Bones - Episodes 9.08-9.09 - The Dude in the Dam and The Fury in the Jury - Reviews

Bones fans got a special treat this week with two episodes as the series made its transition  to Friday nights.  Both "The Dude in the Dam" and "The Fury in the Jury" had some cool and intriguing elements...let's discuss!

The Dude in the Dam

Brennan and Booth worked to solve the case of a dead sperm donor who'd irritated his share of women, an interesting enough mystery.  But my favorite part of this episode was Brennan's encounters with fellow author Tess Brown.  As usual, Brennan's blunt and harsh manner formed its own type of eloquence as she honestly dissed her rival's writing while keeping herself unbesmirched by Brown's manipulative scheme.  From the interview scenes to Brennan's conversations with friends about whether she is "tactless," to the diner showdown, these were wittily hilarious moments.

Hodgins and Angela had a very unusual subplot in this episode, as Hodgins played host to a worm who incubated on the back of his neck.  This is the kind of incident about which we might say "only on Bones" (or, well, Stargate SG1).  It's so over-the-top, silly, and gross that it plays into the show's quirky humor in a characteristic way.  Hodgins is just unstoppably adorable, to the extent that he managed to carry this off winningly, and it was too funny that Brennan thought his choice to be "mommy" to the worm was perfectly normal and understandable.  I actually thought the most amusing Hodgins moment in this installment was when Wendell accidentally slapped him in the face, with sticky corpse goo on his hand.  

The Fury in the Jury

Two sides of the same case It was fascinating to see Booth and Brennan trying to solve the same case - which later unfurled from just one murder to two - while separated for much of the episode as Brennan served jury duty.  Despite their communicative obstacles, they each made great strides in nailing a sneaky killer, and the threads of the mystery came together perfectly when Booth and Brennan reunited.  It's always inspiring to see Brennan dead-set on righting an injustice such as Kidman getting off for the first murder, and she brilliantly found her way to the truth just in time to make sure he went down for the second crime.  Kidman was just a little too smug and cocky, and he paid for it after admitting that he left his home the night of his friend's murder.  This was an awesome take-down scene in a show famous for them.

Cam's identity theft : I'd half-forgotten about this subplot, and it's one that had always seemed peculiar given its occurrence in the same timeframe as Pelant's reign of terror. This is exactly the kind of thing we used to expect Pelant to do to the Jeffersonian crew, yet he had nothing to do with Cam's swindle.  Instead, as Angela helpfully revealed, the perpetrator is Cam's college roommate, a friend and someone she had no suspicions of before seeing the eerie surveillance footage near the end of this episode.  I'm curious to see where this storyline will go now that Cam has identified the thief.

What did you think of this week's two episodes?  Any theories as to what Cam will do now that she knows who stole her identity?  Share your ideas in the comments!