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'Bones' doesn't know much about art, but it knows what it likes
Bones knows what makes modern art really exciting -- heaps of blood, gore and sex! Well, that and beetles -- imagine how much more fun MoMA would be if buckets of flesh-eating beetles were dumped on artwork at random intervals. (Assuming, of course, that they're not doing that already.)
Bom-chicka-spoiler
When a couple of drunkards dig into a crushed car scavenging for parts, they find a gory, disgusting skull. Ah, Bones -- good to have you back! The team trace the crushed car's origins to a modern-art gallery. Five more crushed cars hold pride of place in the space. There's also blood on the floor, but Helen Bridenbecker, the gallery owner, says that's because an important performance artist incorporates pig blood into her work.
The car cubes are the work of artist Geoffrey Thorne. Helen and Geoffrey’s assistant, Roxie, identify the body as his based on a ring the corpse is wearing. Roxie looks slightly ill, but Helen is rapturous -- he actually did it! Geoffrey has been talking about wanting to become one with his work. Helen applauds his commitment to his art. Um, ew.
Brennan transports the car cube back to the Jeffersonian, but before Hodgins can validate his masculinity by prying it open with the jaws of penis life, Caroline Julian shows up with an injunction -- no destroying the priceless artwork! This leads to some improvisation -- using an endoscope to check out the bones, "accidentally" dumping a bucket of flesh-eating beetles into the cube. That last bit just pisses the judge off, and he decrees the team has only two days to figure out if foul play was involved.
But there's a twist -- Angela knows Roxie. Biblically. The two had a yearlong relationship back in college. Roxie turns out to be the beneficiary of Geoffrey's will, meaning she's the prime suspect. Angela wants to clear her, so she figures out a way to use an industrial x-ray -- the sort of thing used in ports to check out incoming freight -- to scan the bones. She hopes to prove that the car being crushed caused all the damage to the bones. That, combined with all the drugs in Geoffrey's system and the fact that he was under psychiatric care for just about everything, would point towards suicide. Alas, Angela's work uncovers an inexplicable break in the skull -- it was murder.
On the upside, the team now gets to tear the art apart, which makes Hodgins happy. Brennan figures out that anomalous break is an axe wound, caused by a common fire axe. What do you know -- there was an axe at the gallery! There were traces of female sweat on the axe handle and on the victim's clothing -- and that sweat reveals drugs used to treat cancer. Those drugs cause skin discoloration, so Roxie's in the clear. Helen, however, wears thick kabuki-type makeup. It's not just an affectation -- she's using it to cover up the signs of her disease and treatment. She killed Geoffrey to make his art more valuable. She was going to use the proceeds to pay for treatment at a clinic in Mexico.
The Lab Rats
Angela is going though relationship withdrawal -- or maybe she just wants some nookie. That makes running into Roxie that much more fortuitous -- maybe it's time to give girl-love another go! Sweets and Angela debate love -- he thinks she's afraid of commitment and needs to wait for the love of her life, while Angela thinks she's met the love of her life many times. Sweets tells Angela to let Roxie decide whether she wants to get into this again, and Roxie very much does.
Daisy Wick, the annoying Not-Zack who drove everyone crazy during her first tenure in the lab, rejoins the group. She's trying to tone down the stalker-like behavior this time, but she still bugs. Cam finally goes to Sweets for advice on how to fire Daisy. Sweets volunteers to do it himself. As the lab rats look on, Sweets tells Daisy she's done -- but then says that now they don't need to keep their relationship a secret. That leads to lots of kissing in the middle of the lab. Hodgins is agog, Cam impressed.
Booth and Brennan
Booth and Brennan get a bit of a shock when they see Sweets and Daisy making out. It'll never work! Brennan says. She's a woman of science, while he's all about those non-specific, pseudo-scientific feelings-type stuff! They have no common ground! How can things work without common ground? Booth agrees -- but we all know they were just describing their own relationship, and all of a sudden, things just got interesting.
Booth had some great bits on his own, too. After a few moments of discombobulation, Booth gets over the fact that Angela played for the other team, and tells the story of his favorite aunt, who had a "roommate." He beat up a kid at school who called her a lesbian, then discovered that yep, Aunt Ruth and her friend Franny were a couple. What happened? Angela asks. "I already said she was my favorite aunt, and Franny, she had box seats for the Phillies games..." And everyone knows good sports tickets makes ANY social behavior acceptable. The man had priorities!
Highlights, thoughts and odds and ends
- I loved Vicki Lewis as "Kabuki ghoul" Helen Bridenbecker. (Those eyebrows!) Give this woman another show!
- Angela takes Sweets out for a drink to talk about her relationship woes. It's been SIX WEEKS since she's gotten any play! Apparently, this is a record for Angela. Sweets is mildly aghast. I'm thinking Angela has no idea what "dry spell" really means.
- Angela sets the ground rules: "Just to be clear, I asked you out for a drink to talk -- not because I'm desperate for male company." Sweets: " You think of me as male company?" He seems so proud!
- Brennan and Booth discuss the prices paid at the gallery. Brennan: "All cultures place great value on art." Booth: "Yeah, art! A nice bowl of fruit, dogs playing poker..." You forgot to mention big-eyed children, crying clowns, and Elvis on velvet.
- Hodgins is incredulous when Caroline comes in with the injunction. Caroline: "Apparently, this is an historic piece of art." Hodgins: "It's a hard car shell with a gooey corpse filling!" Now, if THAT were in the catalog, I have a feeling we'd be getting a lot more visitors to art galleries.
- Booth and Brennan interview one of Geoffrey's rivals. He's gleeful at the news: "Geoffrey Thorne dead? This is a great day for the art world!" "Shouldn't you be trying harder to look innocent?" Brennan asks.
- Booth has a moment when he finds out that Angela and Roxie were a couple. "I was envisioning you together... well, not ...well, together, but... really?" Poor man -- I think she broke his brain.
- Daisy is in fine form -- she does a Yoda impression, insults Cam, nitpicks Hodgins' and Angela's work, and destroys a skull. After that last bit, I'm surprised Cam was looking for a politic way to fire her. You destroyed evidence. Bye!
- Cam, on Daisy: "She's very smart, very able, and she has a knack for turning reasonable people into flaming gas balls of fury."
- Sweets lets Daisy down gently: "You're toast here. Nobody wants to work with you..." "Does anybody like me?" Daisy asks. "No, I'm afraid not," Sweets replies.
- Daisy bugs the crap out of me, and yet I still like her and Sweets together. Go figure.
- Angela and Roxie... what do you think? There was a bit of chemistry there, but I'm getting a little tired of the "Everybody Love Angela" train. We get it, she's awesome. Next! Now, if everyone were in love with Caroline Julian... that I could buy!
This entire season has been a little "bleh" for me. Does anybody else feel the same?
I've taken to TiVoing the episodes and skipping around after reading the recaps.
Roger that. The show is flat. Sweets isn't as good as Frye was in the same role. (Frye as in "Frye and Lorie". . .Hugh Lorie of "House" fame) and Zack was part of a cast with good chemistry, now not so good. The interplay between Brennan and Booth is a yawn-fest now, too. I only watch the show when I've nothing else to do.
Gene H | Nov 6, 2008 5:58:52 AM | #Bring back Season One. I want more action. I want Booth savings Bones, Bones saving Booth. Angela's horneyness can only go so far. Zach gone is too much of a change for a show that had it right and now has lost it. I did actually think Cam and Hodges were pretty funny last night.
We need more shipper moments. Get it together Writers and Directors!!!!
I watch the show for B&B so episodes like last night are pretty blah for me. I don't really care about Angela's old boy/girlfriends
kirra | Nov 6, 2008 7:22:18 AM | #Have to agree. Kind of boring. Sick of Angela's dating issues, still think it was a shame she ended it with Hodgins. Booth & Bones, had little moments, but nothing exciting. Booth overall seemed friendly, more smiles than usual, which I thought was a nice change. TOTALLY sick of them brining in a new lab rat every week. Annoying. Or at least find someone older that is not trying to suck up. Hope the shows gets better, next weeks ep looks promising.
Robin | Nov 6, 2008 9:10:48 AM | #I agree, this season has been really disappointing so far. I have mostly enjoyed the revolving interns, but Brennan and Booth haven't been very well written. She is obnoxiously strident, and he is coming off like a non-PC cretin (the horror!). At this point I can't imagine why they would be attracted to each other. And Angela describing herself as not promiscuous? Please, take a cold shower and get over yourself. But it was great to see Caroline Julian again.
Amy | Nov 6, 2008 9:24:28 AM | #yeah this year bites. The rotating interns, the now gay women. We have see this and are seeing this in House. Are the bones writers the same as house? They are really ruining the show with these breaks. Zach was great, and the show was good, but they took everything away that made the show great. Get back to basics and stop making things so showy. Angela needs to take a pill, Sweets can stay, stop with Bones Booth interplay, and let hodgens go back to the conspiracy nut job he was so good at. And bring Zach back, and stop the doffy story lines.
Eric | Nov 6, 2008 9:53:27 AM | #I agree - totally bored! I forwarded through almost every scene with Angela. Her issues are completely uninteresting for me. I'm planning to read the guides before the next episodes. If they are going to have stuff with Angela's relationships, I'll probably skip the ep.
Bored | Nov 6, 2008 10:25:09 AM | #Yeah, I haven't felt that the show has been especially strong lately. It would help me if the characters that we love would have a serious discussion or even conversation (it could just be about the case, really), which would balance the overly light tone. I mean, I guess Angela and Sweets were discussing things, but the tone still wasn't serious. The interegation at least didn't seem quite as flippant last night.
I miss the diner too. I know they've used it a few times this season, but I'm pretty sure I spotted it as a similar but not the same diner on House a few weeks ago, and last night Angela and Sweets met in a bar twice, so I'm getting concerned that the diner won't be used anymore. That would be sad.
Sarah | Nov 6, 2008 11:03:40 AM | #Sorry, I meant "interrogation."
By the way, awesome recap Sarah! I love your style, and I definitely appreciate the plethora of Highlights you include at the end!
Sarah | Nov 6, 2008 11:05:34 AM | #I miss the old Booth and Brennan - when they always disagreed and argued. Now they are all cutesy and googly eyed. Yuck.
And they change Booth whenever it is convenient for themselves. Booth has always been pretty black/white right/wrong - and very very catholic. His acceptance of Angela's past does not seem right compared to how very catholic he has been in the past
MJ | Nov 6, 2008 11:18:26 AM | #Lasy night's episode was ok, but that doesn't matter I'm just happy to have Bones back. I also just want to mention that the perview for next week's episode loks really awesome!
Dory | Nov 6, 2008 11:26:07 AM | #I am so disappointed in last night's episode with the lesbian scene. I will NOT watch another episode like this. Have the writers ran out of stories to tell that they have to turn what was once good, clean entertainment into questionable stuff like that. This is not the place for those story lines. Bring back the old Bones when the writers had something to say.
carol | Nov 6, 2008 11:40:54 AM | #I have also been disappointed by this season but I thought that last night reached back into the season 1 chemistry. The entire show wasn't taken up by Booth & Bones and their "romance", there was some good humor AND a lot of time spent in the lab on the science.
I also find Daisy annoying but really like her and Sweets as a couple.
Jackie | Nov 6, 2008 11:49:13 AM | #The Angela love-fest needs to stop, because the writers are turning her into a sex-hungry bimbo instead of portraying her as she was originally written, that being a highly-intelligent woman with a deep artistic appreciation who also just happens to be easy on the eyes. The dreck being written for Angela is something I'd expect to see if Bones had been a show that premiered on SpikeTV, which caters to the 21-35-year-old male demographic.
I would love for modern screenwriters to be forced into a room to look at the procedurals that were aired in the 1960s through the early 1980s. Very little was shown about the characters beyond that which directly affected their ability to do their jobs. Cagney & Lacey were one of the first to show more of the not-at-work side of their lives, but it fit into the show quite well. Nowadays, every damn procedural on TV has to have at least two of the characters hooking up, often under the most ridiculous of circumstances that would never happen (or be allowed to happen) in real life. While there is plenty of sex on the job in America, it is not as prevalent (prevelent? never could spell that word right) as TV would like us to think. On a show like Bones that is about a team of highly-intelligent folks with multiple degrees, this obsession with bedroom drama is juvenile and stupid.
As for the case, I have known so many art majors through the years that the episode was like a trip back home for me. The "Kabuki Ghoul" was so familiar that I nearly fell out of my chair laughing. The idea of art for the sake of art is, of course, filled with both beauty and complete crap, and this episode showed some of both. Pity they had to spend so much time on Angela's vaginal adventures, because it would have been a great episode otherwise.
Kudos must be given, though, to the scene in the car between Angela and Booth, for it was pitch-perfect. It shows how supposedly-open-minded folks can sometimes be just as prejudicial towards people they deem "close-minded," even if they're not. Booth opening up to Angela was, for me, the hallmark of the whole season. Not only did Angela's own unintended bigotry get smacked down, but it also showed that Booth is a lot deeper than most of the women in his life know. True, Booth hemmed and hawed through Angela's initial "coming out" about her previous relationship with Roxie, but he redeemed himself in spades.
Sweets and Daisy. Sounds like a comedy duo in the eighth circle of hell. :)
Kara Mel Apples | Nov 6, 2008 12:13:38 PM | #"Sweets and Daisy. Sounds like a comedy duo in the eighth circle of hell."
Kara Mel Apples, I would have snarfed liquid through my nose reading that except that, fortunately, I was sucking on a Tootsie Roll Pop instead. Not sure if that or Sara's ntion about everybody being in love with Caroline Julian--yeek!--made me grin more.
meggins | Nov 6, 2008 1:49:48 PM | #This show has just sucked this entire season. The actress playing Daisy Wick is so much better as a porn star on "Californication". Everyone was kind of an asshole to her except for Sweets.
This used to be the best procedural on TV because you got into the mysteries and the culprit was always well hidden. Now you know who did it after the introduction of the suspects. Bad story telling.
Now, the stories of the Smithsonian crew are all that matter and they are boring as hell. Bones likes pretty girls that had sex - so stupid. DVR this show people and watch "Pusing Daisies". This show has been sucking for quite some time know. I hope it gets back to form but man recent episodes have just been awful.
BRIAN | Nov 6, 2008 1:57:31 PM | #I don't think Bones is going downhill. It seems to be the same as it always been, one of a number of forensic procedurals with a slightly more quirky point of view than most. Enjoyable but not a "must see." The quirkiness this episode was supplied by the Kabuki art gallery owner with the double eyebrows, and she was the highlight of the episode for me. Without her, it would have been pretty bland.
I think Angela is supposed to be an all-accepting free-spirited earth mother/Gaia type, so to find that she had been in a lesbian relationship doesn't seem at all a stretch for character to me. I think for Angela anything involving loving, consenting adults would pretty much be okay with her.
I'm glad my decision to abort this episode was correct. I can see that the writers are still having aftershocks and I'm waiting for the beginning of next season. Why won't the writers realize that Bones is at its best when Brennan is fighting to understand the world around her with earnest sincerety,(as well as a few karate kicks) and Booth is understanding and protective of her mind as he lets her defend herself with her karate skills. This was Bones. The secondary angle with angela/hodgins took the shipper pressure off Brennan and Booth. The writers should know that by breaking them up, they've basically destroyed the show. They could have had angela having kids, and hodgins being paranoid about their safety. New characters could have opened up with the care giving. Nope. Writers suck. I'm waiting till next season. I'd advise everyone else to do the same.
Crazy Loco | Nov 6, 2008 7:33:12 PM | #Aahhh ... don't you know they have Sweets/Daisy for Hodgins/Angela replacement ...
Aahhh I hate Angela ...
they want that puppies to show Booth/Brennan how to be in love ... and for Hodgela too
Aahhh ... still hating Angela
buncha whiners. stop watching the show then. boring... pfff.
the show was never THAT good anyways. its a nice distraction from everyday life and its still the same now.
jon | Nov 6, 2008 10:19:22 PM | #I enjoy the show. I anticipate that there will be some episodes each season that aren't as good as others, and I think that's what we've had for the last two or three episodes. It's mid-season, murder of the week stuff. The one thing this season is lacking is a solid A story to touch on every few episodes across the season. No serial killer, none of Brennan's family stuff... We'll need something soon to give this season some meat!
Chelsea | Nov 7, 2008 6:50:36 AM | #Gotta say that I find it funny that some people think the show was family-friendly, and now it isn't because of a woman-woman kiss. Where I'm living there's a warning before each part about graphic content, and they don't mean smooching.
I like whodunnits. Not remotely interested in Angela's sex life or lack thereof. Far too much time was spent on her yens. Also on the annoying intern. How difficult can it be to fill 42 minutes of a mystery series without going off on these irrelevant tangents.
Maureen | Nov 7, 2008 9:50:52 AM | #Angela is hot no matter which way she swings, but the lesbian story line was pure propaganda for the gays and lesbians in Hollywood. Hell with that.
Vicki Lewis I had not heard of, but she was GREAT! What a great part and performance! That character could have a show of her own.
Did she ever sing with the Glenn Miller orchestra?
Joe College IV | Nov 7, 2008 1:34:04 PM | #Lame episode. I, seemingly like everyone else, don't care about Angela's love life. The Season's been disappointing but not particularly bad... it's just more inconsistent. I think that the last episode - "The He in the She" - was actually very good.
Whilst I like the supporting players, I am not convinced that having an episode centring around them is a particularly good idea. The lack of Booth and of Bones was very noticeable.
Z | Nov 7, 2008 1:43:20 PM | #
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