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gwynBones is my happy place. It's not the most brilliant show, it doesn't have the sharpest writing or the most carefully observed plots, and it's a procedural at heart, so it spends a lot of time trying to gross people out when it doesn't really need to. But it's got wonderfully observed, quirky characters (a personal fave), some great dialog, and an ensemble cast that still keeps the focus largely on the two lead characters. And it's got Dave. I have loved David Boreanaz since early Buffy, and he makes me especially happy when he plays light comedy, his timing is excellent and he's just innately charming.
So now I'm pissed. They peed all over my happy place. I watch the show because it *is* a happy place -- it's a throwback to more old-fashioned shows where there were threats to the main characters, but you knew people weren't going to get offed in some dramatic fashion guaranteed to leave a wake of bitter and confused viewers.
I really am, like everyone else on my flist, just gobsmacked about last night's episode. WTF doesn't even really describe it. I know, strike, yadda yadda. But the strike didn't make them write that character assassination. There's absolutely no reason they created it. It's not a law that you have to have a big dramatic season finale that gets rid of a major character. Were they just tired of Zack? It makes no sense to have set this up so randomly, so quickly. It should have been Sweets, if they needed some kind of lame dramatic flourish of having it be someone inside. He's a far less connected character for us, but all I can think is that they believe it'll be great to have this kid psychologist giving profiles and arguing with Brennan, without understanding what it takes to invest in a character the way we have with Zack.
But this... there's no character motivation for it at all. Zack may have been an alien, but he's not impressionable. He may have been alone, but he himself isn't a lonely character. And by trying to tie it into some kind of logic, they failed utterly, because there is no logic to what happened (and then to have Zack actually decry the truth by saying they wouldn't understand is just... wow, cheap. Beyond cheap). All that stuff they put into Bones's mouth about logic is utterly logic defying. It makes no sense for a character who values truths and science to do something so dishonest, murderous, and ... well, mystical or religious. Those are all emotional arguments that he was making, in reality.
It wasn't Zack. It was as if they'd hired some writer off Lot H to come in and write their season finale without knowing the characters, the usual story style they follow. I love Zack, I love his alienness and how he's the other side of the coin that Brennan and he share. I love that his friendship with Hodgins humanizes him. He's a wonderful part of their ensemble. ANd then they just throw him away for an effect, one that I haven't seen a single person respond positively to.
I also hated how the episode started off -- I loathe fakeout beginnings like that, and it felt totally forced and trite. Worse, it didn't even make sense -- there's no way that they would have been able to fool everyone in a situation like that, and that Sweets was responsible for keeping the secret was even fakier and stupider. Were we supposed to believe that Booth's son didn't know the truth, or else why wouldn't they be there? Did the writers think of ANYthing before they pulled this piece of crap out of their asses?
If they got rid of Zack because they thought they had nowhere to go with him as a character, it will make me even more hostile. He's an incredibly rich character, and him learning to be more of a human, along with Bones, as they work on these cases, is ripe with story possibilities for years. I just... I am boggled by how badly they handled this. Cheap, sleazy, stupid, lame.
Even the bathtub scene does not make up for this. Throw some guy from the lot into the writer's room, throw some other guy from the lot into a room with hundreds of candles and some fake teeth with whom we have no vested interest, throw some guy in at the beginning we're supposed to watch Booth beat the crap out of and be relieved he's not really dead (magically healing GSW to the upper shoulder)... every single thing about this episode was just sad, weak, lame.
Really, I haven't been this angry about showrunners ruining one of my shows since the end of 4th season Nikita. Go to hell, Hart Hanson. You wrecked my happy place.
So now I'm pissed. They peed all over my happy place. I watch the show because it *is* a happy place -- it's a throwback to more old-fashioned shows where there were threats to the main characters, but you knew people weren't going to get offed in some dramatic fashion guaranteed to leave a wake of bitter and confused viewers.
I really am, like everyone else on my flist, just gobsmacked about last night's episode. WTF doesn't even really describe it. I know, strike, yadda yadda. But the strike didn't make them write that character assassination. There's absolutely no reason they created it. It's not a law that you have to have a big dramatic season finale that gets rid of a major character. Were they just tired of Zack? It makes no sense to have set this up so randomly, so quickly. It should have been Sweets, if they needed some kind of lame dramatic flourish of having it be someone inside. He's a far less connected character for us, but all I can think is that they believe it'll be great to have this kid psychologist giving profiles and arguing with Brennan, without understanding what it takes to invest in a character the way we have with Zack.
But this... there's no character motivation for it at all. Zack may have been an alien, but he's not impressionable. He may have been alone, but he himself isn't a lonely character. And by trying to tie it into some kind of logic, they failed utterly, because there is no logic to what happened (and then to have Zack actually decry the truth by saying they wouldn't understand is just... wow, cheap. Beyond cheap). All that stuff they put into Bones's mouth about logic is utterly logic defying. It makes no sense for a character who values truths and science to do something so dishonest, murderous, and ... well, mystical or religious. Those are all emotional arguments that he was making, in reality.
It wasn't Zack. It was as if they'd hired some writer off Lot H to come in and write their season finale without knowing the characters, the usual story style they follow. I love Zack, I love his alienness and how he's the other side of the coin that Brennan and he share. I love that his friendship with Hodgins humanizes him. He's a wonderful part of their ensemble. ANd then they just throw him away for an effect, one that I haven't seen a single person respond positively to.
I also hated how the episode started off -- I loathe fakeout beginnings like that, and it felt totally forced and trite. Worse, it didn't even make sense -- there's no way that they would have been able to fool everyone in a situation like that, and that Sweets was responsible for keeping the secret was even fakier and stupider. Were we supposed to believe that Booth's son didn't know the truth, or else why wouldn't they be there? Did the writers think of ANYthing before they pulled this piece of crap out of their asses?
If they got rid of Zack because they thought they had nowhere to go with him as a character, it will make me even more hostile. He's an incredibly rich character, and him learning to be more of a human, along with Bones, as they work on these cases, is ripe with story possibilities for years. I just... I am boggled by how badly they handled this. Cheap, sleazy, stupid, lame.
Even the bathtub scene does not make up for this. Throw some guy from the lot into the writer's room, throw some other guy from the lot into a room with hundreds of candles and some fake teeth with whom we have no vested interest, throw some guy in at the beginning we're supposed to watch Booth beat the crap out of and be relieved he's not really dead (magically healing GSW to the upper shoulder)... every single thing about this episode was just sad, weak, lame.
Really, I haven't been this angry about showrunners ruining one of my shows since the end of 4th season Nikita. Go to hell, Hart Hanson. You wrecked my happy place.
