‘Once Upon a Time’ season 5, episode 17: The state of Belle and Rumpelstiltskin

Mrs. Carter: Is “Rumbelle” closer to falling apart than ever before?

While on “Once Upon a Time” we have a tendency to see significant fan divisions over particular ‘ships, Belle and Rumpelstiltskin is one of the few that the majority of fans agree on. They want to see the two together and happy, but with a heavy emphasis on the second word. Through much of their relationship so far, there hasn’t been a whole lot of that. While Belle hasn’t been perfect, she seems angelic in comparison to Rumple’s thirst for power, his lies, and the acts of murder he’s committed. It’s remarkable, and thanks only to a few moments where the light shines through, that someone wants to be around him at all.

On this past episode entitled “Her Handsome Hero,” we saw an ending that was relatively atypical for the show’s Underworld arc. Typically, we’ve seen characters work extensively to help a lost soul move on; here, Belle ended up casting Gaston aside, and forced him into an afterlife of eternal suffering. Was it an act of malicious murder? Hardly. It was instead an impulsive act generated by love. She has hoped to find resolution between Gaston and Rumple, and a way for the two to move on. Unfortunately, these two men would not relent, and she had to shove Gaston into the River of Lost Souls to save his life. To make matters worse, her action here voided the new deal offered by Hades: If Rumple had killed Gaston, he would have terminated the contract that would have forced Belle to give up her child to him.

So where does this move leave Rumbelle moving forward? Belle’s act leaves her in a precarious place. She constantly wants to believe the best out of everyone, but now she has more in common with the Dark One than she’d care to admit. Rumple may help to be a source of comfort for her during this tough time, or it’s also possible that she will resist him further, wanting to create distance between herself as a person and the move she made in distress. While there is certainly hope for the two coming out of this episode, we’d say that in terms of their romantic relationship, they may be in a more dangerous position than ever before. We don’t know just which way on the pendulum Belle is going to swing for now.

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