The Scariest Episodes Of Bones, According To Fans

Part of the reason "Bones" lasted as long as it did was because of its unique blend of humor and drama. The show ran for 12 seasons, showcasing throughout an incongruous but somehow charming mix of humorous banter between its characters with some pretty horrific crime scenes and depraved serial killers. But while the humor and the horror were two separate elements, in a way the grotesque bodies on "Bones" were sort of part of the comedy.

Some of the fake corpses made for the show were beyond things you might see in an all-out horror film. There were fresh bodies on "Bones" that even went too far for the show's producers, and one particular body had Zack Addy actor Eric Millegan extra grossed out. These are just two examples from a show filled with some of the most absurdly detailed gore yet seen on a network show. There was even a gross bathtub scene that had to be cut from "Bones" due to some unbearable details. As such, there was something absurdly funny about the way in which the "squints" at the Jeffersonian Institute would gather round casually talking while one of these obscene tableaus just sort of lay before them.

Often, though, the show would veer into straight up nightmare territory, abandoning all attempts at comedy for some unadulterated scares. With that in mind, we've taken a quick look at the "Bones" episodes fans consider the scariest of the series' entire run.

"Bones" had its share of standalone episodes, but it also featured longer story arcs that sometimes spanned seasons. These storylines frequently revolved around Emily Deschanel's Temperance "Bones" Brennan and David Boreanaz's Agent Seeley Booth tracking down serial killers — the very first of which was Howard Epps (Heath Freeman), otherwise known as The Manipulator. But according to fans, Epps didn't quite match the horror of The Gravedigger, who had a penchant for burying victims alive, demanding a ransom for their release, and often simply neglecting to free them even after getting her money. The killer first appeared in season 2 and was a part of the show until the sixth season, ultimately being revealed as U.S. Attorney Heather Taffet (Deirdre Lovejoy).

Over on Reddit, fans evidently consider the Gravedigger "Bones" episodes among the series' scariest — which is kind of understandable seeing as this "Bones" baddie actually killed children. One user lists season 2's "Aliens in a Spaceship," season 4's "The Hero in the Hold," season 5's "The Boy with the Answer," and season 6's "The Bullet in the Brain" as particularly chilling Gravedigger installments.

Based on the Redditor's opinions, the only real rival for scariest "Bones" killer is Christopher Pelant, aka The Hacktivist (Andrew Leeds). This serial killer was introduced in the season 7 episode "The Crack in the Code," where he left a skull and spine at the feet of a statue of Abraham Lincoln. There was also season 3's cannibal killer The Gormogon, whose storyline Boreanaz once called "just bad television." Still even this serial killer was mentioned by Redditors, with one particular jump scare from the season 3 episode "The Knight on the Grid" highlighted as a top fright. It sees the Gormorgon leap out of a closet and murder lobbyist Ray Porter, although the killer was eventually revealed to be The Apprentice and not the Gormorgon himself.

Aside from The Gravedigger and The Hacktivist, some Redditors have highlighted Mihir Roshan, aka The Puppeteer (Ravi Kapoor), as being responsible for some of the biggest scares on "Bones." Season 11's big bad, The Puppeteer is known for drugging his victims with a lethal dose, then using the bodies as marionettes. Users cite episodes that involve nightmares related to the killer as being particularly terrifying, with one Redditor naming a jump scare from one such nightmare as staying with them for a long time. This is a reference to the season 11 episode "The Nightmare in the Nightmare," which begins with the squints gathered round the body of a burn victim, who then wakes up before Temperance Brennan herself wakes up from the nightmare en route to a crime scene.

Another Redditor identified the "episodes with the skeletons as puppets" as being particularly unsettling. In season 11, episode 13, "The Monster in the Closet," Brennan reassembles a skeleton before hanging it from the ceiling of the Jeffersonian institute in an effort to get inside the head of The Puppeteer. It's this scene that reveals the killer's sick practice of turning his victims into marionettes, and is one of the more subtly upsetting moments in "Bones" history. Other users also referred to "The Monster in the Closet" as "the creepiest episode so far."

But it's not just "Bones" serial killers — which were actually a demand from the network — that have given viewers a good fright, as the show is more than capable of scaring audiences with one-off storylines, too.

Serial killers certainly seem to be a favorite of fans when it comes to the scariest episodes of "Bones." But other users pointed to standalone episodes, such as the season 2 installment, "The Headless Witch in the Woods." One fan in particular referred to the episode, which sees Bones and Booth investigating the death of a film student, as "nightmare fuel." "The Headless Witch in the Woods," which takes a lot of cues from the "Blair Witch" films, is also notable for the frequent suggestions that the central murder was the result of potential supernatural forces, though this is never confirmed. As such, it seems to have got under the skin of some fans who are perhaps a little more sensitive to that sort of thing and a little less sensitive to gore.

Elsewhere on Reddit, a user voted for "anytime someone is eaten alive (or almost) by rats or dogs," which I think it's safe to say is a fair metric to use when judging the scariest episodes. There's also mention of "the episode where the girl has all her bones removed" and Jack Hodgins (T. J. Thyne) tries to "blow her remains to get some sort of a lead." This seems to refer to the season 2 episode "The Boneless Bride in the River," where a corpse is found minus the skeleton, and the squints try to construct their own as a way of reconstructing the boneless body. (Told you this show had some gnarly stuff in it.)

In all, then, the serial killers on "Bones" are responsible for most scares. One serial killer even terrified Emily Deschanel herself. But the show also proved that it was more than capable of chilling us all with its standalone episodes, too.