Dissecting Bones

I'm kinda hooked.

A month or two ago I discovered that David Boreanaz of Buffy and Angel fame was starring in a new series, Bones. I checked it out. It's not bad. To be honest, it's not really that great, but it has potential.

The main character, Dr Temperance Brennan has me completely gripped, though. She's highly intelligent and yet socially clueless. Any time anybody around her makes a pop culture reference, she stares blankly in response, adding 'I don't know what that means'. She's completely unaware of herself as an emotional or sensual person. Other characters describe her as having both 'an obvious personality disorder' and 'enough pent up sexual energy to power a small Midwestern city'.

She treats everybody as though they perceive and understand the world the same way she does. Unsurprisingly, she alienates people. She tries desperately to communicate with people on her own level — only 99% just doesn't operate on that level. 'Compared to you', her boss remarks at one point, 'most of the world is a little stupid'.

Other phrases get tossed around:

• can't connect...


• emotionally distant and cold...


• she looks confused, like it's her first day on earth...


• try getting out of the lab once in a while...

Had my education plans not been derailed by circumstances both internal and external, I would have been that character. In many ways, I am that character. Only instead of a world-renowned expert in the field of whatever (and best-selling novelist), I'm a moderately successful comma monkey... With all the social graces of a slightly deranged poodle...

I'm not as completely socially inept as Brennan. But I'm not that far removed either. It's something that needs work.

Comments

[j]

i loved the books and can't watch the show.
just my two cents on that :)

[Beth]

"... comma monkey"
I LOVE that description!

[FTN]

Ah yes, but because of the miracle of the big ol' InterWeb, you have marvelous social graces! Like those of a partying, keyboard-tappin' Dalmatian!

Or perhaps a miniature schnauzer. Or a long-haired dachshund.