"The Wire" on HBO

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?

are you doing a full rewatch brad?

xp
don't see why it couldn't be even more trivial. I don't doubt that police commissioners have abused their power for pettier reasons irl

I don't get the chafing over S2's attention on the stevedores -- doesn't the show set up a parallel between them and the streets? At the very least, they're pretty funny.

are you doing a full rewatch brad?

― Simon H., Thursday, March 22, 2018 6:48 AM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yep! i'm doing it with someone who's never seen the series before so it's gonna take a while

yeah I did that a few years back with my roommate. the second viewing is a blast.

it's interesting, imo there's a learning curve with season one that, at least for me, is *always there*. i rewatch the first 2-3 episodes and i'm like "i know this is great, i'm aware of it being great in the fragments of narrative and context that it's gradually trying to weave together into a more centralized story, but don't feel anything pulling me into what's happening yet." i don't mean to overstate its particular excellence on this front but it's at first alienating then deeply refreshing to watch a television show that doesn't really give a shit about my expectations as a viewer

and the way it does satisfy my expectations as a viewer is largely oblique! occasionally the dialogue gets very transparent about the themes traveling through the structure of the whole series and that's as basic as it gets. but the way the individual stories braid together and then scatter and then braid together again... idk, it's awesome. i guess all of these ideas are pretty pedestrian and are probably embedded throughout this thread multiple times already but: what i love about this series is you get what you put into it. it's great art.

i rewatch the first 2-3 episodes and i'm like "i know this is great, i'm aware of it being great in the fragments of narrative and context that it's gradually trying to weave together into a more centralized story, but don't feel anything pulling me into what's happening yet."

They're the opening chapters of a novelistic story, so the metrics of evaluating individual episodes of an otherwise serialized narrative shouldn't apply IMO.

that's completely right! it's exactly like the learning curve of any novel you're trying to get into

and also, so much more interesting than the "this is actually just a very long movie" taken by so many series/producers now

favorite moment of S5 is Gus doing voiceover of Carcetti firing Burrell - "he feared and hated me, I merely wanted him dead"

lmao

tweedy impertinence

Just finished s2e6, p much half way thru. Ziggy is by far my most hated character, even more than Landsman. I’m having the same reaction to him that I had to Jesse the first time I watched Breaking Bad — a stubborn idiot who refuses to learn a goddamn fucking thing — but Jesse had complexity and a good heart whereas Ziggy is just smug and overconfident. I really hope he dies.

Yeah, Ziggy is probably the most hateful character in the entire series. I'm hard-pressed to think of anyone who even comes close (I'm one of those who likes megafuckup Jimmy McNulty despite the megafuckedupness which you've barely scratched the surface of yourself).

Levy's up there, for sure. Valchek.

Oh yeah I love to hate Valchek, and Levy’s awful too of c but neither of them actually make me angry the way Ziggy does. I think it’s the entitlement, like one second you’ve got a hit on you because you fucked up a package for the THIRD CONSECUTIVE TIME, and the next second your debt has been absolved, and you complain that you didn’t get enough money for your car? And then light a $100 on fire!?!? Like what is WRONG with this dipshit!!!

I hated McNulty at first but moreso because he was presented to us as a flawed but sympathetic antihero who we are supposed to care about and I’m so so so tired of boring straight white men with problems that we’re supposed to care about, I have no more patience for them.

OKAY WAIT HOLD UP, I was actually 5 min away from finishing e6 and THEY JUST OFFED DEE, what the fuck!!! I had a hunch this might happen but I have a lot of hunches of things that might happen that never pan out and I’m a little shocked

I love Ziggy's indignant "BAD ADVICE! You motherfuckers gave me bad advice!"

I think w/Ziggy the arc is interesting and I think the thing is once you see his character as a fuckup who no one respects, and how he can't stop being a fuckup, it makes sense in the end. Sorry for vagueness. I didn't mind him really!

yea agreed i hated ziggy the first time around but seeing it again made me appreciate him

Ziggy is fun to hate/impossible to like but not really a worse person than his brother for being self-destructive and annoying rather than competently amoral

I didn't watch much of treme but the steve zahn character is kind of a ziggy

Oh I also hate Rawls for being such a mean spirited bully. He might be my #2 most hated.

Rawls is an amazing villain! I actually thought that's who you meant when you said "even worse than landsman" (it's been ages since I saw this & I get some names mixed up)

Landsman is the smug cop in jimmy's dept? I find him hilarious tbh

I didn’t mind Ziggy at all because, iirc, the actor puts in a great performance - I think it might be one of the all-time greatest representations of annoyingness onscreen.

Zahn in Treme is similar but much less interesting to watch.

Landsman is the kiss-ass who always seems to be walking around eating something that’s dripping