As the episode opens, we're in some sort of throne room where a war counsel is taking place. Things don't seem to be going well for this side. We do get a sort of Lost reference in that Emilie de Ravin who played Claire in Lost is the daughter of the man in charge.
A sudden bang at the door reveals Rumple who has come at their request to save them from the Ogre onslaught. In exchange for saving them, he wants the daughter to come with him to be caretaker for his estate. Her father and also her rather tall fiance refuse, but she agrees anyways. We find out that the daughter's name is Belle - so this will be a Beauty and Beast episode. Appropriate for Valentine's Day? Belle will go to live in Rumple's castle forever in exchange for the lives of her friends and family.
In Storybrooke, Mr. Gold accosts the local florist, Mr. French, who was Belle's father. The name on the side of the florist's van is "Game of Thorns" which seems to be a reference to the excellent book by George R. R. Martin and HBO show "Game of Thrones".
Apparently Mr. French owes Mr. Gold money and is late on his payment. Even though it's Valentine's Day, which is the biggest day of the year for a florist, Mr. Gold has his lackey take the van with all Mr. French's flowers inside. As Mr. Gold is walking away, Regina turns up and wants to have a word. Mr. Gold really doesn't want to talk and uses the magic word (please) to stop her in her tracks.
Over at Granny's, Mary Margaret and David are sitting at separate tables, but might as well be sitting together for all the eye contact and veiled conversation. Emma shows up and gets the latest report on how Henry is acting at school from Mary. Emma's concerned about him since Regina has been keeping them separated. Ashley (Cinderella) shows up with her new baby and is complaining about how Sean (the boyfriend/baby daddy) has been working so much that they haven't had a chance to get married or spend much time together, even on Valentine's Day. Ruby comes over and suggests that they have a girls night. The sheriff's office buzzes Emma and she leaves to investigate.
In the next scene, Mr. Gold returns to his house and finds the door ajar. As he comes in, we see that his place has been trashed. He finds Emma inside who had been investigating after a neighbor noticed the open door and called it in.
At Rumple's castle, Belle gets tossed into the dungeon. The next day, he starts giving her instructions about her duties around the castle - essentially she'll be doing everything. In the process of serving tea, she drops a cup and it gets a chip. Nice little reference to the Disney version of this story.
Over at Mr. Gold's, he doesn't want the sheriff involved since he's pretty sure he knows exactly who robbed him and wants to take care of it himself. He believes this was done by Mr. French, the florist. However, Emma won't let Gold perform vigilante justice and heads out to start work on the case.
Time passes at Rumple's castle. Belle and Rumple start to become more amicable as Belle transforms the Castle into a friendlier place. Belle also asks Rumple about the children's clothes that she found. He admits to having a son that he lost along with his wife. We know this story from an earlier episode. She also comments on how he has all the mirrors covered up. She assumes this is because Rumple thinks he is ugly, but I suspect it has more to do with the evil queen.
A knock at the castle door is answered by Rumple and reveals Belle's former fiance who announces himself as "Sir Gaston". Another nod to Disney here. He is in the middle of making some sort of demand when Rumple snaps his fingers and turns him into a rose which he later presents to Belle - not telling her that the rose was once her fiance. During the conversation, she admits to not having feelings for Gaston (good thing) given his superficial nature. She asks Rumple for more details about his son and he offers her a deal. He wants her to go to town to get him some more straw and when she returns, he'll tell her his story. Belle can't believe that he's trusting her to come back, but Rumple says that he fully expects her to never return. Seems like a case of "if you love it, set it free".
Also, while Belle was getting a vase for her rose, we catch a glimpse of Geppetto's parents in puppet form displayed in the castle.
Emma brings Mr. Gold to the sheriff's station and shows him all of his belongings that she recovered from French. She says that she's still closing in on the man himself. Mr. Gold is ungrateful for her work - something is missing from the things she recovered and it's the only thing he actually wants.
Girl's night is in full swing and we see Mary Margaret and Ashley moping about not being with their respective men. We flash to David who's at the drug store buying two Valentine's Day cards. Mr. Gold runs into him, notices the two cards and seems to know what's going on despite David's denial. Mr. Gold purchases duct tape and rope - this seems suspicious. I also just realized that the store clerk, Mr. Clark, who always seems to have a cold is actually Sneezy, the dwarf.
You can also see in this picture that the name of the store is "Dark Star Pharmacy". This seems out of place for Storybrooke. Almost everything is named "Storybrooke Something" so I wonder what the significance is here.
We next see Mr. Gold driving the Game of Thorns van and Mr. French is tied/duct taped up in the back. They show up at the cabin in the woods that Mary Margaret and David sheltered in during the 7:15AM episode and Mr. Gold pushes Mr. French inside at gun point. I was wondering who owned that cabin - should have guessed Mr. Gold.
Belle is walking down the road toward town when who should show up but the evil queen. Does she do anything besides ride up and down this road in her carriage all day? Seems like anytime someone sets foot on it, she invariably will turn up. Being far more polite than usual, she gets out and walks with Belle for a while. As they talk, the queen reveals that all curses can be broken and that the kiss from a true love would do it. This makes me wonder about Graham and Emma. Was Emma his true love and that's why he started to remember when he kissed her? Also, I'm assuming that Mary Margaret and David are each other's true love - why didn't the curse lift for them when they kissed? The queen certainly seems to have ulterior motives in this conversation; she wants Belle to break the curse on Rumple so that he'll be an ordinary man again.
Belle returns to the castle and Rumple seems genuinely happy that she's returned, but he can't understand why. She kisses him and the curse starts to lift. He's definitely less green and sparkly for a few seconds.
When he realizes what's happening, he's furious. He asks Belle who told her that the curse could be broken and when he hears the description he marches to the nearest mirror, rips off the covering, and starts talking directly to the queen. He blames the queen for turning Belle against him. Belle is innocent in all this, but Rumple assumes that she's working for the queen. In a rage, he throws Belle back in the dungeon.
At his cabin, Mr. Gold is interrogating Mr. French. He wants to know where "it" is and who told him to take it. When Mr. French isn't forthcoming, he gets beaten with the cane. He gets out something about "it's not my fault" which sends Mr. Gold into a rage. He beats Mr. French into something of a pulp screaming about how Mr. French was her father, that he shunned her, and that she's gone forever. He can only be talking about Belle and we can assume that something bad happens to her. This is also very interesting because it's clear confirmation that Mr. Gold remembers what happened before the curse (the larger curse, not his own) took effect. A parallel rage occurs back at Rumple's castle as he smashes everything, but leaves the tea cup with the chip. Emma turns up at the cabin to stop Mr. Gold from killing French.
Girls night isn't going terribly well. Just as Ashley is about to leave, Sean shows up and brings her flowers. He also finally proposes which she accepts. Mary Marget goes outside to get some air and David turns up. He gives her the Valentine's Day card, but pulls a seriously blunder and accidentally gives her the card intended for Katheryn. This puts Mary over the edge and they decide to cool it for a bit since their current arrangement isn't working out very well.
An ambulance has arrived at the cabin and apparently Mr. French will recover. Emma questions Mr. Gold about what he was talking about while beating Mr. French and as usual he isn't talking. Emma places him under arrest.
In the dungeon, Rumple shows up and turns Belle free. He wants her to leave, but before she does she gives him a piece of her mind. She tells him that he could have had true love if he would have just believed it was possible. She calls him a coward, but he claims that he just wants his power more than he wants her. She's not buying it, and tells him that he will regret his decision. She says all he will have is an "empty heart and a chipped cup".
At the station, Mr. Gold is behind bars when Regina show up. She bribes Emma with 30 minutes of time with Henry in exchange for leaving her alone with Mr. Gold. Even though he's the one in jail, he does his best to assert his control by invoking the magic word to make Regina sit down. She tells him that she has what he wants, and that she mentioned to Mr. French what to take from his place. In exchange for the item, she only wants him to answer one question: "What's your name?" When he answers "Mr. Gold", she asks for his real name. (This is getting serious.) He says that "every moment I've been on this Earth, that's been my name", which is some nice evasion. She then asks, "What about time spent elsewhere?". We've never seen such an open conversation of this type in Storybrooke - I'm getting goosebumps. Mr. Gold acts confused, but Regina persists. Eventually he breaks down and says, "Rumplestiltskin". Regina looks pretty shocked although this has to be the answer she was expecting.
As promised, she hands over the item which turns out to be the chipped cup. Mr. Gold replies, "Thank you, your majesty." Mr. Gold tells Regina that he will be free soon and that he's still the one with the power. He says that nothing will change between them, but Regina replies with a significant sounding "We shall see.". The pure animosity between them is amazing. I really wonder if there is more history between them that has brought them to this state.
Back in Rumple's castle, the queen shows up asking to make a deal concerning a certain mermaid. Is this foreshadowing of an upcoming episode? Rumple's not in the mood for deals and the queen heckles him about Belle who's name she doesn't seem to even know. She says that she had nothing to do with that tragedy. When Rumple asks what she's talking about, the queen tells him that when Belle got home, her fiance was missing and her father shunned her because of her association with Rumple. He had her locked in a tower and eventually she threw herself off and died. Rumple kicks the queen out and pulls out the chipped cup, sets it on display and starts to cry.
At the Storybrooke hospital, Regina enters a code to get through a locked door. She brings a rose to a nurse working in a dark area of the basement. She passes someone mopping the floor that could be another dwarf. Based on how he's looking at the floor, maybe Bashful? Regina opens a slot in another locked door and looks inside. There in the corner, is Belle.
My Questions:
- What happened that made Rumple and the queen (or Gold and Regina) hate each other so much. Is is it just a power struggle thing? Each sees the other as their primary threat?
- How is it that some items, such as the chipped cup, Hansel and Gretel's compass, Geppetto's parents, etc, seem to have come across to Storybrooke?
- Why did Regina ask Gold about his name. Do names actually have some power that can be used? We seem to get hints that this could be true.
- How does Gold remember the pre-curse world? Is this some by product of his own powers protecting him?
New Theories:
- Regina suspected that Gold remembered the pre-curse timeline, but apparently she didn't have confirmation. This leads me to believe that she's still trying to figure out how the curse worked and how is effected certain individuals.
Other Thoughts:
- I loved this episode. At first I thought the Beauty and the Beast thing was going to be cheesy, but they managed to pull it off really well. Emilie de Ravin made a great Belle and I thought that the acting and writing was some of the best so far.