The Sopranos Vs. The Wire

In retrospect that setting and set of characters seems to cry out for an episode/season order half as long, also, imo

I like to imagine a world where Enlightened got like six seasons and a level of deserved acclaim enjoyed by these other shows, maybe if they'd made Laura Dern's character a dude.

enlightened is a half-hour comedy show, so not really comparable to these prestige dramas.

sopranos is the best show ever imo and sort of towers above the wire in characterization, and, you know, saying something about people and american society without beating you over the head with didactic left-liberal polemics

I'm probably biased in that I saw BB way more recently than Sopranos or the Wire, and also think that Better Call Saul should def be in the conversation

how i break it down to an extent:
- the sopranos was essentially an extended family drama with guns
- the wire skillfully dramatized lessons about urban sociology in america
- breaking bad very obviously aimed for epic tragedy

i think the reason i liked BB more was that once it figured out what it was (a chronicle of walt's moral decline), it was easier for the producers to find the endpoint and then work on how to get there. the wire seemed to be making it up as it went along, because there wasn't ever a real overarching narrative arc to guide things. that sprawl was part of its appeal to me, but ultimately i think the narrower remit (?) of BB's plot made the final seasons and the ending much more satisfying

(nb i haven't seen the last season of the sopranos)

I've seen The Wire three times through, though it's been a few years, but when I think of it I *always* go back to season two

despite the fact that it dragged on about 1.5 seasons too long, I would argue The Shield stuck the epic-tragedy landing way better than BBad did. especially since BBad's last two eps are largely disposable

it still blows my mind that David Simon is such an obnoxious, blowhard #resistance liberal, complete with verbose compound insults and whither-the-glorious-republic sentiment. has he watched this show called The Wire??

― wayne trotsky (Simon H.), 14. november 2018 21:48 (fifteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You know what the trouble is, Brucey? We used to make shit in this country, build shit. Now we just put our hand in the next guy's pocket.

Also, tom about The Shield. Probably best ending ever?

sopranos is the best show ever imo and sort of towers above the wire in characterization, and, you know, saying something about people and american society without beating you over the head with didactic left-liberal polemics

^^^

these lopsided poll results still make me mad

It suffered from a few extraneous mid-series plots and characters that never went anywhere, but that whole last season is just incredible. It's a tough show to assess overall because it has greatness and dross scattered across its entire run, sometimes in the same episode. xp

also I will always be here to shove Spartacus into contention just for sheer emotional wallop, mostly-awful first season and all

was the sopranos the first drama to fully integrate "a beloved character could die/get killed p much anytime" as a persistent and always lurking plotting element? it seems like "prestige drama" has leaned pretty heavily on that one weird dramaturgic trick ever since

Even with the third season mess, I'd put Deadwood up with anything.

Breaking Bad was so plot-driven, I don't think it has as much to care about once you've seen it and know how everything will go.

Of the Simon series I've watched, I'd probably rather go back to Treme than The Wire, in retrospect it's kind of amazing how little drama there is to it, there are no evil characters. Even the Texas Republican carpetbagger who comes in to profit off Katrina is redeemed to some extent.

the first drama to fully integrate "a beloved character could die/get killed p much anytime"

yes, definitely, but surely this is inherent in the kind of story they were telling

Breaking Bad was so plot-driven, I don't think it has as much to care about once you've seen it and know how everything will go.

i'd agree with that -- def feel like the sopranos would most reward rewatching

xp oh no doubt, but it definitely wasn't the first crime show, yknow? "sudden, capricious death as verisimilitude" undercut more well-established dramatic practices/expectations; the criminal life just made it easy to implement

The middle stretch of Treme is amazing.

sopranos has entire seasons of fat, and brilliantly-performed fat still loses u srs marks in my book.

bb is not far off dan brown ito ridiculous cliffhangers and preposterous escapes every other hour

cant see the criticisms of narrative arc for the wire set against these two, regardless of the other charms of each

best narrative arc of em all might be jimmy in boardwalk empire tbh

don't take this personally but... you have bad opinions

i only take stuff personally after considering the source tbh

🤗

there are no seasons of Sopranos that are entirely "fat", that's just ridiculous. 1 is a little slow to get up to speed but that's about as far as I'll ago. the rest is gold.

how long did

sorry spoilers

tony spend in a fridge salesman dream again

one episode, and he's a precision optics salesman

how long did fabio spend mooning around mrs s

gonna say we got three episodes minimum of optical schlub tony tbh

might poll a suite of worst sopranos bulkup plots and note for how many episodes we suffered each actually thatd convince ye right

nb its still the second best show obv

I've never been interested enough in the Wire to start watching it, and I stopped watching Breaking Bad somewhere in the second season because it stopped being a black comedy, but the Sopranos doesn't need 6 good seasons to be forever Good to me; I can just rewatch "Pine Barrens" every year or two forever.

xp. furio and carmela is a good plot ffs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d79w1M-nhLA

id see that statement and raise it thus:

fabio and carmela is a bad plot

there you all go calling things "good" and "bad" again

tho I realize I did it too

this is a good discussion abt good shows tho

carmela's character is one of the most compelling in the show, and her relationship with tony is central to the show's arc in general. season 4 is the nadir of their relationship and edie falco's portrayal of the sad, impossible love between her and the passionate, attentive furio that develops during this time is a memorable arc on the show and is very well acted by falco

Sopranos is the best show I have strangely little interest in revisiting (have, for example, seen Wire and BB probably like 2.5 times each and would happily watch again someday).

there's a lot of things that I could say right now that I am not gonna say

Sopranos had higher peaks and lower valleys. I don't know which of these shows is better but The Sopranos best twenty or thirty scenes are better than anything single scene in the Wire

any single

The Sopranos like Mad Men has an amazing core group of brilliantly casted actors and sometimes the going gets a bit muddy when it strays too far from them, but what quality they are! The Wire on the other hand contains many gratuitous scenes of posh but dim useless twat Dominic West allegedly acting, and he is arguably one of the main players of the core group that makes that most of that series :(

yeah dominic west v jimmy gandolfini as series leads (yes i know mcnulty is hardly in a whole season), i know who I'm picking

as well claim anthony jr as a series lead ffs

oh yeah, lol! Like as if Dominic West isn't in a lot of The Wire. just this minor background character, gtfo!

as if anthony jr isnt in a lot of the sopranos!

which one of these useless cunts is quadruply bad: posh as fuck, overexposed, overrated and adult aged at the time and still stealing a living though?

both of them apparently!

Dominic West is def a worse actor than any of the Sopranos leads (quantify that however you like - Tony, Carmela, Chrissie, Livia, Paulie, Melfi, Junior, Janice, Silvio, Meadow, and yes even AJ), how is this a question

but then the Wire is not really interested in actors or even characters - it's about the overarching design, the SYSTEM man

I have already made these arguments on this thread but... y'kow

it was also not interested in doing anything remotely engaging formally, from a stylistic or technical point of view. I can't think of a single shot that made me sit up and take notice of the technical audacity on display the way the Sopranos did, repeatedly, where I'd just think "jesus christ that was an ingeniously composed and shot scene"