I recently finished watching the first season of HBO’s “The Wire”, a show given the label of “best TV drama ever” by many critics. After watching just one season, it is easy for me to agree that “The Wire” is one of the most well put together TV shows of all time. It’s commitment to realism and avoidance of clichés makes “The Wire” a very engaging and interesting experience.
The main story of season one involves a detail of Baltimore police trying to make a case against a West side projects drug ring run by Avon Barksdale. Characters on both sides of this conflict are given equal time as we see how the Barksdale crew works as well as how the detectives build their case. It may sound like a typical cop show, but “The Wire” offers much more.
“The Wire” (at least season one) is about “The Game” and how it is played by all sides. This refers to The Game played by drug dealers and junkies and also The Game played by the Baltimore bureaucracies and those in power. Both games have rules and those who attempt to play outside of these rules are ostracized, marginalized, or worse.
While “The Wire” is critically lauded, it never reached a large audience. This is most likely because “The Wire” is fairly difficult to watch on a couple different levels. First, it requires careful attention by its viewers. Part of what makes it so realistic is its refusal to explain itself or hold the audience’s hand. If the characters know what is going on in “The Wire”, then the audience better figure it out. No out-of-character explanations will be given.
Take for example, a scene where two of the main detectives investigate a murder scene while uttering only one word (an expletive). Other shows would have the detectives explaining to each other what they are finding, how the bullet’s trajectory explains where the shooter was, and what this all means. In “The Wire”, the detectives can see what happened and feel no need to explain it to each other (or the audience). The viewer has to pay attention and understand what the detectives are finding and what it means.
“The Wire” is also difficult to watch because of its content. Baltimore’s inner city problems are shown in all their glory. Nothing is glamorized or romanticized in “The Wire”, including characters’ speech (which is very profane) and actions. Because characters are so well established, the show’s tragedies become much more difficult to watch. The world of “The Wire” is harsh and takes no mercy, even on “main” characters.
Despite its difficulties, “The Wire” is worth seeing. It takes an honest look at life in a 21st Century inner city,[1] and reveals a worldview similar to the one presented in the book of Ecclesiastes.
“Indeed, there is not a righteous man on earth who continually does good and who never sins.”—Ec. 7:20
In “The Wire” there is not a clear line between “good guys” or “bad guys”. Things are not black and white in the world it portrays. It is instead full of many different shades of gray. Even characters who desire to do the right thing find themselves handcuffed by the systems in which they operate. For example, a homicide chief hinders the detectives’ ability to make a solid case against Barksdale and his crew. He does this not because he is a “bad guy” but because what is important to him is that his clearance rate (the percentage of homicide cases closed) remains high. Having some of his detectives distracted by a lengthy Barksdale detail only hurts that.
Similarly, after painstakingly and patiently tracking down the main drug stash house the detail is ordered by their bosses to raid it. The detail is not allowed to follow the lead of the drugs leaving and entering the house or to make a stronger case against the major players because media pressure calls for action now. Seeing “dope on the table” for some press conference becomes more important than making the best case possible.
Even the detectives working the case are not presented as true heroes. They are mostly hard drinking (some are definitely alcoholics, other could be) and adulterous. Detective McNulty, season one’s most “main” character, is portrayed as a complete narcissist whose main motivation at times seems to be to show everyone how smart he is or to stick it to his boss (Ec. 4:4).
“Folly is set on many high places … I have seen servants riding on horses and princes walking as servants on the land.”—Ec. 10:6–7
“The Wire” is full of characters that have great potential if only they were in different situations. Junkie and police informant Bubbles is so charming and intelligent, even one of the detectives wonders “Why the hell is he a dope fiend?” Barksdale’s number two man, Stringer Bell, is shown taking economics classes from a community college, learning how the marketplace works only to apply these principles to his drug trade.
One of the season’s most tragic figures is young Wallace, a 16-year-old caught up in the dealing part of the Game. Wallace clearly is not cut out for this life. He is a sensitive, caring boy who reacts badly when a body that he helped find for his bosses is dumped near his window as a message to some rivals. He takes care of a group of younger kids in an abandoned apartment. Wallace should be in school, studying and enjoying life. Instead, when given a chance to start over he cannot. He knows no life other than the one he is stuck in, saying at one point that he has never even been to the East side of Baltimore.
Those in positions of authority in city institutions are not exactly “fools,” but they are not “princes” in any moral sense either. Mostly they are ambitious people who learned how to play the Game and please those in positions over them. They value their careers more than doing what is right. People who do the opposite do not progress far in the Baltimore bureaucracies.
“Again I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to the skillful”—Ec. 9:11
“The Wire” does not wrap up neatly like most shows. While charges are brought on most members of the Barksdale crew, most of these charges are less severe than they should be. Witnesses who were counted on drop out, and some of the major targets walk free or plead down to minor offensives. The police who worked the Barksdale case most aggressively are reassigned or passed over for promotion, while those who played the Game to their bosses’ liking receive them. In its conclusion, season one of “The Wire” reflects the reality of life seen in Ecclesiastes (3:16; 7:15) that justice is lacking. Even though some characters are brought to justice, the cost for doing so is too high.
“What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun.”—Ec. 1:9
Season one closes with a montage of street activity on Baltimore’s West side showing that The Game is being played. People who were locked up have been replaced. The minor successes of the Barksdale cases have been made irrelevant by the fact that nothing has been done to stop or even slow down the drug war. People are replaced and things continue as they always have.
[1]Although the show takes place in Baltimore, it represents the problems of any major American city.
