Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-5571357-20131216051805/@comment-4993393-20131217025540

I don't think the shadow had anything to do with it. Well, maybe that's why Pan didn't break away from Rumple. It was said several times earlier in the season that the only way Rumple could kill Pan would be for him to die too. This wasn't elaborated on or explained and I'll concede it's possible Rumple might have meant he wouldn't survive mortal combat with Pan. Remember, he was willing to give up his life when he thought Neal was dead (he felt he had fialed and had nothing to live for now) but was more conflicted when he discovered Neal was alive. That's when Neal suggested Squid Ink and then Rumple and Regina tried Pandora's Box as those were non-lethal ways to get rid of Pan that wouldn't require sacrificing a life.

I'm thinking that decided not to cut off his hand and use magic to solve his problems again since using magic doesn't actually solve problems. In this case Pan would always be a threat to his family, recently expanded, as long as he was alive. Therefore Rumple made the choice to kill Pan and in the process he would be killing himself. That's why he had to use the dagger. If Rumple didn't die, Pan wouldn't either.

That was the beauty of the episode, it brought things full circle with Rumple and Regina finally owning up to what they've done wrong and sacrificing self for those they loved because they wanted their loved ones to be happy and for the first times not treating their loved ones as objects to make themselves feel happy. Hook turned out to be a good guy too.