Rumple has always played things close to the vest, but in season one they gave us clues and then Desperate Souls. We knew pretty early his motivations. It helped us fall in love with his story and struggle. But now, we get a breadcrumb and that’s it. Are they trying to get him to be the ultimate villain, kill our love of the character, so we will cheer his demise and think it’s great for the show? What they don’t realize is that it’s Bobby’s acting itself that made many of us love the show. The writing is cheesy, the plot is farcical and yet Bobby is such a great actor that we cared about this outlandish imp. His story is intertwined into the fabric of Once so completely, much like Bae, that his absence will be glaring. The thing is, if they’d have stayed with their original story of him dying as a sacrifice to save everyone like in 3a, more people would have bought it. It was an organic outcome of him going from a point of seeing his grandson as his downfall to help saving him and in turn saving the town. But then when did anything the writers decide make sense. They had a beautiful story in Rumbelle and 1) never gave them any screen time 2) tortured Belle in some way or fashion every step of the way and 3) completely decimated it. I also wonder if that was an order from highers up….a much older man and younger woman might not have tested well in “focus groups” when presented outside the context of the show. Who knows. And now I’ll shut up from rambling.
This.
Just a thought, but we have the whole fungal/cancerous metaphor of evil going on at the moment: that line by Hook when he tells Emma that “darkness has a way of growing inside you” (or something to that effect, am I remembering this right?) as well as the entire thing with retconning Snow’s heart smudge to be something that has progressively grown to finally become quite noticeable by the time she tricks Cora…
My assumption is that the DO’s darkness eventually completely consumes its “host” and whatever goodness was left there. From that perspective, maybe Rumple trying to separate himself from the dagger could make sense (beyond the idea that he wants ultimate power, which felt absolutely absurd character-development wise) if that also means that it would stop the growth, as it were. Not sure what would happen once he’s totally “gone,” if that’s indeed what the end result is. I mean, in some senses, if it’s a kind of zombified total evilness, where the personality/self is dissolved or lost, then it’s a fate worse than death, and no wonder Rumple’s trying his damnest (poor dear, quite literally) to get his story re-written.