Title:"Lost Boys"
Directed by: Alex Zakrzewski
Written by: Joe Gonzales and Eric Overmyer
Air Date: February 13, 2015
Previous: Donkey's Years
Next: High Low
Guest Starring: Veronica Cartwright, Steven Culp
"Lost Boys" is the 7th episode of the first season of Bosch.
Bosch rides to HQ with Stokes after the incident where Julia Brasher was nearly killed. He admits to Stokes that Stokes did not go for Brasher's gun. Bosch then shows Stokes the photo of Arthur Delacroix, Stokes, and their other friends. Stokes is barely able to remember any of them. Later Bosch goes to the hospital and visits Crate, who is recovering from his gunshot wound. He then stops and checks in on Julia, who is suffering from cracked ribs and bruising from the bullet that her vest stopped. Julia insists that Stokes did go for her gun and, in fact, she's expecting a medal.
Raynard Waits aka "David" is still hiding out in the home of his elderly, infirm mother Irene Saxon. In addition to her lupus and other ailments, Ma sometimes needs to use an oxygen mask. At one point she falls down in the house and can't get up, so she blows her whistle for David, who helps her to her feet. David/Waits, obviously thinking about his mother's future now that his days are numbered, calls a long-term care facility, but hangs up when the woman on the line starts talking about money. Later David goes to the pharmacy to fill his mother's prescription but leaves when he sees his own face on the TV news.
Harry goes to see Julia. His gentle suggestions that maybe she think about her story are only met with Julia's anger, and her incredulity that Harry won't back her up. When he leaves her house they're broken up for good. Harry later tells the truth to the LAPD, that Stokes had both hands on the wall when Julia's gun discharged. (She accidentally pulled out her gun instead of the handcuffs.)
On Christmas Day, Stokes is let out of jail. Bosch meets him again and this time Stokes identifies everyone in the photo, including Arthur. Harry calls his daughter on Christmas, but is interrupted in his call with a call from none other than Raynard Waits, who is enjoying chatting with Bosch.
Back to work after Christmas, and Edgar is watching the video of Waits on the field trip. Waits makes a comment on the video about being put "in the trunk". Bosch hears this, remembers Waits making a comment about he and Bosch being "dogs from the same kennel", and has a realization. Bosch tells Edgar that Waits must have been an inmate of McLaren Youth Hall, the orphanage where Bosch spent his teens. The "trunk" was solitary confinement at McLaren. The Waits task force then starts going through 20 years of McLaren files, hoping to find the true name of the person who calls himself Raynard Waits.
Back at the Saxon home, Waits, who knows his time of freedom is short, sits in his mother's room. When she wakes up, he tells her that she was the only person who ever cared about him. Dialogue reveals that he was her foster/adopted son. Then he smothers her to death with a pillow.
Tropes:
- Christmas Episode: Harry eats dinner in a Chinese restaurant and calls his daughter.
- Comforting Comforter: Waits buttons up his mom's sweater as she dozes in front of the TV.
- Death by Adaptation: Raynard Waits's foster mother is alive at the end of Echo Park but is killed in this series.
- Everyone Hates Fruit Cakes: Lt. Billets' daughter says they're sending Harry a fruitcake, and he jokes that it's the same one they sent him last year.
- Flashback: Harry's terrible memories of McLaren are illustrated with flashbacks of a larger boy chasing him down the halls, bat in hand.
- Impersonating an Officer: Waits uses Crate's badge to lure a man into his car. Waits is trying to strangle him to death when a passing ambulance distracts him, and the man escapes.
- Orphanage of Fear: McLaren, apparently, was a hellhole. If the violence wasn't bad enough, there was also a tiny little cupboard that was used for solitary confinement of unruly boys. Harry remembers the screams.
- Peking Duck Christmas: Yes, Jewish people go out for Chinese on Christmas. Who else does? Lonely LAPD detectives like Harry Bosch, that's who.
- Son of a Whore: In Harry's flashback, the older boy chasing him down the hallway uses these exact words.
- Vorpal Pillow: How Raynard Waits kills his mom. True to the trope, it takes about 15 seconds.
- What You Are in the Dark: If Bosch simply says nothing about the incident with Brasher and Stokes, she'll get a medal, everyone will be happy, and he'll be able to continue having sex with a smoking hot redhead. But Stokes will go to prison for assaulting a police officer. Bosch tells the truth.
