"The Wire" on HBO

liked e08 a lot better. clay davis golden as ever. "shameful shit". funny that in a programme mostly about the drug wars one of the least redeemable characters is a journalist.

cringed a bit at the obvious CSI zingage. WE GET IT.

huh. i missed that.

when mcnulty and kima go to the feds, one of them has been an advisor on mainstream cop shows. mcnutty says he's never seen CSI, kima says "most of our business is drug murders", not serials, crazies, etc.

I read the Barksdale-Marlo transition as Simon's commentary about contemporary American capitalism

makes an interesting contrast with no country for old men, which charts a similar rise of chaos but attributes it more to cultural (and/or racial) debasement than economic. the same kind of "we've never seen shit like this" line. except the cops in the wire haven't given up yet, and simon blames failed social institutions (because he's a liberal) where cormac mccarthy blames savage nature (because he's a reactionary). (and paul thomas anderson blames bad parenting, because he's paul thomas anderson.) a right-wing reading of the wire would see the parade of public-sector horrors as just confirmation of the failures of government. but that's obviously not simon's point. his heroes are also mostly public employees (aside from a few reporters and editors), and the private sector to the extent it exists at all is either brutal and corrupt (the drug trade) or just corrupt (developers who worm their way into public-private projects) and/or venal and dumb (corporate media).

Oh my god.

did some shit go down?

i wanna know

wait

no

i don't wanna know

ahhh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDJGjPMR0zo

Just that episode 9 made this season completely worth it.

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1719872,00.html

^^^^^^^ simon, lehane et al write an editorial in time about the fruitless drug war

Four episodes into S1 for the first time since seeing the following seasons, interesting to see how the relatively minor characters were fleshed out and humanized over the course of the show. Bodie, Omar, Bubs, even Stringer, I think, all had a lot more depth written into them over the course of the series.

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The Wire

lolirony

Bodie, Omar, Bubs, even Stringer, I think, all had a lot more depth written into them over the course of the series.

a) You are king of the obvious.
b) I mean, really, one of the greatest character-driven dramas ever produced contains fleshed-out humanized characters.
c) Next you're going to tell me about the show's Dickensian aspects.
d) When you die, Stringer is going to make you his bitch.

lol

badly phrased - I'm saying, they were all pretty flat for (at least) the first half of the season, and I'm starting to understand the nay-sayers of season one being the best

Well, I'd have to rescreen (Soto RIP) S1 to really be sure, but I'd think the show was focused on fleshing out the "good guys" and establishing the character dynamics therein before going to work on the street.

BTW, sorry for being an obnoxious twunt earlier / last night, milo.

it's true, i remember season 1 being so awesome and fully-formed, but when i went back and watched the first couple episodes they seemed kind of awkward and embryonic.

it's true, i remember season 1 being so awesome and fully-formed, but when i went back and watched the first couple episodes they seemed kind of awkward and embryonic.

Kinda like the first couple of episodes of Knight Rider.

wire seasons ranked by me:
4
2
1
3
5

oh we on THAT again?

1
4
3
2
5

I started watching 1 again and it's just as good as I remembered. And it was pre all the contrivances of keeping favourite characters around/together so it wins for that too. 1,4 and 3 are all pretty close for me, though. 2 a fair bit back and 5 way behind.

3
1
4
5
2

i watched 1 again not long ago and thought it was still just as good

4
3
1
2
5

4 and 3 neck and neck but head and shoulders over the others for me. 5 the weakest but i love them all.

oh god what have I done

man i have to say also that when i watched that last episode and afterwards i was shook the rest of the night, not from any plot developments (it was basically as close to happy endings all around as we could've even dreamt of) but just that this is over. other shows i've loved for years, when they ended i might've been 'wow it's over' or 'man, what a great show' but with this, and this is corny as hell, but it was like losing a friend.

i can't separate them, fuck this

3
1
2
4
5

oh we on THAT again?

it keeps changing! 1 was my favorite for a long time. then 2 was, even after 4 was over. but 4's the one that stands out in my mind now. it's where i think the character development and plot complexities really paid off. it was the fullest portrait of life, partly because it's built on all these characters who've had a chance to change over time. and partly because the kids' perspective really fills in a lot about the background of the whole series.

Yeah, even though 3 was excellent, when 4 started I realised that what I'd really been missing was getting to know a bunch of new characters hanging out together on their home turf. I loved the season 1 scenes with D'Angelo, Bodie, Wallace et al sitting on that sofa in the projects yard and the docks in season 2 gave some kind of new mileu. Season 3 didn't have that kind of scene setting so I was really pleased when Michael, Randy, Namond, Dukie and their piss balloons injected new life at the start of 4.

I spent the last week re-watching season 2, which I received as a x-mas present. It was the season I remembered least and I really enjoyed it. Now find myself wanting to watch the episodes of season 5 that deal with "the Greek" again. I really get the impression by the end of S2 that "the Greek" himself would never come back and do the same thing with the same pattern, so I'm a little confused about the scenes with he and Marlo and what they say about the competence of law enforcement.

For me, the seasons are all great. S1 is high on the list simply for being the first and the season I've watched the most.

4
1
3
2
5

ok, now I'm on that again:

3
4
2
1
5

3
4
2
1
5

Its so nice to see all of the love for season 3. That was a damn good season.

the avon/stringer relationship makes season 3

I haven't seen 5 but my favorite is still 2.
Timon of Athens yo

There are also so many amazing speeches that came out of the season:

Bunny Colvin's paper bag
40 degree day
The whole Sunday morning fiasco
Stringer trying to get Slim Charles to kill Senator Davis
Any and all scenes featuring Stringer and Avon
Slim Charle's "If it's a lie, then we fight on that lie, but we gotta fight"

dont forget everyones favorite cartoon gangsters omar and mouzone wild west style showdown

i like season 3 because more than any other season its about spending 10 episodes watching decent people build rickety little lives on rationalizations and justifications and then having them all crash down in the final two episodes

Isn't that every Wire season?

the season 1+2 punch still gives me waking nightmares of the there-but-for-the-grace-of-god variety; three and four don't seem as strong on the quiet desperation front, to me: cutty and namond want out, they get out, there's a lot of other terrible things happening but the simple suggestion of that as a viable choice (finally) dulls the edge a bit. 1+2 are 100% tragic america

Frank Sobotka's "we used to make things in this country" speech at the end of season 2 is one of the saddest things ever.

I am not playing your silly ranking games. I came here to say I finally caught up completely; finished season 5 at 4 am. The McNulty wake scene was amazingly successful in preserving that character for me a little, which I never would have thought possible.

Namond being the only one of the kids that gets out in season 4 is a heartbreaker, though! I actually don't know if I'm ever going to be able to rewatch 4; I had the most intense nightmares while I was watching that season. fucking show.

finished s5 last night, too. we were kind of trying to ration it out, but after watching the 2nd to last ep we had to see the finale. between the two, i cried 3 times (i'm a sap). i agree; seeing what happens to most of the kids is a complete heartbreaker, even if you could spot what was coming a mile off.

i cried at the finale, too, including when Landsman tells McNulty he'd want him to investigate his own murder. which seems weird when i type it out. but the scenes that really killed me: Duquan shooting up in the finale and Michael saying goodbye to Bug and his aunt closing the door on Michael in the second-to-last episode. season 4 kids! will you never cease to haunt me??

btw is that any kind of real thing, a (99% non-Irish) police department having wakes for officers and singing Pogues songs?

the bit when dukie looks back and the car is gone really tore me up.

i thought that prezbo might have tried to intervene more with dukie...? i know - it's not like everything was going to have a happy ending (and they only had 90 minutes), but based on how protective he was of d in s4 i thought that perhaps he might do more than look sad and drive away.

xpost - ha, i've wondered that.

i know. i think what we see of Prez in season 5 is sort of what Marcia Donnelly advised him about coming true. when she asks him in season 4 if he intends to adopt Dukie, I feel like that's directed at the viewer, too: as much as we want to see that, Prez's (impossible) job is to let go of his students each year so he can serve the new ones. it's totally unsatisfying and i think it's meant to be.

HAVE ONLY WATCHED TWO SEASONS, CANNOT READ THIS THREAD. FUCK U AND UR SPOILERS

hon, every wire thread is one gigantic spoiler.