The whole process could have been a joyful PR interlude, replacing the current grind of grimness.
This longing for grimness actually has its own portmanteau word, ostalgie.
"Friend Rosny, you were a fool," M. de Roquelaure said with grimness.
“The calm has it,” Miss West said, with just a hint of grimness.
The play of the white gleams of his smile round the suspicion of grimness of his tone fascinated me like a moral incongruity.
Consequently, he made his dispositions with grimness and determination.
But his grimness certainly disappeared, and more than once she found herself wondering at his consideration and thought for her.
Buck & Avery, says I, she went on, cheerfully oblivious of their grimness.
His faint smile had not vanished, but it had taken lines of grimness.
Her sister carried with her most of the grimness of shift and toil.
Old English grimm "fierce, cruel, savage, dire, painful," from Proto-Germanic *grimmaz (cf. Old Saxon, Old Frisian, Old High German, German grimm, Old Norse grimmr, Swedish grym "fierce, furious"), from PIE *ghrem- "angry," perhaps imitative of the sound of rumbling thunder (cf. Greek khremizein "to neigh," Old Church Slavonic vuzgrimeti "to thunder," Russian gremet' "thunder").
A weaker word now than once it was; sense of "dreary, gloomy" first recorded late 12c. It also had a verb form in Old English, grimman (class III strong verb; past tense gramm, p.p. grummen). Old English also had a noun, grima "goblin, specter," perhaps also a proper name or attribute-name of a god, hence its appearance as an element in place names.
Grim reaper as a figurative way to say "death" is attested by 1847 (the association of grim and death goes back at least to 17c.). A Middle English expression for "have recourse to harsh measures" was to wend the grim tooth (early 13c.).
"spectre, bogey, haunting spirit," 1620s, from grim (adj.).
