The Wire

As the writers’ strike continues and new episodes of shows become increasingly rare, I am extremely grateful for one thing: the fact that the fifth and final season of The Wire has already completed production.

Over the past few years I'd had a lot of friends tell me how great the show is. I listened. I believed. But I never took the steps to start watching it myself. There are a couple of reasons for this. One, I had an erratic schedule so habitually watching anything on television was tough. Two, as much as I enjoy good TV and well-told stories, I still like to pretend that I have some sort of life. Thus, I try to avoid finding new shows to watch so I can act like I was actually going to use that one hour of the week to do something productive. But at one point in March of 2007 I found myself with nothing to do so I decided to watch the first episode of the first season. This entire writing piece can be blamed on that one decision. (I’ve thought about the following two sentences quite a bit and at first I thought that maybe I was deluding myself with hyperbole; yet the more I consider it the more I am convinced that I am justified in my thinking). The Wire is the greatest show in the history of television. However, more significantly, The Wire is the most important show in the history of television.

Pretty early on The Wire shows itself to be different from typical cops versus bad guys fare. In the very first scene, we watch a white man (whom we later learn is Jimmy McNulty) walk into a courtroom. He sits across the aisle from a black man (later revealed to be named Stringer Bell) who is rather intently writing on a notepad. McNulty tries to peek over and see what Bell is writing, with little initial success. However, Bell finally acquiesces and holds up the notepad for McNulty to see. Written in large black letters are three words: "FUCK YOU, DETECTIVE."

Now, had this been, let’s say, Law and Order: SVU, and the detective had been, oh, Elliot Stabler, the very next scene would have been back at the police station interrogation room where Stabler slams the "perp" up against a wall, violates all manner of personal space by putting less than an inch of distance between their two faces while in a threatening whisper saying something along the lines of, "Who do you think you are, dirt bag?" In The Wire, we get a very different reaction. Detective McNulty smirks to himself, as if to say, "Well, I had to try" and leans back in his seat to watch the rest of the trial.

Intriguing.

What else is intriguing is how the entirety of the first season--and by extension, every episode of the show--stems from that one small sequence.

Honestly, while I found the first episode to be very well made and rather engaging, it didn't really capture me. I decided to keep watching anyway. And I don't know exactly when it happened and there wasn't a specific moment that just jumped out at me, but by the end of episode three I realized that I was hooked. It was right around then that I became aware of the fact that I was watching greatness. In a span of about two and a half weeks, I had watched every episode of all four existing seasons. I couldn't get enough of it. If I wasn't at work and I wasn't sleeping, then I was watching The Wire. And sometimes when I should have been sleeping (or doing something work-related) I was still watching it. I would go to sleep later than normal and wake up early (who knew I could?) just to catch one more episode.

The beauty of The Wire is that it was crafted from the very beginning with absolute authenticity in mind. It doesn't dumb itself down and it doesn't cater to lazy viewers. It's not enough to sit down and just watch. You have to be paying attention. As an example, the script quite often uses local slang that might not be decipherable to people not from Baltimore. Other shows may go to pains to include scenes and dialogue for "translation" purposes. The Wire does no such thing unless it is naturally occurring. A scene involving a white cop listening to a wiretap between two black drug dealers might include a person being there to interpret because that would really happen. However, a scene in the projects between a group of friends is just going to flow naturally, without outside exposition. The same hold true for detectives using police slang or Polish dockworkers using longshoreman talk. Heck, just the fact that The Wire refuses to be politically correct and actually show that all the drug dealers in the projects are black would be enough to terrify most networks.

Now, it's one thing to attempt to capture authenticity. It is another completely to be able to do it. The Wire succeeds because of the commitment of everyone to maintain that perfection. That starts from the top. Before collaborating on the show, creator David Simon and his writing partner Ed Burns were a reporter and detective, respectively, in Baltimore. Those careers lend infinitely invaluable insight to the finished product that the audience watches. The pacing is deliberate; nothing is rushed. In an era of people with short attention spans, that has probably kept the show from attracting a wider audience. But for people with the patience to see things through, the payoff is more than worth it.

That brings me to the greatest payoff and best part of the show: the phenomenally talented cast. I originally wanted to write about every character that I find intriguing but as I was running down the list, I realized that doing so would require that I write something roughly the size of The Iliad. So I've therefore focused on who I think are the most important characters (and even then, not all).

DETECTIVE JIMMY MCNULTY
McNulty is the closest thing that comes to an archetype on this show. He's a first-class a-hole who doesn't care if he pisses off his bosses, drinks like a fish, can apparently get laid just by thinking about it and is so secure in his coolness that he holds absolutely no concern about being the lone white man hanging out in West Baltimore projects. Basically, he's there so that a key target demographic (white males aged 18-49) can have someone through whom to live vicariously. He's a flawed figure who has allowed his job to become far too vital to him and treats many of the people around him as a means to an end. However, he also cares about his family and is shown to care about his fellow detectives, although sometimes it takes far too much for him to realize that.

RUSSELL "STRINGER" BELL
Stringer is that character who embodies that classic motif of "what if?" What if, instead of being born and raised in the projects, he had grown up in a more middle-class environment? Stringer is quite possibly the most intelligent character on the show (only one other gives him a run for his money) but to the cops he’s just another nigger thug peddling dope on the streets. And because it’s through McNulty that the audience initially sees Stringer, that’s how it sees him as well. But as we continue watching we see more of him until we finally realize the trap in which he is ensnared: too smart for the street, too street for the business world.

AVON BARKSDALE
It took me quite a while to realize exactly how multilayered a character that Avon actually is (and by extension, the subtle talent that actor Wood Harris has in portraying him). Because he is so close to Stringer, its easy to dismiss him as less dynamic and less interesting. Even the character, in a moment of self reflection, describes himself as “just a gangster, I suppose.” But as we continue watching, more and more of him is revealed. This can be seen in his reaction to the final D’Angelo episode and his sincere hope that the money he gives to Cutty will go to bettering the lives of the neighborhood kids. And when rival drug lord Marlo Stanfield makes his debut, we realize that Avon is nowhere near the monster that we may have made him out to be.

LESTER FREAMON
I have absolutely no qualms about calling Lester the best cop on television. Or in the vernacular of the show, he’s “real police.” Like many of the other characters, it takes time for us to understand the depth of Lester’s character. Early on it’s very easy to dismiss him as an old, eccentric officer who really can’t hold his own with his team. Later we come to realize that he is quite probably the most valuable asset that the wiretap detail has. Although they never really compete head to head, he’s arguably the one character who rivals Stringer in intelligence.

THE KIDS
In all of television history, it’d be difficult to find a more tragic character than Wallace. He is easily the heart and soul of the first season. And as David Simon has said, he’s the living embodiment of the fact that a 14-year old drug dealer is still 14 years old. One of the most heart wrenching moments of the entire series is the scene where we have to watch Wallace wake up and prepare for school the six elementary school-age children that share his apartment, simply because he is the closest thing to an adult they have.

Randy Wagstaff is yet another tragic character. Here’s a genuinely good kid who’s smart and always wants to do the right thing. Yet he’s caught up in several environments that cannot properly support him (most especially the foster home system). As much as stories have historically tried to teach us that good things happen to good people, his plot line shows us that all too often, that is not at all the case. It’s impossible to not be moved in the scene where he finally unloads his frustration on Carver.

I am convinced that the creators chose Michael’s first name as homage to Michael Corleone. The similarities are striking: he’s a good individual despite all the negativity that surrounds him. And as much as he tries to shield himself away from it all, the circumstances in which he finds himself dictate his eventual surrender. More startling, once he has succumbed, we discover that he’s very, very, very good at navigating that world.

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That brings me to my favorite character on the show, my favorite character ever and the most important character on the most important show in television history: Omar Devon Little. To give a description of this character is almost comical: an openly gay stick-up man who has no qualms about killing someone and whose name alone strikes fear into the hearts of virtually everyone who’s ever met him--but abhors cursing, has a strict code about who--and how--he robs and takes his grandmother to church on Sundays. How could such a character ever come across as real or convincing? Yet actor Michael K. Williams does exactly that.

However, more important that the character of Omar himself is what that character represents. Perhaps more than anything, the underlying premise of The Wire is the failure of institutions: the police department, drug organizations, the legal system, unions, the school system, foster care, the press…at some point ALL of them will inevitably and unequivocally fail people who put their trust in them. Omar is someone who has recognized this. In one instance another character calls him a sociopath but he isn’t that at all (Marlo’s presence illustrates that for us). Omar is someone who has simply chosen to live outside of anyone else’s rules. He has recognized that all of the aforementioned institutions are simply the fruit of rules imposed by someone else with enough power to do so. He is also familiar with the disappointment that inescapably comes from adhering to these rules and rationalizes that he is as qualified as anyone else to create rules. And thus in his own little world he does exactly that.

His best scene ever is when defense attorney Levy is cross-examining him on the witness stand. Levy is trying to squash his credibility by pointing out the crimes that he's committed and how his entire livelihood is dependent upon his preying on those who support the city's drug trade. Omar wins over the jury--and viewers--by pointing out that he and Levy are exactly the same in that regard, only Omar uses a shotgun while Levy uses a briefcase.

Despite this being one of the main underlying elements of the show, yet another of its admirable traits is its ability and willingness to cast an unflinching look even at things that it seemingly promotes. This is most apparent in the “Hamsterdam” season where the legalization of drugs is obviously endorsed but the show does not turn a blind eye to some of the inevitable negative consequences.

I think that one key reason that I’ve enjoyed The Wire is because it has hit so close to home for me. In some ways the Baltimore shown onscreen reminds me of growing up in Fort Worth. After New York City, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, DC, Baltimore is pretty much an afterthought East coast city. Fort Worth has a similar position among cities in Texas after Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin. Baltimore is one of the most crime-ridden cities in the nation. For several years while I was in middle and high school, Fort Worth was ranked at the very top of US cities in violent crimes per capita (a statistic in which many of my peers took a disturbing amount of pride). More recently my hometown has fallen from that ranking—although watching how the politicians and police on The Wire hide and distort crime statistics, it makes me wonder how much has really changed. Season 4 holds special significance due to its depiction of the public school system. Tilghman Middle School might as well be Morningside Middle School on the southside of Fort Worth, Texas. I knew students exactly like most of the kids there, and the way the school board forces teachers to teach students to pass standardized test instead of actually educating them is very reminiscent of the emphasis that was put on what was then the TAAS test.

This show pulls no punches. It details the delineation of the dual lives of the have-nots and, not quite the haves, but those who are better off than the have-nots yet whose job it is to stomp out the business of the have-nots. There has never been a better portrayal of the circular existence of the lives of those people trapped in the ghetto. The best example of this is when Stringer sends Bodie along with Shamrock on a drug run to Philadelphia. As they leave the Baltimore city limits, Bodie is shocked to learn that different cities have different radio stations. Here is an otherwise worldly young man who has even been forced by his boss to kill a friend but has never in his life left the radius of a few city blocks. He's involved in the drug trade not because he wants to be or because he dreams of becoming a kingpin. He sells drugs because that is literally all he has ever known.

It’s hard to imagine someone watching this show and not, at some level at least, empathizing with those people trapped in the cycle of poverty. However, I know it is not only possible, but very likely happens. I know this not because of anything that has actually happened on the show but because of a story my sister told me. She and her husband went to watch Blood Diamond and as they were exiting the theater she observed a middle-aged white couple leaving as well. The wife was quite obviously bothered by what she had just seen: the depiction of a world where the lives of Africans are considered to be worth less than that of rocks. Her husband tried to console her by saying, “What, were you scared? It’s not real, stuff like that doesn’t really happen.”

Stuff like that doesn’t really happen.


“They’re dead where it doesn’t count.” –Fletcher, a reporter in Season 5 of The Wire.