The Wire

Dog, I don't know what color you are and it really doesn't matter...but let me ask you this... The beauty of season 2 was that they showed the white dock workers were basically dealing dope and stealing for the same reason as the black street kids. "What the Barksdale kids did was way over the line" but what the dock workers did didn't strike you the same way??? Season 2 was trying to shake you, wake you up, make you see the kids on the corner are the same as the kids on the docks. It was trying to make you examine your racial stereotypes. You missed this?

Again, I don't know what color you are. It's irrelevant. Because many of my black friends felt the same way you did. The kids on the dock story just didn't connect with them as compelling. Maybe it didn't connect with you and my black friends because you've been conditioned (like we all have) to connect criminal behavior with black youth. What Sbodkta was doing seemed more noble than just drug dealing and stealing? You couldn't see that Sbodkta's nephew was a white Deangelo? Sbodkta's son was a different kind of Bodie, horribly insecure and determined to make a name for himself by any means necessary.

Don't get offended. I ain't accusing you of anything that I wouldn't accuse myself or many of my friends of....

 

Fuck, DD, RD, zeke.... your recollections humble me.

These episodes tumble out of my consciousness within a few weeks after viewing.... so thanks for the posts.

 

So, I fear that the ability to watch this season's episodes early has really snuffed out the nice little Wire-worship thread we had going on last season, kind of like you Christmas-Eve-present-opening-motherfuckers.

But last night's episode was simply fantastic, from Bunny's "Thanks for being you, kid" to every scene involving Pryz (who has been brilliant) to the brutal, abrupt ending.

Plus, they had the chutzpah to tease us with a nudity warning and then just flop out Omar's hog in the the first scene. (Speaking of which, Omar's back, baby. And hung like a fucking horse. Indeed.)

So, without any spoilers from next week's episode, how are all the fans -- and any newcomers -- liking this season?

 

I'm loving it. And I get the feeling this season will not end well at all. BTW, I watched Episode 4 last night. Thanks, OnDemand.

 

I love the stuff with the kids. Last night's episode was the best of the season thus far. Randy and Michael are awesome. Even without the ending -- which (even though I knew was coming after reading a review in the NYT) still took my breath away -- you had the fabulous scene with Bunk and McNulty where they're talking about lake trout and whitefish, but they're really talking about McNulty. That's the shit that makes me watch this show over and over, the scenes where people tell stories that have a subtle, and deeper meaning that's obvious to anyone who watches the show, but is the kind of thing that I imagine would be totally confusing if you were just trying to pick it up this year.

Obviously Omar had another one of his classic lines: "How you expect to run with the wolves at night when you want to spend all day fussing with the puppies?"

I'm pretty sure I've got this, but please feel free to correct me if I'm reading this wrong: The scene where Omar walks to the store in his silk pajamas to buy some Honey Nut Cheerios and everyone says "Omar's coming!" At then end, he's standing outside the boarded up row house and someone from above drops a stash of heroin at his feet from above, and he feels sort of annoyed about it. I'm assuming that someone tossed the drugs to him because they saw him walking the street and, knowing Omar's rep, just decided to give the drugs up, which Omar didn't even really expect. Omar, who prefers the thrill of taking someone's drugs over the money he gets from selling them to someone, was upset about this because it was too easy. Thus, the line about, "This is why we get up in the morning" to his lover later after they robbed one of Marlo's stash houses that also happened to be the convienence store. Am I correct?

Another aspect of the school stuff that I loved is how much the kids respect and fear the female teachers/administrators, but don't give a damn about disrespecting a male teacher like Pryz. (I know part of it has to do with the fact that he's new and they smell his fear, but I think my point here is also valid.) I'm not going to pretend like I've spend a ton of time in inner city schools, but I have spent some, and you can definitely tell that a lot of the kids listen and fear the female teachers because, most of the time, their mothers have been the dominant authority figure in their lives. Boys will tell male teachers to fuck off because they feel disrespected and criticized, but they won't do it (as much, anyway) to female teachers.

 

DD --

I read the Omar scene the same way. For him, the game isn't about the money, or the drugs. It's a power thing. We already know he has his own ethos surrounding the game, and this is, I think, the darker side of that coin. The same thig that makes him unwilling to put his shotgun on a civilian or shoot someone on a Sunday morning -- or that makes him pay for his cigarettes while robbing Marlowe's stash house -- is the same thing that makes him want to rob from only the top dog, the same thing that makes him use the biggest gun possible. He wants to see the look of complete terror on their faces.

And the scene with Bunk and McNulty was simply perfect dialogue.

"They sell fried chicken, lake trout."

White fish. trash fish.

Yeah, white-trash fish. No lake, no trout. That shit is just marketing.

 

It gets better in the fourth episode, zeke. That's all I'm saying.

BTW -- My favorite moment of the season so far was when Monk was giving money to the little kids, and the one kid turned down the money and walked away.

The kid refused to make eye contact with Marlo until he was called a "bitch-ass punk." Then the kid looked at Marlo like he was about to throw down. The soft smile on Marlo's face as he realized, "Oh, shit. This kid isn't afraid of me at all" was priceless.

 

Randy is by far my favorite of the kids.

Just hustling, the all-American boy, with that heart-crushing smile, Eddie Haskell in corn rows, slinging snacks to the kids in the lunchroom.

It's going to break my heart when they kill him off.

 

Ten random thoughts on the first three episodes of Season 4:

1. Gotta love seeing Carver actually get to know the mopes and hoppers he's chasing. Apparently, he took Bunny's words of wisdom to heart.

2. I believe DoubleDown has mentioned this repeatedly before, but the actor that plays Bodie is incredible. It's all subtle -- the inflection of his voice, the way his eyes move, body language, the way he spits. He might be the most convincingly portrayed character on the show.

3. Lester Freamon cracks me up.

4. So does the fact that Beady's kids call McNulty, "McNulty."

5. I feel for my man Bunk. It's always depressing when your drinking buddies get married and stay home with the kids.

6. Methinks Marlo, who until now has always showed poise and wisdom beyond his years, is getting too big for his britches.

7. Omar still don't scare.

8. I hope Cutty ends up getting involved in this somehow. Love that character.

9. Three great scenes of hilarity so far -- Daniels and the state's attorney talking about Lester in bed, with Daniels doing his Lester impersonation; Carcetti's campaign manager explaining why he wasn't going to vote for him; and Valchek laughing at Herc's "problem" concerning the mayor's hummer.

10. I thought my favorite new character was going to be Randy, but his buddy Michael is starting to seem much more intriguing. He turns down drug money from Marlo, but yet he's selling drugs himself, and now he's trying to get out of it, but it probably won't take. He could be turning into the tragic Wallace/D'Angelo/Ziggy figure of this season.

 

How long can McNulty's beatific home life last? Honestly, how's he going to stay home at night and play with the puppies when he knows the wolves are out there?

Bodie's gonna either go out on his own or hook up with Marlowe. It was obvious all the way back in the first season that he should have been running shit instead of D'Angelo, who was smart but didn't have much heart. And the actor who plays him is, indeed, fantastic.
It was great how in last night's episode they paralleled all the storylines -- Greggs, Lester, Herc, the special unit LT, Carver, Bodie, the kid who's slinging but won't take a handout -- to show that how well you do your job and whether you are rewarded for a good performance are rarely, if ever, linked. Lester and Kima are top-notch investigators, and one is likely to be left out in the cold. Bodie turned a shit corner into a hotspot, and he's out. Herc, meanwhile, earned his seargeant's stripes by walking in on a blowjob. That isn't even mentioning the correlations between the impending turf war and the mayoral campaign. I mean, who looked like a politician, Prop Joe at the co-op meeting or the mayor putting a hit out on Carcetti's office? Just one of the many reasons this is the best show on television.

I, too, am surprised we haven't seen Cutty from the Cut, yet. I was so busy waiting for the return of Omar, though, that I hadn't really thought on it.

 

God damn, I love this fucking show.

As Dedo said, I'm not sure anyone is as good at spitting out of the side of his mouth as Bodie is.

The scene with Beatie's kids was hilarious.

Another quick question: The woman who comes into the classroom right after the one girl slashes the other girl's face, isn't that the same woman who Cutty went to see after he got out of prison in Season 2, the one he was still in love with? (She had a son named Allen, and Cutty said, "Named after Allen Iverson?" and she said, "No, he's named after his father.")

Marlo sees himself in Michael, the same way that Avon saw some of himself in Marlo. If your read The Corner and Homicide, Simon always talks about how the biggest drug dealers, the real ruthless kingpins who thrive and survive, are never the guys who wear a lot of flash or drive big cars, or put themselves out there. They're the quiet dudes who ride in the back of cars and wear regular clothes control the universe from behind the curtain with a quiet confidence you can't quite explain. Sort of like Melvin Williams, a real life drug kingpin who now plays the preacher who is friends with Bunny.

I can't say enough how much I enjoy the United Nations-style meetings the drug dealers have in hotel board rooms. Prop Joe is totally awesome. One of his lines that I use all the time with my friends is his line from Season 2 where Nick says, "Thanks for being straight about this" and Joe says, "Straight ain't got nothing to do with it. If it wasn't for Serge here, you two would be a couple of cadaverous mutherfuckers."

 

No, she teaches at Ida B. Wells Elementary, on the outskirts of the city, IIRC.