Mortgage Partner (aka Cranial Midget) and I are hurriedly catching up on season 4 of "The Wire" so we can hop into bed with the latest and final season that begins tonight. If you're not familiar with the show, go rent the first season and prepare to cringe. A lot. As with many other HBO shows, this stuff is not for the faint of heart.
What it will give you is a glimpse into the world of cops, gangsters, and politicians. As someone who lives in one KC's more historic hoods, I treat "The Wire" as a lesson in living in the big city. This scares me just a little, but I'd rather know what's out there than live in an ivory tower (or a beige box in a 'burb) and not consider what goes on in the rest of the world.
There is something just a little strange about finding reality in scripted television, but I know the little piece of heaven MP and I have scraped together isn't the only way people live. I guess you could call it roadkill fascination--like a mess so bad you can't help but look at it. Which is probably why most of us watch reality TV if you think about it.
Only "The Wire" is better than that. People are nastier, funnier, and more believable than they are in real life. And you will find yourself loving them--even the gun-toting thugs--because you realize even they have a little humanity in them. Most def.
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It seems so odd because of the infrequency with which it happens: a television show that elucidates and enlightens - and therefore has the potential, anyway - to foment social change. Here's a quote about The Wire from a Slate (and NPR?) TV critic:
The Wire, which has just begun its fourth season on HBO, is surely the best TV show ever broadcast in America. This claim isn't based on my having seen all the possible rivals for the title, but on the premise that no other program has ever done anything remotely like what this one does, namely to portray the social, political, and economic life of an American city with the scope, observational precision, and moral vision of great literature.
I told Sweetness that I thought it was the most important show since "All in the Family," which may have been the first truly "important" TV show.
I fantasize about what might happen if, say, the top 20 or 30 most populous cities were able to replicate the quality and scope and depth of this show, using their own cities as a backdrop.
Baltimore is so much better now than it was 15 years ago (and the show largely deals with the recent past, I think), that it's hard to determine its real-world impact. It is such an unblinking mirror that I find it hard to believe most people would not become much more engaged as agents of change after watching "The Wire - Kansas City" or "The Wire - Wherever."
I know it has played a part in getting me more involved with local causes to try to improve the city I love.
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