David Boreanaz

As season one of the FOX drama "Bones" concluded last spring, forensic anthropologist Dr. Temperance "Bones" Brennan (Emily Deschanel) discovered that her long-missing parents were not who she believed they were; that her name was actually Joy Keenan; that her brother, Russ (Loren Dean), had long kept painful secrets; that her mother was, in fact, dead; and that her father was, in fact, not.

As if all this weren’t tangled enough, season two, which launches Wednesday, Aug. 30, throws a wheelbarrow full of additional wrenches into Brennan’s already complicated private life, her professional life at the Jeffersonian Institute (the show’s fictional version of the Smithsonian) and her not-quite-romantic relationship with her partner in crime solving, FBI agent Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz).

To start with, Brennan and her "squints" (Booth’s nickname for scientists) get a new boss, federal coroner Dr. Camille Saroyan (Tamara Taylor, signed on for at least six episodes), who matches Brennan’s scientific skill with a more focused attention on crime.

"Cam is a coroner," series creator Hart Hanson says. "She’s been the coroner of New York. She makes cases. She has a cop’s mentality. Temperance Brennan and her squints are all about finding the truth, and those are slightly different things.

"Cam would never fake anything to get anyone, it’s nothing like that, but she’s focused on getting the bad guy, so she’s very efficient in her investigations. Brennan tends to go all over the place looking at all the clues and then deciding what they mean. So it gives them lots of good conflict."

Also, it turns out that Cam and Booth have met before. "They have, in fact, slept together before," Hanson says. "They have a history, so that gives us a great triangle."

"She’s authoritative and straight to the point," Taylor says, "and really good at her job. She’s funny, not cold and impersonal. She’s got a lightness about her as well. She’s a fun-loving, brassy gal that also is completely professional.

"We never really know what Cam and Booth’s relationship was, but we know they had one."

"So there’s this competition," Deschanel says, "personal and professional, and jealousy that happens. It’s fun to work with."

As Booth juggles these two women, a third is thrown into the mix — the mother of Booth’s child, played by Jessica Capshaw, who appears in the second episode.

"I’m not saying who," Hanson says, "but Booth does end up in the sack with someone. He’s a loving, passionate man who’s there to help women."

"Is it the beginning of a downfall for Booth?" Boreanaz says. "Maybe. Will he encounter some anger management courses? Maybe. These women who come back in his life, they obviously represent something of his past that he was comfortable with at some times, uncomfortable at other times, and he has to deal with it.

"He’s got to deal with his son more because of her, and he’s got to deal with this girl who is now coming in as an adversary at the Jeffersonian. So it makes for interesting drama."

"Magnificent David," Hanson says. "When he faces Brennan, there’s one kind of sexual chemistry. If he turns around and faces Cam, there’s a different feel to it."

"With Cam," Deschanel says, "Booth has to stand up for Brennan. It’s sweet to see him do that. He’s not always going to do that, but when it comes down to it, he’s on her side, and she’s on his side."

With two ex-lovers and one not-quite-lover, Booth doesn’t seem to be totally in tune with the idea of commitment.

"No," Boreanaz says, "he’s not. He’s dancing around. Here’s a guy who’s trapped in this FBI outfit, and he wants to exercise some of that. Things start to crash around him a little bit. His gambling might sneak up again. Things like that might cause a bit of destruction to his character, to his relationship.

"He holds his relationship with Brennan very dearly, so for something to mess that up, he’d have to go somewhere very dark. The whole show, for me, is my relationship with her. The show, to me, is the two of us, me taking care of her and being a gentleman and really holding that relationship close to my heart."

And Brennan might need to lean on Booth, because Hanson promises the return of brother Russ and more revelations about their father.

"The cliffhanger from last season," Hanson says, "will play out all through this season, which is, where is Brennan’s dad, what’s he doing, and what happened back in the day? In the beginning, it’s, is he even a good man? There’s a reveal in the season opener that makes him look like a very bad man. He will definitely show up at some point."

On its surface, "Bones" is an episodic drama about solving crimes, but Hanson says it’s much more of a balancing act between procedural and character elements.

"If you don’t like the humor or the two leads in ’Bones,’" Hanson says, "you don’t like the show. Some shows are just safer. Our show is more of a gamble. It’s a more specific taste than something like ’24,’ certainly than the procedural shows, where you know exactly what you’re getting.

"We can’t go full soap, and we certainly don’t go full procedural. Every episode, we walk that line. I think we’ve gotten better at it. We should, after 22 episodes, begin to know what we’re doing, and I think we have. The season opener looks very good to us."

"To me," Boreanaz says, "it’s always been about character work and relationships. I could give a rat’s ass about the procedural stuff. That doesn’t do a thing for me."