Trepidations

Season Five, Episode one got off to a strong start. At the same time, contemplating the enormity of the narrative task now facing the show's creators, it seems hard to believe that they're going to be able to reel this whole thing in in a dozen episodes. Not that I expect The Wire to do anything as trite as "wrap up" all the threads into a tidy package, but surely something needs to happen. But with Michael and Dukie from season four still in the mix, then the political plot thread, the new newspaper thread, the cops, the co-op, Omar, and hints that Avon Barksdale and at least some elements of the Greek's crew coming back into view, it all just seems like . . . a lot of ground to cover.

Comments

The McNulty story arc is depressing.

Almost devastating

Posted by hlah | January 7, 2008 11:50 AM

I believe I heard that HBO parsimoniously trimmed this season to a mere 10 episodes.

Posted by infirm | January 7, 2008 11:52 AM

The Newspaper stuff really slowed the episode down and felt very epositiony. But overall I feel very positive about it.

Posted by AJ | January 7, 2008 11:53 AM

Guys, please don't spoil anything for those of us who cannot watch HBO each week or cannot watch this show until it's on DVD. Be liberal with those SPOILER ALERTS, please.

Posted by tinisoli | January 7, 2008 11:53 AM

> contemplating the enormity of the narrative task

"enormousness" I believe there dude. Unless you think the show is really, really, really bad on a monumental scale.

Cranky

Posted by Cranky Observer | January 7, 2008 11:56 AM

[MINOR SPOILER, EVEN MINORER JOKE]
I am a bit concerned that the newspaper scenario is somewhat heavy-handed. I certainly hope that those characters will be allowed the moral complexity and ambiguity given to the other characters in previous seasons. Especially the nasty, over-ambitious white guy reporter. You just know that within an episode or two he's going to complain that he went to Columbia J-School and was on The Crimson (or, perhaps, the Yalie Daily). As a fellow alum of Mr. Yglesias, I am concerned about the representation of Ivy Leaguers in the media. I'm thinking also of Twofer on 30 Rock. While it may be true that many graduates of elite eastern institutions are snobby, effete and entitled, there are several who are not, and their stories are tragically underrepresented!

Posted by infirm | January 7, 2008 11:59 AM

Matt,

THERE ARE ONLY 9 MORE EPISODES!

This season is truncated, remember? So your feeling about the narrative is more than you know. I think they'll do this the way they do everything. While they will tell a story, I doubt it will be a complete one. I think in the end we are going to have plenty unresolved.

Posted by MrProliferation | January 7, 2008 11:59 AM

the only thing that didn't work for me was Herc with Levy. I didn't buy it at all.

great episode though

Posted by josh | January 7, 2008 12:10 PM

I'm guessing that there will be a lots of little moments of face time for the characters from all the previous seasons. But those moments may not add up to much in terms of this season's narrative.

Posted by albany layman | January 7, 2008 12:22 PM

[spoilers]

Can we just take a split second and talk about how incredible that opening was with the Bunk exercising his craft? I was floored by how the writers took the hype of "the greatest tv show ever broadcast" and opened their master-piece season with a great joke! I loved it! What did everyone else think?

Posted by Sandy | January 7, 2008 12:39 PM

Maybe. On the other hand, re-watching earlier seasons I'm struck by how jam-packed they are with disparate elements...and how deftly those elements are juggled. So, I don't know.

I am looking forward to seeing Stavros again, but I'm bummed about McNulty.

(Semi-OT: Netflixed Season 2 of Tru Calling (not great, not bad, but hey--Eliza Dushku!), and in one episode a character makes a phone call pretending to be the head of the Harbor Patrol named...Admiral McNulty! Has to be a Wire reference.)

Posted by Tom Hilton | January 7, 2008 12:49 PM

I like the newspaper stuff. Clark Johnson is real good as the editor. I am optimistic about season 5.

Posted by lemmy caution | January 7, 2008 12:50 PM

Guys, please don't spoil anything for those of us who cannot watch HBO each week or cannot watch this show until it's on DVD. Be liberal with those SPOILER ALERTS, please.

Here's an idea, rather than making ridiculous and selfish requests, don't read posts about The Wire. To do my part I promise not to sneak spoilers into your email or leave them in your voice mail.

Posted by crack | January 7, 2008 12:52 PM

Sandy,

That opening bit with Bunk was a shout-out to Homicide fans -- they did an episode with exactly the same game on that show, too.

Might even have been Clark Johnson's character, Meldrick, who was running it, but I can't remember.

Posted by pesto | January 7, 2008 1:07 PM

what was the hint of Avon returning? I didn't notice that...

Posted by don | January 7, 2008 1:17 PM

Maybe it's just me, but the S5 opening was by far the darkest of the season openers. In every other season, there were at least some "good times" before everything went to shit. I guess maybe the Fat Face Rick story in the Sun was supposed to be that, but considering how bad everything else was (even the Bubbles storyline, a 'success!', wasn't exactly sweetness and light.)

Posted by Pooh | January 7, 2008 1:21 PM

Hey, THE WIRE lovers! Can any of you explain to me why your show doesn't get better ratings? I'm not trying to stir anything up. I seriously would like to see some explanations for why the show you all proclaim as self-evidently the "best ever" can't get anyone to watch it. It's on HBO and it's gotten all the critical praise any show could want...but it still doesn't have a lot of viewers. Why?

Mike

Posted by MBunge | January 7, 2008 1:36 PM

MBunge:

I think the lack of ratings is due to a combination of the fact that (a) until the premier of Season 4, HBO did next to nothing to promote it (esp relative to Sopranos, 6 feet under, etc. and even dud's like John in Cincinnati were hyped more) and (b) the story arcs are so long and involved that you truly can't just jump into the show and watch an episode here and there (this is much more pronounced than even with the Sopranos). So, if it had been promoted heavily at the outset, maybe more people would have watched it from the beginning and would therefore still be watching.

Also, I don't think we should totally discount David Simon's theory that people aren't interested in seeing a show about black culture with so many black actors.

Posted by Goldberg | January 7, 2008 1:49 PM

Why does no one watch 'The Wire'?

Well the show is a dense, complex serial, making it almost impossible to bring new viewers onboard - so you can only lose audience; the cast is predominantly black - widely believed to be a ratings killer. And its also pretty damn bleak.

Posted by Danyl Mclauchlan | January 7, 2008 1:57 PM

I think it's also due to the fact that many Americans aren't interested in a show about the problems of cities beyond those which inconvenience tourists.

There isn't going to be a Wire cookbook.

Posted by Fritz | January 7, 2008 1:59 PM

Rigging up a Xerox machine and placing sheets of paper in pre-taped with "lie" on it is straight from a real life incident chronicled in the David Simon book "Homicide".

The detectives that did it were disciplined, by the way.

Posted by calipygian | January 7, 2008 2:36 PM

Don: w/r/t Avon, in the sneak preview for ep2, there's a shot of Marlo coming to speak to Avon in prison. It's blink and you'll miss it, and there's obviously no indication of why the meeting is happening, but the smart money -- given the Marlo vs. Prop Joe thread, with Marlo checking into the Greek's crew to target the source of Prop Joe's power -- is that it's, um, about what Barksdale knows about Prop Joe and/or the Greek.

Posted by Spenc/r Ackerm/n | January 7, 2008 2:41 PM

So has anyone else squinted at the fake newspaper headlines in the print ads for "The Wire" Season 5, e.g. the one that ran in this Sunday's NYT Magazine? There is something in there about a serial killer preying on the homeless, and when that is coupled with McNulty's expression of shock upon seeing a specific dead body (from the preview of next week's episode), and with the sight of Bubbles heading out of his sister's basement toward the end of episode 1, duffle over his shoulder, I begin to fear that next week's episode may be most...depressing...evar.

Posted by Charlie Murtaugh | January 7, 2008 3:03 PM

I don't know if I could forgive Simon and co. if they did that.

Posted by Pooh | January 7, 2008 3:44 PM

I don't know if I could forgive Simon and co. if they did that.
Agreed. If they go with a serial killer plotline I may have to light myself on fire.

Posted by UberMitch | January 7, 2008 3:49 PM

Agreed. If they go with a serial killer plotline I may have to light myself on fire.

And especially if Bubbles is one of his victims. The Wire does not do 'random' shit.

Posted by Pooh | January 7, 2008 3:53 PM

MBunge,

I think a big factor is that if you didn't start from the begining you have to pass on the broadcasts and catch it on DVD from the begining. I caught on late and watched the first 3 seasons on DVD over the summer before season 4, I think there are a lot of us out there. It would be interesting to find rental and purchase stats.

Posted by Eric K | January 7, 2008 3:56 PM

The serial killer plotline is a done deal, not my idle speculation -- the reviewer on "Fresh Air" mentioned it last week, but he thought it fit well with the overall plot. (Said reviewer has been down with "The Wire" from the beginning, he is not a recent convert.) My only concern is whether Bubs fits into it. As for Simon not doing random shit, he actually had all of season two hinge on a couple of rather random events: Sabotka showing up Valchek with the stained glass window and McNulty finding the dead prostitute in the water. Sine qua non.

Posted by Charlie Murtaugh | January 7, 2008 4:16 PM

I suppose I could see a good plot with Bubbles and others killed, with the press reporting it as a serial killer while it is actually not. That makes sense with the show. But an actual serial killer? Ugh. What's that line from Adaptation? "The only thing more overdone than split personalities is serial killers," maybe.

With false serial killer reporting however, Simon would get to take his shots at the press and show how reporting does not actually reflect reality, and there would be a reason for major crimes to be started up again.

Posted by UberMitch | January 7, 2008 4:57 PM

I gotta say McNulty was a total bore when he stopped drinking, he went from being the most interesting to the least.

So I'm glad McNulty is back on the sauce.

Loved the first episode, really loved the Newspaper stuff. Can't wait to see how it all comes together.

Posted by Drink up McNulty | January 7, 2008 5:49 PM

I think Beadie is going to shitcan drunk McNulty. She previously dumped a no-good husband if I remember my season 2 correctly.

Posted by witless chum | January 7, 2008 6:23 PM

No, her husband left her, as I recall.

Posted by sk | January 7, 2008 6:41 PM

"I gotta say McNulty was a total bore when he stopped drinking, he went from being the most interesting to the least.

So I'm glad McNulty is back on the sauce."

Actually, that's a deeper point than it might seem at first glance. While McNulty is probably also a congenital alcoholic and would have been one no matter where or what other choices he had made, he also drinks for a reason (or rather, many closely-linked reasons). He's partially an alcoholic because, quite frankly, without it the life of a highly intelligent yet undereducated and low status blue-collar male in a third-tier town in economic decline is grotesquely boring. Freamon's sideline of making dollhouse furniture gives you an idea of a supposedly wholesome pastime. The other cops either also drink just as heavily (Bunk), chase sex (Kima, Bunk), participate in machine politics (Daniels, Valchek, Rawls), putter around their houses (which we see more of in Homicide) or.......(it's not too clear what Carver or Herc do in their spare time).

Confronted with those stellar choices, lots of people would just drink like a fish.

Posted by burritoboy | January 7, 2008 8:22 PM

Potential-Spoilers

Just watched the second episode on demand today. The serial killer plot-line is definitely going to be of the non-cliche variety. Think of Bunk's quote at the beginning of the season:

"The bigger the lie, the more they believe." - Bunk Moreland

This season is going to be the darkest and angriest yet.

Posted by Matt12 | January 7, 2008 10:14 PM

If my editor said "There's a million stories out there in the naked city. I'm only asking for 3 or 4" I'd definitely want to kick him in the nuts. Especially the "naked city" part. I have worked in newsrooms where people really were that gung ho and idealistic, but come on, "naked city"? What does that even mean?

I chased a fire because I saw smoke from the newsroom window once, almost exactly like on the show. It turned out to be a riding mower that had caught on fire. Not enough to do a story on, but my photo made the front page. Yes it was a small paper and a slow newsday, but who wouldn't rather look at the burned-out shell of a former riding mower than the greet-and-grin that otherwise would have been the day's art? I'm a lot prouder of that photo than I am of some of the more substantial stories I did after someone sent me a press release.

Posted by superdude | January 8, 2008 2:56 AM

could be a Dassin reference.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040636/

Posted by B | January 8, 2008 6:19 AM

Yeah, the "there are a million stories in the naked city. This is one of them" line is pretty famous. I'm surprised you didn't catch it.

I think the Newspaper stuff will pick up. The "new" section is often a bit slow and disorienting at the beginning, as you're forced to (once again) get used to something like 8-10 newly-introduced major and minor characters.

And it fits perfectly with the "big lie" theme.

Posted by Demosthenes | January 8, 2008 2:08 PM