SPOILERS: The Non-Realtime Wire Season 5 Thread

i hate everyone on this thread until i can downsteal it.

just to get that out there from the outset.

Damn, those fuckers sure know how to bait a hook, don't they?

Anyone else see the on-demand broadcast yet?

piratebay has 1st 2 eps - i posted the link on the other thread - almost done dling over here

yea im watching those tonite

I'd do the same, except I can't make bitto work on this new laptop.

so sloooow

my brother's in the hospital, maybe I will break in to his house and watch OnDemand

Thanks for the piratebay tip, I hadn't thought to look anywhere before the eps actually aired. But yeah, this download is not what you'd call "zippy."

oh, this thread is going to taunt me.

Try Sara - TOPS!

what? WRONG THREAD.

OMG! thanks jhøshea!

will watch tonight

and subsequently hate u guise less

:D :D

OK I AM TALKING ABT THE !ST 2 EPS HERE IS THAT OK? *************

not so sure abt this newspaper angle - shit is looking like ax grinding more than usual so far - but that city desk dude is obv a great character - i like how he deals w/losing these little battles everyday - eh ill end up loving it all no doubt

and wtf mcnulty is up to some serious shit! and lol clay davis apoplectic! and michael catching feelings is nice - thought that kids was totaly darkside. and lolololololol sarcastic avon fucking w/marlo - hes got a good sense of humor when hes not all stressed out and power mad

ARG I HAVE ONLY SEEN THE FIRST EPPYSOTE!

This is turning out to be more complicated than I thought. Dangol' screener leaks!

apparently the media was given 7 eps - so those should be available shortly

how did avon talk to marlo? wtf?

god i missed this show

wow - wtf is mcnulty doing!? i do not understand why he did that at all. wow.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22454106/

EP 2 SPOILERS ************************************

thermo - mucnulty is making look like that guy was murdered. then, judging from his comments, hes gonna do the same thing (perhaps leaving the body in the same position) to some other bodies to make it look like theres a serial killer. which i assume hell use as leverage to try to get major crimes reopened so he can continue to investigate marlo.

you know i complained abt the redundancy of jimmy mcnuttys schtick before - but this is some deep dark next level shit - psyched to see how it plays out - bunks reaction was priceless

wow. i just couldn't figure out any sort of motive for it. i mean - if his plan works his job is going to consist of chasing after a guy that doesn't exist!

yah i cant figure that part

I love this show but it looks like it's kind of gone off the deep end.

Is not paying cops overtime for weeks at a time something that actually happens IRL?

i'm not reading that spoiler but i thought that this was the "real time" thread?

well... ultra-real time i guess. sorry!

what is real tmie in this internets age after all - do we need a leak thread too

Is not paying cops overtime for weeks at a time something that actually happens IRL?

i have no proof but id bet this is based on real events - lots if not most of the stuff in the show is

i know it's happened to transit workers up here before.

Cops here have gone on strike because of not getting overtime pay for months at a time.

marlos crew + slim charles are on 106 & park right now. wire + bublegum teen action = lolz.

Shit, I had no idea this was starting so soon. Damn On Demand and their not 'on demand' broadcasting. I want it NOW.

all the little girls screaming at snoop when she said shes single

I've never bought street drugs or seen a man killed at point-blank range, yet I believe — after watching "The Wire" for four seasons and seeing the first seven episodes of season five — that these characters are as real as my next-door neighbor.

Maybe three and four are out there somewhere?

who said that

that MSNBC article. Critics have the first 7 episodes obv.

well g'damn!

all those files got removed from pirate bay but the same poster has upped the 1st 2 (so far) http://btjunkie.org/search?q=wire

hopefully 3+4 will leak sooooooon

uh duh i guess that just the same ones still hosted on the piratebay tracker - but theyre not on their site anymore for whatever reason

Bunk intro from Homicide: A+++++++
Racism-downplaying old white publisher/editor: C-
City page editor the rest of the time: A+
McNulty drinking: C+
"weak-ass mayor of a broke-ass city," "you don't want to evacuate people," sage-like old-time rewrite man: A+

yah copy machine lie detector - classic! so tragic and hilarious

Agreed on both prior posts.
GAWD this show is good.

I needed Clay Davis' catchphrase. Maybe they're saving it for his indictment scene.

ep 2:

THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK

I needed Clay Davis' catchphrase.

Wich one? You mean, "Sheeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiiiiiiaaaaat?"

Jay Landsman (real) is starting to fill the pants of Jay Landsman (fictional).

Anyone got episode 3 yet?

Simon's Sun axe-grinding is making it hard for me to enjoy this season as much as some of the others.

*** SPOILER SECTION ***:
Also, McNutty's half-baked plot seems out of character for him. I feel like he would have more respect for a dead body than he showed there, no matter how desperate and alienated he might become.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=17840206

ep2 omg!!

To everyone flipping their wigs about EP2: remember this is the same show that had Bunny legalizing drugs in Hampsterdam for most of season 3.

espn -
HBO's "The Wire" burns with quality, truth http://proxy.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=granderson/080104

Macallan -- in what way is that comparable to lying about a murder??

I have given in to the urge to talk about these shows (obviously) and this seems like the thread where that's happening. This thread should be retitled, really. It's now exactly the opposite of what the thread promises.

xpost to myself -- not murder, OK -- we don't know -- which is the point

spoiler

spoiler

spoiler

spoiler

Yah, it's not "wow, that's a mindblowing dedication to the job or a radical new strategy for social ills - it's a Catholic dude defiling a corpse and potentially faking a serial murderer." Completely fucking insane.

i was all wow jimmy mcnulty is finally a compelling character

he walks funny

kind of flappy-footed

thanks for the new thread title!

Genius. My only complaint is that last season, after the first episode, I felt I already had a feel for where the season was going (with the staple-gun opener, Marlo, etc) and after tonight's episode, I really don't know what the themes are. I assume the police funding situation will be up in the air, but outside of that... like I have no idea what the Press are adding to the show yet.

That said, I LOVED the episode + am so psyched The Wire is back.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a3/Stephen_glass.jpg/300px-Stephen_glass.jpg

Reg E. Cathay is gold - can we get a series for him to star in please?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHhxZ4BWeBQ

Yeah. I noticed that. But aren't a lot of the people behind The Wire the same people who did Homicide? I figured they were just cribbing from themselves.

It was originally in the Homicide book, a true story (like Bunk shooting a mouse with his service gun).

The Wire version is better (and truer to the original story).

q: how come freamon mocks sydnor wanting to do street work, i.e. "you wanna sit on your ass doing surveillance for a week when you could be joining the dots, putting together a case that exposes everything?" -- and then proceeds to... sit on his ass for 24 hours doing surveillance that nets confirmation that marlo and his boys are getting sloppy?

q: is clark johnson the shit or what?

i am loving the newspaper stuff, how quickly they've set up the hierarchy, how you're right in the middle of what it's like to be a reporter, where a long memory combined with reading every item of a council meeting agenda is what gets a good city story

my stories are back! yessss.

i'm def. feeling the first two eps, thus far -- i started watching when it first aired since i was a huge 'homicide'/ 'the corner' fan (and i loved the 'homicide' resonances in ep. 1 -- just waiting for andre braugher to show up, now!). during the whole first episode i felt like "awww, here are these people i like enough to have dreams about -- great to catch up with them!"

i love the way that diff. characters are shown in different lights and situations from season to season -- watching that unfold at the start of the waterfront season was really brilliant, i think.

good to see steve earle's character back, and i'm curious to see how deep they go with the recovery angle. i feel like the 12 step lingo is just a tiny little bit "off" as compared to the drug slang -- super small things, like, in my experience, people say "burning desire," not "burning desire to share." i understand that the writers have to give a bit to the gen. audience, and meetings really do differ around the country so it could just be that -- i.e. here in portland, everyone says "loaded" all the time (which just makes me think of 'easy rider'!). and in l.a. at some meetings the folks clap so much it's hard to tell if it's a meeting or a lakers game. the show gives so much attention to detail that here i am parsing two little words -- that really says a lot about the power/ integrity of the show ( as well as to how ridiculous i am).

so much attention was given to the 'sun' angle that i thought it would take place there a lot more, honestly. can't wait to see what happens next w/ clark johnson's character...

i'm eager for 3/ 4 to show up; 5-7 are reportedly "out there" already -- i obv. can't watch them out of order! this shit makes me very impatient.

i watched ep 1 again and am amazed at how deftly they set up the main characters and their relationships.. i think you could come into the series totally cold and basically know who the main players are, despite there being like 4000 of them

...i wonder how the crazy shit mcnulty's doing is going to backfire on him? obviously there are parallels between what mcnulty's doing and the annoying suckup newspaper dude's wheelchair boy.

i could see mcnulty unintentionally spawning a REAL serial killer, for instance -- though that doesn't seem very 'wire.' and i could see the newspaper story blowing up and clark johnson's character winds up taking the fall for it, since he's ostensibly the one in charge.

yeah they're telegraphing the latter from a mile away, it'll be interesting to see the consequences

it's pretty clear in the parallels between the city desk and the station house why simon feels such a natural affinity for police work. it's interesting to me to see how the bmore sun (as portrayed in the show) appears to have been bypassed almost entirely by the affirmative action that the police department has benefited from - the editor's an old white dude with academic connections; the city desk editor's another very educated white dude; clark johnson's one of the few people of color there and he's senior but he runs the troops rather than make the high-level calls (kind of the way women get used in the advertising business, actually)

i have another q: avon's still clearly got the sharp mind of a playa, but incarceration appears to have really messed with him?? he looked like he was totally high on something when he was talking to marlow, eyes buggin out, weird as hell

i thought he was just enjoying the fact that marlow was coming to him for something or a change -- that now marlow might owe him one? that was my take.

(kind of the way women get used in the advertising business, actually)

wtf? this has not been my experience.

always the project manager, never the design director - in my experience

well i have heard tale of inequality in the industry before. but the places i've worked at - a lot of the creative, managerial and financial output is done by the fairer sex.

sure - they boss around the grunts, but there's usually a man to boss them around - people doing the actual work get a mother figure and the people doing the actual decision-making get someone they hope they can dominate

Slate chat-chat is up.

Man, they just doomed McNulty's character to tragedy! The way things play out in this show there's no way he's getting out of it. I wouldn't be surprised if he's dead or in jail in only a few episodes. Dude is so stupid; his plan is so half baked! Fucking mcnulty.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrfCixsd2N8

xxxxpost

Mike, "burning desire to share" is east coast 12-step talk.

i guess it's just been too long since i lived on the east coast, yeah!

any new leaks yet?

no :(

what about now?

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/09/what-do-real-thugs-think-of-the-wire/

hey, uh, can anyone hook me up with or point me to ep1? i convinced a friend to let me come over and watch it real time if i can get caught up.

thepiratebay.org/search/wire%20s5/0/3/0

What's the most horrifying 'Bodie gets shot' thing they could do to end this season? Bubs fights all season, finally gives in to heroin in the last episode and ODs? Michael goes to jail for some of Marlo's dirt?

Good question!

I don't think it'll be Bubs. I think he'll be a poster boy for what hope can exist.

How about Clay Davis rolling on Carcetti and sticking the Mayor's office for corruption while he keeps on earning?

What's the most horrifying 'Bodie gets shot' thing they could do to end this season? Bubs fights all season, finally gives in to heroin in the last episode and ODs? Michael goes to jail for some of Marlo's dirt?

Really good question. If I were them, I would not "resolve" anything in this manner - especially not Bubs falling back into addiction or McNulty catching AIDS or being diagnosed with cirrohsis. I think its much more moving to simply have things continue in their entirely fucked up manner.

you can tell things are being kinda rushed to fit into only 10 episodes :/

oy it can be so hard to watch this show knowing that everyone is going to end up totally fucked in the end.

TS: Bunk's Xerox/lie detector confession vs. McNutty's serial murder fabrication?

wtf episode 3 :(

i hate to say it but

http://www.fuenf-filmfreunde.de/wp-content/uploads/2006/10/jumptheshark.jpg

specifically the end of ep. 3, that is

ysi?

I fear Amon is right. This is getting hard to recognize as my beloved show.

I'm beginning to wonder - is this whole season a big put-on? Will the tenth episode have a laugh track and Prop Joe's adorable cousin show up to live with the wackily mismatched roommates pairing of Clay and Gus as Ziggy returns to reveal he's getting married to Snoop, who in turn gets advice from D's ghost?

i prefer prop joe's adorable nephew, cheese.

Corpse defiling aside, what's so odd this time? I've read some complaints about the way the paper is set up, but saintly editor and evil managing editor/publisher isn't much different from the Kima/Lester/good cops v. Burrell/Rawls dynamic is it? (leaving out McNulty - will we see someone from the paper get wreckless)

And the Bubs stuff this time looks to be as good as anything the show has done before - how great would it be if he never interacts with the rest of the cast, we just see him for a little piece of each episode doing his thing?

(leaving out McNulty - will we see someone from the paper get wreckless)

already have. the over-ambitious dude who wrote the wheelchair-kid-o's-fan story is definitely being set up as a stephen glass.

> Corpse defiling aside, what's so odd this time?

Marlo goes to Hawai'i. Mike and Dukey find love in Six Flags. Omar goes to Hawai'i.

My suggestion for horrible thing for the final year is McNulty accidentally killing bunk.

hawaii? more like marlo goes to the caribbean, omar goes to south america

but really the parts that bothered me: freamon teaming up with mcnuttcase and the dun-dun-dunnnnnnnnnn return of omar ("vengeance is mine" pt. 2347823897895?)

otherwise a pretty entertaining episode

yall are being really hasty to write this off

srsly.

Action-packed!

WARE U GET EP 3 AMON?!?!?!?!?!

on demand

not writing it off, just saying the omar scene was pretty corny

hawaii? more like marlo goes to the caribbean, omar goes to south america

Marlo was somewhere were a person could speak French and not English and get a job as a teller at a bank that does international business.
- Prolly not Haiti.

Omar said "If we're going to make this spit of land home"
- I'm guessing Puerto Rico

Antilles, according to signage. Hawai'i was a figure of speech, y'all.

No, sure - I was just weighing in since most other things that I had to say had already been said.

Martinique?

Yeah, that was my guess - or Guadaloupe.

I've been to St. Martin, at the northern end of the French Antilles, and everyone there could speak English fluently.

But, as they have earned SO SO many points with me over the four seasons with their Baltimore references that are so on the money, I can forgive a slight factual unlikelihood like this.

Also, while I'm thinking on it, what's the least time needed to get a passport? Did McNulty wear the same shirt for like three weeks or some shit?

I was just thinking this morning the timeline seemed like it was getting all fucked.

can't help but think that leaving out randy implies r.i.p. snitch :(

puerto rico is probably otm B.L.A.M.

mcnulty's antics own this episode. bunk getting locked into the box = XD

can't help but think that leaving out randy implies r.i.p. snitch :(

I had thought this one, too, but it COULD mean that he just got put into another foster home away from West Baltimore. I hope that's what it means.

ALSO - LOL "Nice dolphin."

hahahahaha dookie. the six flags thing was great

i wld like to see randy but also namond and bunny

is there a torrent out yet?

i would LOVE to see namond and bunny!
xpost

hxxp://www.mininova.org/tor/1108567

bless you

http://idolator.com/344616/this-just-in-musicians-not-particularly-good-at-picking-believable-fake-names-for-the-purposes-of-drug-trafficking

Marlo Stanfield uses steroids.

if you took out the mcnulty bs, that ep wouldn't be sooo bad (not as great as the wire can be, but not bad).

ep 3 stream

Marlo should have rented the first season to see how this "torturing Omar's people" stuff ends.

I'm just going to pretend that Lester-McNulty convo never happened.

I loved the Lester-McNulty convo! Now McNutty's scheme will gain traction

Digging the fakery: newspaper quotes/stories as well as serial killer

mcnulty looks like a beefier robbie robertson

Why isn't McNutty's girlfriend slapping the shit out of him at this very moment? Where the heck is she?

At home, being an extremely hot MILF.

I dunno, in the shots we've seen of her, Beadie has looked a bit like her Gone Baby Gone character

Marlo should have rented the first season to see how this "torturing Omar's people" stuff ends

Seriously. I know he has cable.

I believe that Beadie is presently at one scene (with no lines) out of three episodes. And one scene where she's unheard at the other end of an especially stupid and obvious lying McNulty drunkdial.

she's in two scenes - once when he calls her and she looks pissed, once when he doesn't call, she looks pissed and looks in the Lil' McNultys

But no lines, though, right?

am i crazy or does the woman at the bank @ antilles have a completely wrong accent?

guys beadie is boring. that's why she doesn't have lines. remember how she was totally moronic and oblivious to all the shit going down at the port? part of me thinks she welcomes being fucked over with open arms, but you know, whatever.

tehresa those words hurtz my ♥ ;_;

I'm just going to pretend that Lester-McNulty convo never happened.

Don't worry! To Freamon, this is just an abstract mental exercise that he's thinking through!!! </denial>

sorry, leee!
are you blogging this?

Prob. not, I'm not smrt enough. :(

Also I rilly want to use a screencap of that time Landsman dropped his pants to waggle those magnificent hams (__|__) as a spoiler warning :| which is preventing me from blogging it.

I'm going to be charitable and assume that because this is the final season of only ten eps that they're going light on the pain that Beadie should be bringing at this moment, to pack in things like torturing Omar's buddy

yeah daria i don't think the actress is a native french speaker

this whole season's pretty elmore leonard so far huh?

not having read one word of elmore leonard, are u saying that in a good way or bad way

value judgements are so last millenium

that post is pretty leonard nimoy

i "like" elmore leonard as i think you humans say

soooo flashing ur badge while doggystylin' on the hood of ur car - c/d ?

flashing ur badge while doggystylin' on the hood of ur car - c/d

Classic. So classic, its scary.

TS - "Prostate on the floor" vs. "Evacuating the residents"

damn the end of ep. 4 is no joke

3 not bad at all on second viewing, except for McNulty

Landsman's spurt-spurt noises plus "y'all tryin to 'criminate me here" - comedy gold

"focus motherfucker, focus!"

I just had some drinks and smokes with odell watkins

Man, Marlo don't fuck around much.

haha was he in a wheelchair tombot?

Tracer, I'll have to listen again maybe she was a native French speaker, good accent just odd that there wouldn't be a speaker with antillais accent, I thought. It was an interesting exchange where I also have to rewatch to be able to tell if maybe she was deliberately ignoring Marlo speaking English because he didn't acknowledge she was speaking French and/or wasn't polite about it.

oh yeah maybe that was an antilles accent! i have no idea. as for their interaction, marlo mumbles so much sometimes even i can't tell what he's saying. maybe she thought he was from, i dunno, tortuga or something.

Episode 4 is !!! Everything is building really fast (and early) this season.

Amy Ryan (Beadie) got an Oscar nomination.

if not already posted, streaming episodes here

http://www.surfthechannel.com/show/television/The_Wire.html

Not at all Antillais accent. More French French, I thought. I'm just intrigued by it - lack of attention by <I>Wire</I> casting/writing? Correct in that professionals in that field with a certain education are likely to have been taught to speak that way? Correct because the teller was likely not from the Antilles? Or incorrect in that she wouldn't speak that way because in the Antilles it's not an accent, it's how people speak. Or, was this in the Dutch Antilles (isn't that where most of this offshore banking takes place) and something else was going on? (Sorry.. I used to be a grad school language nerd.)

Episode 4 is !!! Everything is building really fast (and early) this season.

Seriously. I was getting lulled to sleep by Eps 1 - 3, but DAMN if they didn't come with it this time.

I have a feeling that 5 - 10 are going to be good. I hope so.

Hey, Johnny Fifty!

"sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitt" quotient fulfilled and then some

or quota

wow - prop! what was the logic behind that?

ok after watching ep 4 i officially hate the wire

Prop Joe :( :( :( :(

The Wire really has the best cast of fat men on TV

i guess this means the west side is back on top

i can't even begin to imagine the extent and direction of the turf killing that's going to go down here

hard to believe that joe would be so short-sighted about cheese and his discontent

also i wonder what role slim's going to play in all this - since cheese defected i guess that kind of makes him heir to prop joe's legacy, or whatever remains of it, which is a potentially exposed and dangerous place to be livin

i have to admit that i missed about 1/3 of this show due to it being 2am and me falling asleep

I guess Joe wasn't wrong about Cheese so much as he was about Marlo, not knowing Marlo met with the Greeks. Still wondering if Avon will turn up again because.. I don't expect he connected Marlo with those guys without thinking it'd lead to something bad happening to Marlo eventually, no? Also what's the deal with Levy, because it seems different w/Barksdales and Prop Joe as clients since they weren't on the same turf..

so far this whole season seems to be moving waaaayy too fast.

A non-spoiler thought for those who have seen up to ep. 7

Did anyone else lol at Mike uttering Mcnulty's trademark "the fuck did I do?" to Carver in the street, meanwhile Mcnulty actually is up to nefarious shit for once?

haha, "He feared and hated me, and I merely wanted him dead."

Lester/McNulty descends even further down the ladder of shit

joe returns in ep. 5 dudes

^spoiler

guy that they had tied up for Cheese was the dealer who was upset about Cheese going into the County, right?

killing Joe seems strangely anti-climactic

yeah that was in exchange for him giving up butchie

in exchange for Cheese giving up Joe, you mean

the serial killer bullshit is dragging down an otherwise strong season

oh right, he was paid $ for butchie

I gotta say: Omar on crutches* = classic!

*or a broom, whatever

willing to forgive all if Slim and Omar team up

i don't think slim swings that way, milo

Omar's already got a boyfriend... now he just needs a partner.

Loving how out of control this season is getting (I'm up to ep 7)

On a beach, somewhere in the Caribbean, Omar came into view.
“Yeah! There’s my man!” Shine shouted, spattering the hot-sauce-drenched pork rinds in his lap all over the floor.

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/25/what-do-real-thugs-think-of-the-wire-part-three/

EP4: Wow.

Back on form!!!

SPOILERS TO EP 4

Two questions:

1. Which cell phone is it that Rhonda thinks is being tapped?
2. When McNulty and Freamon go to talk to the homeless, McNulty asks a guy if his dog bites and the guy replies "It got teeth, don't it." Did this guy used to work at the port?
3. That was Nick Sobotka who shouted during Carcetti's speech at the docks, right?

SPOILERS TO EP 6

McNulty is repugnant.

3. yes, i hope he comes back!

wtf @ omar surviving 7 story fall with sprained ankle or whatever. and his crutch seems to come and go, he doesn't need it for coming up on the muscle dude in the alley but then its back again when he hits michael's stash. "that's some spiderman shit" is a classic line but what the hell.

Yeah, that was messed up but I liked how they didn't shirk away from what they just tried to have you believe: they know its improbable and impossible but they continue to reference the height of the jump in both in the dialogue and in the camera-work, which ultimately makes the stunt more believable and the viewer more incredulous.

is there a rip of episode 5 that doesn't have shit audio?

episode 5 is up on-demand, at least for West Coast Time Warner folks.

Some classice Royce/Davis shit going down on Calvert St.

great scene in 4 where gus is doing commentary on the televised speech by the mayor. "plaques for hacks" hahaha.

not to get too nerdy, i thought the editing was weird in that scene, by the end of it i was like "shut up, gus"

Munch!

i hated munch's cameo

wait, how did i miss that???

It hasn't happened yet.

it has in non-realtimeland.

any bittorrent users receive a letter from comcast recently?

i don't think it's seven stories, more like three or four

amon, are you serious?

not me but someone i know (who could be fucking with me) said it cites some copyright act and references 'the wire' haha. i'll know for sure if and when i see the actual letter but you can google for other examples

SPOILERS TO EP 6

McNulty is pregnant.

-- czn, Monday, January 28, 2008 5:06 AM

cute little front and follow kids not so cute and little

serial killer shit gets dumber by the week

serial killer shit is driving the entire plot! i'ts hard to believe landsman isn't going to realize the shenanigans mcnulty is up to; i actually wouldn't be surprised if he's known it's bullshit from the beginning but is letting the string play out for as long as he can, just so he can get a little more grease from the city

can i just say once again that LANCE REDDICK IS BUILT LIKE A BRICK SHITHOUSE

the scene between bunk and randy = heartbreaking

yah daniels body fat has dropped to unrealistic lows this season

a running joke abt him being a workout freak would be appropriate

same trainer as randy it seems.

port characters cameos - sweet!

landsman being at least somewhat on to mcnultys fakery - agreed

slim charles seeing the whole play and maneuvering out of harms way at the 1st post-joe board meeting - smart dude

im thinking some (perhaps all the way up to the mayor) will figure mcnultys serial killer scam but wont go public for fear of the shit storm

prop joe has been suspicious of cheese all along - pretty much every time hes mention him its been w/the caveat "if he werent my kin" - so he exposed his soft side and unsurprisingly got shot right in it

i dont remember prop joes involvement in omars big score - someone remind me

as for the complaints abt this seasons overly sensational plot devices - eh you guys are buying into this so gritty real best show evar hype a little too hard - its the blend of realism and entertainment that does the work - if you want real watch the corner (then go ahead stab yourself in the heart)

Omar's big score, iirc, was the poker game he ripped-off in Season 4. Marlo was at the poker game and go took. This is the root of his hatred of Omar. Prop Joe fed Omar the time and location of the poker game.

ooooh i thought they were talking abt the big drug heist at the truck unloading

which made no sense at all

am i forgetting something stupid or why no prez and bunny?

Bunny's off in suburban retirement and Prez is teaching school - no plots for them to be involved in.

Unless Prez adopts Dukie.

they need prez to decipher the clocks duh!!

This season is more train-wrecky every episode. For everyone.

I'm sort of expecting a huge, 20 min musical number at the end, wrapping up everyone's stories. It will take place at the intersection of Pratt and Calvert Streets and will spill over into Harborplace.

OR

Marlo and Omar duke it out. Carcetti and Clay Davis duke it out. McNulty and a giant, antrhopomorphic Jameson bottle fight, hug, and end up walking off into the sunset. Bunk and Landsman strap on the mawashi and go sumo in the homicide bullpen. Kima, Herc, and Carver end up starting their own private investigation firm. And Lester finds out that Avon is his son. Hilarity ensues.

both of those endings are probably better than what we'll get in the end!

Now that the serial killer storyline has thoroughly been enmeshed in the corrupt newspaper story I'm really enjoying both a lot more (almost everything McNulty and Scott do makes me laugh hard--the scene in the Sun office where McNulty figures out Scott made the phone call and starts fucking with him is just fantastic.) There is something almost farcical about the whole thing that really works for me. The show has always played with that over-the-top-ish element before anyway, so I'm not sure why everyone is so shocked.

lol @ freamon assuming the code will be as easy to break as the code in season 1. cell phones can have unbreakable RSA shit!

where do i find ep 7?

http://isohunt.com/torrents/?ihq=wire+s05e07

is that the 3 part one ppl be complaining about possibly being ep 5?
i was wary of dling it

its 7 i watched it (besides it was a ep labeled 5 that was actually 7)

oh p1r4t3 b4y commenters were going berserk over that one so i was sketched.

thanks!

McNulty, you sick motherfucker.

So, ep 7 was ridiculous. Is there any precedent for this fake serial killer thing? Has anyone actually done something like this?

loved the munch and real jay landsman in the bar at the same time. i wish character jay landsman would have walked in!

i got a cheap thrill out of the phone call mcnulty did at the beginning, tbh.

the voice made it totally amazing

and accent

Ep 7 awesome yeah. You can sort of see how the plot threads might be coming together now.

The clay davis scene was a bit overplayed (although what about davis isn't?) but still really awesome. haha at "I felt really white."

when ep 8 ?

OH SHIT.

I was half-expecting, but half-not. I certainly didn't see it happening then, although thinking back I really should have. But fuck.

they clay scene was def. overplayed. i wish they'd cut back on his rantics and leave more time for plot development.

OH SHIT.

I was half-expecting, but half-not. I certainly didn't see it happening then, although thinking back I really should have. But fuck.

OTM. But they way they dealt with it over the rest of the episode was great - burying the story, lab tech switching the cards. I'm being vague on purpose, because I realize that there are a lot of people who haven't seen Ep. 8 yet. Excellent shit.

FUCKING FINALLY IS ALL I HAVE TO SAY NO ONE IS A SUPERHERO OK

arghhh i was reading a thread somewhere else about ep 7 and someone posted the 8 spoiler and now i am angry!!!!!

I tried to avoid it at all costs.

How does one go about seeing episode 8? Time motherfucking Warner Cable doesn't have it up on demand yet, THOUGH IT TOTALLY SHOULD BE THERE RIGHT NOW.

Ep 8 is up on mininova.

i just watched it on time warner ondemand at a friends house - maybe reset yr box or something xp

Why did they switch the cards in the morgue? I didn't get that.

I figured that somebody had accidentally put the cards in the wrong bags, and when the guy was checking the bodies he noticed the mistake.

I assumed it was a small bit of dignity, the guy noticing and knowing who Omar is, especially after the cops weren't too broken up (McNulty and Lester, anyway) and it didn't warrant any space in the paper.

oh yeah, I meant to write that without using names. Ya'll not up on episode 8, there was a SPOILER right there.

EP 8 SPOILER!

I really wasn't exspecting...that. I was under the impression that the real-life Omar was still alive? Is Simon just aiming for an insanely depressing ending?

I think Omar was the combination of several people. Add to that, Bubbles not having Aids means it isn't about sticking to the real-life counterparts.

David Simon is killing folks just to do it.

lol @ "real-life Omar"

the morgue card-switch, i think, was like he read the name and cause of death and thought it didn't fit and then he sees the old white dude (with what looks like a bypass scar on his chest? i forget) and his card reads "little, omar" and "gunshot"

Ya'll not up on episode 8, there was a SPOILER right there.

...

EP 8 SPOILER!

kind of redundant considering this is the SPOILERS thread

i think my favorite part was the fbi profile!

the look on mcnutty's face is what made that scene.

Yeah, the FBI profile thing was hilarious, although it may be less funny if/when Mcnulty puts himself out of his own misery, which seems destined to happen at this point.

what do you mean? you think he's going to off himself!?

McNulty is taking the whole thing rather well, I thought. They haven't had a scene with him falling over drunk and looking like a mess in, like, two or three weeks. He's alert, talkative, improved hygiene. In fact I'd say this whole thing has been good for him.

Meanwhile Bunk is quietly working his way towards Marlo on his own. You could almost miss it amid the 10,000,000 other shitstorms in each episode.

Who's more likely to off himself, though, McNulty or the dreadful Scott?

lol @ scott pwnage!

also, i was thinking they'd go all crazee and mcnulty would end up actually killing homeless dudes to further his investigation, but it does not look like he's headed that way at this point.

bunk kickin' ass and takin' names. leverage! i think this is the most i've ever liked him!

my prediction: marlos crew gets busted the police have a lol hueg drugs and guns on the table press conference braggin on their sweet operation which has simultaneously unmasked mcnulty as the homeless killer - of course they dont want to sully themselves in the eyes of the public w/that lil titbit - so mcnulty is pressured into resigning w/full benefits

i may have said this upthread but im pretty sure landsman has been onto mcnultys bullshit from jump street

Who's more likely to off himself, though, McNulty or the dreadful Scott?

I dunno, family pressure + mcnulty's depressed look when he got the FBI profile + alcohol + the fact they they killed off Omar makes me feel like they're just gonna do the most depressing thing possible.

I don't think Scott is even going to get canned.

scott is based on a real life character that did get caught fwiw

theres not gonna be any mcnulticide u crazy fuckrs - curious to see where the spilling his guts to (the oscar nominated wtf) beadie will lead

I agree. McNulty will not be killing himself. It doesn't fit his personality - he has far to high an opinion of his ability to get out of trouble, regardless of all evidence pointing to the contrary.

I don't know about mcnulty.. but my prediction is that something will happen to another officer - Bunk or Carver. I hope I'm wrong about that. Wondering if that guy Carver wrote up will reappear.. it isn't like the writers to leave that up in the air.

Colichio (the guy Carver wrote up) is done, no need to revist that. Guess they didn't have time to get to the behind-the-back shit talking Herc promised though.

Only way McNulty offs himself is if he's facing hard jail time. Note Beadie talking about his wake though, and that the other two prequel subjects are dead.

Yeah.. but Bunk was in the other prequel too..

So was Rawls. Triple suicide! Maybe they'll take out some of those other detectives I hate.

omg those stupid prequels

Note Beadie talking about his wake though, and that the other two prequel subjects are dead.

Nope. I refuse to believe that they're going have things wrapped up THIS neatly, product-wise. Prequel the very people they're going to kill? Not buying it.

They killed Omar via random 10 year old kid who was trying to light a cat on fire and then pulled out a 9 mm and shot him in the head. This, after ALL that dude survived and/or put others through.

Here's my predictions:

Cop Side:
- Kima, Bunk, Carver, Sydnor - they keep on keepin' on. The whole "serial murderer" thing washes right over them
- Lester - IF they figure out the serial killer thing, he gets forced out into early retirement.
- McNulty - I really think that Beadie is done with him. I don't think suicide is going to happen, but I don't think its going to end well for McNulty, especially if they catch on to the homeless murders. I can't see them killing him off, but I also can't see them doing the "drinking at his desk, shuffling papers" fade out type thing. I'm still up in the air about Jimmy.

Crime Side
- Marlo - Busted. But not before he gives an order to kill one of his own - probably Snoop.
- Michael does this killing, at least on one of them.
- The reason Chris won't be the target of Marlo's rage is that he'll already be in jail behind the killing of Bug's dad.
- Cheese - not important enough to merit a lot of time, but I'm guessing he's the reason they score a major bust and Marlo goes down.

News Side
- Scott gets busted, kicked to the curb.
- The Baltimore Sun continues its downward slide.

And the last show will end with some group of kids who we've never seen before dealing on a corner.

That's 10 predictions, if you include my highly noncommital "It ain't gonna end well for Jimmy."

Anyone want to make bets on the number out of 10 I get right?

lol someone watched the scenes from next week

i think its marlo that michael kills

lol someone watched the scenes from next week

Dude, no one likes a snitch.

i think its marlo that michael kills

i think its marlo that michael kills

Yeah? I'm not seeing it. I think its gonna be Snoop

I feel like those guys would never do it while Chris is still around, so it would have to be Chris, if anyone.

I agree, but Chris will be gone as soon as, if not concurrent with, Marlo's bust. Bunk has him and is just waiting on the Marlo wire to yield results before going to take him down.

Hence, with Chris gone, Snoop.

Snoop would make an excellent crime boss.

Prolly so, but this is a man's world.

im thinking marlo starts acting even more psychopathic once he gets busted and michael is finally just like ok i cant take this shit anymore (been building for a while) and pops him when he orders him to kill someone else (snoop, dookie?)

cause as far as micheal killing snoop thatd prob have to be at marlos command and michael is already totes disillusioned w/that guy and wouldnt stand by him in a time of crisis

naw snoops pure muscle - no vision

The only ambiguity about Michael's dialogue when he pulls the trigger in that preview is whether he's talking to Snoop or Chris.

just cause he said just like you taught me (or whatever) eh?

marlo taught him stuff too

im thinking marlo starts acting even more psychopathic once he gets busted and michael is finally just like ok i cant take this shit anymore (been building for a while) and pops him when he orders him to kill someone else (snoop, dookie?)

Regardless, its not going to be Chris. Chris is gone either via drug bust or via Bunk's old fashioned police work. I'm betting Snoop, but Marlo...Marlo could catch one, too. We'll see.

cause as far as micheal killing snoop thatd prob have to be at marlos command and michael is already totes disillusioned w/that guy and wouldnt stand by him in a time of crisis

This I totally agree with. Michael is truly what it means to be caught up in the game. Nowhere else to go, but enough keeping him there. Shit, the kid is what...13? 14, tops?

yah maybe 15 - how long ago was last season (wire time) - they were in 8th grade then - of course he couldve been held back a year or whatever - hes somewhere in the 13-16 range

Well, Dook's at least a year older - he was socially promoted to high school while the others weren't - and he's only 15.

I'm betting 14. Shit. That's fucking scary.

It's Chris that took Michael under his wing. Marlo even commented about it last season. Considering we saw the scene where Chris specifically says "get there early," it would hardly be pointed if he were talking to anyone but him or Snoop. Not that they're overly spoiler-conscious anyway, but whoever produced the preview for HBO probably didn't pick up on it.

ts: taller ghost walt vs. taller awesome dookie

SAME... GUY.... DA DA DA DUUUUUUUM !!!!

lol how about rawls almost acknowledging his presence in the gay bar scene from s3(?) when he says "i like some kinky shit every now and then but biting a homeless person?"

if mcnulty is gonna go out i would think it would be by drunk driving

if mcnulty is gonna go out i would think it would be by drunk driving

Although this was somewhat telegraphed by his crashing into the underpass a season or two ago, this is an excellent call.

BTW - from the real time thread:

drugs on the table.

i want them to pull it off tbh.

but i guess it's a race for the prize w. omar.

Oh, non-demandpaws.

goddamn episode 8 was hardcore

And the last show will end with some group of kids who we've never seen before dealing on a corner.

-- B.L.A.M., Tuesday, 19 February 2008 16:40 (3 hours ago) Link

Nah, it will be The Greek talking on the phone to his FBI contact. We have seen very little of this angle so far in S05.

itll be michael running his own crew and daniels becoming commissioner

michael turning snitch and bubbles running for the senate.

Munch will take over for the Greeks and the story will continue on L&O: Whatever the Fuck.

Rawls discovers McNutty's serial killer is bogus. He blackmails McNutty and turns him into his love slave.

scott takes the tumble for the whole fake serial killer thing, bunk takes down chris, there's a huge bust but marlo somehow comes out o.k., something terrible and tragic happens to dookie, there's a heartwarming story about bubbles in the paper, carcetti and the city end up totally screwed because the budget is shot and they need to lay off teachers after all, and prez shomehow shows up briefly in the context of this. when its revealed he's been chasing a ghost, mcnutty gets forced into retirement, perhaps ends up back with beadie. gregs probably gets killed, but i'm not sure how.

oh yeah, daniels maybe gets screwed too.

b'more gets a-bombed by fascists hoping to trigger a war between the two superpowers, using a lost munition we sold to the israelis decades ago; the director of central intelligence is killed, but his protege saves the world from a nuclear showdown with quick thinking and a bevy of expertise on the new russian leader's personality quirks

and that man is... Ziggy Sobotka.

can you imagine what a clusterfuck it'd be if all of sterlings predictions had to come true within the TWO remaining episodes!??!

MADNESS!

gregs probably gets killed, but i'm not sure how.

-- s.clover, Wednesday, 20 February 2008 02:04 (3 hours ago) Link

Ah! This is a nice idea because it would explain why they're showing all these pointless domestic scenes (IKEA etc.)

Dude, I will cancel my HBO if Kima gets killed.

BLAM is on crack, but Sterling may have something.

No-one else subscribe to Enrique's take on the serial killer plot as Simon angling at the War on Iraq...? I like it, give us some more Enrique!

I figure the two evil white editors of the sun give scott a pass and gus has to take a buyout.

also, what do people think about lestor confronting clay davis?

yah what was he up to there?

What I'm curious about is the folder of sealed indictments and other court docs at Prop Joe's.. where did those come from? something is missing on that. I wonder if that judge is shady. Did you notice he had a box of medications on his desk.. is that new? I also recall that Daniels originally worked in the Eastern..

BLAM is on crack

If by "on crack", you mean "less than a week from the bar exam", than yes...I am on crack.

They killed Omar via random 10 year old kid who was trying to light a cat on fire

THANK YOU. all the shit that went down in that episode and the my one burning question was wtf those kids were doing with the cat.

on another trivial point, weird that Omar was older than I thought (and 6 years older than Michael K. Williams, apparently).

I thought Kenard killed Omar

it was Kenard, which makes the beatdown he got from Michael in season 4 all the more satisfying.

I'm pretty sure the newspaper folk said Omar was 34. Could the tag have been wrong (hence the mix-up)?

<3 <3 <3 kenard go little man

yeah I didn't think it was one of the random alley kids but I couldn't quite place who it was.

the tag w/ Omar's proper name/c.o.d. had a 1960 birthdate (and MKWilliams's is 1966), don't remember hearing an age reported in the Sun.

I just rewatched episodes 4-7.. wish I had season 4 on tape.. really starting to appreciate how smart Marlo is.

what does Freamon want with Clay Davis?? does that have something to do with the money laundering @ that church on the eastside?

hasn't Clay Davis been his white whale for a couple years now? or do you mean more specifically why?

Part of me though that Lester was getting some leverage with Clay so he/his people might get some political leverage if (when) the fake serial killer shit went pear-shaped. I don't really believe that, but it's the best I could come up with.

I'm pretty sure Alma reported a "34-year old black male killed in a grocery store" to Gus. Could be wrong, though.

I'm not doubting you, I just didn't catch it myself. Maybe the discrepancy is just another "lol shitty reporting" jab, though.

Yeah, I mean specifically why now would he go talk to Davis - what does he want from him? There's a lot of stuff I can't figure out right now inc. the folder from Prop Joe, I still think there is something shady about the judge and nobody is paying attention there..

Also trying to figure out what is going on with Marlo though, is he out of touch or what, does he know what Omar's been going around telling everyone & does anything happen about that. Stuff is weird, I don't know.. I was watching the scene where Omar goes after fat face Rick and that guy seems to not take it all that seriously but Chris seems really stressed lately

Maybe the discrepancy is just another "lol shitty reporting" jab, though.

or it's 1994 in Wire-land

Oh, and where's Burrell? hmm. He went to school with Joe..

Burrell has a high-paying job somewhere.

I figured Prop Joe had some dirt on a judge or somebody, which is how he had contact within the department that were leaking information to him about who the police were investigating. Actually, wasn't that folder dirt on Clay Davis?

Yeah, I mean specifically why now would he go talk to Davis - what does he want from him? There's a lot of stuff I can't figure out right now inc. the folder from Prop Joe, I still think there is something shady about the judge and nobody is paying attention there..

I didn't feel like I totally followed the meaning of that scene either. But my assumption was that, after Lester took the info to the feds and they basically told him he fucked up by waiting until after the grand jury to show them his evidence, he decided to try and scare Clay a little, and maybe strategize some way to leverage more incriminating info out of him to make the case more of a sure thing for the feds.

or it's 1994 in Wire-land

I guess they've never stamped a year on anything (besides the one or two direct or indirect references to 9/11 in early seasons) and there's always been a lot of plots based on real 80's/90's stories, but yeah obviously the show is always vaguely present-day. The thing that fucked me up about the Omar tag is that it was a specific month/date/year DOB, not just an approximate age.

I laughed very hard at the FBI profiling scene. I didn't think it could get better than the 'oh, you got a call from him did you' conference with McNulty and the Sun.

And I was very sad watching Beadie tear McNulty up.

I really, really wasn't expecting Omar to be taken out with such an anticlimax. I assumed there would be some Good, Bad and the Ugly-style standoff.

nah, i think that was perfect.

Yeah, that was pretty much how I expected/hoped it would go down, and I wasn't disappointed at all.

Another vote for Omar's death being perfect. In fact, my friend predicted that Kenard would kill Omar like three episodes ago!

I think the way he went down, and the way the rest of the ep dealt with it, were perfect.

yah the newspaper didnt even know who he was - fucking street legend

even mcnulty showed more emotion for bodie's death than omar's

I kind of love how D. Simon can slap the viewers back to reality (or better yet our removal from reality) with one single scene. When Omar was mistagged in the morgue at first I was like "HOW CAN YOU PEOPLE NOT KNOW WHO HE IS" but then I was like, damn, there are probably so many Omars "out there" that we have no clue about who are renegade kings on the street but are nameless and faceless pawns in the overall game.

A bit more random, but last weekend at the gym guess who was exercising next to me? Prezbylewski! I damn near fell off when I realized it.

awesome!
i am going to see neil sabotka in a play!

I think the way he went down, and the way the rest of the ep dealt with it, were perfect.

Yeah, agreed, I just didn't see it coming. Couldn't have played out any other way, really

Simon defends the fifth season, part 2387902:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/114438

he even goes to an Iraq comparison at the end!

landsman's absence from ep08 is k-ominous

has anyone noticed how with the exception of herc, all the orig major crimes wire team has now been brought into the fake-murder loop (or very near it)? for instance, kima is told outright, yet her knowledge has no consequences in this episode apart from provoking the patended greggs glower; carver isn't exactly brought all the way in but jimmy's generosity has piqued his interest; alcoholic farter dude has made it clear he knows something's up (wasn't he one of the original layabouts assigned to the wire way back in s01?)

Simon defends the fifth season, part 2387902

I dug Simon's point that hey, we legalized drugs in season three, which was pretty far out there, so a fake serial killer can't be that far out for us

the problem isn't that something unconventional happens - it's that it feels unsupported by the Wire universe (characters, etc) around it. also the pessimism/fatalism about the whole project, from bunny's perspective, was way different than mcnulty/freamon's insane-o "o rly yeah that'll work for sure!" bs.

yeah it shifted gears into near satire this season, which isn't inherently bad except that it sort of undercuts the illusion of grit that the series depends on. i appreciate the effort to make it more than a lark -- to make mcnulty face some possible consequences -- but in some ways that just heightens the awkwardness.

otoh i love city editor gus. him spiking the lead and dumping the story in the m.e.'s lap was awesome.

and omar, yeah i guess he went about the way he was bound to.

Ep. 9, so fine.

I am going to be really sad to see this show end its run. This season has turned around from "What the fuck?" to me getting choked up during this past episode.

Trivia: The actress that plays Alma is married to Larry Gilliard Jr, aka, D'Angelo Barksdale.

Crap!!! Why does this show have to end?!?!?!

Man, spoiler on HBO's front page.

yow ep 9

michael outsmarts snoop - snoop is impressed, checks hair - all those who called that one, well played

dookies got one ep to become a junkie - his obv fate all along

namond walks ass backward into a wholesome enviroment

kima drops a dime but no ones gonna want that shit to see the light of day

and marlo goes dooooown - but hercs feeding fucking levy info - wtf herc w t f

i don't think they're making herc out to be the leak, if thats what you mean

for those without on-demand, can't vouch for it http://www.megaupload.com/?d=0XYLR6NS

no not the supreme court leak - just at the end he told levy abt the illegal wire-tap

getting his revenge on the department the jerk - it occurs to me that he only gave carver marlos cell cause levy was talking abt how awz $$$ itd be when marlo got busted

ok maybe not "only" hes conflicted and so so dumb - fu herc jerk

who is the supreme court leak tho? someone we know or just a loose end left dangling? only one more ep ;_; ;_; ;_;

supreme court lol GRAND JURY

just at the end he told levy abt the illegal wire-tap

wait i missed that. was that after snoop and the kid on crutches left?

no like at the v end of the ep after hes drinking w/carver et al to celebrate the bust he goes back to levys office and is all they say theres no wire but the word on the street is there really was and levy is all hmmm and rubs his hands together all evil like

Holy shit these last two eps were fucking amazing.

yeah I'm feeling really good about the last couple episodes, although there were still a couple clangers in this last one (especially that whole "woohoo Lester Freamon gonna get him some tonight!" shit or whatever), starting to get optimistic about the finale, even if it looks like they're gonna finish with a big shit-hittin-the-fan episode (which they usually put in the penultimate episode and then end the season more with dust settling).

didn't know they were jamming Thin Lizzy down in Walter Reed.

i loled @ drunk lester

i loled @ drunk lester

Seriously. And was he talking about that MUCH younger girl from earlier seasons, or am I making that up? He did end up with one of the girls from season two, right? She, Lester and Mr. Glenfiddich were gonna have a party that night. WOO!

shardene, yeah, cool lester smooth's still hittin' that

one of the most salient points that "The Wire" has ever made: you can turn a ho into a housewife.

except for Jimmy, I guess.

no like at the v end of the ep after hes drinking w/carver et al to celebrate the bust he goes back to levys office and is all they say theres no wire but the word on the street is there really was and levy is all hmmm and rubs his hands together all evil like

damn i just watched it again (lol "rescreen") and i must have still been reeling from snoop getting got that i paid no attention to that scene. herc is a fuckhead nitwit

it seems to all be wrapping up in the direction of "here we go again, same old shit, nothing ever changes" as dookie becomes bubbles, mcnulty becomes bunny colvin, carcetti becomes mayor royce, etc.

kind of goofy imaginary Omar obituary, which maybe misses the whole point of him not getting a lovingly detailed Sun obit in the show: http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/02/writing_the_obit_for_the_chara.html

funny how even with this being the most "unrealistic" season, there's still a lot of parallels with real life Baltimore current events. first the police dept. restricting overtime, now a big gang bust right around the same time the episode w/ the raid on the Stanfield crew: http://www.examiner.com/a-1241202~Alleged_drug_gang_members_face_organized_crime_indictment.html

crazy thing about Skinny Suge from Stop Snitchin' getting indicted is that I was just at a 'welcome home' party for him a couple weeks ago when he finished a 2 year bid. dude is just a magnet for trouble, I guess. if there's one reason I wish "The Wire" could do one more season it would be to address the new surge of gang culture in Baltimore, shit is really out of control compared to the era most of the show's stories are based on.

Anyone else rofl at the Dexter reference?

someone splain to me how they tracked down that cell phone in evidence?

Kenard and Bug on a radio show: http://youtube.com/watch?v=kHXpgbQrsEo

They are both 12!

not just a radio show, the radio show that you can hear in the background of a bunch of scenes in recent episodes. they do a morning-after check in with one or more Wire cast member the Monday after every new episode, I was listening this week when they said that Kenard was gonna be on, but by the time the break was over I had gotten to work and had to get out of the car.

what the fuuuuuuuck

http://periscopestudio.com/?cat=23

the internet is weird

that omar obit is stupid, no way i'm reading that

yeah a friend just showed me that and i was like ughhh, they didn't even make it a formal exercise where it reads like a real obituary. really i can shoot the shit about The Wire all day but most of the internet writing about it (especially the one or two all-about-Wire blogs out there) is pretty fucking tedious.

wow wow wow

Is it a two-hour finale?

90 mins.

As great as that was, it still got dragged down by McNulty venting and the serial killer. I really wish they could have worked the illegal wiretap in another way, and spent more time with the paper rather than just cutting to vignettes of Stephen Glass vs. David Simon (if he were young, skinny and black).

I didn't get the warrant number ringing to Marlo's cell - Lester had to know that would show up in the paperwork, and didn't they talk about redirecting the wire from the warrant number to Marlo's or something?

What did Michael see that tipped him off that he was getting hit? I couldn't figure that out. Was that his corner, or Snoop's fake victim's corner?

Oh, I see. This show is too subtle for its own good sometimes.

It was Snoop telling Michael that he didn't need to bring a gun. Cue very brief flash of realization crossing Michael's face.

I love that, for the final episode ever, they've created a scenario which has no clear resolution. If I'm correct in my assumptions, the illegality of the wiretap will essentially exonerate Marlo & Co., yes? This whole deal could come down to whether Daniels and Pearlman go by the book or conspire to cover it up.

At any rate, I'm glad that the consequences of McNulty's incredibly short-sighted plan are being dealt with realistically. Even if it leads to a bleak finale.

of course theyre gonna cover it up everything will be covered up everyone from the mayor on down has too much riding on this dont u see

(except maybe levy will uncover everything up and ruin it all)

You might be right about Marlo getting exonerated by ill-gotten evidence, since the "next episode" clip showed him out on the street defending his rep, after they already said there's no bail set for him.

I'm curious if Levy is one of those characters that will finally get his comeuppance now, or if they'll end with him still out there making the world a worse place.

in the scenes from next week marlo was in a suit implying that he came straight from court to the corner to smash shit up

oh yeah, i forgot he was wearing a suit

I want to imagine that he's in character as Levy in this, but much to my chagrin there is no Arby's in Baltimore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDJGjPMR0zo

but maybe thats why those dudes are so psyched theyre all wow u brought that arbys in from out of town levy allllriiiight !!!!

btw i didnt realize he was a def poetry jam vet

lol

btw what did you guys think about the jail scene w/ Marlo finally blowing his top and chewing the scenery with all that "MY NAME IS ON THE STREET!?" shit? he's always been such a subtle, hard to read character, and I knew something like that was always coming but I'm not sure how I felt about the execution of it.

i liked the tenor of his voice there - it was pretty convincing - there wasnt just anger there was command too

and lol at monk spilling the beans while chris gives him the stinkeye

MY NAME IS MY NAME

SERIOUS MARLO IS SERIOUS

i thought it was pretty powerful seeing him raise his voice for the first time ever, really.
and then he just snaps out of it back to his normal demeanor!

yeah, it was a good scene. it just felt, i dunno, weird, not what i expected, didn't know if i was alone in that.

no - but in a good way, for me!

i liked that scene because there's never been much evidence of what makes marlo tick. with avon you could see it was gamesmanship, he wanted to hustle and outhustle. stringer had his whole entrepreneurial fantasy. marlo has always just been power for its own sake, but that scene gave it a little context. it's about respect. he wants people to see him and know him. sort of a problematic characteristic in a drug lord, which chris obviously recognizes. he was afraid it would get marlo killed.

interesting Dominic West interview, he admits that only 10 episodes was a bad idea, says cast members are bugging Simon about doing a Wire movie (hmmmmm nah), kind of hints at what the finale will be like:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2008/02/the-wire-react.html

ugggh a movie?

What did Michael see that tipped him off that he was getting hit? I couldn't figure that out. Was that his corner, or Snoop's fake victim's corner?

-- polyphonic, Wednesday, February 27, 2008 2:20 AM

i think it was the latter and that might even have been the victim she was talking to. in any case it looked like maybe an ambush was being set up for Michael with those guys hiding inside the boarded up front

yah he was weirded out by the gun scenario in the context of the bust so he went to check out the spot when he saw that... later he asked snoop for the gun as soon as he got in the car just to make sure

There were so many great scenes in this week's episode, which I thought was very sad. The scene with Marlo in prison, raising his voice, was especially great though I can't help feel that it seems like too little to late. It would have been nice to have seen that this anger and passion for his name is a key motivation for him earlier. On a technical note: great sound-design in this scene really emphasises Marlo's voice.

The set of scenes with Michael saying goodbye to his little brother and Dook were heartbreaking.

Some nice cameos again: the guy in Evidence Control was the guy who tried to fall down the stairs in Season 1, right? Or that partner of that guy? (Minus moustache, obv.)

oh man, that would make the "landed on your feet" line a truly awful pun.

oy yes writers having fun!

so any bets on the "new mcnulty" and "new omar" ? i'm stumped. unless michael ends up going on a vengeance tip for the latter...

for the former, gregs?

Yeah, as soon as I ready the "new Omar" thing I assumed it would be Michael, since he's kind of becoming a vigilante who does some dirty work but has his own moral code, especially if he continues to operate in the game from outside any gang. I can't picture him completely becoming Omar, though.

I think you might be right about Gregs, clover. After the city government and the police department conspire to cover up the fake serial killer thing and let McNulty go quietly, she's going to be one bitter motherfucker.

maybe marlo kills the dook and that's what sets michael off.

that would prevent the dook from becoming bubbles

I don't see how circumstances like that would make someone like McNulty per se, especially when the situation involves her character being completely outraged by the actions of McNulty himself. I thought his whole thing was that he was just naturally an inconsiderate asshole with a high opinion of himself, and the departmental bullshit only slightly pushed him in the direction of faking a serial killer.

(xpost to Deric)

actually this is probably the most obvious clue of who could be the new Omar:

Kenard is a younger member of Namond Brice's circle of friends from Edward Tilghman middle school (also known as the Fayette Street Mafia). He is first seen is season three, where, following a prolonged gunfight at a Barksdale stashhouse, Kenard argues with his friends over which one gets to pretend to be Omar Little while re-enacting the gunfight.

<3 kenard

http://www.baltimoresun.com/services/newspaper/printedition/thursday/today/bal-to.people28feb28,0,1470617.column

goddam piece of shit fuck penis

I'm happy about it, even though I hate the wait. It feels more like an event.

http://i1.tinypic.com/7wglfdl.gif

ok, a friend gave me dvds with all the 5th season eps so far. it's on.

watched the finale last night, guy at work lent me the screener dvds (I think his fiance is a tv critic)

guess I'll come back next week, I thought maybe people got it on on-demand last night but given that article up above, I guess not

episodes 8 & 9 were craaaazy though

McNulty at the profiler was some hilarious shit

lol @ that's-my-jam-right-there gif

I didn't get the warrant number ringing to Marlo's cell - Lester had to know that would show up in the paperwork, and didn't they talk about redirecting the wire from the warrant number to Marlo's or something?

I thought Marlo's number wasn't in the warrant, it was in some paperwork that Pearlman and Daniels got from the phone company or something. Lester had to submit the real number he was tapping to the phone company at some point

http://www.baltimoresun.com/services/newspaper/printedition/thursday/today/bal-to.people28feb28,0,1470617.column

goddam piece of shit fuck penis

-- am0n, Saturday, 1 March 2008 22:45 (2 days ago) Link

haha, this morning I woke up super early and couldn't get back to sleep, so I decided to get up and try and watch the finale OnDemand, and all that was there was a 1-minute promo announcing that it wouldn't be available until next week w/ a loop of Clay Davis going "SHEEEEEIT". in a way I respect that, really I think they should've never put the last 2 seasons' episodes OnDemand a week early (when this year had the show's lowest premiere ratings ever I was like duh, if you make it available early of course noone's gonna watch it on Sunday). still kind of an asshole move to bait and switch and announce that at the last minute, though.

so did episode 9 (out of 10?) air last night? i watched the wire like it was my job yesterday and i'm on episode 8.

I don't think it was a bait and switch. I read that the last episode wouldn't be available a week early before the season started. I even read the guy who posted the information talking about how he was glad the finale couldn't be spoiled by people who saw it early.

well, the fact that it wasn't mentioned in the Sun until last week, and that the aforementioned promo went up today the same time the episode normally would and basically joked about it being an unexpected announcement, makes me feel like it was a bait and switch. hell, if you knew this months ago you coulda mentioned it here!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDJGjPMR0zo

^levy inhales whirlwind of beef (spoiler?)

dmr please spoil me - what happens to Dukie?!?!

no not here^

Poetri (2 days ago)

You are right, I say, "Can I get some curly fries with that shake?

I want to imagine that he's in character as Levy in this, but much to my chagrin there is no Arby's in Baltimore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDJGjPMR0zo

-- Alex in Baltimore, Wednesday, February 27, 2008 1:30 PM (5 days ago) Bookmark Link

^^ props for whirlwind of beef line, tho

i knew it was too good to not have been posted

it's funny because the commercial's like 2 yrs old and i just got around to posting it last week.

there's an Arby's in Laurel but no sidewalks nearby to strut w/ after I get my food.

dmr please spoil me - what happens to Dukie?!?!

lol, no way, I'm keepin my mouth shut

promo announcing that it wouldn't be available until next week w/ a loop of Clay Davis going "SHEEEEEIT"

classic

maybe i can borrow it from someone at work whose husband works with someone whose fiancee is a tv critic or something ...

no no it's ok, i can wait.

there's an arby's in white marsh

probably where levy lives

btw what did you guys think about the jail scene w/ Marlo finally blowing his top and chewing the scenery with all that "MY NAME IS ON THE STREET!?" shit?

that scene was pretty great .... fleshed out a lot of stuff that had only been hinted at here and there w/ asides about him wanting to wear the crown, have my name ring out ....

again: the guy in Evidence Control was the guy who tried to fall down the stairs in Season 1, right?

haha I knew it was supposed to be somebody but I didn't know who

yeah i think it was him.

man, i was so misty throughout this ep! bubbs, bug, dookie... *sigh*

Argh, I've been searching torrents everywhere for 10, didn't even know it was next week.
I'm JONESIN

I thought the guy who threw himself down the stairs got retirement, and this was the guy who just went to rehab at Daniels' command?

no one threw themselves down the stairs - one guy had an accident then the other guy was contemplating throwing himself down the stairs for the sweet benefits - that was the guy in evidence

Nah, one guy got his ass beat like a bitch down at the spot

Agh, shit, sorry, it doesn't seem all misogynistic when characters on the show say stuff like that.

oh right, at one point he was in a full body cast or something, just like he would have been if he DID fall down the stairs on purpose

so then his partner went even further into the sauce

who beat the bitch ass down at the spot - i dont remember?

so was kenard after the bounty? or just trying to make a name for himself? or just because what the fuck?

i mean, he knew who omar was, right?

all of the above

(i haven't seen ep 9, but it was surprising at the end of ep 8 that kenard hadn't tried to claim responsibility for the murder, at least judging by what marlo said to chris & snoop)

i juuuust rewatched that scene and it sounds like when snoop asks marlo who did it he says

"some young boy aint heard his name dont even know if there was a why - hopper went ahead and pooped just to see the damage you know yeeaaah"

then chris looks all butthurt

but kenard im sure knows abt omar and the bounty

popped not pooped l o l

I thought Marlo said in that scene that no one claimed the bounty

xpost - oh nm you just rewatched it

yeah, Kenard knows all about Omar -- as I pointed out upthread, his first season in season 3 was reenacting his gunfight at a Barksdale stash house, with Kenard going "now it's my turn to play Omar!" to another kid. the little sociopath is probably just trying to get a rep, not collect a bounty.

the fact that it was Kenard who did it must add to Marlo getting so mad in jail when he finds out Omar was calling for him ... people thinking Marlo is scared of Omar and a random 11-year-old or whatever does the job

For my money, the beauty of building Omar up into an unstoppable ghetto superhero (on some spiderman shit) and then having him rendered and cut on the street by the weakest among them is yet more proof how smoothly and effortlessly brilliant this show is.

finale's kicking around the usual circuits...

I HAS ACQUIRED FROM USUAL SOURCES AND WATCHED

ITS ALL OVER ;_; :) :/

I just finished it.

how many people need to see it before we reach critical mass and start spoiling the shit outta this thing

ok i'm officially not opening this thread again until monday.

For real. I am so interested in hearing what other people think.

If you haven't seen the finale/Seasons1-4 then you best roll out

I MUST GO SEARCHING - LEAVING WORK RIGHT NOW!

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

Is that enough warning?

I thought it was a totally apropos finale. The "wake" was a little much, but the rest was largely perfect. It was kind of nice to see all the gloom and doom predictions (including my own) sidestepped in favor of a more measured approach totally befitting the show.

They do a good job of making it seem like any more chronicling of these characters would be redundant.

yah there was a nice magnanimous its all in the game vibe

i actually thought the most tender moment was when slim charles killed cheese for joe

daniels and pearlman were cute in court

and i totes called michael becoming the new omar

I actually thought that was one of the hokier moments, just a little too cut-and-dry.

bubbles final scene made my eyes well up, for real

and dukie's, for the opposite reason ;____;

had to see that coming, though

Michael becoming Omar and Dukie becoming Bubbles were weak points for me. Come on now David Simon. You know we are smarter than that. I know that the game is the game, but is it really that predictable?

on the whole I thought episodes 8 and 9 were the heart of the season and had way more WOW HOLY SHIT factor but the finale was solid. especially the final montage, pretty awesome.

I know that the game is the game, but is it really that predictable?

yes, sadly

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

I couldn't believe homeboy got a pulitzer. L O L.

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

yah that part strained credulity - there was a pretty solid case against him there

plus his writing was awful

not that i really have any idea what they give pulitzers for

stuff like this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janet_Cooke

i.e. it's not exactly unprecedented

also it kinda completed all the parallels they were making btw the cops and reporters, they good guys get busted down for doing the right thing if they're not political enough

most of those little end scenes were total eye-rollers.

slim and cheese was !!!

I was trying to figure out in that scene whether Slim knew ahead of time he was gonna do that or if the huge $$$$ Cheese was gonna put in for the co-op tipped him off that he was responsible for Joe

I guess between the money and Marlo elevating Cheese to be his right hand man Slim put two and two together

I didn't think the stuff at the end was any more eye-rolly than any other season ending. I lolled

i was thinking cheese pulling the gun at that meet up was just the last straw - slim and everyone else knew he set joe up when he started rolling w/marlo right afterwards - slim was just all you know what fuck it this guy is totes unbearable

"sentimental motherfucker just cost us the 9"

The Wire's War on the Drug War

By Ed Burns, Dennis Lehane, George Pelecanos, Richard Price, David Simon

We write a television show. Measured against more thoughtful and meaningful occupations, this is not the best seat from which to argue public policy or social justice. Still, those viewers who followed The Wire — our HBO drama that tried to portray all sides of inner-city collapse, including the drug war, with as much detail and as little judgment as we could muster — tell us they've invested in the fates of our characters. They worry or grieve for Bubbles, Bodie or Wallace, certain that these characters are fictional yet knowing they are rooted in the reality of the other America, the one rarely acknowledged by anything so overt as a TV drama.

These viewers, admittedly a small shard of the TV universe, deluge us with one question: What can we do? If there are two Americas — separate and unequal — and if the drug war has helped produce a psychic chasm between them, how can well-meaning, well-intentioned people begin to bridge those worlds?

And for five seasons, we answered lamely, offering arguments about economic priorities or drug policy, debating theoreticals within our tangled little drama. We were storytellers, not advocates; we ducked the question as best we could.

Yet this war grinds on, flooding our prisons, devouring resources, turning city neighborhoods into free-fire zones. To what end? State and federal prisons are packed with victims of the drug conflict. A new report by the Pew Center shows that 1 of every 100 adults in the U.S. — and 1 in 15 black men over 18 — is currently incarcerated. That's the world's highest rate of imprisonment.

The drug war has ravaged law enforcement too. In cities where police agencies commit the most resources to arresting their way out of their drug problems, the arrest rates for violent crime — murder, rape, aggravated assault — have declined. In Baltimore, where we set The Wire, drug arrests have skyrocketed over the past three decades, yet in that same span, arrest rates for murder have gone from 80% and 90% to half that. Lost in an unwinnable drug war, a new generation of law officers is no longer capable of investigating crime properly, having learned only to make court pay by grabbing cheap, meaningless drug arrests off the nearest corner.

What the drugs themselves have not destroyed, the warfare against them has. And what once began, perhaps, as a battle against dangerous substances long ago transformed itself into a venal war on our underclass. Since declaring war on drugs nearly 40 years ago, we've been demonizing our most desperate citizens, isolating and incarcerating them and otherwise denying them a role in the American collective. All to no purpose. The prison population doubles and doubles again; the drugs remain.

Our leaders? There aren't any politicians — Democrat or Republican — willing to speak truth on this. Instead, politicians compete to prove themselves more draconian than thou, to embrace America's most profound and enduring policy failure.

"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right," wrote Thomas Paine when he called for civil disobedience against monarchy — the flawed national policy of his day. In a similar spirit, we offer a small idea that is, perhaps, no small idea. It will not solve the drug problem, nor will it heal all civic wounds. It does not yet address questions of how the resources spent warring with our poor over drug use might be better spent on treatment or education or job training, or anything else that might begin to restore those places in America where the only economic engine remaining is the illegal drug economy. It doesn't resolve the myriad complexities that a retreat from war to sanity will require. All it does is open a range of intricate, paradoxical issues. But this is what we can do — and what we will do.

If asked to serve on a jury deliberating a violation of state or federal drug laws, we will vote to acquit, regardless of the evidence presented. Save for a prosecution in which acts of violence or intended violence are alleged, we will — to borrow Justice Harry Blackmun's manifesto against the death penalty — no longer tinker with the machinery of the drug war. No longer can we collaborate with a government that uses nonviolent drug offenses to fill prisons with its poorest, most damaged and most desperate citizens.

Jury nullification is American dissent, as old and as heralded as the 1735 trial of John Peter Zenger, who was acquitted of seditious libel against the royal governor of New York, and absent a government capable of repairing injustices, it is legitimate protest. If some few episodes of a television entertainment have caused others to reflect on the war zones we have created in our cities and the human beings stranded there, we ask that those people might also consider their conscience. And when the lawyers or the judge or your fellow jurors seek explanation, think for a moment on Bubbles or Bodie or Wallace. And remember that the lives being held in the balance aren't fictional.

The authors are all members of the writing staff of HBO's The Wire, which concludes its five-year run on March 9

damn, pretty interesting

I didn't know dennis lehane wrote for them, I guess that's how amy ryan and omar ended up in gone baby gone

also, before Joe got killed he knew Cheese was at least somewhat untrustworthy and told Slim Charles to watch him..

lol heated debate here over whether michael is now gay or not: http://allhiphop.com/forums/118/19070818/ShowThread.aspx

ha!

I like that one poster's evidence: some guy in some scene with Michael was wearing a pink shirt and sandals

thinking as soon as i get around to go back and rewatch older seasons, going to pay closer attention to whatever slim charles says b/c he's otm pretty much on everything

I seriously cannot tell you how tempting this thread is to read. I have decided to see it on Sunday, but damnit, this thread...

Talk to y'all on Monday.

The finale hit the spot; it fulfilled what I needed it to do.
I'd argue that The Wire, taken as a whole fifty-something hour teleplay, is the best sustained film narrative of the 2000s, maybe longer. You can throw in film, tv, cartoons, whatever. I can't wait to see what they do next.

trying to pitch a series on jazz musicians in new orleans

http://www.showbuzz.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/10/15/tv/main3366543.shtml

meh

gwot is the way to go here srsly

i was hopping for maybe a more action packed finally. i had convinced myself that Marlo was going to go down. what was with the scene where he got shot at - did he just randomly pick some corner to go cause trouble at?

i guess overall it was true to the usual - winding down, last episode of previous seasons.

did he just randomly pick some corner to go cause trouble at?

that's pretty much how I saw it. I think it used to be his corner, he goes down there and they don't know who he is (even worse, they're talking about Omar), so they get into it. also in the finale's "new -------- " terms he was trying to be new Stringer but couldn't help being new Avon ("that's MY corner" etc)

it was weird that they didn't show Avon at the end, I thought that's who Chris was gonna walk up to in jail but instead it was Webay

I also thought they left McNulty kinda open-ended .... yeah he's back with Beadie but what's he gonna do for work?

maybe he'll teach!

& i did wonder that about avon too

they should do one on homeland security. TSA, Coast Guard, Border Patrol, Customs, Secret Service, my fuckin' job, all barrels of fun! of course it would all be the same story as the Wire minus the great street characters, so thbbpt

The follow-up should be "McNulty, P.I."

McNulty and Marlow get an apartment together and are the original odd couple.

not readin this thread and this might have already been posted but WOW

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1719872,00.html

"This show will be a way of making a visual argument that cities matter," Simon said. " 'The Wire' has never done that. I certainly never said or wanted to say that Baltimore is not saving, or that it can't be saved. But I think some people watching the show think, Why don't they just move away?"

I know a lot of you guys are from there and I'm well aware that it's a fictional show, but this DID cross my mind occasionally.

Generation Kill looks good.

Great ending, Dukie/Michael endings were kind of throwaway so not a big negative to me.

Pretty stoked re: the final. Some parts were awesome, some were meh. The scenes with Levy and Pearlman were great. Totally how it works with courthouse meetings, too.

I think my favorite was, during the first scene when Carcetti is informed about the fact that its all fake, that Norman was laughing his ASS off. Awesome. I so don't want to be the Mayor - I want to be the guy who can laugh at this point.

Here's to a GREAT series coming to a solid end. Well, well done.

i thought it was funny that after the show ended w/ hack Templeton winning the Pulitzer, then the first thing immediately after credits was a promo for the John Adams miniseries that began with "based on the Pulitzer Award-winning...". if it'd been the promo for Generation Kill (which looks potentially awesome) I would've really lolled.

jhøshea, i hope you're being ironic with the "totes" shit, 3 times on this thread alone.

I'm glad Wiki had an explanation for the title of the last episode because I was scratching my head the whole time:

"–30–" is a journalistic term that has been used to signify "the end" or "over and out" since the Civil War when telegraphers tapped "XXX", the Roman numeral signifying 30, to end transmissions.

But damnit that scene with Dukie and Prezbo broke my fucking heart. Duke's, too.

im pretty sure this guy http://www.hbo.com/thewire/img/90x94/characters/cityhall/normalwilson.jpg is totes narrating this national geographic what if the humans totes all die tomorrow show but i totes cant find any info

i really hope simon does his new orleans show.

eh it sounds like more of a corner sort of thing - id prefer something that brings wire style intrigue

not that the corners not great cause it is

Reg E Cathay has the best voice in the world

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/03/10/arts/wiresec.jpg

i had mixed feelings about the season, but i think the finale did right by the series. got a little choked up at bubs sitting down to dinner at the end. (also steve earle was pretty good in this season. in the earlier seasons his line readings seemed stagey to me, but he had enough time onscreen this time to inhabit the character more.) nothing really surprising in the end, but it hit the right notes of grim inevitability tempered with flashes of possibility.

great fucking show. i already miss it.

No one else has mentioned it yet, but I *loved* that silent montage of outdoor city shots about halfway through.

I did too Simon H. They were making love to the city of Baltimore so many times in this episode. A great way to end it all.

A fantastic end to a fantastic show, and even managed to make the flaws of this season seem worth it.

I loved Carcetti being speechless for the first time in his life at the beginning of the episode.

i kept putting off watching this (have had it for a few days) and now that i have i am so so sad there's no more left. thought the montage at the end was pretty silly, but overall a good finale.

great irony w/ending for marlo

also, random question but.. am i correct in that when stringer had charge of the coop and got killed by omar, everyone thought marlo did it.. and when prop joe got killed by marlo, he told them omar did it

yeah, i think so.

will watching homicide help with wire withdrawal?

Extended interview with David Simon

http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/2008/03/09/85-the-wire/

part of what's so sad to me about this show passing is that i think it's gonna be a real long time til we get another high-profile television drama with this many black actors

practically every interview w/cast and crew that i've ever seen touches on this a little -- nobody had ever been on a set like that before

http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/2008/03/09/85-the-wire/

One of the reasons this show had such terrible ratings is because it isn't at all popular with white people. Maybe "stuff hipsters like"?

lots of white people like The Wire, but probably more black people (percentagewise) do, too. that doesn't really seem like a website worth arguing over, though, it's kind of stupid on purpose right?

indeed. See also: BET being the only network running the wire in syndication.
More seriously, I'd like to know if I need to be renting season one of Homicide. Anybody wanna rep?

More seriously, I'd like to know if I need to be renting season one of Homicide. Anybody wanna rep?

Dude, it's got wall-to-wall Clark Johnson AND Jon Polito AND Ned Beatty AND Yaphet Kotto. Isn't that enough?

yeah, there's a long Homicide thread full of love around here somewhere, it was a great show in its own right. once I finish rescreening (heh) seasons 3 and 4 of The Wire I'm gonna start going back through Homicide's whole run since I'm sure I missed a lot of episodes at the time.

Homicide: Life on the Street: classic or the best show ever created?

that thread has spoilers, so long story short first 2 seasons are must-screen. gets weaker around s5 but still screenable

srlsy wished more drama went down in that last episode. the only tragic bit at all was dook, and they needed to juice it a bit more for it to really work. Way too quiescent for my tastes. lester probably should have ended up in more hot water. Oh, also, the gregs and syndor bits in the outro? a bit too much on top of one another.

I kind of loved the fact that, Cheese aside, it wasn't at all the bloodbath that I think a lot of people expected out of a Wire finale (but also not a total Sopranos fakeout, except I guess the silly McNulty wake thing but noone could've really been thrown off by that). I do wish that that there weren't quite so many characters who landed on their feet that could've gone either way, though.

For every part in the montage that made me groan, there was something completely hilarious and perfect, though, like Valchek becoming commissioner.

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/03/the_wire_finales_final_montage.html

oh yeah, the cheese thing was pretty awesome. i'm on the fence about the "for prop joe" bit though -- it set up some cute dialogue, but a bit too quiescent again. i could have just stood for "motherfucker talked too much" and left it at that...

not to get on too much of a side tangent but I can't be the only one who thinks this Eliot Spitzer mess sounds exactly like a Wire plot line. I kind of imagine this is what would happen to Carcetti in Season 6.

(IRS) investigators conducting a routine examination of suspicious financial transactions reported to them by banks found several unusual movements of cash involving the governor of New York, several officials said. …
The money ended up in the bank accounts of what appeared to be shell companies, corporations that essentially had no real business.
The transactions, officials said, suggested possible financial crimes — maybe bribery, political corruption, or something inappropriate involving campaign finance. Prostitution, they said, was the furthest thing from the minds of the investigators. …
Because the focus was a high-ranking government official, prosecutors were required to seek the approval of the United States attorney general to proceed. Once they secured that permission, the investigation moved forward.

The investigation into the Emperors Club VIP gathered more than 5,000 telephone calls and text messages, and more than 6,000 e-mails, along with bank records, travel and hotel records and surveillance.

Wiretaps enabled government agents to listen as the woman later told a booking agent for the ring that she had secured $4,300 in cash from her client and that she liked him. Authorities also had statements from a confidential source and an undercover officer.

completely. what, did herc give the feds spitzer's cell phone number? approx. a million fans of the wire are thinking.. this doesn't add up

"the only tragic bit at all was dook"

Crazy. The whole point is that our entire culture is one fucking tragic wheel-spinning fucking mess.

^^^

wheel spinning isn't tragedy.

...if you're a cyclist

for the players in the game of the wire, it certainly is, even for the higher ups

yah tis

the tragedy is in the notion that things could be better if not for everyone looking out for themselves in the end and repeating the cycle. i was hoping for more cutty in the last two episodes, btw.

i think his speech with duquan was his (my) only appearance this season?

How come no one ilxors with the handle of Hauk? Or Clay Davis? Or Squeak? Or Rawls?

the tragedy is in the notion that things could be better if not for everyone looking out for themselves in the end and repeating the cycle.

Actually, I'm not sure the tragedy is actually that -- the REAL tragedy is not realizing that "the game is rigged" and thinking your penny-ante shit makes a damn bit of difference. If you're willingly playing the game knowing these conditions (cf. Kima & Bunk, and maybe Slim Charles too), then you're good. But if you're McNulty or Stringer or Daniels (or, to a lesser extent, Freamon), and you're trying to shake things up and make an actual change, then you're going to kill yourself trying to change absolutely nothing unless you wise up to your place in the scheme of things or get the hell out.

alex in nyc is our rawls

alex in nyc is our rawls

RONG

i'll have to live knowing cutty is just happy boxing and jogging and enjoying the pastries fine ladies bring to the gym

as far as the wire's cutty, i don't have any clue

Burning Question: what happened to Nick's girlfriend!?!?

well yeah, stringer was a genuine tragedy, but that wasn't this season, where everyone else came out too ok. "Whom the Gods seek to destroy, they first make mad," rite? but where was the destruction !?

I don't know that they came out OK so much as they simply came out. Even if he was a drunk selfish bitch when he was doing real police work, McNulty was "real police," and he resigned himself to the fact that he wouldn't be able to do that anymore.

(If anyone has more straws I could make a go @, I'd appreciate it.)

i never really thought of stringer as a tragedy.

no? stringer wanted out of the drug game, avon wanted to continue being a gangster

David Simon cameo:

http://images.salon.com/ent/tv/feature/2008/03/10/wire_wrap_9/simon.jpg

And the Sun didn't like the finale:

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/critics/blog/2008/03/thoughts_on_the_wire_finale.html

why would the end require destruction? that shit is just predictable at this point w/r/t big series finales.

Simon was also a reporter hounding Sobotka in season 2

i found that to be sort of ironic, but not really tragic.
and did stringer really want out of the drug game completely or was he more about playing the game more from a businessman-like angle? (among other legit businesses)

stringer/avon was totally tragic

marlowe was never as compelling as stringer and avon for me.

I don't think he was meant to be, per se.

I thought that a lot of the characters would fall harder (esp. McNulty, Freamon, Gus), but they just got knocked down far enough that all the corruption & mediocrity could continue (see also everyone having dirty on everyone else).

just like our boy spitzer

narese as mayor and valchek as police commissioner is really, really bleak

One little thing that bothered me, if Bug has an aunt in the suburbs, where was she when he was living with a crackhead mom, etc.? Was she supposed to be Bug's dad's sister (ie the dude who Chris killed)?

narese as mayor and valchek as police commissioner is really, really bleak

No worse than Royce and Burrell. It is what it is.

she wasnt necessarily the most sympathetic lady - michael did have to send bug off w/a box full of cash xp

never said it was worse. just bleak.

I think it's kind of funny that The Wire can't resist the Hollywood touch of making Nerese Campbell 25 years younger and way hotter than Sheila Dixon.

thank god for that h-wood touch imo

haha, i couldn't help thinking in the finale that daniels could get way hotter women. he likes those political connections, though.

I can't help thinking that Daniels is impossibly yoked every time I see him.

they should do one on homeland security. TSA, Coast Guard, Border Patrol, Customs, Secret Service, my fuckin' job, all barrels of fun! of course it would all be the same story as the Wire minus the great street characters, so thbbpt

-- El Tomboto, Friday, March 7, 2008 9:10 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Link

this would be great. no bad guys tho : /

man vs self

just watched the last one, was glad the last couple episodes were the strongest.

did not like the yiddish bit from the dirty lawyer though :-(

man I thought the guy who plays Levy turned it ON this season. he got some great scenes. the one with Marlo was amazing to watch (and his negotiation scene with Rhonda of course)

Dukwan's real heartbreaking scene wasn't the one where he was shooting up, which was kind of a foregone conclusion by the point, but the whole scene with Prez. Christ Almighty that killed me. Just killed me.

yeah, the only jewish dude is by far the smarmiest dude in the whole series

yeah, Levy was awesome this season. also liked this guy's addition to the cast this year, had some great moments but seemed kind of unheralded:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/5/59/The_Wire_Steintorf.jpg/250px-The_Wire_Steintorf.jpg

they seemed to have back-loaded the star writers into the last few eps y/n

the first time we meet levy he's been torn away from a family meal -- more circularity.

yeah, the only jewish dude is by far the smarmiest dude in the whole series

Isn't Pearlman Jewish too? Hence the back-room deal.

also liked this guy's addition to the cast this year, had some great moments but seemed kind of unheralded

Ha yeah I met that actor a few weeks ago and he said "I'm a regular on The Wire" and described his role and I couldn't place him.

i think that guy was too much 'the voice of horrible reality' and though he had some good zingers (someething about "ok so we've all agreed that this is nobody's responsibility" in s04) no-one had a line on him, he had no weaknesses, and he came out of nowhere. he was a dem party hack i guess? i reckon if this had been 13 eps there'd be more of him vs norman.

he and "tony gray" are both in 'michael clayton'!

haha, i couldn't help thinking in the finale that daniels could get way hotter women. he likes those political connections, though.

I personally think that Ronnie Pearlman is a fine peice of ass. His ex-wife, not so much. But Ronnie be a fine-assed judge.

narese is fuckin hot tho

i dont really buy them being able to pin the murders on the business card guy

They aren't really pinning them on him, though. He's a 'suspect' in the homeless murders, but only going to the loony bin for the two he actually committed.

yeah but youd think SOMEONE would be like "hey how tf did this obvious psycho send picture msgs and shit!!"

lol @ "how tf"

alex makes an important point there.

i think that guy was too much 'the voice of horrible reality' and though he had some good zingers (someething about "ok so we've all agreed that this is nobody's responsibility" in s04) no-one had a line on him, he had no weaknesses, and he came out of nowhere. he was a dem party hack i guess? i reckon if this had been 13 eps there'd be more of him vs norman.

-- That one guy that hit it and quit it, Saturday, March 15, 2008 11:35 AM (11 hours ago) Bookmark Link

fair enough, but he was so perfectly cast, looked and behaved more like someone in his job would've than almost any other person on The Wire that I almost felt like he was some actual city hall guy I'd seen profiled in Baltimore Magazine or something.

lol how about rawls almost acknowledging his presence in the gay bar scene from s3(?) when he says "i like some kinky shit every now and then but biting a homeless person?"

I AM DISAPPOINTED THIS DIDN'T HAPPEN

Norman's glee after the homeless unveiling is amazing.