TV Review: BONES – Season 11 – “The Carpals in the Coy-Wolves”

By RACHEL REITSLEFF / Contributing Writer

Posted: October 29th, 2015 / 02:36 PM

Betty White in the BONES - Season 11 - "The Carpals in the Cry-Wolves"| ©2015 Fox

Stars: David Boreanaz, Emily Deschanel, Michaela Conlin, TJ Thyne, Tamara Taylor, John Boyd, Betty White, Bryan Klugman, Tyler Francavilla, Erin Cahill, Tom Lenk, Paul Johansson
Writer: Gene Hong, series created by Hart Hanson, based on the life and writings of Kathy Reichs
Director: Randy Zisk
Network: Fox Network, Thursdays @ 8 PM
Airdate: October 22, 2015

For those not up on mammalian taxonomy, a coy-wolf is the offspring that results when a coyote mates with a wolf. Sounds fascinating, right? Alas, none of the creatures named in the title of the BONES Season 11 episode “The Carpals in the Coy-Wolves” turn up, though we see what is meant to be coy-wolf scat. (Yes, I know, but this is BONES – we see blood and mangled flesh all the time, at this point, a little waste product shouldn’t make anyone call foul.)

On the other hand, we do get the awesome Betty White playing Dr. Beth Mayer. Dr. Mayer is what is known in some circles as a “Mary Sue” – she swoops in and instantly proves better at everything than all of our expert main characters, and furthermore does it with humility and charm. This could be very annoying, except that (see above) it’s being done by Betty White, so it is in fact charming and feels very much like her due. If our normally top-dog heroine Brennan (Emily Deschanel) has to give up props to someone, this seems the appropriate character for it.

The legendary Dr. Mayer comes in to help out in part because normally grumpy Dr. Oliver Wells (Bryan Klugman), Brennan’s current lab assistant, is being more difficult than usual, as he’s in an epic funk owing to problems with his manhood. (We could be more specific but we’re not going to, lest search engines think this site is selling something.) Since the body in question was found in the woods, Dr. Mayer suggests that Wells accompany the gung-ho Hodgins (TJ Thyne) in his quest to recover missing evidence.

The body in question belongs to a realtor who was an extreme Fantasy Football aficionado. While there turns out to be a great deal of real-world money on the line here – and the victim lost a lot of it for a friend – the culprit turns out to be the league commissioner (Tyler Francavilla), who despite his powerful title works as a sandwich shop employee. When his status as commissioner was threatened, he lashed out.

There’s also a B plot, involving Booth’s (David Boreanaz) seething reaction when Brennan, who is also a best-selling novelist, kills off Booth’s fictional alter ego in her latest book. Dr. Mayer comes to the rescue here as well, suggesting that, since Brennan wrote this while she and Booth had both temporarily quit their respective jobs, the author/anthropologist had been working out her unconscious rage issues around being sidelined from her passion. By the end of the episode, Brennan thinks she may be able to revive the character “Agent Andy” after all, while Booth has made his peace with the character’s demise. (I think we’re pulling for Agent Andy to make it after all – Brennan may not have been conscious that leaving the Jeffersonian was a ridiculous idea for her, but it was clear to the rest of us.)

Besides the pleasure of seeing White in a rare non-comedic performance, Klugman’s self-absorbed Wells remains a hoot and Tom Lenk is very funny in a couple of scenes as a suspect who has a meta awareness of how his reactions are perceived (shades of Lenk’s Andrew on BUFFY and ANGEL).

But still, it would have been great to see a coy-wolf.

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