Three (White, Male) Tough Guys Sign Off. Is It a Moment?

“Bosch,” “Mr. Inbetween” and “Jack Irish,” dependably good and noticeably old-fashioned, all reach the end of the hard-boiled road.

Biologists trace changes in the environment through die-offs: a lake of belly-up fish or a sudden drop in the honey bee population. The television ecosphere is less conducive to scientific analysis — the recent arrival of the final episodes of “Bosch,” “Mr. Inbetween” and “Jack Irish” within just over a month could be coincidental. On the other hand, it could be a sign that the climate has become less hospitable to hard-boiled crime dramas with middle-aged white male heroes. This convergence wouldn’t be worth mentioning if the shows involved were ordinary, but all three were superior, if disparate, examples of their genre. (Spoilers ahead for each show’s final season.) “Bosch,” whose seventh and last season streamed June 25 on Amazon Prime Video, was the best procedural police show around during its run. The Australian dramedy “Mr. Inbetween,” whose third and final season ended July 13 on FX, was sui generis, a smart, deadpan, quietly daft deconstruction of tough-guy clichés. “Jack Irish,” which ends its run of three TV movies and three seasons with Monday’s episode on Acorn TV, was more lightweight and formulaic than those two, a breezy but downbeat neo-noir with an angsty private eye surrounded by colorful reprobates. It was elevated by its lovely Melbourne setting and a stellar cast led by Guy Pearce as Irish. (That two of the three shows were Australian may say something about environments more congenial to traditionally male-driven story forms.)