It's never a dull moment for the team at the Jeffersonian and this week's episode proves just that. Monday's episode, entitled "The But in the Joke," finds Brennan (Emily Deschanel) and Booth (David Boreanaz) investigating the remains that end up stuck to an infamous street artist when he falls from a billboard.
The season's eighth episode kicks off with Brennan and Booth trying to figure out how a street vandal ends up super glued to decomposed remains. The duo decides to send the remains and the vandal, who turns out to be famed graffiti artist Seth Zolinksi (Jay Paulson), back to the Jeffersonian to be unglued. After spotting an arrow coming out of the victim's head, Brennan says that the preliminary cause of death is blunt force trauma.
Back at the Jeffersonian, x-ray results reveal that the arrow didn't in fact pierce the victim's head but was instead a comedian's gag. The victim is identified as a male in his early 30s who has undergone a neck operation. By finding the doctor who performed the surgery, the team uncovers the victim's identity-Morgan Delaney, who works at a company called Telecom during the day and as a stand-up comedian at night.
In order to unglue Delaney and Zalinsky, who goes by his alter ego street name of Zed, Hodgins (TJ Thyne) asks his wife Angela (Michaela Conlin) for her secret stash of peanut butter. Hodgin plans to use the peanut butter to break down the adhesive and save Zalinsky's skin. However, in getting the peanut butter from Angela, Hodgins discovers that his wife isn't as happy as he thought she was.
While a drugged-up Zalinsky waits to be unglued from Morgan's remains, Angela gets him to admit that he is actually the famed street artist Zed. When he does, she is so "star struck" that she decides to give him a quick kiss on the lips.
Meanwhile, Booth and Brennan head over to Morgan's girlfriend's place. Alexa's (Stephanie Lemelin) brother Elliot (Adam Cagley) answers the door and quickly calls his sister to talk to Booth. However, the two don't take Morgan's death very seriously raising suspicions with Brennan and Booth. It is then that they discover that Morgan was a comedian at a comedy club called Laughtatics.
Alexa and Elliot are brought in for questioning at the FBI, where Booth and Dr. Sweets (John Francis Daley) discover that Alexa is a bartender and that she and Morgan had dinner the night he disappeared. They also find out that her brother taped all of Morgan's gigs and that he was working closely with Morgan to launch his own comedic career.
Over at the Jeffersonian, Zed is finally out of his drugged stupor and he asks Angela not to divulge his secret. He sees that she is a fellow artist and tells Angela that it is imperative that she keeps his secret. She agrees and says, "Okay, your secret is safe with me." As he leaves, he notices an odd painting of a rainbow and unicorn and tells Angela, "You have excellent...technique." Although it appears to be a compliment, Angela's face reveals that it is not.
Further questioning of Elliot reveals that he helped Morgan write jokes and that the bartender at the comedy club was Morgan's biggest heckler. Booth and Sweets also discover that Brennan's intern Fisher is an underground comedic sensation. Booth and Brennan head over to the Laughtatics and question Morgan's heckler, only to find out that the heckler and Morgan had an agreement for the heckling and that the heckler in fact wrote some of Morgan's jokes.
In leaving the comedy club, Brennan notices a flier for a comedian named Rex, who appears with the same arrow gag that the victim was found with. The pair decides to question Rex and test his gag mallet, which checks positive for blood. Meanwhile, back at the diner, Angela and Hodgins discuss her kiss with Zed. Angela tells Hodgins that she "kissed him because he's an artist" and "he's changing the world." Although Hodgins says he understands, he asks Angela to not kiss other people.
At the FBI, Sweets tells Booth that he and Fisher have come up with a genius plan to possibly uncover Morgan's murderer. Sweets knows that Morgan stole other's jokes and uses those jokes to sniff out the joke's author. In order to do that, he and Fisher have Booth perform at the comedy club telling a mixture of Sweets and Fisher's jokes as well as some stolen ones.
After failing to get any laughs from either Sweets or Fisher's jokes, Booth decides to tell his own jokes, which gets the crowd laughing, much to Sweets surprise. "Oh my god, Booth is funny," Sweets exclaims. However, Sweets reminds Booth to use the stolen jokes. The stolen jokes grab the attention of Annie Pinkus, who confirms that she is the one who wrote the jokes for Morgan.
During questioning at the FBI, Annie tells Booth that Morgan's death doesn't benefit her because she was making money off of his career. According to Annie, Morgan was set to move to New York and had actual gig bookings and TV show appearances lined up.
Back at the Jeffersonian, Angela confirms that three blows to Morgan's head caused his death and along with findings from Hodgins, reveals that the murder weapon was a toilet. Booth gets a warrant to test all the toilets Morgan frequented the most. Hodgins soon determines that Morgan was killed at his girlfriend's house. Alexa and Elliot are brought back for questioning at the FBI, where Elliot admits to murdering Morgan and disposing of his body.
In her small act of rebellion, Angela graffitis the intersection where she received a infraction earlier in the day. Zed shows up, and although he doesn't appear to approve of her art at first, tells her that she did a great job. To top it off, he adds that she has terrible technique, making Angela very happy.
'Bones' S8E9 "The Ghost in the Machine" airs on Monday, December 3 at 8 p.m. EST on FOX.
WATCH A PROMO FOR "THE GHOST IN THE MACHINE"