Tag Archives: Bosch

Amazon Prime video review: ‘Bosch, season 7’

All good things must end, and Season 7, we are told, is the final series of Bosch, a superior adaptation of the bestselling novels by Michael Connelly. I just finished the last episode.

Los Angeles police detective Harry Bosch has a motto: “Everybody counts or nobody counts.” This leads him to go the extra mile for the forgotten victims – the poor, the marginalized, the powerless.

In this adventure, Harry pursues a gang lord who ordered an apartment house firebombed, to send a message. In the ensuing fire, innocent people died, including a ten-year-old girl. Bosch is ordered to back off. His superiors tell him it’s for the greater good, but Bosch isn’t buying it.

Meanwhile, his partner, Jerry Edgar, is off his game, overwhelmed with guilt because of an act he committed last season. And Lt. Billets, their boss, is fighting sexual harassment from some of her subordinates.

It’s hard to find fault with the production. The writing is top-notch, though heavily adapted from the original stories due to a major time shift to the present. Everyone who has read the books is aware of the character changes that were made – certain characters altering not only their races, but their whole personalities. One of those, however, Commissioner Irving, swerves back closer to his literary roots this season.

So it’s really good, and gets my coveted approval. My problems with it are purely in the realm of my opinions, and do not necessarily resemble the opinions of real people, living or dead. WARNING: The following paragraphs include minor spoilers.

Bosch’s daughter Maddie expresses interest in becoming a cop. This is a common thing in cop shows nowadays (I was especially disappointed at the end of Longmire, when Walt suggests that his daughter Cady run for sheriff. This was obvious pandering to the feminists, as Cady had up to that point showed no aptitude for, or interest in, law enforcement. Quite the opposite). I honestly can’t recall whether Maddie Bosch becomes a cop in the books or not. She might have (at least she’d get some training before hitting the mean streets). I’m a fossil, I know. I still think it’s wrong to hit a woman, and (by extension) wrong to put a woman in harm’s way. And I plan to hang on to that opinion until they send me to the reeducation camp.

Also, although I admire Bosch’s principles, I wonder about the real-world consequences of his lone wolf actions. It seems to me there are always tradeoffs when you’re dealing with life or death. I’m not sure Bosch’s principled actions in this series might not cost more lives in the long run than compromise would. And is this the first time Harry has seen this kind of deal made? Never made one himself? Why dig his heels in now and not before? Has he just had his fill of compromise at last?

However that may be, Bosch is a superior cop series, and I do recommend it highly. Cautions for pretty much everything.

TV review: ‘Bosch, Season 4’

Bosch, Season 4

The fourth season of Amazon Prime Video’s Bosch series was released recently, and I continue to like it a lot. Many changes have been made from the original books – some of which are pretty old now – but the spirit of the novels flies high, in my opinion.

Season 4 is based on the first Bosch novel I read, Angels Flight. Angels Flight is the name of a quaint funicular rail line in Los Angeles, and this mystery concerns the death of a famous, headline-hungry defense lawyer, who is found shot to death on board the car one night. (The operator has also been killed.) Racial tensions in the city immediately spike, because the lawyer had been on the brink of going to court with a case of excessive police violence against a black man. Harry Bosch is named to head a special task force to identify the killer. The obvious suspects are the cops the attorney was going to accuse – but Harry suspects the killer is someone with deeper motives.

There’s a subplot involving Harry’s ex-wife Eleanor (Sarah Clarke), who has a gambling problem but is trying to get reinstated with the FBI through going undercover and into danger. Their daughter Maddie (Madison Lintz) plays a major role in the story.

I don’t watch much TV anymore, but Bosch is a must for me, at least so far. The best part, as before, is Titus Welliver’s portrayal of the main character. He has Harry down cold – the impassive face, the world-weary, disillusioned attitude that doesn’t stop him from fully investing in every case.

Recommended, with cautions for language and violence. Not for the kids.

Amazon Prime Video Review: ‘Bosch,’ Season 3

Bosch Season 3

I’m pretty sure I reviewed Bosch, the Amazon Prime Video series based on Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch mystery novels, earlier on this blog. Still it’s been a while, and I just finished the new third season, so I’ll praise it again. Because it is quite good.

Harry (Hieronymus) Bosch is a Los Angeles homicide detective. He’s a military veteran and has a high case clearance rate, though he can be a pain in the anatomy to his co-workers and superiors. He’s almost obsessively by the book in his work ethic, but he can cut moral corners when he feels it’s justified. He is in fact motivated by inner demons, but he keeps them buttoned up.

In this third season, the first major plot line involves a reprehensible Hollywood producer (that’s an oxymoron, I suppose), who had a lowlife acquaintance murdered because he knew too much about a previous murder he’d committed (this is complicated by the fact that Bosch has been pursuing the guy himself over another matter, and has the murder on film, which he can’t use because his surveillance is illegal). The second big plot line centers on a group of former Army Special Forces guys who pull off a big theft and aren’t shy about killing people along the way. Their combat skills make them formidable adversaries for Bosch – and eventually for each other. Continue reading Amazon Prime Video Review: ‘Bosch,’ Season 3

Watching ‘Bosch’

Bosch

I’ve been watching the third season of Bosch on Amazon Prime Video. In one episode, I noticed a detail that intrigued me.

Harry Bosch (Titus Welliver) lives in a house partly supported by stilts, on a hillside in the Hollywood Hills, just as in the books. In one shot I noticed a framed poster on a wall.

It was a poster for a movie or a novel (I couldn’t tell) called The Black Echo.

The Black Echo is one of the novels this season of the show is based on.

So even if you imagined that a book had been written or a movie made about Bosch’s adventures (such a made-for-TV movie is in fact a plot element), and called The Black Echo, there’s no way either one could have been done about an adventure that isn’t even over yet.

The poster is a wink at the viewer from the production team. A very subtle breaking of the proscenium.

I expect that sort of thing happens more in movies and TV than I’m aware of.