Why The Bones Season 10 Finale Was Written As A Series Finale

Bones may have been off the air for years, but that doesn't mean its fans are any less loyal. Thanks to constant reruns on cable and viewers discovering the show on streaming, it remains hugely popular. The series mainly focuses on Temperance “Bones” Brennan (Emily Deschanel) and FBI Special Agent Celia Booth (David Boreanaz) who work together to solve murders. “Bones” aired on Fox and was filmed primarily in Los Angeleseven though it's technically in Washington

After all, “Bones” ran for 12 seasons and ended in 2017. So when the season 10 finale of “Bones” aired, viewers still had two full seasons of adventures with Brennan and Booth left. However, back then, the show's creators had to treat the Season 10 finale as if it could be the series finale. Executive producer Steven Nathan spoke with TV Guide in 2015 and disrupted the incident. First of all, it should be emphasized that fans of the season 10 finale of “Bones” did not witness what the show's creators originally planned to film. So why did they have to change course? As Nathan explained:

“We had actually planned a completely different ending to the season, a much more traditional cliffhanger and a situation that would take us into Season 11. But the lift we always expected didn't come for a lot of reasons. It was out of our control.”

For what it's worth “Bones” was a show that was often on the bubble and could end multiple times during its run, so this wasn't exactly unfamiliar territory to its creators. However, once the restoration was done from the grid, it was too late to change course again. Thus, the season 10 finale had to go forward as written. Nathan added that the show's creatives won't risk further disappointing fans, explaining:

“After we were told, 'This could be the end of the series,' we realized that we couldn't let down or let go the viewers and fans who have been so important to us for ten years (..) and compromise on the episode. So, very likely could be the last episode. So we had to write a series finale that hopefully had a sense of continuity in time.”

The season 10 finale, titled “The Next in the Last”, first aired in June 2015. In this episode, Jefferson's team discovers the remains of a victim at a crime scene, pointing to a possible defender of the serial killer. Christopher Pelant aka The Hacktivist, the villain who scared Deschanel. This forces them to revisit their previous work on Pelant while investigating new clues that will hopefully lead them to a copy of the killer. Meanwhile, Brennan and Booth consider options outside of Jefferson and the FBI, a thread that is pulled to make this episode feel like a finale.

Season 10 of the show was actually significant for other reasons as well. for one “Bones” season 10 featured the death of John Francis Daly Sweets. It was also the point at which “Bones” was on the air for an entire decade. It is difficult to maintain a certain level of quality for so long. To that end, Nathan explained why the episode could have served as a fitting end to the show, even though it wasn't the way things shook out:

“We all talk about endings, and you get a certain finality, but there's only one ending in life that's final, and that's death. Other than that, it's just change. Brennan has always said, 'There's no such thing as closure. Everyone wants to wrap something in a pretty ribbon and say, “Okay, it's done.” Life doesn't work that way, and Booth and Brennan have pretty much proven that it does.”

“Bones” is now streaming on Hulu, or you can purchase the entire series on DVD from Amazon.