BONES: The Bones on the Blue Line
April 2, 2010 by Sarah Curtis
Hey BONES fans! Thursdays just haven’t been the same without you, but we did it. We survived the two month BONES hiatus. I hope you liked this episode, because I did. I think it has somewhat of a misfortune of being stuck in the position of being our first ep back AND the ep that precedes the 100th; those are tough shoes to fill. Then again, we BONES fans are loyal and able to judge an episode based on itself, and I think when it comes down to it, this episode will always have a very special place in my heart.
But let me backtrack a bit.
First, I want to say that I love GMMR, because it’s such a great site for fans of TV shows. Those of us who write here don’t get paid to do it, and we don’t feel like we’re talking ‘at’ the readers, but with you all. We’re in this together, this TV love, and I just so appreciate that kind of environment. I read GMMR for years before I wrote for it, and I loved it just as much then. So, in the interest of that, I want to share a bit about how this episode of BONES affected me personally.
A few years ago, my Gram was diagnosed with a pre-leukemia. But she was a tough lady, and she fought it. Earlier, this year, she had to enter the James Cancer research center, because her doctors felt that she had moved from pre- to existing leukemia. But again, she fought and did chemotherapy, and as of March 5th, 2010, she was leukemia free. It was amazing. We were all in shock at her recovery. I wish I could say the story ends there, but unfortunately, a week later, to the minute almost, she had a massive heart attack and passed away. Now, I know that was somewhat abrupt, and I’m not telling you this to make you feel sorry for me. I’m just setting up the story. So, fastforward through a weekend of family and friends and arrangements, and it’s Monday, the 15th, and I’m standing at Gram’s calling hours, and I get an email from Kath with good news…I have the opportunity to screen episodes 99 and 100. I kind of put it out of my mind, but then later that night, I pulled up the link and I began watching. And within the first several minutes, as you can imagine, I was just stunned. Stunned. Sweets’ experience (though with a stranger) was like a mirror of my life, and I just kept blinking at the exact way it had fallen into my lap at that exact moment. BONES has just always had a way of hitting me right where my life is, and that night, though the circumstances seemed random, was just another example. That Sweets would befriend a young man who had been cured of leukemia only to see him die tragically, and for me to watch that episode on the exact same day as my Gram’s calling hours, it just was like a warm BONES blanket around me. I also thought it was kind of ironic, but then learned that it was really just an unfortunate juxtaposition of events! I love this show. I love being able to talk about this show with you, week after week; I wanted to talk about that moment with you THEN. I love that the show isn’t afraid to let its characters be troubled by the events in life. If you have any show moments like that, please tell us. I love those. Living life and sharing that (and TV, here) is what this is about.
Now…
THE CASE:
A subway is derailed during a severe water main break, and in all of that, some bones are discovered. Brennan and Booth determine that the body belonged to Martin Aragon, a blind professional letter writer. Martin was caught in a Cyrano de Bergerac type of situation, and it may have cost him his life. As Booth and Brennan dig deeper, they see that what was a love triangle might be even more complicated between Martin’s writing partner Sophia, one of his clients, Colin, for whom he wrote letters to Officer McKenna Grant, whose boyfriend Eddie isn’t the best guy. But also, Martin wrote his own angry letter that was returned with a death threat. Meanwhile, Sweets, who was on the subway, must deal with the tragedy he witnessed and he concentrates on figuring out how he can live his life to the fullest. Also in the mix is the plotline that Brennan is being interviewed by a Japanese reporter. Her books are very popular, but when Brennan finds out that the lives of her characters are perceived as more ‘newsworthy’ than the science and cases in her novels, she is troubled. In the end, it was officer Grant who killed Martin with Eddie’s gun, for writing the letters for Colin, even though Sweets believes that Martin wrote the words for Sophia.
THE SQUINTS:
I don’t know about you, but Sweets’ line “I just don’t…I don’t want to disappear, without living the life I want to live” really made sense to me. I liked his character development in this episode.
Were you surprised that Sweets proposed to Daisy? I will admit that I didn’t hate her as much in this episode. I liked that Angela kind of took her under her wing. I also liked Angela’s actions and reactions with the magazine journalist. (Did anyone else think that now that Angela has presumably a lot of money that she could buy as many pigs as she wanted? Or am I the only evil one?)
I liked that Hodgins also took Daisy along with him (You seem to know your poop), even if it was just to get Daisy to tell Hodgins about Page 187! Ey yo! I don’t know how I feel about us just finding out that Angela has been helping with Brennan’s books, but I DID love that page 187 was Hodgins’ move. How great was he when he told Angela she should only sleep with guys that can’t read because otherwise she’ll never be rid of him.
Cam was kind of just there, but I did like her reaction to Hodgins’ chart.
BOOTH & BRENNAN:
I love Booth’s concern for Sweets. That is very special. This episode was interesting to me in that Booth was paired more with Sweets and Brennan paired more with Daisy. I don’t need a lot more of that in the future, but for this episode, it worked.
I also like that in some ways, Booth and Brennan were the B Plot. I laughed when Brennan was trying to explain to the writer that while Booth’s symmetry is very pleasing, he is not Agent Andy.
I like their banter at the pawn shop, especially Brennan, “What? We got him.”
But what I loved MOST about this episode was the B&B ending. It is by far one of the most intriguing scenes between the two of them. For one thing, didn’t you get the idea that Brennan wasn’t surprised to see him? And yet she was still in her night robe. Not sexy, or anything, although she did look pretty. But the complete way they were comfortable with one another just spoke incredible volumes to me. It was romantic in their friendshippy way.
Ah yes!
Thoughts from you? Are you so pumped for next week?!? Now that Sweets (and also Jared) is engaged, do you believe David Boreanaz when he told me that it’s NOT one of Booth’s goals to get married? Or do you agree with me and think that it might just upset Booth a little bit? Let me know what you’ve been up to!
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Filed under #1 featured, Bones, Posts by Sarah (Seels)
I really enjoyed this episode! I have been reading some chatter with people complaining about it, but I honestly don’t know what there is not to like. I thought JFD’s acting in this was really good. I also enjoyed Booth’s concern over Sweets. I agree that B&B did feel more like a B plot in this episode, yet I didn’t feel as if I wasn’t seeing enough of them. Overall, after waiting about two months for a new episode, I was satisfied and can’t wait to see what’s in store the rest of the season.
I really enjoyed this episode… so much so that I watched Wednesday (I’m from Toronto so it plays on Wednesdays here) and Thursday just to re-watch the brilliance that was JFD in this episode. You can see just how much he made the character struggle with what had happened and how this usually put together seemingly character broke and turned to someone else to get help.
I also enjoyed the fact that with this show, we as an audience (well the ones who watch obsessively every week) have become invested in characters beyond B&B that having them and the case almost be the b-plot is not something that bothers us.
I also think it was smart on the writers to give us a B&B lite episode when next weeks is probably all B&B.
The end, with the majority of the episodes, has B&B together talking and I think that with the lack of their presence in the ep it was a good cap. They were comfortable with each other and joking “Plato/play-doh” and the talk of soul mates and finding someone to complete you made my fangirly, shipper heart squee and want to be like “hello that’s the two of you.”
Thanks for sharing your story…it always amazes me how even the most random things can be used to comfort us.
I second what Stephanie said- John Francis Daley knocked it out of the park in this one…and I must say, I found Sweets incredibly attractive sitting there on the subway. I also didn’t find Daisy too annoying, they used her well in this episode. I also LOVE that they are engaged- good storylines will come out of this!
I liked that B&B were part of the B plot, but I kinda got the sense in this episode that there wasn’t really an A plot- they were all just B plots. I wasn’t a huge fan of the case and I connected most with the Sweets/Daisy story but I think it’s just because I am so anxious for next weeks episode I kinda just wanted to get through this one. But I did miss Bones, so glad it’s back!
And yes to the interactions at the end- perfect and subtle…she didn’t seem surprised he showed up but he seemed a little surprised that she greeted him at the door in her robe.
I agree with beth, Booth did seem surprised (maybe a little intrigued) that Brennan answered the door in her robe. Check out how his eyes linger on the robe as she welcomes him inside her apartment. Love it!
Not the strongest B&B episode, but very good character development episode for Sweets and Daisy. Also, loved the confident, sexy way Hodgins confronted Angela about his “move” on page 187.
I’m excited and a little anxious about what’s to come this season. I know that the BONES team is going to put me through an emotional wringer by the time the season finale comes to a close. *sigh*
I liked most things about this episode (aside from the obvious product placement..AWKWARD), but after much thought something really bothered me! I really felt the writers did a disservice to the character of Bones by exposing just how much (25% worth) Angela has contributed to the “steamy” plot line in her books. Bones has never been shy about how she likes sex and her sex life. I always felt that the steamy/romantic parts in her books were used as an outlet for the feelings Bones could not express outwardly. It kind of made her more “human” in my eyes. That it wasn’t just all about the BONES…..Just a thought anyway…
Thank you for the review Seeley!
I too thought about how many pigs Angela could buy.
I wasn’t too impressed with the dialoque for the ending scene but it did feel good to see how comfortable they are in each other lives.
Another great thing was how Booth was Papa Bear throughout this episode. He was protective of the reporter (‘As long as we keep you safe’), good friend (Brennan telling Sweets to go home because Booth said so), funny guy (Plato vs. Play-doh) and dangerous (Brennan saying it’s really exciting when he shots someone).
Drippy
Haha! If you’re a horrible person then so am I…because I totally thought about Angela buying pigs with the money. 😀
I think Daisy is growing on me…I was actually kind of expecting the end when he proposed and I was rooting for her to say yes. Daisy is becoming more of a character now that she isn’t duplicating every move Brennan makes. It’s kind of ironic that she wants to be just like Brennan and Brennan never wanted to be married…at least in the beginning. We’ll have to see if her opinion ever changes.
I LOVED the Angela/Hodgins moment. I was at work while I was watching and people were looking at me weird for laughing. 🙂
And Booth is definitely finally accepting his role with the baby duck! And I think it’s going to be hard for him, whether he believes it or not, to watch Sweets get something that he (Booth) has always wanted, but doesn’t feel like he has a hope of getting. It’s also going to be interesting to see how he reacts to Sweets “growing up”.
And now I’ll stop rambling because I’m pretty sure this comment is going to be WAY too long! I’m just so excited to see Bones and your reviews back!
I ADORED Sweets in this episode. He’s consistently my favorite character these days, but this episode in particular reminded me exactly why. They really let him grow up a little bit in this episode. And even though Daisy has consistently been one of my LEAST favorite characters, I still ooed and awwwed when he proposed. It was super sweet.
I have a feeling this next week’s episode is going to be supremely epic.
Keep up the good work, guys!
–Penguinonthetelly.com
I enjoyed this episode. Although, I kind of feel like I wanted to just get through it to get to the next one which I’m really excited about.
It was awful about the guy on the train, and you could tell that it completely broke Sweets’ heart. What I found interesting (kind of like in the Buffy episode The Body) is that it’s a show about death, to the point where they almost become desensitized to it. That’s what makes these episodes special. I think.
As a side note, I was wondering where you were from. I had to google “calling hours.” I had never heard of that before.
I usually like Bones, but in this episode, eventhough the acting was great, I had some problems with the storyline. With the water main break, skeleton floating, all evidence at the scene of the crime, rats nest and all should’ve floated away as well. So big water main break derailed a train, killed someone, displaced the skeleton, but left the nest intact?