Monday, July 16, 2012

The Priest in the Churchyard

There is a corpse found in consecrated graveyard. Bones is making fun of the holy water which blessed the graveyard now consecrating a crime scene and Booth says, "I can't work with you on this case." He is not going to stand there while she attacks his beliefs, "You should have just sailed off with your boyfriend."

"Funny a man who believes the world is controlled by an invisible super being wants to control my personal life."

Since Bones has honored religious rituals she doesn't believe in before for cultural reasons, it is unclear why she is mocking Booth's beliefs or, more importantly, the priest's. She doesn't have to be respectful of Booth, but the priest complained that she was making fun of him too, when she told him his sacred ground was now a crime scene. Of course, she shouldn't let the priest have his obstructive way, but she shouldn't make him think his rites are laughable either, which is the impression she gave him.

The people on this show continue to have no consistent, established behavior. They may do one thing in one show and the complete opposite the next time. If Bones is having problems with Booth, which the show claims, although those claims are less than credible, then why not just take it out on him and not the people they encounter in the investigation.

Also, instead of them always telling us that Booth is religious, shouldn't we see him doing something religious? Scully didn't talk about it half as much but we knew her beliefs were deep or that when she had doubts about it they went very deep too. Booth gives it lipservice, but it's not something that seems ingrained, part of his personality or daily behavior. The religious routine is (going to mass), but not the conviction. Like when he worried about if he let Epps fall, I didn't feel as if he worried from a religious standpoint, like Scully wondered if she was doing the devil's will in Orison.

Booth says they have issues in their relationship and he feels that instead of confronting them, she lashes out at his religion. I wonder: Does he think her issues are the same as his, which are that he has the hots for her?

Oh, so there's a Father Matt, a hippie priest. I wonder if Brennan is going to fall in love with him. She'll be surprised that someone who is her contemporary and seems to share so many of her views is also very religious. She'll end up giving him the respect she didn't offer the older priest -- or Booth.

Oh, after seeing Father Matt, he's not the hunk that I envisioned. Brennan won't have a thing for him, but she did reveal that she did not expect him to believe in the supernatural gobbledy gook that the elder priest did. For instance, she did not think he'd buy into the Holy Trinity. It is UNREAL to me that Brennan would be questioning someone else's belief in the father, the son and the holy spirit. This is a woman who finished an autopsy last week and told them to dispose of the remains in a manner that would honor Chinese custom and now here she is going into the Catholic church and telling the priests their faith is screwy and showing surprise that they have it. If he didn't believe in the Holy Trinity why would he be wearing a collar?

They are in the parsonage and have been offered refreshment by the elder priest's assistant, Lorraine. When the prieset got cranky, she told him he'd be having dry roast beef that night, if he kept it up. The way Booth devoured the cake he was given and asked Lorraine how long she'd been there made me think he was just pretending to like the cake to get closer to her. After all, she let it be known when they were outside that she was responsible for the meals there. Also, Matt has had a bad stomach lately. She's probably poisoning peeps.

In the car Booth tells Bones not to insult priests when they are supposed to be gaining trust. He's right as I have already posited, but in her defense, he doesn't always ingratiate himself with the people related to their investigation either. She says, "Matt wasn't insulted. You were." He says they definitely have a problem. She says because he is bossy. He did try to propel her into the house with his hand on her waist again and she kind of batted him away. Maybe she'll just come out and tell him to stop pushing her one of these days, as he does it every episode.

The fact that Booth is repeatedly saying that they have a relationship problem doesn't make it so. If they wanted them to have one, why not build it into the scripts, rather than having them TALK about it suddenly one day. He asks her to come with him to see Wyatt, which is the only reason they're suddenly, supposedly, not getting along.

Wyatt meets them at the diner and quotes Blake. He says that we are all at the mercy of our fundamental natures and when we understand the natures, we understand the conflict. Well, the writers don't understand the characters' natures from one week to the next, so this is going to be a hard nut to crack.

Wyatt says he will find their underlying issue, help them resolve it and set right the balance of dark and light in the universe. I bet in the end he will say that they are hopeless and he can't do anything for them, they will fight forever!

Booth takes Angela to church with him to help on the case. He says he and Brennan are spending time apart. She says, "did you two sleep together?" The lady in the pew with them looks shocked. Appalled, Booth wonders what that lab does to those people. Angela says, "It's just this feels like a couple's thing and now that Sully is gone . . . "

He says, "It's a work thing."

After the service, Booth talks to people and the congregation recognizes the sketch of the dead person as Father McCourt. I wonder if he was a child molestor and that's why he was killed. The altar boy who recognized him didn't act all freaked out about it though, not as if McCourt was a bad memory for him. So, I say Lorraine did him in.

Angela says there's been tension between Brennan and Booth ever since she let Sully sail off into the sunset without her.

Most of the things that Booth does are so comical, as if from a caricature, not a man(like putting his thumbs in his belt, like he's impersonating a western hero, rather than acting naturally) that it's not really believable that Wyatt is seriously diagnosing or interpreting them. I take it that Booth is joking more than exhibiting genuine behavior. Of course, this whole episode is probably supposed to be received as a lighter one, so best not to take anything seriously.

While escorting Wyatt around, Booth complains the the lab is phony and too clean. Death is not clean. If you aren't into math where do you stand in this lab? Wyatt says that his problem with Brennan is that he doesn't know what will catch fire (?) or where he stands with her. Clearly, that last is the key. "What?" says Booth.

They interview a graverobber who indicates that McCourt was a molestor. Booth gets all upset at the suggestion. Is he so protective of his religion that he is blind to the evil people who sometimes practice it? They say the kid who identified McCourt was the priest's "type." But, as I said, the boy seemed too calm to me, to be hiding such a trauma.

They show Hodgins and Angela having sex in a Cleopatra exhibit at the Jeffersonian, during their lunch hour. This is what he meant when he asked her if she wanted to go to that Egyptian place for lunch. Ha, this happens just after the episode where I expressed surprised that we hadn't seen them being intimate. He wants her to move in with him.

Booth and Bones talk to the altar boy and he says McCourt was his best friend, not a molestor, a surrogate father.

Later Bones inflames the priest again and she says that he kicked her out. Wyatt said that the term "kicked out" indicates that she accepts the interrogation room as his domain. Well, it is. Her domain is the lab and Booth should be in charge of the police aspects. She says Booth is good at questioning people and can tell when they are lying. "Can you?" Wyatt wants to know.

She's learned a lot from Booth about people, but he doesn't have a sixth sense. He just reads minutiae. But Wyatt doesn't think she sounds convinced. Booth likes to say that there are more things than are dreamt of in her science. It's a variation on Hamlet. Wyatt says he's aware of the derivation. But the beyond science part is like Mulder trying to convince Scully (except for the religious angle on it).

She wants to dissect what Booth does during interrogations, so that she can do it herself, Wyatt deducts. So that you can do it without Booth, so that you won't need him anymore.

If she just wanted to observe, she wouldn't insist on being in the room with him, out of her element. She would observe from behind the glass.

She says, "Ideally I'd prefer to be inside Booth's head. Seeing and feeling things the way he does. Then, maybe I'd understand." "Be one with him," Wyatt concludes.

"In a scientific sense," she clarifies. Wyatt gives her an "oh sure, you do" look, not buying the idea that her interest in being one with Booth is only scientific.

Well, I'd agree that she likes to go on the field investigations with him, because she likes being around him.

Nice that when Bones indicates the challis on the altar might be the murder weapon that Booth kneels and crosses himself before approaching it. Boreanaz tweeted about lighting a candle for Michael Clarke Duncan today, so I gather he is Catholic as well.

At the diner, Bones has to admit she has no intuition and she says Booth has no analytical skills. He's all about "emotion and feeling." Um, that would be interesting if he was an emotional person, but he's not. By contrast, I think in order to read people you have to be analytical. Actually, knowing science and math and how to draw conclusions from them is less analyticial than being a good detective.

She says he has a well-developed feminine side and he almost spits his coffee. He doesn't really have a feminine side. Mulder did. Angel did more than Booth does.

Wyatt catches them arguing and he says he knew what their problem was immediately, he only met with them 3 times for fun.

"You're both afraid that the reason Dr. B didn't sail off into the sunset with her boyfriend Sully might have been because of her ties to agent Booth." Well, yeah, when she told Sully rationally she should go, but she can't, I was kinda thinking that too.
I don't think Booth was afraid of that. I think he was hoping it and maybe he's uneasy around her now because he's uncertain as to whether his hope has been realized.

Booth doesn't know where to look. Then, Wyatt says (big letdown here for the audience I know, but I don't care since I know I have 6 more years to go on this show and they aren't getting romantic any time soon and I almost think everything will be spoiled once they do), "you're both quite wrong."

"Why didn't I go with Sully?" Brennan demands. "How is he supposed to know?" Booth asks. (A switch; before it was Bones saying that Wyatt couldn't possibly have discerned the root of their problem. Now, she's asking him to tell her about herself). She says Sully was perfect for her, sex was incredible. Booth rolls eyes.

Wyatt says she is unable to lead a purposeless life at this stage in her development. I buy this, especially after what happened with her parents, just 15 years earlier. I think she has a drive that she can't get rid of. He says Booth's behavior is based on an irrational fear that he's responsible for someone else's destiny. But I don't buy that because Booth is responsible for her coming to work there anyway. We saw in the pilot that he brought her back and she was reluctant to come work with her. But he bargained, cajoled and won. He doesn't want her to leave, even tricked her into staying in the pilot. He tries to shape her destiny. So, he's surely not feeling guilty that he might be responsible for it, as Wyatt claims.

Having offered his opinion, Wyatt thinks they will be able to work together just fine, now that their minds have been set at ease. But I think he just gave them rationales they could live with which would let them continue to work together without awkwardness, not ones that were completely true. Will he reveal his little subterfuge to someone before the show ends?

Wyatt leaves. Booth wants to know what she feels. Without addressing their relationship at all, she says she feels that Father Matt's illness is unusal. Booth jumps right on that. Matt was poisoned. They are working in synch again, forget Wyatt. They high five, "we're back!"

Talking with Brennan later, Angela is skeptical that Booth was not the reason she didn't leave with Sully, a man Brennan says she adores. How can she buy what Wyatt said. "Do you believe that?" Bones says she has to defer to Wyatt's expertise in his field, if she wants to be respected as an anthropologist, which means, "I want to believe."

I'm not invested in Booth and Bones as a couple yet. I like them fine as friends, so I can't say I'm frustrated by anything, but it is hard to believe that they don't know their feelings. Although children and teens may, I don't think adults like or love one another without realizing it. While Mulder and Scully went years without sharing their feelings with the viewers, I think they knew what they felt. At some point (by the time of the movie bee almost-kiss), they even knew what the other felt. This sitting around being afraid that you may be in love with your partner is rather silly. Knowing that you're in love and being afraid that they know, if they don't reciprocate is more realistic.

I'm disappointed that Booth takes so long to suspect Lorraine of poisoning the priests, especially since he wolfed down her cake and realized that she was responsible for its contents, as she told him what it was he was eating. Once he finally figures it out while questioning the head priest, Bones is tapping him on the shoulder, tugging at his sleeve, wanting to know what he suspects, trying to tap into his intuition.

Lorraine poisoned the priests because she thought they were molestors. When Booth goes in after the priest to hear the rest of Lorraine's confession, he's in his zone, his domain, the interrogation room. Bones looks at him through the glass partition with wonder (I'd dare say admiration).

She takes Angela to see Wyatt about the situation with Hodgins and then leaves because she and Booth have to put their notes together (are they calling it "notes" these days) for the prosecution.

So, I guess Wyatt would tell Angela he lied to Booth and Bones. I knew the script would give him a way to reveal his deception. He tells Angela while half of her clothes are filling Hodgins' closet she shouldn't marry him. Wait until he has an equal amount of clothes in her closet, so that they are both equals. That is stupid. As a man Hodgins may not have as many clothes as Angela anyway. Also, who does Wyatt think has the most power. They may be in Hodgins' apartment all the time and he has the money, but she has all the power. So, what exactly is the imbalance that Wyatt perceives. Hodgins' near death escape in Gravedigger should have made her see that she loves him too, so if she doesn't feel the same about him now, will she ever? Wyatt tells her not to fill up more than 1/3 of Hodgins' closet. This counseling is more humorous than sensical, but Angela seems to like it.

He was good with analyzing her problem, she thinks, but Angela calls him on the theory he spouted to Booth and Bones and says look "Monty Python," they both know that he is full of it about Booth and Bones.

Angela says Brennan stayed because of Booth. She says Wyatt's first priority is the FBI, to get agents back in the field. That's why he lied to Booth and Bones just to give them a way to continue to work as partners without the truth making them self-conscious about each other. She quotes Shakespeare back at Wyatt and says, "Journeys end with lovers meeting, as every wise man's son doth know."

"Excellent," answers Wyatt taking a sip of his drink. "You are good."


























































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