Title: "Creep Signed His Kill"
Directed by: Ernest Dickerson
Written by: Daniel Pyne and Katie Pyne
Air Date: April 19, 2019
Previous: Hold Back the Night
Next: Creep Signed His Kill
Guest Starring: Paul Calderón, Chris Vance, Mimi Rogers, MC Gainey, Linda Park
"Creep Signed His Kill" is the 10th and last episode of the fifth season of Bosch.
After finding a suitcase full of limbs in the street, Pierce and Vega find a woman's head and hands in an air vent of the adjacent derelict apartment building. The killer carved a cross on the victim's hands, in the same manner as the serial killer that Hollywood station was briefed about in the first episode of the season.
Maddie makes her early departure for school. When Bosch keeps probing about why, she admits that she was the one who leaked a copy of the CIU memo to Honey Chandler.
Bosch goes to Chief Irving's office and confronts him with the evidence. It seems that back in the day the investigating officers kept a Xerox copy of the Polaroids from Borders' apartment. The copy shows the missing Polaroid, the one Irving destroyed, the one that showed the seahorse pendant wasn't in the apartment. So Bosch's fears are correct: the seahorse pendant wasn't found in Borders' apartment, it was found in his backpack, during the illegal search. Irving then planted the pendant, which was proof of Borders' guilt, so it would be found in the apartment in a legal search. Irving promptly takes the Xerox from Bosch and shreds it in the same shredder he used for the Polaroid.
Later in the episode, Irving declares his candidacy for mayor of Los Angeles.
Harry approaches Scott Anderson, the reporter who posted the story about Bosch in the paper, the one that nearly got him killed. With some artful questioning he gets Anderson to admit that Honey Chandler was the one who planted the story. When an outraged Bosch confronts Chandler, she apologizes for blowing the undercover operation (which she didn't know about), but says that they needed to get standing and she did what she had to do to get it.
Barrel has his retirement party at the Smog Cutter. The only problem is, despite being so old that he investigated the Tate-LaBianca murders fifty years ago, Barrel isn't retiring! In fact, he's signed a new five-year Deferred Retirement Option Plan contract.
Harry, back home after the party, gets a call from Edgar. It seems Walsh and what's left of his crew was spotted at the Van Nuys airport. Harry is getting ready to roll out to Van Nuys when the barking of his new dog Coltrane (the stray from the drug camp) alerts him that the bad guys are there. They've come to kill him. A shootout ensues in which Harry, with a little timely help from the dog, kills all three of the bad guys.
Meanwhile, Jerry Edgar has figured out the motive for Gary Wise's murder: Wise had a gun stolen from the LAPD impound. Marcos and Arias were the Dirty Cops who gave it to him some time ago. Other guns illicitly sold by Marcos and Arias were used in the drive-by shooting. Edgar meets Marcos and Arias and, without saying so, makes it clear he's on to them. Marcos and Arias, without saying so, make it clear that he'd better watch his back.
The season ends with Harry back at home, going through the murder book for Elizabeth Clayton's daughter Daisy.
Tropes:
- Amicably Divorced: All three of Barrel's ex-wives show up for his party. When Harry's old partner Rodgers chats one up, Barrel hopes he'll marry her and spare Barrel some alimony.
- Call-Back:
- Maddie tells her dad that she leaked the memo. Bosch says that if you work for the DA you have to play by their rules. Maddie asks if you have to even when the DA is wrong, he answers in the affirmative, and she says "Two kinds of truth." That's a call back to the season premiere when he told her about how lawyers were trying to manipulate the Preston Borders case.
- The Smog Cutter, which has now become Robertson's hangout, is where Barrel's retirement party is held.
- Chekhov's Gunman: The dog! Harry adopted Coltrane barely a couple of days before, but Coltrane provides Bosch with some life-saving warning by growling at the intruders, and then darts out at a crucial moment and distracts the first bad guy, allowing Harry to kill him.
- Face Framed in Shadow: During the entire ominous exchange between Edgar and Marcos and Arias, all three are lit by the red lights of the nightclub dance floor in a way that looks kind of like Hell.
- Famous, Famous, Fictional: It seems that Barrel investigated the Night Stalker, Manson, and the Koreatown Killer.
- Framing the Guilty Party: What Irving did. He took the seahorse found in the illegal backpack search and planted it in Borders' apartment so it could be found legally.
- I Know You Know I Know: The last conversation between Edgar and Dirty Cops Marcos and Arias is thick with this, after Edgar reveals he knows about the missing guns, and then is silent when one of the bad guys asks "Who?"
- Product Placement: Crate's retirement gift for Barrel is an Apple Watch. He wants it back after learning Barrel isn't retiring.
- Reluctant Retiree: Barrel winds up reneging on his retirement and renewing his DROP contract. (Alimony to three wives is part of the reason.)
- Serial Killer: Someone is going around LA chopping up women and carving crosses on their skin.
- Sequel Hook: Two sequel hooks are planted in this episode. First, there's the serial killer who carves crosses on his victims. Then, there's Edgar's vendetta against Marcos and Arias, the cops that killed Gary Wise.
- Shout-Out: Barrel says he's going to a double feature of Yojimbo and A Fistful of Dollars.Crate: Red Harvest adaptations!
- Shut Up, Kirk!: Bosch gives Irving a What the Hell, Hero? speech about planting the pendant and how there are some lines that he, Bosch, will never cross. Irving demands to know what Bosch wants. Bosch yells "The truth!" Irving then shreds the incriminating paper, and then gives Bosch a two-word Shut Up, Kirk! speech.Irving: About what?
- Suicide by Cop: Bosch has the drop on Walsh at the end. Walsh looks Bosch straight in the eye and shakes his head "no" before raising his gun, whereupon Bosch shoots him through the heart.
- Title Drop: When Pierce and Vega show Bosch what they've gotten about their murder case, Pierce says "Creep signed his kill", just like Bosch said in the season premiere when the detectives were briefed on the other case.
- You Just Told Me: Bosch gets Anderson the reporter to admit that Chandler was his source by pretending that he, Bosch, knew about it all along. Anderson is very angry when he realizes that Bosch tricked him.
