I know I'm kinda going backwards in episodes, here but I wanted to write about Belle. She is one of my favorite characters on the show. The Outsider is two episodes before Tiny and is about Belle and Mulan and Belle's adventures between leaving Mr.Gold/Rumple and getting captured by Regina and locked away.
Thus, in FTL, Belle is still with the dwarfs, hiding out with them, reading a book. She overhears a group of men come in and talk about the Yaogui, a fierce fiery beast. Dreamy, the dwarf in love with Nova, comes up to thank her and tells her that he and Nova are going to run away together. Dreamy tells Belle that she should go take a chance on the adventure and find the Yaogui. She tells him thank you and closes her book. Before Belle jumps on the wagon, though, Dreamy gives her fairy dust that is "good magic." Belle thanks him and says she will use it for good.
Belle travels with some men to another, far off land (possibly China?) reading her book that is written in Chinese. The men laugh at her and ask where the Yaogui is. She tells them it is near a lake, which is a lie, and they throw her off the wagon. Belle picks up the book and travels to the mountains, where the beast really is.
Belle uses the book to find the Yaogui's cave in the mountains, but it comes out trying to attack her, but Mulan appears and shoots at it. The beast runs away and Mulan helps Belle up. Mulan tells Belle she has been tracking the beast for weeks and is angry she missed her shot. Belle shows Mulan the book and offers to help her find it again, but Mulan refuses.
Later, in a somewhat looking Chinese town, Belle is fetching water from the well, when the men who ditched her find her and attempt to beat her up. Mulan shows up and fights them off. She then asks Belle for help tracking the Yaogui so that Mulan can kill it, as Belle's tracking skills are better than Mulan's. Belle agrees and notices that Mulan's leg has been injured in the fight, to which Mulan ignores.
They track the beast, but as they find it, Mulan's injury prevents her from fighting. She gives Belle her sword and tells her that she must defeat the beast,that she must save Mulan's village from the Yaogui. She tells Belle that once people said she wasn't strong enough, but once she found something worth fighting for, she never gave it up.
Belle goes to the field and gets the Yaogui's attention and it comes after her as she runs down the road to the town. She breaks a water pipe as it attacks her, putting out it's fire. The beast starts to write something in the mud in chinese that stands for "help me." Belle takes out the fairy dust and sprinkles it on the beast who turns into Prince Philip! So Belle is the "beauty" for two beasts, Mr. Gold and Prince Philip! Yay Belle!
Belle and Philip go find Mulan and he tells her them that Malificent (what is it with this witch???) cursed him and sent him to their land. This implies that Mulan's land really is different than the others. Mulan agrees to help Philip go back to his land, which is Aurora's also I believe. Belle decides that she needs to go back and fight her own beast and leaves them. This is my favorite moment of Belle, when she comes back having defeated the Yaogui. She has so much promise to her life, but sadly...
At the top of the hill, Belle looks back saying she will never stop fighting for him. She turns around hearing Regina, who has found her with the help of the two men Belle traveled with. Belle is locked up, but screams that one day she will be reunited with Mr. Gold and that Regina cannot keep them apart forever and that Belle will never stop fighting for him.
As we know, Belle is locked away for 28 years. In present day Storybrooke, Mr. Gold has made a potion spell to get across the town line without losing his memories as long as he sprinkles the item on whatever he values most. Which happens to be a shawl that used to belong to his son. I guess this means that he loves his son more than he loves Belle? Belle asks if she can come with him (as she so longs to be with him and to go on adventures) but he says he must go alone.
Belle goes to the library and finds Hook waiting there for her. She recognizes him as the man who came to her jail cell once while she was prisoner trying to kill Mr. Gold. Hook says that he wants to kill Mr. Gold but will settle for her. She runs and slams the book cart into him and then locks herself in the elevator and calls Gold, but they have bad connection and he cannot hear her very well. He comes and rescues her and they walk back to his shop, which has been ransacked and the shawl stolen.
Mr. Gold is angry, as now he is trapped in Storybrooke and cannot find his son. He tells Belle that he will find Hook and get the shawl back. He tells Belle to go back to the library. which she does. In the library, Belle is working on organizing books and finds the book that Hook was reading before she came in. She realizes that he came by ship and heads to the dock.
At the dock, Belle notices a seagull perched on something invisible and throws sand onto the stairs of the ship. She walks through the invisibility spell and begins searching for the shawl. She finds Archie Hopper and frees him and tells him to go find Mr. Gold. Hook appears and tells Belle the truth, how Milah left Gold because he was a coward and that she loved Hook. He tells her that he loved Milah and took her away, but that when Gold later found him he almost killed him, but instead he killed Milah for leaving him and their son.
I feel sorry for Hook, but I hope he finds someone new to love. Maybe he fall in love with Regina, after all they both need someone and have both lost someone in the past. The writers have said that Hook will find some allies in Storybrooke. I hope that there is still good left in the two of them bad guys!
Mr. Gold arrives as Belle runs away from Hook, whom he starts beating with his cane. Belle convinces Gold not to kill Hook and that she believes that there is good in him still. How Belle keeps believing amazes me. She has so much hope and so much promise. Gold tells Hook he never wants to see him again and he and Belle leave taking the shawl.
And after it happens Emma, David, and MM don't let him see Belle.
And Mr. Gold cashes in his favor, and he, Emma, and Henry go on a road trip to find his son.
And Hook recovers and lives after getting hit by a car, and gets to have a great conversation about how he's a dead man with Emma.
Favorite scenes from The Outsider!
I love Belle a lot and I hope she gets her memories back (actually the writes have said that she will, but that it will require a great sacrifice from Mr. Gold). I also hope that one day she gets to meet Mulan again and Prince Philip and Aurora. I hope she gets to go on so many adventures!
http://www.tvguide.com/News/Once-Upon-Time-Spoilers-Kitsis-Horowitz-1058181.aspx
Until next time, everyone. Love, Rachel
