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S12.E03: The New Tricks In The Old Dogs


WendyCR72

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Hal Holbrook, Ed Asner and June Squibb play the retired folk in the home. Other that fudging with time I suppose it was an ok episode. Can't see Hal having enough strength to move a body with a broken collar bone however. Guess Cam is completely on board with weddings now since a few seasons back she wanted nothing to do with them.

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On January 18, 2017 at 0:40 PM, BookWitch said:

. . . Can't see Hal having enough strength to move a body with a broken collar bone however. . . .

I dosed off and missed that, but you are totally correct. And having recently spent time with my fraile elderly mother, I was horrified to see Booth help the old guy up out of the chair to go for a walk and then leave him with no support (the cane was out of reach). No wonder he fell down (even though that wasn't the "reason")!

Edited by shapeshifter
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19 hours ago, BookWitch said:

Hal Holbrook, Ed Asner and June Squibb play the retired folk in the home. Other that fudging with time I suppose it was an ok episode. Can't see Hal having enough strength to move a body with a broken collar bone however. Guess Cam is completely on board with weddings now since a few seasons back she wanted nothing to do with them.

I know! It bugged me so much that they didn't even address body disposal. It's not like the dump site was in the home's back yard. Then there's the clean-up, and supplies. I wonder if they left out a scene where the  orderly helped dispose of the body, because that would have made sense.

The baby talk in the lab bugged - not because it was baby talk, but because Cam insisted it couldn't wait until they got home. What? That made no sense to me - since home is exactly where that discussion should take place.

When I saw Hal Holbrook, I'm sorry to say, I thought "but isn't he dead?" I could have sworn I'd seen his obit a year or two ago. I'm glad he wasn't. I thought it was him immediately, which is odd since there were certainly enough actors of note to be the perp.

Edited by Clanstarling
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6 hours ago, UncleChuck said:

The only thing missing (other than the mystery body dump) was if the Ed Asner character had reacted to Bones' questioning by telling her:  "You've got spunk.  I HATE spunk"!

That would've bought a lot of good will from me!

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If they are already using birth control, why is it worse (from a Catholic perspective) for him to get a vasectomy? I guess I don't understand the subtleties of observant Catholicism.


I am glad I wasn't the only person who wondered how the body got to the acid dump. I thought maybe I had missed the explanation!

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2 hours ago, possibilities said:

If they are already using birth control, why is it worse (from a Catholic perspective) for him to get a vasectomy? I guess I don't understand the subtleties of observant Catholicism.


I am glad I wasn't the only person who wondered how the body got to the acid dump. I thought maybe I had missed the explanation!

No, they don't understand Catholicism.  

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5 hours ago, possibilities said:

If they are already using birth control, why is it worse (from a Catholic perspective) for him to get a vasectomy? I guess I don't understand the subtleties of observant Catholicism.


I am glad I wasn't the only person who wondered how the body got to the acid dump. I thought maybe I had missed the explanation!

I can't say I know much about Catholicism, dropped out of catechism when I learned I would get graded. But a couple of things - Bones is taking the pill, and is not a Catholic herself, and she not using more controversial methods such as the IUD. I'm not sure how the church stands on condoms. But I've known plenty of Catholic couples who use birth control (even back in the early 70's).

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I found a HUGE stash of condoms under my parents bed (around 1979). My dad is so catholic it make my head hurt. He went to Jesuit high school and college, and attends mass everyday at 7 am. When my parents got divorced after 15 years, he had it annulled by the church so he could remarry "in the eyes of God." So yeah... even the most stubborn Catholics use birth control.

Edited by GreenScreenFX
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I thought the mention of Booth using condoms was to imply that his religion was just a cover for his real aversion to vasectomy — that he, like many men, was not comfortable with having anything severed in that area, whether by knife or laser.

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The Catholic Church has also opposed the use of condoms even in places where HIV is spreading like wildfire. The Church historically opposes all forms of birth control. The way people apply their religion's teachings to their own lives is often somewhat self-serving. I could easily see someone (including Booth) justify the use of condoms, while at the same time hiding behind religion to avoid a vasectomy as shapeshifter mentioned. His logic could simply be that a vasectomy is permanent and actually altering his body, whereas a condom is completely temporary, therefore a vasectomy is much worse than using a condom from a religious POV. However, if he's perfectly fine with getting a vasectomy, he's unlikely to do any mental gymnastics to rationalize not getting one, if that makes any sense.

I didn't have too much of a problem with this storyline in and of itself, but I think the whole marital problem-of-the-week got old a long time ago. Their marriage is stale.

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I thought it was Cam who said that Booth's religion was a reason not to ask him to have a vasectomy, not Booth who used that reason. And Brennan didn't correct her or point out the irrelevancy of it (since they are already OK with breaking Catholic rules by using condoms and the pill). So to me it was a very weird blip on the part of the show's writing, but then again it's certainly no bigger than completely neglecting to tell us how the frail injured murderer got the corpse to the acid vat.

Edited by possibilities
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The whole episode just felt very unresolved. Not only was there no explanation of how the body was disposed of, but I find it hard to believe that any prosecutor would charge poor old Hal Holbrook with murder. Any decent lawyer could easily get him off on self-defense and/or lack of intent (involuntary manslaughter?). He might get probation at the most. I agree, there must have been a cut scene where they said the orderly cleaned up the murder site and disposed of the body. He might be charged with obstructing justice or improper disposal of human remains, I guess, but that's about it. I know this show isn't Law and Order, but I often find the lack of follow-up on how the guilty person would be prosecuted to be frustrating, especially in cases where the "murder" seems to have been more or less an accident. Are the federal prisons really full of people who improperly dispose of the bodies of people they killed accidentally?

What could have been a fun case, with classic actors like Ed Asner and Hal Holbrook ended up being kind of a throw-away. If they don't care any more, why should we?

Edited by Kathira
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They're clearly more interested in setting the characters up for the show ending rather than caring about any weekly plot particulars.  What bugged me is that they have Angela and Hodgins all excited and talking about more babies when they were majorly stressed out worrying if Michael-Vincent would end up blind.  Are they going to adopt or do they not care about the challenges of potentially raising a baby born blind?

Edited by Starscream
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On 1/21/2017 at 8:12 PM, Starscream said:

They're clearly more interested in setting the characters up for the show ending rather than caring about any weekly plot particulars.  What bugged me is that they have Angela and Hodgins all excited and talking about more babies when they were majorly stressed out worrying if Michael-Vincent would end up blind.  Are they going to adopt or do they not care about the challenges of potentially raising a baby born blind?

By the time Michael Vincent was born, I think they had reached a peace about being able to face raising a special needs child. Hodgins' new mobility challenge could break two ways as I see it. Either it could make them feel less able to deal with a potential additional challenge, or it could make them more appreciative of their ability to adapt. Angela and Hodgins are just so "heart-led" (I'm making that up) my money is on them throwing caution to the wind and having dozens of babies, biological, adopted, foster, what have you, and having a big, messy, untraditional, crazy loving family. 

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