it's "sexist fat hate ruins my favorite shows"* week!
This week's Bones looked at first as if it was going to deal with the housing crisis - "The Foot in the Foreclosure." TWIST! It's actually Booth and Brennan delving into a WORLD FULL OF FATTIES AND THE FREAKS WHO LOVE THEM.
The victim, who has recently lost 100 pounds, is presumed to have been fat because she was "fixated on overeating," and has become a feeder because "that kind of obsession doesn't just go away," and not because the extreme behaviors which frequently accompany that scale of weight loss encourage the creation of an obsession with food. IN ANOTHER SHOCKING TWIST, the victim was a stealing fattie who stole her roommate's insurance in order to get a lap band. Booth assumes that the (fat, natch) roommate must have wanted her own lap band and, upon being turned down by her insurance, killed her friend. Shockingly, the friend did not do so, and was in fact harmed by her roommate when she was prevented from engaging in healthy behavior like getting a regular checkup by her roommate's fraud. But Order Is Restored when Fat Roommate calls Newly Skinny Roommate a "bitch" for having cheated on their sacred weight loss contest.
Even though she's a Former Fattie whose long-term fatness unhinged her enough that she was sexually attracted to an Actual Fattie, Our Heroes magnanimously decide to go ahead and solve the murder anyway. Bones, Booth, and Booth Major go to Club Jiggle (if it's called something else, please correct in comments, as I am Being Kind to Myself and Not Rewinding) to observe the FFLT in their Native Habitat. One Sexy Fat Lady overtly hits on Booth (she is Black and Sassy as well!), scaring him much in the manner of a serial killer or ticking bomb, enough to pretend he is with Bones, which he has spent the last five years resolutely refusing to do. Of course, she is also a Jealous Bitch, as she dismissively refers to Bones as "the celery stick." Bones has a few shining moments when she points out that thin has not always been in and beauty standards are flexible, and that the ladies in the club "appear to be having a good time," but redeems herself by chortling "clearly they haven't seen their blood sugar levels!" and, EVEN THOUGH SHE IS A SCIENTIST, citing her BMI as proof of her individual health and moral superiority to Black Sassy Jealous Bitchy Sexy Fat Lady. Throughout this scene, Booth Major's failure to be appropriately appalled by Sexy Fat Ladies is played for laughs - and the Fatties' ignorance about their Impending Doom is contrasted with the B-story of Booth Major's unwillingness to accept his aging.
Moreover, when Our Heroes discover that the crime was precipitated by disgust and annoyance at "gross cake sex" on the part of the victims, Angela - Angela, whose defining personal traits for the first two or three seasons were (a) love of sex and (b) radical acceptance of others - sighs her sympathy for the murderer, "that's so sweet."
This is really disappointing from Bones, which usually (used to be?) a show which gleefully enjoys showcasing the irrationality of hateful stereotypes (one previous exception being, of course, the Fat Stalker who tried to kill Brennan back in season 2).
The fat hate in Castle (Castle! WHY YOU GOTTA BREAK MY HEART, NATHAN? OUR LOVE WAS REAL!) is more of a drive-by hate-on which is a vicious twofer in that it is rape minimizing fat hate (Meme Roth would be proud!)
Witness: I have a weakness for girls.
Castle: Young girls?
Witness (horrified): No!
Castle: Fat girls?
Witness (equally horrified): No!
Castle: School girls?
Witness: No! Call girls.
NATURALLY, sexual attraction to one of these tubbo uggos is JUST AS SHAMEFUL as being a STATUTORY RAPIST. AH, CASTLE, YOUR HUMOR IS MOST QUIRKY AND SLY.
Of course, this is far from the only hateful bullshit we see in the episode, as (spoiler) the killer is a sociopathic hooker who lies about being a battering victim. This is the first time I can recall seeing such hateful nonsense on the show; in fact, usually it's a surprisingly sex-positive, gender-inverting, anti-self-hatred show. Given the above, along with the way pretty much the only person in-character this week was Beckett, I'm hoping we can chalk this up to a rotten writer. THEY NEED YOU, NATHAN. YOU CAN JUST SAY NO.
CRIME SHOW FAIL. Lie to Me, you are my only hope.
*My favorite non-canceled shows. Sniff.
The victim, who has recently lost 100 pounds, is presumed to have been fat because she was "fixated on overeating," and has become a feeder because "that kind of obsession doesn't just go away," and not because the extreme behaviors which frequently accompany that scale of weight loss encourage the creation of an obsession with food. IN ANOTHER SHOCKING TWIST, the victim was a stealing fattie who stole her roommate's insurance in order to get a lap band. Booth assumes that the (fat, natch) roommate must have wanted her own lap band and, upon being turned down by her insurance, killed her friend. Shockingly, the friend did not do so, and was in fact harmed by her roommate when she was prevented from engaging in healthy behavior like getting a regular checkup by her roommate's fraud. But Order Is Restored when Fat Roommate calls Newly Skinny Roommate a "bitch" for having cheated on their sacred weight loss contest.
Even though she's a Former Fattie whose long-term fatness unhinged her enough that she was sexually attracted to an Actual Fattie, Our Heroes magnanimously decide to go ahead and solve the murder anyway. Bones, Booth, and Booth Major go to Club Jiggle (if it's called something else, please correct in comments, as I am Being Kind to Myself and Not Rewinding) to observe the FFLT in their Native Habitat. One Sexy Fat Lady overtly hits on Booth (she is Black and Sassy as well!), scaring him much in the manner of a serial killer or ticking bomb, enough to pretend he is with Bones, which he has spent the last five years resolutely refusing to do. Of course, she is also a Jealous Bitch, as she dismissively refers to Bones as "the celery stick." Bones has a few shining moments when she points out that thin has not always been in and beauty standards are flexible, and that the ladies in the club "appear to be having a good time," but redeems herself by chortling "clearly they haven't seen their blood sugar levels!" and, EVEN THOUGH SHE IS A SCIENTIST, citing her BMI as proof of her individual health and moral superiority to Black Sassy Jealous Bitchy Sexy Fat Lady. Throughout this scene, Booth Major's failure to be appropriately appalled by Sexy Fat Ladies is played for laughs - and the Fatties' ignorance about their Impending Doom is contrasted with the B-story of Booth Major's unwillingness to accept his aging.
Moreover, when Our Heroes discover that the crime was precipitated by disgust and annoyance at "gross cake sex" on the part of the victims, Angela - Angela, whose defining personal traits for the first two or three seasons were (a) love of sex and (b) radical acceptance of others - sighs her sympathy for the murderer, "that's so sweet."
This is really disappointing from Bones, which usually (used to be?) a show which gleefully enjoys showcasing the irrationality of hateful stereotypes (one previous exception being, of course, the Fat Stalker who tried to kill Brennan back in season 2).
The fat hate in Castle (Castle! WHY YOU GOTTA BREAK MY HEART, NATHAN? OUR LOVE WAS REAL!) is more of a drive-by hate-on which is a vicious twofer in that it is rape minimizing fat hate (Meme Roth would be proud!)
Witness: I have a weakness for girls.
Castle: Young girls?
Witness (horrified): No!
Castle: Fat girls?
Witness (equally horrified): No!
Castle: School girls?
Witness: No! Call girls.
NATURALLY, sexual attraction to one of these tubbo uggos is JUST AS SHAMEFUL as being a STATUTORY RAPIST. AH, CASTLE, YOUR HUMOR IS MOST QUIRKY AND SLY.
Of course, this is far from the only hateful bullshit we see in the episode, as (spoiler) the killer is a sociopathic hooker who lies about being a battering victim. This is the first time I can recall seeing such hateful nonsense on the show; in fact, usually it's a surprisingly sex-positive, gender-inverting, anti-self-hatred show. Given the above, along with the way pretty much the only person in-character this week was Beckett, I'm hoping we can chalk this up to a rotten writer. THEY NEED YOU, NATHAN. YOU CAN JUST SAY NO.
CRIME SHOW FAIL. Lie to Me, you are my only hope.
*My favorite non-canceled shows. Sniff.