Mr. Gold

Season 1 and 2

In the Enchanted Forest, Mr. Gold was originally known as Rumplestiltskin, a whimsical yet sinister sorcerer who delights in making devilish deals with desperate people, warning them "all magic comes with a price." He is also known as the "Dark One," the Beast and the crocodile that cost Captain Hook his left hand. He is the true love of Belle, father to Baelfire/Neal Cassidy, and grandfather to Neal and Emma Swan's biological son Henry.

Rumplestiltskin was born to the infamous Black Fairy and a con man named Malcolm. The Black Fairy abandoned him without even giving him a name, out of her desire to "choose power over love." Later, as a boy, Malcolm left him with two spinners, from whom he receives a magic bean to create a portal to another world. Malcom used the bean to take them to Neverland, though he forced Rumplestiltskin to be returned to the Enchanted Forest, realizing his son was preventing him from becoming a boy again. Rumplestiltskin witnessed as his father transforms into Peter Pan. In his adult years, Rumplestiltskin became a poor spinner who deserted from the Ogre Wars, to the disgust of his wife Milah, who left him for the pirate Killian Jones. Rumplestiltskin was then tricked into becoming the Dark One, later killing Milah and cutting off Killian's hand, after which he takes on the name Captain Hook. He prevented his son Baelfire from being forced to join the wars, though Bae wants rid of his powers, creating a portal to transport them to a world without magic. Rumplestiltskin fears losing his powers, leaving Bae to cross over alone; he vows to find his son. He trains Zelena, the Wicked Witch of the West, until she becomes jealous of his continued teaching of her half-sister, the Evil Queen Regina, who he chooses to cast his curse. As part of a deal to save her town, Belle becomes the caretaker of his estate and the two form a romantic bond until Rumplestiltskin forces her to leave forever, mistaking her for working with Regina, who later claims that Belle committed suicide. Soon afterwards, Prince Charming and Snow White use squid ink to immobilize, and placed him into a magical jail. Regina enacts his curse, and he requests that she give him a place of comfort in the "new world" that they will be sent to.

In Storybrooke, he is Mr. Gold, the owner of a pawn shop and the town's wealthiest resident. Like everyone else except Regina, he does not remember his true identity until Emma comes to town and tells him her name. He owns most of the town. He finds Regina a baby whom she names Henry, only for her to later learn that he is Emma Swan's biological son. He helps Emma become Sheriff, and offers his legal services to Mary Margaret Blanchard (Snow White). Emma eventually breaks the curse and Gold is reunited with Belle, bringing magic back to Storybrooke, though he is later enraged when he learns that leaving the town will remove residents' magical memories, as he had planned to search for Baelfire. Gold eventually creates a potion to leave and tracks Bae to Manhattan, learning he is Neal Cassidy, Henry's father. Gold begins to die after he is poisoned by Hook with Dreamshade and the group return to Storybrooke, where Mary Margaret heals him by reluctantly cursing Cora's heart.

Season 3 and 4

When Henry is kidnapped to Neverland, Gold travels with Emma, her parents, Regina and Hook to rescue him from his father's plot to steal Henry's heart. Returning to Storybrooke, Pan attempts to kill his loved ones, though Gold uses his dagger to sacrifice both himself and his father. However, Pan's curse is enacted, and when Regina destroys her curse to end Pan's curse, the inhabitants are returned to the Enchanted Forest.

Neal and Belle travel to Rumplestiltskin's castle and are located to the Dark One's vault where Neal resurrects Rumplestiltskin but kills himself. Before he dies, Rumplestiltskin merges Neal's body with his own. When Snow White and Prince Charming enact a curse to stop Zelena, Mr. Gold is returned to Storybrooke under Zelena's control. Emma later finds him, only to find that Neal is trapped within him, thus causing Gold to lose his mind. Neal asks for Emma to free Gold to defeat Zelena, though he will die; she reluctantly agrees. Mr. Gold proposes to Belle, also giving her his dagger. Unknown to her, it is a fake, and Gold uses the original to kill Zelena. He later marries Belle with her father's blessing, secretly returning the real dagger to Belle. Gold soon discovers the Sorcerer Merlin's magical hat in Storybrooke and once again defies Belle to take back the original blade. Attempting to cleave himself from his dagger and have ultimate power and control by killing Hook, Belle stops him and banishes him from the town. Gold finds Ursula and Cruella and enlists them to help in returning to Storybrooke, later teaming with Maleficent to find the Author of Henry's book and retrieve their own happy endings at the expense of Emma who's savior status must be removed. As Mr. Gold's darkened heart affliction worsens, he uses the Author to create an alternate universe in which villains get their happy endings. However, Henry undoes Isaac's work, and Belle finds an unconscious Mr. Gold back in Storybrooke. The Apprentice removes the Dark One's powers from Gold's heart and keeps him in a preservation spell. The darkness is then taken in by Emma, who becomes the new Dark One.

Season 5

He is then left under the spell during the Camelot Quest. Shortly after the heroes' return, he is awoken by Emma and forced to become a hero via protection of Belle in order to pull Excalibur from its stone. After succeeding, Gold threatens to ensure Emma's defeat, because as a former Dark One, he knows better than anyone how to defeat one. After Hook was revealed to be the true villain, Gold engaged in a duel with him for the first time as a human since their first meeting. Despite the reversed circumstances – with Hook as the Dark One and Gold as the mortal – Gold still managed to defeat Hook in combat, purposefully allowing him to live, believing it would haunt Hook that he had been defeated by his "cowardly" nemesis. Though Gold hoped to resume his relationship with Belle, she ended the relationship due to the numerous times he lied and hurt her.

After Hook unleashed the dead Dark Ones into Storybrooke, Gold was among those whose souls were claimed and were to be taken to the Underworld in place of the Dark Ones. Though Gold claimed it was pointless to resist, Emma continued to look for a way to stop Hook. Taking advantage of Emma's decision to use Excalibur to destroy the Darkness once and for all, Gold enchanted the blade so that the Darkness would be transferred back into him. Indeed, following Hook's redemptive sacrifice, Gold was revealed to not only be the Dark One again, but to embody the power of every Dark One before, including Emma Swan. Upon discovering this fact, Emma used this to blackmail Gold into helping the heroes journey to the Underworld to resurrect Hook. When he arrived, he is tempted by his father, who must live out his soul as Peter Pan, an offer to trade a living soul for his, and was tempted by Hades to leave only to betray Gold by forcing him to kill Milah just as they were hoping for her to make peace with Baelfire. Hades then uses the contract that gave the healer their second child, as payback by amending it in order to do Hades' bidding. When he created a portal for Hades in order to bring Zelena's daughter to the Underworld, the portal also bought Belle as well, and he confessed to her about his reclaiming his role as the Dark One and her pregnancy, explaining that she cannot merely love him for the man she sees inside the beast, since the beast is also a part of him. Upset with Belle going into a sleep to protect their child, Gold decides to resort to using dark magic again, and with the help of Pan to act as a "Loophole," he kidnapped Zelena, as she was responsible for giving Belle the spindle that put her under in the first place. After getting Hades to rip up the contract for his and Belle's baby, he rips Robin's heart out to give it to Pan so he can live again but Rumple double crosses him and puts Robin's heart back and puts a glamoured wineskin filled with water from the River of Souls. He later puts Belle in the Underworld Pandora's Box and leaves back to Storybrooke and goes to Belle's father to get him to wake her up but he refuses until Rumple is gone from Belle's life. After Hades's death, Gold uses the Olympian Crystal to steal Storybrooke's magic to help free Belle from her sleeping curse but when Henry steals it to destroy magic believing it to be nothing but trouble, Gold lies to everyone and says if he destroys magic he will destroy us. After finding Henry in New York, he steals the crystal back and plans to use its magic to wake Belle up but Mr. Hyde uses The Sorcerer's wand to open a portal and steal Pandora's Box which contains Belle after Rumple decided to save the crystal instead. When Henry destroys magic Rumple suggests they visit a man called "The Dragon", who might tell them where to find any magic left in the world and when they discover the fountain in New York contains magic they get random people to help make wishes to get their family back and after Snow, David, Hook, Zelena, and Dr. Jekyll return Gold travels to the Land of Untold Stories to confront Hyde and get Belle. Hyde later makes a deal with Gold to give him info about how to free Belle from her sleeping curse in exchange for Storybrooke in which Gold agrees.

Season 6

Gold uses the Sands of Morpheus to wake Belle, at the same time, meeting the consciousness of his unborn son in the dream world. Due to his son encouraging Belle not to let Gold ruin their lives, she leaves him to stay on the Jolly Roger. Gold attempts to show Belle he does love her and their son, but fails numerous times. At the same time, the Evil Queen tries seducing him into help her; pretending to fall for her wiles, Gold instead manipulates her. Tired of the man he sees in the mirror, Gold cuts his hair short, hoping a new look would help. Eventually, the Evil Queen frames him for accelerating Belle's pregnancy to make her give birth; to keep their son safe, Belle asks Mother Superior to take him somewhere else. Gold is left saddened as Belle refused to tell him the name of their son, telling her he would never have hurt her or him. To his horror later, Gold finds himself unable to find their son with magic; he tells Belle to ask Mother Superior, with both learning a terrible truth: the Black Fairy kidnapped their son. Gold reveals to Belle that the Black Fairy is his mother, and that she is corrupting their son, Gideon, as they speak. A short time later, a hooded figure arrives at the shop, and to their horror, it is a grown-up Gideon, now poisoned with evil by the Black Fairy; he is the one destined to kill Emma.

Character Development and reception

The producers had been eyeing Carlyle as the right person to play the dual roles, even after having been written with him in mind, though the writers initially thought he would not accept the part. Horowitz recalled Carlyle's prison sequence in the pilot episode, which was the actor's first day on the set as "mind-blowing ... You could see Ginny actually jump, the first time he did that character. It was fantastic!" Jane Espenson has stated that no official first name has been established for him.