Hey, Bones fans! Okay, some of the Bones cold opens have been really gross, but a bunch of rats feasting on a corpse was not the best after-dinner vision. Here are your Bones Top Five Moments!
Well, sort of. It’s the middle of the night for B&B, and they Skype with Parker in London, It seems Booth has planned an adventure for the two of them hiking the Appalachian trail. As they start to talk about it, Parker says his ride is there early to take him to school. So much for family bonding time. Parker also manages to look super uncomfortable even with only ten seconds of conversation.
The cause for all of the awkwardness is discovered in Parker’s Skype call to Brennan. Goodness but she’s suddenly the go-to sensitive and understanding one. Anyway, he got into this awesome creative writing program at Oxford, and he doesn’t know how to tell Dad he’d rather do that. He enlists Brennan for help. It’s kind of cute how he consistently calls her Bones.
She does tell Booth who seems to not understand why Parker would throw away a summer of fun to do work. But Booth does come around when he sees a sample of Parker’s writing and declares it better than Brennan’s, who of course disagrees. He also says life is to be enjoyed. When Brennan asks if he’s worried Parker will turn out like her, he says if that happens, he’ll be the proudest dad ever. Awww…
Things do not go well from the start. She seems star-struck and only parrots back what Brennan says by rephrasing it in simpler terms. I must say Brennan is hugely patient and does try to draw her out in ways that don’t insult her but basically tells Mills to get a mind of her own.
The situation is further complicated when Mills jumps to a conclusion. Rut roh. Hodgins tries to warn her, but Mills announces proudly “I found cause of death!” as she waves around the bone. Brennan is going to lose it on her soon. And sure enough when all she does is kiss butt, Brennan again has to remind her to have an original thought.
When she does get one, she calls Cam to tell her. Sammy hasn’t even seen the worst of Brennan. And maybe she never will. Brennan points out a number of mistakes she made, said it delayed the progress of the investigation, and she’s fired.
Surprisingly, Brennan’s not horribly cruel about it and when Mills cries, puts an arm around her and says There, there” even if it is stilted and awkward. Hodgins and Angela try to go to bat for Sammy, since she cleaned up around the lab during her work-study program and they considered her a friend, but it’s no use. I’m with Brennan on this one. I don’t even know how they would put Sammy in a lab with Brennan, since I probably could have done a better job, and she’s not known to suffer fools gladly. Bye, Sammy!
He’s Scott Hill, a sophomore.
Cam is pretty excited to be at the Lynwood University bio lab, and since it doesn’t have to do with food or video games, Aubrey has his serious face on to remind Cam they’re on the job. And, ew! I guess the rats ate themselves to bursting while feasting on Scott. Is there an eating disorder program for the poor critters?
But the answer might lie in that they were being starved for Pavlovian conditioning, so the killer thought it would be a good body dump location. This is getting grosser by the minute. And after Cam makes a crack about how the sound of a bell can make rats do pretty much anything due to their tiny little brains, all of the teams’ phones go off, and they hurriedly grab them to take a look. WAH WAH. At least they seem to understand the irony.
When Booth and Aubrey visit Scott’s roomie, McKay, and he’s told Scott’s dead, his “That’s awful” doesn’t even have the emotion you’d summon for describing a bad meal. But he has finals, you know, so he has more important things on his mind. Apparently they didn’t get in each other’s way, since Scott spent all of his time with The Whippersnaps, which Aubrey identifies as an a cappella group.
When Aubrey shows off his research skills regarding The Whippersnaps, for some reason Booth turns into a luddite who announces the Internet is for social idiots, while the art of bowling is for people on a higher plane…because Aubrey looked up facts about the case they’re working on. So…what’s your point, Booth?
Anyway, A&B enter the Whipperspace where the group is practicing a lovely rendition of “After Midnight.” But when they’re done the leader, Jake, goes on a power trip, while others point out he needs to get his diva hand under control. Ummm…simmer down, guys.
Booth breaks up the slamfest with his shiny shield. Seems Jakey took Scott’s place, and once Scott’s name is mentioned, the two guys Jake was screaming at, Ted and Julian, both immediately accuse Jake of murder.
So, poor Scott can’t get any love, as the guys in his group promptly forgot about him five minutes after he was gone, what with the National Collegiate A Cappella Competition coming up, they don’t have time for this murder stuff. Why is nobody at least concerned for their own safety amid all of this self-centeredness?
By the way, Aubrey is fanboying all over the place, so we can add a cappella singing to his list of stuff he loses his mind over, and maybe he can stop looking down on Cam.
Jake also didn’t have time to report Scott missing and just stepped in to take his place. Plus, Scott dying is a real inconvenience, since they lost a tenor right before nationals.
Was Scott a horrible person, or was it everyone he surrounded himself with?
Jake turns A&B onto Ian Johnson, Scott’s ex-best friend and member of the Whippersnaps until Scott kicked him out. Ian was a legacy, I guess, since his dad was not only a part of the Whippersnaps but a former director. He’s now a lawyer and insists on being present for the interrogation of Ian.
Ian says Scott kicked him out of the group, because he wasn’t cutting it, but after hearing Ian’s voice, I can say Scott was either tone deaf or had some nefarious shenanigans going on. Aubrey agrees. Ian goes on to say that Scott was keeping secrets.
If you might have guessed, Aubrey knows more about this singing stuff than just looking it up on the internet. He whisper-confesses to Angela he used to sing a cappella in college in a way others might admit to something much more embarrassing they did during their college years. But, you know, he has a manly rep to protect. Anyway, as a result of his musical knowledge, he’s able to identify the arrangements Scott was doing were original and amazing and not at all having to do with the Whippersnaps’ current arrangements. He convinces Angela that whatever Scott was going through, will show up in his music.
Sure enough, they find a For Liz playlist and capture footage of Scott and Liz going into a closet together. A&B go to visit Liz, and aaaand…suddenly I’m in the movie Pitch Perfect with a female group, The Ginger Snaps, singing a cappella, only with gyrations. Also, that closet action wasn’t as sexy as it sounds. Aubrey realizes those arrangements were for Liz. Scott wanted her to join their group, which is why he kicked out Ian. Seems she could hit a note Ian couldn’t. Scott wanted more press at nationals and figured the novelty of the first girl to join the Whippersnaps would get them attention.
So, this meant they were both screwing over their respective groups. Not only that, but a month previously, Scott and five other members of the Whippersnaps came down with an unidentifiable strep-like infection that was created in the lab at the university.
A member of the Gingersnaps, Esther, is a research fellow at the lab. She apparently added a secret disease ingredient to her lip gloss and set about kissing multiple members of the Whippersnaps but knew nothing of Liz’s defection. She just wanted the awesome gigs they were getting. She goes on to say that even if Scott wanted to have Liz join the group, the bylaws prohibit it. When Aubrey points out that as director Scott would have been able to change them, he’s corrected. Ian’s father, the head of the Whippersnap Alumni Foundation, is the only one who could do that.
Anyway, Esther used her best “negotiation tactics” on Mr. Johnson, because she wanted to become a Whippersnap, and by that I’m sure she means she used everything in her seduction arsenal. But Mr. Johnson wasn’t having it.
Mr. J does admit to manhandling Scott, because he threatened to change the name of the group to the WHIPPERSNAPPERS if Mr. J didn’t make Liz part of their group. Oh, the horror! But that’s as far as it went. Sooo…Mr. J directs them back to Julian and Ted. You remember them, right? Anyway, they were more qualified to become director, but Scott blackmailed them about buying term papers.
The arrest of Julian and Ted brings on Julian’s lament that he cried at the end of Legally Blonde 2, so no way could he be a murderer. The interrogation includes blubbering and babbling, and how awesome Scott was as a director, so it worked out for the best. Hey, Scott even shared his anti-anxiety meds with Julian! Anyway, the ladder in the Whipperspace practice room doesn’t match the marks on Scott, so they get to sing another day.
Hodgins finds traces of meteorite in Scott’s skull. As it turns out, Scott’s “distraught” roomie, McKay, is an astrophysics major with a focus on geology. It’s always the quiet ones, right? So, McKay was the one on the anti-anxiety meds. He had a presentation to give for the astronomy fellowship and needed his meds, but since Scott had stolen them, he had a full-on panic attack and lost the fellowship. He threw the meteorite at Scott’s head, Scott stumbled, grabbed bookcase, and it fell on him and killed him. But instead of calling the police, McKay made the guy rat food.
Oh boy. Seems Hodgins secretly contacted a surgeon, Emil Hoffman, who is doing experimental surgery for nerve regeneration. If you were expecting Angela to jump for joy over this news, you’d be wrong. And it’s unfortunate we get a glimpse of the belligerent, jerky Hodgins we’ve been seeing for the past few weeks. He’s upset Angela isn’t happy for him and announces it’s his decision alone to make.
Angela finds out that one of Dr. Hoffman’s patients died in surgery. During this whole time, Hodgins has been bottle feeding and taking amazing care of the surviving rats, even giving them a luxurious condo. Angela points out that he cares more for the rats than himself, and the other ones all died because they were poked and prodded, so does he want to do the same to himself? Hodgins does come to his senses and agrees with her, so it took him a shorter time to go back to his old self. WHEW.
In the end, Booth gathers everyone to his house. He has a video tape? of Aubrey at the 2001 National Collegiate A Cappella Championship, courtesy of Mr. Johnson. I guess since Booth is old school he might own a VCR (look it up, kids). Any self-respecting luddite would. Aubrey has hair up to the ceiling and a really nice bowtie. They all rib him good-naturedly.
And so closes another Bones chapter. See you next episode!