Episode Report Card Cindy McLennan: A+ | 384 USERS: A+ YOU GRADE IT PANic And PANcakes
By Cindy McLennan | Season 3 | Episode 11 | Aired on 12.15.2013
Gold's Shop. Gold kneels next to a table and lays his left hand upon it. With his right hand, he raises the sword in the air. He's about to swing when he hesitates. We cut back to the...
Street. Pan mocks his captive audience, then hones in on Neal and Belle. "You both look so adorable. It's hard to tell which one to kill first. No it isn't." He focuses on his grandson. "You. You first." Gold comes up behind Pan and lays his still attached hand on Pan's left shoulder. He's still wearing the magic suppression cuff. He growls as he pulls Pan back. "Stay away from them."
Pan says, "How about this. The worm has teeth. Are you here to pwotect your woved ones?" Gold says he won't let Pan touch either of them. I have a job to finish and I have to do whatever it takes. No loopholes." While every else is still frozen it's clear from little things -- blinks, swallows, that they're conscious of the scene playing out before them. Gold says, "And what needs to be done has a price -- a price I'm finally willing to pay." He turns to his son. "I used the curse to find you, Bae, to tell you I made a mistake, to make sure you had a chance at happiness." Pan makes an Oh this guy face. Stuff it, Pan. Rumpelstiltskin is about to break our hearts.
Once Pan and I have piped down, Gold continues. "That happiness is possible, just not with me. I accept that." Pan mocks his son's pretty words, but Gold is undeterred. "I love you, Bae." He turns his attention to the other love of his life and says, "I love you Belle. You made me stronger."
Pan looks at his son's cuffed wrist and realizes he is still without magic. Gold says, "Oh, but I don't need it. You see, you may have lost your shadow, but there's one thing you're forgetting." Pan asks what that is. Gold says, "So did I. I sent it away with something to hide." When he raises his right hand, his shadow appears. It places the Dark One's dagger in Gold's hand then slips back inside Gold's body with a flash of blue. He grabs Pan into a hostile hug. Pan can't seem to break free, which makes no sense, because he seems to have been as magical in Storybrooke as he was on Neverland. I am chalking his helplessness up to the fact that Gold has his shadow back, but I fully admit I'm just rationalizing, because the rest of this is so damned good.
Gold tells Pan, "You see, the only way for you to die, is if we both die, and now -- now... I'm ready." He plunges the dagger into Pan's back. Pan screams. I clap. Belle and Neal take in the whole tragic tale. As Pan cries out, Gold wheezes and the two shake. Black smoke rises up out of them. When it clears, Gold is standing there with his arms around not Pan, but his old, adult father. Gold says, "Hello, Papa." Papa Stiltskin says, "Rumpel, please? You can stop this. Remove the dagger. We can start over. We can have a happy ending." Papa Stiltskin, you might have been more convincing if you weren't laughing in your son's face as you were trying to manipulate him.