Friendship Can Be GRIMM

Episode 206: “Over My Dead Body”

[Photos: Scott Green/NBC]

An alternate title might be Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner for this episode. This was a better episode than last week. Characters were true to themselves. The writing worked on several layers and the suspense was tight. Hank is no longer being given conflicting character shifts. There is more mystery and the story line is still progressing.

Spoiler Alert!

There are three different dinner pairs going on. Nick is helping Juliette fill in the gaps of her memory of their relationship history. Monroe has Rosalee over for a sweet romantic dinner where they discover more that they have in common. Renard meets Mia over drinks perhaps following dinner.

Mia is a new character. She is probably the most dangerous adversary that Nick has come up against. She has a history with Captain Renard, knows about his place with the royal family. She has money, power, and is ruthless.

Remember Angelina from season one? She is an ex-girlfriend of Monroe’s. She has a tendency to leave a trail of dead bodies in her wake. Well, she’s back in town. We find her at a honky-tonk bar having a fun evening, dancing and drinking. Her new friend in the bar is expecting a return for the beers and chicken fingers he bought. He is not a gentleman, but then again Angelina is not very lady like. When he continues to press his advances out in the parking lot she rips his throat out.

Oddly enough killing the creep leads to a job offer. Unfortunately it’s not a job she wants to take. She just landed the assignment of taking out Monroe.

This storyline puts everyone involved in awkward and morally uncomfortable positions. Angelina barges into Monroe’s home just as he and Rosalee are kissing. Rosalee leaves unsure what is going on, but feeling very much in the way. Monroe calls Nick for help when he finds out why Angelina is there. Nick does not like working with Angelina to solve why someone wants Monroe killed. She is wanted for the murder of two Bauerschwein from season one. He puts aside his dislike of Angelina for Monroe’s sake.

Rosalee calls Monroe to apologize for leaving so abruptly. She has received bad news, her Aunt is gravely ill and she must leave town immediately. She asks Monroe if he can watch over her spice shop for a few days while she is gone. Monroe is happy to help her out. He’ll just need to live through the next 24 hours.

Monroe is left under Hank’s protection for the night. They share drinks and Monroe helps Hank to understand how Wesen can change and sometimes he can see it and sometimes not. This script worked better for Hank than last week. It suits him better to be curious and wanting to learn than how it was handled last week. It made Hank seem weak and he is not a weak character.

Nick drives Angelina back to the bar from the night before to follow their only lead. There is just one detective still on the scene where Angelina killed the guy. Despite Nick’s orders to wait in the vehicle she can’t resist playing detective and posing as Nick’s partner. She finds the cell phone that she threw away from the body the night before. The other detective finds the wallet. That gives them a name. Later Nick calls in the last phone number from the phone to get an ID on that.

There’s a bit of sexist irony between the local detective and Nick. The detective finds Angelina attractive. He has no idea what she is like or capable of. Nick is not nearly as impressed with Angelina’s show and tell, or her assets.

Nick and Angelina find Will, the shorter man with the gun, from the night before at a hardware store.  Nick sends her into get information and puts an open cell on her so he can listen in on the conversation. Angelina confronts him saying she needs to know why she has been hired to make this hit. The answer she gets hits Nick like a punch to the gut. Monroe’s being used, set up as an example because he’s friends with a Grimm, Nick. The guy that hired Angelina was hired by someone else and Will doesn’t know who that person was.

Captain Renard does some research on Mia and learns that she was meeting with the Dragon’s Tongue. It seems that these two have a checkered past. They are both ruthless and ambitious. They both have connections to powerful organizations.

Nick and Angelina return to Hank’s home. They break the bad news to Monroe that he has been marked because of his relationship with Nick. And they have not figured out enough to know where the orders came from. They are running out of time before Angelina is to deliver Monroe’s dead body.

Monroe comes up with the idea of using a potion that creates the Dead Faint. They go to the spice shop and call Rosalee for help with the potion. Rosalee is worried that the Dead Faint is risky and Monroe may not wake from it. No one has a better plan and Monroe is not interested in trying to run away or hide. Rosalee warns them that if Monroe has not woken up after 2 hours they must revive him. If his hands curl up and his face turns white he must be ventilated. You see where this is going.

Angelina delivers Monroe to the drop off site in the woods. Nick and Hank are there also as back up. Now, it’s Hank who is being reminded that what happens out here will have to be off the books. This is probably not a good thing for a cop’s psyche to be keeping secrets and working cases off the books. First the two guys that hired Angelina show up and Arbok the Konigschlange morphs in to his cobra form to check Monroe’s body. Then the person who hired them drives up to inspect the body. It’s the mysterious Mia. She compliments Angelina on her ability to kill her own kind and says for her to be paid.

Angelina has been nervously glancing at Monroe it’s clear that he is running out of time. His face is turning white and his hand is curling into a single claw. Finally she can’t take it any longer and she jumps up on him and starts giving him mouth to mouth to revive him. As soon as everyone else figures out what’s going on everything breaks loose. Nick and Hank come charging in yelling police. Angelina gets shot. Monroe kills the guy that shot Angelina. Nick is in a one on one fight with Arbok who is now in cobra form. Just when it looks like Nick is about to be killed, Hank shoots Arbok. Mia drove herself away when her driver was killed.

Angelina dies in Monroe’s arms. True to form her last words are for Monroe to be careful, and her final word is “Damn”. Nick is about to call for help when Monroe says no, that he will take care of this in their way.

Nick gets home late. He makes a quick call to Rosalee to tell her that Monroe is fine. Then he finds a note left by Juliette thanking him for the new memories.

Captain Renard is waiting at the airport for Mia. They have a short verbal exchange. She asks if Renard is going to kill her. He replies that it depends on so many things. This one is left very much unresolved. I hope it gets followed up on next week.

I wondered if Rosalee may be traveling into a trap. The timing of her trip seemed unlikely. It looks like there is a lot going on in next week’s episode and I am looking forward to it.

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[Official Show Site at NBC]     [Previous recap: “The Good Shepherd”]