NBC's Grimm - Episode 3.16 The Show Must Go On
A double homicide leads Nick and Hank to a traveling carnival where the performers are not what they seem. To get a better understanding of what's going on behind the scenes Monroe and Rosalee go undercover. On the wedding front, Monroe has a really important question for Nick. In Austria, an invaluable member of the Resistance makes the ultimate sacrifice to help Adalind.
Traveling carnivals seem like the perfect setting for an episodic plot of Grimm. It allows things to be weird and entertaining in terms of the Wesen world while not having to worry about public perception. But instead of taking the opportunity to have the characters discuss the significance of the Wesen world coexisting with the human world, it's mostly an episodic story. Apparently if you go full woged so everyone can see you for a long period of time, it can revert you back to your primal instincts. That's the challenge facing the characters in "The Show Must Go On." The primal needs caused someone to murder two girls and Nick and Hank have to try and find some king of justice. Monroe and Rosalee try to help the people working for the carnival but wind up getting sucked into that universe.That's the narrative approach this episode wanted to take. That's fine with me as long as the show is entertaining and interesting and allows its character to interact in fun and interesting ways. But the climatic beats of the hour focused on the people of the carnival as they were the ones to serve justice to their murderous ringmaster. The reveal that the ringmaster is the true bad guy and not the slowly losing control Blutbad felt like an afterthought. The show didn't push him far enough as a man who mistreats these Wesen to perform for him. That would have made the closing of them banding together to kill him more meaningful. Instead it feels like something that just happened because the episode was ending. And it also took time away from the main characters.
Some more thoughts:
- "The Show Must Go On" was written by Marc Gaffen & Kyle McVey and directed by Paul A. Kaufman.
- On Wednesday, NBC picked up Grimm for a fourth season which I'm glad because I like this world even though it's fundamentally just a B/B- kind of show.
- This week in Austria, Adalind eludes those chasing her and is now making her way out of the country. It's about time this story starts connecting to everything else on the show. Fortunately, next week's episode looks like it will do just that.
- Also, Wu is back at work and offering investigative lines and quips just like he used to. So basically, the show asked him to carry a meaningful story for two episodes just to go back to what he always had been doing. I wish they would have just taken that time to write him off completely.
- And of course Meisner gets to kill everyone except the one that really mattered. But hey, at least it means Alexis Denisof is sticking around for a bit.
- Lastly, Nick and Juliette are asked to be Monroe and Rosalee's best man and maid of honor which later on Nick realizes might not be the smartest of ideas.
