The Wire: Episode 60 "-30-"

Great post DD, I'll echo those who have said coming to this site has enriched the show. Same goes for Sepinwall's blog, so you'll be glad to hear, if you haven't already, that he is planning on going back and starting with season one in the coming weeks to give those episodes the attention he gave to seasons four and five.

One of the parallels that I think is really strong the more I think about it (and having seen it in DD's post) -- and I think maybe the most seamless and believable -- is Carver as the next Daniels. The reason I think it works so well is it never really became clear that Carver was following in another character's footsteps until the last moments of the show. For the first four-plus seasons Carver and Daniels were their own characters and they didn't seem that similar, but now looking back you can see the similarities. Even though we never saw Daniels' dirt, we can imagine it was like some of the stuff Carver got into early in the show. Carver reformed his ways as much as anyone during the series run and it's very believable that he'd be next in line after a character with strong morals like Daniels.

 

Indeed.
Two things turned me on to this show a couple of years ago. One was a friend and co-worker who raved about it. The other was SportsJournalists.com, where I saw his ravings validated. So thanks for that.

DD, another brilliant post in a long line.
And you're right. This show got at things that we, as storytellers, struggle to get at. Those human stories and those connections in our cities, in our society. Those dots that we know are out there but that are so hard to get at and string together, so hard to "pull through the keyhole" (to use a David Simon-ism). Those emotional truths that we know, and understand in our gut, but have such a hard time articulating in a form that might run in an actual newspaper.
But David Simon & co., even if they had to turn to fiction, they took a real, honest stab at telling them. And it was brilliant.
God bless them for that.

 

Interesting to note that the DVD's of the seasons of The Wire went up in price on Amazon.com just in the last week. I bought season one 10 days ago for $39.99 and now it is $47.99

 

I've got a great idea for the Wire spinoff.

The Wire 2: Detroit.

The thing could write itself.

It could be about an out of control mayor who goes out of town and stays at lavish hotels with his chief of staff who he is having an affair with. The show could focus on committing perjury and firing police officers and having a wild party at his home involving a stripper who was allegedly beaten up by the mayor's wife with a wooden baseball bat. It could also highlight the corrupt police department, because two days later the same stripper was shot and killed. The bullets were traced back to a police-issued gun.

Does everyone agree? It's too easy not to do this.

 

came in on the Wire late, but think its the best thing on Television. I have to go back and watch it from the beginning to get the background on some of the the characters, but glad I joined in when I did. My favorite character is Bunk because he takes no shortcuts....Slow and steady wins the race...Do it right.

And Mustang, you could proably do a similar show on any big city in the U-S. Detroit certainly, LA-corrupt cops (RAMPARTS), New York (Rudy Giuliani's term anyone?), Miami (Carl Hiassen made a living off the shit that goes on there), San Francisco.

I think David Simon and his crew were able to weave several storylines together effectively and make us care about the characters. That's why the show has such a loyal following.

 

--30--?

The Wire's down for good?

Shee-eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-it!

 

Some thoughts:

How evil is Marlo? He knows police got their info from a wiretap and he still tells his people to go after Michael for ratting them out.

Didn't notice until this season that cool lester smooth is one bowlegged mother fucker ...

I couldn't think of any practical reason why Jimmy might be dead but I certainly feared he was ... it was but one of an increasing number of red herrings that I've seen in this show in an attempt to fool the viewer. The first was the rehearsal gunfight between mike chris and snoop last season. There were some obvious ones this season but it's late and I just lost my train of thought.

I was right about the business cards and who the killer was.

Anyone else think Templeton was going to rat out McNulty for a story? I imagine that wouldn't have played too well for him since it would have risked his own lies, but the look on his face leaving the police department indicated that to me. No surprise that I'm wrong. I have a hard time understanding Templeton's character and what he was feeling when McNulty was calling him out.

 

Re Marlo: I'm not so sure that info would completely let Michael off the hook. They still got Chris on the murder of his step-dad without the wire, so you can understand why he'd think Michael said something when the police talked to him. And after he killed Snoop it really doesn't matter about wiretaps or snitching; he has to get got.

Re Lester: Bunk had a great throwaway line one time when Lester was walking away last season (I think). Lester was walking away, Bunk said "Look at the bow-legged mother fucker. I made him walk like that."

Re McNulty: I definitely thought so too, though, as you said, there was nothing to suggest it. The guy who played Landsman can sure deliver a great drunken eulogy.

Re Templeton: I think Templeton was completely shook by that confrontation with McNulty. Look at this way, even though he had been lying, even he thought the second call was real. So to find out even that was a lie, and that someone was lying even more than him all along, that was shocking.

 

Part of the point with Blair though was that he really was encouraged. You had the city editor essentially saying "this guy cannot write for the Times ever again, we need to stop this now" and Gerald Boyd was still saying "let's send him to cover the sniper case!" It wasn't until, literally, the editor in San Antonio noticed that he'd stolen something verbatim from their paper that the Blair stuff came out. Then all the threads started to come apart. So it's bullshit to say, "Newspapers don't encourage this." Some do, sadly. Because they love the idea of discovering a young star. I was talking with two of my friends a few weeks ago. They work for one of the New York tabs. They said, "oh yeah, we've got a guy who cooks it. He makes up quotes, invents details. No one knows how to confront the editors about it, so it gets left alone."

Jim Haner (the guy Templeton is based on) would probably still be working at the Sun if Brill's Content hadn't written a 6,000 word article essentially calling him a liar and a fraud.

 

By the way, Boobie, you are correct. Very Alfred Hitchcock of Mr. Simon.

 

Here is the text of Landsman's eulogy for McNulty at the end. Not quite as awesome as Ray Cole's wake, but good stuff.


Jay: What to say about this piece of work? Fuck if I don't find myself without the right words. Me, as gifted a golden throat as any of you cocksuckers being loose from religion are ever likely to hear. What can I say about the dearly departed? I mean really?

Bunk: He died young. Too young.

Norris: Under 40 years old.

Carver: Though had he lived his dick would have been 134.

Jay: Shut up. It's coming to me. He was the black sheep. The permenant pariah. He asked no quarter of the bosses and none was given. He learned no lessons. He acknowledged no mistakes. He was as stubborn a Mick as ever strolled out of the Northeast parish to take a patrolman's sheild. He brook no authority, he did what he wanted to do and he said what he wanted to say and, in the end, he gave you the clearances. He was natural police.

Bunk: Yes he was.

Jay: And I don't say that about many people, even when they're here on the felt, I don't give that one up unless it happens to be true. Natural po-lice.

(Fake tears).

Jay: But Christ, what an asshole. And I'm not taking about the ordinary gaping orafice that all of us posses. I mean an all-encompassing, all-consuming out-of-proportion-to-every-other-facet-of-his-humanity chasm. From, who's born, if I may quote Shakespeare, no traveler has ever returned.

Jimmy: What the fuck did I do?

Bunk: Shut the fuck up! You're dead to us now!

(Lester enters)

Bunk: Oh ho! Here's his partner in crime!

Lester: Now, now! Be gentle! Be gentle! I'm a civilian now.

Bunk: Your papers went in now, huh?

Lester: This afternoon. 32 years.

Shardene: And four months.

Lester: (Looking at Jimmy.) Who-hoo. Ya'll did a fine job with him, you did. He looked to be about 10 years younger than I remember.

Bunk: C'mon, there's enough room for more to be laying out.

Lester: Nah, nah, one at a time! You don't crowd a man at his own wake.

Jimmy: C'mon Lester, come and snuggle.

Lester: That's our secret Jimmy. I got Shardene with me.

Jay: If you you gentlemen will spare us this unfortunate homoerotic lapse, I will conclude my elegetic remarks.

Bunk: Then do it ya gabby mutherfucker!

Jay: To conclude! To conclude I say, he gave us 13 years on the line. Not enough for a pension, but enough for us to know that he was...

(PUT THE FUCKING SONG ON HUGH!)

Jay: despite his negligible Irish ancestry, his defects of personality, and his inconstant sobriety and hygene, a true murder police. Jimmy, I say this seriously: If I was laying there dead on some Baltimore street corner, I'd want it to be you, standing over me, catching the case.

Dozerman: (Cough) Bullshit!

Jay: Because brother, when you were good, you were the best we had.

Bunk: Shit, if you were dead on some corner, it was probably Jimmy that done ya.

Cue The Pogues Body of an American.

 

I just wanted to share some thoughts, but I am in no way am as gifted at the keyboard as DD, so I will just through a few random thoughts in the reliable bullet form.

- Has anyone noticed that every person on the police side has finished in a better place in their life than when the series started? Even McNulty is when you really think about it.

- Everyone in City Hall seemed to progress forward as well.

- There is no rhyme or reason to who survived on the street. Marlo, Slim, Poot, Namond and some others surviving (for now) the street just holds no form. It truly is a crap shoot, and nothing can be relied upon.

- Alma getting demoted and Twigg being bought out showed, just like the street, that working at The Sun had its own danger as well.

- Did anyone notice the cyclical effect at the end? New mayor, new Robin Hood of the streets, new Bubbles, new players dealing with The Greeks... After all of this drama and time, everything pretty much stayed the same. The characters only changed.

- Bubbles surviving was fantastic. To think that a shot of a person walking up from the basement to sit down at a dinner table would have such a profound effect on the viewer? That is the greatness of The Wire.

- The final shot of the highway, isn't that the road you take from DC and NOVA to get to Camden Yards? So many people on that road going to the American Pastime, but just yards from the depths of society.

- Loved the scene of Dukie breaking Prez's heart, and then shooting up in the final montage.

That's all I have for now.