We begin this evening back in Storybrooke with Belle and Rumple preparing for toddler Gideon’s birthday party. They’ve had a wonderful year of peace and solitude in which Rumple “can’t even remember when he last used the dagger.” In a prophetic callback to the movie “Up,” he hands her a scrapbook and promises Belle she’s going to get what she’s always wanted – to see the world.”

Ahead in Hyperion Heights, Weaver stops off to see Tilly (aka “Alice”) to talk business. He wants to know more about Victoria. “Had an ex-girlfriend who worked for her once,” Tilly tells him, letting us know where her sexual orientations lie. Please tell me we’ll see a return of Mulan this season and she finally gets her damn happy-ever-after. I’ll even promise to like Tilly if Mulan does. I just don’t want to think of Mulan wandering from realm to realm all alone forever.

Anyway, it’s Halloween in Hyperion Heights and Tilly has herself a puzzle: she seems to know everyone – including Weaver – is “wearing a mask.”

A short while later, Tilly hides out in Victoria’s car and ambushes her, demanding to know how she got to Hyperion Heights and why everyone’s not who they seem. Victoria fends her off with pepper spray but Tilly leaves her bag behind. Victoria finds Weaver’s card and summons him to her office, demanding that he find Tilly and see that she gets back on the meds that Victoria gave her.

Weaver doesn’t seem to find it odd that a businesswoman is assisting a doctor in prescribing anti-psychotic meds for some reason.

Nevertheless, he refuses simply out of principle because Victoria doesn’t own him. She makes it clear that she most certainly does – she’s got incriminating video of his corrupt ways and will send him to prison if he doesn’t get Tilly under control.

Over at the bar, Roni is serving Henry a drinks she calls “The Poisoned Apple” (Scotch, Schnapps and dry ice with a dash of Henry-suggested cinnamon. Which sounds revolting, TBH). Henry unloads on Roni’s bartender ear and tells her about finding his family’s graves and the effect it had on him.

“Losing a love like that can make you afraid to move on,” she agrees. “But you owe it to yourself to find love again.” Oh, please. Let that be true for the both of them. Her more than him. She’s earned it.

Meanwhile, Weaver lets Rogers know that Victoria is hiding something big, and what’s more – she’s afraid. Tilly is the key to what that is. Rogers agrees to help the girl and Weaver brands him “The champion of Lost Girls.” Awww. My Captain Swan Shipper Heart!

Back now to Rumple and slightly-graying Belle in the Enchanted Forest on a bridge “older than time itself” where people toss wishes into a river (as a preteen Gideon frolicks in the background). Rumple tosses the Dark One dagger off the bridge into the wish river – wishing himself mortal. But it’s not that easy, and the dagger comes right back to him. Belle vows she’ll find a way to free him from that dagger.

We move forward another ten years or so and Belle gets grayer. An eighteen year-old Gideon has been accepted into Elfaim Academy (I hope I’m spelling that right – that’s what it sounded like), and Rumple is thrilled to have another scholar in the family but also terribly sad to see him go. Belle has finally found a scroll that describes “the Edge of Realms” and a way for Rumple to lose the Dark One dagger forever. There’s a fairy prophecy that claims “When the dark one finds eternal love at the sun’s brightest set” he’ll see the path to getting rid of the dagger. So off they go to the Edge of Realms.

Forward to Hyperion Heights, and Jacinda arrives at Belfry Towers to drop off Lucy’s Halloween costume. She begs Ivy to let her take Lucy trick-or-treating since Ivy is none to thrilled to be saddled with the duty. Ivy refuses, not wanting to risk Victoria’s anger.

Ivy actually makes Lucy wear a paper bag over her face instead of using face-paint or buying a mask, and Lucy swaps bags with another kid and takes off, leaving Ivy frantically looking for her.

Over near the troll bridge, Weaver finds Tilly and she claims the pills Victoria wants her to take will “make her small again,” and she almost remembers how to make Weaver see whatever it is she thinks she knows.

“We’re all pieces of the big puzzle,” she tells him. “That’s why Victoria scattered us.” She uses the word “beast” as she alludes to his past, but the word doesn’t seem to have an effect yet. She wants to show Weaver something, so they climb in his car.

Weaver tries to slip her a marmalade sandwich full of meds, and Tilly is infuriated. She tells him he has someone who loves him that’s waiting for him, and reminds him that he’s a good man. Then she leaps from the car and takes off running, with Weaver in pursuit.

Flashing back now to Rumple and Belle at the Edge of Realms, where time stops and the sun sets brightest in all the lands. An eternity here is like the blink of an eye back in the outside world. They decide to spend this extended eternity building a home with their own hands, and they even use the music from Up (or something very like it) in the montage to complete the Karl-and-Ellie-esque effect. It’s freaking adorable, but oh God, I know where this is going.

And in a heartwrenching callback at the end of the life-long montage, an elderly Belle falls as she opens the curtains right into Rumple’s arms. He offers to fix her and make her young again with his dagger, but Belle confesses the secret she’s carried all these years. The “sunset” in the fairy prophecy actually refers to her death. Rumple must believe their love and let her die – only then will he find the path that will free him from the dagger and lead him back to her. Rumple balks, and she tells him the story of their love once again (complete with gut-punching flashbacks), and promises him they’ll find a way back to each other. She dies smiling, and we’re all absolutely gutted.

Forward now to Henry, who shows up at Mr. Clucks and is just about to ask Jacinda out when Ivy arrives to let them know Lucy has gone missing. Henry offers to help and slyly puts his number in Jacinda’s phone, vowing to keep her updated on his search.

Henry tracks down a tearful Ivy sitting on a bench. It turns out she’s feeling all alone in the world because Victoria is all she has. He mentions how he’s just as alone as she is, and he recommends they both do the scary thing and try to take some chances in their lives. They team up to look for Lucy.

Over at the warehouse we saw Weaver hanging out in during episode one, Tilly finds what she was looking for and pulls the infamous chipped teacup off a shelf. She says Rumple gave her the cup and told her it would remind him of how to get back to “her” – but it doesn’t yet. She takes his gun and he asks “Why are you doing this?”

“Because you told me to – Rumplestiltskin!” she cries, just before she shoots him. Rumple lays in a spreading pool of blood and still doesn’t know what the hell is going on.

Flashing back, we’re at Rumple and Belle’s house – and Belle’s grave at the Edge of Realms. He’s carved her a beautiful rose-themed grave marker on the top of the cliff, and Gideon has arrived to pay his respects. Gideon begs Rumple to give him the dagger and free himself so that he can move on and be with Belle, but Rumple refuses.”I took the dagger for one son,” he says. “I’m not going to give it to another.”

Rumple says he needs to pass the dagger on to “The Guardian” – and the Guardian will lay the darkness to rest. He steps through a portal and finds Alice, on the very night Henry is heading to the ball.

Ahead in time to Hyperion Heights, and while Weaver is unconscious he sees a vision of Belle. He wakes in the hospital with Rogers standing over him, holding the bullet that should have ended his life. “You must be bloody immortal,” Rogers quips. Rumple orders him to cover up what Tilly did, and let her go.

Out in the hallway, Detective Rogers lets Tilly know that’s she’s been cleared of charges and is free to go. She apologizes, and then invites him to sit down and play a game with her – a game of chess. Oh, she’s his lost girl, all right. They just made me like Tilly, for her parentage alone.

A short while later, Victoria confronts Weaver about letting Tilly go, and he tells her that he knows she’s got a secret, and reminds her that she can’t hurt him anymore – “Dearie.”

Lucy finally shows up at Mr. Cluck’s with Henry and Ivy, and Ivy suggests that Jacinda take Lucy trick-or-treating for the next hour. Jacinda invites Henry to go along but he chickens out.

We end at Roni’s bar but don’t bother to put Roni in this scene because what the hell, she has her forty seconds. Ivy brings Henry a drink and thanks him for the reminder to put herself first for a change, and they clink glasses, commiserating about being alone. Good God, please don’t write her into having a thing for Henry. A toxic love triangle might add great tension in a story, but in this one it’s not going to work because I already like Ivy a thousand times more than Jacinda, despite her stilted, overly-petulant lines.

I’m giving this episode four roses out of five, and pretty much only for the Belle and Rumple storyline, because that’s what carried the episode.

Alice was intriguing, but like Aladdin, I’m having a hard time understanding some of her lines through that mushmouth of hers.

Officer Rogers makes me fan myself every time I see him in that uniform, and Roni lit up the scene when she got her forty seconds of screen time. I realize the show is moving forward and in a new direction, but the three main carryovers are still the only ones worth watching the show for, four episodes in. Nobody else has really interested me much so far, though Ivy is growing on me (heh heh).

My thoughts:

I’m guessing Alice is The Guardian or she knows The Guardian? Is the witch the Guardian? Victoria is still boring me to death. Blah. Just blah. What is on the tape that Victoria has on Weaver? And why do I not care? Can we have Tiana move in with Ivy please? Just to maybe see if the new characters can be interesting? Is Tilly’s ex-girlfriend one of Victoria’s three assistants? How will that play in? Henry still isn’t doing it for me much. He’s likeable enough, but that’s about it. I’m hoping once Regina comes to her senses, they’ll really make a connection and he’ll get more intriguing. Right now he’s just the nice guy in the background to me. And they keep trying to make these cutesy “moments” happen between him and Jacinda that are just falling flat.

What did you think of Rumple and Belle’s happily-ever-after?