Grimm - Season 4

[Christopher]

I'm glad Nick still has his Zombie powers.

I'm not. They never did anything with them or explained them last season, and then they just ignored the whole thing for about a year. So the fact that they've belatedly remembered that the ill-defined "zombie powers" exist doesn't give me any hope that they'll bother to justify their existence anytime soon. I have no faith at all in these writers to pay off anything in an effective way. Like I said, I think they're too lazy to want to pay anything off -- they just want to drag everything out endlessly, to tread water and fool us into thinking they're actually going somewhere with all this.

 

[Dream]

I'm sorry, I had to laugh at that.

Laugh all you want. I've been burnt out on shows getting cancelled early. Even "hit" shows like Revolution and Touch in their first seasons, tank in the ratings in their second seasons and get canned. Audiences get easily distracted nowadays. At this point I won't watch a show until it gets a season 3, which usually always means a season 4 for syndication purposes.

I'm glad Nick still has his Zombie powers.

I'm not. They never did anything with them or explained them last season, and then they just ignored the whole thing for about a year. So the fact that they've belatedly remembered that the ill-defined "zombie powers" exist doesn't give me any hope that they'll bother to justify their existence anytime soon. I have no faith at all in these writers to pay off anything in an effective way. Like I said, I think they're too lazy to want to pay anything off -- they just want to drag everything out endlessly, to tread water and fool us into thinking they're actually going somewhere with all this.

What is there to explain? Nick acquired zombie powers after being spit in the face by the Baron Samedi. We saw it happen. We know that it gives Nick a boost in power when he needs it. I figured it was just a way for the writers to make Nick more badass.

Grimm does drag out certain plotlines like the endless amnesia arc, Royals, and anything involving Adalind, but I don't think of the Zombie powers need to be explained right now.

 

[JD]

I'm glad Wu finally knows. But it would have been nice if it had happened in an episode that wasn't already so busy. I definitely agree that the show does try to fit to many arcs into episode. I think the worst is still the Royals arc, we just keep getting one or two scenes each episode and they have nothing at all to do with what's going on in the rest of the episode. I actually don't mind when shows have these kinds of ongoing arcs, but Grimm's approach is kind of annoying.
As for the rest of the episode, I really enjoyed the main story with Monroe being kidnapped.
I'm very curious what they are going to do with Juliette now being a Hexenbiest. Usually it drives me crazy when we get people keeping secrets like that, but I with everything happen with Monroe I didn't mind it as much. I just hope she doesn't keep it secret for very long.

 

[Christopher]

I'm sorry, I had to laugh at that.

Laugh all you want. I've been burnt out on shows getting cancelled early.

Oh, don't misunderstand me. I do sympathize with that feeling. I was just amused by the idea that it was somehow a recent phenomenon for SF shows to have a hard time. It has always, always been that way, and it was a lot worse when I was growing up.

I'm glad Nick still has his Zombie powers.

I'm not. They never did anything with them or explained them last season, and then they just ignored the whole thing for about a year....

What is there to explain?

What they are. How they work. Why he has them. All we've seen is him going pale and exhibiting vaguely defined powers from time to time, and none of the characters even seem to notice or be the least bit curious about it. Most of all, the writers have done nothing to explain why we should care. What purpose does it serve in the storyline to give him these abilities? They haven't done anything with them. It's just a random new mystery that they introduced and then forgot about for a year.

I recently read that a member of the writing staff on Lost had admitted to a colleague that they never had a plan, that they just threw in random mysteries to keep the audience guessing and never had any intention of actually explaining them or paying them off. I strongly suspect the same is true of Grimm's writers.

 

[Greg Cox]

I'm sorry, I had to laugh at that.

Laugh all you want. I've been burnt out on shows getting cancelled early.

Oh, don't misunderstand me. I do sympathize with that feeling. I was just amused by the idea that it was somehow a recent phenomenon for SF shows to have a hard time. It has always, always been that way, and it was a lot worse when I was growing up.

Tell me about it! Would you believe they canceled Kolchak: The Night Stalker after only one season, and Planet of the Apes and The Time Tunnel and Logan's Run and Quark . . . ?

 

[Christopher]

^Back in the day, when cable television was new, I used to wish there would be a cable channel that would devote itself primarily to the dozens of old sci-fi shows that had been cancelled after a season or two, or even less, and didn't have enough episodes to be properly syndicated. It seemed to me that was the only way they'd ever be recovered from oblivion. Then the Sci-Fi Channel came along and basically was that for the first few years, but by the time I actually got the channel, they were already doing less of that, and they continued to do less and less as they shifted more to original programming (and infomercials).

The TV landscape is littered with genre shows cut down in their infancy. Heck, it's littered with all categories of shows cut down in their infancy, but the number of genre shows that actually survived longer was small. Today, we're in a comparative golden age for SF/fantasy TV. I don't know if there have ever been so many genre shows on the air at the same time as there are now.

 

[Dream]

I'm very curious what they are going to do with Juliette now being a Hexenbiest. Usually it drives me crazy when we get people keeping secrets like that, but I with everything happen with Monroe I didn't mind it as much. I just hope she doesn't keep it secret for very long.

My biggest fear is that the writers are going to drag out this whole Hexenbiest secret over the entire season just like amnesia in S2. I really miss S1's Juliette, her role was perfect back then.

 

[Greg Cox]

The TV landscape is littered with genre shows cut down in their infancy. Heck, it's littered with all categories of shows cut down in their infancy, but the number of genre shows that actually survived longer was small. Today, we're in a comparative golden age for SF/fantasy TV. I don't know if there have ever been so many genre shows on the air at the same time as there are now.

Amen. We've reached the point where it's all but impossible to watch every new genre show. There's simply not enough hours in the day.

 

[Christopher]

^Indeed, we've reached a point I never thought possible: A time when I'm just not interested in watching most of the genre shows on the air. They're so ubiquitous that I can afford to be selective, and there's as great a variety of them as there is of any other type of show. (Although fantasy shows still enormously outnumber real science fiction.)

 

[Greg Cox]

Meanwhile, if I was Juliette, I would have bailed on Nick by now. In the few years that Nick has been a Grimm, she's been been subjected to a coma, amnesia, sanity-threatening hallucinations, love spells, shape-shifting sex tricks, and now she's been turned into a Hexenbeast. And that's not even counting the usual physical threats and jeopardy you inevitably run into when your boyfriend hunts monsters full-time.

Who could blame her if she decided enough was enough?

 

[The Master of Tarquin Hill]

Meanwhile, if I was Juliette, I would have bailed on Nick by now. In the few years that Nick has been a Grimm, she's been been subjected to a coma, amnesia, sanity-threatening hallucinations, love spells, shape-shifting sex tricks, and now she's been turned into a Hexenbeast. And that's not even counting the usual physical threats and jeopardy you inevitably run into when your boyfriend hunts monsters full-time.

Who could blame her if she decided enough was enough?

Well, when she looks into his eyes while she is in in Hexenbeast form, she may want to bolt.

 

[JD]

What they are. How they work. Why he has them. All we've seen is him going pale and exhibiting vaguely defined powers from time to time, and none of the characters even seem to notice or be the least bit curious about it. Most of all, the writers have done nothing to explain why we should care. What purpose does it serve in the storyline to give him these abilities? They haven't done anything with them. It's just a random new mystery that they introduced and then forgot about for a year.

I recently read that a member of the writing staff on Lost had admitted to a colleague that they never had a plan, that they just threw in random mysteries to keep the audience guessing and never had any intention of actually explaining them or paying them off. I strongly suspect the same is true of Grimm's writers.

I didn't really think there was a mystery there. I thought they were just a left over from when he was turned into a zombie at the end of whatever season that was.

 

[Dream]

Well, when she looks into his eyes while she is in in Hexenbeast form, she may want to bolt.

Nick could always wear sunglasses around the house.

It should be interesting to see the Wesen community in Portland react to a Grimm in a relationship with a Hexenbiest. What a scandal!

 

[Christopher]

I didn't really think there was a mystery there. I thought they were just a left over from when he was turned into a zombie at the end of whatever season that was.

Well, yeah, of course we know that much. My point is that we don't know anything else about them, like what the hell they actually are. We know he got something as an aftereffect, but it's vaguely defined. And the way the characters have reacted to it has been terribly written. At first they were vaguely puzzled and worried about it, unsure what it meant or whether it was safe, but then they just seemed to forget about it. Nick and Hank are supposed to be detectives, investigators, but they had no curiosity, made no effort to seek an understanding. They just stopped caring.

 

[Taylirious]

Well, when she looks into his eyes while she is in in Hexenbeast form, she may want to bolt.

Nick could always wear sunglasses around the house.

It should be interesting to see the Wesen community in Portland react to a Grimm in a relationship with a Hexenbiest. What a scandal!

Ha!

I think Wu will lose it again.

 

[Dream]

Wow! What an awesome episode!

It felt like it took them ages to find out the location of the Tribunal, but it did build up the suspense for the ending. I was actually worried they were going to kill off Monroe or Bud at the end of the episode.

Not sure about how I feel about Juliette only telling her secret to Renard. I'm glad she has told SOMEBODY at least, Renard would know a thing or two about Hexenbiest because of his mother. But I fear the writers are going to take the rest of the season until they have Juliette tell Nick.

We haven't gotten such a large scale action scene with all our main characters since the opening zombie arc of season 3 have we? It was great that pretty much everyone was able to get a memorable badass scene in the ending fight, especially Rosalee.

Loved the "power walk" when our crew went to take care of business in the forest to save Monroe. Sure it was a little cheesy, but I like that the writers went there.

 

[TimmyWl]

It was an amazing episode. I liked how the whole notion of Juliette's new Hexenbeist 'nature' was introduced at the beginning, never addressed, and then came out at the end. It was very well done.

 

[Dream]

 

[Christopher]

This was much better than last week's, because instead of cramming in little bits of too many subplots, they focused on one core story and resolved it while advancing other threads organically within its context. That's how they should do it more often.

And it was cool to see Monroe and Bud standing up to the bigots. It's interesting to note that all the Wesenrein members were white in their human form, even though they belonged to different Wesen races. It makes me wonder if they're really about ancient principles of Wesen purity and more just part of the white-supremacist movement with Wesen culture grafted on. When you think about it, the language they use is a hodgepodge -- "Primum Naturae Ordinem Wesen" or whatever, three Latin words and then a German word. Plus the resemblance of their iconography to Nazi symbolism. It suggests they aren't the ancient order they claim, but more of a modern construct with an invented ancient tradition. Groups like these are generally just scams to manipulate the gullible into giving power or money to the groups' leaders.

By the way, Trek Lit fans take note: The prodigiously bearded Wesenrein member who was holding onto Bud just before the cops arrived was played by former Star Trek novelist Andy Mangels. Here's a Facebook post from him about it. He was supposed to be in last week's episode too, but his scene there was cut.

 

[Thestral]

Meanwhile, if I was Juliette, I would have bailed on Nick by now. In the few years that Nick has been a Grimm...

Who could blame her if she decided enough was enough?

I don't think Nick would have based on how last season ended. The willingness to adapt she has is extraordinary.

It's interesting to note that all the Wesenrein members were white in their human form, even though they belonged to different Wesen races.

Eh? There was at least one black person fairly prominent in the background shots, particularly among the survivors. And remember we've already established Hitler was a Wesen himself, so in this universe the Nazi symbolism of the Wesenrein probably predates the Nazis themselves.


Anyway, excellent episode for sure, and two-parter. Wu's in! Finally!! Also no Adalind and... err... Wesley. And it wasn't missed one bit.

Except.... I'm nervous about how it ended. Juliette turns to Renard and is keeping it a secret... why? I mean, okay she's understandably freaked the hell out but I really really hope they don't have her keep this from him long. If it's a "hexenbiests are evil" thing, we just saw a few episodes ago a good (or at least temporarily good?) hexenbiest that helped Nick get his powers back. That's what got her into this mess, so there's no reason to think logically he'd reject her outright for it. Logically, of course... so it makes sense she has to deal with it herself. But the whole "Nick vs. Juliette" nonsense is just misdirection, and I'm pretty sure some of those preview bits are just another dream sequence, and we've already had one (well-done!) fakeout with that.