Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-25926288-20161003005933/@comment-24674051-20161004155958

I think you have a valid point. It was totally like Regina to try and find the loophole in Rumple's protection spell. So using the Count makes sense (and it is a valid loophole. Wow! Rumple must have been slipping up, leaving that big of a loophole). And after Rumple thwarted that effort at bypassing the curse, My guess is that Regina would finally acquiesce to the situation and start looking for the best way to enact the curse, rather than fight both Snow and Rumple (a fight that she would never win on either front).

Regina just shoving Snow through a portal and killing her causes an issue, because Regina would have to follow, and Portals tend to be one way unless you have a means to open it again. And so far, I think we've only seen Jefferson's Hat and the Apprentice's wand as reliable options. And while Regina wants to get rid of Snow, she also wants to be in the position to Rule the Kingdom.

And finally, once Regina chose to pursue the curse option, KILLING Snow was no longer the goal. Subjecting Snow to endless years of torment and suffering was more her goal at that point, one which she did actually get to enjoy for 28 years. Of course, she also tried that with the apple, and failed miserably.

To Utter's comment regarding the fact that not all flirting is purely sexual. I agree that flirting may be more than just sexual, but at it's core it is sexually based manipulation. It is using sexually driven desire to acheive some goal. So whatever else may be involved (and I agree that the move was definitly a power play on the EQ part), the EQ flirting with Gold provides some very sexually based mental images that are just plain creepy, on multiple levels.