Of The Wire

Right I would like to preface this next blog post by saying that I am in no way whatsoever qualified to soliloquise what makes The Wire so bloody awesome (more awesome than The Dark Knight which as I’ve made clearly is pretty darn awesome).

I would also like to say that The Wire isn’t my favourite show on television (still belongs to Lost), but it is safe to say that The Wire is well and truly the best show on television. Not just at the moment but all time.

Now as to why The Wire is so fantastic. Well The Wire is so fantastic because it is so brutally honest with the viewer. Whilst it isn’t solely for that reason, it is definitely a big part as to why this show is superb. No other show on television is able to show with such brutal honesty the police, the drug trade, port workers, school systems, politics and now in season 5 a news room.

Of course the acting and the writing for this show are superb. In particular characters such as Omar Little (Michael K. Williams), Stinger Bell (Idris Elba), Jimmy McNulty (Dominic West)…. ah screw it the entire cast is flipping awesome and it’s a sight to behold that even within a cast of over 30 main characters (which makes Lost seem small) there is hardly a weak actor in the entire bunch.

The story is long and over arching, a lot like Lost except without the centric episodes devoted to certain characters and weird fantasy type moments. The Wire is completed grounded in reality to the point where all the music is diegetic (apart from the montages that finish off each of the seasons). The Wire isn’t one of those shows where you can sit and surf the net for an hour and still understand what has happened in the preceding hour. You have to be concentrating 100%, which is in no way a strike against but something that you must be prepared for if you do watch. Another thing about the show which again in no way is a negative point is that the plot moves at very slow pace and so takes a while to get into the main plot of the series. But it’s still the best show on TV even when its setting up all of these little plot points and layering it’s characters to a point where they look like onions.

Now onto Series 5 of The Wire. Series 5 begins a year after the end of series 4 and continues the poor state of disrepair that Baltimore is enduring. Marlo Stanfield still rules the streets of West Baltimore. Major Crimes is getting nowhere in their investigation meaning that there are more than 20 unclaimed bodies in the morgue. Mayor Carcetti is trying to get the school budget under control which means diverting money from the police funds leading to the police moral being at an all time low. They aren’t receiving overtime pay for their work and have to drive rusty cars around town on their patrols. The media is completely out of touch with what’s happening in Baltimore. Oh and McNulty is drinking again.

So all in all just another average day in Baltimore. And it can only get worse from here. Yup it looks like Baltimore is going to get a lot worse over the coming weeks hopefully leading up to an awesome ending (which from what I've heard is pretty special). So the series premiere of series 5 has shown that not a lot is going to change in Baltimore and we're going to get all the normal killings and indepth introspectives into the lives of a group of people who have never had such a heart felt look at their culture before.

LONG LIVE BALTIMORE

P.S. Lost Comic-Con panel gave us this awesome video.

Is that Daniel Faraday I hear in the background? 30 years in the past?

Also, finally a release date for The Fall in the UK. October 3^rd I can hardly wait (luckily Heroes, Chuck, Pushing Daisies, Dexter, How I Met Your Mother and 30 Rock will be back on by then).