Fans were pleasantly surprised and curious when Gorilla Grodd made a brief cameo in the first season of Creature Commandos as Princess Ilana Rostovic's right-hand ape as she devastated the world, including all of its superheroes. He thankfully wasn't forgotten, as it was recently announced that Jimmy Tatro would be playing the simian supervillain in HBO Max's upcoming mockumentary series The People v. Gorilla Grodd, starring Skyler Gisondo's Jimmy Olsen.
Filming has been ongoing for weeks on the true crime satire, with photos of outdoor sets flooding the internet, revealing that one of the primary locations will be the Georgia Institute of Technology in Midtown Atlanta. However, one fan on X, AtlantaDCFans, captured several photos of Gorilla Grodd on set.
Similar to The Thing in Marvel Studios' The Fantastic Four: First Step, the supervillain was entirely practical in these photos, even wearing layers of human clothing, including a dorky sweater vest and a graduation robe. According to Jimmy Tatro on the Pardon My Take podcast, his role is "mostly voice acting" and that "they're gonna use my expressions," meaning that this practical Grodd is likely only for reference for the VFX artists.
Although it's curious what possible context there would be for an ape supremacist like Gorilla Grodd to be attending a human college and debasing himself by wearing human clothing.
A Sanctimonious Simian
The only possible explanation for why this attempted tyrant would be presenting himself as a harmless seven-foot-tall 500-pound ape would be to beat the rap for murdering his father and attempting to usurp his rule over Gorilla City. It also helps lean into the absurdity of this series, as Gisondo's Jimmy Olsen explores the slim possibility that Grodd is innocent and wrongly convicted.
But could there be another motive driving Jimmy to vouch for the ape?
In the comics, while Jimmy Olsen and Gorilla Grodd don't interact much at all, they share one potentially hilarious connection: that Olsen was once married to one of Grodd's girlfriends, Bruna, an actress gorilla. In Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #98, the photographer was roped into marrying a literal gorilla, ultimately breaking her heart.
In a one-shot anthology comic, DC's Kal-El-Fornia Love, one of the stories revolved around Jimmy being tasked to get a photo of Bruna for the Daily Planet, only to run into Gorilla Grodd at an event, who brought Bruna as his mate. Jimmy's already been shown to be a ladies man in James Gunn's Superman, and him temporarily marrying a gorilla wouldn't be out of the question for this universe. Perhaps he's trying to pay Bruna back for breaking her heart by helping prove Grodd's innocence.
Another possibility is that this isn't Gorilla Grodd in the set photos at all, but his grandson, Sam Simeon. It would line up, too, since, unlike his grandfather, Sam actually likes humans, even going to New York City to work as an illustrator for DC Comics. He could be called to serve as a character witness for his grandfather at the trial, which wouldn't end well for him, considering Sam hates Grodd for his hatred of humanity.
In all likelihood, this will merely be a ploy by Grodd to present himself to the jury as a hard-working ape of circumstance and academia. Someone wholly incapable of murdering his father with his own opposable thumbs.
