Considering this would be a recent interview, I’m guessing it’s an indication of the type of story they’ve been telling in the eps they’re up to shooting now, otherwise it wouldn’t have been relevant for him to mention it at all. (That “Emma loves him” bit might have made me a little bit happy, because present tense, baby!)
I know I’ve said this before, but if they want to give Hook some character growth through this NL arc, they’ll be having him examine his past actions and consider how that should affect his present (and future) actions. Killian Jones of the past would proudly boast, “I’ve had many a man’s wife.” Killian Jones who has learned from his past could well say, “I’ve had more than enough women who were loved by another man, and I’m not gonna do it again.”
And I’m not just saying this stuff as a SF shipper, I’m also saying it as a fan of Hook, who acknowledges that he doesn’t exactly have a pristine track record, and he’s probably not that proud of all of his past actions, and I’d like to see him be happy within himself. Being stuck in a cycle of living in a way that you know isn’t productive, happy and healthy, it’ll eat away at you, and he’s been around for a few centuries, which is a long time to have regrets eating away at you. So I could see it if they created this “triangle” situation because now is the time when he’s gonna be tempted to do the same old thing, but is finally gonna get the inspiration he needs to get his arse kicked out of that usual cycle he’s entrenched in. Something in his usual cycle needs to change, and that something could well be being slapped in the face with how his actions can hurt someone he genuinely cares for in Nealfire. Any other time he’s taken a woman, it’s been with no concern for how his actions might affect the other man in that woman’s life. But this time, the other man is Bae, who Hook genuinely cares for. Last time he took another man’s wife, it also involved Bae, and it hurt Bae, but he didn’t see or appreciate that until many years later, at which point he regretted causing the hurt.
The alternative way they could take the story would have him just hurting Bae all over again in a very similar way, but where’s the story in that? Where’s the character growth? So I’m glad that Colin mentioned Hook’s emotions regarding Bae in that article, because more than anything, it gives me hope that they’ve got some stuff in store where we’re gonna get a better look inside Hook’s head and heart, and as a Hooker, that’s what I’m dying to see.
The last part where he’s talking about Emma and Hook being similar, that’s the stuff that makes me think they’d be valuable friends for each other. I was listening to a podcast earlier, and someone pointed out that since losing the friendship she had with Mary Margaret, who turned out to be her mother so their relationship drastically changed, Emma has no close friends. She could do with a close friend who gets her, like Hook does.
I’d rather his relationship not progress with Emma to the point of being in love, since I’d rather he just cool it with Emma when Neal returns.
That’s what I’m imagining. I think his telling Emma that perhaps he would like to get to know her better was genuine, and I think he’s willing to open up to her in a genuine way, and I think they very well could start to develop a closer bond without him falling in love before Neal shows up. Maybe Hook would be on the brink, but he’s still be a bit unsure of how exactly he’d like their relationship to progress, and the Neal reality check will cause him to see the situation more clearly.