A Remedy for Bad Times

Last night, I watched the first episode of Der Greif ("The Griffin", available with English subtitles on Prime Video).

I was sure I wouldn't like it, I was sure it would be typical German cringe since there aren't many German productions I like, and the trailer looked just like what I had expected.

I can't say yet if I'll like the entire show, but what I can say is that episode 1 was truly captivating. It captures school and family life in Germany in the 80s and 90s really convincingly, and the atmosphere surrounding this whole Black Tower prophecy thing is dense and thrilling.

To my own surprise, I'm planning on watching the rest of the show as soon as I can find a little time to do so. 👍

I had to think about it for at least half of this series opener before it hit me: Jeremias Meyer looks a lot like I could imagine James McAvoy looked at 16. It might just be my imagination, so I'm going to ask people in my circle who are also watching The Gryphon if they think so too.

The period music is well chosen with at least one obscure Black Crowes cut that I couldn't name, just identifying it by the style and the lead vocals by Chris Robinson. It's kind of nice seeing that kids in Germany were listening to some of the same things that were popular in the US.

So far, I like the story and I'm kind of hooked into the series. The Gryphon is scary enough for this to be classified as horror, but so far there isn't really enough backstory development to say that it's sufficiently creepy to be a full-on horror series.

I will say that the story avoids being bogged down with too much explanation of everything, leaving lots of room for the viewer's imagination to work. Too often, fantasy/horror pieces have far too much investment in explanation, and that kind of ruins it for me. Der Greif dodged that particular bullet so far, and I like it.