Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch Is Back on the Case in the Second Season of ‘Bosch: Legacy’
When Bosch: Legacy launched on Amazon’s Freevee last year, it may have had a new title, but it was really just a continuation of the long-running Amazon Prime Video series Bosch, based on Michael Connelly’s novels. The second season of Bosch: Legacy continues that trajectory, picking up on threads from Legacy’s first season that connect back to Bosch’s original run. That makes it perfect for longtime fans of curmudgeonly cop turned private detective Harry Bosch (Titus Welliver), although the beginning of a new season doesn’t necessarily indicate an ideal jumping-on point for new viewers.
Still, it’s not too difficult to get caught up with Harry and his associates, who are immediately plunged into danger as the season begins. The early episodes mainly deal with the fallout from an investigation led by Harry’s daughter Maddie (Madison Lintz), a rookie LAPD officer who had been on the trail of a serial rapist. The first season ended on a cliffhanger as Maddie was abducted, and her storyline in these episodes is so intense that it occasionally resembles a horror movie, giving Lintz her most significant acting showcase yet.
It’s a bit tough for Legacy to adjust from that harrowing ordeal to Harry’s latest case, once again assisting defense attorney Honey Chandler (Mimi Rogers). She takes on a client accused of a murder he insists he didn’t commit, and once Harry starts investigating, he’s drawn into what appears to be a conspiracy surrounding the killing of a local politician.
Meanwhile, Maddie gets assigned to a new LAPD unit, and the overarching case from the previous season, which entangled Harry and Honey with Russian mobsters, is not as closed as it had seemed to be. Even Harry’s affable hacker employee Mo Bassi (Stephen Chang) gets his own subplot in the second half of the season, as he starts a potential romance with a podcaster and fellow hacker.
Mo’s storyline feels superfluous, but the rest of Legacy’s second season effectively weaves together multiple plot strands, drawing from Connelly’s 2015 novel The Crossing. After nine seasons across two separate series, Harry has become a well-defined character with distinctive habits and personal quirks, and it’s comforting to watch him take on new challenges in his grumpy but competent manner. He’s now one of TV’s longest-serving detectives, but he still has plenty of avenues left to explore.
It helps that Legacy is a true ensemble drama, with high-stakes arcs for both Maddie and Honey. Prior Bosch supporting characters, including Harry’s former partner Jerry Edgar (Jamie Hector), continue to make appearances, connecting Legacy to the previous series and reminding Harry of his own past on the police force. His distance from that past increases with the more time he spends as a private eye, as emphasized by his many tense interactions with cops this season. That sets up a rewarding dichotomy that’s only possible thanks to the character’s extensive TV history.
Denise G. Sanchez gets promoted to series regular this season as Maddie’s LAPD training officer Reyna Vasquez, who becomes her friend and colleague, and Maddie builds her own supporting cast apart from Harry. Eventually, the true Bosch legacy could be Maddie having her own show if Harry finally retires completely.
Despite his occasional protests to the contrary, it doesn’t seem like Harry is ready to hang up his P.I. license, though. Legacy has already been renewed for a third season, and there are still plenty of Connelly’s Bosch novels left to adapt. In an era when streaming series often end after only a handful of seasons, Harry is building the kind of ongoing career that could place him alongside icons like Columbo and Murder, She Wrote’s Jessica Fletcher. With the latest season of Legacy, he continues to prove worthy of their company.
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Josh Bell is a freelance writer and movie/TV critic based in Las Vegas. He’s the former film editor of Las Vegas Weekly and the former TV comedies guide for About.com. He has written about movies, TV, and pop culture for Vulture, Polygon, CBR, Inverse, Crooked Marquee, and more. With comedian Jason Harris, he co-hosts the podcast Awesome Movie Year.