Skip to content

Grimm: a review of the pilot

Grimm: a review of the pilot published on No Comments on Grimm: a review of the pilot

In NBC's new procedural/fairy tale production, Grimm, Nick Burkhardt is the last in the line of the Grimms, apparently NOT collectors of fairy tales, but instead people with the gift to see folkloric monsters as they truly are, though they walk among us looking like humans. Nick develops his new abilities when he senses a wolf-like creature dismembering women wearing red sweatshirts. His skeptical fellow police detective is along for the ride, while his police chief appears to be in cahoots with the monsters. Shenanigans ensue.

This show has very little to recommend it, besides its concept. Even then, the concept isn't much good. If the first ep is any indication, Grimm will use fairy tales as sources of monsters without plumbing the psychological hold and resonance these stories still have over us today.

Furthermore, I find the plotting in this ep jarringly ridiculous. While on the trail of the killer, Nick and his partner are about to give up the search until they realize that the killer was humming the same song that was playing on the first victim's music player. This coincidence causes them to turn back. Fortunately, their hunch that a connection exists between the killer and the first victim is correct, but it's a pretty huge stretch to call a guy humming a popular song a real clue. That's just silly.

Additionally, when Nick and his partner turn back into the house, guns drawn, to find the second, still living victim that the killer has hiding in his house, the killer rushes both Nick and his partner, throwing each of them to the ground. As the wolf-like creature runs away, Nick's partner shoots the man several times in the back, killing him. I do not understand why the creature was shot in the back when fleeing from the scene. I was under the impression that police aren't supposed to shoot to kill unless they are imminently threatened, which they were not at the moment. If a story follows the form of a procedural, it shouldn't be sloppy with the basic rules of the genre. Bad idea.

With nothing original about it and no actors that rise above the level of competency, Grimm is a waste of time.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar