Television: The Wire

I heard an NPR interview with Ira Glass sometime over the last year that caught my attention. You read that correctly, it wasn't Glass' own public radio show, This American Life. Instead, he was doing the publicity circuit for his new 'television' show of the same title. As any interviewer might ask, this one wondered if Glass, a radio man, was somewhat apprehensive and derisive about the landscape of television. Glass responded with something that resonated with me, and something with which I wholeheartedly agree. He said that television is going through a new 'Golden Age.' To paraphrase, he says that as viewership declines for particular stand-by ideas due to either lack of interest or a wider variety of programming, those who create television are forced to stretch their comfort zones and come up with something fresh. Coincidentally, this is what I've thought about the music scene lately, as well. With more and more independent labels, and multiple instantaneous ways to have music heard, it is taking a very special kind of band to break out.

Anyway, this kind of televised creativity has been going on at HBO for quite a few years now. This decade, HBO has spawned some of the best programming in television history with Six Feet Under, Deadwood, The Sopranos, Carnivale, Rome, In Treatment and Band of Brothers. I don't know how I passed over The Wire. Maybe it was the glut of police procedurals on the networks with umpteen Law & Order spinoffs and CSI's to make you S-I-C-K. But, eventually, I was convinced by my brother to watch the show. In years past I've called various and sundry programs 'the best show on television.' Well, guess what, the series may have ended, but The Wire is the best show (formerly) on television.

Created by David Simon, The Wire is less a police procedural than a visual novel about Baltimore and the world of crime that envelops the city. In season one, we are introduced to Detective Jimmy McNulty, who becomes the central figure within the world of the Baltimore police. Through him, and his many screw-ups within the department, we meet the rest of the law enforcement team that become the Major Case Unit, attempting to overhear, in any way they can, incriminating evidence on the massive drug trade. In that same first season, we meet the Barksdale crew. Avon Barksdale, his nephew D'Angelo, second in command Stringer Bell and other various characters within the organization all made for worthy foils to the Police.

The second season brought in a new dimension, the dockworkers who find their business and their union less strong than it used to be, and so turn to aid in overseas smuggling to ensure their futures. Of course, everything then ties back into the Barksdale Organization, making for an intriguing web of crime and villainy. (Back to the villainy later). The third season adds three new layers, those of politics with mayoral hopeful Tommy Carcetti, rival drug boss and overall vicious bastard Marlo Stanfield, and the recently sprung from jail old-school gangster trying to make his way in a new world, Dennis "Cutty" Wise. The third season is where things got interesting. With all of these storylines, it set up a vast number of intricacies that would continue up until the end of the series. Also, the third season provided a timely analogy to the war in Iraq with the more straightforward war on drugs.

The fourth season introduces four public school kids who are torn between a life on the corner, selling drugs, and the far less likely 'way out.' Namond Brice, son of imprisoned Barksdale enforcer "Wee Bay" Brice, Michael Lee, a boy looking out for his younger brother despite their junkie mother, Dukie Weems, whose parents steal everything he brings home to sell for drug money, and Randy Wagstaff, an adopted foster child, are our central figures. Despite their seemingly unavoidable destinies, where these boys end up might surprise you, and ends up being one of the most interesting aspects of the fifth season. That fifth and final season layers on the newspapermen of the Baltimore Sun, tying in the lies and deceit of the print with the lies and deceit of the police, especially one Jimmy McNulty, and the code of ethics of their peers such as Bunk Moreland and Augustus Haynes. Meanwhile, we are introduced to two of the most vicious people to ever appear on the show, Chris Partlow and Snoop Pearson, Marlo's ruthless henchmen. The fifth season is the final season, and aside from Six Feet Under, probably the best last fifteen minutes of a show ever aired.

I have saved the best parts of The Wire for last. There are two characters who have appeared in every season, sprinkled throughout so as not to overpower the main storylines, but enough to become the more interesting and popular characters on the show. The first is named "Bubbles," an addict who is often a 'C.I.' (Confidential Informant) for the Baltimore Police. Over the years, the well meaning but down on his luck Bubs repeatedly goes on and off the drugs, is abused by the cops, the other street dwellers and his own family members. Through it all, Bubbles tries to see the good in things and people and we can't help but connect with him, no matter how disparate our lives may be to his. The second character is Omar Little. Omar, somewhat a Baltimore streets 'spook story,' is a criminal with a code. He will only rob from those who prey on the community, i.e. the drug trade. He is the only major character on the show not to use profanity. He would normally seem somewhat an outcast, being an openly gay street thug, but is the most feared individual on those streets. When he walks down the street in PJ's to buy some cereal, kids flee in terror screaming, "Omar's comin', Omar!" One of the more haunting soundbites in the show is Omar whistling his threatening theme, "The Farmer in the Dell." When he whistles that tune, you know you're in trouble.

Omar and Bubbles are probably the most complex characters in a show filled with complex characters. Bubbles, aside from the major players in the police, is one of the only characters to have appeared in the first and last episode, making a particularly long and intriguing story arc. Omar's story shares a similarly mirrored and bookended storyline going from the third episode in the first to three episodes from the close. David Simon has claimed that there are almost no redeeming characters in the entire show, save for maybe Leandor Sydnor, one of the Major Case Unit Detectives, and even he has his moments. This show is a televised and dramatized novelization that's based on reality, and that's what makes this show so special. Life is gritty and ugly, with slight moments of hope, and this is exactly how the City of Baltimore is presented here. Five seasons just wasn't enough...