Hello, all! A recent comment from our pal, Paul, on the Harbingers post has gotten me thinking.
Has anyone done the Myers-Briggs personality testing? What personality did you get? Keep this in mind, I think a mini-series based on this is coming, so prep up 🙂
A link to take the test if you are interested: Myers-Briggs Personality Test
And thanks, Paul, for the inspiration!
“Harbingers in the Fountain”
Episode 5×01
Written By: Hart Hanson and Pat Charles
Directed by: Ian Toynton
Are you guys even ready for this episode?
We meet Avalon Harmonia. Although, Brennan kinda already knows her in a way…
Brennan is back from a long trip and definitely not into the card reading.
AVALON: Ok, I see a sick man in a hospital. He takes refuge in a dream life. You’re there in the dream and you’re helping him to create that dream life by telling him a story. You’re both so happy in the story, so happy it’s almost sad when he wakens. The man whose life you saved is really excited to see you again.
BRENNAN: No, I don’t save lives. People are already dead when I get to them.
AVALON: I’m pretty sure you saved somebody’s life. A man with a heart of a lion.
ANGELA: Booth has a lion heart!
Booth is reinstated! Though Sweets has concerns.
Gun in pocket > or = to shoulder holster??
SWEETS: Do you miss anything about the alternative life you experienced while in a coma?
BOOTH: Yeah. The clothes. Mm, I miss those clothes. They were great clothes.
Brennan arrives back at the lab. Apparently not knowing Booth was still recovering.
BRENNAN: What did Booth do while I was gone, solve boring normal murders?
CAM: He hasn’t been reinstated yet.
BRENNAN: The doctors told me that he’d be fine in a couple of days, that’s why I went.
So many hugs!
HODGINS: Oh, I’m happy personally and professionally. Unsolved murders have gone up a thousand percent since you’ve left.
BRENNAN: Well, I find that hard to believe.
HODGINS: Rough estimate. Welcome back!
They are reunited!
The end of that hug though…
Joy. Partner hugs. Arm veins. What?
Dazzlement.
BOOTH: Look at that, I’m reinstated on the day that you come home. That’s the weirdest coinkidink ever.
BRENNAN: No, it’s not even the weirdest coinkidink today.
Angela tries to get them to dig deep…but nope.
ANGELA: That’s interesting because Avalon says that you two were linked in a very profound and spiritual manner…she also says that in your weirdo alternate shared life experience thing that Brennan was pregnant. It’s odd that neither of you mentioned that.
They decide to investigate when Angela’s psychic talks of hidden bodies.
BRENNAN: Sweets said that your dream was nothing more than your comatose brain processing what I read to you from my book.
BOOTH: Wait, the point is how did the psychic know that if she isn’t psychic?
Booth questions Avalon as they investigate.
AVALON: You’re worried you lost something…You never lost anything in that coma, Agent Booth. You gained something.
Booth confides in an old pal his ongoing concerns.
CAM: First drink since the brain operation?
BOOTH: Yeah, since uh, you know getting back to work.
CAM: I’m honored. An auspicious occasion. So what do you want?
BOOTH: Just wanna share a drink, you know, with one of my closest and dearest friends who, you know, I can trust um with certain things…
After the investigation on the bodies continues, Avalon admits her sister has been missing for years.
ANGELA: Avalon told me she had no family.
BRENNAN: Obviously telling the truth her sister’s been dead for ten years.
ANGELA: Yeah it’s just you’d think that was something that would show up in the cards.
Booth calls on Angela to help.
BOOTH: Exactly. And you know what, Angela is going to get to work on the Internet and find out all that information for us now.
ANGELA: Yes, sir, on my way, you bet.
BOOTH: Hey look, I’m sorry, Ang. You know, it’s first case back, you know, it’s been a long day. Maybe I got something to prove. I’m sorry, you look, you look beautiful.
They continue to investigate. Avalon remains a suspect, but Booth listens to Avalon about Brennan and runs to save her.
AVALON: Let the neurosurgeons have your brain. They know about your brain. They don’t know jack about your heart.
AVALON: She’s in terrible danger. You gotta go to her now.
Ugh, this episode is literally so good.
I truly love Caroline.
And oh, oh. Oh….
The socks are back, but is the full cockiness really back?
They get the bad guy, but everyone ends up settling. For now.
BRENNAN: I’m sorry we couldn’t get him for killing your sister.
AVALON: Sometimes you gotta just settle for the second best situation.
AVALON: You two are going to keep doing things as usual.
BOOTH: Sometimes you gotta settle for second best.
Ok, I didn’t get everything. I know that. But man, what a jam-packed epsiode!!! Thoughts?!
I’m still aching for Booth, healing alone and desperately trying to get reinstated, and having to withhold his feelings as Cam and Sweets tell him to be super careful, and then he’s so careful, he takes back the “I love you” way too fast and…I’m aching for Brennan who knows Booth isn’t 100% but wants to help him get back to himself and then gets told “I love you” but she doesn’t get to fully react on that and it’s gone.
But props to everyone on this episode. So. Many. Layers. And David & Emily continue to amaze me with how they can show so much with slight facial changes and body language. Bravo! Ugh. I need to rewatch this like 5 times in a row now. 🙂
“The End in the Beginning”
Episode 4×26 / Production 4×20
Written By: Hart Hanson
Directed by: Ian Toynton
**I watched this episode live with my parents when it aired. We were SO CONFUSED with that opening scene. We thought we’d missed an episode or ten! lol**
BRENNAN: Do you love me?
BOOTH: Yeah. Do you want me to prove it to you?
BRENNAN: Mmm, if you’re not too sleepy…
We get our murder case tie in, but do we even care? Our team is in bizarro world!
CAM: A body was found at your nightclub.
HODGINS: [narrating] She has never seen a dead body before.
HODGINS: [narrating] He was in the Army and has seen too many.
Our squints are still much the same though!
WENDELL: Zack screamed when he saw the body, so he’s off the hook, right?
ZACK: Yelped!
FISHER: He screamed like Slutty Girl #1 in a teen horror flick.
CAROLINE: From here on in you do not answer questions you don’t get asked!
FISHER: Consider me your top suspect. I’m a trained chef, alright. Finest schools in Europe. But my professional life consists of cooking chicken wings designed to make people drink more beer. I’m a man on the edge.
SWEETS: I’m a bartender, I’m practically a psychologist.
________________________________
CAM: Wow, what they said about you was true!
BRENNAN: What’s that?
CAM: That you’re kind of a cold fish.
BRENNAN: Well if by cold fish you mean pragmatic and rational, then that’s what I am.
CAM: No I meant more like somebody when a human being is murdered cares more about reopening the club than capturing the murderer.
BRENNAN: Well, I have my job, and you have yours.
And, as in the real world, Brennan sorts out her feelings with her sounding board.
BRENNAN: Cam says everybody thinks I’m a cold fish.
BOOTH: Nah, what you are is Iceland. Cold to the touch, but underneath you’re all volcano.
BRENNAN: I don’t like people thinking that I’m a cold fish.
BOOTH: Look if you were really a cold fish, you wouldn’t care.
BRENNAN: You used logic on me. That’s sweet.
Didn’t your mind explode with this B&B cute coupliness?
Brennan and the team figure someone is using her to get to Booth.
MAX: Why didn’t you show this to the police?
BRENNAN: Because they’ll take it without telling me what it means.
MAX: What do you think it means?
BRENNAN: People know the best way to hurt him…
MAX: …is to hurt you.
MAX: Everyone serves somebody. Something you husband refuses to accept.
BRENNAN: I know he’s stubborn.
MAX: He’s a man of principle, and I mean that as a terrible insult.
Suspecting Brennan and Booth are behind this crime, “Jared” hits on some truth as he questions Booth.
JARED: …And then he threatens her, he sends this Worstenbach guy on the job, but you don’t see it, because you don’t use your head. You think that everything you feel is true…You need to grow up.
But Booth dismisses that and is still thinking with that lion heart. As Brennan remains logical!
BOOTH: Yeah, I’d feel if the energy was bad between the two us, I’d know. The same way that you would know that I couldn’t murder someone.
BRENNAN: I do believe that you would murder someone for me. And I believe that you’d lie about it so I wouldn’t have to carry that burden.
BRENNAN: You know, if this murder is any inclination, I don’t know how any homicide is ever solved. When everyone lies, everyone has a secret agenda.
B&B figure out Jared did it.
BOOTH: My brother killed a man to save my wife. What are we gonna do?
BRENNAN: Do? We thank him and shut-up.
Wrap-up time! (In the dream and real world!)
HODGINS: [narrating] You love someone, you open yourself up to suffering; that’s the sad truth.
Maybe they’ll break your heart…
…maybe you’ll break their heart and never be able to look at yourself in the same way…
Those are the risks.
BRENNAN: I have another confession.
BOOTH: What?
Whoops!
There we go!
BOOTH: You are pregnant! There’s a little baby boy, huh?
BRENNAN: Or girl…
How about both?! 🙂
BOOTH: Such a weird dream.
BRENNAN: Booth? Booth! You’re awake!
BOOTH: So real.
BRENNAN: You’re operation was a success, but you reacted poorly to the anesthesia. You’ve been in a coma for the past four days. What took you so long to wake up?
BOOTH: It felt so real.
I wouldn’t want to wake up either, Booth.
BRENNAN: It wasn’t real.
BOOTH: Who are you?
So many possible questions and thoughts.
How do you feel about this episode in hindsight, with the series over and complete. Hart wrote this one. How did it play for you? Does it make sense within the overall Bones framework? What did you like, what not so much? Have your feelings changed since it first aired?
EMILY HATH TWEETED!
(And she never tweets)
Isn’t that a great article?! Happy Wednesday!
Happy Mothers’ Day to you and yours! 🙂 See y’all next week for more episodes! 🙂
What was your favorite/least favorite Bones/mom storylines throughout the series?
“The Critic in the Cabernet”
Episode 4×25 / Production 4×19
Written By: Stephen Nathan
Directed by: Kevin Hooks
Another gruesome Bones beginning! Icky things in the wine! But onto counseling!
SWEETS: It’s quite simple. Whatever Agent Booth says, you respond with whatever word or phrase pops into your head. And vice versa.
BRENNAN: Well that’s ridiculous. I can’t properly respond without careful thought.
BOOTH: Can’t we just make it a drinking game?
SWEETS: No. This is a valuable, psychological tool, Agent Booth. When you respond viscerally we can get to the root of your emotional issues and figure out what binds you two together as partners.
BOOTH: Donuts.
SWEETS: Beg your pardon?
BOOTH: Donuts. Glazed donuts. I see ‘em right there.
BRENNAN: Because you had no breakfast. You’re hungry.
BOOTH: I’m starving.
BRENNAN: Yeah.
Brennan’s response is so pure there. She knows her partner 🙂
SWEETS: No, that’s not the proper response.
BRENNAN: Of course it is, I’m explaining why he said “donuts”.
SWEETS: The point of the exercise is not to explain, but to respond. Okay? Children can do this.
BRENNAN: Because it’s childish.
I love when they playfully torture Sweets.
SWEETS: Can we just try it, please?
BOOTH: All right, okay, fine, here we go. Are you ready? Hunger.
BRENNAN: Sex.
BOOTH: Whoa.
BRENNAN: Horse.
BOOTH: Cowboy.
BRENNAN: Child.
BOOTH: Baby.
BRENNAN: Booth.
BOOTH: What, what do you think I’m a baby?
BRENNAN: You’re a father.
BOOTH: Oh. Mother.
BRENNAN: Birth.
Brennan drops her baby bombshell.
BRENNAN: But you need to be tested, of course. What, is something wrong?
BOOTH: Yeah. Okay. You don’t just go around asking for people’s sperm.
But, pause this game, there is a case! B&B rush off.
BRENNAN: You’re the one who’s always touting parenthood, implying that my life is incomplete because I don’t have a child.
BOOTH: I know, but this is kind of sudden.
BRENNAN: Hmm, perhaps you don’t want to help me.
BOOTH: Of course I do.
(I love his instantaneous response. Of course, he always wants to help her!)
BRENNAN: So you’ll do it?
BOOTH: I’ll think about it.
(Spoiler Alert)
BRENNAN: What? I don’t understand. It’s a simple request. I’m sure you engage in masturba…
BOOTH: Whoa.
BOOTH: Okay, we’ll talk about it later.
Brennan has the whole wine apparatus taken to the lab. They fish in the wine for clues. Brennan gets personal.
CAM: Bingo! A chunk of liver, enough for a tox screen.
FISHER: My guess—you’ll find a high alcohol content.
So casual 🙂
BRENNAN: Tibia. I’ve decided to have a baby. Capitulum.
CAM: Wait. Baby, like a small human?
BRENNAN: Yes. I know I’ve had no interest in the past. But neither did you and you seem to find parenthood very fulfilling.
CAM: Uh, yes. I do. And you brought this up now… why?
BRENNAN: Well, I wanted to give you notice. I’ll be needing some time off when the baby comes. About six weeks I imagine. The staining makes it very difficult to see any anomalies on the bones.
HODGINS: Is there a father?
BRENNAN: Well, I’d like to use Booth’s sperm.
CAM: Booth. Whaddaya know?
HODGINS: Dr. Brennan wants to have a baby.
FISHER: I offered my sperm, but she’s leaning more toward Agent Booth.
ANGELA: You’re joking, right?
BRENNAN: Booth and I discussed it in Sweets’ office. He’s thinking it over now. Although, I don’t understand why he’d be protective of his semen.
ANGELA: You can’t just announce you’re having a baby and walk away.
BRENNAN: 15,000 babies are born every hour. It’s not all that exceptional, Angela.
ANGELA: Brennan… this is crazy.
BRENNAN: Why? I’m intellectually gifted, financially secure. Statistically I could expect to have an exceptional child.
ANGELA: Fine. Yes. Absolutely. But you do know how this is supposed to work, right? You get naked together. You devour each other in a passionate frenzy.
BRENNAN: Booth would think that would create an emotional bond between us.
ANGELA: Of course that’s ridiculous.
BRENNAN: I knew you’d understand.
ANGELA: Then why use Booth at all? Why don’t you use Fisher and his discount sperm?
BRENNAN: No, Booth has a larger mandible and a more prominent zygomatic than Fisher, as well as a more pronounced ratio between the width of his clavicles and his ilia.
A fine specimen, really. In lab terms, of course.
ANGELA: So, it’s because Booth is hot. Now we’re getting somewhere.
BRENNAN: Statistically, attractive people are more successful. I’m only thinking of the child, Angela.
ANGELA: Then do this right, sweetie.
BRENNAN: I am. Emotional ties are ephemeral and undependable. Look at you and Hodgins. You and Roxy. Booth and Rebecca. Booth and Cam.
ANGELA: Brennan, I…
BRENNAN: I appreciate your concern, but I have thought this through rationally.
Cam talks to Booth.
CAM: You and Brennan, you’re going to have a baby?
BOOTH: She told you.
CAM: She told everyone. It’s probably on the news by now.
BOOTH: I’m just donating.
CAM: So you decided?
BOOTH: No, no. I am deciding. I-N-G, ing.
CAM: I know you, Seeley. You’re going to do it. You want to do it without really doing it. But it’s still doing it even if you’re not doing it the way it should be done.
BOOTH: She wants a kid, okay? It’ll make her more personable with people.
CAM: And what will it do for you?
BOOTH: She’ll get what she wanted.
CAM: A piece of you?
Out in the field, Booth tries to see if Brennan has thought her plan through.
BRENNAN: You don’t have faith that I can do it?
BOOTH: What?
BRENNAN: You think I’d be a good mother, don’t you?
BOOTH: Yeah, of course.
BRENNAN: I know sometimes you don’t think I’m empathetic. And it can be difficult for me sometimes. But I would love my child, Booth, I would.
BOOTH: I know. I—I know that, Bones.
BRENNAN: I know people disapprove. If you’re uncomfortable, Fisher sells his sperm monthly, he’s very intelligent and…
BOOTH: Oh, Fisher? Fi—Oh, no, you are not having Fisher’s kids. You’d be giving birth to the spawn of Satan, okay? I’ll do it.
BRENNAN: No obligation. I don’t want you to feel any obligation.
BOOTH: I’ll do it. Don’t worry about it, okay? It’s your kid, it’s totally yours.
BRENNAN: Not worried about it.
BOOTH: I’m just saying I’ll do it.
B&B speak to the wife of the victim.
BOOTH: There was a domestic disturbance report filed approximately one month before your husband disappeared. Can you explain that?
JENNY: Our neighbor heard us arguing. That’s all. She called the police.
BRENNAN: The report says it was more than an argument, Mrs. Holt.
JENNY: I threw some dishes. But not at Spencer. It was just the pregnancy hormones, you know? I would never hurt Spencer.
The Fisher & Hodgins comedy hour.
HODGINS: You know when it doesn’t contain human remains, Bedford Creek makes an excellent cab. It’s very full-bodied. It’s like an Australian Shiraz.
FISHER: I only drink diet soda. I’m hoping the preservatives can add some stability to my life.
HODGINS: Man, I can barely get wine stains out of my shirt, let alone a skeleton.
FISHER: But your shirt isn’t composed of calcium. Oh, my God. I can clean them. This is weird. Something good is happening.
HODGINS: Take a deep breath; I’m sure it’ll pass.
Fast forwarding….
Booth checks in with Sweets.
BOOTH: I’m fine, great. Turns out that, uh, the victim might have been sleeping with Mortenson’s wife, huh? Jealousy, always a good motive.
SWEETS: Yeah, that’s good. But right now, I’m more interested in whether you decided to inseminate Dr. Brennan.
BOOTH: God, you know. Don’t say it like that.
SWEETS: I’m sorry. I’m interested in whether you decided to provide your semen for her fertilization. BOOTH: Saying it like that is worse.
SWEETS: Okay, well, I could go with “baby daddy” but that just seems even more…
BOOTH: I’m gonna do it. Hey, I’ve already made the deposit. That’s right. Apparently, I am a god. That’s right. Motile sperm count: 28.8 million. I could start my own country.
BOOTH: Just… I got a little, you know, anxious at the clinic.
SWEETS: Anxious?
BOOTH: Anxious. Don’t get all shrinky on me.
BOOTH: It’s normal to imagine things?
SWEETS: Well, not pink elephants, but…
BOOTH: No, no, no, of course not. Like, um, baby things.
SWEETS: It’d be odd if you didn’t.
BOOTH: Ha! It’d be odd if I didn’t. You’re my guy. That’s all I needed to hear. Thanks, Sweets. Thanks, uh, I gotta go, you know, take care of somebody.
The team talks everything over.
ANGELA: It’s none of our business.
CAM: Exactly right.
ANGELA: Oh, that kid is gonna be so cute, though.
CAM: Please, we’re gonna go nuts.
ANGELA: I bought it a little onesie today.
Sweets brings B&B in for another group chat.
BRENNAN: Well, I thought that these sessions were meant for you to see how we interact as partners. How does this relate?
SWEETS: You’re using Agent Booth to have a child. You don’t see how that might relate to your partnership?
BRENNAN: It has nothing to do with our work.
SWEETS: Okay, um, let me just organize my thoughts here.
BRENNAN: It’s not like I’m going to be bringing the child along when we interrogate someone.
BOOTH: Ah, but you might decide to breastfeed. It is healthier.
BRENNAN: Oh, that’s true. So, yes, there might be some crossover. I can see that now. I’m sorry, go on.
SWEETS: I think you need to acknowledge that there are some emotional considerations that you might be denying.
BRENNAN: Like what?
SWEETS: There are sperm banks that guarantee high IQs and exceptional physical prowess, yet you specifically chose Agent Booth. Why?
BRENNAN: He has traits like courage and compassion and empathy that would be tremendous assets to my child. Sperm banks don’t catalog those traits.
BOOTH: Did you just say something nice?
BRENNAN: No, I gave an objective evaluation.
BOOTH: Oh, because it sounded like you said something nice.
BRENNAN: No.
SWEETS: How can you two not see what is going on here?
Angela with the tough love.
ANGELA: Did you ever think, what if Booth is the perfect father for your child? Not just his stuff, but him. What if you’re throwing away the chance to have a family, a real family, because you’re scared?
BRENNAN: Scared? Why would I be scared? I’ve been to Rwanda, to Iraq…
ANGELA: Listen, you just said you wanted to do this alone because feelings are ephemeral. So is life, Brennan. We’re here one minute, and then we’re gone the next. You should know that better than anybody. If you keep living trying to protect yourself, nothing is ever gonna touch you.
We get a killer and a motive but it’s mixed up with Stewie so….whatever. Fast forwarding again…
And just as easily as they broke up…
HODGINS: Man, just when you think you know what’s what. Man, we can’t take anything for granted, can we?
ANGELA: Why is it so easy to forget that?
HODGINS: Ange, when we split, either one of us could’ve stopped it. It would’ve been easy.
ANGELA: I know.
HODGINS: It would be just as easy… to begin again.
And more awards for ED and DB’s fine work:
BOOTH: Would you come in there with me, to the operating room?
BRENNAN: No, I’ll see you in Recovery.
BOOTH: Oh, come on, what are you gonna do, sit in the waiting room and read all those old magazines for hours?
BRENNAN: I’m not a neurologist, Booth, or a surgeon.
BOOTH: Yeah, but you’re a genius. That’s good enough for me. Plus, you’ll know if they’re screwing up.
BRENNAN: I’ll ask.
BOOTH: Listen, Bones, if I don’t make it…
BRENNAN: Booth, you’re gonna be fine.
BOOTH: Yeah, but if I’m not… I want you to have my stuff. You know, for a kid.
BRENNAN: Booth.
BOOTH: I want you to. You’re gonna be a really good mom.
BRENNAN: You’re gonna be fine, Booth. I’ll be right here.
BOOTH: I’m ready.
So, so much to unpack here.
What do you make of Brennan’s desire to have a child? Too sudden? Does it make sense?
Aside from the Fox-show-crossover-for-ratings addition of Stewie, what did you think of Booth’s agreement to be a sperm donor for Brennan? How would he have handled it if they had proceeded with the plan and Brennan conceived?
*One thing I noticed is their quick acknowledgement of what the other was saying and to help the other throughout the episode. So in tune with each other throughout:
SWEETS: Whatever Agent Booth says, you respond with whatever word or phrase pops into your head.
BOOTH: Donuts. Glazed donuts. I see ‘em right there.
BRENNAN: Because you had no breakfast. You’re hungry
_________________________
BRENNAN: Hmm, perhaps you don’t want to help me.
BOOTH: Of course I do.
_______________________________
BOOTH: Would you come in there with me, to the operating room? BRENNAN: No, I’ll see you in Recovery.
BOOTH: Yeah, but you’re a genius. That’s good enough for me. BRENNAN: I’ll ask.
Ugh, why aren’t they real life?!?!?!?
Guys, listen to Booth, and just stop what you are doing. We are getting to the end of the season! Critic in the Cabernet! Anyone have any pre-thoughts before we review and remember?
Boots & Blazers 