The GRIMM Brings the Devil With Him

Episode 6:12 “Zerstörer Shrugged”
Story by David Greenwalt & Jim Kouf
Directed by Aaron Lipstadt 

[recap by Maia Ades]

This is the only episode in which the writer’s credit has been listed as “story by” rather than “written by”. I’m not sure if there is any significance to the change. I thought it was interesting, so I’m sharing my observation with you.

Are you making plans for the series finale? I’m hosting a watch party at my home. We’ll be live tweeting and YouTubing. I’d really like to see your posts, photos or video of your party or other way to mark the occasion. This has been a long ride my friends. We’ve seen these characters go through a lot. We’ve seen them take new lovers, change lovers, have babies, lose loved ones and learn so much along the way. Will you follow these actors on their new adventures or is it the characters they portrayed that are of interest to you? Either way, I’d like to hear from you and find out what brought you to Grimm and why you’ve become a fan.

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I think the title comes from the nonchalant manner in which our antagonist, the Zerstörer killed most everyone in his path. He didn’t kill all the drunks under the bridge, and I don’t know why he bothered to kill the one. The guy wasn’t a threat. He could have just turned and kept on walking. Or he could have killed all of them with one wave of his staff, but he didn’t do any of those things. Instead, he killed just one of them. Was it to learn another snippet of our language? Was it to prove to us how deadly he was? Was it to make sure he was easy to find by following the trail of dead bodies he left behind? I don’t know. With only one episode left, I’m protective of time left to finish up the story. We don’t need any extraneous stuff to detract from our actual story.

Wow! The end of this episode was painful. Painful because these are characters we’ve lived with for so long. To see them die so easily was hard to watch. We lost Wu (Reggie Lee) and Hank (Russell Hornsby) in rapid succession. My biggest question, who will survive the next, the final episode?

Diana (Hannah R. Lloyd) got to flex her acting muscles this week. We’ve not seen her do a lot that was, what actors would call, demanding. Her emotional response to the impending approach of the Zerstörer was impressive. Kudos to you Hannah.

The biggie this episode was red skull made it from “the other place” to our place. He was clearly a fish out of water. He didn’t fit in. He mimicked mimicked every person he heard, learning bits of language. The disturbing thing about red skull was his complete lack of regard for life, any life. It was truly disturbing. I thought on this for some time trying to decide if for some reason I felt his disregard for life was more      _ _ _ _  than the way that others have killed over the years. I can’t say if he was worse. I can say that somehow it was more unsettling. Which means, I owe Andrew Morgado respect for pulling this off. If I’m crediting the wrong actor, I apologize. There is only one credit for Zerstörer. I expected two credits. One for the person in the extensive makeup and one for the woged buff God like character. Since there is only one credit listed, I used it.

While this episode is devastating to the main characters and audience when they lose two of our central characters, it’s not as catastrophic as I expected. For so long I thought the final show down was going to be a world wide war with Black Claw. Then it was to be the arrival of the Devil and destruction of civilization. So far, he’s killed a few people and brought a rain of dead bats. While neither of those is nice for those involved, including the bats, it’s not the massive destruction I expected.

While I’m on the topic of Black Claw, wrapping up a multi season storyline with one line felt insufficient. Trubel, (Jacqueline Toboni) brushes aside the entire war with an off handed comment that Black Claw has been defeated. Not that I wanted to see the war. I argued many weeks that bringing a full war to Grimm was not a good idea. It would have been the wrong tone and lack the storytelling that Grimm established. On the other hand, this was the other extreme and it didn’t feel satisfying at all.

The books have been the resource to solve cases since the first season. I think they may be the ray of hope to defeat the Zerstörer. The books offered information on who or what their enemy is. Perhaps a bit further in their reading they’ll find information on how to even defeat this Devil. It seems appropriate that the final solution would be in the books. I suppose that the show’s creators, David Greenwalt and Jim Kouf have been, in a not so subtle way, promoting books and reading. I don’t think a single case has been solved without reading up and finding information and solutions. Perhaps they’ve found a more successful way to promote reading than the many public service messages that try to accomplish the same thing.

Next week, the whole story will be wrapped up one way or another. Any guesses how the writers will tie up the storylines left? Or at least how they’re going to finish this? Will all our main characters be killed off? Will the whole world of Portland and Grimm as we know it be wiped out? Will Diana be forced into marriage with the Devil? We’ll all find out next week.

Grimm airs Friday nights at 8/7c on NBC.