Color me hopeful.
Kudos to Hart Hanson and Stephen Nathan for penning an outstanding opener for Season 9 of this wonderful TV series. "The Secret In The Proposal" was very good, and I want to think it promises the start of a high quality season of TV for this often great show.
As I write this the day after the airing, 90 persons have rated this episode an overall average of 9 stars, and I think that is evidence of the impact of solid writing and performances by everyone. WELL DONE.
I won't provide spoilers, but it was great to see Ms Wick as the squintern of the week, and it was great to see the characters re-emerge strongly from the inconsistent miasm presented by the course of seasons 7 and 8.
About myself: I came to a love and appreciation of this series only over the last 18 months, thanks to the availability of Seasons 1 through 6 on NETFLIX at that time. On the recommendation of a friend, and the strength of a Season 4 episode I watched one night, I started at S1 E1 and drilled straight through to S6 E23 over two months time. Frankly, I was blown away; the Achilles hill of many CSI shows and crime shows is their lame reliance on a formula, and linear action-driven plots that strain belief. I found that six seasons of "Bones" to be refreshingly literate and character-driven, and I made sure I learned the names of the half-dozen best writers of these episodes.
For me, the series maintained a rather high consistency and quality level in those six years, with a dozen truly breath-taking pinnacles of achievement; "Doctor In The Photo" almost made my head explode. My watching ended with "The Hole In The Heart," and "The Change In The Game," and the second of these made me start to worry about where Bones / Booth open co-habitation was headed.
I proceeded to purchase some Season 7 episodes a couple of weeks before the Season 8 FOX premiere, when Netflix added Season 7 to their offering. I forged ahead into S-7 (which I already knew created some fan dissatisfaction) while watching Season 8. I managed to watch the S7 cliff-hanger right before the S8 opener, and that S8 premiere didn't match the excellence of the S7 finale which set it up.
There's a part of the fan base which was and is enamored of the Bones Booth love affair, and I feared that the show would move in the direction of giving them the storybook ending they wanted; indeed S7 was taken up with the baby, and all of the characters were often written as simplistic shadows of their complex selves, jerked this way and that way by the writers in order to flesh out very weak story ideas. It was very unsatisfying save for a few high points. Season 8, same comments.
Sorry for the personal prologue - - my whole point is that THIS episode, THIS premiere for THIS 9th Season of THIS show - was an achievement in quality, an achievement in performance, and an achievement in restoration for the other part of the fan base, persons like me who WANT shocks and surprise, and drama, and we want our connection to characters who are written and developed in a fashion that lets great actors do their finest work. THIS is what I saw on the screen last evening.
Kudos to Hart and Nathan. Many who are like me look back on "Hole In The Heart," and all that came before it, and wonder if the show can rock the house like that again. The season premiere I saw last night said very clearly, "Yes It Can."
I love having hope. Thanks for that.
Kudos to Hart Hanson and Stephen Nathan for penning an outstanding opener for Season 9 of this wonderful TV series. "The Secret In The Proposal" was very good, and I want to think it promises the start of a high quality season of TV for this often great show.
As I write this the day after the airing, 90 persons have rated this episode an overall average of 9 stars, and I think that is evidence of the impact of solid writing and performances by everyone. WELL DONE.
I won't provide spoilers, but it was great to see Ms Wick as the squintern of the week, and it was great to see the characters re-emerge strongly from the inconsistent miasm presented by the course of seasons 7 and 8.
About myself: I came to a love and appreciation of this series only over the last 18 months, thanks to the availability of Seasons 1 through 6 on NETFLIX at that time. On the recommendation of a friend, and the strength of a Season 4 episode I watched one night, I started at S1 E1 and drilled straight through to S6 E23 over two months time. Frankly, I was blown away; the Achilles hill of many CSI shows and crime shows is their lame reliance on a formula, and linear action-driven plots that strain belief. I found that six seasons of "Bones" to be refreshingly literate and character-driven, and I made sure I learned the names of the half-dozen best writers of these episodes.
For me, the series maintained a rather high consistency and quality level in those six years, with a dozen truly breath-taking pinnacles of achievement; "Doctor In The Photo" almost made my head explode. My watching ended with "The Hole In The Heart," and "The Change In The Game," and the second of these made me start to worry about where Bones / Booth open co-habitation was headed.
I proceeded to purchase some Season 7 episodes a couple of weeks before the Season 8 FOX premiere, when Netflix added Season 7 to their offering. I forged ahead into S-7 (which I already knew created some fan dissatisfaction) while watching Season 8. I managed to watch the S7 cliff-hanger right before the S8 opener, and that S8 premiere didn't match the excellence of the S7 finale which set it up.
There's a part of the fan base which was and is enamored of the Bones Booth love affair, and I feared that the show would move in the direction of giving them the storybook ending they wanted; indeed S7 was taken up with the baby, and all of the characters were often written as simplistic shadows of their complex selves, jerked this way and that way by the writers in order to flesh out very weak story ideas. It was very unsatisfying save for a few high points. Season 8, same comments.
Sorry for the personal prologue - - my whole point is that THIS episode, THIS premiere for THIS 9th Season of THIS show - was an achievement in quality, an achievement in performance, and an achievement in restoration for the other part of the fan base, persons like me who WANT shocks and surprise, and drama, and we want our connection to characters who are written and developed in a fashion that lets great actors do their finest work. THIS is what I saw on the screen last evening.
Kudos to Hart and Nathan. Many who are like me look back on "Hole In The Heart," and all that came before it, and wonder if the show can rock the house like that again. The season premiere I saw last night said very clearly, "Yes It Can."
I love having hope. Thanks for that.