Susan Gittins

We’ve been specualating for a while that Eion Bailey’s August W. Booth, aka The Stranger, could be Rumplestiltskin’s long-lost son Baelfire. It turns out he’s not, but Robert Carlyle’s Rumpelstiltskin/Mr.Gold has some hope early on in episode nineteen called The Return.

It opens with a seemingly-disabled August struggling to get out of bed and to walk. He meets up with Jared Gilmore’s Henry across the street from Mr. Gold’s Pawn Shop, asking for the boy’s help in “accelerating the plan” while pretending it’s part of Operation Cobra. “We’re a go,” he says as Henry runs into Mr. Gold’s to buy a gift for Miss Blanchard “since she didn’t kill that woman” (one of the funniest scenes is the accompanying “We’re glad you didn’t kill Mrs. Nolan” card from her class), while August searches Mr. Gold’s back office. I saw them film the exterior scenes in a mid-February downpour in Steveston dressed as Storybrooke, and then move inside Mr. Gold’s for interior scenes with Robert Carlyle.

Once Upon a Time intercut these scenes with the fairytale world where Bae tries to get his now clearly evil father Rumple to return to his original self, untainted by magic. They make a deal that if Bae can find a way to rid him of the Dark One’s powers, his father will go along with it.

Back in Storybrooke, a suspicious Mr. Gold decides to follow August out of town to the local convent. That’s Eion Bailey on the motor bike below but his stunt double rode it down the Moncton Street in Steveston. And that’s Mr. Gold’s ride, the big Cadillac parked outside his pawn shop.