Gay TV Recap: Bones

At first, the "gay twist" to last night's Bones seemed frustratingly insignificant. In investigating the murder of Kristen, an intern working in the Authentication Department of the Jeffersonian, Brennan and Booth question another intern named Neil Tyler (played by Sam Jones III, who we recently saw playing Dr. Pratt's gay, paramedic brother on ER), who worked with the victim.

Neil has reason to be jealous of his former colleague: she was expected to win a $75,000 fellowship award and didn't need the money as much as Neil did. (Kristen could work late while Neil had to leave by midnight because of his second job. These people sure give a new definition to dedication.) When Booth wonders aloud if Neil could have been having a relationship with Kristen, Neil denies it, saying that he's gay.

Neil only appears in that one scene, as the investigation quickly moves beyond him. However, the character seemed positioned to make a few more appearances this season (what there may be left of it). When we meet him, he is authenticating artifacts that connect to a serial killer that the Jeffersonian crew have been trying to catch. After this week's Bones, Neil's department is a lot smaller and it wouldn't be surprising for him to become a default expert on the serial killer and the artifacts connected to him. It'll be interesting to see if that pans out.

Bones also features an out actor in the cast, Eric Millegan, who plays oddball genius Zack Addy. Millegan was central to the episode's most memorable scene, where Zack and another Jeffersonian researcher cause a commotion after throwing a model skeleton off of the roof. Zack explains that they needed to see how the ersatz skeleton would react to the impact: if the damage done by the fall matched the damage done to the skeleton, then they can confirm a suspicion about where Kristen was murdered.

Not only does Zack causally use words like "ersatz", but the making a model skeleton to re-create something as dramatic as a long fall is like something you'd expect the Mythbusters crew to try, not an investigator on a crime procedural ... but any excuse to watch Millegan in action is a good one.

But will we see more of Neil as the Jeffersonian crew continue to try to find the serial killer? I guess we'll have to wait and see.