Origin
Nathan Dolly was a world traveler and doll collector who received two wooden dolls from a old toymaker that resided in the Wundagore Mountain. The evil entity Chthon was imprisoned on the mountain in the Balkans of Central Europe where his mystical energies had infused the entire area including the trees. The toy maker had carved two death effigies from the wood that possessed magical potential and told Dolly that he could animate the figures by projecting his life essence into them. Dolly made the fatal mistake of projecting himself into both dolls at once and his spirit was trapped in them permanently. Dolly managed to mail his doll-selves to his wife Priscilla back in America. Priscilla studied the occult and discovered a way for her husband to transfer his spirit from the dolls into two full-sized mannikins that adopted the deathly garb. The two mannikins were brought to life and dubbed the Brothers Grimm. Dolly would use his surrogate bodies to perform criminal acts which led into numerous conflicts with Spider Woman.
When he coerced the sorcerer Magnus into helping him escape from the dolls to possess a human body. Magnus destroyed him.
Creation
Brother Grimm was created by Marv Wolfman and Carmine Infantino in 1978. His first appearance was in Spider Woman # 3.
Character Evolution
SILVER AGE
The Brothers Grimm were initially two full-size mannikins that were brought to life by the life essence of Nathan Dolly. Spider Woman would only engage with one Brother Grimm during their first encounter. Both of the Brothers Grimm appeared with Priscilla Dolly who called herself Madame Doll after they had captured Spider Woman and Jerry Hunt to perform a magical rite of transfer. Magnus had prevented the spirit of Nathan Dolly to possess a human body and his life essence presumably passed from the Earthly plane.
MODERN AGE
Barton and Percy Grimes acquired the theater and discovered the costumes of the Brothers Grimm. The two brothers would don the costumes and become the current and most popular version of the Brothers Grimm. The Brothers Grimm have performed criminal acts on their own but are most remembered as a member of the Night Shift. When the Night Shift disbanded, the Brothers Grimm were recruited by the Hood and has come into conflict with the Avengers on a few occasions.
Story Arcs
Later two businessmen named Percy and Barton Grimms, acquired Dollys theater and full-size manikins of the Brothers Grimm.
Trying on their clothes, the brothers found they had the powers of the original Brothers Grimm. They used their powers to exact vengeance on a rival who cheated them, but they where stopped by Iron Man.
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The Night Shift
The Brothers Grimm would be recruited into the Night Shift by the Shroud. The Night Shift would fight alongside Captain America in Los Angeles and help take down the Power Broker who was dumping his failed augments into the sewer system. They also battled members of the West Coast Avengers on a few occasions. The Night Shift would attack the West Coast Avenger’s headquarters when they learned that one of their members named Digger was taken down by Mockingbird and placed into police custody. The Shroud was absent at the time so their deputy leader, Dansen Macabre decided to take on the Avengers and to let everyone know that you don’t mess with the Night Shift. However, the Brothers Grimm and the rest of the Night Shift were defeated but escaped from their custody when the Shroud bailed them out with his darkforce abilities.
The Brothers Grimm would participate in other activities without the Night Shift and be one of several criminals and assassins hired by Crossfire to exact revenge on Hawkeye. After Crossfire was humiliated from a previous defeat by Hawkeye, he would place a bounty on one of his arms and would pay the Brothers Grimm or any of his associates thousands if they were successful in completing the task. However, the Brother’s Grimm and the rest of Crossfire’s cartel would be defeated by the combined forces of Hawkeye, Mockingbird and Trick Shot.
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Acts of Vengeance
The Wizard would break free the Grimes brothers from the Los Angeles County Jail when he uses his anti-gravity disks to levitate their cell from the prison ground. The Wizard gave the Grimes brothers their costumes he attained from a property warehouse and offered them an exchange. The Brothers Grimm agree to commit Acts of Vengeance on the Wizard’s behalf by destroying Spider Man when they heard that the Wizard and his associates would destroy Iron Man. Spider Man was going through some changes with his powers after he was zapped during an accident at the Empire University Physics Lab and his spider-sense started to go crazy when he saw Madison Square Garden levitate off the ground due to the Wizard’s gravity disks. Spider-Man saved a civilian with his webbing when the Brothers Grimm attack the web-head with pies filled with dynamite. Spider-Man evades the explosive pies but it causes two civilians to fall off the floating stadium. The Brothers Grimm strike Spider-Man with colored eggs filled with tear gas as he saves the two falling civilians. The Brothers Grimm would boost above the stadium on their floating clouds when they activate a device given to them by the Wizard that would eradicate the anti-gravity disks attached to the floating stadium. The arena starts to descend from the sky but Spider-Man prevents a major disaster by using a lot of his webbing to catch the stadium. The Brothers Grimm start to retreat when the arena doesn’t fall and realize Spider-Man is much stronger than they were lead to believe. Spider-Man starts to chase them when the Brothers Grimm attack with exploding silk scarves. Spider-Man dodges the magical prop attacks and snags one of the brothers with his webbing. Spider-Man hurls the snagged brother into the other brother and they are knocked out when they were smashed into a building wall. Dr. Doom watched the defeat of the Brothers Grimm from a floating monitor device and discovered that Spider-Man was filled with great power that he wanted.
A new Hangman would take over as leader of the Night Shift and all the current members were supernaturally augmented by the powerful demon, Satannish in exchange for their souls. Satannish was conjured up during a national televised fight between the West Coast Avengers and the Night Shift. The Brothers Grimm and the rest of his teammates were getting stronger after Satannish appeared. The Scarlet Witch and Dr. Strange told the Night Shift members that the Hangman offered their souls to the demon so he can become a movie star. The Night Shift members agreed to give up their demon-given energies to power up the West Coast Avengers. The Brothers Grimm and the rest of the Night Shift decided to help the Avengers and they attacked Satannish together. Satannish was forced to leave the earthly plane and all members of the Night Shift lost their augmented abilities.
The Blazing Skull would confront a Night Shift member named Digger and wanted him to answer some questions. A fight ensues and the Blazing Skull knocks out Digger. Captain America intervenes and wants to talk to the Blazing Skull because he thinks he is connected to the Red Skull. The Brothers Grimm, Needle and Misfit interrupt their fight and take on both men for messing with Digger. However, the Brothers Grimm and the rest of the Shifties are taken down by Captain America and the Blazing Skull.
Over the years they appear on and off, usually just in the background, at a good deal of gatherings of miscellaneous villains such as the wedding ceremony of the Absorbing Man and Titania.
The Brothers Grimm would come into conflict with Nighthawk and Gargoyle of the Defenders when they attempt to set off an explosive device at the Grand Coulee Hydroelectric Power Station in Washington State. Both brothers are easily defeated and shipped back to the Raft.
Most recently, the Brothers Grimm surfaced during the Secret Invasion as part of the Hood‘s gang.
A Council Of Masters
Max Fury, the leader of the Shadow Council has assembled a new Masters of Evil in the sovereign nation of Bagalia where the Brothers Grimm are presently members. The Brothers Grimm is present when Max Fury and the Masters of Evil capture John Steele after he attempts to escape Bagalia with the Serpent Crown and the Crown of Thorns.
Alternate Realities
On Earth-9997 the Brothers Grimm refers to Thing‘s two boys, Buzz and Chuck. They are basically smaller versions of Thing.
Powers & Abilities
The powers and abilities of the Brothers Grimm are magically based and they have a large array of eccentric and odd weaponry they could conjure up from somewhere in their costume. They use a variety of novelty items as weapons like colored eggs filled with corrosive acid, tear gas or goo. Pies filled with dynamite or blackbirds and exploding silk scarves. They have used expanding jumping beans to strike enemies or encase them in a large cotton ball. They have shown the ability to shoot gas, powder, “twinkle dust” and high tensile gold thread from their gloves. Other weapons included sticky dough to suffocate their opponents, magic beans to create instant weed growth to entangle their opponents, fake hand that explodes and a giant candy sucker as a striking weapon. Other weapons they have conjured up have been saw blades, cleavers and giant moon shape blades.
Transportation
The Brothers Grimm can attain flight by riding small clouds or some sort of trapeze suspended from a floating star.