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Grimm S02E08: "The Other Side"

In last night's episode of Grimm, "The Other Side," helicopter parenting ran amok as a Wesen kid took out his entire quiz team and Adalind surfaced in Europe to raise hell for Portland. However, the biggest question of the night came not from the story but from the episode's weird ending: Namely, why is Nick such a jerk?

"The Other Side" began with the ongoing saga of Juliette and Renard as she and Nick attended a ceremony honoring the captain and then Renard awkwardly drove Juliette home after Nick and Hank left for the A plot. We saw Renard's obsession had gotten worse as he stared at Juliette in the shower a la Psycho before stumbling off into the night and punching an innocent bystander in the face. Renard: 1, Grocery Man: 0!

Meanwhile, a high-school academic decathlon participant was brutally murdered and it wasn't long before another team member bit the dust, prompting Nick and Hank to believe the murderer was another teammate whose motive was to take out his competition. After they questioned team star Pierce—who was a Galapagos Tortoise Wesen—Nick and Hank found the decathlon coach murdered as well.

It turned out that Pierce's mother, a geneticist and total hard-ass—as her "do homework to take your mind off your friend's murder" approach to parenting proved—had tinkered with her son's DNA in-utero, adding genes of the Lowen (a super-aggressive Wesen) to give him an edge. The splicing created a Jekyll/Hyde personality; Pierce was now killing anyone who stood in the way of his decathlon greatness... without knowing. When he found out he'd done, he was devastated and tried to commit suicide, but ultimately Nick was able to save him. Although the poor boy ended up in prison, so maybe that wasn't such a kindness.

Everyone's favorite Hexenbiest returned as Adalind hooked up with Renard's Royal brother. From Ro-Bro we learned that Renard is half Hexenbiest, the son of their Royal father's Hexenbiest mistress. Renard and Monroe interacted at the spice shop as Renard sought a cure for his Juliette obsession, and the episode ended with Monroe delivering some bad news: Not only is there no singular cure, things are going to get worse for the captain.

While enjoyable, the episode's hard sci-fi twist of gene-tampering was not only difficult to swallow, it also brought up all sorts of new questions about the Wesen—questions the episode never answered—and served to point out how little we actually know about the Wesen world. For instance, if you can isolate and transplant the genes that make up individual Wesen species, can you get rid of them? Is being a Wesen something you can "cure?" Fundamentally, what is a Wesen and where did they come from?

Also, how is a prize-winning geneticist unable to afford a better lawyer for her son? I mean there were multiple witnesses to his split-personality insanity! He was obviously mentally unbalanced, so how's come Nick and Hank were fine with callously spitting platitudes about the deck being stacked against him as he was marched off to prison (and not juvie!)?

Up until the ending, "The Other Side" was a great Wesen-of-the-week episode that did a nice job of balancing Adalind's plotting and mythology with cop-procedural action. It was fun to see Monroe geek out about the spice shop and Hank get upset about the Grimms' bloody past. Plus Renard is such a strong character that I even liked the Juliette storyline. But Nick and Hank's cynical shrugging-off of a mentally unbalanced kid who desperately needed help not only felt out of character for both of them, it also destroyed the whole premise of Grimm—that Nick, despite being a Grimm, is still a good guy.

A good guy doesn't say, "Oh, well!" when a kid is thrown into jail instead of getting the psychiatric help he needs. A good guy doesn't learn that the kid's mother is the true culprit, in messing with her son mentally and genetically, and then casually watch as the kid gets thrown under the bus. A good guy would at least testify or something, right? After watching Nick cover up his own murders and bend the rules for his friends, seeing him not do anything for a Wesen who truly needs him is more than upsetting—it runs contrary to Nick's fundamental role on the show.

Last night Nick was the real bad guy, and this is a twist I neither like nor am confident that the writers of Grimm will explore past this episode.

QUESTIONS:

– Is that police station intern going to be a new main character? He's obviously going to be important, otherwise Grimm wouldn't have wasted a scene on him, right?

– Why are the Royals prejudiced against the Hexenbiests?

– As they are clearly not Hexenbiest, what type of Wesen are the Royals?

– If Pierce's Wesen species is from the Galapagos, why is he white?

– Does Rosalee just have a list of weird things Monroe needs to ask people walking into the shop, and if so, can I get a copy?

– What do you think will happen to Renard?

Grimm "The Other Side" Photos

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Scandal S02E01: "The Other Woman"

'The Nation's Pastor' dies facedown on top of his mistress.

A Pregnant FLOTUS begs for forgiveness.

A high ranking Washington insider photoshops a picture of a mass grave and passes it off as intel.

Immaculate pearl-colored suits.

IT MUST BE TIME FOR SCANDAL.

This week's "The Other Woman" storyline existed almost solely to give Olivia the chance to show the audience that she is NOT OKAY with having an affair. Deep in her heart, it's not what she wants to do, but love is love and the President is the President, even if he does complain he's more like a prisoner of the Crown Jewel of America's prison system. (AKA The White House, which has its own movie theatre, airplane, and brewery last time I checked. Fritz is so emo.)

After Olivia's team of morally flexible gladiators in suits moved a 300+-pound pastor back to his home so he could be found dead in his bed as opposed to dead on top of his mistress of 15 years, Olivia spent the rest of the episode whispering the word "Mistress" with all the coy intrigue of a Parisienne Viscountess. "She was hiz miztress, zat is zee way of zee whirl. Oui, she love him, and he love her, but what iz zere to be done? Such is Parizzz." That was basically the subtext. It also allowed Satan's FLOTUS, Millie, a moment of humanity as she comforted the Pastor's wife (expertly played by Lorraine Toussaint) as Olivia listened, chin trembling, behind a door.

Millie's argument that they were still partners and a mistress is nothing because WIFE was oddly hollow and undercut further by a scene in the car where she begged Fritz for forgiveness and he clasped her hand and gave her a Patriarchal blessing and then went back to reading his Emo Newsletter.

The moment of overheard psychological knife-twisting would lead Olivia to race to the Mistress's house (who was demanding more money for her silence as the pastor's high-profile funeral loomed) and have an Other Woman huddle that was waaaay sexier than the wife huddle. Then she brought the mistress and the mistress's illegitimate kid with the pastor to the funeral and in a genuinely touching moment the Pastor's widow took her arm as she walked down the aisle during the processional out of the funeral. (Genuinely touching…although also a good way to blow the pastor's cover.) So yeah, honestly all of that was pretty great and well done and looked fantastic. We even got a moment where Olivia and Fritz made eye contact in the same room at the funeral and practically set the place on fire.

Funeral boners are the greatest of faux pas, Mr. President, so control yourself.

The whole being-in-the-same-room thing was extra welcome because their phone conversations have been so cute. At first I super hated the phone conversations but the whole idea of 23 people having to stay up and Mr. President being okay with it and the genuinely brilliantly intimate tone the actors bring to it is kind of adorable. With 2 caveats:

1. How could Olivia reveal such a whopping huge state secret as the way she found the pastor over the phone? Has she not had enough experience with phone bugs and tapping and spying to realize someone, anyone, could be listening in on the so-called "secure line"?

2. The "cleansing bout of laughter" between Fritz and Olivia was really weird. It was kind of off and they cut back and forth waaaay too many times and it felt like the last take of the day. Like, there is no question that these people are not really laughing:

Knock it off, you two we know you're both utterly, untouchably humorless and that's the way we like it. Get stuck in an elevator together already.

Also, it looks like Quinn is living with Olivia, on Olivia's couch, so they can have more of their every-episode hissy fits at each other.

Quinn seemed to fill the position not so much of a roomie as a dog, with Olivia asking Huck to check in on her because she was getting "stir crazy" (take out the stir and you got it!). Huck found Quinn had escaped the apartment and ran away, so he grabbed a container of her food and went up and down the street shaking it.

Quinn had flown out to Forks, to meet with her estranged father for flapjacks and seemed offended that he was questioning her innocence. Yo, Quinn: you were accused of bombing a building and then you disappeared for YEARS with no explanation. Cut the guy some slack. He asked his ladyfriend to make you up a bed, so he's not disowning you, he just probably won't be down to shoot off some fireworks anytime soon.

Quinn was later shown sobbing while watching the pastor's funeral. Sack up, ho! Or mourn for a famous figure, whatever, this was kind of an intense moment to just throw in there.

You know who should be sobbing for reals is Abby. She seriously has the worst job of all the Pope-ettes/cast of Scandal. Every episode finds her racing through a room talking at an extra or yelling at a prop phone or sorting through a garbage bin. She's the first line of contact for all the stuff we really don't care about, and she's become so isolated from all the storylines we do care about, that the tone of her voice makes my brain shut off at this point. It doesn't help that her editorializing while laying out the specs for a case has the same rambling, psycho-energy cadence as the label for Dr. Bronner's soap.

Like give her something to do or at least a massage, cool it down.

And in this environment already chock-a-block with crazies, the D.A. has SLIPPED INTO MADNESS.

Yawn.

More interesting: Olivia met up with a pack of cigarettes in a white wig that was also a Supreme Court judge. Teasingly, Olivia and the Supreme Court Cigarettes eye-f-cked in the mirror and discussed how Quinn had been a cover-up for a larger conspiracy that could TEAR THIS COUNTRY APART…

NEXT WEEK! Hey guys, I'll be watching, you don't have to hook me all hard, I'm already hooked…

That having been said, PROMO LOOKS AMAZING!

…QUESTIONS

…Do you like the POTUS/Olivia phone relationship?

…When she said "Let me go" what does that mean and do you relate?

…Did you feel sympathy for Millie this episode or do you not even care about that bitch?

…Could you forgive your husband's mistress?

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Doctor Who S02E04: "The Power of Three"

This week's episode marked a return to form that I hadn't seen in a while—the unlikely enemy. I simply adore it when really random things are repurposed as mysterious menaces on Doctor Who, and I especially love it when those enemies are global. However, the "A" story was hardly the point of the episode.

We opened on the Ponds doing some of the less-than-glamorous chores that result from time travel, like dumping out very expired milk and lamenting their lack of detergent. It'd been ten years (for them, not the world), and the Ponds were beginning to realize that they can't keep traveling with the Doctor forever. It's not sustainable.

I feel like there are definite parallels between time travel and drug addiction in Doctor Who—like a drug, time travel is fun, it feels naughty, it opens your mind to new and bizarre things, but it wears on your body and your psyche. Regular life doesn't seem to hold a candle to drug-/time travel-enhanced life, and certainly can't fit into your regular schedule, so you end up neglecting regular life while you chase the dragon. After a while, even if you're still getting something out of your addiction, you're just exhausted by the whole thing. (Note: Drugs are bad.) You cannot invite getting high/the Doctor to your quiet night at home!

But there was one time, Amy informed us, where the Ponds did just that. One morning, small black boxes just showed up all over the world, randomly scattered everywhere, doing nothing. Everyone started freaking out about them, but they just sat there. The Doctor appeared, of course, bristling with curiosity.

The authorities were called in, in the form of our old friends UNIT (now the UNified Intelligence Taskforce, since the real-life UN decided it didn't love the fictional association), and no matter what they did, they could not figure out what was going on with the cubes. The world went from being freaked out to feeling comfortable very quickly, as the cubes became a common presence in people's homes and in social media.

There was a nice scene with the Doctor, who was sticking around to observe, losing his mind with boredom after four days (more parallels to addiction!) and then deciding to leave. He belittled Rory's protests that he couldn't leave his "little job," causing Rory to put him in his place. "What you do isn't all there is!" Rory shouted, and the Doctor was taken aback. The Ponds were setting down roots, which made it hard to live a double life.

Other than an isolated incident with two cube-related, hose-mouthed humanoids kidnapping a guy, months and months went by and the cubes were just there, assimilated into people's lives. After the Doctor took the Ponds on an anniversary trip that ended up lasting seven weeks, Rory's dad Brian started asking questions—questions about what had happened to his other companions.

"Some left me, some got left behind, and some—not many, but some—died. But not them, Brian. Never them."

It seems to me that the only way for the Doctor to really ensure the Ponds' safety is if he already knows their fate, an idea that I'm being convinced of more and more each episode.

The Doctor moved in and, like the cubes, was integrated into the Ponds' lives a bit. One year and one day after they arrived, the cubes woke up. The Doctor finally confronted Amy about her wanting to stop traveling with him. She couldn't continue leading both lives forever, she said, and the traveling was starting to feel like running away.

The Doctor responded by saying the most Doctor-like thing he's ever said, which is that the reason he travels is so that he may see everything. He knows that everything is fleeting—he knows better than anyone—and he just wants to see things before they flare and fade forever. This includes the Ponds.

Meanwhile the cubes had started a countdown, and when they opened, millions of humans dropped dead from heart attacks. The creatures behind the attacks were the Shakri, who the Doctor thought were just the Keyser Soze of Gallifrey—a spook story. The Shakri wanted to rid the universe of humanity before it started expanding in service of the Tali; essentially, they wanted Judgment Day. The Tali would be met, he said...

And here's where the episode took a downturn for me.

A beautiful series of conversations had been set up between Amy and the Doctor that'd I'd like to call their "pre-break-up"; there was also a weird invasion that ended up being deadly, and a very interesting reason for it to occur. But everything managed to resolve itself in about three minutes. The Doctor saved humankind with a mass defibrillation, gained an appreciation of the Ponds' everyday lives, and once things were all tidied up, was ready to drop them off at home... until Rory's dad intervened.

It's not the time travel they'll have trouble giving up, Brian said, it's the Doctor. He encouraged the Ponds to go travel; "life will still be here when you get back." And like that, the Ponds seemed to decide that they don't have to choose. They were a team again—"The Power of Three"—which made it seem to me that instead of a bittersweet but understandable goodbye, we are gearing up for something traumatic and heartbreaking.

This was my favorite episode of the season up until the end, which seemed a bit rushed and tacked-on, almost as a reassurance to us that the Ponds will not go quietly into the night. Overall, I still enjoyed it quite a bit, but for as well as this show handles complex relationships, it's amazing to me how simply the conflicts in this episode were resolved.

We'll find out next week how things with the Ponds wrap up, but you know, there are only a few ways to kick addiction: removing the substance from your life, years and years of meetings and therapy, or death. I wonder which path the Ponds will follow?

– Amy writes about travel for magazines? Now lookie here, there's a career for her that isn't Kiss-gram or modeling! Good for you, Amy!

– I loved the mention that the cubes, within three hours, had a thousand separate Twitter accounts. More proof that when the apocalypse occurs, we'll all be Instagramming it.

– As long as Matt Smith is the Doctor, there will always be a scene in which he does amazing things with a soccer ball.

– That The Apprentice clip using the cubes? Hilarious. The cubes in general were brilliant, because there is always something slightly menacing about a blank slate where it's not supposed to be.

– Nice call-out to both Yorkshire Pudding and Smith's first appearance as the Doctor, as the threesome ate fish fingers and custard.

– Very nice reference to Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart of UNIT, when we learned that Kate Stewart is his daughter. The Brigadier was a friend to several incarnations of the Doctor, so of course his daughter would carry the torch.

– "You were the first—the first face this face saw. You are seared onto my hearts."

– I love that Rory's dad Brian has taken on the necessary, wide-eyed and excited attitude about time travel that we expect of our companions. Sure, the Ponds are up for adventure and say things like "I'm gonna miss this!" but it's Brian who has a real sense of wonder about all of space and time. It's a new twist, and I like it.

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Saturday Night Live S38E02: "Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Mumford & Sons"

Quick question, and I'm not trying to be disrespectful: Does Joseph Gordon-Levitt have a bit of a personality disorder? It seems like every few years he's got a new personality entirely? Far gone are the days when he was an awkward charmer who starred in quirky indie films. Now he's like some kind of fratty wiseguy? Seriously, every time he talked it sounded like he was doing a bit. Like Christopher Walken at a kegger or something. But regardless of what the real Joseph Gordon-Levitt personality may be, it's hard to deny that the guy is talented. This week he returned to SNL for his second hosting gig, and NAILED IT BRAH. Let's talk about it!

[Apologies to international readers for these embedded clips, Hulu can be a bit of a jerk.]

First noticeable thing about this sketch? Jay Pharoah was hilarious in it! He's definitely risen to a much more prominent place in the cast, hasn't he? Personally I haven't seen much of this new incarnation of Live with..., but I trust that Nasim Pedrad and Pharaoh are probably nailing it.The picture of Michael carrying Kelly around in a Baby Bjorn made me laugh out loud.

This intro is not available online probably due to music-licensing issues (they danced to that dubstep remix of "It's Raining Men" from Magic Mike). Which, YUP. Magic Mike parody. Which meant stripping. I don't think anybody was mad about this, and a lot of people probably really enjoyed it. My favorite part was Bobby Moynihan ripping off a vest to reveal a second vest. Congratulations are probably in order to Joseph Gordon-Levitt's personal trainer? I don't know.

PERFECT. Seriously, this was just a great, great sketch. Probably my favorite of the night. Not only did I nod my head all righteously, like, "Right on," but it was genuinely funny. Plus it unveiled a new SNL mystery: Who was that Asian dude? No really, who was that?

This was fine. You know. Just fine. The problem is, it riffs on something that itself was already parody. Those Dos Equis commercials about the Most Interesting Man in the World are already hilarious, so this just felt like piggybacking in a way. There are few comedy sins as grave as stepping on other people's bits, but whatever. I get it. I still laughed.

This was probably the first dud of the night. It reminded me of that failed old Kelsey Grammer sketch show on Fox, The Sketch Show, in which sketches had one joke and then ended after like ten seconds. They could've just ended this thing after the first drawing and called it a day. Zing! We got it. Moving on...

Oh, here was the pay-off for that first ad: The Most Interesting Man in the World gets mad at his son! So again, see what I'm saying? They took a comedy character and parodied him? Parody of parody is the worst.

This was great: Taran Killam is amazing. A man "pretending" to be hypnotized but still making a straight-up fool of himself in the name of goofing on the hypnotist? Plus the button was killer. Loved this sketch.

This fake ad was definitely more of a thoughtful head-nodder than actually funny. You know? Politically relevant, but maybe not something you want to post on Facebook. Unless you're one of those political Facebook posters in which case I probably unsubscribed from you years ago. Anyway, Vanessa Bayer's ALSO kind of front-and-center this season, isn't she? It's cool, she cracks me up 2 the max.

This is a good band full of handsome dudes, but this song was incredibly forgettable to me. I ain't no music critic, but I remember their breakthrough album as being a cool, unexpected treat that a bro could share with his pops. This song sounded like they were just going through the motions. I don't know. Hey remember that time the lead singer dude secretly married Carey Mulligan? I'd forgotten about that until just now.

Nah.

Okay.

I love this recurring bit: Two backstabbing childhood friends who whisper-trashtalk a prominent dictator of some kind. It's simultaneously ludicrous and relatable. Perfect.

Speaking of perfect! Kate MacKinnon's Ann Romney impersonation was an instant highlight. Man, I'm starting to get nervous that people may vote for Romney if only because it'll be more fun to watch Sudeikis and MacKinnon play the Romneys on SNL than whatever tired Obama impersonation we'll get. We live in dangerous times!

I don't watch sports and barely know what they even ARE, but I still laughed at this Jay Pharoah character. All screechy and boastful. "When I was 11 you pulled me from a river and saved my life. The next year I returned the favor and pulled you from that same river." I don't need a working knowledge of football to laugh at this!

When Mumford & Sons—in Beatles drag—began to play "You've Got To Hide Your Love Away," I immediately was like, "Well, this sketch won't be on the internet." And guess what, I was right! Finally. But yeah, here's a sketch that I thought was going nowhere until the premise kicked in and it became amazing: As the band played, four dudes exchanged embarrassing or terrible stories just in time to then join in and sing the chorus. The actors' timing was impeccable, and the whole thing concluded with everybody rising up and marching into the studio audience. Not the most hilarious sketch overall, but plenty funny and more than anything just impressive considering this was LIVE TV. I'm all for spontaneity and this sketch brought it in a really exciting way. I would love for SNL to play more with the live TV aspect. Call it a Christmas wish.

Another dud, unfortunately. I'm not sure the idea that rappers like luxury has been funny since... 1996? But I did laugh when Jay Pharoah coyly modeled the expensive handbag. Other than that, it always makes me nervous seeing white people affect hip-hop personae for the sake of comedy, so this sketch didn't really work for me.

More handsome background music. Will probably not be downloading this .mp3 though.

This here was a classic example of a last-half-hour-of-SNL sketch, and by that I mean it was BATSH*T. I still don't even know what was going on? Was the joke that the daughter (played by JGL in drag) really WAS awful, or was it that she looked like a man, or that her parents were a nightmare? I don't know and quite frankly I don't care. Some of my favorite comedy is confusing as hell, so I appreciated that about this. Give me weird over boring any day. (Also after this, isn't it clear that Kate MacKinnon is SNL's next leading lady? So good.)

Dick jokes! I like 'em. Also, it's only the second episode and I'm already liking this Tim Robinson guy. Seems like a winner already.

We're only two episodes deep into Season 38, and I have a really good feeling about this season so far. It seems like an effort has been made to fit more content into the runtime (four pre-taped shorts in this episode alone), and the standout sketches have been pretty strong. And I don't know how to tell you this, but the next host? Daniel Craig. TELL ME that won't be fun. I dare you. (It seems fun!)

How did YOU think Joseph Gordon-Levitt did? What was your favorite sketch of the night?

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