Director: Clark Mathis

Writers: Naren Shankar and Sarah Goldfinger

Picture Credit: Sciencefiction.com

“Little pig, little pig, let me come in”, said the wolf to the pig. “Not by the hair of my chinny, chin, chin,” said the pig to the wolf.

The episode opens at night in what looks to be forest, until we see a geodome house. Someone is inside being gluttounus and healthy at the same time, with a arguably the funnies weight loss/exercise barbell I’ve ever seen. It vibrates, and it continues to vibrate it’s way out of his hands and out the window to the ground below. The guy goes out to retrieve it and when he does his house explodes.

The next morning, the scene is milling with firefighters and Nick and Hank who are trying to get information from Lasser, the guy who escaped an exploding death. He is, however, more interested in his ruined possessions including his record collection and his Xena Warrior Princess Comic, Issue 17, which he informs us and the guys, was a classic. Exasperated, Nick cuts to the chase and asks whether Lasser was involved in any bomb making because the people investigating the scene are bound to find something. Surprised, Lasser denies this and shifts into a Blutbad before he tells them about his brother, who died in his trailer the same way.

At the station, Lasser is on the phone to Angie, asking for a place to stay. He hangs up though when Nick appears and asks Lasser for his help to try and find out who tried to kill him. Lasser looks stoned to be honest, as he claims he’s a happy guy, who everyone loves, including the guys he owes money to.

At the scene of the explosion, someone arrives on a motorbike and starts sniffing the scene, until they find a broken gas pipe and a family picture. Meanwhile Lasser is at the station going through a list of people he owes money too, while an Nick and Hank shoot questions at him. They are considering Rolf’s, his brother, death and the attempt on his life were done by the same person and are looking for links between all the people Lasser owes money to and Rolf, of which there are none. Rolf, Lasser says, didn’t hang in the same circle that he did. While the questioning is going on, surprisingly, Monroe shows up, looking very much like he doesn’t want to be there, though Lasser looks pleased to see him.

Nick is as surprised as Hank at Monroe’s appearance and Monroe uncomfortably explains that he and Hap were at a treatment program together and those bonds are still going strong. Hap, it’s obvious has no idea who Nick is. Monroe takes Hap, with intstructions from Nick to watch over him.

Nick and Hank are talking to the arson investigator, Orson, who believes the explosion was accidental. He goes through Rolf’s death as well, and insists that while anything is possible, he doesn’t believe these two explosions were deliberate. He also asks to be kept in the loop of the investigation. Hm, the pipe we just saw with the mysterious biker looked cut more than corroded to me though.

Next, we see the biker riding through the streets heading straight for Monroe’s house, but without going in. Inside, Monroe is showing Hap around, explaining the ins and outs of things and we see how strictly controlled Monroe’s life is – is it because he’s a blutbad or just that anal? I’m inclined to think the former, in order to control his Blutbad side. As they go through the house, Hap is astute enough to see that Monroe is uncomfortable having him here and offers to leave, but Monroe confirms he wants Hap to stay.

Nick pulls up to Monroe’s house and is pretty much pulled out of his window by a blutbad in biker clothing. This blutbad immediately recognises that Nick is a Grimm (yet Hap didn’t, which I hope the show explains soon) and is pretty much set on relishing his death when Monroe and Hap rush out to separate them. Turns out the biker is Angie, Hap’s sister.

Inside, Angie and Nick are still pissed at each other, while Nick being a Grimm and a cop doesn’t seem to compute for Hap. Also, this little interesting titbit is dropped into the conversation – Angie is Monroe’s ex, which explains why Hap called/knows Monroe. Angie is furious at talking instead of killing Nick, and at Monroe for going “straight”. Nick reiterates he was here to protect Hap and ask him questions, and asks Angie to shut up, which sets her into a rage but she’s held at bay by Monroe and Hap. Hap, who really is living in his own little stoner world, I swear, is still taken with the fact that Nick is a Grimm.

Nick in the meantime asks about Rolf’s insurance and it’s beneficiary, which Angie begs Hap not to answer, but he does and names himself as the beneficiary – he genuinely believes Nick wants to help him much to her disgust. When Hap dies, Angie is the beneficiary of his insurance, which makes her Nick’s prime suspect. She has an alibi though, for she was in New Orleans, visiting an old friend – a butcher called Adam who is a butcher in the French Quarter. Hap, is seems, is not pleased at her alibi, neither is Monroe and there seems to be something there between the three of them and Adam that Nick is unaware of. When Angie and Hap leave to get drinks, Nick insists that Monroe cannot trust her, and the implication being that Monroe believe Nick in that she is a viable suspect. I like this – it shows how much Nick is invested in Monroe and his opinion but Monroe knows her too, and insists she would never hurt her brother. He promises again to watch over Hap before Nick Leaves.

Outside, Nick sees Angie’s bike and runs her plate, before he heads to Marie’s trailer for research.

Back at Monroe’s house, Angie tucks Hap into his sofa bed, before she thanks Monroe for being there for Hap, before she swigs a drink straight from the bottle. Devoted, protected sister she may be, but there is a another side to her blutbaden/wild one that it may be. Monroe asks after Adam, and Angie says that Adam is a lot of things, but he’s not Monroe. Here, we get to the crux of Monroe’s need for order and control for when she asks if he misses “it”, he answers that he doesn’t miss being out of control and Angie, taking some sort of offense, insists she was in control as well as she didn’t kill Nick. Monroe points out Nick could have killed her too. She hints that she may have come here to protect Hap, but Monroe is giving her another reason to stay. She proceeds to seduce Monroe in order to get him to lose control and he seems to be doing so. She teases him into a run in the woods – blutbaden seductions, I guess. And Monroe caves, running after her until he catches her and did I mention, blutbaden seduction?

Nick continues to research finding Marie’s notes about nerve clusters of blutbaden. In the middle of this, Wu calls with Angie’s address and some background on her, including speeding tickets. It’s nothing criminal per say, but Nick heads over to her house to investigate.  Distracted by a photo, he is knocked out by someone who runs out.

Dawn comes and Monroe and Angie are sleeping in the woods. Monroe wakes up, pleased at the sight of Angie in his arms still, until he sees the blood on his hands and his mouth. Angie wakes, and she has blood everywhere too. Some way off, he sees the bloody remains of something they ate overnight.

At Monroe’s house, Hap is awakened by what he thinks is pizza delivery, but opens the door to  a hitman and is shot four times. Hap sees that it’s a supernatural creature, one that looks suspiciously like a pig.

Someone must have called the cops, for Nick, Hank and Wu are at the house investigating Hap’s death, but Monroe and Angie are still nowhere to be found. The street is teeming with cops. Hap’s death looks professional and Wu says they haven’t found any other bodies yet – which worries Nick – until Angie and Monroe walk up to the house. Angie is devastated at Hap’s death, while Hank points out the blood on Angie’s vest.

At the station, Hank is interrogating Angie, including about the blood on her best. She strips off her shirt, and demands Hank test the blood. Manwhile, Nick is talking to Monroe, trying to figure out what happened. Monroe insists that Angie would have nothing to do with Hap’s death, while Nick hints at the possibility that Angie might have a partner. Monroe, though, insists she would never kill her family, it’s not what blutbaden do. Wu calls Nick with a report on the blood on Angie’s vest, which to Monroe’s relief has been identified as rabbit blood – he hadn’t been sure when he woke what it was – but Nick realizes then that Monroe and Angie were out hunting. Monroe is a little embarrassed at his slip-up, but the topic of his slip-up is forgotten when Nick explains he went over to Angie’s house last night and about the figure that knocked him out. He warns Monroe to becareful, but Monroe leaves with her anyway.

Hank, in the meanwhile, has Angie’s water glass from their interrogation and wants to run her prints, as he’s sure she’s hiding something.

Angie is furious that cops want to hang her brothers’ deaths on her, and berates Monroe for being Nick’s friend. Unfortunately, Monroe denies their friends, and insists he barely knows Nick. Monroe tries to get her to becareful as someone might be after her, and tells her that Nick was in her house – all she cares about though, is that a Grimm was in her house. She leaves Monroe standing in the street, while unbeknownst to them both, someone is watching them from afar.

Cue requisite scene of Nick going home to Juliet, and her 30 seconds screentime. Okay, it’s official, this is beginning to annoy me. I REALLY hope they do something with her soon to integrate her into Nick’s storyline more.

Angie returns home, in blutbaden form, following the scents in her place. She recognises one scent, and identifies it as “pig”.

The next morning, Hank reports that Angie’s prints match a bloody print found at the murder of two brothers two years ago, who were murdered on the same night. Hank points out that the brothers were the brothers’ to their arson investigator, and that now it makes sense why he didn’t find anything. They take this to Renard who tells them to go ahead and continue their investigation.

Monroe is cleaning Hap’s blood from his house when Angie pulls up and says she knows a Bauerswine is her brothers’ killer. She has no idea of the identity of the killer, just the creature he is, someone she smelled at the precinct and at her house. Monroe is grief-stricken still at not being there for Hap the night before, but all Angie wanted was company while she went to kill the person that killed her brothers. She leaves Monroe, telling him that she hates that she still loves him. Inside his house, Monroe starts to lose it and calls Nick warning him that Angelina is out for blood.

Nick confronts Orson, goading him into revealing his true form when he broaches the subject of the death of his two brothers. Orson warns Nick that he has no problem with him, and their families have never been enemies, and they shouldn’t change that now.

Nick goes to Monroe for help in finding Angelina, but Monroe is determined to stay out of a feud that makes no sense, and goes back for far too long. He doesn’t want Angelina caught, and is honest enough to admit how much he wants to help her kill Orson for killing his friend.

Angelina, however, has headed straight to the police station to try and find the person she smelled. She finds Orson’s office, and is ransacking his desk when she’s caught. She throws the cop across the desk and the alarm goes off in the station about the attack, but she escapes. Hank and Nick, however try to focus on where Orson is…

…Orson, is at Monroe’s house, waiting for him with a shotgun. He wants Monroe to tell her they’re even – his brothers deaths and her brother’s deaths. The old world order of feuds between the two should end, before he leaves.

At the station, Wu reports to Nick and Hank about a fire at Angelina’s house, but there is no evidence of bodies just yet. Nick and Hank split up, with Nick going to Orson’s house and Hank to what’s left of Angelina’s. Nick enters what looks to be an empty house, and starts checking the rooms. He finds a bathroom filled with, I have no idea what, but Orson rises out from it. It’s a mud bath, lol!

Orson explains that she killed his brothers for fun, when all they did was try to live their lives. Orson claims he and Nick are the same, out to kill monsters like the blutbaden, but Nick insists they are nothing alike.

In that moment, Orson smells her and realises Angelina is there, just before she attacks him  – and they pretty much fight like wild animals, while Nick looks on trying to get a clear shot at one or the other. Angelina is winning the fight, until Nick hits her in the small of her back, in the cluster of nerves he read about in Marie’s notes. That gets her attention off Orson and on him, but it also gives Orson a chance to shoot her in the back. She escapes and Orson is left to take the blame for everything.

Monroe is crying over old photos of him and Angelina, when Nick calls asking him to come help track her. He refuses, and hangs up but when he does, he hears a sound outside and sees a photo of Angelina and her family when they were kids on his doorstep. A wolf howls in the distance.

I am not sure what to make of this episode. It’s uncomfortable in that Angie gets away with murder for fun, while Orson is arrested. She is a cold-blooded killer, unwilling to change to fit into the society she is part of, while Monroe, Hap and Rolf (by all appearances) did and suffer for her crimes. She leaves not knowing she is the reason  for their deaths and still thinks she did nothing wrong in killing Orson’s brothers.

I guess that is also what I like about this show though – that it does go the uncomfortable path, where the cold blooded killer, who is doing what she is brought up to be.

Unfortunately, Monroe clearly does not think as much of Nick’s friendship as Nick does of his – he dismissed their relationship to Angelina pretty much. It’s a bit of whiplash considering he was doing what Nick asked in the previous episode to help Roddy. Is it just because she was an ex he was trying to keep up appearances for? I actually can’t decide.

We also learn more about Monroe, and the will it takes for him to remain in control over his blutbad side. He has schedules and order around him and what were quirks in earlier episodes are now given context. It’s a painful decision to live the way he does, and Angie is the example of what he was and what he walked away from.

What we also see in this episode, is that besides the enmity supernatural beings feel towards Grimms, there are different feuds that exist and that Nick will find himself in the middle of. Ones he will not be able to stop or change as a cop. Hap, in his awesome stoner way, did voice early on that being a Grimm and cop might not always be possible. Now that there is a full season pick-up for the show, I hope it’s something else it explores.

This show is pretty great at laying interesting breadcrumbs for possible future episodes, but it remains to be seen if it actually picks them up going forward.