I think it’s poetic licence. American Gangster is another example of this. It pissed me off too, but I kind of file it away with exploding cars and other shit that happen in movies but not real life. The Wire is actually a lot more stylized than a lot of people think; it’s certainly not documentary-style.
I actually think The Wire is trying to demonstrate that what you think is a semi-casual reaction to murder is the reality so many aren’t aware of. I certainly think of it as the most realistic and plausible crime show of all time, and I think it’s as close to a documentary as entertainment is likely to come - as long as money decides what gets made.
Speaking as someone who lived next to North Philadelphia when crack hit, it’s really not.
Just finished watching Season 4. The Wire: Greatest Show Ever? or Greatest Show of All Time?
By the way, while checking out book that this series was based on on Amazon, I came across another series called Homicide:Life on the Street. How does that compare to The Wire? Is it also decent?
First 2 seasons are pretty good to great (it really was one of the best cop shows of the time), season 3 alright, then it becomes not so good. You know that vision you have of what would happen to The Wire in the hands of an advertising supported network? That happens. Unless you like spotting David Simon troupe folks there is no real need to continue with it.
Homicide is the precursor to The Wire in many ways (not to mention the fact that it’s based on the same material from the same writers/contributors to some extent). It starts off well and has many of the hallmarks of what makes The Wire great, but does kind of get kinda meh after awhile.
— Alan
If you want to dive more into the nitty gritty Baltimore world that David Simon loves to write around, check out The Corner. It’s more of a miniseries (6 episodes I think), and shot in an almost documentary fashion from street level.
I agree the first few seasons are far stronger, but even when it tapers off it is still worth watching if you like cop shows/crime procedurals. Even the worst episode of Homicide is better than any other similar show unless you bringing some of the British shows into the mix.
Yeah OK, it is slow to get to a point where you see bad episodes past season 3, and it’s not like they’re all bad bad. But I would hope Amazon’s thing is cluey enough not to say “people who bought The Wire also bought … H:LOTS:The Movie!”.
I never really saw The Wire getting bad in the past couple seasons. The impression I had was that, okay, we didn’t get canceled, maybe we can tell a broader story.
In the beginning we are looking at running down a single drug operation. They then expand that to show the kids and how they move down the path of ending up stuck in the trade and how the network of suppliers can be pretty complex.
So, slower-paced, but not bad, per se, or weak.
The last season, now that did have the feeling of tying up loose ends, and it ended in a way that showed where everyone you knew was at the end. There were still a lot of hard-to-watch moments there, but I liked it.
While the newspaper plot arc in season five did not resonate with me as well as some of the others, the education arc across season four was amazing. I know a lot of people who consider season four their favorite.
They are talking about Homicide: Life on the Street, not The Wire. This caused me to do a double take as well, how could anyone ever say that season 4 is weak!
Actually I think the best Homicide episodes all came in the first season.
By the way, David Simon’s book that preceded the series, Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, is fantastic.
What year did the reveal scene happen during the interrogation? That was one of my favorite episodes.
Donnie Andrews, who was the basis for the character of Omar, has died. Amazing life story - had the story of the gun jamming shown up in the Wire, I would have complained that it was unrealistic.
Wow, didn’t realize Omar was based on a real person.
Also, I’m still surprised that Andre Royo didn’t become a huge star after The Wire ended. He was amazing in that show.
Ahh I recognize him. He actually played a part on The Wire.
My favorite story about him was in the Wire, when Omar jumped out a 5th story window. Everybody thought that was superhuman. The story is that Donnie actually jumped out a sixth story window, but they cut it down to 5 for the show because nobody would believe it.
Here’s an interview where Simon talks about the jump and some other bits also (SPOILERS IF YOU HAVENT SEEN THE WHOLE SHOW!):
A big thing I wonder about in terms of writing The Wire is how you went about constructing composite characters from real-life influences, like Omar is a big one, of course, but—
Why don’t I do Omar, because that’s the one everybody always asks about. Here are some people that we used for the Omar story line—and they are real people and real names that would be known on the streets of Baltimore. Anthony Hollie, Ferdinand Harvin, and Cadillac and Low. I don’t know their real names, but they were a team. And there’s also Donnie Andrews. He was the big man who went to war with Omar the last time. He got killed in the shootout in the apartment in the ambush. That’s actually the real Donnie.Oh man, the guy who was with Omar and Butchie and then he was Omar’s backup against Marlo? Oh wow. No kidding.
Yeah, that’s the guy.The actor who plays the Deacon was also from the streets, right?
He was a major drug trafficker. Melvin Williams, little Melvin. He was famous going back to the 60s. He had maybe 30 years of selling heroin and coke in Baltimore. He was busted by Ed in ’84 and got out in 2001. We all had lunch and then he came to work as an actor.So out of all these people, did you pick and choose traits and stories from their realities for Omar? For instance, Omar carries a shotgun. He’s gay. He’s got all these really great characterizations.
Listen, when he jumps out the window during that shootout, that was something Donnie Andrews actually did. He jumped out of the sixth floor of the Murphy Homes when he was caught in an ambush and out of ammunition. Did he think about it? No, but he did it and he survived and he was able to limp away. It happened. He also jumped off the Poplar Grove rail bridge another time. It’s legend. There are people who will tell you about it in West Baltimore other than Donnie. It’s not just something he’s making up. If you make that jump, you’re dead. If I make that jump, I’m a puddle on the ground.But he did it.
He needed to make the jump and he wasn’t gonna die that time.I love that Omar’s jump was based on a real story, because that was one of the things in the series where people were like, “Ah, that would never happen. He’d be dead.”
And we actually only had Omar jump from the fourth floor.Whereas Donnie really jumped from the sixth.
The building we had only went up five and we said, “Eh, the fourth is fine. They’re not gonna believe it anyway, but he did it.” Some other things we just made up. None of those names I gave you I know to be homosexuals, but at one point I was mistaken in my own head. Somebody had told me when I was a reporter years ago that Cadillac and Low were a gay team—that they were a couple. I just thought that was true, and then at some point that’s what got me to say, “This is an interesting character to have be gay because he can be openly gay because he’s not beholden to anybody.” It’s impossible to be an openly gay male cop. It’s OK to be a lesbian, but it’s hard to be a gay male cop. And with all the homophobia it’s hard to be openly gay in the organized drug trade.Unless you’re an outlaw even to the outlaws like Omar was.
Right. Omar’s playing by his own fuckin’ rules. So you look at that and you say this would be a good character for that and I thought I was referencing Cadillac and Low, but when I mentioned it to Ed four episodes into the show he said, “They weren’t gay.” So I just got that wrong. We also made up the Sunday truce. There are things we made up because they were fun. But we didn’t make up how important church hats are to women in West Baltimore. There’s actually a great picture book called Crowns.