The Women of ‘Bosch’: The Secret Weapons of Amazon’s Manliest of Cop Shows

Amy Aquino has been a recognizable character actress for a very long time. Most likely you remember her from E.R., where she recurred as Dr. Janet Coburn, but she’s also been on Picket Fences, Freaks and Geeks, Felicity, and Curb Your Enthusiasm. On Bosch, she plays Lieutenant Grace Billets, a superior officer who elides some of the hoariest cop-show cliches about superior officers (while, sure, playing into others). The gravitas that Aquino projects after decades of character work is essential to Billets’ authority, while the rare moments of vulnerability are a credit to Aquino’s ability.

Fans of ’90s sitcoms will remember Erika Alexander from two of her most prominent roles: as Cousin Pam on the latter seasons of The Cosby Show, and as Maxine on the FOX sitcom Living Single. Since then, she’s popped up here and there (including a handful of episodes of Low Winter Sun, which may have prepared her for something as hard-boiled as Bosch), but the role of Captain Irving’s wife, Connie, is likely her best role yet. Alexander and Lance Reddick have fantastic chemistry together, and their scenes are some of the most compelling in the early episodes of season 2. You really hope that the story will begin to focus more on them. And then when it does … well, it’s devastating, but it’s also a good opportunity for Alexander to show her stuff. If nothing else comes of Bosch, here’s hoping it results in more good roles for Erika Alexander.

On some level, Sarah Clarke is never not going to be best known for playing Nina Meyers, Jack Bauer’s duplicitous partner on the first season of 24. But it’s undeniably satisfying to watch her get another good part to chew on here. She plays Eleanor, Harry Bosch’s ex-wife, and the relationship between the two characters is far more interesting than that sounds. Eleanor herself has more layers than you expect her to. She’s a poker player by trade, but she used to work for the FBI. Her relationship with Bosch can be adversarial, but they also occasionally meet as equals. Clarke and Titus Welliver work well together, and it makes you want to see the story bend her way more often, which is not something you can usually say for cops’ wives on TV shows.

Similar to Sarah Clarke, it’s tough to envision a world in which Jeri Ryan won’t at least partially be best known for playing Seven-of-Nine on Star Trek: Voyager. But she’s worked steadily on TV since then, and she gets to play a textbook femme fatale in Bosch‘s second season. Ryan manages to have a lot of slinky fun with the role without going overboard, and the show never insults the viewer’s intelligence by pretending she doesn’t come across as wildly suspicious, but Ryan does the work of keeping the viewer far enough away from the truth to harbor doubts.

If there is any more reliable a land mine of a character than “teenage daughter of protagonist,” I have yet to see one. Credit, then, to Madison Lintz for playing Maddie with enough relatable teen angst without making her so maddening you hope a drug cartel DOES abduct her and never brings her back. One fun tidbit: you might remember Lintz from her most memorable role, as Carol’s ill-fated daughter Sophia on The Walking Dead. Thanks for everything you did to help make Carol into the badass she is today, Madison!