Bones decided to go alternate reality on us for its season finale. Bones and Booth are cast as a couple who own a nightclub called “the Lab.” Bones and Booth’s nightclub is the site of a murder and the investigators are Booth’s brother Jared and Cam. The show uses the dream episode as a good excuse to drag in every actor who’s played a lab assistant or bit character to come back for more. While last week the crime was secondary and somewhat lame, in the finale the crime is the centerpiece of the story.

The murder in the bathroom of “the Lab” brings all of the employees into the mix as suspects. Sweets is the bartender. Angela is the hostess. Hodgins is a crime novelist. Even Zach reappears as a goofy busboy. The arrows of the investigation seem to repeatedly point toward Bones and Booth. Their ever loyal employees don’t help matters by concealing evidence and generally acting like detectives. Evidence points everywhere but is all inconclusive. From gang ties to possible infidelity between the fantasy-couple, motives are everywhere. In the counter investigation that Booth is conducting Jared his brother and Bones’ father Max come up as prime suspects.

Bones gets a complete head scratcher of a guest star for its season finale. Motley Crue shows up to play “the Lab” as part of Booth’s head trauma-inspired dream. At the same time, Jared and Cam end up in a standoff in the club’s alley. Jared is exposed as the murderer. He killed the victim protecting his brother wife who the victim had come to kill as retribution over disputed protection money. Bones steps into the fray, thanking Jared for his protection and asking that he now give himself up. He does and is taken into custody just in time to have Motley Crue play “Dr Feelgood.”

Booth awakens in a hospital bed with Bones gently writing at his bedside. Teary and relieved Bones rushes to him. She explains that he’s been a coma for several days but that his operation was a success. Booth looks quizzically at Bones and asks her “who are you?” The season ends.

Bones does a pretty good job of playing up its campy side this week. Keeping track of each character’s new role is a little difficult, and that’s to the episode’s detriment.  Generally though, I found it more fun that it sounds on paper. My general problem with this episode is that it just felt drama-less. I figure most of the audience assumed that this was all an intense dream sequence brought on by Booth’s brain surgery. Thus, where is the tension? The only tension the episode is able to serve up in anticipation of next season is Booth’s amnesia. Though that may play itself into a more interesting set of stories next season, in itself it doesn’t carry enough weight. Here’s looking forward to next season’s round of fresh corpses and unrealized sexual tension.

This has been an uncharacteristically uneven season of House. there were episodes of pure brilliance like last weeks, and still other’s that felt stale and repetitive. The formula that has driven the show has become so expected that sometimes it isn’t really important to know much about the illnesses at all. Its Dr House himself (and to a lesser extent the crew) who make the show worth watching. This season-ending episode was proof positive of that. Last week, House kicked his drug habit, stopped hallucinating and finally slept with Cuddy. It was a pretty big week. This week, we’re left to deal with the aftermath.

The patient this week is a man whose left a right brain functions are deviating. So much so that his left arm (operated by the left brain) slaps his girlfriend around while the other hand caresses her. Though it is pretty funny seeing the patient dealing with a sort of tourette’s syndrome for the hand, in reality its a bad metaphor for the conflict that House lives every day.

In typical fashion, he starts by pranking Cuddy and she responds in kind. As their back and forth marches on with eye rolling predictability, the patient and his separated brain illness gets worse. The high point of their pranks is the addition of an elderly patient who the two use as a pawn. The elderly patient is played by TV legend Carl Reiner. There’s no need to go into Mr Reiner’s biography here, but for those who don’t know who he is should check his IMDB profile.

Another left over from last week is the conflict between Chase, Cameron and Cameron’s dead husband’s sperm. Cameron wants to keep it “in case” things don’t work out with Chase. Chase eventually decides that regardless of how strange it may be for his wife to keep her sperm-cicle, its something he can live with. This whole plot just makes no sense to me. Maybe I just don’t get the symbolism of the frozen man mayo, but it feels like a completely unneeded addition.

House and Wilson talk and inexplicably, Wilson suggests that House ramp up the crazy.  Taking his advice to heart, House stands on the balcony of the hospital and makes the grand announcement that he and Cuddy have slept together. Obviously furious, Cuddy fires him while House suggests they move in together. Then seemingly at random, House is approached by the elderly patient. Talking to the patient about his problem somehow triggers his epiphany.

It isn’t pretty.  All the good feelings, all of House’s memories about kicking his drug habit and sleeping with Cuddy where hallucinations. She was never there. He never quit popping pills. It was all in his head. Now, as House realizes how crazy he really is, CTB and Kutner reappear. Now rudderless and terrified, House admits that he needs help. We’re supposed to believe that House spent all day thinking that his bottle of pills was Cuddy’s discarded lipstick. Its a bit more far fetched than usual, but it is a show stopper.

As the season ends, happy scenes of Chase and Cameron being married are intercut with grim shots of Wilson driving House to a dark and creepy psychiatric hospital. There aren’t any answers delivered here, only a cut to black. The patient is simply left without a proper resolution. Sure there is a quick few lines from Taub about their misdiagnosis, but generally this proves my earlier point. The illnesses and the diagnosis of those illnesses is just window dressing.

All season I clamored for change in a show that I love, but found stagnant. In the last several episodes, Kutner has died and House has gone crazy. In taking these risks, House has cracked open a whole new book on how these characters can interact with each other. Who knows how evil a jerk a completely sober Gregory House could be?

While there’s been some pretty compelling posts around the net suggesting that Dollhouse is Josh Whedon’s best work, the general consensus seems to be that Dollhouse was a massively ambitious disappointment.  In truth, the potential that was there has only been showing up over the last five episodes. What will humanity look like when all of our experiences and personality traits are just space on a hard drive? What makes you human if your body and mind are separable? What is the difference between exploitation for the common good and evil? All surprisingly deep philosophical questions for a show whose original facade was that of a high end brothel. Though wrapped in kinky fantasies and kung fu kicks, Dollhouse really did try to tackle those ideas. Sometimes with a fair amount of success, like the episode “Needs” but also with some shallow detours like the god awful “Stage Fright.” In the final tally, Dollhouse simply wasn’t able to grow up enough to catch a steady audience over its twelve episode run and this will likely be the last episode ever broadcast.

This is it. Alpha has Echo captive out in the wild and Ballard is captured by the Dollhouse. What exactly the clearly insane ex-active has in mind with Echo isn’t clear but its bound to be ugly.

Through out the episode we catch flashbacks of Alpha’s time as a doll. Turns out Doctor  Saunders has a much bigger role to play than we had originally known. She too was an active. The House’s most popular in fact. Alpha’s non fatal attack on her seems to be even more significant now. After Echo arrives, Alpha takes an interest in Dr. Saunders aka Whiskey, the same way Victor had been taking an interest in Sierra.

Ballard and Mrs Dewitt are joining forces to try to capture Alpha and Echo. Ballard seems to be able to handle all of it with surprising smoothness considering how obsessed he’s been with the Dollhouse. Ballard attempts to help Topher, Dewitt and Boyd decipher what Alpha’s motives and target could be. Realizing that the first thing that Alpha destroyed was his primary or original personality, Topher discovers that Alpha too has stolen Echo’s primary personality.

Now having built his own imprint chair and kidnapped a hostage, Alpha’s plan for Echo starts to crystalize. Alpha wants to build his own perfect mate. To do that, he has to remove Echo’s true self and dump all of her previous imprints into her at once. To do that, Alpha uses his homemade brain chair to put Caroline (Echo’s true personality) into their hostage. At this point Alpha delivers a psychotic and gripping soliloquy. It’s proof that Alpha has lived up the boogeyman persona that’s been building all season long. Tudyk is once again excellent, playing up the glitches in Alpha’s programming. One personality overrides another as Alpha’s ticks and freaks out.

Once again in flashback, we see Alpha and Whiskey in the Dollhouse. Whiskey is the most popular doll and is consistently being called out on jobs. Suddenly Alpha appears over her and says in a creepy childlike voice “Whiskey, let Echo be number one” and slashes her face. Now subdued Alpha appears to be getting another treatment, but something goes wrong and Alpha’s imprint is warped as he struggles.
Back on the manhunt, Ballard tries to understand Alpha in some deeper sense. He thinks the actives still posses a soul and that understanding who Alpha was before he was wiped could tell them who he has become. You can almost hear the Whedon sub plot bells ringing.

Now with Caroline imprinted on the hostage, Alpha sets out to make Echo into his own super crazy love partner. Alpha fancies himself god-like and superior to ordinary people and he intends to make Echo the same. Thus transforming her into his “Omega”. Caroline is trying to appeal to Echo. Its fascinating for the mind, encased in another body to try to talk rationally with her own body, even without her persona. Alpha expects Echo to kill Caroline and exorcise her original self permanently. Echo isn’t going that way though.

In a fantastic twist, the newly crowned Omega turns on Alpha laying him out with a pipe to the face. Even with all of her actives in her head, Echo maintains a feeling of self. Her inner soul as Ballad called it, continues to see the evil nature of Alpha. Who we discover through Ballard’s detective work was well on his way to becoming psycho before the Dollhouse picked him up. After some esoteric conversation with her own mind, Omega and Alpha begin the inevitable fisticuffs. Omega gets the upper hand and it looks like we may have a neat tidy ending, but just as Omega/Echo is about to escape Alpha shoots Caroline in the throat.

Ballard and Boyd are breaking out their old police skills as they track down the victim of Alpha’s last act of free will before becoming an active. Once they do, they discover that she too has the facial scars that Alpha has made a calling card. It seems like Balard and Boyd’s sleuthing could turn something up and the two are closing in.

Alpha has the upper hand and he forces Echo back into his home made chair. Claiming he’s going to destroy the hard drive with Caroline on it if she doesn’t comply. Echo is having none of it though. Now reversing roles, Echo is chasing Alpha just as Ballard and Boyd arrive.

Now with all the principles in place for a finale showdown, there’s an excellent foot chase using a power station as a backdrop. During the fray, Alpha throws away the hard drive containing Caroline. Ballard catches the hard drive thus finally getting to save Caroline in an incredibly esoteric way. Alpha escapes to be a specter should the Dollhouse magically get renewed.

Back at the Dollhouse, Topher begins to see that the active Whiskey is peaking through the cracks in the composite of Doctor Saunders. She too is able to see beyond her imprint. Ballard is working at the Dollhouse now in exchange for “Millie’s” freedom. In the final moment as the actives return to their pods for sleep Echo whispers one name “Caroline.”

Whedon’s premise became obvious. Though personalities and memories can be calculated and copied, a person’s true nature can’t be overwritten. Its a very good ending to what became a very good series. It had the potential to be great, but Dollhouse just never was able to get there. Sadly, it looks like Whedon will once again be without a network TV home. Though the airwaves might be poorer for that, I’m guessing with the success of Dr. Horrible, the internet will be made richer.

There’s one more week of Bones, and although there hasn’t been a blood pumping rush to a finale, there does seem to be some urgency in the works. Constantly full of cartoony gore, Bones can be inherently ridiculous. On the other hand, as a detective show Bones can be tense and emotional. Walking the line isn’t easy and very often its done in such a clumsy fashion that it completely undercuts both the humor and the emotion. This week that clumsy approach was really jarring.

The rotted semi-melted corpse of a wine critic is found in a cask or red wine. Watching wine snobs spit up red wine mixed with corpse was pretty funny, I must admit. Obviously a body that has disintegrated and red stained bones made flexible in the vinegar of wine making is going to be a task. Through several tests involving watermelons, wine bottles and denture cleaner, the murder finally reveals itself. One of the wine makers feels threatened that his plan to undermine a neighboring vineyard would be discovered by the critic, and he killed him stuffing the body in a wine barrel.

The real impetus of the story is Bones’ all to sudden decision to have a baby. Not only to have baby, but to have one using Booth’s sperm. Dr Sweets almost falls over himself in disbelief as Bones and Booth spend the entire episode trying to pretend that this doesn’t signal something deeper about their relationship.

The lead selling point of this episode is a special guest star. Stewie from Family Guy joins in as a Booth hallucination. Who at Fox thought it would be a god idea to have Stewie guest star in an episode of anything other than American Dad? Despite the ridiculousness of it all, Bones tries desperately to explain it away. Booth has seen visions several time this season and Bones finally forces him to go to the doctor. Within moments, Booth is diagnosed with a benign brain tumor and is on his way to surgery changing the entire tone of the episode.

This week made me wish that the writer’s hadn’t bothered with a murder. Other than giving the crew some time to bounce sperm donor jokes off of each other and hit fruit with wine bottles, it didn’t serve much purpose. Also, the complete 180 degree turn between silliness with a cartoon baby to the seriousness of a brain tumor was so quick it almost made my nose bleed. Despite that, we clearly have the set up for next week’s season finale. The preview promises a return of all the old faces and a possible bedroom scene between Bones and Booth. I’m gonna throw down $2 on it being a dream sequence.

House is building toward a climax like many other shows this time of year. Its been a surprisingly rocky season for House. I spent much of the season longing for a shake up, but when one finally came (in the form of Kutner’s suicide), I wished it hadn’t. Network executives always say critics are fickle, I suppose they’re right.

Newlyweds Chase and Cameron are discussing the idea of a prenup. Not a normal prenup though. Cameron kept the frozen sperm of her deceased husband. She tells Chase that she wants to keep it just in case things don’t work out with Chase. Odd to be sure, and I don’t really think this was a good time to add another layer to the episode. It just felt tacked on and out of place. The real meat of the episode, was house and his hallucinations.

With the CTB still trapped in his head, House tries to take some time off but is drug in to deal with a new patient. This week’s insane patient is a ballet dancer. As usual, the cause seems unknowable. Unable to trust his own judgement, House turns to Wilson for help overseeing all of his diagnostic work as well as helping him treat his hallucinations. Even so, he can’t bring himself to tell Wilson that its his dead love Amber who is stuck in his head.

This particular patient has perhaps on of the single grossest symptoms ever. Her skin is coming off. Yikes. House thinks the skin disintegration was his fault and feels guilty about it. House takes this as a symptom of his own sickness (which on second thought is hilarious) and worries about possibly having MS. In an attempt to reconcile that emotion he goes to the patient and apologizes. All the while, the CTB is acting as his subconscious mocking him from inside.

While trying to talk out the diagnosis and his hallucination with Wilson, House lets slip who the real identity of his invisible friend is. Wilson takes it surprisingly well but also decides that House has to detox. Regardless of what the cause is, House’s future as a doctor hangs in the balance.

Because of the icky skin situation, House and the crew elect to stop the patient’s heart in order to get an MRI. Its risky and crazy dangerous, but they can’t figure another way. At the same time, House becomes desperate and tells Wilson he’s going to put himself into insulin shock thinking this will exorcise the CTB demon in his head. Its an excellent back and forth scene with the crew trying to save the patient, while House fades into shock. Its very well done and quite gripping.

House wakes up without his hallucination. Sure that he’s cured, he returns to the patient.  Foreman saw a shadow behind her heart during the MRI andbelieves there was something there. House comes to the psychotic epiphany that her boyfriend gave her gonorrhea and that it has somehow made it to her heart. Huh?

With House now celebrating his victory, Foreman calls and throws a monkey wrench into the whole thing. House guessed right, but it was a lucky guess not an informed one. As this dawns on him, the CTB returns. House immediately calls Wilson and sets out to check himself into rehab. At that moment, Foreman calls to tell him that the patient is spiraling down. Thought the diagnosis may be right, they can’t stabilize her enough to operate. House however is off the case now. The crew is on their own. Eventually they do figure a way, but the drug they give her gives her gangrene in her feet and hands. It requires amputation but as a dancer she’d rather die. Spurned on by Taub, they crew tries an long shot treatment that pays off, curing her black extremities.

House goes to Cuddy to quit his job. In doing so he makes an emotional plea for her help. House begins to withdraw from the Vicodine with Cuddy acting as his nurse. He tells Cuddy where his stashes of drugs are, confounding his hallucination. CTB and House go back and forth arguing over Cuddy and his addiction. Clearly his hallucinations are standing in as a symbol for his addiction. The scene is excellent, cathartic and raw.

As the morning comes, House and Cuddy talk about their past. Suddenly, House realizes CTB is gone. As she’s about to leave, Cuddy and House embrace and we get the moment we’ve been waiting for. The two begin to tear each other’s clothes off and the show cuts to black.

The reappearance of the CTB has been fantastic. Acting as House’s subconscious she added a whole other layer of subtext. It remains to be seen if House’s new found cleanliness will last, or if the romance with Cuddy will see the light of day next episode. Regardless, this episode was rock solid television. The fundamentals of House are strong once again.

There are only a few more episodes of Dollhouse left now and the show seems to have found its footing. Last week’s episode wasn’t as explosive as the previous weeks, but this week’s is an absolute scorcher.

Ballard is trying to break up with his active/ girlfriend Lilly. Not surprisingly, Lilly is devastated. As the Dollhouse collects its now suicidal active, Ballard follows them back to the home base and discovers the Dollhouse’s location.

Echo is trying to help young girl with emotional difficulties. In order to help the girl, Topher has imprinted Echo with the kid’s own patterns thus giving Echo all the tools to help the abused girl. It seems to be Topher’s own personal charity work.

Meanwhile at the Dollhouse, a chip supposedly from the NSA has been found and the only way to decode it is to let Dominick out of the attic. Not Mr. Dominick actually, but Victor imprinted with the former security head’s brain. Dominick reveals that the chip isn’t from the NSA, but from Alpha. Alpha was trying to point Dominick to Dollhouse HQ in Arizona.

Ballard discovers that a man was brought on as an environmental specialist during the Dollhouse’s construction. After finding the shaky, pot growing environmentalist, played brilliantly by Whedon favorite Alan Tudyk, Ballard forces him into an alliance.

Now at the Dollhouse, Ballard and the pot-head are breaking in just as Echo is returning. Eventually the two make it inside and Ballard gets his first look at his white wale. Slowly making their way through the Dollhouse, its becoming clear that the pothead knows more than he’s letting it on. The unlikely pair make their way to a computer terminal and begin to try to free the actives. As Ballard does, he’s discovered by Boyd. Boyd and Ballard fight in what must be Dollhouse’s most sought after tussle as these are the only two characters on the show with any moral compass. While the two scrap, the pothead disables all of the security systems. Its a pretty impressive fight scene, and Boyd comes out the winner.

Now here comes the twist. As the doctor escorts Victor back to her office for medical attention, the potheads true nature reveals itself. The goofy environmentalist is Alpha. Now in control of the whole Dollhouse, Alpha begins a rein of terror. He mutilates Victor in his traditional blade happy way and then holds the doctor and Echo hostage. He takes Echo to the chair and he imprints her. Alpha and Echo embrace and Alpha’s motivations are now obvious. He’s in love. Now with no one to stop them, the happy couple walk out of the Dollhouse.

This is an episode that payed off. It was good enough to make all the other silly inconsistencies of earlier episodes fade out of memory. Tudyk is great on screen as Alpha and I only wish we’d seen him sooner. The only downside of this episode is the abused child plot line. It seemed to go nowhere even though the concept had a lot of potential. The intensity os seriously ratcheted up by the end and I for one am really looking forward to next week.

Bones is always finding new and creative way to turn up bodies. A few weeks ago they found a skeleton being used as a prop in a metal band’s stage decor. This week, they find a dead body shoved into a mascot costume. Bones, is there any place you can’t find a corpse?

The mascot corpse had been mutilated during a pep rally by the students and at first its a little difficult to determine the cause of death. In particular, the students fired a canon filled with random junk at the mascot leaving perforations and random junk scattered throughout the body. Eventually though, the affable Muslim intern from a few weeks ago finds a bullet.

The victim was nicknamed “beaver” and was a member of a frat. The investigation first turns to the fraternity brothers first. The victim was a popular guy and regular party animal. He had however slept with another student;s girlfriend, this putting the jilted boyfriend in the crosshairs of the investigation.

Booth’s brother also reappears this week. After helping Booth in the gravedigger climax a few weeks ago, Jared received a discharge from the military. Booth decides its up to him to get his little brother back on track. Jared ignores his brother, buys a motorcycle and is set to take a trip to India. He even invites Booth along. Booth is going to be forced to let his little brother go on his own.

After some insane DNA tests involving the sheets from the frat house, they discover that Beaver had been sleeping with an older woman. While looking for evidence of his lover’s identity they also find evidence that the victim was acting as a campus bookie. All of these clues though still have uncovered a true cause of death.

At this point the writers have a lapse of creative mojo because in order to get a cause of death, the don’t set out any logical pattern. They simple have Bones star at the corpse with sappy pop music playing until she has a moment of revelation. That’s some pretty lame story telling.

After some more electronic wizardry, a few photos are found on the victim’s computer. One of which was a sexually explicit picture of the dean’s wife. Obviously, the dean now has a motive. Despite that, the dean as murderer just doesn’t add up.In the end, its not the jilted boyfriend but the girl he claimed to be involved with. The victim was trying to force himself on her and she shot him with a nail gun.

A pretty good episode overall for Bones. Aside from the fraternity sheet testing, this one seemed almost plausible. Plus, I’m pleased how Bones has treated the Muslim assistant. I had worried that they would turn him into a cartoon character, happily they’ve avoided that impulse so far.

Now a few weeks removed from the Kutner suicide, House feels rudderless. Its surprising to see how big an impact Kutner had on the show. Very rarely did a show hinge on Kutner’s personal life, but there’s no doubt now that he was a serious anchor on the show. House as a character has always been about bouncing between the profane and the ridiculous, the serious and the silly. Kutner was a big help in establishing the warmth and humor that House possesses. Much of this episode was meant to be playful, but it couldn’t quiet make it work.

As usual, the tension doesn’t come from the patient but from the group. Most importantly, from House’s new imaginary friend Amber. Fans will remember Amber as both Wilson’s dead love interest and as House’s foil “the cut-throat bitch” or CTB. House plays off the return of CTB as a hallucination brought on by lack of sleep and pills. Regardless of the reason, CTB is ever present in this episode. She questions, complains and even leads House astray a few times while dealing with his patient.

Speaking of the patient, a young deaf high school wrestler suddenly hears the sound of explosions. Deaf since birth, the young man has no idea what is happening to him. Brought in for treatment, House realizes that the kid’s handicap could be overcome with an implant. Though House is annoyed by the kids frustrating attachment to his deafness, he’s distracted. Not only by his new hallucination, but also by Chase’s bachelor party.

Chase and Cameron are getting married and in true House form, he takes the reins of Chase’s bachelor party. House apparently really knows how to throw a party and proceeds to get every stripper and hooker in New Jersey to attend. This is the before-mentioned playful portion on the show. While it was certainly fun to watch Wilson and House try to remember all the strippers from Wilson’s bachelor party, mostly the playful side felt hollow. Maybe its just me, but I kept wanting to see Kutner with a dumb expression of excitement while getting out lap dances.

In typical fashion the patient’s illness is obtuse and masked by a billion other options. The one different aspect of the patient is his deafness and his desire to remain so. Having never been able to hear, the young man clings to the proud identity he has created. House finds this decision to remain handicapped insane and decides (with the assistance of the ghostly CTB) to install a implant allowing the boy to hear without his parent’s permission.The plan seems to backfire when the patient tears them out. Ouch. In the end, after hearing his mother speak his name for the first time, he decides to keep his implants, but not before he is near death twice and misdiagnosed five or six times. Again, pretty standard.

The real star of the episode was CTB. Prowling around House, telling him he’s crazy and watching House try to rationalize her away all made for some fun TV. Good news as well, she’ll be back next week. House’s plan to stay up for several days to attempt to exhaust the hallucination away turned up empty, and thus she’ll be back next week. Still, I couldn’t help but miss Kutner during the bachelor party scenes.

Internet rumors about Dollhouse have been going crazy for the last few weeks. Most of them are inspired by Wheadon himself. Though I don’t think a review is the proper place to explore them, it does seem as though the interest in the show has coincided directly with the uptick in quality. Ao the show itself has improved, so too has the interest in it.

A rich older woman is killed in what appears to be a horse riding accident. Margaret is a former Dollhouse customer and a friend of the icy Ms. DeWitt. So much so, that Margaret is imprinted onto Echo giving her another shot at life. Essentially making Echo a ghost. Margaret in Echo’s body ghoulishly attends her own funeral and after seeing her family in mourning, Margaret decides to solve her own murder.

The fsuspects include her son, daughter, brother and her far younger boy toy.  Margaret spends much of the episode trying to come to grips with her family’s real feelings toward her. Apparently, her reputation as an unfeeling dictator was lost on her in life. I suppose that’s a fear we almost universally share, to discover that your loved one’s weren’t as loved as you thought.

Not a whole lot went on back at the actual Dollhouse. Topher gets permission to use Sierra for a “diagnostic” but in truth just wants a playmate. Interestingly enough its the first time I remember seeing a doll used as a plutonic friend. Which seems hard to believe considering Topher. The two spend their time playing laser tag, video games and drinking beer.

Margaret’s investigation finally come to a head when her son guesses her real identity. Its a bit silly because regardless of how much she might act like his mother, its hard to believe that he’d figure that out. The son killed his mother by drugging the horse that threw her to her death. Not surprisingly, the murder centers around her fortune. After a tussle between the son and the boy toy, the son is exposed and  Margaret has some closure.

This week’s episode really showed the potential built into the Dollhouse concept. As has been said on other websites, the concept of imprinting a mind into a new body was one of the ideas that made Battlestar Galactica successful. The device is full of traps and surprises that could make for very compelling television. This week’s episode really worked that concept and made it interesting.

This week Bones opens up a bit to Asian culture. Note, I’m using the term “culture” very loosely. Booth is asked by a Japanese detective friend Ken, to help him find his sister who has been living in America. Sadly, she turns up dead. Only her head is found in a swampy marsh wearing an anime mask. Now in the lab, the brother brings in a Japanese forensic scientist to work with the group. Once again, Bones goes Emo and the Japanese scientist, Dr Tinaka has random piercing, blue highlights and is totally androgynous.

The victim was pursuing modeling. The photographer sends them to a Japanese tea house which then leads them to an escort agency. Booth’s Japanese detective friend is his right hand man on the investigation. Obviously this leads to many altercations as he discovers the seedy world his sister has been living in. After questioning the pimp, we find out that the victim’s roommate, not the victim, was working as an escort.

Aside from the usual forensic jargon, the crew spends most of their time trying to guess Dr Tinaka’s gender. Its silly and immature, but that’s Bones.

Eventually, Booth finds the missing roommate. The murderer intended his gruesome crime to be a signal of warning. The terrified roommate leads them back to the pimp, but the suspected murder weapon turns up clean. The pimp did decapitate her, but the murder was caused by drowning. The pimp offers to point Booth to the murderer if he gets immunity. Finally, the investigation ends with the pimp going free, and the rough escort agency customer is in custody for the killing.

This was an excellent episode of Bones over all. The plot was tight and not overwrought. Most importantly, the Japanese guest stars where excellent (if a little too stereotypical) and were actually helpful in moving the plot in a good direction.