When it comes to spoilers, some days people are like Chicken Little and sometimes they’re like..well what is the opposite of that? I’m sure there’s a folktale that applies. Maybe something about chickens and hatching eggs. Anyway, let’s remember context is everything in this show.
At this point, it would be a spoiler because everyone is in NL, and everyone is supposed to be in danger. That MRJ hasn’t been spotted outdoors doesn’t mean he hasn’t been filming,but I’d think it means he hasn’t been spotted filming by any of the usual people who follow such things. I don’t know if the crew does this, but some productions will have a 2ndry unit filiming, perhaps in studio, and the paparazzi are going to go to the outdoor stuff. So if there were simultaneous indoor things, they’d miss it. .
As to what Slurpeez said I think if they had Neal in another land again it would be sort of a rehash, but putting him in jail is a way to create obstacles that doesn’t feel like a cheat. It also sort of addresses something fans felt, that sort of karma so to speak, ought to catch up with Neal as Emma went to jail for helping him cover up with his crime. So having him imprisoned for a crime he didn’t really do (that is something to do with Tamara missing) but is guilty about covering up (because presumably, he knows his father killed her or should find it out) would be sort of fitting. It also wouldn’t make Neal so center-stage that people should get upset. He’d be “off-screen” a lot in jail, and then everything would be on the other characters to deal with real world consequences. It could create some awesome funny scenes of our “FTL” wandering around in the real world, always comedy gold when they tap into those moments of fairy tale meets real. So, on the other hand, if they do something where Neal’s just absent because he got sucked in a portal, well, it’s going to feel like a rehash and super contrived rather than a natural sort of consequence of what’s gone before. Bringing up Tamara, his past, all of these things are storylines even people who don’t ship SF have said they felt ought to be dealt with (mainly because those who don’t ship it want it to prove something negative about Neal’s depth of feeling for Emma….). I say, bring it on. Emma ought to confront Neal about Tamara, how well he knew her, and it should come out that maybe they had separate apartments (seemed like they did) and that while it appeared like he’d “moved on”in important ways, he hadn’t because what he feels for Emma is too strong. Then as that’s happening, Emma could (say by 3.16 or whatever the anniversary is) close the door on Hook, and they can drag out SF more because knowing you do not want someone doesn’t mean you know you want someone else.
On the other hand, if they’ve decided to do no holds barred CS, then writing out Neal and having him move to London with the Darlings or some other sort of convenient excuse why he would totally go against his character to stay with Emma and Henry, well I guess that’s the closest as you can get. He thought Emma and Neal were all he had, but now he has the Darlings again. It’s not satisfying to me, because I don’t see him walking out of Henry’s life that way, even if I could see him giving Emma space (and himself if she’s with Hook).
“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?” -- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass