This was mentioned in the dialogue thread for 301 by thelonebamf, and I agreed with them because I’d noticed it too, but I’m listening to a podcast right now and someone else mentioned it as well, so I figured it was worth mentioning in the SF thread.
The way Rumple calls Emma a, “bail bonds person,” he breaks it up into very distinct syllables with a definite pause in between, and it sounds an awful lot like, “Bael bonds person.”
Person on the podcast said: When he said that she was just a bail bonds person, I thought he was gonna say she was Bael’s, like Baelfire, you are Bael’s bonds person. And I was like, that’s such a great play on words, that is genius. Because for a long time I’d assumed that Emma became a bail bonds person just because she was looking for her parents. And when he said that it was like, OH SNAP, she was looking for Neal.
I mean, they could have called her a “bounty hunter” instead, or could have given her another job entirely, but they chose to go with the label for the job that sounds similar to the name of the guy she fell in love with and searched for after he left her. Names are important on this show. Emma’s name was vital to Rumple, and when Rumple’s son found out her name, he was all, “Good name,” and now Emma’s eventual career sounds similar to Neal’s original name. Basically, clever writers are clever.