Rumplestiltskin


 * This article focuses on the character Rumplestiltskin. For the fairytale, see Rumplestiltskin (Fairytale).

"All magic comes with a price!"

- Rumpelstiltskin's iconic phrase

Rumplestiltskin is a major character on Once Upon a Time. He débuts in the first episode of the first season. He is played by starring cast member Robert Carlyle, and is the fairytale identity of Mr. Gold. Rumplestiltskin is an extremely powerful but crooked and greedy wizard who is able to foresee the future. He is one of the most feared beings in Fairytale Land and is notorious for his deals.

Rumpelstiltskin is a main character in a fairytale of the same name. He is also revealed to be the Beast from the fairytale Beauty and the Beast.

Season One
Rumplestiltskin was once a normal widowed spinner with a son named Baelfire, whom he loved with all his heart and was his most treasured possession in the world. At some point before Baelfire was born, Rumplestiltskin ran from a war that he was meant to fight in, and was forever labeled as a coward.

When the kingdom finally has to resort to using children as soldiers in the Ogre Wars, Rumplestiltskin and his son flee into the forest, only to be found and tormented by royal knights. After the knights leave, Rumplestiltskin and Baelfire are approached by a mysterious old man who offers them shelter in exchange for a small amount of food and company.

After listening to Rumplestiltskin's story, the old man tries to inspire him to find another way to save his son, but Rumplestiltskin is adamant that the only real choice was to run away. Knowing that Rumplestiltskin cannot run forever, the old man offers him a more complete solution to his problems.

He informs him that the Duke of the kingdom has a magical dagger in his possession. The Duke, in turn, uses this magical dagger to control the Dark One, a terrifying entity with unmatched magical powers who is the most feared being in all the land.

As such, if Rumplestiltskin could steal the dagger, he, rather than the Duke, would have control over the Dark One. Thus, he could protect Baelfire and turn the Dark One into a force of good. Of course, Rumplestiltskin realizes that he would never be able to truly hold the Dark One as a slave because he will be terrified of him. The old man sympathizes with Rumplestiltskin, but reiterates that obtaining the dagger is the only way to protect Baelfire from being taken away.

Convinced that he had no other choice, Rumplestiltskin plots to steal the dagger by setting fire to the Duke's castle during the night. After stealing the blade, Rumplestiltskin runs back into the forest to meet Baelfire, whom he told to go wait at home while he summoned the Dark One.

Upon calling the name on the dagger, "Zoso," the Dark One appears. Though he attempted to act brave, Rumplestiltskin cowered in the Dark One's presence, and when the entity implies that Baelfire isn't truly Rumplestiltskin's son, Rumplestiltskin stabbed the Dark One in a fit of blind rage.

Upon getting a better look at the dying entity's face, Rumplestiltskin discovers the Dark One was in fact the old man who had told him about the dagger in the first place. Shocked, Rumplestiltskin asks him why he would do such a thing as plot his own murder. The man tells him that all the horrible deeds he was forced to carry out as the Dark One has made his life a burden, and that he welcomes death as a release.

Cackling at Rumplestiltskin's blind faith and desperation, the old man spits his last words: "Magic always comes with a price," knowing that now that price was Rumplestiltskin's to bear forever, sealed with his own name replacing Zoso's on the dagger.

Rumplestiltskin, now with more power than he ever dreamed, returns to his hamlet to humiliate and kill the knights who had harassed him the other day, all while Baelfire watches in horror as his father relished in their deaths. When Baelfire asks his father the cause for his actions, Rumplestiltskin states that he had simply protected what belonged to him, and that he wasn't longer afraid, thus beginning his reign of terror.

Eager to fulfill his promise, Rumplestiltskin put his newfound powers to use by bringing about an end to the Ogre Wars; walking into the middle of battlefields and brokering a truce between the warring parties. However, while this good deed brought Rumplestiltskin reverence and respect, the powers of the Dark One had corrupted him; causing him to continually hurt people and seek more power for fear that he wouldn't be able to protect Baelfire from his enemies otherwise.

As such, reverence turned into fear, allowing Rumplestiltskin to become a wealthy and powerful individual who terrified those around him, much to the distaste of Baelfire, who believed that his father wouldn't need so much power to protect him if he simply didn't have any. Rumplestiltskin knew this was not an option, as the only way he knew he could be rid of the Dark One's abilities would be if someone killed him with his magic dagger.

Wanting things to return to the way they were before, Baelfire offered his own deal to Rumplestiltskin: if Baelfire was able to find a way for Rumplestiltskin to give up his powers without killing him or hurting Baelfire in the process, Rumplestiltskin would do so. With this goal in mind, Baelfire sought out the Blue Fairy, who offered him a magic bean which could produce a portal which would transport him and his father to a "land without magic," where Rumplestiltskin would be powerless, but alive and with his son.

However, when it came time to follow through with Baelfire's plan, Rumplestiltskin reverted to his former personality; not wanting to give up the influence he had garnered as the Dark One, Rumplestiltskin clung to the edge of the bean's magic portal with his dagger, abandoning Baelfire in the process. In their last moments together in Fairytale Land, Baelfire called his father a coward and Rumplestiltskin broke the only deal he ever really cared about: sacrificing power for his son's happiness.

Immediately regretting his decision, Rumplestiltskin summoned the Blue Fairy and begged her to send him to be with Baelfire. When she said that if was impossible to do so by any magical means, Rumplestiltskin tricked her into revealing that a powerful curse could allow him to be with his son. For that point on, Rumplestiltskin swore that he would stop at nothing and would sacrifice an entire world if it meant seeing Baelfire again, acknowledging that he had "all the time in the world" to figure out how.

Some time later, Rumplestiltskin has amassed considerable wealth and a castle of his own, but grows lonely and seeks someone to take care of his estate. Summoned by King Maurice to protect his town from a horde of ogres, Rumplestiltskin made a deal to protect the kingdom in exchange for the king's daughter, Belle, to live in his castle as a caretaker.

After holding her captive for several months, Rumplestiltskin grows fond of Belle, and allows her to go into town on the pretext of fetching him straw for spinning gold (although he wagered she would not return). While traveling on the road, Belle encounters the Evil Queen who encourages her to kiss Rumplestiltskin by saying "true love's kiss" would cure him of his evil.

Against Rumplestiltskin's assumptions (as well as her own) Belle returns to the castle and kisses him, causing Rumplestiltskin to begin to revert to his human form. Shocked by her actions, Rumplestiltskin incorrectly believes that Belle was working with the Queen when Belle stutters that she learned from a woman that kissing him would break his curse.

In a fit of anger, Rumplestiltskin locked her in his dungeon and later cast her out of his castle, saying that he valued his power more then the love Belle was willing to give him. However, Belle challenged Rumplestiltskin, saying that despite all his efforts to be seen as powerful and feared, he was still a coward at heart for not being able to accept that someone could actually love him, and that all that his power would bring him in the end would be "an empty heart and a chipped cup."

After Belle leaves, the Queen visits Rumplestiltskin and goads him about her fate, telling him that after Belle had returned to her own kingdom, her father had locked her in a tower and sought priests to cleanse her, believing that she had succumb to Rumpelstiltskin's evil ways. According to the Queen, after being tortured and disavowed, Belle had killed herself by jumping off the tower.

Visibly shaken by this knowledge, Rumplestiltskin believes the Queen to be lying and tells her to leave. Left in his grief, an emotional Rumplestiltskin replaces a golden chalice in his trophy room with the teacup that Belle had chipped on her first day as his caretaker, the only memento he has of his lost love.

Some time later, he is summoned to King George's court, where King George begs him to bring his son, who had been killed in a tournament, back from the dead. Rumplestiltskin admits that not even magic can bring back the dead, but tells the King that his dead son had a twin. Years before, the King and his wife could not bear children and had made a deal with Rumpelstilskin to bring them a child. He made a deal with a poor couple that had given birth to twins but were about to lose their farm and gave one of their sons to the King.

He demands the location of King George's family fairy godmother in return for getting the other twin, which King George reluctantly gives. He goes back to the farmer's farm to collect the other twin, who turns out to be Prince James. He convinces James to go to King George's court and become a prince, which he does.

Some time later, he meets with Snow White, who wants him to give her something that will make her forget about an unforgettable love. Rumplestiltskin makes her a potion and takes some of her hair in return. Prince James, still in love with Snow, is determined not to marry Abigail. After helping Abigail free her true love from a curse, he goes to Rumplestiltskin to ask for help in locating Snow. He tells Prince James that he will help him as long as he gives him his cloak that he is wearing. Prince James agrees to give him his cloak and leaves with the information on how to locate Snow. After Prince James leaves, Rumplestiltskin takes a strand of hair off the cloak and puts it in a bottle with the hair he took from Snow White and places it on his shelf with his other potions.

Rumplestiltskin then goes to Cinderella's step-family's manor, where the fairy godmother is in the process of granting Cinderella a chance to go to Prince Thomas's ball. He destroys the fairy godmother and takes her wand, much to Cinderella's shock. However, despite her angry protests, he convinces her to make a new deal with him instead - she could go to the ball for something precious in return.

Cinderella agrees, signs the contract, and hurries off to the ball. Later, at their wedding ball, Rumplestiltskin briefly shows up to remind her about their contract, then walks off. Many months later, he meets with Cinderella again, who tells him that she was having twins, and wants to make a new deal. At first, he doesn't buy it, but, after warning Cinderella about the consequences of using magic against him, he eventually signs the contract with a magical quill, which paralyzes him.

Thomas, Grumpy and James load him up into a cart to take him away to prison, when Thomas mysteriously disappears. Cinderella confronts him, but he says that Thomas would never return unless he received her baby. Then he is carted away to his prison in the dwarves' mine.

During Snow White's wedding, the Evil Queen appears and announces her plans to destroy the happiness of Snow White—and, subsequently, everyone else in the Fairytale Land as well. When she attempts to fulfill her plans of the Dark Curse, she finds that it doesn't work. She goes to Rumplestiltskin to find out why, where he demands that he receive riches and comfort during his life in Storybrooke—and that she must give him anything he asks for if he says "please." After the Queen agrees to this, Rumplestiltskin tells her that she must sacrifice the heart of the thing she loves most for the Curse to work.

Soon after the Queen's visit, Snow White and James go to him seeking help because of the Evil Queen's Dark Curse. The guard warns them not to tell him their names, because it will give him power over them. However, Rumpelstiltskin already knows who they are - he greets them by name and tells them to take down their hooded robes.

Rumplestiltskin agrees to give them information in exchange for their unborn baby's name, to which Snow White agrees, in spite of the guard's earlier warning. Thus, he learns that the Savior's name is "Emma" right before he tells Snow White and James that the only thing that can save all the people in the land from the curse is "that thing growing in her belly" and it will not happen until her 28th birthday.

He, along with every other character, is consumed by the Dark Curse on the day of Emma Swan's birth.

Trivia

 * He is in love with Belle, and is known as the Beast from Beauty and the Beast.
 * He is the second known Dark One.
 * Both he and his counterpart have been captured and locked in prison cells.
 * Ironically, Rumplestiltskin is given a deadline of three days to save his son from becoming a soldier in the Duke's army. In the original fairy tale, the girl Rumplestiltskin spins gold thread for is also given a deadline of three days to guess his true name, or else she must forfeit her firstborn child.
 * He is seen spinning gold out of straw in various episodes. However, he states that gold itself is meaningless to him, and the real reason he spins so much is that it helps him relax and forget what he has lost.
 * His powers can be taken away by a kiss from his true love, since his powers are a curse. Because of this, he is very cautious as there are many who would take advantage of his powerlessness to enact revenge on him.
 * He is a potion-maker and claimed to have a potion for every magic in existence except for true love. He claims true love is the the most powerful magic there is. He later crafted the potion for true love: intertwined strands of hair from Snow White and Prince James.
 * In a conversation he has with the Blue Fairy (earlier in time, but later in episodes), he guesses that a curse can get him to the realm where Bae is. The Blue Fairy tells him the only curse is a terrible one that would require a great sacrifice - their world for the other realm. The Blue Fairy is releived that such a curse is beyond his abilities, so it is significant that he says, "If you can bottle love, you can do anything" and then he crafted a true love potion.
 * His counterpart and himself prior to being cursed with Zoso's powers talk in a more suave tone and had normal skin tone. During his time making deals, his voice seemed to become higher-pitched and his skin became grayish.
 * In the traditional fairytale, Rumplestiltskin was an imp, who spun straw into gold for a girl in return for her firstborn child. The girl was told she could keep her child if she could guess his name. When she finally did, Rumplestiltskin destroyed himself.