S11.E15: The Fight In The Fixer

[WendyCR72]

The team investigates the body of a private investigator who was found frozen in ice, after being dumped in the Potomac. The victim, a man with many enemies, was a “fixer” who made sure his cllients’ problems got “resolved.”  Meanwhile, Aubrey is shocked to find information tied to his father’s whereabouts, Angela and Hodgins continue to work on their rocky relationship, Brennan and Booth get Christine’s first report card and criminal behaviorist Karen Delfs asks Aubrey out on a date.

[shapeshifter]

The episode was pretty tedious, but I liked the sunny outcomes to Reportcardgate and Cam getting to wear the jewelry (and Angela not having to), as well as Bones enjoying listening to her own voice on the answering machine instead of being angry about it.

While I'm happy to have more Aubrey, his plot arcs do not interest me. 

[mojoween]

I actually was starting to enjoy Booth's interactions with Karen.  He was clearly frustrated with her every time she opened her mouth and she either didn't notice or pretended not to.  But he wasn't a dick about it.

So based on that Ford ad Emily really talks like that?

[Julia]

At least creepy overshare psychologist lady is going?

It was kind of a meh for me. Wells is just so over the top spiteful and deliberately offensive that he kind of ruins any episode he's in, since I don't believe Cam would be willing to put up with his disruptiveness and bad attitude no matter how good he is. We have annoying commune squintern, and she's at least serving some kind of plot purpose by dating Aubrey (and probably being menaced by his dad, this being Bones). Can't we lose Wells?

[Clanstarling]

Wells is certainly my least favorite squintern. I would have liked to see him get his comeuppance on the screen. For all of his supposed superiority - crapping over the work and grades of a six year old speaks more to deep insecurity than confidence. (that psychological profile will cost you a nickel - just call me Lucy). I thought the did she or didn't she drama a bit much - Booth finally did what I thought should be the first thing to do - ask the teacher.

I'm glad Hodgins is getting back to normal, but this time it's Angela who's frustrating me. If she wants intimacy, and of course she does - it's important in a marriage, she needs to discuss it with him, not Cam.

I'm actually a little interested in Aubrey's background. So I'm kind of looking forward to the plot arc.

Edited May 13, 2016 by clanstarling
Because Aubrey isn't Avery. And this isn't Nashville.

[secnarf]

I was bored with the report card issue - I figured it out immediately and it just seemed silly.

The case was a bit more interesting and I'm looking forward to Aubrey's storyline with his father. I'm glad Hodgins is no longer being an ass but I'm quickly growing sick of the relationship drama with Angela.

[Lee4U]

I'm no genius and the first thing I thought of was that ink had run out and a different marker had to be used.  Come on show!  

[Beezella]

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I'm no genius and the first thing I thought of was that ink had run out and a different marker had to be used.  Come on show!  

I thought this as well, but my alternate thought was maybe Christine did do it because she was worried about how her overachiever mother might react to a less than perfect report card from her "perfect" daughter!

[immortalfrieza]

17 hours ago, Beezella said:

I thought this as well, but my alternate thought was maybe Christine did do it because she was worried about how her overachiever mother might react to a less than perfect report card from her "perfect" daughter!

Brennan has always had issues with accepting the idea that she is average in ANY respect whatsoever and that extends to her daughter to the point that she'll even refuse to believe direct evidence of that I was actually a little surprised to see Brennan being accepting of the evidence of guilt as she was, though she should have just called the teacher to clarify the situation in the first place. Having to simply change pens was the first thing I thought of when this whole thing was brought up.

I'm glad Karen is gone, she was just Sweets fused with Daisy without having anything either character had that was endearing whatsoever, not to mention she never really even contributed to the cases in ways that the rest of the team couldn't and didn't figure out on their own. When you make Daisy look like the better option you're a bad character.

Edited May 14, 2016 by immortalfrieza

[Panopticon]

I'm glad Karen is out the door,  but if I had a choice it would have been Obnoxious Squintern. The fact that Cam and Brennan continue to bring him into the lab makes them look bad at their jobs. They have a million options and there is nothing about him that is so special that he should be called rather than one of the others. Supposedly all of Brennan's squinterns are geniuses and despite his protestations he doesn't come off as especially talented to me. (Oddly, although Jessica is cartoonishly underdeveloped as a character I do buy that she's extraordinarily intelligent and driven.)  There's only a few episodes left and there's no reason for the show not to use the squintern characters who have actual uses and/or personalities. So of course promo suggests a new one next episode...

Hodgins doing experiments is love. So is Cam ending up with the jewelry. So is Booth being quietly good at his job while taking time out to amuse himself at Aubrey's expense.

I'm torn about the Aubrey backstory. On the one hand, I'm interested. On the other hand, this show already did "criminal father who walked out on his teenager years ago is back and spying on his child who is now firmly on the right side of the law" to absolute perfection with Brennan and Max.

[secnarf]

Upon re-watch: how did Booth/Brennan get the report card back intact after Hodgins did TLC on the ink sample?!

[Julia]

11 hours ago, Panopticon said:

II'm torn about the Aubrey backstory. On the one hand, I'm interested. On the other hand, this show already did "criminal father who walked out on his teenager years ago is back and spying on his child who is now firmly on the right side of the law" to absolute perfection with Brennan and Max.

Oh, that's interesting. I've been assuming Aubrey's dad is or is tied up with the new big bad.

Of course, I also think that about creepy overshare psychologist lady, who is showing signs of classic Bones weirdly intimate secret mastermind behavior. She's not going to report that a criminal he took down is stalking an FBI agent unless she can get him to compromise his ethics and look at records he thinks are outside the scope of his investigation? So she stalked him outside work and brought the evidence from the crime scene on a 'date'?

On the one hand, it isn't any more unprofessional and work-inappropriate than obnoxious squintern, who no-one even chastises any more (the Bones christmas party must be a truly soul-scarring event). On the other,

Spoiler

they're writing the rest of the show with Hart Hansen, who loves him some leaden, melodramatic, turgid masterful psychological torture porn. And if there's one hackneyed, played-out, stupid cliché brilliant twist that man clings to like grim, overwritten death loves, it's The Big Bad Is Calling From Inside the House  

[Clanstarling]

10 hours ago, secnarf said:

Upon re-watch: how did Booth/Brennan get the report card back intact after Hodgins did TLC on the ink sample?!

I'd forgotten Hodgins had the actual card. I guess he wasn't king of the lab this week - as he obviously never turned it over and had his aha! moment.

 

2 hours ago, Julia said:

On the one hand, it isn't any more unprofessional and work-inappropriate than obnoxious squintern, who no-one even chastises any more (the Bones christmas party must be a truly soul-scarring event). On the other,

  Reveal hidden contents

they're writing the rest of the show with Hart Hansen, who loves him some leaden, melodramatic, turgid masterful psychological torture porn. And if there's one hackneyed, played-out, stupid cliché brilliant twist that man clings to like grim, overwritten death loves, it's The Big Bad Is Calling From Inside the House  

Pretty much everyone is unprofessional and work-inappropriate on the show. It sometimes seems that all their dialog is discussing things like sex, marital woes and other sensitive subjects around the autopsy table, not to mention having relationships with subordinates.  There'd be no show if they kept things professional (this show, anyway, some others do more or less manage it).

[Lee4U]

Well, if it wasn't all those things - unprofessional, work-inapprapriate, etc - we would be stuck watching Bones be Bones with bones and even more of a regular procedural.

I do always miss Sweets though and am still pissed they felt a need to kill him off - that always left a sour taste for me. They had already killed off one intern, had another become a serial killer (Zach), and one with cancer who miraculously recovered - That was enough such stuff for a show like this - to me anyway; killing Sweets was kind of a nasty move on their part.  

I always wondered if they were just so pissed at the actor for leaving to do something else refusing to allow him back to the show when that project was done that they wanted to make it certain he could never return.  Probably just fantasy in my head but something about it just seemed - off 

[Clanstarling]

I miss Sweets too. I also thought killing him off was spiteful move on the show's part.

I don't recall Bones being quite as inappropriate (work wise) in the first season, and there was plenty of autopsy table repartee. Hmm, maybe I'll watch a few of the early episodes on Netflix.

Update: Okay, I take it back. 20 minutes into the second episode of the series and Angela, Hodgins and Zack are discussing Booth and Bone's (separate) sex lives. It was always inappropriate.

Edited May 14, 2016 by clanstarling

[Panopticon]

To me the difference between this intern and everyone else is the vicious intent behind his inappropriate behavior. Yes, the show started off with Angela dragging everyone into her master plan to couple up Booth and Brennan, but that was well-intentioned. She loved Brennan and thought that this was the way to make her happy or at the very least give her a fun time. There was inappropriate chatter, but without lying or manipulation or disparaging small children. Forget everything that got said this episode and whether it was polite... the man stole the report card from his boss' office, gave it to Hodgins, and lied to Hodgins about the origin (claiming it belonged to his own niece when in fact it belonged to the girl who is for all intents and purposes Hodgins' niece). He took actions to hurt people with no positive motivation. Plus, some of the premise of the show was always that Brennan (and to a lesser extent her chosen ones Angela and Zack) got away with some inappropriate behavior because she was the best in the world at what she did. Why the special treatment for an assistant who is one of many, and nasty to boot?

[Panopticon]

6 hours ago, Julia said:

Oh, that's interesting. I've been assuming Aubrey's dad is or is tied up with the new big bad.

Regardless of whether this time the wayward father turns out to be rotten to the core, I expect the initial story structure and emotional beats to be the same. It just may end with Aubrey killing or arresting his father rather than offering himself up as reasonable doubt to free him.

Quote

Of course, I also think that about creepy overshare psychologist lady, who is showing signs of classic Bones weirdly intimate secret mastermind behavior. She's not going to report that a criminal he took down is stalking an FBI agent unless she can get him to compromise his ethics and look at records he thinks are outside the scope of his investigation? So she stalked him outside work and brought the evidence from the crime scene on a 'date'?

Now this is a place where I have zero faith in the show's ability to differentiate between "psycho" and "cute." I know you and I agree that the previous psych profiler constantly got away with immoral/unethical/illegal behavior and he was supposed to be sweet (ha!) and noble. The show has always shifted back and forth as far as which characters have access to which aspects of other characters' files and personal information depending on what the plot calls for that week. They've also shown Booth abusing his position on multiple occasions to harass Rebecca's boyfriend at work; run a background check on his sister-in-law so he could reveal information to his brother that his brother-- gasp!-- already knew; and, my personal favorite, pulling information on the head of the daycare center so Brennan could bully the poor woman into spending all day texting pictures of Christine instead of doing her actual job.

Hmm. I suppose I'm grateful that reportcardgate wasn't about Brennan trying to get the teacher fired and suing the school system because her little mini-me got the equivalent of a B.

[Julia]

I wasn't a Sweets fan. He was symptomatic of the dumbing down of the leads he manipulated for me. But back in the day, a lot of people weren't. I remember the first thing he said in their first live tweet was "Any Sweets haters out there?"

JMO, he became a fandom favorite pretty much because people who didn't like the character (who Hansen and Nathan predictably doubled down on because the viewer is always wrong, and became a creator's pet up there with Pelant) gave up and stopped watching.

Which is why I absolutely do believe Nathan killed the character out of spite. They pretty much turned their show into the JFD fanclub, and he decided to put his needs before theirs. He wanted to come back. They made sure that was never going to happen. 

ETA: Cam trying to get Angela and Hodgins to behave more appropriately was a running joke for a while, and Brennan felt very strongly about respecting the dead. It wasn't until the advent of Clark that it became something only stiff people cared about. 

Edited May 14, 2016 by Julia