bubber1992

Possibly my favorite TV show of all-time for the courage of its writing. First, its worth acknowledging the incredible quality that HBO has been putting out there for two decades. In this instance, "The Wire" offers a trove of insightful and prescient social commentary, becoming more relevant with age, as police brutality and racial tension boil over in our urban centers. What I appreciate about the "The Wire" is its courage; it does not blame the plight of urban Baltimore on the innercity inhabitants - mostly african-americans - but rather on all the stakeholders who profit from the churn of the urban economy. The drug lawyer is just as complicit as the drug dealer. The ethically compromised labor leader no less self-interested than the Prosecutor and the Police Chief. Everybody is trying to get their slice of the pie. The Wire is most deft in slowly shifting the lens angle so that, at different times, you find yourself sympathizing with the drug dealers, the police, the politicians, and the public school teachers. But everybody gets their turn. In the end, you realize everyone is innocent, and everyone is guilty. It might be most useful to see The Wire as the most realistic, grounded depiction of the systemic racism that we've all struggled to describe through other art forms. In all, "The Wire" is a thunderous contribution to our understanding of the underlying values of our urban center economies, systemic racism, the frailties of government, and perhaps most poignantly, the ultimately fallacy of "fighting crime". Because, in the end, whose crime you gonna fight?