-

Uh oh! Seeley Booth’s brain lapse from last season is back with shooting ability snatching vengeance. The teaser opens with Booth at a shooting range unable to hit any thing on the target. He goes to see Sweets about it but is miffed when the psychologist treats him as a patient and not as a friend. Good thing he didn’t confide in him that he could no longer shoot a gun, Sweets may have raised concerns about him, I don’t know, not being fit for duty.

Leaving Sweet’s office Booths gets a call, or text message, and by looking at his phone knows he has to go solve a murder. At the scene Bones gets him to talk about his “bad day on the range” and she comes to the conclusion that his inability to fire a gun must be psychological since his tumor wouldn’t have had an affect on it. Booth, having already seen Sweets and gotten the patient treatment, says he can’t go to him because he will just report it to the FBI. He uses the term “loopy doopy,” to describe his current brain function and expresses concern about passing his re-certification in a week.

The body for this week is a small green skeleton found when a road collapsed. Just to make the whole story unbelievably bizarre, as is seeming to be per usage for Bones, Brennan finds a gold coin and a water main breaks causing a rainbow to form in the mist. Don’t look now folks but I think we’ve got a leprechaun case.

Intern of the week is the BRITISH one Nigel Murry and of course he is backing the leprechaun theory, however Hodgins is all for the minerals at the site making the body green.

Knowing he couldn’t go to Sweets, Booth goes and looks up his old mentor Gordon Gordon, who is now a head chef, for advise.

Brennan examines the body and concludes the dwarf had injuries due to fighting. Nigel Murry proposes he might be from Lord of the Rings, but Bones is thinking more along the lines of professional wrestler.

Angela looks through professional fighters with Brennan and they fight one who matches, the Iron Leprechaun. However, that particular Iron Leprechaun is fighting that night, so they decide to see if the one can lead them to the other.

Hodgins examines what was found next to the body, and discovers all the coins were worth a couple hundred dollars and a gun that was found next to the victim was unfired.

Booth enjoys Gordon Gordon’s meal and shares his brain lapses. Gordon feels Booth’s need for helping fire his gun is “desperately phallic,” which of course gets Booth’s panties in a bunch.

That night Gordon joins Booth and Bones at the midget wrestling arena where a bumblebee and an Iron Leprechaun are fighting. Brennan spots a poster of the original Iron Leprechaun beside the rink and starts booing that the one fighting is a fake. The bumblebee wins the match and Booth goes to bring the Leprechaun in for questioning. He ends up fighting the dwarf… of course he does.

It comes out that the original Iron Leprechaun had a fling that went bad with one of the bosses of the fighting ring. When Booth and Bones go to question her she drops the analogy bomb of the episode. “ You know men, they get hurt in the heart department it always shows itself in another way.” HINT HINT.  The leprechaun, Bryce Stefante, had a criminal past and was not aloud to own a gun but the boss lady says she had one that went missing.

Gordon Gordon and Sweets have breakfast at the diner. He quiets Sweets fear that Booth doesn’t want to confide in him by telling him that Booth came to Gordon because he knew that he would confide in Sweets. The two decide to work together to help Booth.

Cam and British intern positively ID the body as Bryce. Cam also signs for two things, which is awkward.  Intern finds three nicks in the victim’s ribs that happened before the car caved the pavement in, but the reason for them is unknown.

Sweets goes with Booth to question the brother of the victim and the brother’s wife, while Angela and Gordon talk about how Booth is sad because he misses his dream life with Brennan.

Booth discovers that Bryce probably was trying to rob the pawn shop across the street from where he was found using an old pedestrian under pass. The security guard confirms that there was a robbery,

Back at the lab the intern and Brennan are still trying to figure out what made those graze marks. They decide it could have occurred if someone leaning forward was shot at an angle from above. The bullet would have hit his liver, and bled out within minutes.

Back in the diner, now apparent home to Gordon Gordon, Sweets and the aforementioned former psychiatrist are looking over brain scans of Booth. Gordon confides that he doesn’t think that Booth has brain damage and asks why Sweets didn’t publish his book on the crime-fighting duo. Sweets says that it surmised that the two were in love. The two psychologist go on to explain to the audience why for the love of god and all things holy the two have not hooked up yet. Apparently its’ all very psychological.

Then comes the Booth and Bones moment. Bones tells Booth his shooting problem may simply be due to the fact that he is over 35, which is when men start to decline physically. He remarks that he doesn’t know why talking to her makes him feel better, it just always does. Aw. Also, its cause you’re in love with her. Good God.

While questioning the fighting boss about the gun they found it comes out that the leprechaun left her because she wasn’t enough woman for him, leading the psychologists to jump to the conclusion that he was seeing his brothers wife. They question her and it comes out that they had been having an affair since “always.”

Back in the lab the would be king, Hodgins, finds a high school ring in the crash debris but it is too small to be the victims. It was his brothers. Murder solved. BUT the Booth dilemma is still out there.

In Gordon Gordon’s chef kitchen Booth pleads for one last time for the good ole doc to fix him. Instead Gordon tells him he is in love with Brennan. GASP. Booth replies that they are not compatible, “ she doesn’t love me. I’d know if she loved me.” Gordon advises hope and patience. I think that is as much to as the audience as it is to Booth.

As for the shooting front, Gordon tells him to “grow a set,” and to invite Bones. He has to protect her on the job, so he better be a good shot. “He won’t fail in front of her.” And you know what, he doesn’t.