Discussion Springboard: The Proof in the Pudding

The primary purpose of non-news, unintentionally political (because everything can be political) television is to entertain the masses. This is a fact that needs to be stated because of the level of seriousness pop culture bloggers like myself tend to place on the medium. The purpose of television in the long run is to entertain you and make you feel like that last 30 minutes to an hour you spent on your couch was well spent. Perhaps it made you smile a little. It probably isn’t necessary to mention that they would greatly appreciate it if you bought the DVD, too.

Now let me go on the record for saying that the sugar-filled good cheer is nice but largely a waste of time, especially given the studies out there that prove doing so ultimately unhealthy both physically and emotionally. For that reason I tend to hold TV in high regard when it can do more. Entertainment television should ultimately aim higher. Try making people think. Try making people consider an issue in another light. When television functions as a strong conversation piece, above merely asking if someone thought “Pants on the Ground” was hilarious, then it achieves something worthwhile.

Last week Fox aired an episode of Bones that I think achieves just that. I’ve written a lot about Bones in the past, and I have to admit that it’s for more personal reasons than for pointing out the significance of the series. This time around it’s quite meaningful. The Jeffersonian crew is forced by a government agency to examine the remains of the apparently exhumed John F. Kennedy. They examine the wounds and even perform an experiment to determine if such shots could have been accomplished by a lone gunman. The experiment, featuring Booth in the roll of the sniper, proves almost entirely successful.

Almost successful because the team then determined that one of the exit wounds provides evidence for a projectile fired from another direction, suggesting a second gunman. This depresses Booth because, if the body is indeed JFK’s, then the government lied. Booth was a sniper for the army, and he’s killed over 50 people in the name of the United States. As pointed out by Dr. Saroyan, that’s a lot of blood on one person’s hands. The only way that Booth can get through the day is through faith in the government – that it is the best, that it doesn’t lie, etc. See the episode below.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/120185/bones-the-proof-in-the-pudding

This is an excellent branching off point for discussion about the current war and our troops. For those on the more liberal end of the spectrum, it is easy to speak out against the war actions. All the time. It is sometimes appropriate to do so, but there are times when it is more than appropriate to shut up about it. Our soldiers are not always involved in war by choice. It is their job when they sign up for the military. Some people may even say joining the military was their calling. Regardless, shoving it in their faces that we should not even be over there and telling them that we’re fighting battles based on lies is probably the most inappropriate thing one can do. There are horrors faced in battle or even sometimes just near the conflict that most of us will never know.

Obviously, there lies my stance on the issue. Like I said, this episode merely serves as a springboard for discussion about how to deal with our returning troops. The truth is always important, but there is a time and a place for things. Should Brennan have been more forthcoming with the truth for her respected colleague (for whom she has unsatisfied sexual urgings), or did she do the right thing? What would you do? What do you do when you talk to people in the military?

Bones: Season 5, episode 1 – clever inversion

Last week I watched the season premiere of Fox’s Bones approximately 1.5 times. Something didn’t sit right with me upon each viewing. The episode wasn’t particularly bad, but there was a little something that was off. Off until I thought about it.

The season premiere was an exercise in inversion, although not blatantly so. A true inversion for the series would involve putting the stars in the background and letting the supporting cast run with everything, which I argue would make far superior episodes. An additional technique for inversion would be to literally play out events backwards – but no one currently wants Bones to become Memento.

The first clue I found for the inversion was in the musical interlude/montage segment found roughly 12 minutes into the episode. The musical cue felt out of place to me, since moments like those are usually reserved for the latter portion of the second act or the beginning of the third to lead into the denouement. I worried that maybe they blew their use of Cindy Lauper’s music too soon due to over eagerness, but it’s a clue that things are off. Obviously, things are off because Booth is returning to work – but the episode wants the viewers to feel that sense of uneasiness Booth must be feeling.

The larger inversion within the episode was the focus on Booth’s proving how tough he is despite his supposed fragileness. This is a theme of early Bones episodes, but the focus was usually on Brennan. Brennan would get caught in sticky situations and have to fight her way out, proving that she was capable. Booth here needs to prove that he is capable, so he gets to prove himself as a capable badass in saving the usually capable-herself Dr. Brennan. Longtime viewers will note precisely how odd it was that Brennan couldn’t defend herself against a scalpel-wielding doctor, but it was a matter of inconsistent writing for the sake of some greater purpose. It was a bad decision with good intentions, though.

These inversions are both minor without something larger to encapsulate them both. The major inversion is the obvious one in the focus being on the romantic tension rather than the crime at hand. The point of Bones is that the characters solve murder mysteries while the main characters make loving eyes at one another. Purposely reversing that dynamic makes for an odd-feeling episode. One that shouldn’t happen again until the series ends.

It is absolutely wonderful that Bones is willing to experiment like this, especially so late in its run. Not only have they had incorporated specters, haunting memories that somehow manipulate physical reality (inexplicably), and a dream sequence finale, but they have now taken an episodes usual elements and placed them in the wrong sequence of importance. Does it work? Some longtime fans have pissed on the dream sequence, but overall these things are consumed vigorously and deconstructed for further (mayhaps incorrect) meaning. For someone who isn’t quite a hardcore fan but enjoys the ride provided by the show nonetheless, I can only say that I admire experimentation but fear that it reveals a deeper lack of direction. It’s great that the show isn’t just another CSI rip-off, but I don’t like the idea of the show becoming too much of a foo-foo romantic-comedy either. I know that eventually Booth and Brennan will get together, but that looks to be best reserved for enriching the background elements of the show than the pointed parts of each episode.

Bones – seasons 3 and 4

With the fifth season premiere of Bones looming ahead on September 17th, I felt it was important to catch up so that I could watch the series in real time. Television is so much more easily consumed when on disc (or other media), which may skew any show more favorably than it might deserve. Seeing a show in its true, once-a-week environment is the true test of its standing. It’s ironic I say this because I managed to finish two seasons of the show within a month.

Bones continues to be a fun show to watch, but I can’t help but to complain that it could be darker. It’s a show about examining corpses, but it’s mostly lighthearted – and season 4 gets lighter and lighter. But I’m getting ahead of myself, since I should technically discuss the seasons in order.

Right off the bat, season 3 introduces the much needed element of serialization to the series. The first episode brings in a serial killer known only as the Gormogon, who kills and eats people but uses a single bone from each victim to build skeletons. The Gormogon always has an apprentice, meaning that throughout the season the Booth and Brennan squad are on the lookout for two culprits. This is great, except for the fact that out of a 15 episode season, the Gormogon comprises less than a handful of episodes.

Did I say 15 episodes? Yeah, the season was cut short due to the Writer’s Guild Strike. The result was a rushed season climax, in which the Gormogon’s apprentice is narrowed down to being one of three main characters in the Jeffersonian: Hodgins, Zack, or newly acquired psychologist Sweets. My understanding is that fans wanted it to be Dr. Sweets because he was the newest and therefore least familiar character, but they didn’t get their wish. In a boneheaded move on the writers’ parts, it was decided that Zack would be the Gormogon’s apprentice because he was swayed by the Gormogon’s logic. Zack is a great character, so I will not mince words about this – the decision was stupid, and the Gormogon climax could have waited another season.

What wasn’t stupid was the inclusion of Dr. Lance Sweets to the team at the Jeffersonian, although he isn’t a true squint because he works for the FBI. Sweets at first appears to be continuing the work of Dr. Gordon Gordon from the previous season. I say it appears that way because it’s the only thing that makes sense, despite the fact that for some reason Brennan is now involved in the therapy. Somehow he also manages to work on cases with the crew regardless of the fact that it results in a dual relationship the likes of which would prove problematic for real life psychologists. Anyway, that’s not a bother to me because the character is a expert profiler and brings an extra bit of humanity to the lab.

I fear the failure of the Gormogon plotline has resulted in the abandonment of the serial season. Season 4 lacks such a serial element, but there is a bit of a subplot with Booth that builds toward a climax involving Stewie Griffin from Family Guy. I like the idea of Booth developing a brain tumor and seeing things, but a disgustingly blatant crossover with another Fox show – and a cartoon to boot? That’s ridiculous, and it’s indicative of the fact that the writers don’t really know what else to do. That and the Fox network is run by nuts. We knew that one already.

Much of season 4 felt too light and fanciful for me, and it’s clear the show is continuing based on the fact that it has a viewership and not because it has more story to tell. Hodgins and Angela end up not getting married for no reason except to create drama. Booth and Brennan go undercover at a circus, and the normally reserved and logical Brennan carries their knife-throwing act too far but also feels the need to walk the tightrope for no reason except because she did when she was a little kid (and figures out the cause of death in the case by falling). How about the episode involving the death of a Japanese girl, with the normal soundtrack changed to include sound cues from old samurai films? There is no excuse for “Double Death of the Dearly Departed”, although the alliteration in the episode title is commendable. The greatest atrocity of the season, though, is in the inclusion of Zack early on and his admission that he was not directly involved in murder – a retcon to preserve his innocence but ultimately show the writers’ failure to commit. Many of these decisions can be chalked up to fun, though.

I’m not allergic to fun, but I found myself drawn toward other elements in the season. Namely, the rotating cast of squint interns essentially auditioning (to the audience) to be Zack’s replacement. Each one had such a distinct personality that really brought something to the episodes, and I felt the presence of an outsider made the Jeffersonian feel more real. But I have an issue with the squinterns – for the most part, each one was used as a plot device. It was just too convenient and made the writing feel a little bit cheap.

I also enjoyed the continued use of Sweets, not only as a profiler but as someone compiling information on the working relationship of Booth and Brennan for a book on the anomaly of two opposites getting along so well. Really, he’s writing their love story, as he is used as the voice of the viewers who just want the two characters to jump on each other. Part of me keeps getting ticked off at the fact that Brennan continually dismisses psychology while in and out of session with the good doctor, but it’s hard to be too offended when Sweets is right about things 90+% of the time and even had his suspicions confirmed by Dr. Gordon Gordon.

I feel compelled to write something on Brennan’s revelation toward the end of the season that she wants to have a child. I hear that it was a big deal for Bones fans, who think it was totally out of character. I felt that way at first until she used the word “progeny”, and then it all clicked for me. Brennan is ultimately narcissistic, and she wants to have another her. Also, it could be a way of subconsciously reaching out to Booth and wanting him involved in her personal life, by asking for him to be the father.

And then there was the season finale, which took place all in Booth’s post-surgerized head. In this dream reality, Booth and Brennan are married and running a successful lab-themed bar, which just meant that the lab set was changed into a bar. A murder takes place, and every recurring character from the season (from Zach to the squinterns) not only works in the lab but is also a suspect. I thought this was a brilliant way to make up for the previous season’s finale, as it was essentially a similar plot but done right. If you’re going to suggest that a cast member was the murderer, give the viewers an actual full cast to work with. The whole story played out well, despite the fact that it didn’t mean anything for the season. Then it ended with Booth waking up and saying, “Who are you?” to Brennan – which suggests amnesia and therefore a major jumping of the shark. Hart Hanson, the creator of the show, has gone on record saying that Booth doesn’t have amnesia and really was asking if Brennan was the one he knew from reality or the one from his dream, but I think he’s just backtracking.

Bones continues to be an interesting show with a strong cast of characters, and I look forward to seeing where season 5 goes. At this point the show is all about the revelation of the feelings Booth and Brennan have for each other. This isn’t a romance show, by the way, but at least there’s a direction in mind. I just don’t know how they plan to stretch that out for another two seasons. I think at this point I’m interested in seeing how they stretch things out more than I am in what may occur in each individual episode. Regardless, I’ll still be watching. I really enjoy the show, but I fear that the choices being made have made the series a bit weaker than it ought to be.

Bones – Season 2

I wasn’t quite sure where to go with this entry in light of the fact that I finished the first season less than one month ago. Overall, my opinion has not changed, and it shouldn’t. There really shouldn’t be much more to say unless the show changed drastically between seasons. Bones is still about Dr. Temperance Brennan, a renown anthropologist celebrated for her forensic skills in studying bones as well as for her mystery novels; and Agent Seeley (which is Olde English for “silly”, it turns out) Booth, a former Navy sniper and current FBI agent renown for his funny socks and loud belt buckles. Change isn’t necessary.

Except for one, apparently. Daniel Goodman, director of the Jeffersonian Institute and only strong black character, was removed in season 2 to make room for his replacement in the new Head of the Forensic Division, Dr. Camille Saroyan. She’s Halfrican American, although that’s never broached – so just consider her a strong black female. She starts off great, butting heads with Dr. Brennan because it’s hard to have two strong women who are good at their jobs. After a few episodes, sadly, they make peace.

Dr. Saroyan is a sadly underdeveloped character, but this is due to her introduction during a season that’s all about relationships. In fact, that should have been the season’s title, similarly to how Heroes titles its volumes. Dr. Hodgins begins a romantic relationship with Angela Montenegro (whose half-Chinese heritage was revealed but her name left unexplained), Brennan briefly has a fling with an Agent Sully (who, in an attempt to make him appear too good to be true, seems to be a guy with no real direction or passion), and Booth has a fling with Saroyan (with whom he previously worked and had a fling). It seems to me that Saroyan’s character was created for the purpose of being a potential cog in the wheel of the expected blooming romance between Booth and Brennan. What expectations can one have for a character created just to mess with fans?

A lot, actually. With the continued underrepresentation of minorities on the show, I would hope that those they have would be quite realized. Saroyan is simply shown to be nearly as brilliant as Brennan in her own right (although her specialty is flesh) but with superior social skills – meaning, she can pass for normal. In a way, she’s everything that Brennan is not, or at least we’re told to accept her this way when she gives decent relationship advice and whatnot. But that’s the extent of her character so far, which is shameful. What they did well, however, is not actually make race an issue for the leads. That’s appreciable.

Also noteworthy this season was Silly Booth’s reaction to breaking up with Saroyan because he felt it was wrong to interweave work and love, watching Brennan let Sully go after the man offered her a chance to sail away, and watching a serial killer die via falling after he was unable to hold onto the man – he shot the clown head atop an ice cream truck because the music playing was making a phone conversation difficult. He gets sent to therapy with Dr. Gordon Wyatt, played by British actor Stephen Fry. Dr. Wyatt is a psychiatrist for the FBI but also very British. I found this interesting because I imagined that the FBI would want someone a little more homegrown crawling around in the heads of its agents. Also interesting was the fact that they called for a psychiatrist instead of a fully trained psychotherapist. The difference is rarely acknowledged in the media, but psychiatrists specialize in medication and psychotherapists specialize in rooting out deep-seeded issues through talk therapy.

Obviously, this is an interest of mine because I studied to be the latter. Television psychologists amaze me because they are able to do things that real-life professionals cannot without risking their licenses. Wyatt has Booth build him a BBQ pit in their first episode together, which would be an issue of a potential dual relationship is the client is rendering services to the therapist or simply an issue of a therapist’s using his influence and power over a client. (It being the beginning of their relationship, it’d be hard to accuse him of such in a court of law. However, people have sued and won for lesser offenses.) Dr. Wyatt has also had Booth meet him at his house, which is generally a bad idea for a therapist. He also readily involved Brennan in a session in a public restaurant. He’s also met with Angela as per Brennan’s recommendation, which gets him a little too involved in the workings of the Squints and Silly Booth. These are observations more than they are complaints. If anyone has seen In Treatment, one might be able to note how the usual television representation of therapists who can do whatever they want is a lot more interesting than more realistic portrayals. (Note: I would love, love, love to see Rogerian Therapy portrayed realistically on television. I think it would actually singlehandedly kill the market for therapy, though.)

I haven’t yet talked about the individual episodes of the season, but that’s because they’re basically more of the same. The standouts are the episodes featuring Dr. Brennan’s father, the Howard Epps episodes (Eppsisodes?), and “Aliens in a Spaceship” – especially due to its essentially being left unresolved. Only in those episodes does it feel like anything matters, like anything is actually on the line. The rest are just filler somewhat void of substance, no matter what they try to do with the relationships and the therapy. It’s good filler, but it’s filler nonetheless. This is why I can only say that the season was a good season and not a great season.

Bones is at its best when it treats its characters like whole beings. I don’t just mean Brennan and Booth, since they are the only real people on the show. I mean the whole cast needs to be treated like whole beings. The writers are so close to that, but not quite. The Squints are said to go home at the end of the day, but the viewer is never given much indication that they don’t live in pods under the Jeffersonian aside from hearing that Zach lives in an apartment above one of Hodgins’ garages, Hodgins lives in a giant estate, and Angela has a place to put her clothes other than in Hodgins’ closet. When Zach gets drafted, though, the viewer feels something. Little moments like that need to be more included. Hell, how about a scene of him receiving the letter in his apartment? How about something! I keep telling people that the characters are what set Bones apart from CSI drivel, but a firm look at its character development compared to other shows that I watch (hell, let’s bring up Heroes again) makes me feel like somewhat of a liar. Somewhat, not entirely. The characters are good, and the show ultimately is as well.

I do have one major gripe for something I find almost inexcusable. There is an episode in which it is revealed that a mother killed her impaired daughter because she feared that no one would be able to care for the child if she were to pass. (She had HIV, but her medications began to work.) Also in this episode, Bones was coming to terms with the fact that her mother abandoned her as a child because of the dangerous life she would have had to face otherwise. In a closing moment in the episode, Bones sits with the mother of the child and basically says, “I know why you did that, and I can understand it.” She didn’t condone it, but it almost seemed that way. It really bothered me. Turns out series creator Hart Hanson wrote that episode, and I think that was supposed to be another moment where Brennan’s focus on facts and logic were supposed to be front and center, another reveal of how she can think outside of the normal cultural mindset and seem different to us. The problem is that there still isn’t enough of that going on in the series to make this seem acceptable. If you ask me, it’s kind of screwed up. I would definitely like to hear other people’s opinions on it.

Oh, and a Bonus Fact in case you weren’t already sold on the season: Alex Winter, the man who originally portrayed Bill of Bill and Ted fame, played a pimp in the episode “The Girl in the Gator”. Reasonable because, like it or not, Bill is definitely very pimp.

Bones – season 1

Bones was originally conceived in early 1970 as a spin-off series from the original Star Trek. It featured DeForest Kelley playing the titular doctor as he went from planet to planet on a mission of healing the galaxy while also finding himself wrapped up in minor murder mysteries featuring different cultures. The concept was of an unwilling detective in a consistently fish-out-of-water scenario. Unfortunately, Paramount could not get behind that. Instead, they went with the now underappreciated Filmation series Star Trek: The Animated Series. (Urban legend suggests that the reason Bones was not produced was because Paramount took issue with the idiosyncratic episode titling. There were concerns about convincing the network and TV Guide to list a series of titles that basically read, “Dammit, I’m a doctor, not a(n) X.”) Too bad, too. We may have missed out on the most intelligent series ever produced.

Flash forward to a very special day in the Fall of 2005, when the first episode of the now resurrected Bones franchise was shared with the public on the Fox network of all places. Bones is now the nickname of brilliant forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan who solves murder mysteries with her crew of nerds – called squints – while growing as a person due to her self-imposed fish-out-of-water status. Her emersion into the human world is helped along by Agent Seeley Booth, a hardworking FBI agent who has no trouble reminding the viewer every few episodes that he was a sniper in US Army. (Fun fact: I doubt the writers thought of this, but “seele” in German means “soul”, making Booth very soulful.) These characters, respectively, are played by Zooey Deschanel’s less lively and less attractive older sister and…

David Boreanaz of Buffy and Angel fame. He played the latter of the Whedon characters, in case you were wondering. I mention this because with Bones, I figured he was Bones before I started watching the show. We all make mistakes.

The most interesting thing about Bones is the characters, not the actual murder mysteries. To some, this is a modern day Moonlighting, with two characters sharing top billing and a continually unresolved sexual tension. To my knowledge, the two characters have not yet consummated anything after four seasons, so Bones currently lacks boning. That’s fine.

All kidding aside, the two characters represent a very different way to approach the core of human beings. Bones’ primary interest is in bones and determining who people are from the wear, tear, and usage put on people internally. Booth’s primary interest is in how people represent themselves and their actions. Every episode is about Bones’ reconstruction of individuals from the bone out while Booth deconstructs them from the surface to the soul – culminating in their collaboration and determining the person’s core somewhere in the middle. It’s truly fascinating, especially as it’s all played out as kind of a buddy cop dramedy with roles fluctuating between them.

After writing that, I can respect why so many feminists seem to like the show. Many, I’m sure, like Brennan’s tough-as-nails character. However, the rest probably appreciate the fluid dynamic.

The supporting characters are great as well, but they’re not the draw. Interestingly enough, Bones works with a team of squints while Booth seemingly has no friends on the force. (Save for one episode, but that didn’t turn out very well.) The squints represent various stages of brilliance versus the ability to be social. Zack is Bones’ graduate student assistant and shows how Bones must have been when she was his age – socially isolated due to an inability to connect on a more mundane, human level. Hodgins has greater social skills than Zack, occasionally showing that he can get laid, but is a conspiracy theorist who doesn’t seem to respect people enough to give them a say. Then there’s Angela, the brilliant artist with all of the social skills in the world; but she’s unsurprisingly not very scientific. The reason they exist in the show is for the two leads to trip over them with exposition for their relationship and occasionally muck up, or clear up, the works. But they’re actually pretty great characters.

What initially bothered me about the show was that it gave me kind of a Buffy vibe in the character of Brennan. There was something of an action girl who may occasionally be called wrong but never is that bothered me all too much. That and the fact that Brennan is an ice queen who comes across as condescending and inhuman. It gets explained as the series progresses, although the degree to which it melts her heart into yours is to be determined by how much of a bastard you can be. (Note: I’m a pretty big bastard. I’ve just started the second season and still find her annoying.) Brennan’s family vanished on Christmas day when she was 16, she went into foster care after pushing her older brother away, and she buried herself in trying to understand the world intellectually because that was the only way she could cope. An armchair TV psychologist could easily diagnose her with OCPD, a bit of mania (suggesting some level of Bipolar Disorder), and the frequent use of intellectualization as a defense mechanism. Hell, she even teaches intellectualization to her protégé in one episode to help him be more professional when examining the remains of a child – do not refer to the corpse as a person but rather as “the victim”. And on that level the show is brilliant. She’s not a tough-as-nails but also brilliant scientist. She’s a brilliant yet fragile and slightly disturbed woman who may not be able to find peace until she finds out what happened to her parents.

The episodes in the first season are mostly good, with a few misses as far as I’m concerned. One big miss was the Christmas episode, in which Brennan bitches to people about the futility of giving gifts because her parents disappeared that day. As expected, her icy heart melts just a little bit by the end of the episode. The episode served well in delivering character development for everyone (Booth has a son, and Zack’s family from Michigan(!!!) loves him despite his profound quirkiness), but as a story it just plain sucked. The last two episodes, so far, are my favorites because they delivered cases to the two leads that struck them a little too close to home and took them out of their comfort zones. And they were written very well.

Another bother that came to me is the usual one concerning television shows – the underrepresentation of minorities. The additional nag of this is that the very white Jeffersonian that serves as the base and home of the squints is supposedly the height of intellectualism. Sure, there’s Angela Montenegro, with the seemingly Hispanic name (while the actress herself is part Chinese, which heeds only the voice of complaint but not a full diatribe right now); but she’s merely an artist and often shown to be the least book-learned of the group. Then there’s Daniel Goodman, the African American administrator of the Jeffersonian Institute who rarely involves himself in the cases. He is shown to be a good guy and the man in charge, but Bones initially complains about him for loaning her out to the FBI. It’s made clear that he does much more for the image of the facility than for the pursuit of truth. In one episode, white Hodgins complains about Goodman’s not wanting to reveal the information they have about an ancient specimen for that very fact. When he comes around to Goodman’s way of thinking, he thinks up the strategy for how to keep the information under wraps for the time being. Then there was the episode where, albeit its being comedic, Bones got an African American club riled up due to her commenting (positively) that the music and dance patterns mirrored their tribal origin. At least one African American woman stated the good doctor’s meaning, but the unnamed character also came across as pretty pretentious and seemed only present only to say, “Hey, blacks can be smart, too! See that one person out of a dozen or so who are pissed?”

But if I were to stop watching television shows due to under- and misrepresentations, then I would have to give up on television altogether. Bones has yet to justify itself as a show worth abandoning. I’m one season in, and I already wish to be completely up to date with the series. The characters are fun, the overarching plot concerning Dr. Brennan’s parents is interesting, and the episodes themselves are clever enough to keep me moving forward as well as to elevate this above the usual CSI crime drama crap that infested television some many moons ago. I just wonder how long they can keep this going. Eventually, Brennan needs to discover the truth. For how long can they dangle that carrot in front of viewers before we get tired? I don’t know what happens in later seasons because I’ve had no desire to read spoilers, so I’m assuming that four years of carrot dangling isn’t yet too long.

Bonus: The Drinking Game Rules

• Every time Booth mentions he was a sniper, take a shot
• Every time Brennan says she doesn’t know what that means/is, take a shot
• Every time Hodgins pisses someone off by not listening, take a shot
• Every time Zack presents himself as abnormal, take a shot
• Every time Brennan inappropriately wears something low cut to a crime scene, take a shot and mentally prepare a letter for the network’s consideration
• Every time you hear the name Seeley and squirm because it’s a dumb name, take a few shots to cleanse your mind
• Every time you say to yourself, “This is a science fiction show! There’s no way we have the technology to reconstruct faces from bones and render it in 3D with various scenarios acted out – all in a hologram…”, find something harder to drink and up the ante for yourself

Special Die Early Rule

• Every time the name of the show is said throughout an episode, take a shot