i've pre-screened this article (rick)

and it's safe to read. it doesn't give anything away (AND it even says 'the wire' is barack obama's favorite show).. a good analysis of the show.

'The Wire' -- Why Criticize One of the Best Crime Shows in TV History?
By Brian Cook, In These Times
............In a recent story in The Nation, Chris Hayes used 2,200-plus words to argue why progressives should back Sen. Barack Obama. I'll use only seven: Obama's favorite TV show is The Wire. It's certainly true, as Hayes noted, that Obama, like every presidential candidate, won't be saying one word about the prison-industrial complex or the disastrous consequences of the "war on drugs." But it's heartening to think that at least he's tuning in to one of the few public forums that fiercely drags such issues into our consciousness.
Throughout its five seasons on HBO, The Wire has created riveting fictional drama out of the residents living, policing and selling dope on the streets of Baltimore. Described by its co-creator David Simon as the ultimate "anti-cop show, a rebellion against the horseshit police procedurals afflicting American television," The Wire obliterates easy dichotomies of "good cops" and "bad drug dealers." Instead, it builds morally complex characters on both sides of the law whose individual decisions are largely shaped by political and economic forces outside their control. After detailing the ravages of the drug trade in its first season, the show broadened its scope in each subsequent season, examining the city's collapsing industrial sector (and unions), political system, public schools and, finally, journalistic institutions.
The result has been a show that can't seem to garner enough critical accolades: "Extraordinary" (San Jose Mercury News), "revolutionary" (Entertainment Weekly), "Dickensian" (New York Times) and "the best television show ever" (Salon and Slate). And yet quietly simmering beneath this loving consensus, there have been recent murmurs of discontent and unease with the show's portrayal of inner-city America...........

tonight

the last season of the wire begins.

it is THE best show on television, bar none. the writing is beyond the pale. the writing is REAL. the cast is superb. the storylines amazing. i'll miss it when it's over

'The Wire,' Crackling With Heat
By Tom Shales
Merely facing hopeless truths mitigates hopelessness. Crises become somehow less daunting for having been confronted, and therein lies one of the triumphs of HBO's "The Wire," returning Sunday for its fifth and, sad to say, final season. "The Wire" proves again, and with lacerating brilliance, that blurring the line between fact and fiction can be a very good thing. Good television, good conduct, good news. Set and shot in Baltimore -- although at least one civic leader reportedly had concerns about the show -- "The Wire" started out being mostly about drug traffic in the city, especially the most squalid and impoverished parts of it. But over the years, "The Wire" has grandly expanded in scope. Now it's about everything -- or everything that's likely to have gone wrong in a big American city of the 21st century. Thus another of its accomplishments, one that can be stated simply: It succeeds strikingly at getting what's wrong just right.........

snoop, NO NOT THAT one

the wire is the most amazing show on television. season four is finished and they say season five (which just started filming) will be the last. that is a tragedy. all four seasons were different. all four focused on a different element of baltimore. from drug dealers to longshorement. the constant theme is the PO-LEESE.

snoop is an amazing character. you can tell she (at first i thought snoop was a male. it's very difficult to tell she's a woman) came up through the streets and not some performing arts high school. she is a stone cold killer on the show working her magic (chill inducing) with a NAIL GUN.

turns out snoop did some time. she did some time for killing another woman. snoop was 14 at the time. FOURTEEN. talk about tragedy.

i wasn't there. i don't know what went down. i do know my thoughts and prayers go out to the family and friends of kia toomer.

i also know 'the wire' is the absolute best there is out there.

The Role of Her Life
Snoop Pearson Is a Killer on HBO's 'The Wire.' A Victim's Family Can't Bear to Watch.

By Teresa WiltzWashington Post Staff WriterFriday, March 16, 2007; Page C01
BALTIMORE
The thing is, Felicia "Snoop" Pearson's life wasn't supposed to look like this. At all. Some folks think it shouldn't look like this. An eye for an eye, and all that that entails.

But on rare occasions, fate decides to indulge in a little rearranging of centrifugal forces, turning lives inside out and granting the object of its attention a massive, cosmic do-over.............

..........Four years out of prison, age 24, Snoop wasn't living a life lined up along the straight and narrow. She was back in the game, peddling drugs, running with the rough boys, an undersize woman with an oversize swagger. Not much good was coming her way.
Until the night that Snoop spotted "Omar," the gay thug on the acclaimed HBO show "The Wire," at a club. Or maybe he spotted her. Accounts differ............

"They saved my life," Felicia "Snoop" Pearson says of the producers of HBO's "The Wire" who hired her to play a hardened street character very much like, and named after, her.
Photo Credit: By Marvin Joseph -- The Washington Post