So I’ve started watching this for the first time. Three episodes in, and I fail to see why that was such a big deal.
I can’t understand anything which the black characters said, because they never pronounce clearly. However, what I do understand perfectly is all the profanities that I could do without. George Carlin’s proud legacy, no doubt – so daring! – but we’ve passed from the time when one vulgar word every thirty minutes was just enough for dialogue to realistically resemble spoken language to one where one every thirty seconds is barely enough. And it’s not even limited to the scum on the streets, every suit in the police department speaks like that. It’s tiresome – no, sorry, it’s fucking tiresome.
Also, this other scene where they’re looking for a picture of the ring leader, and they rule out the photograph they get because the guy on it is middle-aged and white. Either that’s racism or that’s RACISM!!!, and either way it’s as subtle as a military band at a funeral.
So what I’m getting from this series is that the United States is a vulgar, crude hellhole. I believe I knew that already. Any reason to keep watching? (I don’t usually watch recent television, so I can’t avoid thinking that Kojak was doing quite a lot of the same more than 30 years ago, except without the preachiness and with just as much social commentary if you looked beneath the formula.)
I noticed in Donnie’s obituary that he also married Fran Boyd (one of the primary people The Corner is about), and his stepson from that marriage, DeAndre McCullough (another of the core cast of The Corner, who went on to play a bit part on the HBO miniseries based on the book and played Brother Mouzone’s henchman on the Wire) died in August of a heroin overdose. Very sad. And, unfortunately, very illustrative of how hard it can be to get out of that sort of life, even when you’re smart and want to and have supportive family and friends (including a big name reporter and show producer like David Simon).
Episode 6 of the first season is “The Wire” - you really ought to at least watch until then before writing the show off. The first three chapters of war and peace didn’t exactly grab me either, but it was worth sticking it out.
Not surprising for a man so hostile towards digital entertainment.
I can’t understand anything which the black characters said, because they never pronounce clearly.
Since you pirated the show, how about you go and pirate the subtitles? If I watch a British show (Luther, for example), I had to turn on subtitles. I’ve even turned on subtitles in The Wire sometimes and had to Google up slang. Simon & Burns don’t hold anyone’s hand in this show, nothing is made easier to understand if it’s not something that the characters would say or do in the cultural context in which it takes place.
George Carlin’s proud legacy, no doubt – so daring! – but we’ve passed from the time when one vulgar word every thirty minutes was just enough for dialogue to realistically resemble spoken language to one where one every thirty seconds is barely enough.
What in the hell is the purpose of bringing up Carlin in a gritty crime drama? Did your brain just try to think of the most vulgar comedian and try to make some kind of connection? Is that how you work?
And it’s not even limited to the scum on the streets, every suit in the police department speaks like that. It’s tiresome – no, sorry, it’s fucking tiresome.
As are your posts.
Also, this other scene where they’re looking for a picture of the ring leader, and they rule out the photograph they get because the guy on it is middle-aged and white. Either that’s racism or that’s RACISM!!!, and either way it’s as subtle as a military band at a funeral.
Good on you for trying to pick out the most heavy-handed joke in the 3 episodes you watched. I would point out the incredible amount of more subtle dialogue and circumstances in the show, but that would be a waste of time.
So what I’m getting from this series is that the United States is a vulgar, crude hellhole. I believe I knew that already. Any reason to keep watching? (I don’t usually watch recent television, so I can’t avoid thinking that Kojak was doing quite a lot of the same more than 30 years ago, except without the preachiness and with just as much social commentary if you looked beneath the formula.)
No, there’s no reason for a technophobic anti-American whose first reaction to anything is to be a contrarian blowhard to keep watching this series.
They already know of DeAngelo Barksdale - you know, his nephew - being fairly definitely black, so it’s not a hugely racist leap of imagination to expect Avon Barksdale to not be a white guy.
I think he deliberately missed the point of that scene. It’s not funny because the association of a middle-aged white guy to an urban drug crew is ridiculous, it’s funny because that bit of information was unironically considered as “good enough” by the two drunken older cops who have lost all of their will to actually do their jobs in the environment of an apathetic police department that’s tasked with fighting an uphill battle socially, financially, and criminally.
Yes, every time I have re-watched The Wire I have thought about how angry everyone who worked on Kojak must be about being over looked for the epic genius the series portrayed at the time and which has endured to this very day. The Omar reference made on The Bugle podcast recently really yanked my chain. I mean, c’mon where’s the Kojak love?!
I see that my comment about my inability to understand the black characters has already been relayed to that other place, where the owner of that place has been collecting the remarks I made here to demonstrate how “mortally toxic” I am. (Oh, and Pogo, about what you replied to him: you’re right, and yes, I know, but it’s too late to change.)
Still, isn’t it normal that someone who doesn’t speak English as his first language should have problems understanding a specific accent without being necessarily racist? I had a lot of problems understanding the street-level characters, and I spent a good part of season 1 confusing Avon Barksdale with his nephew, and for a while him with Stringer Bell. Usually I put on subtitles or captions, but it wasn’t an option here.
As for the profanity, it got better, but I’d have preferred if they had abstained from using it except where it mattered (such as every “sheeeeit” of Clay Davis).
Now, let’s move to what you’re really hoping to crucify me with: isn’t it strange that the series spends a great deal demonstrating the discrimination that blacks are doing? Can’t have a white mayor unless two black candidates divide the opposition among themselves. Can’t have a white police commissioner, which means Rawls is screwed before he can even get started. Clay Davis gets off a charge which everyone in political circles knows to be true just because he can play Martin Luther King to a black jury. A white cop shoots a black cop by accident, and immediately some people jump to accusations of racism. Well, then, black racism against whites is also racism.
I have no doubt that The Wire is superior to the vast majority of television fare, but the overall message of “nothing ever changes” is not particularly new, perhaps because I’m more acquainted with French culture, which is replete with pessimism. I’m also not sure what impact the ending of The Wire is going to have, whether it will mean that the well-off viewers of the series will just abdicate their sense of moral responsibility because change isn’t going to happen anyway - in which case, I wonder what good The Wire was. A time capsule of the Bush era, with its bleak assessment of the education system, among other things, but not much more.
While I can explain the main plot of the second season as a necessary diversion to allow time to pass in the Barksdale affair, the fifth season was a little too pat, a little too eager for closure. Okay, Simon worked at the Baltimore Sun, but sweeping the discovery of the fabricator under the rug because he might win a Pulitzer isn’t particularly realistic, because any newspaper will be concerned that he might destroy its credibility and may even get it sued (especially here, since he made up quotations). McNulty was even nuttier than usual, and Lester was playing against character when he went along with the serial killer excuse. It’s as though the characters’ consistency had been sacrificed in the interest of the plot.
The general sentiment seems to be that the Wire went off the rails in Season 5 and would have been ended on a high point if Season 4 had been the last. Though the worst season of the Wire is still pretty damn interesting.
I don’t agree the focus is “nothing ever changes” – we see the systems laid out in detail. We see some of them almost working, like Bunny’s program with the corner kids in Season 4 that was actually working.
It’s not. It’s the internet, you can re-create and re-focus your energies from the gaming world to the art world. Start with a new blog!
Still, isn’t it normal that someone who doesn’t speak English as his first language should have problems understanding a specific accent without being necessarily racist? I had a lot of problems understanding the street-level characters, and I spent a good part of season 1 confusing Avon Barksdale with his nephew, and for a while him with Stringer Bell. Usually I put on subtitles or captions, but it wasn’t an option here.
If you are watching this via “digital download,” I think there are options for subtitles out there. And I don’t think anyone claimed you were racist in your response to not understanding the cultural ghetto and “Bal’more” slang in The Wire.
As for the profanity, it got better, but I’d have preferred if they had abstained from using it except where it mattered (such as every “sheeeeit” of Clay Davis).
The profanity is there in real life. As mentioned, this show does not dumb anything down at all. The details of life are relayed by writers who were paid to pay attention to those details.
Now, let’s move to what you’re really hoping to crucify me with:
Nobody sets out to do crucify anyone in a thread about the greatest TV show on the planet, stop being paranoid. I’m giving you benefit of the doubt, that you’re trying to understand why people love this show and you’re not going to do it in bad faith, although I can easily mistake your very colored perceptions of reality for that.
isn’t it strange that the series spends a great deal demonstrating the discrimination that blacks are doing? Can’t have a white mayor unless two black candidates divide the opposition among themselves. Can’t have a white police commissioner, which means Rawls is screwed before he can even get started. Clay Davis gets off a charge which everyone in political circles knows to be true just because he can play Martin Luther King to a black jury. A white cop shoots a black cop by accident, and immediately some people jump to accusations of racism. Well, then, black racism against whites is also racism.
Racism is part of the focus of the show, but mostly as a way to show how it’s institutionalized and politicized. It’s not strange that the series spends time on the dichotomy of the racism when it’s been reduced so casually into political dogma.
I’m also not 100% sure about this (as you can’t be completely sure about the motivations or message of a lot of things in the show), but Carcetti being elected as a white mayor was supposed to be a pushback against the status quo and give the viewer and the characters some sense of hope before hitting the next bureaucratic brick wall.
I have no doubt that The Wire is superior to the vast majority of television fare, but the overall message of “nothing ever changes” is not particularly new, perhaps because I’m more acquainted with French culture, which is replete with pessimism.
It’s not because of your acquaintance with French culture, it’s because the show is a Greek tragedy. Of course it’s “nothing new,” that’s a way to phrase passive-aggressive disapproval of something so highly rated.
I’m also not sure what impact the ending of The Wire is going to have, whether it will mean that the well-off viewers of the series will just abdicate their sense of moral responsibility because change isn’t going to happen anyway - in which case, I wonder what good The Wire was. A time capsule of the Bush era, with its bleak assessment of the education system, among other things, but not much more.
President Obama has watched The Wire. If people have their greater insight into how fallible and ingrained our institutions are, and how horrendously hypocritical the Drug War is, then culture is better off.
While I can explain the main plot of the second season as a necessary diversion to allow time to pass in the Barksdale affair, the fifth season was a little too pat, a little too eager for closure. Okay, Simon worked at the Baltimore Sun, but sweeping the discovery of the fabricator under the rug because he might win a Pulitzer isn’t particularly realistic, because any newspaper will be concerned that he might destroy its credibility and may even get it sued (especially here, since he made up quotations). McNulty was even nuttier than usual, and Lester was playing against character when he went along with the serial killer excuse. It’s as though the characters’ consistency had been sacrificed in the interest of the plot.
Simon watched similar things happen at The Sun. He was being overly cynical, but your charge of it being “unrealistic” is off… and somewhat strange considering how cynical you are in the first place. It’s nowhere outside the realm of possibility.
Character-wise it wasn’t the show’s shining season, nobody will argue that.
I must admit that there was a certain ambiguity in certain actions, especially Colvin’s Hamsterdam. For a while, I wondered whether the makers were for or against it, while I was decidedly against. To me, this makes quite a fair bit of difference, as it makes Colvin’s dismissal from the service either unjust or well-deserved.
The beauty of Carcetti’s character is that there was also a certain ambiguity about him, at least at first - whether he really was hoping to change things and was crushed by reality, or was just fooling everyone around him by pretending the mayoralty was anything but a springboard to the gubernatorial race.
Two things about American political mores appeared strange to me. The first is that this huge election campaign seen in the series was over winning the Democratic nomination, while the election for mayor itself was so predictable that it wasn’t even shown. This is completely different from what we have here, where comparatively few people join political parties, least of all at the municipal level. Parties here don’t tend to operate at all levels of government, and even parties with the same name, like the federal and provincial Liberal Parties, have a fair number of political differences between them; and at the municipal level, all it takes is a recognizable figure to create a new party around him to become a strong contender for the mayoralty. And unlike The Wire’s Baltimore, the mayoralty of Montreal is usually a retirement post for sidetracked political veterans, not a stepping stone for ambitious young politicians. So yeah, that threw me off a bit.
I’ve always avoided Tarantino; I’m not about to change.
