ABC's Once Upon a Time is one of two competing "fairy tales in the real world" dramas premiering this fall, so clearly somebody's been reading too much Fables lately. NBC's got Grimm, which is a sort of police procedural intersecting with the fantastic, and with Angel's David Greenwalt at the helm. Once Upon a Time, on the other hand, comes from former Lost writers Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis, and also sports Damon Lindelof as a consulting producer. Promising talent on both sides, but let's face it: the odds of two fairy-tale shows actually surviving the season are pretty slim. To help make up your mind, earlier this week NBC gave Twitter users a chance to see Grimm's pilot. Now ABC has posted the first nine minutes of Once Upon a Time online.
So what do you think? At first glance, it seems like Once Upon a Time will be a bit less, well, grim than Grimm, perhaps a little more mainstream. And hopefully if they keep doing flashbacks to the fairy-tale world, they'll become less cheesy. In the mean time, who are you rooting for: Once Upon a Time or Grimm?
Once Upon a Time premieres this Sunday, October 23rd at 8/7 central on ABC. For Grimm, you'll have to wait until Friday, October 28th at 9/8 central.
