‘Bosch: Legacy’ Season 3 Episode 3 Recap: Bearing The Brunt

One cool thing about Harry Bosch: in retirement, he gives even less of a fuck. His deep conviction for what he believes in remains; that’s been Bosch’s M.O. since Bosch, and it isn’t going anywhere in Bosch: Legacy. But while Honey “Money” Chandler frets over media noise and whataboutism in her campaign to unseat DA Archer, and Maddie continues to duck Harry’s calls – she’s still sore over the did-he-or-didn’t-he regarding complicity in the Dockweiler murder – Bosch keeps steady on, and digs further into the disappearance of Siobhan Murphy’s daughter and her family. The swirling “Chief’s Special” investigation into his methods and activities, the one that fuels Maddie’s suspicions of him and threatens to mar Chandler’s run for district attorney? It will continue. People like Archer and Robbery-Homicide captain Rick Seals (James Read) – they’ve always disagreed with Bosch, and there’s nothing he can do about that. What he can do is apply his investigative mind to determining what happened to the Gallaghers, and buttress Siobhan’s belief in their well-being with his own. After all, at one time he thought he’d lost a child, too. “You bear it,” Bosch says about concern for their loved ones. “Hour by hour.”

They should keep bearing it, because with a shift of perspective, episode 3 of Bosch: Legacy also builds some hope into the Gallaghers’ plight. Brief flashbacks lit mostly by flashlight reveal how masked men abducted the family from their Ojai cottage in the middle of the night, hogtying the parents right next to their two little kids and tossing them all in the back of a car to be taken…somewhere. And as his investigation continues, Bosch is uncovering the kind of bad business behavior that could lead to such drastic measures. At Gallagher Rentals, Siobhan’s son-in-law Steven’s heavy equipment business, both Sheila Walsh (Dale Dickey) and Finbar McShane (Michael Reilly Burke) admit the company was hurting. But they also say Steven was embezzling millions by paying himself as a false vendor.

Which, OK, that is definitely not good. But neither is Bosch having to find out from Sheila’s dirtbag son – after knocking him in the groin when he foolishly tried to come at him – that he was a ghost employee of Gallagher Rentals, too. Part of Bosch’s giving less fucks in retirement is his impatience with lowlifes who step to him. Another part is getting with Mo to plant a listening device in Sheila and Finbar’s offices. Headphones on, and without care for warranted wiretaps, Mo kicks back and waits for them to incriminate themselves.

In their hotly-anticipated first radio debate, Honey Chandler is winning the war of words with Emmett Archer when the incumbent pulls a dirty trick. The whole point of the “Chief’s Special” investigation is that it’s a secret. But Archer blabs about it during the debate so Chandler’s name will be tied to Bosch. A district attorney hopeful hired as her personal security chief a loose cannon former detective, who is now alleged to be part of a murder conspiracy? Bad optics, and as opinion polls enter freefall, the media soon build a camp outside Honey’s house. 

Archer is a weenie who’s only in it for himself, so it’s not surprising he would publicly undercut an investigation he himself designated as double-secret. But while the acknowledgment offers Archer political cover, it hampers Jimmy Robertson’s work as lead detective on the case. At Wasco State Prison, when Robertson and Lopez question Preston Borders, he admits he called Bosch. But he says he did so from a burner phone that simply appeared in his cell. And intriguing as that tidbit is, Borders won’t say anything more about anything until he gets a cooperation deal in writing from the DA. Solution? They will call Borders to testify “hand to bible” at an official grand jury hearing, and they will subpoena Harry Bosch to also appear.  

On the follow-home crew front, Victoria is doing all the work, everything except the actual stick-up, but Albert and Nestor are still mad she receives half of the cut while they have to split the other half. From her boyfriend and Nestor, who can’t even be bothered to find a clean car they can appropriate for their robberies, to the disrespectful fence she deals with at a West Hollywood recording studio, Victoria is surrounded by individuals who receive her favorite piece of invective. “Stupid-ass motherfuckers.” Victoria’s anger only grows when Nestor and Albert ignore the intelligence she gathered about a potential target. Sure enough, as they grab for his wife’s necklace, the husband pulls a gun and fires at the robbers, just like Victoria suggested he would. The follow-home crew lives to pilfer another day. But internal strife could sink them before Officers Bosch and Vasquez even get close to an arrest.

 â€œI swear on your mother’s memory, I had nothing to do with Dockweiler’s murder.” How many times, and in how many ways, must Harry Bosch profess his innocence in this matter? This time around, after he knocks on Maddie’s door – she ignored his calls and texts – he invokes the memory of Maddie’s late mother as proof. But he will say nor more once she brings up Gurbizs’s story about Tora Bora and torturing people in caves. “Eleanor’s fucking memory? Mom’s memory?” And he still says nothing to her questions? “What is wrong with you?” Maddie tells her father to leave. 

We’re a little torn between Maddie’s position and Harry’s resolute denials. Because why did Borders call him specifically? But we’re also willing to grant that Bosch only gives a fuck about what he can control. If someone somewhere is jamming his name into a conspiracy, then maybe his silence toward Maddie is a form of protection. It’s like she tells Vasquez when her partner asks about the Chief’s Special: “I don’t want you to have to lie for me.” We’ll see how all of this is characterized in the next episode, in public and on the record, when the grand jury is convened. 

Johnny Loftus (@johnnyloftus.bsky.social) is a Chicago-based writer. A veteran of the alternative weekly trenches, his work has also appeared in Entertainment Weekly, Pitchfork, The All Music Guide, and The Village Voice.

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