Bones “Yanks in the UK” Trite, Yet Entertaining

The 2-hour season premier of Bones, “Yanks in the UK” provided a change in venue for Dr. Temperance Brennan (Emily Deschanel) and FBI Special Agent Seely Booth (David Boreanaz). We find them both in London on speaking engagements. When a body of the daughter of a wealthy American is found in a car in the river, Booth and Bones meet their parallel-universe UK versions, with female Inspector Pritchard (Indira Varma) and male Dr. Ian Wexler (Andrew Buchan). Thos gets them involved with royalty, and later, gets them involved in the apparent murder of Dr. Wexler.

Back at the Jeffersonian, besides the team investigating the forensics from the murder, Angela’s (Michaela Conlin) ex-husband Grayson (Sean Blakemore) returns, finally grants her a divorce, and has a fling with Dr. Saroyan (Tamara Taylor), causing some friction within the team – and between Jack (T.J. Thyne) and Angela.

The episode, as in all episodes of Bones, was entertaining. But, I found it somewhat flawed. This series, which seemed to start heavy with science in the first season, has evolved into story lines heavy on the relationships. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, since the entire cast has great chemistry. But Clark Edison (Eugene Byrd) had I right when, at the end of the show, he says he wants to work more of the science. With this episode, there was almost too much fluff and not enough substance. The murder cases took a back seat to the soap opera, so to speak.

And while I enjoy the interactions between Booth and Bones, which frankly are the core of the show, in this episode, Booth comes off as being more of what’s called in the scientific circles, a “doofus maximus.” I found it silly that he had such extreme troubles driving on the London streets, and even more trouble parking the car, which he did no better than a student driver. The show seems to be going a little overboard on focusing on the brains of Temperance Brennan, all the while making Booth into a running joke. I would have preferred that they make him a little more FBI Agent and less into just window dressing.

The “drama” back at the lab also seemed too much and detracted from the murder case. It’s not that the relationship with Angela and Jack bore me, it’s just that I’m just not all that interested.

Moving the show to London was a nice change of pace, but frankly I found it a little hard to believe that both Brennan AND Booth were needed there for speaking engagements. The one good part of the show is that we were treated to Indira Varma, who I have become more impressed with her in every show where I’ve seen her. The downside is that I had to repeatedly turn up the volume on my TV every time she spoke as she seemed a little too quiet. The location sometimes detracted, as it became just a backdrop to highlight Booth’s growing idiocy. Frankly, it made me yearn to see a real grown up crime drama set in London (I have my hopes set on the up-coming UK version of Law & Order with Jamie Bamber, which hopefully someone will pick up in the US. But I digress.)

All my criticisms aside, I thought this two hour episode was enjoyable. It probably only needed an hour if all the distractions with the soap opera happenings at the Jeffersonian were cut out. I would like to see a little more grown up Booth emerge over the season, rather than regress any further. And maybe, just maybe, they’ll get back into the science.


Here’s a behind the scenes look at this episode :




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