The New Bosch Prequel Can Finally Tell the Story Prime Video Erased From the Original Show

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This police drama is a recent critical and popular success on Prime Video, and it’s grown into a whole fictional world with shows like Bosch: Legacy and the newest series, Ballard. Based on Michael Connelly’s books, Bosch follows Harry Bosch, a detective in the LAPD’s Hollywood Homicide division. Due to the series’ popularity, another show featuring a character from Connelly’s novels is in development. This new series will be a prequel to Bosch, showing Harry Bosch’s early career with the LAPD and how he advanced, drawing from Connelly’s books and likely adding original storylines. Hopefully, this prequel will also explore a major plot point from the first Bosch novel that wasn’t included in the original series: the story of how Harry and Eleanor Wish first met.

Michael Connelly’s first novel, The Black Echo, which also marked the debut of the Bosch series, was published in 1992. Season 3 of the Prime Video show Bosch was based on this book, specifically the investigation into the murder of Billy Meadows. However, the show left out a key part of the original story: the developing romance between Harry and Eleanor as they worked on the case. In the Bosch series, Harry and Eleanor were already divorced with a teenage daughter, Maddie, when the show began. With a Bosch prequel now in development, fans could finally see how their relationship first started.

Eleanor Was an FBI Profiler When She and Harry Met

As a big fan of the Bosch universe, I always enjoyed seeing Eleanor Wish, played by Sarah Clarke (who I also recognize from 24), on screen. She’s Harry Bosch’s ex-wife, and we first meet her when Harry travels to Las Vegas. She’s rebuilt her life there with their daughter, Maddie, and her new husband, Reggie. It turns out Eleanor’s a professional poker player, moving between casinos, and Harry visits them both during the Christmas holidays. It was a nice way to see a different side of Harry and how he navigated his family life.

Harry claims he’s visiting family for the holidays, but he’s actually going to Las Vegas to ask for Eleanor’s help with a case. Eleanor used to work for the FBI as a profiler – similar to the experts you see on shows like Criminal Minds – before becoming a professional poker player. Harry needs her skills to get inside the mind of Raynard Waits, a murder suspect who recently escaped from police custody, as seen in the episode “Fugazi.”

Raynard Waits was a serial killer unexpectedly caught when police discovered a body in his van during a routine traffic stop. At the same time, detective Harry was investigating a cold case – a decades-old murder brought back to the LAPD’s attention after a dog walker found the victim’s remains. The victim was identified as Arthur Delacroix, a teenage runaway, and Waits confessed to killing him years prior.

Waits pretended to have information about the murder, which allowed him to visit the location. Harry suspected Waits was faking it, and he was right. Waits used the visit as a chance to escape, shooting the Assistant District Attorney and Detective Moore – one of the popular detectives known as the ‘Crate and Barrel’ pair. After getting away, Waits called Harry, starting a game of cat and mouse where he would tease and challenge the detective.

Harry travels to Las Vegas to seek Eleanor’s help in figuring out why Waits is obsessively targeting him with calls and threats after breaking free. Eleanor believes Waits developed a strange connection with Harry, viewing him as an equal due to their shared history of growing up in foster care. While the first season of Bosch beautifully sets the scene for Eleanor’s backstory and allows her to use her profiling skills to assist Harry, the Prime Video series doesn’t explore their relationship and past as fully.

Harry and Eleanor Develop a Relationship While Working Together

Harry and Eleanor team up to investigate the murder of Billy Meadows, an army veteran. The case gets complicated when Harry discovers a link between Meadows and a string of bank robberies carried out with military tactics – tactics Harry himself was trained in. The FBI was already aware of this connection and initially suspected Harry, given his army background, but he was later cleared.

Harry and Eleanor team up to investigate a series of bank robberies, and a romance blossoms between them. But their relationship hits a snag when Harry discovers Eleanor was actually part of the robberies. She’s eventually sent to prison, and after her release, she reinvents herself as a professional poker player.

The series Bosch on Prime Video never fully revealed why Eleanor left the FBI, but in Season 4, she’s shown trying to rejoin as an undercover operative in an international case. Unfortunately, this investigation leads to her death – she’s shot and killed in a surprising and heartbreaking turn of events. Eleanor had always been Harry’s great love, and her death deeply affects him, particularly as he suddenly becomes a single parent responsible for raising his teenage daughter, Maddie.

The relationship between Harry Bosch and Eleanor Wish in the books is more complicated than what was shown on TV. Unlike the series, which focused on the crimes and Harry’s bond with Maddie, the books explore Harry having multiple romantic interests. After Eleanor goes to prison, they reconnect in the fifth book, Trunk Music, when a case takes Harry to Las Vegas and he discovers she’s become a professional poker player.

The Bosch Prequel Series Could Deliver a Captivating Love Story

The complicated relationship between Harry and Eleanor would fit well into the Bosch prequel, Bosch: Start of Watch. Since the original Bosch series was successful, the new MGM+ show could continue their story by portraying Eleanor as an FBI agent. The Billy Meadows murder case has already been featured in Bosch Season 3, but the bank robbery storyline wasn’t adapted for television and could be a good fit for the prequel instead.

It would be great to explore Harry’s past relationships, including those that didn’t appear in the original Bosch series, since the show changed the timeline of how he met Eleanor. While Bosch and Bosch: Legacy rightly focused on Harry’s work, the new prequel series, featuring a younger Harry, is a perfect opportunity to show his early romances, much like what’s done in book adaptations like Prime Video’s Reacher. The most compelling part, however, would be seeing Eleanor’s story unfold, showing how she becomes involved in the bank robberies and ultimately ends up in prison.

Eleanor was a strong and truthful character in Bosch, and a prequel series could explore her past to show a different side of her. Understanding why she originally left the FBI, and the struggles she faced trying to rejoin in Season 4, would add depth to her story. Plus, a look into the world of Las Vegas casinos and professional poker could offer compelling storylines that run alongside Harry Bosch’s investigations in Los Angeles.

The new series features Cameron Monaghan, known from Shameless, playing a young police officer named Harry. Given Monaghan is in his early thirties, the show could explore his developing relationship with Eleanor Wish from the beginning, as the two eventually marry and have a child together.

Currently, details about the new show and its actors are limited, beyond the announcement of Titus Welliver’s involvement. It’s also unclear if the series will explore the relationship between Harry Bosch and Eleanor Wish in more detail. Fans are hoping to see their romance and challenges unfold further. In the meantime, you can revisit the world of Harry Bosch by streaming Bosch, Bosch: Legacy, and Ballard on Prime Video.

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2025-10-26 04:41