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Grimm
Network: NBC
Main showrunners: David Greenwalt ( Angel ) & Jim Kouf ( Cutter )
Main stars: David Giuntoli, Silas Weir Mitchell
Script review/analysis: Another fairy-tale inspired series (there’s also Once Upon A Time coming this year, which we’ve seen but only the understanding we don’t review it – bah!), Grimm is a procedural wrapped in fantasy. Portland Detective Nick Burkhardt is happily engaged and good at his job, but something weird is happening to him. As he passes seemingly average people like a pretty woman, Nick instead sees an old hag. Or the perp being led into jail has an owl’s face. The snippets of bizarre throw him, but it only gets worse when his dying aunt Marie – who raised him after his parents died – comes for an unplanned visit.
On a walk together, she tells him that there’s a lot more to his history than he’s ever been told and that she knows he is seeing odd things. Before she can finish, the two are attacked by a troll-like creature. Sickly aunt Marie suddenly turns into an ass-kicker, but Nick ends up killing the troll with a few rounds from his gun. However what’s lying in the street isn’t a creature but a nerdy looking guy.
In the hospital, Marie tells him to look inside her Airstream camper for the answers and so Nick comes to learn that he comes from a long-line of magical protectors called Grimms. They see what average people can’t – the Blutbads (or Big Bad Wolves), trolls, witches and more wrapped in magic and human guise living amongst us. Some are really bad – their natures manifesting in murders, rapes, and child abductions. Others aren’t so bad, like reformed Blutbad Eddy Munroe (who advises Nick on more details about his Grimm status) as they actively fight against their natures to live peacefully. The family job will pass to Nick and he’s got to muddle through only knowing the barest facts about his imposed destiny.
It’s not surprising that there are certainly shades of Buffy and Angel in Nick’s supernatural duties, as showrunner Greenwalt worked on both shows. There’s certainly more of a cop show in the DNA of this series than either of those show, which makes this more accessible to mainstream viewers. There’s an interesting tone and vibe that allows for the fairy tales to go back to their dark roots with the violent crimes that Nick and his human partners have to investigate, but the execution of the creatures via VFX will determine how creepy or cheesy this show will be. The mythology arc is interesting, if not particularly fresh, but characters like Eddy show there could be a lot of potential outside of the case-of-the-week aspects.
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