Welcome back Grimmsters! Last week we got a good glimpse of Blutbad loyalty and the growing bond between Hank and Monroe. This week’s episode is a bit of a throwback to last year where the evilness of a character may not necessarily be because of human nature but because it’s the nature of the beast within. And speaking of beasts, the witch is back and Adelind is none too happy with what she returned to in Portland.
As for this week’s Grimm tale inspiration? It comes from the story called ‘The Spirit in the Bottle‘.
“Let me out, let me out,” the spirit cried. And the boy, thinking no evil, drew the cork out of the bottle.”
(Warning! As this is a recap, there will be some major spoilers involved.)
The episode opens with Nick and Juliette making dinner together as Nick tells her about the time she told him about her dad taking her to see fireworks. All of the sudden, Juliette begins to remember her telling Nick that very story. Her memory has returned as she remembers Nick and how much they mean to each other! She hugs and kisses him and tells him the last thing she remembered is him saying he could see things. Although she didn’t believe him then, she believes him now and it all makes sense. In the background, Nick’s alarm goes off and she asks him if he has to wake up.
Nick opens his eyes and he’s on the couch… it was all a dream.
April is sitting on the porch of her home as her father Bill pulls up in his truck. Happy he’s finally arrived, she runs down to greet him suitcase in hand. Bill and April stop to get gas but the surly attendant tells him that his credit card was declined and asks for another card. When that card is also declined, he tells Bill to just give him cash. Bill tells the attendant that the cash is in the truck and as he leaves to go get it, he changes into a Drang-Zorn.
Bill hears a noise in the garage and goes to investigate. As he turns the corner, he screams and his body is flung against the window.
Hank and Nick arrive to the gas station where Sgt. Wu fills him in on the bloody scene.
Back at the station, the detectives go over the security footage and from the info obtained from the credit card machine, they are able to identify the murder as a William Granger and his last known address. The camera footage also caught the license plate of his truck and revealed the presence of his daughter. Renard sends the detectives to Granger’s home just in case he was headed home to his wife.
Bill is in a panic and looks for a way to get the police of their track. April tells him not to worry. He then sees a man pull up in a truck and comes up with a plan. He goes up to the truck driver and asks if he could help him out but the guy says no. April then pops up and “innocently” asks if he’s the man that will help them out (who can resist a 9 year old girl, right?).
The detectives arrive at Bill’s home and get no answer. They storm in and notice a trail of blood that leads to the bathroom where they find Bill’s wife, Lilly Anne. She is bloody and badly beaten but still alive. Hank calls 911 and leaves. Lilly Anne wakes up and asks about the whereabouts of her daughter before turning into a Wesen and passing out.
Back at the station, Hank and Nick give Captain Renard a short background history of Bill. Up until recently, he was a family man with a construction job and would coach football. Then things change and he became a man filled with rage. Wu comes in with Bill’s laptop and some receipts. It looks like he was planning on building something. They get try to locate where Bill had the building supplies sent.
Bill and his daughter are hitching a ride with the truck driver when the radio announces an Amber alert for April. Bill quickly turns the radio off and April tells her daddy that her name was mentioned. April obviously doesn’t know how to whisper as the driver hears her and tells them he’ll drive the truck into a ditch if they try anything. Bill, not really liking the threat, once again turns into a Drang-Zorn and attacks the driver. Bill disposes of the body in the woods and tells April to get back into the truck.
While examining Bill’s laptop at the station, Juliette decides to drop by the precinct in hopes that seeing Nick in his work environment would help her remember. She says hi to Sgt. Wu and to Hank but when Renard comes by to ask how she is doing, something strange happens. Juliette says she needs to get back to work yet can’t seem to keep her eyes off Renard. Although she leaves, she seemed reluctant to do so.
Nick takes Hank to Aunt Marie’s trailer to look up what kind of Wesen Lilly Anne had changed into. He gives Hank a drawing and one of the Grimm books and tells him to start looking. Hank is amazed at the amount of different Wesens there are and settles down to match the photo.
Meanwhile, at the station, Renard receives a phone call from Adelind who demands to know who killed her mother. Renard tries to get her out in the open and tells her to come see him. He also tells her that Juliette is awake and she replies that she’s certain he had something to do with that little miracle. She continues taunting Renard by telling him that he’ll be having some fun soon… and so will she. Adelind hangs up and as Renard goes back to work, he sees that he has unconsciously typed Juliette’s name repeatedly on his computer.
Hank is able to find out that Lilly Anne is a Drang-Zorn, nasty Wesens that retreat to underground dens when threatened. The surmise that Bill must be taking April to a safe house he built from the cargo containers. The entry shows that a crossbow was used to subdue a Drang-Zorn in order to tie them up and burn them at the stake. Hank asks if they could just shoot them instead. Nick says okay but he has a crossbow if Hank was interested in seeing it. (Boys and their toys!)
As Nick opens the weapons cabinet, Hank is astonished at all the weapons it contains. He then sees an elephant gun and the bullet that was used to kill Stark before the Siebgarste/ogre was about to kill him. Hank asks about it and Nick tells him it was Monroe that actually saved his life while Nick was in the hospital.
Bill and April get to the safehouse and it seems all is well. The next morning Bill tells April that he will out getting supplies. She worries that he won’t come back but he reassures her he will. Once he leaves, April talks to herself into not crying and reads her stuffed animal a story.
The driver of the truck that was giving Bill and April a ride was found by the state police. Wu was able to narrow down the area where Bill and April may be and search squads were soon dispatched.
They find were the safehouse is and open the hatch. Bill sees the search squad go into his makeshift den. Nick finds April who is terrified but when he tells her he is the police and that no one will hurt her now, she runs to him and hugs him.
Nick takes her to the police station and questions April about Bill. April asks to see her mom but they tell her she’s been hurt. Social services come by to take her to a foster home. Meanwhile, Hank gets a call telling him that Bill went back to the wife’s home and after he was told that she was taken to St. Joseph’s hospital, he left very angry.
At the hospital, Bill sees his battered wife in a hospital room. Upset, he changes into a Drang-Zorn and enters the room. Nick and Hank see him with his wife and pull out their guns. Lilly Anne yells that Bill hadn’t done anything. They mention that it was April who had done all the harm. She is going throught the Drang-Zorn change much earlier than expected and Lilly had called Bill to come get her as she couldn’t handle April any longer. Lilly tells them that no one seems to be able to handle her. At that moment, Nick realizes that Social Services took April to a foster home.
At the foster home, April is being bullied by one of the kids. The parents see the altercation and give both kids a time out. But April is having none of this and transforms and attacks the dad.
Nick and Hank arrive to the foster family’s house just as they are running out yelling how April tried to kill the dad. The detectives head to the backyard only to find April, now in human form, calmly swinging on the swing. She tells Nick she remembers him as he was kind to her and smiles at him with her bloody teeth.
At the police station, Nick meets Jess Reilly, a Juvie guard whom Monroe sent to see Nick. She tells Nick that she understands girls her age can’t help themselves but she’ll make sure April is sent to her block. Nick asks how she can be sure she can handle a girl like April. Jess turns into a Wesen to answer Nick’s question.
Nick gets a phone call from Juliette wondering if he’ll be home for a cozy dinner for two.
After dinner, Nick tells Juliette sometimes they would dance. She gets up and tells it this is something she should try to remember and as they dance she admits to him that it feels nice. The dancing leads to a passionate kiss, but when Juliette pulls away, she sees Renard’s face instead of Nick. Bewildered, she pulls away. Nick asks her what’s wrong and she tells him it’s just her as she rushes into her room.
Episode Observations:
• This episode really reminded me a few episodes of last season where an innocent is not so innocent. Remember in ‘The Three Bad Wolves,‘ it was the piglike Wesen cop that tormented the wolves and not the other way around, and it wasn’t the “evil” stepsisters that were the evil stepsister in ‘Happily Ever Aftermath‘. Now in this episode, not all girls are sugar and spice and everything nice, eh?
• Funny how Juliette seems to know Wu and Hank well but seems to not know Renard. The potion Adelind gave Renard to take before he kissed her is now taking effect. Can’t wait to see how far the potion will take them.
• Adelind brings new meaning to the saying “Hell hath no fury….” Now that Clair Coffee is a regular, it will be wonderful to see what the writers will have her character do!
• Nick is trusting Hank more and more and Hank is getting the hang of being the partner of a Grimm, but will he have the same problems that Monroe had for being close to one?
• This episode was very Monroe light, and while his side story was amusing, his character is at his best when he’s helping out Nick with a case.
• As an added treat, if you missed Friday’s episode, you can watch it below courtesy of NBC!
If you need to catch up, you can read the recap of last week’s episode ‘Over My Dead Body’ here. So what are your thoughts of ‘The Bottle Imp?’
