The Wire
Are you sick to death of being told you should watch the DVD of The Wire or else you will miss out on a thought provoking, insightful look at society, acted by a fabulous cast, written and directed by craftsmen of the highest calibre, and a storyline that will totally hook you in? Well, take it from me, they’re right!
David Simon, creator of the HBO series The Wire is an American author, journalist, and writer/producer for television. After working for twelve years as a reporter for the Baltimore Sun City Desk he published his first book, Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets. He also co-wrote, with Ed Burns, The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood. Both books were made into television series but it wasn’t until he created The Wire that everyone began to sit up and take notice.
Homicide is set in Baltimore where murder, stabbings, and shooting are daily events. David Simon was the first reporter ever to gain unlimited access to a homicide unit, and this book is a compelling foray into the culture of violence. The narrative follows a veteran investigator, a detective and a rookie as they tackle the terrible murder of an eleven-year-old girl against the backdrop of the criminal underworld. This book was to set the scene for what would eventually become The Wire.
The Wire has been described as the greatest television series of all time and yet it hasn’t won any major awards. Perhaps it touches on the raw nerve that is "conservative America". Perhaps it is closer to the truth, the awful truth of poverty, corruption, power, addiction, and the useless pandering to the mainstream views at the expense of lateral thinking and looking beyond the norm.
There are five series, each season focussing on a different facet of the city of Baltimore (though it could have been set in almost any major city in the world). It starts with the drug trade on the side streets, the corner boys, the killings, the police fighting crime to little or no effect. Series two takes us to the port with shipments of goods coming from all over the world, smuggling, longshoremen working on the docks; series three casts a sharp eye on the city government and the bureaucracy that stalls and thwarts at every turn, decisions made purely with an eye on votes; series four (my favourite) is set in the school system where every drug dealer starts his apprenticeship in a world where there are little or no choices for the young and the teachers who try, year after year, to make a difference; and series five introduces the print media with journalists, editors, sponsors, codes of ethics often bypassed in the hunt for a good story. Through it all, the Baltimore Police work the beat and the drug dealers peddle their wares.
If that sounds a little harrowing then remember that behind the serious nature of the stories there are a wonderful cast of characters who bring Baltimore to your front room with humour, with deadly precision, with raucous sexuality, with unbelievable honesty, with cunning, with chilling care. There is a fabulous mix of actors from all ethnic backgrounds (no token woman to make a scene look sexy, no token black man to make it look authentic) and after a short while you stop seeing the colour and the gender and start seeing the character. Neither are the characters simply good or evil, corrupt or honest, hardworking or lazy: they are real, like you and me with a little bit of everything in the mix.
There are so many characters who made the show a winner for me: McNulty, the bad boy hero; Bubbles, who had the cards stacked against him; Omar, the sexiest dude to have ever lived; Kima, the woman who gave as good as she got; Snoop, the deadliest girl in town; Pryzbylewski, a guy who surprised the life out of me; and Namond, Duquan, Michael, and Randy, the kids from hell who grew up on set and stole the show.
Go on, watch it and learn. Maybe it will open your eyes, maybe it will change how you think.
Tip: watch it with the sub titles, at least in the beginning. The language of the sub culture is often not easy to follow (unless you are a rip roaring drug dealer yourself, of course) but after a while you’ll get the hang of it, let it flow, learn the language of the streets. D’ya feel me???
David Simon, creator of the HBO series The Wire is an American author, journalist, and writer/producer for television. After working for twelve years as a reporter for the Baltimore Sun City Desk he published his first book, Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets. He also co-wrote, with Ed Burns, The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood. Both books were made into television series but it wasn’t until he created The Wire that everyone began to sit up and take notice.Homicide is set in Baltimore where murder, stabbings, and shooting are daily events. David Simon was the first reporter ever to gain unlimited access to a homicide unit, and this book is a compelling foray into the culture of violence. The narrative follows a veteran investigator, a detective and a rookie as they tackle the terrible murder of an eleven-year-old girl against the backdrop of the criminal underworld. This book was to set the scene for what would eventually become The Wire.The Wire has been described as the greatest television series of all time and yet it hasn’t won any major awards. Perhaps it touches on the raw nerve that is "conservative America". Perhaps it is closer to the truth, the awful truth of poverty, corruption, power, addiction, and the useless pandering to the mainstream views at the expense of lateral thinking and looking beyond the norm.
There are five series, each season focussing on a different facet of the city of Baltimore (though it could have been set in almost any major city in the world). It starts with the drug trade on the side streets, the corner boys, the killings, the police fighting crime to little or no effect. Series two takes us to the port with shipments of goods coming from all over the world, smuggling, longshoremen working on the docks; series three casts a sharp eye on the city government and the bureaucracy that stalls and thwarts at every turn, decisions made purely with an eye on votes; series four (my favourite) is set in the school system where every drug dealer starts his apprenticeship in a world where there are little or no choices for the young and the teachers who try, year after year, to make a difference; and series five introduces the print media with journalists, editors, sponsors, codes of ethics often bypassed in the hunt for a good story. Through it all, the Baltimore Police work the beat and the drug dealers peddle their wares.
If that sounds a little harrowing then remember that behind the serious nature of the stories there are a wonderful cast of characters who bring Baltimore to your front room with humour, with deadly precision, with raucous sexuality, with unbelievable honesty, with cunning, with chilling care. There is a fabulous mix of actors from all ethnic backgrounds (no token woman to make a scene look sexy, no token black man to make it look authentic) and after a short while you stop seeing the colour and the gender and start seeing the character. Neither are the characters simply good or evil, corrupt or honest, hardworking or lazy: they are real, like you and me with a little bit of everything in the mix.
There are so many characters who made the show a winner for me: McNulty, the bad boy hero; Bubbles, who had the cards stacked against him; Omar, the sexiest dude to have ever lived; Kima, the woman who gave as good as she got; Snoop, the deadliest girl in town; Pryzbylewski, a guy who surprised the life out of me; and Namond, Duquan, Michael, and Randy, the kids from hell who grew up on set and stole the show.
Go on, watch it and learn. Maybe it will open your eyes, maybe it will change how you think.
Tip: watch it with the sub titles, at least in the beginning. The language of the sub culture is often not easy to follow (unless you are a rip roaring drug dealer yourself, of course) but after a while you’ll get the hang of it, let it flow, learn the language of the streets. D’ya feel me???
Labels: David Simon, Homicide, The Wire
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