Home › Forums › Once Upon a Time › Character discussion › Didn’t Rumple check? › Re: Didn’t Rumple check?
I can see I’m really late to the party with this response. Rumple didn’t follow her immediately because he thought she had a better chance at a happy life at home with her father. After the EQ said she’d died, Rumple really believed Belle was dead. At one point (in another episode) he says his magic can’t bring back the dead, so there was no point in going after her then. I think the real reason he didn’t go after her was because he didn’t feel like he deserved her love. If she was dead and gone, he was certainly saddened by that. He could have done something more to save her–but he thought her best chance was away from him, too. All that self-loathing. A powerful guy, but pretty low self-esteem when it comes right down to it. He was living like a recluse in that empty castle, and had sworn off any notion of romantic love. Done and gone. Just not something he got to do in this life. Belle appeared out of the Blue; she was Hope to him. That brief flicker in a vast Ocean of Darkness.
And yes, I do think this response is in keeping with his character. If you don’t think you deserve something (like true love) you don’t go after it. I kept waiting for Gold to rescue Belle from the Asylum. But in the season finale, Bell went to him. Belle sought him out.