Bones: Fox's Answer to the Forensics Drama

At season's end, May, 2007, there were eight forensics-style dramas on-air between CBS and Fox. Fox's contribution to this current trend is Bones, inspired by the real life of forensic anthropologist and novelist, Kathy Reichs.

Bones (also known as Dr. Temperance Brennan, played by Emily Deschanel, Boogeyman) is a forensic anthropologist who works for the Jeffersonian Institute in Washington D.C. She also works as a consultant to the FBI, partner to Agent Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz, the WB's Buffy the Vampire Slayer). Bones, so called by Booth for her career studying ancient bones, a nickname which her colleagues (who he calls "Squints" because they spend all their time squinting into their microscopes) soon adopt for her as well, makes a point of being all scientist, placing very little creed in emotion or intuition, two things upon which Booth relies heavily.

At the beginning of the series, Bones works for the FBI on a case by case basis. If a case comes in where her skills might be useful, Booth calls and they go to work. As the series progresses, this formality is left behind and Booth goes to her as if she were another agent assigned as his partner, the Scully to his Mulder, if you will excuse the reference.

The formalities of their relationship also begin to soften as Booth quickly becomes only one of two people to whom Bones is comfortable showing her vulnerable, human side; the second being her colleague and oft-called best friend Angela Montenegro (virtual newcomer, Michaela Conlin), the only "Squint" who doesn't hold the title of Doctor.

Angela's calling in life is as an artist, having found her commission at the Jeffersonian putting computer generated faces back on the bare bones Dr. Brennan digs out of the ground. The other "Squints" Bones works with are Dr. Jack Hodgins (T.J. Thyne, Ghost World), an heir whose true love is science, and Zack Addy (also played by a relative newcomer, Eric Millegan), a doctorate student working and training under Dr. Brennan's supervision.