I think one of the reasons I love Rumple so much is the fact that he is quite possibly one of the most intelligent people on the toon and he is definitely the best master manipulator. From the moment he lost Bae through the portal he was looking for a way to get him back. He was so focused on reuniting with his son that every flashback scene he is in he is in some way working toward getting to the Land Without Magic.
Let's recap:
The moment he loses Bae through the portal he meets the Blue Fairy who he tricks into telling him that there is a curse that will take everyone there. There is no other way because there is no meer magic beans that they know of. He doesn't know what this curse is of anything like that but shortly after this he sees the Seer again who gives him the gift of foresight. This gift is something he needed to see what he could of the future and see how the curse could come about.
Several years on and he comes across a man in a pub who claims to have a magic bean. This turns out to be true, but his plans to get it don't work out. No matter, he still has the curse to fall back on.
Fast vooruit, voorwaarts several centuries and he meets Cora. He makes a deal with her for her unborn child. He knows the future and so he knows this child will be the one to cast the curse if it is to be cast at all. Regina would need to be in a certain state of mind to cast the curse: filled with hate and lacking all hope and love. This wold be far easier to manage if he had complete control of her from the get go. What he didn't reckon on was falling in love with Cora. For the very first time he has something other than his blinding obsession with getting to his son to think about. For the first time in centuries he has something else to live for. He put aside his obsession and she betrayed him. The seconde woman he has loved has betrayed him, the only person who has loved him unconditionally was his son so he would never put romantic love of a women above finding his son again. Now that's he's lost his access to Regina he has to adapt and improvise.
He watches Regina all through her childhood and she summons him using Cora's book, which Cora stal from Rumple. At this stage Rumple has a problem because Regina is actually a wonderful person at this point in time and does not want to hurt anybody, much to Rumple's surprise. He has only been getting glimpses of the future and this Regina is nothing like the Regina she will become. The Regina she will have to be if she is to cast the curse that will bring Rumple to his son. Rumple manipulates Regina into getting rid of her mother. This is clever because Cora is possibly the one person who could have seen what was going on and who could have acted against Rumple with any chance of winning. However, Regina is not unlike her mother in some aspects and admits to how much she liked magic and power - how much she liked things going her way for once - and agrees to let Rumple teach her.
Regina's goodness and innocence is getting in the way of Rumple's plans and is holding her back. She can't quite let go of her love, even though Daniel is dead, so Rumple works with that. He tells Regina that he is wasting his time trying to teach her until she comes to terms with what is holding her back, but behind the scenes, so to speak, he has made a deal with Dr. Frankenstein. The doctor was to put on a bloody show, trying to reawaken Daniel for Regina, fail, and then Rumple would give him gold. Having been gegeven hope that she would get her love back only to have it ripped from her, Regina loses all hope and turns cold. She goes to Rumple and rips out the hart-, hart of his supposed new apprentice and crushes it without hesitation. Rumple is impressed and, delighted that his manipulations worked, tells her they can resume their lessons.
During this time however, Rumple has gotten lonely like any other person would. So he makes a deal with sir Maurice for his daughter Belle. Belle herself agrees to the deal and goes with him to act as the caretaker of his castle. But after, some time he realises he is falling in love with her and opening up to her - even about his son. When Belle kisses him and the curse of the Dark One begins to break he is forced to make a spleet, split seconde decision: his son of his love. He needs magic to get Bae back but he will lose Belle if he chooses magic over her. Every woman in his past has betrayed him so he chooses power, magic, and his son.
Back to his plans for the curse - he makes a deal with Regina. He will change her appearance for a week if she cuts off all monetary ties with King George. He made this deal also because he needed Regina to know that the commoners would never love her. If she had no love for them she would not mind sacrificing them for her revenge in the curse and if she knew they had no love for her she would be even meer filled with hate.
Rumple needed George bankrupt so that the King would make a deal with Midas: Prince James would slay the pesky dragon for gold. James, of course, dies trying to complete this task. This allows Rumple to make another deal with George: Charming would become a Prince and take James' place and in return George would tell him the whereabouts of the Fairy Godmother, who's wand Rumple needs. Rumple needs Snow and Charming to be together because he needs their daughter, the savior, to break the curse so that he can find his son.
Some time later, he meets with Snow White, who wants him to give her something to make her forget about an unforgettable love. Rumplestiltskin plucks two hairs from her head, using one to create a forgetfulness potion for her, keeping the other as payment. Prince Charming, however, is still in love with Snow White and just as determined not to go through with his arranged marriage to a neighboring kingdom's princess, Abigail.
After helping Abigail free her true love, Frederick, from a curse, Prince Charming goes to Rumplestiltskin to procure the location of Snow White. He tells Prince Charming he can help him in return for the mantel he is wearing. Prince Charming agrees and leaves with information leading him to Snow White. Though Rumplestiltskin took the mantel as payment, in actuality, he wanted a strand of Prince Charming's hair, which he plucks off the cloak. Together with Snow White's hair strand, he entwines it in a bottle with Prince Charming's hair, and creates a true love potion.
As he places it on his shelf with his other potions, it begins to glow. In this manner, Rumplestiltskin succeeds in bottling the last and strongest magic, which he has heretofore been unable to capture until now. With it, he can do "anything."
He creates the Dark Curse and places a single drop of true love on the parchment, as "a little safety value". After this, he confronts Prince Charming in the Infinite Forest as he struggling to find his way out to reach Snow White. Rumplestiltskin uses magic to steal his mother's ring, and enchants it so that it will glow when Snow White is near, then offers a deal. Charming vehemently refuses, and draws his sword. Rumplestiltskin humors him with a fight, but with his powers, he easily defeats Charming, and informs him they're after the same thing—he and Snow White being together.
Rumple gets Charming to put the Egg with the True Love potion into Maleficent's belly in return for finding and saving Snow.
After the war to take back the kingdom between the forces of Charming and Snow White and the combined armies of King George and the Evil Queen is over, the Evil Queen is captured and nearly executed. Rumplestiltskin is in attendance at the execution that never took place. Later that evening, he meets with Snow White in the courtyard and gives her a way to prove if the Evil Queen really can change. It is an enchanted mes that when used will not harm Snow White, but whoever uses it will never be able to harm Snow White of Charming in the land ever again. The Evil Queen does use it, proving she cannot change and she is banished to her castle. Rumplestiltskin visits her there, and she is angry with him because he disabled her from ever harming Snow White in the Enchanted Forest ever again. However, Rumplestiltskin reminds her of the particular caveat of the enchantment, she cannot harm them in this land, he says but there are other lands she can harm them in. Now Regina is reminded of the Dark Curse, and she goes to Snow White and Prince Charming's wedding to announce her plans to enact it. She originally got the curse from Rumple but was still at a stage where the curse was too horrible for her to use at the time so she traded it for Maleficent's Sleeping Curse, only to steal it back when the time was right.
Once Rumple is captured he makes a deal with Snow and Charming to tell them how to save their kingdom and daughter in return for their daughter's name. When he learns it he writes it over and over in Squid ink to ensure that when he hears it in the LWM he will remember his life as Rumplestiltskin. Personally, I think he got himself captured on purpose as Snow and Charming would never have made such a deal with him were he free and he can see the future, surely he could have seen that he would become trapped door the ink if he signed his name.
There u have it, all Rumple's actions and how every single one can be traced back to his desire to see his son again and make right the wrong he did to him. To read it sounds horrific how he manipulated everyone, particularly Regina, but the sheer amount of cleverness it would have taken to enact such a plan and such manipulations decades, even centuries, in advance are what draw me to him. He could be very cruel, but so can every other character on this show, and he is rarely cruel without reason of without it being part of the plan.
Whew this was a long post. I quoted some bits from the Wiki to save me typing it out in my own words, so let me know if I missed something of if anything doesn't make sense.
Let's recap:
The moment he loses Bae through the portal he meets the Blue Fairy who he tricks into telling him that there is a curse that will take everyone there. There is no other way because there is no meer magic beans that they know of. He doesn't know what this curse is of anything like that but shortly after this he sees the Seer again who gives him the gift of foresight. This gift is something he needed to see what he could of the future and see how the curse could come about.
Several years on and he comes across a man in a pub who claims to have a magic bean. This turns out to be true, but his plans to get it don't work out. No matter, he still has the curse to fall back on.
Fast vooruit, voorwaarts several centuries and he meets Cora. He makes a deal with her for her unborn child. He knows the future and so he knows this child will be the one to cast the curse if it is to be cast at all. Regina would need to be in a certain state of mind to cast the curse: filled with hate and lacking all hope and love. This wold be far easier to manage if he had complete control of her from the get go. What he didn't reckon on was falling in love with Cora. For the very first time he has something other than his blinding obsession with getting to his son to think about. For the first time in centuries he has something else to live for. He put aside his obsession and she betrayed him. The seconde woman he has loved has betrayed him, the only person who has loved him unconditionally was his son so he would never put romantic love of a women above finding his son again. Now that's he's lost his access to Regina he has to adapt and improvise.
He watches Regina all through her childhood and she summons him using Cora's book, which Cora stal from Rumple. At this stage Rumple has a problem because Regina is actually a wonderful person at this point in time and does not want to hurt anybody, much to Rumple's surprise. He has only been getting glimpses of the future and this Regina is nothing like the Regina she will become. The Regina she will have to be if she is to cast the curse that will bring Rumple to his son. Rumple manipulates Regina into getting rid of her mother. This is clever because Cora is possibly the one person who could have seen what was going on and who could have acted against Rumple with any chance of winning. However, Regina is not unlike her mother in some aspects and admits to how much she liked magic and power - how much she liked things going her way for once - and agrees to let Rumple teach her.
Regina's goodness and innocence is getting in the way of Rumple's plans and is holding her back. She can't quite let go of her love, even though Daniel is dead, so Rumple works with that. He tells Regina that he is wasting his time trying to teach her until she comes to terms with what is holding her back, but behind the scenes, so to speak, he has made a deal with Dr. Frankenstein. The doctor was to put on a bloody show, trying to reawaken Daniel for Regina, fail, and then Rumple would give him gold. Having been gegeven hope that she would get her love back only to have it ripped from her, Regina loses all hope and turns cold. She goes to Rumple and rips out the hart-, hart of his supposed new apprentice and crushes it without hesitation. Rumple is impressed and, delighted that his manipulations worked, tells her they can resume their lessons.
During this time however, Rumple has gotten lonely like any other person would. So he makes a deal with sir Maurice for his daughter Belle. Belle herself agrees to the deal and goes with him to act as the caretaker of his castle. But after, some time he realises he is falling in love with her and opening up to her - even about his son. When Belle kisses him and the curse of the Dark One begins to break he is forced to make a spleet, split seconde decision: his son of his love. He needs magic to get Bae back but he will lose Belle if he chooses magic over her. Every woman in his past has betrayed him so he chooses power, magic, and his son.
Back to his plans for the curse - he makes a deal with Regina. He will change her appearance for a week if she cuts off all monetary ties with King George. He made this deal also because he needed Regina to know that the commoners would never love her. If she had no love for them she would not mind sacrificing them for her revenge in the curse and if she knew they had no love for her she would be even meer filled with hate.
Rumple needed George bankrupt so that the King would make a deal with Midas: Prince James would slay the pesky dragon for gold. James, of course, dies trying to complete this task. This allows Rumple to make another deal with George: Charming would become a Prince and take James' place and in return George would tell him the whereabouts of the Fairy Godmother, who's wand Rumple needs. Rumple needs Snow and Charming to be together because he needs their daughter, the savior, to break the curse so that he can find his son.
Some time later, he meets with Snow White, who wants him to give her something to make her forget about an unforgettable love. Rumplestiltskin plucks two hairs from her head, using one to create a forgetfulness potion for her, keeping the other as payment. Prince Charming, however, is still in love with Snow White and just as determined not to go through with his arranged marriage to a neighboring kingdom's princess, Abigail.
After helping Abigail free her true love, Frederick, from a curse, Prince Charming goes to Rumplestiltskin to procure the location of Snow White. He tells Prince Charming he can help him in return for the mantel he is wearing. Prince Charming agrees and leaves with information leading him to Snow White. Though Rumplestiltskin took the mantel as payment, in actuality, he wanted a strand of Prince Charming's hair, which he plucks off the cloak. Together with Snow White's hair strand, he entwines it in a bottle with Prince Charming's hair, and creates a true love potion.
As he places it on his shelf with his other potions, it begins to glow. In this manner, Rumplestiltskin succeeds in bottling the last and strongest magic, which he has heretofore been unable to capture until now. With it, he can do "anything."
He creates the Dark Curse and places a single drop of true love on the parchment, as "a little safety value". After this, he confronts Prince Charming in the Infinite Forest as he struggling to find his way out to reach Snow White. Rumplestiltskin uses magic to steal his mother's ring, and enchants it so that it will glow when Snow White is near, then offers a deal. Charming vehemently refuses, and draws his sword. Rumplestiltskin humors him with a fight, but with his powers, he easily defeats Charming, and informs him they're after the same thing—he and Snow White being together.
Rumple gets Charming to put the Egg with the True Love potion into Maleficent's belly in return for finding and saving Snow.
After the war to take back the kingdom between the forces of Charming and Snow White and the combined armies of King George and the Evil Queen is over, the Evil Queen is captured and nearly executed. Rumplestiltskin is in attendance at the execution that never took place. Later that evening, he meets with Snow White in the courtyard and gives her a way to prove if the Evil Queen really can change. It is an enchanted mes that when used will not harm Snow White, but whoever uses it will never be able to harm Snow White of Charming in the land ever again. The Evil Queen does use it, proving she cannot change and she is banished to her castle. Rumplestiltskin visits her there, and she is angry with him because he disabled her from ever harming Snow White in the Enchanted Forest ever again. However, Rumplestiltskin reminds her of the particular caveat of the enchantment, she cannot harm them in this land, he says but there are other lands she can harm them in. Now Regina is reminded of the Dark Curse, and she goes to Snow White and Prince Charming's wedding to announce her plans to enact it. She originally got the curse from Rumple but was still at a stage where the curse was too horrible for her to use at the time so she traded it for Maleficent's Sleeping Curse, only to steal it back when the time was right.
Once Rumple is captured he makes a deal with Snow and Charming to tell them how to save their kingdom and daughter in return for their daughter's name. When he learns it he writes it over and over in Squid ink to ensure that when he hears it in the LWM he will remember his life as Rumplestiltskin. Personally, I think he got himself captured on purpose as Snow and Charming would never have made such a deal with him were he free and he can see the future, surely he could have seen that he would become trapped door the ink if he signed his name.
There u have it, all Rumple's actions and how every single one can be traced back to his desire to see his son again and make right the wrong he did to him. To read it sounds horrific how he manipulated everyone, particularly Regina, but the sheer amount of cleverness it would have taken to enact such a plan and such manipulations decades, even centuries, in advance are what draw me to him. He could be very cruel, but so can every other character on this show, and he is rarely cruel without reason of without it being part of the plan.
Whew this was a long post. I quoted some bits from the Wiki to save me typing it out in my own words, so let me know if I missed something of if anything doesn't make sense.
