The Wire! and other musings [tv]

Look, I’m not exactly coming with groundbreaking commentary here when I say that The Wire is incredible. It is. It’s undeniably among the finest things to ever grace a TV screen, if even a screen period. My friend Mike puts it well when he calls it one of the “best works of art ever created,” and that he “honestly believes that, that it will stand the test of time as a snapshot of where we are in American history right now.” He’s completely right. It’s THAT good. Did I mention that it’s good?

Why is it so good? Again, if you’ve seen The Wire, this is all going to be obvious to you. But the world they create is so vast and personal, intimate even, while at the same time being faceless and endless. The character development is probably the best I’ve ever seen done. There isn’t a hokey TV writing trick in the book here, every character gets his/her share of face time to show their motivations and purpose, what drives them. And each season crescendos in a beautiful way, where all the pressure bubbling under the surface of each case isn’t resolved by some crazy ass gunfight, it’s resolved in poignant, sometimes ugly and unsatisfying ways. I could go on and on, but I’ll stop because I’d just be gushing.

But more than all of that, it’s kind of amazing that The Wire managed to live up to the massive fucking hype it’s received over the course of five years. I watched about three total seasons of The Sopranos, and I loved the show. But I didn’t love it nearly as much as everyone else in the world did. When I heard about The Wire being talked about in the same breath as that show, I thought inevitably it would disappoint a teensy bit…that I could acknowledge its greatness but regrettably not ENJOY it as much as everyone else did. But it managed to meet every facet of hype, and even exceed them in various ways. Can you think of another experience you’ve had with music, movies, books, tv shows, anything in life where that’s happened? I honestly can’t right now. Feel free to leave it in the comments.

It’s funny, I put up an away message last night that said “The Wire has taken over my life,” and within half an hour I received six IM’s from people who were gushing over the show and legitimately jealous that I got to experience it for the first time (one of whom, I hadn’t spoken to on IM for over a year and a half). I’m happy to be a part of that club now, content to gush over McNulty and Omar and Avon Barksdale for hours at a time. Again, not the most illuminating revelation, but you can call me a fan for life.

Have I hyped up this show for all the nonbelievers out there? Good. Now go fucking see it meet the expectations with a vengeance.