Seeley Booth - Relationships - With Colleagues

With Colleagues

Booth faces some hostility from Brennan's "squint squad". Hodgins is especially hostile due to his disdain for the government and bureaucracy, in general. In the episode "Two Bodies in the Lab" where they conduct a rescue operation to save Brennan from a hostage situation, their animosity subsides when Booth lets Hodgins go with him, and further earns Hodgins' respect, to the point where Hodgins apologises to Booth about a case which required them to exhume a soldier. Hodgins also asks for Booth's advice about proposing to Angela, and later asks Booth to be his best man. In season 4, when Special Agent Perotta takes over an investigation in which Booth is a suspect, Hodgins and intern Wendell Bray tell Perotta that they are "Booth's people" rather than Perotta's.

Of the "squints", Booth gets along best with Angela Montenegro in the pilot episode. Booth has a difficult relationship with Brennan's assistant Zack Addy, as he finds Addy's cold naïveté and social awkwardness disconcerting, and Booth convinces Addy that ignoring each another is a form of male bonding. Addy later admires Booth as a man of experience, and to Booth's annoyance asks him for advice on various issues. Booth threatens to shoot Addy on several occasions. Before Addy goes to Iraq, Booth gives him a harmonica.

When fellow FBI agent Dr. Lance Sweets first joins the team, Booth often treats him in a condescending manner, due to his youth and boyish looks. Sweets is able to relate to Booth in "layman's language". In season 4, Booth learns about Sweets' abusive childhood and eventually takes Sweets under his wing and regularly takes Sweets to interrogations or to analyze crime scenes for insight into the victim. He also consults Sweets on a number of issues, including his feelings for Brennan.