TV Review: ‘Bones,’ Season 7 Premiere

bill bodkin looks at the return of the popular will=-they/won’t-they procedural drama …

Bones has been one of FOX’s most highly rated and regarded shows since it debuted in 2005. It’s done so by deftly fusing classic television archetypes — the odd couple comedy, the will-they/won’t-they romantic comedy, the procedural crime drama and the shoot-the-works CSI-inspired forensic special effects drama into one gorey, well-written and lighthearted ball.

What makes Bones so engaging, outside of its penchant for allowing itself to be goofy, is its extremely detailed characters. For example you’ve got Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz), on the surface a hotshot FBI agent, under the surface — the descendant of John Wilkes Booth, a devout Catholic, an emotionally scarred sniper, a proud single father, a product of an abusive home life, a hockey and rock ‘n’ roll diehard with a flare for odd ties and belt buckles. Within one episode he can go from glib and too cool for school to deadly serious, highly emotional and driven beyond belief. How many characters in crime dramas these days are that well-developed?

Booth’s chemistry with his foil in every manner, Dr. Temperance Brennan (Emily Deschanel), is what drives the show. Brennan a cocky and confident forensic anthropologist with a serious lack of social skills and a cornball sense of humor clashes perfectly with Booth. She’s rational while he’s emotional. He’s hip, while she never seems to get the obvious joke or pop culture reference. It’s entertaining to watch the two interact, so entertaining that’s it helped the show evolve from a serious, effects laden procedural crime drama, soundtracked by the pop rock song of the moment, into one of the most beloved shows on TV.

Yet all of this excellence was put into a bit of jeopardy when in real life, Emily Deschanel became pregnant with her first child. Creator Hart Hanson made a bold executive decision to include this gift of life into the storyline. By doing this, he killed off one of the driving themes of the series — the “will-they/won’t-they” romantic tension between our leads.

We’ve seen shows in the past end this type storyline to disastrous results. When Tony and Angela got together on Who’s The Boss? the show’s demise quickly followed. The whole on-again/off-again Ross and Rachel relationships on Friends grew tired after a while. And, of course, there’s the most famous fall-out: when Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd hooked up on Moonlighting. The show lost its steam almost immediately.

However, on Thursday, Bones proved that the end to this tension isn’t a bad thing. The same at-odds relationship between Booth and Bones still exists. And it makes logical sense — just because they’re together doesn’t mean their personalities have changed. They’re both polar opposites who butt heads frequently. It’s one of the more realistic television relationships you’ll find on the dial. They love each other, but they still get on each other’s nerves, whether it be over a dead body or over moving in together. And let’s face how long could they stretch out these two not getting together?

So what the premiere of season seven has taught us about Bones is that it’ll be business as usual. The laughs, the viscera and the pot boiling will all remain while the relationship between Booth and Brennan will be further tested by the adventures of pregnancy, co-habitating and eventually parenthood.