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The Wire #567946
02/23/10 09:40 AM
02/23/10 09:40 AM
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Australia
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Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica Offline OP
Mickey Meatballs
Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica  Offline OP
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Underboss
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Australia
Holy Hell, how freakin' great is The Wire ?

I totally missed out when this was running, despite my mates and critics alike heaping praise on it. Finally, i caught an episode last week, and had to go out and by the series. Goddamn. I haven't watched so much T.V since I bought the first 3 seasons of Soprano's and watched them in a row.
(Actually, i did the same with Deadwood recently, so maybe not as long ago as i think.

For those who, like me until fairly recently, dont know about it, the series is a crime-drama set in Baltimore, Maryland.
Each series has a theme, and the first is particularly enticing, set amongst the rival drug gangs of the city. This stuff is gritty, it just drags you in. The later series go on to cover a range of themes.

Some great acting and casting. Alongside the numerous street gangs and drug-rings are various criminals, criminal groups and the police that pursue them, and the authorities they in turn answer to. In particular i really dig the Greek Mafia sub-plot, involving, funnily enough, a gang of Greek mobsters who come to the city and set up shop.

Aaargggh. I really cant describe how good this shit is. Ive heard it described as the best television show ever, and for me its definitly on par with The Soprano's, Oz, Brotherhood, and Carnivale (thats right Carnivale. Hey, dont knock it. I loved it. If only they didn't produce so many other great shows, i would have boycotted HBO for not giving me a third series. The Wire makes up for it though.)

The Wikipedia entry has a bunch of info, for anyone that wants to check out the casts or whatever.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wire

Highy, highly reccomended. Highly.


(cough.)
Re: The Wire [Re: Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica] #567950
02/23/10 11:16 AM
02/23/10 11:16 AM
Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 8,845
Newcastle-upon-Tyne UK
Yogi Barrabbas Offline
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Newcastle-upon-Tyne UK
You are right mate,it is awesome. There is already a thread about it floating around somewhere though,i'm just to lazy too look for it rolleyes


I would rather die on my feet than live on my knees!
Re: The Wire [Re: Yogi Barrabbas] #568592
03/07/10 12:56 PM
03/07/10 12:56 PM
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Posts: 35
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Charlieopera Offline
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It wass a great show with some EXCELLENT writing and ACTING.


Charlie Stella
Johnny Porno (April, 2010) Stark House Press
Mafiya: A Novel of Crime (January, 2008) Pegasus
Shakedown: A Novel of Crime (June, 2006) Pegasus
Cheapskates: A Novel of Crime (March, 2005) Carroll & Graf
Charlie Opera: A Novel of Crime (December, 2003) Carroll & Graf
Jimmy Bench-Press: A Novel of Crime (December, 2002) Carroll & Graf
Eddie's World: A Novel of Crime (December, 2001) Carroll & Graf
www.charliestella.com
Re: The Wire [Re: Charlieopera] #573831
05/16/10 01:29 AM
05/16/10 01:29 AM
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 307
Wellington, New Zealand
veneratio Offline
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Capo
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Wellington, New Zealand
Oh so it really is as great as everyone has been saying??
I have seent the box set and people say it's just as good as the sopranos but I have been a bit reserved. I might go and get it.
What is it that is so good about it?


"Just when I thought I was out.. They pull me back in"
Re: The Wire [Re: veneratio] #573836
05/16/10 06:51 AM
05/16/10 06:51 AM
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 5,325
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Lilo Offline
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Originally Posted By: veneratio
Oh so it really is as great as everyone has been saying??
I have seent the box set and people say it's just as good as the sopranos but I have been a bit reserved. I might go and get it.
What is it that is so good about it?


The writing, acting and storytelling was all top-notch.
There were very few characters in "The Wire" who were completely "good" or completely "evil" and even they would occasionally slip up and make mistakes or be controlled/corrupted by institutions that were more powerful than they were.

Although most of the writing team was white, The Wire was one of the few shows to depict a cast with fully realized black characters that were neither supermen nor comic relief but just people like anyone else: equally able to be heroic or corrupt. No Will Smiths or Martin Lawrences here...

It may have been mentioned in another thread or one of the reviews but The Wire is one of the closest things to a modern day Dickens novel that we can see. Even the small roles are well drawn, logically developed and well acted. The Wire had an attention to detail that gave it a verisimilitude that most other TV shows lacked.

Whether it's a vicious gangster underboss that also reads Milton Friedman and Adam Smith; a female cop who preaches integrity in everything she does but will join in to beat a teen suspect; or a high ranking cop who tries to do the impossible in keeping crime down with less resources, The Wire delights in showing all the hypocrisies and contradictions involved in being human.The writers were not afraid of putting characters through a lot of s*** or eliminating them if that's what the story required.

Highly recommended..


"When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives."
Winter is Coming

Now this is the Law of the Jungle—as old and as true as the sky; And the wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk, the Law runneth forward and back; For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Re: The Wire [Re: Lilo] #573962
05/18/10 01:26 PM
05/18/10 01:26 PM
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Joisey
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Charlieopera Offline
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I'm with Lilo on this. I liked it as much as the Sopranos (although I never saw the final season). There's an interesting article in Playboy (last month, I think) where someone was very upset at the writing and how urban blacks were portrayed by white writers. It was an interesting article. I'll try and find the exact piece and post it.


Charlie Stella
Johnny Porno (April, 2010) Stark House Press
Mafiya: A Novel of Crime (January, 2008) Pegasus
Shakedown: A Novel of Crime (June, 2006) Pegasus
Cheapskates: A Novel of Crime (March, 2005) Carroll & Graf
Charlie Opera: A Novel of Crime (December, 2003) Carroll & Graf
Jimmy Bench-Press: A Novel of Crime (December, 2002) Carroll & Graf
Eddie's World: A Novel of Crime (December, 2001) Carroll & Graf
www.charliestella.com
Re: The Wire [Re: Charlieopera] #574171
05/21/10 05:31 PM
05/21/10 05:31 PM
Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Capo de La Cosa Nostra Offline
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I'd like to read that Playboy article; a Google search came up with nothing.

It's terrific in all the ways that inferior dramas fail. Real drama - all great serious art, actually - accounts for people by way of their socio-economic contexts. It's genuinely thrilling stuff. Season Four is the best thing I've ever seen. Ever.

I wrote this article last year for a friend's magazine.

SPOILERS WITHIN

The Wire: Straight and True
Michael Pattison, on why the critically acclaimed series might be the most relevant and pressing drama in recent years

David Simon’s television series The Wire may not have been an overnight commercial hit, but its critical acclaim has grown steadily. It originally aired on US cable channel HBO, and is now airing in the UK on BBC Two. More and more viewers are discovering the show. This can only be a good thing.

Formally, The Wire’s appeal may lie in its docudrama visual style, or in the seeming effortlessness with which Simon and his writers give their multi-stranded narrative an urgency and drive. But beyond this, the show has that most rare of attributes in contemporary drama – substance. It is politically motivated and artistically honest; it is interrogative and questioning.

The Wire is not about a tragic city, but about the tragic parts of a city. To wit: the drugs corners of West Baltimore, the seaport in the east of the city, its inner-city schools. As well as such geographical distinctions, it focuses also on the neglected individuals within these areas: the stevedores, the students, the addicts and the pushers.

Much of this is grounded in reality, from which the show gains an almost unprecedented authenticity. Series creator David Simon is a former reporter for The Baltimore Sun and author of two epic works of journalism, Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets and The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood. The latter of these is co-authored by Ed Burns, a former Baltimore detective and inner-city school teacher who also works on The Wire. The show is incredibly well-researched.

Furthermore, the series’ cast is vast. There are more than 900 speaking parts over the course of 60 hour-long episodes, and the entire thing is shot on location. Many roles and scenarios are based on real-life Baltimore figures and events. In acknowledgment of some of these, real-life models are cast in both major and minor parts: Avon Barksdale (played in the show by Wood Harris) is based on “Little Melvin” Williams, who portrays the gentle church deacon in the show; Felicia “Snoop” Pearson, meanwhile, is an ex-convict and Baltimore native who plays an eponymous version of herself in the show. There are many other examples in similar vein.

Such nuances combine to comprise a fully developed and convincing whole. The Wire’s view of Baltimore is panoramic. The city becomes a living organism, fictionalised to life. Its attention to detail is unsurpassed. As a wake-up call, it is truly alarming. Indeed, crime statistics show that in recent years Baltimore’s murder rate has been six times the national rate; graffiti in one scene reads “Bodymore, Murderland”, a grim variation of Baltimore, Maryland. Other statistics show that over 20 per cent of the city’s population live under the poverty line, eight per cent higher than the national average.

But in the particular, we find the common. By concentrating on a specific social layer – be it topographical or institutional – and by placing this layer into a larger context, the series addresses issues more general and widely pressing: how the school system is failing the very students for whom it is in place; the slow, steady death of the working class as a result of budgetary conflicts and political corruption; the inadequacies and transparencies of the print media and other institutions, not least of all the police department itself.

All of these are symptoms of a greater malady: capitalism itself, in all its socially destructive nature. As Simon himself has noted, the show is about what happens when “raw, unencumbered capitalism” is allowed free rein. Indeed, Marxist viewers ought to embrace the show wholeheartedly. Others must surely wake up.

The Wire is angry. As a critique of the system it is damning; as an examination of what is happening at the bottom rungs of the social ladder, it is a convincing and devastating work of journalism. But the show is also humane. It has compassion for and an investment in its characters, who it exposits and explores by means of a fully developed social context. In this respect, it puts most other dramas to shame.

There are elements of Greek tragedy in the series, in how its characters seem at the mercy of things beyond them. But instead of internal conflicts of emotion, or acts of divine intervention, we have the very real institutions of a post-industrialised West, which chisel away at the people within and around them. As Simon has said, these are “people for whom the end is certain and the betrayals are certain.” Indeed, as one character says in the series, “You cannot lose if you do not play.” But not playing seems impossible, for, as another character laments, “The game is rigged.”

This embodies, perhaps, the show’s central paradox and its view of America as a whole. In its very opening scene, Detective Jimmy McNulty (Dominic West) observes the body of a young black male shot to death on the street, as he chats to one of the victim’s acquaintances. The youth, McNulty is told, was shot dead because he snatched money time and time again. Puzzled, McNulty asks why, if he repeatedly stole the money, he was allowed in the game. “Got to,” replies the friend. “This America, man.” This is the land of the free, and everyone is trapped.

Simon says he and his writers are not interested in notions of good and evil, that the show “is about sociology and economics.” And repeatedly, The Wire shows its characters are a product of socio-economic circumstance; as a result, nobody is beyond redemption.

Bill Rawls (John Doman), for example, is the callous Deputy Police Commissioner of the Baltimore Police Department. He may be a heartless careerist with seemingly little moral conscience, but his concern for his clearance rate is in response only to higher demands. As one stevedore puts it in Season Two, “Seniority sucks – unless you’re senior.”

The chain of command looms large in The Wire. Perhaps its strongest strength is the conflict between honest workerism – unloading a ship at the docks, writing sincere reportage, or simply being “good po-lees” – and dog-eat-dog careerism that results in juked stats, policy failures and institutions bled dry.

Thomas Carcetti (Aiden Gillen) rises from the position of Councilman at the beginning of Season Three to Mayor of Baltimore in Season Four. Nobody doubts Carcetti’s ambition, hope or his sincerity, but by Season Five and the show’s end, the writers have shown us once more that the system is bigger than the man – always.

What compromises Carcetti’s plans for reforming the city are fiscal issues and the need to ensure his own re-election. Between funding the police department and the inner city schools, one advisor’s solution is fitting: “Kids don’t vote.” Seniority does suck, but even for those who wish to reform, being senior may matter very little.

Likewise, on the opposite side of the law, drugs kingpin Stringer Bell (Idris Elba) wishes to transcend the rank and file of the streets on which he has grown up, and to turn legitimate in the city’s property development sector. At first, a la Michael Corleone in The Godfather Part III, what keeps pulling Bell back into the gangster world is the violence of the gangster world itself; in the end, though, the matter runs much deeper than that. As with Carcetti, Bell is at the mercy of the moneymen who seem to run the city and dictate who gets what and when.

Tellingly, a recurring story in the show sees Detective Lester Freamon (Clarke Peters) following the money trail, investigating where the city’s drugs money is invested further up the chain. Repeatedly, it is found in the hands, pockets and accounts of the city’s top brass. Freamon gets so far up the trail only to be reined in by his superiors. Clearly, money talks, and shit runs downhill.

In The Wire, individuals may be corrupt, but it is the system itself that has corrupted them. Some viewers – those Marxists previously urged to rally behind the show, for instance – might cry for a revolution, for a complete overhaul and restructuring of the system. But David Simon, alas, is a social democrat, not a socialist: The Wire works with what it has got.

But if Simon sees capitalism as the only feasible system in which wealth can be a real, attainable goal, his show calls for some sort of systematic framework to ensure those at the bottom of the economy are not neglected in the merciless way in which they currently are.

In Season Three, for instance, the series addresses the notion of turning the war on drugs from a question of crime into a question of health. The results show promise, and perhaps a sustainable way of dealing with a very complex social problem. But the idea is unable to be fully realised; treating the drugs war as a health issue means exposing it and facing it with more patience and care than if it were simply a crime issue.

As a result, it is easier and more convenient to return to the status quo. The system continues to fight a social health problem with a law enforcement strategy. In the opening episode, one line of dialogue is revealing: “You can’t call this a war on drugs... Wars end.” The problem is that crime itself is not a social constant; other factors weigh heavily. The Wire exposes this.

In Season Four the series concentrates on the school system. Three characters emerge as potential leaders to whom otherwise neglected youths can turn: Dennis “Cutty” Wise (Chad Coleman), a former drugs runner whose 14 years in prison has rendered him incompatible with more ferocious streets than before, establishes a boxing gym that takes the kids off the corners and puts to more productive use their energy and need for discipline; Ellis Carver (Seth Gilliam) is the detective whose rapport with and compassion for the corner kids provides the series with one of its most cutting and heartbreaking scenes, when his admirable efforts to secure the safety of one child, left behind by both the witness protection and adoption services, meet a devastating cul-de-sac; and ex-cop Bunny Colvin (Robert Wisdom), working as part of a social experiment within an inner city school, teaches hope and self-confidence to a student hitherto beyond despair.

In each of these cases, it is individual courage that stands out. As Simon says about Colvin in particular, “Ultimately what he does is to literally seize one kid and say, ‘I’m gonna take responsibility for you,’ in a world where nobody’s taking responsibility for anything. Not the school system, not the parents, not anybody.”

But these characters seem to be a dying breed. The system does not encourage them. If the kids themselves are being left behind by the schooling system, the would-be teachers, mentors and moral guardians have their work cut out too.

In the show’s fifth and final season, the writers turn their probing eyes to the Baltimore Sun and bring to light what they feel is a very real and sad situation: the decline of genuine journalism in favour of Pulitzer chasing. Gus Haynes (Clark Johnson) is the Sun’s experienced city editor, whose honesty and integrity are undercut by the false journalism of an underling and the dishonesty of his superiors.

In spite of all his efforts to expose one reporter’s outright forgery of events – which haven’t actually happened – Haynes is himself subdued because the resulting coverage gained by the newspaper sits too well with his bosses. Careerism wins again.

Under capitalism, not only is the working class dying a slow death, real work is becoming impossible. The fabricated truths told in the papers are in response to a serial killer manhunt, which has been concocted by Detective Jimmy McNulty. Outrageously immoral or not, McNulty’s adventure is a desperate masquerade with more dignified intentions: a serial killer, whether make-believe or not, gets the media’s attention, which in turn puts pressure on the Mayor and ultimately the police.

As a result, McNulty’s case acquires enough backing and funding so that fellow detective Freamon can hunt down young drugs lord Marlo Stanfield (Jamie Hector), a target previously deemed by the higher-ups too elusive and well equipped for the police department’s current budget and resources.

That real work – happening behind the scenes – is only possible through such fundamentally questionable methods, and dependent from the outset on hysterical fear-mongering from the media, is a telling and sad reflection of our times. A change is undoubtedly needed.

The Wire is growing in popularity. All seasons are available on DVD, there are several blogs dedicated to it, David Simon and cast members are becoming established names. The series is no longer an obscure drama tackling some niche issues – to be honest, it never was – but a very relevant exploration of the harmful, corrosive effects of capitalism at its most unbridled.

Even beyond all the hype, the series has to be seen to be appreciated, so rich are its thematic fabric and aesthetic approach. Grounded in realism and honesty, it lends itself to a wider, general depiction of not just America, but any urban environment in the civilised world.

Last edited by Capo de La Cosa Nostra; 05/21/10 06:58 PM.

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Re: The Wire [Re: Capo de La Cosa Nostra] #574511
05/26/10 10:27 PM
05/26/10 10:27 PM
Joined: Aug 2009
Posts: 1,819
Australia
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Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica Offline OP
Mickey Meatballs
Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica  Offline OP
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Underboss
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Australia
Sweet article. Those are exactly my sentimonies.


(cough.)
Re: The Wire [Re: Charlieopera] #574833
06/02/10 06:41 PM
06/02/10 06:41 PM
Joined: Dec 2006
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pizzaboy Offline
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Originally Posted By: Charlieopera
There's an interesting article in Playboy (last month, I think) where someone was very upset at the writing and how urban blacks were portrayed by white writers. It was an interesting article. I'll try and find the exact piece and post it.


I haven't seen the Playboy interview, Charlie, but I think you may be talking about Ishmael Reed's take on the show, along with its writers. He hated it.

This is from a rather lengthy interview done with Reed a year or so ago. He speaks about the show and the writers in great detail. His thoughts on "The Wire" are about halfway down the page. For the record, I LOVED the show, but I respect Reed. He's an absolutely prolific writer.

Ishmael Reed on "the Wire."


"I got news for you. If it wasn't for the toilet, there would be no books." --- George Costanza.
Re: The Wire [Re: pizzaboy] #574857
06/03/10 05:08 AM
06/03/10 05:08 AM
Joined: Mar 2010
Posts: 35
Joisey
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Charlieopera Offline
Wiseguy
Charlieopera  Offline
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Joisey
This is an interesting article (thanks for posting it). I've been watching Simon's new HBO series, Treme and I like it a lot (as much as The Wire) but I've also been taking shots at some of the politicalization in it. I'm wondering if it's the same guy in teh Playboy article (I really need to go find it) but it says the same thing so I'm guessing you nailed it.

In Treme, it's the opposite, I think; where all the blame lands on the Republican Party, George Bush, etc. .... and the racism is overplayed (I think). I went after it (Treme) a few times on my blog (including yesterday): http://temporaryknucksline.blogspot.com/2010/06/more-kind-words-marilyn-me-president.html


Charlie Stella
Johnny Porno (April, 2010) Stark House Press
Mafiya: A Novel of Crime (January, 2008) Pegasus
Shakedown: A Novel of Crime (June, 2006) Pegasus
Cheapskates: A Novel of Crime (March, 2005) Carroll & Graf
Charlie Opera: A Novel of Crime (December, 2003) Carroll & Graf
Jimmy Bench-Press: A Novel of Crime (December, 2002) Carroll & Graf
Eddie's World: A Novel of Crime (December, 2001) Carroll & Graf
www.charliestella.com
Re: The Wire [Re: Charlieopera] #574913
06/03/10 03:07 PM
06/03/10 03:07 PM
Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Capo de La Cosa Nostra Offline
Capo de La Cosa Nostra  Offline

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Gateshead, UK
I'm wondering if Ishmael Reed has actually seen the show in its full context. His grudge for David Simon seems to go back to The Corner:

"He was going around the country with a Black kid from the Ghetto to promote something called The Corner – it was all about Blacks as degenerates selling drugs, etc."

That 'etc' is a bit telling in how vague and unfounded that criticism is, really. Simon's book The Corner is an epic work of journalism; it may very well be 'about Blacks selling drugs', but it's also - Reed does not note - about a particular part of a particular city that happens to be grossly neglected and left behind due to many issues into which he probes.

None of Reed's statements about The Wire ring true at all, actually. He seems very self-absorbed, and because of that seems to miss the whole point that The Wire portrays and explores many real social issues by grounding them in socio-economic terms, which are de facto questions of class. Any line of argument that deals with race alone - Reed's seems to - is going to fall into the same holes as the liberal feminists. Frankly, they all sound like they've got chips on their shoulders. You can't isolate race or gender or sexuality or anything else without viewing them as part of a whole - all of these are complex issues, and The Wire does well to give a coherent, honest voice to them in its 60 absorbing, engrossing episodes.

I did some searching and came across UnderCoverBlackman's blog. I largely agree with this: "With the racialist critique, a white boy can't win. If he ignores the stories of the black lower class, he's rendering the black poor 'invisible'... it's benign neglect.

"If, on the other hand, he devotes his talent, intellect and passion to humanizing the black poor, without sugar-coating it... then he's a white interloper, a race profiteer."


As per Reed's argument, Simon can't win. Coming back to some of Reed's arguments - which fall flat for anyone who has actually watched the show:

"Der Sturmer – see Julius Streicher Nazi Editor of the Notorious Anti-Semite Newspaper Der Sturmer by Randall l. Bytwerk. I was shocked. Jewish men were depicted as sexual predators, raping Aryan women. They were exhibited as flashers. Both Bellow and Phillip Roth’s books include Black flashers. Jewish men especially those immigrants from Russia were depicted as criminals. Jewish children were seen as disruptive, a threat to German school children and so on. If any one looks at this stuff for example, you’ll find a perfect match for the way that David Mamet, David Simon, George Pelecanos, Stephen Spielberg and Richard Price portray Blacks. They are very critical in their projects about the way Black men treat women, yet none of them has produced a project critical of the way that men of their background treat women."

Haha, I'm thinking immediately of Jay Landsman, Bill Rawls, Mayor Carcetti; three white characters who treat women pretty awfully. Then there's Cedric Daniels, a black character who couldn't be any more in contrast to those previous three.

This isn't just tokenistic placement of self-conscious accusation-evasion on Simon and his writers' parts. I'm not speaking about Spielberg here, but Simon and co. are not "very critical in their projects about the way Black men treat women". They're critical of the way women are treated within the current system - their approach is grounded in history. Their very careful to portray these people as fallible humans born into chance situations, trying to make sense of a world already fucked up when they came into it. I can't think of anything more heartbreaking in drama than the individual narratives given to Wallace in Season One, to D'Angelo in Season Two, to Randy in Season Four, to Dukie and Michael in Season Five; or anything as sharply observant and honest in the way the show traces Bubbles's drug addiction, or Cutty's post-prison rehabilitation, or Omar's struggle to survive in a world hostile to him on both sides of the law. None of these have the power they do without the broader look at a particular part of a particular post-industrial city whose institutions are failing due to the economic foundation in place: its police department, its working class, its drug addicts, its school children, its press.

I don't think it's flawless at all, but it's certainly the most pressing thing I've ever seen - including movies too - and Ishmael Reed's criticisms are hollow chasms of contradiction.


...dot com bold typeface rhetoric.
You go clickety click and get your head split.
'The hell you look like on a message board
Discussing whether or not the Brother is hardcore?
Re: The Wire [Re: Capo de La Cosa Nostra] #574920
06/03/10 04:45 PM
06/03/10 04:45 PM
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Lilo Offline
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I don't know, Capo. I loved "The Wire" but I can see where Reed is coming from on some things. He's actually discussed class quite a bit. Check out "MultiAmerica" which he wrote and edited or also "Airing Dirty Laundry".

Reed was active in the arts and progressive movements in the fifties and sixties with Baraka and that entire crowd so he's quite familiar with all of the arguments about the intersectionalities of race, class, gender etc. I won't pretend to speak for him since he does that so well for himself but from a certain perspective class is subsumed by race. Or, more to the point, in some societies, race is virtually determinative of class. This was certainly the case for any black person that grew up, as Reed did, during segregation and before the changes in the sixties and seventies. Sometimes class isn't THE issue.

Check out some of his writings if you haven't already.
I don't imagine that you will agree with him much but he definitely has debated and discussed at length some of the issues you raise. As Reed states repeatedly his issue is not with white writers, it's with particular white writers and dramatic emphasis on black pathology. I think he's wrong on this particular series but the larger points remain.

As far as UndercoverBlackMan aka David Mills, I was fortunate enough to have some interactions with David Mills before he passed. He was an interesting fellow to say the least. But as you know he was a writer for Homicide, The Wire and NYPD Blue so one must keep in mind that his defense of some things could be overlaid with self-interest. He actually got his gig writing for NYPD Blue when he challenged David Milch's assertion that black writers were locked into certain racialized perspectives while white writers were not and thus Milch didn't expect to hire any black writers. Ultimately THAT is the sort of thinking that both Reed and Mills detested and fought against, albeit in different ways.


"When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives."
Winter is Coming

Now this is the Law of the Jungle—as old and as true as the sky; And the wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk, the Law runneth forward and back; For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Re: The Wire [Re: Lilo] #574924
06/03/10 06:06 PM
06/03/10 06:06 PM
Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Capo de La Cosa Nostra Offline
Capo de La Cosa Nostra  Offline

Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Yeah, I haven't read any of Reed's work at all, which was why I'm criticising solely on his criticisms of The Wire, which don't ring true at all for me.

Quote:
Sometimes class isn't THE issue.
Hm, I'd argue it is, but whatever. A race issue or a gender issue is 'in general' going to be a de facto class issue.

That's not to say I don't disagree that in some societies at certain points in history - even at present - 'race is virtually determinative of class'.


...dot com bold typeface rhetoric.
You go clickety click and get your head split.
'The hell you look like on a message board
Discussing whether or not the Brother is hardcore?
Re: The Wire [Re: pizzaboy] #575081
06/07/10 01:43 PM
06/07/10 01:43 PM
Joined: Mar 2010
Posts: 35
Joisey
C
Charlieopera Offline
Wiseguy
Charlieopera  Offline
C
Wiseguy
Joined: Mar 2010
Posts: 35
Joisey
It was, in fact, Ishmael Reed and it's the May issue of Playboy ... good call!


Charlie Stella
Johnny Porno (April, 2010) Stark House Press
Mafiya: A Novel of Crime (January, 2008) Pegasus
Shakedown: A Novel of Crime (June, 2006) Pegasus
Cheapskates: A Novel of Crime (March, 2005) Carroll & Graf
Charlie Opera: A Novel of Crime (December, 2003) Carroll & Graf
Jimmy Bench-Press: A Novel of Crime (December, 2002) Carroll & Graf
Eddie's World: A Novel of Crime (December, 2001) Carroll & Graf
www.charliestella.com
Re: The Wire [Re: Charlieopera] #575082
06/07/10 01:48 PM
06/07/10 01:48 PM
Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 23,296
Throggs Neck
pizzaboy Offline
The Fuckin Doctor
pizzaboy  Offline
The Fuckin Doctor

Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 23,296
Throggs Neck
Originally Posted By: Charlieopera
It was, in fact, Ishmael Reed and it's the May issue of Playboy ... good call!


I get lucky sometimes lol.


"I got news for you. If it wasn't for the toilet, there would be no books." --- George Costanza.
Re: The Wire [Re: pizzaboy] #584068
10/25/10 02:26 AM
10/25/10 02:26 AM
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 307
Wellington, New Zealand
veneratio Offline
Sicilian Paisan
veneratio  Offline
Sicilian Paisan
Capo
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 307
Wellington, New Zealand
Thanks Lilo!
I bought the box set, I really enjoyed it, zipped through it quick!
Will be watching again.
I liked it but not as much as Th Sopranos, but I might be biased..
You guys think it was better than The Sopranos?


"Just when I thought I was out.. They pull me back in"
Re: The Wire [Re: veneratio] #584072
10/25/10 05:14 AM
10/25/10 05:14 AM
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 5,325
MI
Lilo Offline
Lilo  Offline

Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 5,325
MI
I liked both The Wire and The Sopranos immensely. For me it would be like choosing between Coltrane and Hendrix. shhh
Still I probably would give The Wire a slight nod because of writing.


"When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives."
Winter is Coming

Now this is the Law of the Jungle—as old and as true as the sky; And the wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk, the Law runneth forward and back; For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Re: The Wire [Re: Lilo] #584076
10/25/10 06:35 AM
10/25/10 06:35 AM
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 307
Wellington, New Zealand
veneratio Offline
Sicilian Paisan
veneratio  Offline
Sicilian Paisan
Capo
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 307
Wellington, New Zealand
I think I'm going to have to watch through it again...
I'll take the blinders off this time (a bit more anyway)


"Just when I thought I was out.. They pull me back in"
Re: The Wire [Re: veneratio] #584084
10/25/10 11:09 AM
10/25/10 11:09 AM
Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Capo de La Cosa Nostra Offline
Capo de La Cosa Nostra  Offline

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Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Both series do things the other cannot. Because of its necessary scope, The Wire never gives us the extensive point-of-view that The Sopranos does; but then, The Sopranos doesn't have the scope to deal with socio-economic concerns on the same level as The Wire.

Also, The Wire is grounded in social realism; The Sopranos often does away with it and we get surreal dream sequences as important narrative threads.

If The Wire is Dickensian, The Sopranos is Shakespearean. As such, they're pretty incomparable, and both excellent.


...dot com bold typeface rhetoric.
You go clickety click and get your head split.
'The hell you look like on a message board
Discussing whether or not the Brother is hardcore?
Re: The Wire [Re: Capo de La Cosa Nostra] #584094
10/25/10 11:52 AM
10/25/10 11:52 AM
Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 5,527
In a van down by the river!
Longneck Offline
Longneck  Offline

Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 5,527
In a van down by the river!
I've just started Season 3. I like it. This season has been the first where I wasn't lost for the first 4 episodes.




Long as I remember The rain been coming down.
Clouds of Mystery pouring Confusion on the ground.
Good men through the ages, Trying to find the sun;
And I wonder, Still I wonder, Who'll stop the rain.

Re: The Wire [Re: Longneck] #585882
11/16/10 03:10 AM
11/16/10 03:10 AM
Joined: Nov 2010
Posts: 2
F
feierdd Offline
BANNED SPAMMER
feierdd  Offline
BANNED SPAMMER
F
Associate
Joined: Nov 2010
Posts: 2
ALL SPAM REMOVED

Last edited by SC; 11/16/10 03:27 AM.

SPAMMING ADDRESSES REMOVED
Re: The Wire [Re: feierdd] #588841
12/21/10 06:18 AM
12/21/10 06:18 AM
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 2
R
razet93 Offline
Associate
razet93  Offline
R
Associate
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 2
The wire is one of the best crime show ever made...

Last edited by razet93; 12/21/10 06:20 AM.
Re: The Wire [Re: razet93] #589363
12/29/10 05:26 AM
12/29/10 05:26 AM
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 8
A
alex4u Offline
Associate
alex4u  Offline
A
Associate
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 8
Well The Wire was a Classic. Season 1 was best season of it

Re: The Wire [Re: Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica] #591928
01/24/11 06:26 AM
01/24/11 06:26 AM
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 5,325
MI
Lilo Offline
Lilo  Offline

Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 5,325
MI
David Simon and Baltimore Police Commissioner Frederick Bealefeld III exchange unpleasantries.

Simon responds


"When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives."
Winter is Coming

Now this is the Law of the Jungle—as old and as true as the sky; And the wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk, the Law runneth forward and back; For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Re: The Wire [Re: Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica] #592868
02/01/11 04:26 PM
02/01/11 04:26 PM
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 1,635
V
VinnyGorgeous Offline
BANNED
VinnyGorgeous  Offline
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V
Underboss
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 1,635
Never seen the show. Do they allow curse words in it?


"What is given, can be taken away. Everyone lies. Everyone dies." - Casey Anthony, in a poem, July 7, 2008
Re: The Wire [Re: Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica] #592872
02/01/11 04:57 PM
02/01/11 04:57 PM
Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Capo de La Cosa Nostra Offline
Capo de La Cosa Nostra  Offline

Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 12,543
Gateshead, UK
Yeah, plenty.


...dot com bold typeface rhetoric.
You go clickety click and get your head split.
'The hell you look like on a message board
Discussing whether or not the Brother is hardcore?
Re: The Wire [Re: Capo de La Cosa Nostra] #592874
02/01/11 05:22 PM
02/01/11 05:22 PM
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 1,635
V
VinnyGorgeous Offline
BANNED
VinnyGorgeous  Offline
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Underboss
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Posts: 1,635
Originally Posted By: Capo de La Cosa Nostra
Yeah, plenty.


I'm downloading as we speak!


"What is given, can be taken away. Everyone lies. Everyone dies." - Casey Anthony, in a poem, July 7, 2008
Re: The Wire [Re: Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica] #592892
02/02/11 12:09 AM
02/02/11 12:09 AM
Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 5,527
In a van down by the river!
Longneck Offline
Longneck  Offline

Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 5,527
In a van down by the river!
I love the scene in season 1 where all they say is "fuck" back and forth.




Long as I remember The rain been coming down.
Clouds of Mystery pouring Confusion on the ground.
Good men through the ages, Trying to find the sun;
And I wonder, Still I wonder, Who'll stop the rain.

Re: The Wire [Re: Mickey_MeatBalls_DeMonica] #592896
02/02/11 03:12 AM
02/02/11 03:12 AM
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 4,089
Brooklyn, New York
Dapper_Don Offline
Underboss
Dapper_Don  Offline
Underboss
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 4,089
Brooklyn, New York
amazing show!!!


Tommy Shots: They want me running the family, don't they know I have a young wife?
Sal Vitale: (laughs) Tommy, jump in, the water's fine.


Re: The Wire [Re: Dapper_Don] #592935
02/02/11 02:50 PM
02/02/11 02:50 PM
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 2,989
getthesenets Offline
Underboss
getthesenets  Offline
Underboss
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 2,989
I don't have HBO and my cousin was telling me for YEARS about the show. I never like to feel as though I'm caught up in the "hype" about something.

Didn't watch it until there was discs of all the seasons at my local library...each weekend I took them out..and of course, was blown away.

I applaud the writers for not watering down the dialogue slang for mainstream audience. In fact, almost on cue...the "critics" seemed to take offense to not having things tailored to them. I read a NY times article/review of the show and the writer ACTUALLY wrote something to the effect of..." the street dialogue is self consciously accurate".f the critics.

maybe they'd be more comfortable if the characters were talking "blaxploitation jive" or what-not.

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