Bones Season Finale Recap: The Marriage Dance

Bones, Episode 24: "The Secret in the Siege"

[Ed. Note: I know that Bones is not a show that I regularly recap, but I decided to give a quick take on the season finales of all the shows that I watch.  So, enjoy!]

The Bones season finale was pretty amazing.  It had you shouting at the TV in equal parts joy and rage and frustration.  The episode featured the return of the best long term villian the show has ever had, Pelant.  The last we saw of Pelant he was performing self surgery on his face after being shot by Booth.  The case of the week finds Booth investigating the deaths of FBI agents that were part of a raid on a cult compound that went sour.  

Booth, Brennan, Sweets and the rest of the Jeffersonian crew figure out that Pelant is behind this pretty early on.  They know he isn't doing the actual killing, but he is manipulating the person who is the actual killer.  Sweets realizes that Pelant is using his research to facilitate his plan.  It turns out that Pelant is manipulating the daughter of one of the FBI agents who was killed at the compound by playing fake video messages of him.  The Jeffersonian crew think that Pelant's big plan is to kill Booth, but it turns out he is targeting Sweets.  There is a pretty tense scene in the climax where Booth, Sweets, Brennan and the killer are all stuck in a Pelant created traffic jam.  You get the feeling that someone is going to get it, but Booth ends up shooting the girl, wounding her, before she can take out Sweets.

That is not the thing that had fans salivating and then crying, tears of joy and rage, in the finale though. Brennan was pretty shaken up by the thought of losing Booth, so much so that she came to a realization.  She wanted to marry Booth.  She drops the bomb on a shocked and delighted Booth.  It is one of my favorite Booth/Brennan scenes ever.  It was pretty much perfect in every way.  You knew this happiness wouldn't last, since Brennan's proposal came at about the halfway mark of the episode and it didn't.

After foiling Pelant, Booth received a call from Pelant.  Pelant told Booth that he would decline Brennan's proposal and if he didn't Pelant would start murdering innocent people.  Pelant went at Booth in exactly the right way by preying on Booth's hero complex.  He knew that Booth would never allow innocent people get hurt if he could stop it, even if it cost him his personal happiness.  That night, Booth tells Brennan that he doesn't think they should get married.  That he isn't convinced that Brennan wants to marry him for the right reasons.  

Emily Deschanel and David Boreanaz kill it in this scene.  The whole thing is nuanced and underplayed.  The subtle changes in body language convey so much.  You can just see how comfortable they are after 8 years and it really sells the scene.  The episode ends with uncertainity.  Will Booth and Brennan's relationship be over before it's even really begun?

Final Verdict:  The Bones finale was great.  It was equal parts satisfying and frustrating.  The creators gave fans what they have been waiting for only to yank the rug out from them in the same episode.  I can't imagine they would tear the couple apart so soon after putting them together, but you never know.  Also, kudos to the writers for finally crafting a season long villian who is a real threat to the team in Pelant.  I am pretty happy knowing that he will be back to torment the staff of the Jeffersonian next year.

So, what did you guys think?  Happy that Pelant lived?  Angry that the engagement lasted half an episode?  Sound off in the comments.