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.
