is in another physical location, in truth, the door on the page itself can be opened to free the Author, although August does not say this. However, since August does not know that Henry currently has the page, the answer he gives the villains about the door's whereabouts is regarded as truthful and does not trigger the potion's lie detector. Once Regina and Maleficent leave with Rumplestiltskin to search the Sorcerer's mansion for the door, Cruella stays to guard him until Emma Swan and her parents take her out to rescue him. They are stopped by Ursula, who relents after regaining her singing voice and reconciling with her father Poseidon. While resting at the loft, August learns Regina is actually spying on the villains, and he reveals the door in the illustration can be opened to free the Author.
As August's condition deteriorates due to the recent magic used on him, he is taken to the fairies, where the Blue Fairy looks after him. While Emma continues to worry about August, Captain Hook becomes jealous over her concern for him. To reassure him, she elaborates on her difficulty in making friends after shutting out her first friend, and August has been the only exception since then. Once August gets better, Snow White and Prince Charming visit him, and Hook notifies Emma. After showing August the discovered key to the door illustration, she expresses interest in asking the Author questions about her story. However, there's no guarantee this Author wrote her story, as August reveals there have been many Authors over time; each chosen by the Sorcerer and his Apprentice to record tales in the book. With the last Author, as August explains, he began manipulating stories, so the Apprentice imprisoned him in the door illustration. Despite this, Emma recognizes the Author can still alter the course of things, and she unlocks the door with the key. The Author, Isaac, is freed, but before she can ask anything, he flees.
Gallery[]
Screenshots[]
Miscellaneous[]
See also[]
- Pinocchio (character)
- Pinocchio (Geppetto)
- Pinocchio (Pinocchio 2022)
External links[]
August Booth on Once Upon a Time Wiki
