Jennifer Morrison played Emma Swan in the first six seasons of Once Upon a Time, but the actress left the ABC series before the seventh season.

Summary

• Jennifer Morrison, who played Emma Swan in Once Upon a Time, decided to leave the show after six years due to the grueling schedule and a desire to pursue other creative opportunities like directing.
• Despite leaving the show, Morrison returned for the series finale to give Emma Swan a proper farewell and happy ending.
• Morrison has since directed films and episodes of other TV shows but continues to make guest appearances on television, including This Is Us and Will Trent.

Once Upon a Time ran for seven seasons on ABC and put its own spin on classic fairytales like Cinderella, Snow White, and Beauty and the Beast, but at the center of it all was an original character — Emma Swan, played by Jennifer Morrison. Sadly, Morrison was not a series regular for all seven seasons of the television show, seeing as her character exited the series following the season 6 finale. However, she was not the only actor to do so. Ginnifer Goodwin (Snow White/Mary Margaret Blanchard), Josh Dallas (Prince Charming/David Nolan), and Emilie de Ravin (Belle French) also left the show before its last season.

As viewers learned in Once Upon a Time season 1, Emma was the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming. After her birth, Charming sent Emma to the mortal world so that she could escape the Evil Queen's curse and rescue them all when she was 28 years old, as Rumpelstiltskin prophesied. The rest is history as Emma later reunited with her family and fought alongside them against all sorts of evil. So, when Morrison announced she was leaving Once Upon a Time, the writers had to completely restructure the series.

Jennifer Morrison's Decision To Leave Once Upon A Time Explained

During an interview with Deadline in 2017 (following the news that she was exiting Once Upon a Time), Jennifer Morrison revealed why she decided to leave the ABC series. She said:

"I spent six years year on House, a year on How I Met Your Mother and spent 6 years on Once Upon a Time, and collectively that’s 13 years of network schedule, which is an amazing and incredible gift, but it’s a grueling schedule. I’ve been transitioning into doing more directing. I’ve had some opportunities that I’ve passed up along the years in order to fulfill these network schedules, and I really had to weigh where I was in my life. I’m just at an age and a time in my life where I want to be home, I want to be with my family and my friends, to have a chance to have a personal life for a while, and also wanted to be available to do other creative things."

Morrison felt it was time for her to move on from Once Upon a Time. She had been the number one actor on the call sheet for the fantasy adventure drama television series for almost six years, and she was ready to branch out and try different things in the realm of movies and television, like directing. Shortly following her exit from the show, Morrison directed the film Sun Dogs. She later directed episodes of Euphoria, One of Us Is Lying, Dr. Death, Joe Pickett, Surface, and Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies. However, Morrison didn't quit television acting completely — she also appeared in This Is Us and Will Trent​​​​.

Jennifer Morrison Still Had A Guest Star Role In Once Upon A Time Season 7

Since Once Upon a Time season 7 was the show's last, Jennifer Morrison, Ginnifer Goodwin, Josh Dallas, and Emilie de Ravin reprised their roles during the series finale. The family reunited one last time to stop evil, and the series came full circle when Regina cast another Dark Curse, but one that was a lot less sinister and more heartfelt. Morrison returned to Once Upon a Time to bid a proper farewell to Emma and give her the happy ending she had always deserved.

Source: Deadline