Wire, The (TV Show): The Complete Series (5 Seasons) (DVD)

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Note: In the following joint review, Hock provides his thoughts on the series proper, with Jason writing up the Video, Audio, Extras, and Parting Thoughts.

For the most realistic depiction of drug addiction in America´s inner cities and its devastating effects on one West Baltimore family, one should catch the HBO Emmy-winning miniseries, "The Corner". For the most realistic depiction of life on the streets of Baltimore from both sides of the fence (the cops on one side and the drug dealers on the other), look no further than the new HBO crime series, "The Wire". It is therefore not a big surprise to me when I found out that the same screenwriter, David Simon, created both programs. In 1988, Simon, then a police reporter for The Baltimore Sun, spent that year accompanying Baltimore´s homicide squads as they investigated various murders around the city. From his experiences, Simon wrote an Edgar Award-winning book, "Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets" which went on to inspire the critically acclaimed 1993 television series "Homicide: Life on the Street", another Baltimore-based television police drama.

See all the David Simon connections?

Good, because now you know where all three television programs get their reality check from. Apart from the now-canceled NBC series "Homicide: Life on the Street", FX´s "The Shield" is as gritty and edgy as you will ever get on regular cable television. I love the show´s filming style using handheld cameras, which gives "The Shield" a documentary and almost reality show-like look. However, it sorely missed the one thing that would have made the show ultimately more realistic--swearing. It is an absolute downer when you consider a show that is as potent as "The Shield" goes on the air without the obligatory curse word uttered at least once. That, unfortunately, is the reality of regular cable television programming, which, although not as scrutinized as the major networks, still have to conform to certain decency standards. Nevertheless, the rules completely change when you step up to a pay cable channel like HBO where profanities and nudity are permissible, which gives the channel a huge advantage when trying to attract an increasingly numb television audience looking for better programs to watch. Not only that, the original shows on HBO are darker, better scripted and edgier when compared to other channels. As a result, HBO consistently leads the television community in garnering major awards for its original series, mini-series and movies.

"The Wire" is one of the very few HBO series that has yet to be recognized by the industry but I am pretty sure that will change in the near future. The first season runs for a total of thirteen episodes and unlike most television cop dramas, "The Wire" consists of one single continuous story that runs the entire length of the season. Think of the entire season as a book and each episode as one chapter of that book. This format is reminiscent of another acclaimed television courtroom drama from 1995 called "Murder One", which follows a single case for the entire season. The serialized nature of "The Wire", like Fox´s "24", demands full weekly commitments from a television audience that is increasingly harder to please. In that scenario, we should all be thankful for the release of entire seasons of a television show on DVD as one can watch the episodes at any pace one likes.

Unlike "24", which almost always ends with a cliffhanger on every episode, "The Wire" does not employ such a tactic to hook the audience. Instead, the show moves at its own deliberate pace and grabs the audience´s attention by delving deeply into rich character growth and careful plot development. Never have I seen a more diverse set of characters coupled with an intricate plot on a single show than on "The Wire". It opens with the murder trial of D´Angelo Barksdale (Larry Gilliard, Jr.), an up and coming mid-level drug dealer who is also the nephew of the city´s biggest and more importantly, most low-profile drug kingpin, Avon Barksdale (Wood Harris). After D´Angelo gets off because a witness, clearly intimidated by Barksdale´s hoods, recants her testimony, the judge in the case, Judge Phelan (Peter Gerety) calls in Detective Jimmy McNulty (Dominic West), wondering why McNulty is attending the Barksdale trial that he has no involvement in. McNulty, a very competent and ultimately also a very frustrated homicide detective, launches into a rant about how the Barksdale gang now controls most of the city´s drug trade at the Towers and the low-rise projects and has been also suspected of many homicides in the past few years. The problem is, according to McNulty, no one in the police force is working on bringing the gang down. Thinking nothing of his conversation with the Judge, McNulty goes back to work.

Soon enough, the shit hits the fan. Apparently the Judge made a call to Deputy Commissioner Burrell (Frankie R. Faison) inquiring about Barksdale and why no action has been taken against his gang. Apparently, none of the higher-ups have any inkling about whom Barksdale is and get completely blindsided by the Judge. Obviously, Burrell brings his wrath down on McNulty´s superior, Major Rawls (John Doman), who in turn, comes down hard on McNulty for starting all this trouble by mouthing off to the Judge. So, to please the Judge, Lieutenant Daniels (Lance Reddick) from Narcotics is ordered to put together a detail to bring down Barksdale. To accurately reflect how much importance the police department place on this investigation, Daniels´ ragtag team is shoved down into the basement to use as a temporary office. Apart from tapping his own people from the Narcotics division, led by Detective Shakima Greggs (Sonja Sohn), Daniels is stuck with McNulty and a bunch of other rejects that none of the other departments wanted. Obviously, someone wanted to send a message about the priority of the Barksdale investigation.

After this set-up in the first episode, the next twelve revolves around the team´s efforts, despite all the obstacles, in bringing Barksdale to justice. For me, the entire series is an amazing journey because the scenarios are so authentic and it does not gloss over the crummy and tedious details of police work. In a revealing and quite frankly, a darkly funny scene, we get to see McNulty and his partner Detective Bunk Moreland (Wendell Pierce) work a 6-month old murder scene like it was less than a day old. These two detectives obviously know what they are doing. Without uttering any word other than various versions of the f*** expletive, the duo is able to identify where the shooter was, how the victim was shot and even find the missing bullet lodged in the refrigerator and the spent shell. And to think that no one else in the department could come up with anything for six months.