The Sopranos Vs. The Wire

+

I always interpreted the "the streets just aren't like they used to be - people used to play by the code" talk as a sort of naiveté - people are always gonna cheat. And it's hard to imagine that the drug trade is actually nastier in the 00s than the 80s. Marlo is someone who gets ahead by cheating, which you can do in any field - and he's not gonna be there forever (*SPOILER*: which is what the last scene suggests.) But he's not necessarily a symbol of a long-term downward trend in the drug trade.

+ (this is more 4th and 5th season stuff, sorry shakey)

On both sides, a lil bit of law/code breaking is accepted - but, when things start getting serious, you have mechanisms that are there to stop them (you'll get fired, you'll get shot.) But these mechanisms, although they usually work, are not perfect and don't always go off in time. There's not one single institution in charge of enforcing the rules on either side - somebody always needs to step up. Marlo and McNulty both manage to avoid this happening early enough - and on both sides this leads to a dangerous point of no return situation.

what I was getting at is that the two opposing sub-groups in the first two seasons (the drug dealing crew vs. the detective crew) by and large the individual detectives are hard-working, morally driven, good humored guys. The individual drug lords - Stringer, Avon, D's mom (basically anyone that isn't D'Angelo) - are shown to be ruthless, greedy, and violent.

Do you mean to say the drug dealing crew that is black? Nicky Sobotka is a pretty sympathetic character.

i don't remember Nicky being a drug dealer

nicky is how they und up connecting the case they have been told to investigate (frank) and the drug case they're all interested in

right, he was one guy who took money to let people ship shit through the docks without knowing what it was. i know he got caught up in Ziggy's whole thing for a little bit, but i don't know if that makes him a "drug dealer". i guess it's sort of beside the point anyway. most of the petty street dealers, powerless cops - the "pawns" - are sympathetic characters.

the individual detectives are hard-working, morally driven, good humored guys. The individual drug lords - Stringer, Avon, D's mom (basically anyone that isn't D'Angelo) - are shown to be ruthless, greedy, and violent.

i really feel like shakey was watching a different show than me.

he gets way more into street level dealing than ziggy ever was, and not just because he's less of a fuck up -- he makes the connection through the greeks for his package. he watches his corner(s?) and is surveilled by herc and carver.

xp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lB-wRxSNU7o

u guys have to remember shakey sees all police as constant violent aggressive alpha male alcoholics who love beating protesters & common folk at every opportunity purely for the visceral joy of torturing another human being

i mean im from jon burge's chicago so i know there are some torturous awful excuses for human beings in the police dept but the idea that the entire staff of national pds are a murderous hate patrol is shakey's operating perspective here

^^^

btw congrats omar littel.

^__^

you're right, caek. i stand corrected. forgot how deep into it he gets.

Well Stringer and Avon, especially the former seem much more sympathetic once they're gone. One aspect I've noticed about the Wire is that they make it clear that as long as there's drugs there's drug dealers (and vice versa) and everything that comes with, and thus it's not a simple question of taking down those charge and thus ending drug trade. So, when Marlo comes, Stringer's attempts to manage the drug trade, for instance, put him into a whole other light.

Also, there's often a fine line between nuanced character and self-consciously counter-conventional "look at me, I'm not a type"-ism.

u guys have to remember shakey sees all police as constant violent aggressive alpha male alcoholics who love beating protesters & common folk at every opportunity purely for the visceral joy of torturing another human being

and?

yeah i always wanted to know more about the girls (in a jetta, even?) who come into Hamsterdam to buy

*SPOILER*

sorry way way xpost but one of these girls ends up in rehab w/ bubbles in season 5. she's the girl who goes on about how deep into prostitution she got to feed her habit.

wow, never made that connection!

many xposts

the main guy in Dead Meadow is David Simon's son, if you didn't know. Hence their occasional inclusion in the series....

...damn I such a geek.

"it's only omar doesn't break the code i think. but it's a code he made up himself. he made up his own rules not to break. he doesn't really care about the street 'code' i think."

― Philip Nunez,

Slim Charles never breaks it either. He's one of the few characters that never bends the rules, except for maybe shooting Cheese. But Cheese was such a stupid, double dealing pain the the ass that it's questionable whether Cheese counts.

In the first season, it seems less like cops=good, drug dealers=bad, than workers=good, bosses=bad. D'angelo and his crew are sympathetic characters, while Stringer and Avon and the muscle are less sympathetic - besides the fact they kill people or give orders to kill people. In the cop sphere, it's similar, the bosses - Burrell, Rawls, even Landsman and Daniels at times, are not as sympathetic as Bunk, Lester, Kima, McNulty.

As the seasons progress - starting in Season 2 and esp. in Season 3 - you see the trials and tribulations of being a boss.

^ I haven't gotten to season 2 yet but that is OTM ^

finished Season 2, sorta on the fence about continuing with this

it seems to be deliberately unsatistifying, the way things never really get resolved - there's a whole tone of no matter what happens, things continue more or less as before, there's a kinda futility/fatalism to the whole thing

The other seasons felt way more like things continuing futilely than season two, which was at least about the ending of a particular way of life that provided people with a decent living, more like the Sopranos with how the good old days of the Mob were ending and it was getting harder to get by doing the same jobs that your parents did.

no more than in the sopranos imo xp

shakey if you stop watching the wire will you stop talking about it

probably

I wouldn't say 'a tone' as much as a point, personally.

Would've come down on Soprano's side before I started season 4 of the Wire, now I'm not sure. The former is more morally complex, poetic and well-acted, but the Wire is actually trying to do something very different. In terms of pure narrative it's much denser, tighter and more propulsive.

its denser, but I basically don't give a shit about any of the characters, everyone is pretty one-dimensional

i recommend ceasing screenings of the wire

there's a whole tone of no matter what happens, things continue more or less as before, there's a kinda futility/fatalism to the whole thing

― Kitchen Paper Towel (Shakey Mo Collier), Monday, June 22, 2009 12:23 PM (35 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

uh duh

Just FYI no one has solved the "drug problem" yet.

i did

Isn't season 2 the one with the duck? In The Sopranos, birds are purely symbolic contrivances. In The Wire, ducks are given their due as characters with their own arcs.

I don't need a montage to hit me over the head with this message at the end of each season k thx

x-post

OK sorry for the tone but I guess I'm just wondering why you expect the show to avoid futility and fatalism, given that it's invested in a sense of realism?

imagine if that was how season 5 wrapped up, though...Bubbles stumbles upon a miracle drug that cures addiction to all other drugs. (xpost)

If you don't like it why do you want people to convince you to like it?

Also you might want to watch the whole series before deciding that "things continue more or less as before." I'm not saying you're going to change your mind, I'm just saying it seems weird to conclude this when you've only watched 2/5 of the show.

what ears are wounds said. if you're 2 seasons in and you don't like it, maybe just... stop watching it.

even tho i personally think it gets better, it's still the same show.

shakey should stop watching the show and move on with his life imo

fwiw i'm pretty sure if i forced myself to watch every episode of the sopranos i'd probably be acting like shakey by the later seasons

yeah tv rots your brain

haha I acted like Shakey about the Sopranos without watching more than two thirds of it

later I was diagnosed with a special form of autism that makes me unable to recognize or care about the complex emotional interplay of characters on the Sopranos and also Don Draper on season 2 of Mad Men

season 3 and 4 are pretty different from 1 and 2. I could see someone not liking the first 2 and really digging 3 or 4.
but (spoiler) 3 and 4 are duckless