The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

[ad hoc]

Just finished watching it this weekend, and ...fuck me. There is no way that Series 5 can even come close to that, so as far as I'm concerned The Wire Series 4 is the best TV ever made. They may have needed to have series 1-3 to build everything up enough to make Series 4, but it wipes the floor with anything I've seen before.

But bleak or what?

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Purv and I are going to start this series at the same time, but we'll inevitably go out of synch, so can we observe a convention of posting

EPISODE NUMBER ('EPISODE NAME')

every time we move onto discussion of a 'new' (to us) episode (whether a direct appraisal of the episode or the new issues raised by it)?

Cheers.

[Er Liquidatore]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

SR - you are going to love this series. Really love it.

[jason voorhees]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Again, season 4 is a documentary.

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Have you started yet, Purv? I haven't even managed to buy the discs yet, so you're probably gonna get a head-start on me.

[Purves Grundy]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Not yet - domestic and professional stuff means we've stalled at 3/9.

We do have the discs though, so we're still good to synchronize this.

[jason voorhees]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

My warnnig to the both of youse is DO NOT OPEN ANY YOUTUBE LINKS UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. NO MATTER WHAT. (I mean ANY.)

Those assholes will link videos on the side of the video you open, with titles like DEATH OF (*Insert name here*) that are complete spoilers. I got 3 spoilers from that alone.

[Anton Gramscescu]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

People *die* in The Wire? Oh, thanks for the spolier, shitbird.

Have we discussed the Kima Greggs - Jay Landsmann sex scene yet? I thought it was touchingly filmed. And also, that he had a surprisingly good touch for a big man.

[nefertiti]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

It was very moving AG. But then when Carcetti orders the hit on Jay and poor Kima was crushed beneath him...

[ad hoc]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Just to mention something that I did actually notice about Series 4, and which if you stretch a point might be considered a spoiler, but really isn't
*
*
*
There's no sex in series 4.

[nefertiti]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

That's very intersting, ad hoc, and I hadn't noticed that. I wonder if that's because it's set in the education system. So it can be watched by the people it's about.

[Purves Grundy]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Spoiler Free No More

Series 4 Episode 1 - Boys of Summer

Great opening scene with that terrifyingly inarticulate girl from Marlo's crew getting the nail gun.

It's good that four series on they are well and truly confident enough with their audience to offer no laborious reintroduction scenes. The cards have been shuffled, Herc's on security and there's an imbecilic new lieutenant in charge of teh detail, but you've got to join the dots yourself (the way I completely failed to w.r.t. that girl from the Stanfield crew).

The Stanfield crew looks interesting in that there appears to be no brains in the organisation. I mean, Marlo is ice cold and he's shrewd but he's so disorganised on the business side that all his money is still dirty. Like back in the day when Avon couldn't pay for medical care for his brother. He's going to need to sort that out. I imagine he'll get Levy on his payroll.

As for the gang of kids this series looks like it's going to focus on: well, I can't imagihe it being a picnic for them. This playful Dennis the Menace stuff with piss/water bombs, bug bombs and pigeon traps is already getting beaten out of them. This shit's going to be harrowing.

Carcetti is still a waste of space, but I really can't read the intentions of the writing and production team. Is he meant to be likeable? A bit of a rough diamond? Because he strikes me as a complete scrotum, only instead of testicles he's padded out by a pair of balls called self-regard and self-pity. Maybe I'm misinterpreting their intentions and that's how he's meant to be viewed but I sort of get the feeling that I'm seeing a difference in teh way we in the UK regard our politicians compared to how people in teh states do (or would like to, or would like to think they do, or would like to think they'd like to).

Best version of the theme since Series 1.

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Probably the best first episode so far, and definitely the best opening scene. I failed to recognise the DIY enthusiast as Snoop, the pillion-passenger assassin from Series 3. In fact, I thought it was a boy. What an extraordinary voice.

That scene also shows how right Purv is about Marlo & co's sloppiness. As soon as one of the bodies gets found, any cop with half a brain is gonna go straight to the nearest big DIY megastore and ask "So, had anyone acting suspiciously, not appearing to be buying tools for their intended purpose, and throwing a lot of cash around?"

This whole thing with the kids, I feel, ties in with Avon and Stringer's nostalgic waterfront reminiscences near the end of Series 3 (getting into capers, shoplifting in malls and running for their lives, etc). We're all-too-blatantly invited to see the children as a nascent Barksdale Organisation, with their piss bomb armoury mirroring Avon's weapons cache, with that little fat kid (Randy?) selling sweets on the corner like a junior D'Angelo (right down to his moral qualms when he finds out he's been indirectly responsible for a murder), and with the kid with the long hair reluctantly emerging as a leader because he has cash to bestow upon his 'soldiers' and because he's connected to the real bad boys.

So, it looks like the remnants of the Barksdale crew are now led by Slim Charles at an administrative level, with Bodie the street-level boss. Which is cool, because they're both brilliant characters. In fact, I think I've got a bit of a man-crush on Bodie.

Glad to see Fruit getting what's been coming to him since day one. One of the vilest of the vile.

On the police side of things, nothing especially interesting brewing just yet, although I did enjoy Bunk's gag about Freamon. "Look at that bow-legged motherfucker. I made him walk like that."

The situation with Prez and the dysfunctional school worries me a little, in that I hope it isn’t setting up too much of a cliched Dangerous Minds storyline.

I'm enjoying Carcetti’s cracking-up scenes as the election approaches, very convincingly done, although I agree with Purv. I also don't know what we're 'meant' to make of him, but for me it's still hate-hate-hate.

One thing I didn't quite buy. It's strongly hinted that the boarded-up properties of what was once Hamsterdam contain a whole cemetery's worth of bodies left by Chris and Snoop. Which explains why the murder figures in the Marlo era seem to be low (cos the cops aren't finding any corpses)... but surely there'd have been a few missing persons reports?

[Brandenburger Toro]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Hasn't the missing-persons thing been covered? I don't want to say too much, as I can't remember the chronology perfectly, but it's made very clear why there are no flags going up.

[jason voorhees]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

No Missing Person Reports =

[Anton Gramscescu]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

I'm pretty sure Carcetti was written as a symathetic character. He's not a machine politician, which is the main thing. Perfect, no. Fallible, certainly. Andon the wrong side of the Hamsterdam issue. But basically a clean politician in a town which is very, very dirty.

Purves and SR seem to have a hate-on for him because he engages in empty rhetoric rather than substantive policy issues. But rhetoric matters in a city like Baltimore. The city government is fucked about nine ways from Sunday; in many ways, the mayor's only real power is that of the bully pulpit.

[Soccer Scrimmage]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

It's fun reading these early impressions. Some quite prescient observations, some wrong-tree-barking.

Unless I missed something, I don't think the vacants are meant to be from Hamsterdam specifically. Baltimore has tens of thousands of vacant houses.

Snoop's voice is of course one of several outstanding, authentic examples of the beautiful Baltimore accent in the series, as is Mrs. Donnelly's, Prop Joe's, and Lt. Mello's. I know I've posted a similar sentiment in virtually every Wire thread in OTF history, but the New York accents (and whatever the hell Dominic West's is supposed to be) possessed by many of the actors are extremely annoying for this Marylander.

It's very difficult to participate in this thread without saying, or implying, too much, so I'll stop.

Oh, and I have an extra set of Season 4 dvds (Region 1). If anyone is interested, please PM me.

[Er Liquidatore]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Yeah, you can tell the guy who plays Herc is from New Jersey or wherever. Thankfully as a Brit that sort of shit doesn't bother me too much.

Ah just searched on IMDB, he's from the Bronx.

[Jimmy Bignutz]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Yeah, but it's acknowledged that the character is as well.

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Spoilers, spoilers, come here for your spoilers, we got dem spoilers...

EPISODE 2 'SOFT EYES'

A couple of unexpected 'firsts' in this episode: Cedric laughing (and what a sinister henchman laugh it was), and Marlo actually venturing out from behind his protective cordon to talk to someone (Michael, the kid who'd turned down his money).

One slightly un-Wirelike moment: Clay Davis saying "I'll take any motherfucker's money if he's giving it away for free"; exactly the same line that Randy Wagstaff (Wagstaff!!!) said on the stoop five minutes earlier. A little too on-the-nose in terms of heavily-signposted parallels, but it raised a chuckle so we'll let it pass.

What we know this week that we didn't know last week: Namond is Wee-bey's son. So, his connection to the real bad boys (as mentioned in my Episode 1 post) is even closer than I thought.

The thing with Cutty being a babe magnet for ladies of a certain age, queuing up to ask him out and bringing him home-made food, really reminds me of something. It's on the tip of my brain. It might be Janice courting Bobby in The Sopranos, it might be something like Calendar Girls, it might be something else. Any ideas?

Anyone notice the length of Marlo's fingernails as he took the mobile phone call while his crew were doing shooting practice? What a brilliant detail. Makes him look like De Niro in Angel Heart.

A question regarding this season as a whole, not this episode in particular. The school is called Edward J. Tilghman. The prison guard who gives Wee-bey grief in an earlier series is called Tilghman. Quite an unusual surname. Is that some sort of in-joke, or is it a well-known or significant Baltimore family, or something? (Don't answer if it would involve giving spoilers.)

There was one tiny thing I didn't quite get: the word 'BELIEVE' on a bin in the street outside the Mayor's office. Huh?

One last word: sheeeeeeeeeeeeit.

[Soccer Scrimmage]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

SEASON 3 SPOILER IN THIS POST

Parallel lines spoken by different characters is actually not new; in season 3 episode 11, Stringer and Bunny Colvin both say the identical thing prior to getting killed/fired: "Well, get on with it!"(or something). There's a more subtle one in this season, so subtle I am not sure it was intentional.

The Tilghman family was indeed prominent in early Maryland history, but the use of the name in the Wire is a tribute to Edward Tilghman who I believe was chief of Baltimore police when David Simon spent his year in with the homicide department.

The Believe sticker is from an anti-drug/crime campaign launched in 2002. The word, on bumper stickers, billboard, on the sides of walls, was/is ubiquitous in Baltimore. People liked to modify the stickers to read "B'lieve" (to match the way Baltimorons say the word) or "Be Evil". More can be said once you've finished the season.

[Wyatt Earp]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

I've only just learned that PG has been texting me about the Wire for weeks, having missed the post where I said I'd lost my phone. All rather poignant.

Purv, if you can remember any of the texts, do post them here.

[jason voorhees]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Be sure and listen to SocScrim, SR & Purves regarding the Believe sticker. DO NOT GOOGLE IT.

[Anton Gramscescu]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

"Lost" your phone, Wyatt? Are you on to pagers or payphones?

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Wire Series 4 (no longer spoiler free)

Ha ha ha.