GRIMM — “Into The Schwarzwald” Episode 512 — Pictured: Silas Weir Mitchell as Monroe — (Photo by: Scott Green/NBC)
Co-showrunners Jim Kouf and David Greenwalt turn up the heat in Grimm’s (NBC, Fridays, 10/9C) 100th episode, Into The Schwarzwald. The past and the present converge to show a few intriguing possibilities.
In the Black Forest, Nick (David Giuntoli) and Monroe (Silas Weir Mitchell) have stumbled/fallen into what is revealed to be a catacomb under a really, really old church. In Portland, Eve (Bitsie Tulloch) stalks Marwan (Joshua Sawtell), the assassin who’s just shot mayoral candidate Andrew Dixon (Michael Sheets) – and Rosalee (Bree Turner) and Adalind (Claire Coffee) wait in the Spice Shoppe to hear from Nick and Monroe when the past comes back to haunt Rosalee. Also in Portland, Captain Renard (Sasha Roiz) makes what may be a terrible mistake that suggests a very different possible future.
Directed by Norberto Barba, Into The Schwarzwald presents us with the possibility of seeing what all those map keys were for – while leading up to a cliffhanger that is not the one the episode has been leading us to expect. Barba has fun with the Black Forest sequences, giving the normally chatty Monroe a chance to babble about history (to Nick’s exasperation) before the priest from last week’s episode arrives with his posse of Black Claw Wesen to crank the immediate danger up a notch.
GRIMM — “Into The Schwarzwald” Episode 512 — Pictured: (l-r) Silas Weir Mitchell as Monroe, David Giuntoli as Nick Burkhardt — (Photo by: Scott Green/NBC)
The part of Rosalee’s past that comes back to bite her is a guy named Tony – with whom she had a bad relationship that including experimentation with illicit substances. After going nuts in the shop, he makes the mistake of threatening mama Adalind…
Some of the episode’s best moments come from moments like Nick and Monroe thinking like Templar Knight Grimms from 800 years ago, and watching Eve take down Marwan without appearing to do anything – but there are some compelling moments for Adalind and Renard as each faces a future that could not be more unexpected.
In its own bat$#!+ crazy way, Grimm just keeps getting more and more outrageous – and the more outrageous it gets, the more fun it is. And, parenthetically, is it just me, or is Eve way more entertaining than Juliette ever was?
Into The Schwarzwald does what a good 100th episode should do: give us some walloping great answers while setting us up for more questions and weirdness to come.
Final Grade: A