Sunday, January 29, 2017

Grimm, Season Six, Episode Four: El Cuegle


"Foretold our fate, by the gods'
decree, all heard and none
believed the prophecy" 

Oh Grimm, I should have known that you couldn't stick to a season which focused on the meta even if this is your last season ever.  Here I was praising the fact that there's finally some momentum to stories the writers have been hinting at for six years and what do they do? Why, they return to the Wesen of the Week story that nobody wants to see right now. I suppose the question of would you eat a baby if you knew that they would grow up to be evil is somewhat relevant given what's going on in the world today; however, it feels like a waste of the precious little time we have left with Grimm

So, at the end of the last episode, Renard returned home only to find Meisner waiting for him. Renard has begun to doubt his senses while Meisner talks shit about Sean being on the wrong side of the war. Renard's little argument with the apparition gets put on hold when he gets a call from Black Claw to read him the riot act for refusing to take the office of mayor.  It seems that they are not pleased given all of the resources they invested in Renard. 

At the spice shop, now that Nick has turned back to himself, it's time to talk Diana down before she reverts to creepy demon eyes and takes Nick out. Adalind tells Diana that they are going to stay with Nick because it's Kelly's turn to live with his daddy. Invoking her younger brother was a smart play by Adalind. Diana then turns her attention to Rosealee and Monroe and announces that Rosealee is carrying more than one child though she cannot say how many. This of course is accompanied by what is now one of Diana's creepy ass looks, which is enough to freak Monroe the fuck out. 


And now Grimm takes a turn to the Wesen of the week. Isidoro Malpica is sweating like he ran a 5K, as he struggles to deal with a migraine from hell, looking through the birth announcements in the paper. Isidoro checks out a map to locate the Maler family.

The Malers are going through a new parent tradition of taking a photo of every breathing moment of their child's existence and posting it online. Haley is completely into this while Paul clearly is simply tolerating his wife's enthusiasm.  They finally put the child down for the night but Paul notices the baby is running a slight temperature. Later that night when the child cries, it's Hayley who goes to check on the baby, only to find Isidoro looming over the crib in a full on woge. Isidoro quickly knocks Hayley into the dresser before fleeing with the child. 


Having gotten Diana onside for the change of their residence, the odd little family moves in. Diana looks around and is not impressed by the fact that she doesn't have her own room and that a lot of people died at the loft.  This creeps both Nick and Adalind out and once alone, they agree that they have to protect Diana. What the hell do they mean protect Diana? Diana can take care of her own damn self. What they need to be doing is protecting the world from the freaky demon eyed child.  The conversation then shifts and they declare their love for one another and how they cannot live without each other.  Remember folks, Adalind is Nick's rapist and I'm never going to stop saying that.

While Nick and Adalind are busy declaring their undying love, Eve is sneaking around in the tunnels beneath the loft. When Eve overhears Nick and Adalind's conversation she sort of half woges and slumps down like a dejected dog. Yep, they are legit going to do the love triangle thing. 

With things settled with Renard, it's time for Nick, Hank and Wu to return to work. The three are greeted with a standing ovation. Renard however feels the need to lay down the law and calls them all into the office to make it clear that at the first sign of a fuck up, they are outta here. Once Hank, Wu and Nick leave, Renard hallucinates Meisner again. Renard even goes as far as to toss his weak ass coffee at Meisner, which of course lands on the window because Meisner isn't even really there. To Hank, Wu and Nick who are outside of the office it appears as though Renard is talking to himself. Given what Renard has done recently they aren't there for him on this at all. 

The cops head out to speak with the Malers and it's clear that they are having some issues.  Paul is certain that his wife is "crazy" based on her description of the perp. He makes it clear that though he loves Haley, he's certain that Hayley is obsessed with little Auggie. 

Baby Auggie is crying from the fever he is running and so Isidoro woges which results in a third arm that seems to be great for soothing an upset baby. 

Back at the precinct, Wu, who's back in his role of general researcher reveals that he's found several cases of baby snatching like this one.  

Eve, who is still in the tunnel tries to take the stick and it burns her badly, leaving a copy of the glyph which she saw on Bonaparte during the death grip.  The moment Eve touches the stick, Nick feels woozy and has to sit down.  It's clear that he's really connected to the stick and it will act defensively to make sure no one messes with it. 

The cops head to the spice shop and do some Wesen related research and discover that they are looking for a El Cuegle - a Wesen who kidnaps babies, keeps them alive until the dreaded hour and then turns them into snack food. Apparently, for the El Cuegle, it isn't because they find babies especially tasty, it's about avoiding a dark future. There's a lot of uncertainty surrounding the El Cuegle but given that Rosealee is pregnant, Monroe is certain that it needs to be stopped.

Once alone, Rosealee reveals her fears to Monroe about raising their child/children in Portland with all the drama that is constantly surrounding Nick. It seems that she never wanted to get married or have babies but now that this is how her life worked out she's happy and doesn't want to see it end badly. I guess that means that at the end of the season, Monroe and Rosealee will be saying their goodbyes to Nick.  

Isidoro heads to the pharmacy to get some medicine for little Auggie but is hit with an attack and collapses. When the pharmacist heads to see if he can help Isidoro, he finds that the Wesen has woged. Isidoro stumbles out of the pharmacy as quickly as he can. This creates the lead the cops need to track Isidoro down and return Auggie to his parents. 

With the custody of the little demon child all worked out, Adalind drops Diana off to spend time with Renard. Diana's first question is why Renard doesn't love Adalind anymore and he lies and blames Nick. He knows damn well that his relationship with Adalind was never more than a freaky ass booty call and is only bringing up Nick to cause trouble for him. Adalind however was way wise to Renard and warned Diana that this is exactly what her father would say. In the end they come to the agreement that Adalind loves Nick and Renard loves Diana so they are all good.  

With the relationship issues settled it's time to make dinner.  Diana wants to put the pasta in water that hasn't been boiled and when Renard points out that the stove isn't even on, Diana makes the water boil instantly. He's amazed by this while I would be saying hit it with a rock. At any rate, Renard finally gets around to asking about Bonaparte and is informed by his demon daughter that he is the one that killed Bonaparte. Diana finishes by adding that Bonaparte hurt her mother and good men don't do that. Okay, okay so Diana has a point but it doesn't make her any less creepy. Renard, proving that he has a modicum of conscience, suggests that Diana can come to him if Nick ever hurts Adalind but Diana makes it clear that she'll handle it. 

Okay back to the case of the week.  Isidoro is being questioned by the cops and he admits that he has visions telling him to stop the evil. It seems that Isidoro has visions of the past, present and the future. I guess we know what the third eye is for now. Isidoro admits that he eats the babies to stop them from committing some kind of horror in the future. Isidoro then explains that Auggie's parents will get a divorce (ya think?) and the kid will grow up to be so maladjusted that he'll pull a Mendez on his parents. The cops are absolutely shocked by Isidoro's protestations and so he tells them to check out Kenny Slater, who apparently is baby he didn't eat years ago. It turns out that when Kenny grew up, he killed 10 people in Idaho. 

The cops do some research and verify that not only is Kenny a murderer but was kidnapped as a baby and returned to his parents. While the cops are debating what to do about Isidoro, he manages to escape the interrogation room. 

At the Maler home, Haley is busy cuddling Auggie, as Paul is trying to talk her into getting some mental health treatment.  Isidoro bursts into the house in full woge determined to eat Auggie and is quickly followed by the cops.  After a brief struggle, Nick manages to push Isidoro down the stairs. Isidoro's dying words are, "the bears".  Nick and Hank try to make sense of his dying words.

We get a flash to the future where a now grown Auggie is pointing a gun at his parents who beg him not to do this.  The gun is wrapped in his baby blanket and he fires. 

In the present, the Malers don't miss a beat and immediately start arguing.  Nick tries them to calm the hell down and even has to threaten to arrest Paul. The couple take their argument upstairs and this is when the cops see that little Auggies baby blanket is covered with bears. 

As far as the meta goes, I'm not sure that we learned anything this week.  We already knew that the stick would act to defend itself and Nick, so burning the shit out of Eve really doesn't come as a surprise.  It does however strongly imply that something is going on with these glyphys because they keep popping up. Clearly it has something to do with the purpose of the stick. The problem however is the attachment to Nick which leads me to believe that nothing good is coming from the stick of wonders.

In terms of Nadalind, it disgusted me to watch them profess their undying love for each other. To be clear, I don't really prefer Nick with Eve/Juliet given everything she has done.  Nick needs to simply swear off women but it's clear that Grimm is not going to allow that to happen. I do however think that Nick needs to be wary of the demon child because she's made it clear that she'll cut him if he looks sideways at Adalind. I highly suspect we are going to see a Diana/Adalind/Nick confrontation soon.

On to Renard.  Yes, he's still evil.  He knew damn well that he was baiting his daughter even if his weak conscience didn't allow him to go all the way with it.  Also, Meisner may be a hallucination but to Renard he is corporeal.  This suggests that someone has worked some woo woo on Renard and that he might still be redeemed. 

Finally, the case of the week.  I really did find the premise interesting even if I think it's a waste of the few episodes that we have left. Can we morally kill a child if we know that they are going to do evil? Would you for instance go back and kill Hitler?  It really comes down to nurture versus nature. Is little Auggie inherently evil or does it come down to his environment.  Nick and Hank know Auggie's future and so if they intervene in the child's life, is there a chance they could impact his future? There are a lot of variables to consider here.