i'm getting the vapors

some women are turned on by looks. some by money, some by who knows what.

i'm turned on by bill moyers and david simon (together no less)

it was a very sad day indeed when the wire wrapped.
(although i hear tell they are going to work on another show about new orleans. i will keep my fingers and everything else crossed - that it's true)

Bill Moyers Talks Drugs, Crime, Journalism and Democracy with Creator of 'The Wire'
By Bill Moyers, Bill Moyers Journal.

Editor's Note: The following is the transcript from Bill Moyers' recent interview with newspaper beat reporter turned television writer and producer David Simon. You can watch the interview here.

BILL MOYERS: Welcome to the Journal.

"When television history is written," one critic says, "Little else will rival 'The Wire.'"And when historians come to tell the story of America in our time, I'll wager they will not be able to ignore this remarkable and compelling portrayal of life in our cities.

Take a look at this scene:

[...]

DETECTIVE JIMMY MCNULTY: Let me understand you, every Friday night you and your boys will shoot crap right? And every Friday night your pal Snot Boogie he'd wait 'till there was cash on the ground and then he'd grab the money and run away? You let him do that?

WITNESS: If we'd catch him we'd beat his ass but ain't nobody let it go past that.

DETECTIVE JIMMY MCNULTY: I gotta ask you, if every time Snot Boogie would grab the money and run away why'd you even let him in the game?

WITNESS: What?

DETECTIVE JIMMY MCNULTY: Snot Boogie always stole the money, why'd you let him play?

WITNESS: Got to. This America, man.

[...]

BILL MOYERS: For five seasons on HBO, this critically acclaimed series held up a mirror to the other America — the America we couldn't see anywhere else on television. It reveals a lot about what's happened to us in recent years, and it comes from a surprising source — a newspaper beat reporter turned television writer and producer.

David Simon and his creative team, including Ed Burns, a cop turned teacher, used the City of Baltimore and the drug wars there as a metaphor for America's urban underbelly........

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.........

we have to wait until jan 6th

for the wire

for the LAST season of the wire to begin. that along with john from cincinnati are two of THE best shows on television. of course john has been cancelled (and i know i said i'd do a review of the show and i will, eventually) and the wire will go away too.

the wire was real. the wire was gritty. the wire was down deep. the wire used REAL language. it was hard to tell the bad guys from the good guys.

the stories for each season followed a different path. drug dealers in season one (the dialog of the scene where deangelo teaches chess to some kids is one of THE best written secenes i have ever come across), longshoremen in season two, politics in season three, the school system/school kids in season four. who knows what we'll get in season five. it is bitter sweet for me. i can't wait for it to start, but i don't want it to end.

Down to 'The Wire': It's a Wrap for Gritty TV Series
Real Life and Fiction Jostle for a Final Time As Acclaimed HBO Show Shoots Last Episode


By Teresa Wiltz Washington Post Staff Writer
It was early still -- about 10 p.m. on Friday -- and somewhere in Columbia, David Simon was giving a tour of the sights: There, he said, pointing, was the Baltimore mayor's office. Over there? The city's Western District police headquarters, and there, that little closet of a room, "that can be the visiting room at Jessup." Pause. "Or the jail. Depends. We just redecorate."
As he stood on a platform, taking in his world, it was hard to ignore the irony: For the past two years, a good chunk of "The Wire," the HBO show that critics have praised for the grittiness of its inner-city v?rit?, has been filmed in an anonymous soundstage in the burbs -- a soundstage that reportedly will be turned into a massive Wegmans Food Market...........
............"The Wire" has always struggled in the ratings; last season it averaged 1.6 million viewers per episode. But it's always enjoyed the admiration of critics, who praised it as being the "most authentic epic ever on television." Notwithstanding the giant soundstage, a good 50 percent of the show was shot on location in Baltimore, with real-life characters frequently sprinkled in with the fictional ones. Like former drug kingpin Melvin Williams, whom co-producer and writer Ed Burns, an ex-Baltimore cop, once arrested in a big takedown. Felicia "Snoop" Pearson, who did time as a teenager for killing a 16-year-old girl, made her acting debut last season, playing an assassin. Even Robert Ehrlich, when he was Maryland governor, made a cameo -- as a state trooper in the governor's office last season................