Article originally written for Seat42F.
This week’s installment on NBC’s GRIMM is called “Trial by
Fire.” A Wesen that can turn himself into a living flame burns down a family
business, inadvertently killing two employees in the process. Nick (David
Giuntoli) and Hank (Russell Hornsby) investigate, turned to an old foe to help
them, which causes trouble for one of their closest friends.
What I was expecting from this week’s GRIMM was the showdown
between Juliette (Bitsie Tulloch) and Adalind (Claire Coffee). It was highly
publicized and long anticipated. And technically, “Trial by Fire” does deliver
that – briefly, at the very end. This exemplifies the problem with GRIMM right
now, which is that it minimizes the big stories that effect our characters in
the favor of case-of-the-weeks.
It’s hard to complain too much about the case in “Trial by
Fire.” It not only brings back Orson (Daniel Roebuck), one of the first
villains Nick puts away back in the sixth episode of the series, but also deals
with some real depth here. Nick realizes that Orson isn’t the only one to blame
in the conflict in which two of his brothers were killed by Monroe’s then-girlfriend,
now deceased. It’s a re-examination of something the show glossed over awhile
ago, which is always a good thing for a program to do down the line.
Even better is how this affects Monroe (Silas Weir
Mitchell), whose people have an ancient feud with Orson’s. When Monroe sees
Nick and Hank working with Orson, he is furious and storms out, which makes
sense, given his history. Monroe doesn’t buy into stereotypes in general, but
because this one is backed up by his own experiences, he embraces it. It takes
Rosalee (Bree Turner) to make Monroe realize he’s really no better than the
hate group that kidnapped him if he can’t get over his prejudice, and with
great strength of will, Monroe decides to help out.
How the case ends is really of no importance to GRIMM. Sure,
they catch the bad guy who hired the evil Wesen and kill the Wesen himself. But
in terms of the mythology of the show, it’s far more important that Monroe sees
something about himself that he can use to help grow, Rosalee puts her husband
in his place, and Nick helps the viewer look a little further into complexity
of the world.
Were a case-of-the-week-centered episode rare, this is the
type I’d like to see, the depth making up for how repetitive the story
structure is. Because GRIMM has been delivering a lot of these cases, the fact
that this is by far the best one in recent memory doesn’t take away the sting
of a series squandering its potential. This needs to be the exception, not the
rule, for GRIMM.
Back to Juliette and Adalind, “Trial by Fire” finds Viktor
(Alexis Denisof) and Adalind still trying to track Adalind’s baby. They get a
little info from Renard (Sasha Roiz), whom I guess decides to cooperate the
minimum amount to avoid trouble, and then Adalind goes after Juliette to find out
more. Not knowing Juliette is now Hexenbiest, Adalind doesn’t know what she’s
in for.
I love that Adalind ends up being scared of Juliette.
Apparently, Juliette isn’t just a Hexenbiest, but the Hexenbiest, the top dog of her breed. This has many implications
that I can’t wait to see explored (though GRIMM will probably only give us
small bits of this at a time), and how Adalind will deal with this should be
among the most interesting.
The hour ends with Nick finding out Juliette’s secret. I
still say it’s completely dumb he doesn’t figure things out himself; he’s
supposed to be a great detective, and all the signs are there. But the episode
ends before we get his reaction. NBC’s promo is awful, making it seem like
Juliette is scared of Nick for some reason, which makes no sense, but still,
the promise of the couple coming to terms with this development together is
nice.
“Trial by Fire” is a great GRIMM episode that, unfortunately,
is part of a larger, disappointing trend. On its own, I have very few complaints.
Taken with the rest of the surrounding installments, it doesn’t do anything to
fix the mistakes GRIMM is making.
GRIMM airs Fridays at 9 p.m. ET on NBC.
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