Rumplestiltskin is the Dark One again on Once Upon a Time, just in time to guide Emma Swan (Jennifer Morrison) and the rest of the gang down to the Underworld to try to save Hook (Colin O'Donoghue). It's a bit of a backslide for Robert Carlyle's character, who fought hard to be a hero after he lost his Dark One powers only to once again reclaim the full might of his magic.

Robert Carlyle as Rumplestiltskin in Once Upon a Time

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Is there anything that can be done to redeem the character again? While on the red carpet for Once Upon a Time's 100th episode party, showrunners Eddy Kitsis and Adam Horowitz promised that this storyline will play out differently than it has in the past."He has learned something," Kitsis said when asked whether Rumple might have learned from previous mistakes and do something as simple as tell Belle (Emilie de Ravin) the truth about being the Dark One again. (They didn't say whether or not he will tell her, for the record.) "I think that if fans are like, 'Oh, are they going to do the same thing again?' -- absolutely not. He's learned a lot."An upcoming episode will delve into Belle's life before she met Rumplestiltskin, with Wes Brown playing Gaston in the Belle-centric episode's flashbacks. But because so often the flashback sequences have a mirror in the present day storylines of Once Upon a Time episodes, I asked the showrunners whether this news means there's a significant Belle/Rumple arc happening concurrent to Belle and Gaston's tale."I will say that it does parallel the present day story, and it does inform it in a very direct way," Horowitz teased. "Without giving away too much, I think we can say that it was fun for us to explore a period in Belle's life that we hadn't explored yet, which was before she met Rumple, before we saw them meet in 'Skin Deep.' That's an area of her life that was a lot of fun to bring to life."For star Jennifer Morrison, she sees Rumple's return to the darkness as a metaphor for the suffering people go through in our every day lives, and explained how she believes the characters in Once Upon a Time will respond to the Dark One reveal."I always have seen the show as a metaphor for life and different people in life," she said. "I know [Carlyle's] talked about seeing that character as addicted to the power in the same way an addict is addicted to drugs or drinking or whatever. I think it's a similar relationship when you love someone and they're part of your family and they continue to deal with addiction. It's a disease, so do you blame them for their disease or do you figure out how to help them get help or at what point do you decide they need to help themselves?"If you look at it metaphorically, it's not so much can we ever forgive him, it's how do you continue interacting with this person that is a part of the family and is a part of the group," Morrison continued. "We're never going to be free of that. He's always going to be part of the family. You just have to continue adjusting to that and figure out the best way forward. It's not about getting rid of him or something."Lana Parrilla, who plays Regina, believes the reformed Evil Queen will be able to relate with Rumple's decision because she sees a deep connection between the two characters."I think there's always been a friendship between the two of them. It's just unspoken. There's a thin line between love and hate for the two of them," Parrilla said with a laugh. "They've known each other for so long and he's been a mentor, he's been her adversary, he's been someone she just wants to kill, someone she loves and hates -- and sometimes, we've always thought, 'Could he be her father?' because he had a love affair with Cora. Robert and I talk about it; we're like, let's leave that element there somewhere. Even if it's never, ever going to be written, there's a glimpse of it in our performance. I don't know what's going to happen there. I do want want more of the two of them together."

Once Upon a Time returns with its midseason premiere and 100th episode, "Souls of the Departed," on March 6 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC.Terri Schwartz is Entertainment Editor at IGN. Talk to her on Twitter at @Terri_Schwartz