"The Wire" on HBO

If you haven't seen Party Down yet...

Among the reasons I would love Prime Suspect, max suspiciously forgot to mention that everyone smokes constantly all the way through it like it's their collective full-time job.

not enough love for veronica mars itt

First 2 seasons are great.

when i made my list above i forgot that i had just recently watched NYC 22, a cancelled show (only made it through 13 episodes, all on netflix instant now) that is probably as close in spirit to 'the wire' as you could get if you made a network procedural that was focused on cops only. created by richard price, focused on one harlem precinct and the surrounding neighborhood, basically it tracks rookies as they get trained in 'community policing'. one of the rookies is an ex-journalist / auteur stand-in who switches careers in middle age, so he kind of acts as an in-show point of audience contact, and kind of as an attractor for the kind of david simony stuff you might expect to be in the show's dna somewhere. it has to be, world-building-wise and just visually, one of the most place-grounded shows i've seen in forever.

RIP big man

http://www.uproxx.com/tv/2013/01/r-i-p-the-wire-star-robert-prop-joe-chew/

heaven needed a hustla

http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=ey0FDh444VU

hey j., did you ever catch up w/the newsroom? i was really enjoying yr take on it in the thread & didn't hear anymore after you said you couldn't get hold of it anymore

aw man RIP, he couldn't have been that old

(nope, sorry schlump, no access.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyewqmAKHto

oh those numbers from the ripped screeners that leaked really took me back

http://www.hulu.com/braquo

'the french wire'

(haven't seen, can't vouch)

that seems like extremely high praise. it's good tv but from what little i've seen here and there it felt more like the shield maybe. it was created by olivier marchal, who's directed a few movies in the same vein, think cops and the bleak lives they live or something to that effect (if you've seen mr-73 or 36, quai des orfèvres for example).

<3 The Shield <3

Yeah the shield is great. Braquo is similar in that its cops crossing a line and going too far and of course it doesn't end too well for them.

http://davidsimon.com/gus-triandos-1930-2013/

Lol, first comment

This is a pretty cool behind the scenes article about how the actors got familiar with Baltimore:

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2013/07/david_simon_s_the_wire_a_behind_the_scenes_look_at_mcnulty_kima_bunk_and.html

Still, Bubbles may have been more than a cliché, but it was a difficult character to play day after day. “My character’s head space was not a pleasant one,” Royo said. “I’d look at Idris? Nothing but bitches outside his trailer. Dom West? Nothing but bitches. Sonja? Dudes and bitches. Me? I’d have junkies out there. They fell in love with Bubbles. I’d go into my trailer and clean my shit off and come out and they’d look at me like, ‘You’re not one of us. Fuck you.’ And then when I had the Bubbles garb back on, it’d be, ‘Hey! What’s up? Welcome back!’ That’s a head trip, man. That shit eats at you.”

By the third season, he said, “I was drinking. I was depressed. I’d look at scripts like, ‘What am I doing today? Getting high or pushing that fucking cart?’”

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-01-27/lifestyle/35438800_1_probation-officers-adults-sonja-sohn

on sohn's post-show community outreach

that bubbles quote, lol.

still feel like season 5 taints my memory of the show as not being as great it actually was.

i never got around to affording season 5 dvds so that has been working out ok for me so far

started rewatching for the first time in ages, I forgot how much of a shock it is when Kima, ostensibly the honorable, good cop out of all of them starts beating the shit out of one of the low-rise boys (Bodie?) when he punches a cop.

yeah, the one cop who WON'T hit anyone is mcnulty; in many ways, he's the model police officer!

S5 really isn't as bad as its rep suggests.

Yeah, it’s not as good and is perhaps a bit OTT, but still has so many great moments, and good to see the the decline of local newspapers, which I experienced at first-hand over 15ish years in UK local media, covered in such a great TV show.

I rented and watched all 5 seasons as they came out and later got them all on DVD. Even though I've had the DVD sets for a long time, I still haven't yet re-watched seasons 4 or 5, while I've watched the first 3 seasons multiple times. Gotta make some time for them.

http://24.media.tumblr.com/8618bcd4a0be0a6c7e0231336aee0084/tumblr_mqzln8OQ0k1s683d8o1_500.png

Ruff ruff!

XL

who is that??

the cartoon dog?

Lisa Frank?

Shopped :(
http://24.media.tumblr.com/ef92e119edc51cb97ff3a220c39008e9/tumblr_mseiowp9tb1qaqw03o1_500.jpg

:(

aw

there are a lot of sick people out there

Can’t believe they shopped it out. :.(

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/08/david-simon-capitalism-marx-two-americas-wire

In retrospect I hate The Wire and wish I had never watched it.

hummmmm - why is that?

It ruined him for every other TV show including the new girl

I just finished this. I will miss Lester the most.

then you should watch Treme

2 eps away from the end of S2.

Was thinking about it. I caught a couple of eps on a free HBO weekend and seemed worth a look.

My wife got pulled in after I watched S1 which forced an immediate rewatch. By the time we got done with S4 she was ready to bail because she was so heartbroken.

Treme is slower and more melodramatic than The Wire, but Clarke Peters plays one of the more lovable characters, so that might fill the Lester-sized hole in your heart.