Chromium_five

Today's featured IMDb user comment, by a Fox marketer posing as an IMDb user, describes "Bones" as "refreshingly real, from characters to plots."

Here's one of these "refreshingly real" plots:

A corpse turns up with a mutilated face that upon computer reconstruction looks like... a chicken's. Also, an autopsy shows that the corpse's neck has been wrung, like a chicken's. Bones and Booth trace the corpse to a chicken farm, which is being picketed by hipster protesters chanting, "Cluck you, cluck you." Here they learn that the victim developed his chicken-like face when the farm's chicken stench caused his nasal passages to become deformed. Then, they probably solve the case. I don't know. I couldn't finish watching. I've never made it more than halfway through an episode. Not for lack of trying.

I don't remember exactly, but the chicken episode may be the same one in which the corpse is found by a troop of girl scouts who carefully preserve it and transport it to the FBI lab on their scout bus, with the consent of their scout leader. And let me tell you, the realism left me feeling refreshed.

The above plot description might make it sound like this is an inspired, surreal parody of cop shows, but it isn't. If this was parody, I'd expect the actors to play it completely deadpan. Instead, they're trying to be so cute and precious that we just want to eat them up.

There's Bones -- whose level of social awkwardness is wildly inconsistent, depending on which writer is phoning in the gags -- and Booth, her thoroughly bland boss, and a group of thirteen year old boys disguised as lab technicians. One of these guys is named "Sweets," which alone is enough to push this show from annoying to intolerable.

There's also a slutty girl (Angela, I think her name is?) who has no identifiable function other than letting us know every six minutes that she's been sleeping around. How this advances the plot in any way is beyond me. Maybe it all comes together in the second half of the episodes, when I'm not watching.

The only unique aspect of "Bones" is the shockingly grotesque corpses. Now, if the rest of the show was as grotesque -- if these corpses were put into any sort of appropriate context, that is -- it would be one of the darkest, most compelling shows on television. Instead, we are treated to the bizarre spectacle of these hideous, decaying bodies that look like they're from the set of a Lucio Fulci movie displayed in brightly-lit rooms while childish actors poke at them and flirt with each other against sparkly background music. It's one of the weirdest things I've ever seen, but it's not funny or interesting at all. It's unwatchable.

0/10.

I've been watching this show since it began, and I've never felt (as some do) that it's "jumped the shark" or suffered a slow decrease in quality. Every season has had some good episodes, some not-so-good ones, and one or two jewels. "House Divided" came out of nowhere to dominate the latter category. The reason this episode is so much damn fun is that the unthinkable happens: House finally "cracks." Just when it seemed like this character was hopelessly static and would never really grow, the writers faced facts and admitted that a guy, no matter how smart, who tried to live his whole life as a completely rational being and ignored all emotion would never succeed at it: he'd either cave or go literally crazy. House refuses to cave.

All of the show's best elements are in this episode: a cool medical mystery with a red herring, an interesting patient and the ethical issues surrounding his treatment, great lines ("and then I have a clever response"), pure hilarity (House rocking out to Public Enemy is definitely a crowning moment) and House dangerously abusing his body in the name of science (in this case, going without sleep for days on the grounds that it's "interesting"). But at the same time, all of the standard elements are subtly warped. As House, the central cog, becomes inwardly unglued, so does the whole formula: nothing is working correctly. House breaks a major rule in his treatment of the patient, but for the first time ever, he can't explain why he did it. His analysis of the patient's mother's motivations is totally off base. The patient doesn't grow personally; no lessons are learned. The team spends most of the episode mildly drunk. Wilson is even more ineffectual than usual and ends up wandering into the street hammered and without his pants. Cuddy has the upper hand. Even the MUSIC is screwed up: the cool percussive beats that are always in the background suddenly morph into what I can only call "the world's creepiest sound effect" in the scene where House relaxes in the bathtub (when he realizes that whatever is happening to his brain is worse than mere sleep-dep... *sigh*, beautifully done). I also note that the lighting gets increasingly brighter throughout the episode as House gets increasingly spaced-out.

The whole thing is simultaneously one of the funniest, saddest and scariest TV episodes I've ever seen. The two follow-up episodes were good, but they couldn't match the "House" meets "X-Files" meets "Twilight Zone" vibe of this one. A great way to wrap up the season and proof that the show has life left.

I liked this show in the beginning for Tony Shalhoub's masterful portrayal of extreme social awkwardness (not so much the writers' cartoon version of OCD), nicely contrasted against Ted Levine's dry-witted police lieutenant, and the clever mysteries that called to mind the glory days of "Columbo." But things went downhill when the writers made the decision to sacrifice all realism in favor of putting their lead character in an OCD sufferer's worst nightmare every week, always thanks to some "Final Destination"-style inescapable twist of fate. It was kind of funny the first, third, and tenth times, but eight seasons of it is appalling.

I put up with this insanity for about half the show's duration, but the final straw came in season four, when Mr. Monk went to a rock concert (ho ho, he thinks it involves rocks) and mistook a port-a-john for a phone booth. And spoke into the urinal. Because he thought it was a phone. The genius detective with a germ phobia. He talked... into... the urinal. At that point, it was obvious the writers were only using their potentially interesting character as a prop for lame jokes. The few episodes I've caught since then don't seem to have made significant changes. The only thing the show can be praised for anymore is consistency. 3/10.