bones: gearing up for imminent sides & spoilers
the hands! the hair! the ridiculous cliffhanger! // fox promotional photo
It’s probable that in the next couple days, the first casting sides for season six of Bones will be released. A year ago today, the sides for “Harbingers in the Fountain” found their way onto the Internet, bringing the first spoilers—and a big foiler from Hart Hanson.
In the pages for Dr. Leacock, the dude who stabbed Brennan with a scalpel in last year’s premiere, Hart altered the scene in which Booth rescued Brennan to include this little bit:
Brennan: Yes, thank you. Don’t worry about hurting me, Booth. (Then) You saved me.
Booth kisses Brennan. She kisses him back as they sink down to the floor.
Obviously, that didn’t happen. (Most graciously accepted the “I’ve got you, baby” we got instead.) To my recollection, such tomfoolery didn’t happen for the rest of the season, suspicious as the spoilers about Hodgins and Angela’s jail cell wedding seemed to be at the time.
With production resuming on July 20 and the sides imminent, I wouldn’t be surprised to see some suspicious spoilers in the next couple days.
I’d bet money there’ll be sides for a character called “Coffee Cart Vendor,” and if there’s going to be funny business in the new pages, that’s where it’ll be.
But while we’re on the subject of the nearly-inevitable coffee cart scene, let’s talk about what we can actually expect.
Will it be the first scene in the premiere? Will it be a joyful reunion? Will it be awkward? Are we about to be led to believe that Booth and Brennan have had no contact whatsoever in the last year? Will they be alone?
In my opinion, the scene has to happen, but with it kicking off a season which will be an incredibly angst-ridden and frustrating one, I have a hard time imagining that the coffee cart will be the romantic reunion everyone is hoping for.
So here’s what I think will happen.
Booth and Brennan will still plan to meet at the coffee cart. Maybe one of them (Bones?) will be waiting on a bench when a text comes in from the other—Sorry, can’t make it, we’ve already got a case.
They don’t get a formal reunion; they’ll just rush back into murder-solving. It’ll be awkward as everyone tries to fit back into their roles. (Rest assured, by the end of the premiere, everything will be back to normal and we’ll be lucky if we get a mention of the year apart ever again.)
We might even be introduced to new characters. I would not be surprised at all to see casting sides for a girlfriend for Booth, who’s followed him home from Afghanistan (a reporter, maybe? A government contractor?) and who will stick around through November sweeps, at which point she will realize that she’s got no business getting between the partners and will promptly Susan Lewis That Shit (translation: get out the way, a la Dr. Lewis in ER’s “Secrets and Lies” or Juliet in Lost’s “Something Nice Back Home” or any number of other characters).
Not to worry, though. In order to prove that everything will be business as usual—and to give us that tiny bit of hope that keeps Bones fans watching in the face of dark, dark despair—Booth and Brennan will, if my theory is correct, meet up at the coffee cart in the last scene of the episode, for their customary End Scene of Fluff. It’ll set the tone for the rest of the season: they’re still crazy about each other, but there’s more waiting to be done. I can see Brennan coming back with the realization that absence really does make the heart grow fonder, while Booth comes into the season thinking that he’s gotten over her. But the last scene will make it clear that this is a serious Good luck with that one, Mister situation.
Because yeah, right. It’s still just a matter of when.
Also, would NOT be shocked to find out that Angela is pregnant.
lost: the post i’ve been waiting six years to write
Skaters, you can all go eat dirt.
For six years, I hated your guts. Now, I wonder how much you’re hurting. Your couple was never endgame. Mine was.
End of story.
No, really, end of story.
I win. You lose.
One more time: Jate is fate.
bones: examining the variables for the season finale
how exactly does one say no to that face?? // fox promotional photo
I’ve spent the last three days laying by the pool with my best fangirl friends, trying to speculate on what could possibly come next for Bones‘s Booth and Brennan. Many, many hours; many, many beers; and many, many rewatchings of “The Parts in the Sum of the Whole” later, we’re no closer to determining what the finale will bring.
The conclusion is that there are just too many variables.
So since we can’t effectively speculate, I figured it might be appropriate to just list all of the variables we’ve identified and turn it over to the group as a whole to see if anyone can fit the pieces together.
Spoilers for the next six episodes are after the jump. Read more…
fringe: i’m making “pete’s world” happen
J.J. Abrams’s series have long prevailed committing out-and-out thievery against its predecessors. Alias‘s whole “the bad guys stole my eggs so they could make a crazy baby” thing was straight out of The X-Files, as were plenty of other plot points in that series.
Fringe, however, is really taking the cake these days.
Because while the parallel universe thing is a well-loved concept in a variety of media, the particulars of Fringe‘s dimension-jumping physics are directly out of the BBC’s Doctor Who.
Doctor Who first introduced a parallel reality in series two of the current incarnation, and it would become a major staple in the show’s canon for the rest of the Tenth Doctor’s journey. In “Rise of the Cybermen,” The Doctor, Rose, and Rose’s boyfriend Mickey travel to a parallel world, slightly ahead of ours technologically and about to be taken down by Cybermen. In the parallel world, Rose’s father, Pete Tyler, is still alive and incredibly wealthy, but her parents’ version of Rose is a puppy. Though Rose and The Doctor only stay in the parallel world long enough to defeat the Cybermen (as it is very dangerous to travel between dimensions and could result in the complete collapse of time and reality), they re-encounter the parallel world in the series two finale, “Doomsday,” where Rose gets stuck in the parallel world, known by The Doctor as “Pete’s World.”
Okay, so in order to travel to a parallel world, you have to cross the “void,” the dark space between realities. It’s a dangerous place. When you go through the void, you get covered with “void stuff,” which makes you shimmer a little bit when viewed through 3D glasses. Here’s The Doctor explaining:
Flashforward three years and Fringe is explaining the laws of their parallel-reality travel. As children, certain people were subjected to a test of the drug Cortexiphan, which allows them to differentiate between things from our world and things from the parallel world. This applies not just to people, but to anything that came from “over there.” Conveniently, Agent Dunham was one of those children–in fact, the only one who could ever really differentiate. It’s like she has the 3D glasses built into her brain. And what happens when she sees something from the other world? It glimmers. Here’s their explanation:
Now, this I’ll write off as coincidence or healthy inspiration. However, the (pardon the pun) parallels got way less subtle last night.
See, Doctor Who‘s parallel world, as I mentioned before, is slightly ahead of ours technologically. They wear earpods which download information straight into their brains and they fly around in zeppelins. Noticing the zeppelins is the first defining characteristic of the parallel world. Here’s what it looks like:
Crazy, right? Zeppelins! There’s a word you don’t hear every day.
Cut to last night’s Fringe. Know what’s interesting about their parallel world? They’re a little more technologically advanced than us. And, hey, did you know what the observation deck of the Empire State Building was originally designed for?
That’s right. ZEPPELINS. Walter looks through a portal to the other world and, to prove it’s parallel to the military guys observing, he shows them a zeppelin. I’m sorry, but that is just TOO random to be a coincidence. When’s the last time you had a conversation about zeppelins? When’s the last time you heard a TV show mention zeppelins? At least for me, before last night, it was, well, the last time I watched “Rise of the Cybermen.”
ZEPPELINS! Come on.
Now, the final thing, which I’m happy to write off as a funny coincidence, is that the name for Doctor Who‘s parallel world is “Pete’s World” (here at :54, a continuation of the “void stuff” scene):
So, since we now know the details of where one Peter Bishop came from, can we PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE call Fringe‘s parallel universe “Pete’s World”? It’s really only fair.
Meanwhile, having learned more valuable lessons from Doctor Who–Rose falls through the void and ends up trapped in Pete’s World–some of us (like Hannah) are beginning to worry that this season finale of Fringe will find either Peter or Olivia somehow trapped in Pete’s World. It’s an interesting theory, but don’t worry. Fox is developing an American version of Torchwood, and those guys can help build a dimension cannon.
lost music videos: the abc promo department gets creative!
As they did several years ago, ABC is releasing a set of promotional music videos related to Lost–one for each major character. I particularly love these videos, because they demonstrate how the network–or at least the promotional department–feels about the characters and their relationships to each other. Take this one for example:
I’m sorry, who’s all she’s known of love?
Anyway, the one at the top of the page is the most recently released and focuses on Sawyer. Now, while I am not a fan of most things that involve Mr. Ford, I am a big fan of anything featuring Carrie Underwood. And of course I’ll tolerate anyone or anything that calls Sawyer “candy-coated misery.” Because seriously.
I’m more interested, actually, in how these videos correspond to centricity for the rest of the season. Spoilers are after the cut. Read more…
bones: first real finale spoilers!
look both ways, guys. // fox promotional photo
I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve been a little anxious about the Bones finale lately. If you were spoiled for last year’s finale, you’ll remember that by this time in ’09, we had already heard key phrases like “artificial insemination,” “alternate reality,” and “health crisis.” This year, not only have we not heard about any big themes heading into hiatus, but we don’t really have anything seriously coming to a head right now, aside from Booth and Brennan’s relationship, but when it that NOT in play?
At the end of the day, it’s an easy problem to have, right? Right now, I’m dealing with the possibility of my favorite television couple in the history of television couples never seeing each other alive ever again, let alone having mischievous tree-climbing little children. I don’t need to spoiler-cut the fact that Booth and Brennan will be together someday. It’s just a matter of whether or not Hart Hanson has the stones to risk “OMG DESTROYING THE CHEMISTRY” by actually having them give it a go.
(Quite frankly, I can’t imagine that getting to make out more frequently at work wouldn’t amp up the tension between David and Emily to levels previously thought unreachable.)
Will this finale be the (cough) “beginning” (cough) of Booth and Brennan’s strictly-unprofessional relationship? Or will we finish this year like we have all those previous–with a frustrating near-miss? Spoilers and speculation after the jump. Read more…
lost: a poem, by allie, about “recon”
I cannot, cannot, like that cop.
I will not, will not—MAKE IT STOP.
Don’t like them with the Man in Black—
Please hurry and rejoin Team Jack.
Not on a date! Not by the sea!
And as for Kate, you let her be!
I will not like him any hour.
With or without that damn sunflower.
I REALLY HATE him by the fire.
(This triangle situation is painfully dire.)
I do not like them “here” or “there.”
(But I will say I’m enjoying Claire.)
I do not like Lost’s final year—
But it’s okay. The end is near.
(Thanks, Green Eggs & Ham. I’m sure they’re more delicious than this crap.)
the office: 39 weeks. holy god.
It’s one week to go before Jim and Pam’s baby is born on The Office, and I couldn’t possibly be more excited. Between the prospect of Jim holding the baby, the baby getting a name (and a confirmed gender), and Kelly and I having a squee-off, I’ve basically got a monumental evening in the works. After the jump, spoilers.
grey’s anatomy, private practice, and the deterioration of “romance” in shondaland
enjoy it while it lasts, lady. // abc promotional photo
Pete and Addison are kind of back together on Private Practice, which made me think for a moment that things were finally righting themselves in Shonda Rhimes’s world. See, Pete and Addison totes made out in Practice‘s backdoor pilot, and then they had some more hot kissing in the first handful of episodes, but before long, the wheels came off the wagon. Most recently, Addison’s been doing some kissing with Sam, and Pete’s still inexplicably obsessed with Violet, who really should be with Cooper, who’s AGAIN NOT AGAIN hooking up with the excruciating Charlotte.
When Pete and Addison most recently fell into bed together, they admitted they were just settling for each other. But Sam’s officially put the kibosh on his flirtation with Addison, and Violet doesn’t seem to be coming around any time soon, so it’s possible that my personal pick for Private Practice OTP may actually have a shot at something here.
However, despite my appreciation for Pete/Addison, I’ve recently come to realize that it’s stupid to keep your fingers crossed for ANY couple on Private Practice or Grey’s Anatomy, when the absolute best you can hope for is a Post-It “wedding.”
See, Shonda doesn’t do relationships–she does hookups. The characters can appear to make it work for a while (Callie and Arizona, Owen and Cristina), but there’s always someone lurking in the background (Mark, Teddy) to make one or both relationship participants behave like children. And even though she’ll bring on new characters as “potential love interests” for established characters, I don’t believe for a second that she has any plan as to who’s supposed to end up with whom. For instance, Alex. At the end of the show’s run, will Shonda pull out all the stops to get Katherine Heigl to do a Clooney and reunite with Alex? And what about Cooper? Are we supposed to want him to figure things out with the unimaginably horrifying Charlotte, or are we to believe that he and BFF Violet may one day become more than friends?
I’m far more inclined to believe that the notion of who-ends-up-with-whom will boil down to which pairings are doing the dirty in the on-call room in the episode prior to the series finale.
Which isn’t really that big of a problem, except for that it (A) doesn’t exactly instill trust in the producer, (B) gets a little ridiculous as the characters grow up, and (C) makes fools out of the people who stupidly get excited about things like weddings. (On the flip side, it makes break-ups almost humorous–consider how pain-free Mark/Lexie’s break-up was.)
So when Kevin McKidd goes out and says, “I’ve always thought it would be cool to see (Owen and Christina) have a baby together down the line,” I want to pat him on the head and say, “Dream on, little ginger one.”
lost: let’s play catch-up, shall we? [spoiler-free]
mr. linus is creepier than purging ben // abc promotional photo
I’m moderately embarrassed about how long it’s been since my last post, but, in my defense, I moved and there was a blizzard. And Lost started, which means the time I used to devote to overanalyzing Hart Hanson’s tweets has been redirected to rocking back and forth in the corner of my apartment hoping against hope that 23 is the new Jacob.
That said, I’m not entirely thrilled with the new season of Lost. The flash-sideways aren’t gelling for me yet, the on-island stories are bogged down in banality, and a heavy handful of new characters is about the last thing I wanted to see in the final season.
There are, of course, two things going on that have me just as hooked as the population at large: John Locke-as-Smoke Monster and the numbers on the wall. (Aren’t you impressed I didn’t say Jack and Kate’s longing glances?)
So there are now five candidates for Jacob’s replacement, and in my mind, it pretty much has to be Jack or Sawyer, but probably Jack. Sayid’s been “claimed” (by whom or what, we don’t know, but it sounds gnarly), Hurley doesn’t really have it in him (sorry), and who really gives a crap what happens to Sun and/or Jin beyond being reunited? I’m still hoping Sawyer sacrifices himself to save Kate and her unborn child (hey, it’s still only been, like, five days since “316,” even if three of those days were in 1977). And if it’s Jack, see, he can Alpertify Kate and they can be TOGETHER FOREVER. Also, Jack’s the one who’s been the most vocal about the island not needing to be protected and all that, so it’s nice and ironic for Jack to become the island’s ultimate protector.
While we’re on the subject, I will say that I loved that split-second look of confusion on Jack and Kate’s faces when they made eye contact at LAX, which went beyond, “Hey, didn’t I steal your pen?” I’m hoping that moments like that, where the flash-sideways characters experience bizarre deja-vu-like memories about each other, continue throughout the season. Folks are speculating that Kate could end up with Sawyer in one reality and with Jack in the other, to which I say SHUT YOUR FACE. I will not accept that. Fate is a critical concept of Lost and the romantic relationships. Whoever she’s supposed to end up with (hint: not Sawyer), she has to end up with in both realities.
Okay, but seriously, the mythology stuff is way more interesting that what’s going on with the relationships. We’re getting awesome new vocabulary lessons, like “claimed” and “recruiting,” and Ilana finally seems to be earning her paycheck. Claire’s back, which is obviously awesome, and it seems likely her visit will bring answers about the mysterious sickness, as well as a much-anticipated Jack/Claire “hey, we’re siblings!” scene. Since most people have known that was coming since “Two for the Road,” it’s about time they got to have a chat about it.
There’s plenty more Lost to talk about–Locke’s dad! The kid in the jungle! Richard Alpert pwns everything!–but that’s old news at this point. I’ll be better about staying on top of things from now on.
