GRIMM Runs Away to the Circus

Episode 3.15 “The Show Must Go On”

[photos: Scott Green/NBC]

I enjoyed this episode. We got to see yet another side of Wesen life. We don’t often see Wesen in everyday life. Usually we don’t get to know them till someone has died or is about to die. Well,  I guess that part hasn’t changed.

What a great and obvious idea; Wesen are carnival performers woging for the public. The public thinks it’s all a trick, a really good trick but a trick not reality. Since the show is Grimm and it’s a police procedural our story starts with murder.

The Wesen carnival act reminded me of the lion tamer acts where the tamer cracks a whip and the lions perform tricks. Here it’s the master of ceremonies who cracks the whip at each Wesen as he weaves a titillating tale and appears to make each of them woge for the audience. They are woging but he’s not making them do it. They are performers. They’re doing it themselves. The deception is that what the audience thinks is an act is very real and actually very dangerous.

This week gave us another lesson on Wesen. There is a condition that Wesen can get called umkippen. If Wesen woge too many times they lose their humanity till there is really nothing left to override their bestial nature, which doesn’t work well in modern society. And if your job is to woge over and over for the paying public guess what you risk? In this carnival act there is a Damonfeuer, Hasslich, Fuchsbau and a Blutbad is the star of the show. I’m not sure why he’s the only one that is suffering but he is and he’s using alcohol to self medicate.

After a performance, a couple of young women who saw the show see the Blutbad, Max, as they are leaving the carnival. They coerce Max to go home with them to party. They drink more and push Max to woge in front of them. Even if these women thought that what Max did in the show was fake, slapping someone in the face is not okay. Both of these women bully Max badly enough that I wasn’t that sorry when they were found dead.

The good news, Wu is back at work and showing Nick and Hank around the crime scene. The bad news is this is the only scene with Wu and we don’t follow his recovery at all this week. The only lead they find at the scene are tickets to the carnival in both ladies’ pockets. This part bothered me. There should be fingerprints and DNA evidence all over this crime scene. Max wasn’t wearing gloves, he drank from a glass, and oh yeah, he wasn’t even the killer. As a Grimm shouldn’t Nick be able to tell the difference between a Blutbad attack and a Lowen attack? Or is that asking too much? I find it hard to believe that the carnival tickets are the only clues that modern police can find.

I was really glad that Grimm was able to keep the audience in the dark about the real killer till much later in the episode. This was one of my complaints the first couple of seasons. It just makes a murder mystery much more interesting if the audience doesn’t see who the killer is in the first scene. Thank you to the writers for figuring out how to do that.

Hank and Nick visit the carnival where they both witness the Wesen show. Unlike the rest of the audience, they know what they are seeing. After the show they interview the performers and the carnival owner Hedig. Hedig tells our detectives that he’s owned the carnival for ten years. They don’t have any clear leads from interviewing the people at the carnival. So they ask Monroe and Rosalee about the Wesen performance. Rosalee explains that because it’s portrayed as a magic act it doesn’t technically violate the Swabia code. But the real danger is umkippen and the Wesen suffering psychological damage. Local Wesen are encouraged to act as intervene, which is why Monroe and Rosalee head to the carnival themselves. Rosalee quickly ends up in the show and finds herself in way over her head.

Turns out the Hedig has been murdering young women in towns where the circus stops. He framed Max and now he’s pushing Max so hard to perform that he’s definitely suffering the umkippen. Max loses control during the show and goes for Rosalee. Which sends Monroe to woge and run to her defense. Hedig woges, sees Nick is a Grimm and he flees the scene. Unfortunately for him he’s cornered in the house of mirrors by the other Wesen performers and is burned to a crisp by the Damonfeuer.

In the other storylines, Monroe asks Nick to be his best man and Rosalee asks Juliette to be her maid of honor along with her sister who will be the matron of honor. The weight of the best man responsibility gives Nick nightmares. He fears that his presence at the front of the ceremony could lead to disastrous, deadly results.

Adalind, the baby and bodyguard make it to the cars left by Prince Victor and his hunters. They find Sebastian in one of the cars. Adalind uses her powers to force the one guard to kill himself. The bodyguard shoots one of the cars ruining the radiator. I’m not a mechanic, but I’m pretty sure that there are quieter ways to disable a car than to shoot it multiple times. Sebastian stays in the disabled car with a gun. When the hunting party returns he kills all of them except the Prince. It certainly looked like the Prince killed Sebastian but I’m hoping against hope that Adalind or the baby gave him some sort of protection. I’ve enjoyed his character and we’ve only recently gotten to see much of him.

What we haven’t seen lately is Nick using any of the unusual powers he’s gained from some of his adventures. For instance; nothing has been seen or said about his zombie affliction. Did all the weird side effects just disappear? And there was his ability to sense without his sight after the attack of the Jinnamuru Xunte. The only demonstration of that was, I think, in the end of that same episode. Nick has a lot of skills or powers at his disposal that are not being used. It seems like the writers have forgotten the abilities they gave him.

The show is off this week and returns March 4th. It looks like there will be more about Nick’s mother, who is escorting Adalind and the baby to Nick’s house. I’m hoping we get more of Wu’s story. Because you know there is more to that story.