"The Wire" on HBO

Is season 4 the one with Zombie Wallace?

Season 2 is the reason The Wire is The Wire, I think. Season 1 ended much more definitively than most other seasons, with McNulty on the boat and the group disbanded, so they had to really lay the groundwork for the show running five seasons in season 2. It is kinda offputting, but I think the reason many other shows go off the rails after great first seasons is because they try to cut corners with their long term investments.

Season 2 is the reason The Wire is The Wire

otm

I don't know why the only thing I specifically recall as a development during season 2 is the drama surrounding Valchek's stained glass windows.

Oh, wait, shit, season 2 was Ziggy, wasn't it. I clearly need to rewatch this thing for a third time.

heard this is a good show, started watching it, halfway through S1 and it's really great!

I've heard that too, watched the first six or so episodes years ago and didn't feel that moved to continue but someday I'll give it another go

Glad to see the word's finally getting out about this show. It's so weird that HBO's hourlong dramas never get any buzz.

o_O

I think it's great that people are still getting to experience this show for the first time.

I've seen several of the HBO dramatic series. They're pretty good! It's just surprising to me that I never hear anything about them in the press or via word of mouth. Oh, well. Maybe someday they'll get their due.

(I'm lampooning you, mh. It was a simple lampoon.)

I figured you needed a straightman to sell it

Season 2 is the worst. Get through it.

Wrong

Having watched the show in its entirety multiple times, I think I'd rank it just below s4

i prefer it to s1. fred b otm about the reasons for its slow start, which is less frustrating on rewatch, as is the way the barksdale org stuff feels compartmentalized for the whole season while it sets up s3. (3 and 4's political stuff would also be shallower had you not surfaced into it from s2's grain pier scenes.) s1 is p much self-contained but s2, as it were, plugs the show into a thematic supply chain it will need going forward

that makes it sound dry tho and i mean: frank

s2 is one of the best, but i didn't like it the first time around

you get so into the street and its world and characters and then you are lurched out and taken into the world of these dumb fucking longshoremen

but yeah it is actually a good season. love frank sobotka 4eva

s1->s4 is a progressive (cumulative, really) improvement and s5 is not that much of a quality dip

lol the same discussion about S2 in this thread so many times

we still have some time to go before definitive answer is established

Best season of The Wire

Yup. It's usually prompted by people watching it for the first time though, and it is jarring in that context

3 is the overrated season

lol the same discussion about S2 in this thread so many times

― (•̪●) (carne asada), Tuesday, March 20, 2018 2:56 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

true

nicky sobotka looks like he smells bad

lmao at that wire poll ending presumably after human extinction

Ziggy is unforgivable. I don't mean as a character, I mean as a thing that writers thought up to make the audience suffer through. But I'll stop

5 is the worst season and, as Simon notes, it's not that much worse than the rest. And it's almost entirely due to the just...mindblowing stupidity of McNulty. I mean, seriously, what the fuck, McNutty.

Every time I think of season 5, I basically go through the same process as Bunk once he starts seeing the wheels turning on McNulty's 'amazing' plan. Oh...oh, no. Oh hell no. You have got to be fucking kidding me right now.

McNulty is not a man who was meant to keep the wheels on

5 basically sucks bcz they didn't get the spinoff AND had the order cut, so it tried to cram what would have been covered in 19 episodes into 10

the ramping up of McNutty's lunacy would have been bearable if given more room

the reporter characters were also boring

What spinoff was that? Also I thought I read somewhere (this thread??) that DS said that the decision for 10 episodes was his/the writers', not HBO.

Simon wanted to do six-episode series of The Hall in between S3/S4 and S4/S5. A lot of the Carcetti / Norman / Clay Davis type stuff would have happened in those, setting up political status quo for each following season of The Wire.

5 is the worst because it’s so hard to hear the dialogue over the sound of David simon grinding his axe

This series isn't always bad, but it is no Juliet Bravo or The Shield.

fuck you! and your window!

two episodes into S2 and I like it!

The vibes of S1 and S2 are so different and jarring.

Always liked how this person stayed true to the themes with these Breaking Bad parodies:

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhX7hvzlaGc

lmao omg

S1 is pretty underrated at this point, i feel like there's so much gold in there as we get to meet the characters. really love the slow unfolding of Lester Freamon's character throughout the first several episodes.

marcos
Posted: March 20, 2018 at 12:03:48 PM
nicky sobotka looks like he smells bad

how dare u

i always liked s2

especially the whole subplot with the stupud fuckin stained glass window

whoever is playing Ziggy feels like he took all his acting cues from the kid from T2

1. how dare you besmirch Edward Furlong
2. the guy is actually a good actor, I've seen him in other roles like Generation Kill where he's not super annoying. he was definitely directed this way

you get so into the street and its world and characters and then you are lurched out and taken into the world of these dumb fucking longshoremen

― Louis Jägermeister (jim in vancouver), Tuesday, March 20, 2018 2:52 PM (two days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

s1 is great, whenever I think of it I always picture avon startling daniels wagging that finger as he glides past, one of the best wire moments

xxpost Yeah, I've been surprised to realize that Ziggy actor is Ziggy actor when I've seen him in other things.

especially the whole subplot with the stupud fuckin stained glass window

It's not just a subplot, it's how it all gets rolling!

It also sticks with me as a wholly believable catalyst for police/political action. A huge criminal investigation is initiated not by any true interest in justice but because a police commissioner is feeling butthurt over a petty rivalry.

^^ lol i was thinking exactly this yesterday (just finished up s2 e2)

I can see where a petty rivalry starts to snowball, but over that?