Grimm: Highway of Tears

"It's good to have you back!"

It looks as though this season is going to continue as well as it started; we're several episodes in, and there's a pleasing number of ongoing plot threads. Here we're mostly concerned with the dramatic tension- will Elizabeth's concoction cute Nick in time for him to solve a strange series of murders committed by reptilian Wesen linked to the Thuggee? (Oh, and Rudyard Kipling was a Grimm. Blimey.)

But there are other threads bubbling under. The motive for Nick (and Juliette) agreeing for Nick to be re-Grimmed, as it were, is the constant harassment of Rosalie and Monroe by the Wesen Ku Klux Klan, who object to their inter-racial marriage and burn crosses on their lawn. 

Meanwhile, in Austria, Adalind tells all to Pronce Victor, who at last learns that the baby (unseen so far this season) is with Kelly Burhhart. More importantly, though, just when is he going to get rid of that thing on his upper lip? It's doing my head in.

Elizabeth's spell requires Juliette to become Adalind and shag Nick in said form, leading to some awkward but also illicitly exciting sex for them. But Juliette collapses afterwards. Hmm. Something has happened to her!

Elsewhere, Elizabeth tells Sean that she's leaving, and Josh arrives at the Burkhart residence to find only a tense Trubel. This is to be continued next episode, I'm sure. But for now, Nick is back as a Grimm and the series has never been better.

Grimm: Cry Luison

"You need to be a Grimm again!"

The strong run of recent episodes continues as we get a rather clever crime story, a fraud involving a set of quadruplets, that could be only slightly rewritten not to involve Wesen at all. It's a clever, satisfying plot. No doubt there's some interesting Brazilian cultural allusions I'm not getting, but the stories of the week this season certainly seem to be a cut above what they were.

A lot of season arc stuff happens too, of course. A lot of delightfully trippy stuff happens to Adalind, evoking Alice in Wonderland, until we learn that she never escaped her cell at all. Victor, however, wants to speak to her. He's still sporting that facial hair.

Also, Elizabeth has bought Sean a very, very posh house indeed. Mother and son are getting along rather sweetly, much as neither of them are particularly demonstrative people, to the point that Sean feels abject tell his mum that Nick's mother has her grandchild. I'm sure that she will make use of this information at some point.

In another subplot, Josh the not-Grimm is in trouble, but the details can wait until another episode. Apparently they're after that I famous key, now held by Nick, which promises to be fun.

We end with a cliffhanger, though, as the Wesen Ku Klux Klan leave a burning cross on Monroe's and Rosalie's lawn...

Grimm: Dyin' on a Prayer

"You married a monster, that's all."

This is an interesting broadening of the kinds of stories Grimm can tell; the legend of the Golem that protects the Jews of Prague has nothing to do with Wesen; the Wesen baddies, a pair of domestically violent brothers, are fairly perfunctory. Still, this is interesting; will the loss of Nick's powers expand the narrative possibilities?

It's all very well handled, although admittedly its a coincidence that the only known Golem remains should end up in Portland. And Nick gets to play the hero by just being a good cop with, admittedly, supernatural knowledge.

In other season plot threads, Rosalie and Monroe are beginning to face prosecution from the Wesen KKK for their mixed marriage. Trubel tells Nick about her offer from Chavez, the FBI woman, and Woo continues to have suspicions about Trubel and Nick. It's all bubbling away nicely in this superb season. And if this is the level of stories of the week we're getting now then I for one have no complaints.

Grimm: The Last Fight

 "It's cheating, right, if he's Wesen?"

"There are probably Wesen in all sports."

Boxing usually bores me, but this is a fantastic concept for Grimm; a bull Wesen as a boxer who is made to fight and win by showing him the metaphorical red rag by beating him with sticks before a fight. There's a vague bullfighting metaphor in here, although I suspect Clay is supposed to stand for all boxers and Sam for all boxing promoters. The script is not big on approval of boxing promoters; I rather suspect Hank's views are those of the author.

It's brilliant, even before the big reveal about Clay's mother, and that's just the story of the week bit. The arc stuff is really fizzing this season, and so far it knocks all previous seasons into a cocked hat.

It looks as though Nick and Adalind did indeed swap places between Portland and that cell in Vienna, but only for the duration of their strange mutual collapse. Oh, and FBI lady only kidnapped Trubel in order to confirm she's a Grimm and offer her a job on behalf of her mysterious employers. This one will run. And it looks as though Sean's mum will find a cure for Nick's "disability". And interestingly there a dilemma about Trubel- Nick needs someone to do the Grimming, but can he keep putting a teenage girl in danger?

Oh, and Adalind has escaped with the aid of her mysterious neighbour. There are a proper number of arc threads going on, and yet all this is nicely intertwined with a solid story of the week. Grimm is just so much better written these days. Can they keep it up?

Grimm: Octopus Head

"I just saw Burkhart. He's not the Grimm."

The first season of Grimm was, in hindsight, a bit blah, all story of the week episodes. The second series was better, with more continuing season arc stuff, but after a brilliant opening triptych it settled down into a largely story-of-the-week format. Here's hoping this third season, as with Buffy, breaks that habit and ends up a classic.

This episode is awesome, mainly because it's packed with status quo changing events; no reset button here. Good. I'm not going to list all of the big things that happen, partly because a blog like this shouldn't be a synopsis but mainly because it would be rather tiresome to do.

Instead I shall just opine at random things.

I love the Captain's resurrection at the hands of his mother (Louise Lombard from The House of Elliot...!) and a giant CGI dissolving snake. It's clear she's to be an important character; Sean goes to the trouble of summarising the first two seasons for her. And any passing casual viewers. See what they did there?

Viktor has never been quite as much as a bastard as he is to Adalind here. That partly makes up for the moustache and beard, I suppose. But it makes my wife fancy him all the more, the bastard.

Interesting that Juliette is in no hurry for Nick to become a Grimm again for the sake of their relationship; I think this is genuinely going to be at least a medium term thing. Trubel is clearly Portland's Grimm-in-training, with this two parter being both a baptism of fire for her and a dry run for the new format of her as a Grimm helping detectives Nick and Hank with Wesen-related crime. Good. She's a much more interesting character than Nick. And she gets quite the cliffhanger, being kidnapped by that mysterious Wesen FBI woman. What's she up to?

Woo at last seems about to discover the truth. About time. We've reached the point, at the start of the third season, beyond which the character can no longer be credible if he doesn't find out soon. And yet... the whole thing is delayed again at the end with that weirdness between Nick and Adalind. Have they swapped bodies? Is Nick in a female body in a rat-filled cell in Vienna? Who was that bloke in the next cell with the Frank Gorshin laugh? We must be told!

The big question, though, is why does the "Octopus Head" have only six tentacles?