Parents guide

In several scenes someone is run through with a bloody sword or stabbed with a knife. Several people have their necks broken, either physically or by magic.

Many, many times a person's "heart" is painfully ripped out of his/her chest. It is not a "graphic" heart, no blood, not beating... more like an internally-lit plastic heart. Still some viewers (especially younger ones) may find this disturbing.

Crashes, bloody sword fights, explosions, murder. People's hearts are removed from their chests in a non-gory (but startling) way. Frightening creatures like trolls and eerie monsters. A man is attacked by wolves, a dragon burns people alive. One character is impaled, and dead bodies can be seen after a town is destroyed. Most graphic acts take place off-screen. Arguments/conflict. Characters disguise themselves as other characters to trick people into having sex with them.

There are shootings and stabbings (occasionally with bloody aftermath), an assault by a masked attacker, an implied neck break and an attempted drowning. There are also scenes of moderate fantasy violence including humans being attacked by invisible forces and magic spells.

Injury detail includes sight of old scars on a wrist, a sewn up eye socket and milder cuts and bruises.

Blood is kept at a minimum; there isn't that much. In a few episodes, there are larger amounts, as a character bleeds out and such.

There are multiple birth scenes where you do not see anything, but the mother is screaming in pain.

Season 1 Episode 15: a wolf attacks a group of men. The attack is off-camera, however the bloody aftermath of the attack is seen from a distance detailing bloody bodies and in one case a severed hand and several legs. There is A LOT of blood in this scene. Before we see this Red pulls a bucket of blood red water out of a well. Also during this episode a wolf eats a man alive. You can't see anything you can just hear growls and muffled screams. The wolf turns into a human and looks at the bloody aftermath of what had just happened. There is some flesh and a couple of bones in the distance for about a millisecond.

Season 1 Episode 17: A man is decapitated and his head is held by his hair. His body falls to the floor but his head is still moving. A lacerated wound around his neck is shown but not graphically bloody.

Season 1 Episode 6: There is a dragon who burns the knights to death. There is one knight scene who looses his legs from the dragon, but is not killed. Mostly no blood, just skeletons and burns are seen.

"Ass," "hell," "suck" sometimes used.

There is infrequent use of moderate bad language ("bitch"), as well as milder terms including "bloody", "screwed", "crap", "hell", "bastard" and "piss".

"Damn", "hell", "bastard", "ass", and "bitch" are all used occasionally, particularly by Regina and Emma.

Some heavy drinking is shown at times. Characters are occasionally shown drunk or with hangovers.

A pirate appears to have an addiction to rum, he constantly talks about drinking with other characters and carries a hip flask around which he sips from regularly. A future version of himself is seen who is clearly an alcoholic (dirty clothes, slurred speech etc.)

A woman is shown injecting herself with a magical liquid that imitates the effects of drugs; she is heard saying "takes the edge off" and is visibly floppy with slurred speech.

Magic is used to create potions etc which imitate the effects of drugs e.g Sleeping curse, poisons, Squid ink

Season 7 contains repetitive and regular drinking in almost every episode. One character owns a bar and while not depicted in the show, drinks so many times a day in the real world she'd be considered an alcoholic.

Regularly drinking of rum from a flask is presented prominently in several seasons. In every season hardly an episode goes by in which alcohol seems the preferred drink of the series.

Rumplestiltskin has an unhealthy and dangerous reliance on dark magic comparable to a drug addiction, often to the point of lying or stealing to get more.

Some social drinking (beer, mostly).

Most of the characters are seen drinking from time to time. That being said, there is no drug use, and no one smokes in this series.

MANY emotionally intense scenes throughout

Several characters have a love interest who is murdered or otherwise dies. Some love again, but this takes many episodes, and some, especially Regina and Killian Jones, seek revenge on those responsible for the death of their lover.

Scenes of moderate threat occur in fantasy and real world settings and include the threat of telekinetic violence, curses and death - occasionally in prolonged sequences.

Some mild scenes.

The show deals with more realistic versions of the fairy tales we grew up with. They can tend to be darker and even sadder, with final consequences of death. There is also a constant theme of children being separated from their parents for one reason or another (Emma, Rumple, Henry, Neil, Gepetto, Snow White, Prince Charming, Zelena, Regina, Anna & Elsa, Hansel & Gretel, Grace, Lily, etc. ). This could be a touchy subject for anyone who may have had similar home life situations.