The Wire: Hot Shots
Season 2, Episode 3
Written By: David
Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns
Directed By:
Elodie Keene
One of the
most difficult adjustments that David Simon had to make when writing and
producing the second season of The Wire
was to let go of almost every one of his original locations. In many great
television series, there are locations and sets that become a character
themselves—the main deck of the Battlestar Galatica, the Bluth model home, or
Counter Terrorist Offices of Jack Bauer. But in this second season, we’ve
abandoned almost every location save for the homicide offices. Gone is the low
rises and Orlando’s strip club and instead we get the shipping docks and the church.
It’s a bold move that changes a lot of the ways we view how location creates
character, though the cinematography of Uta Briesweitz (who I still argue is
the visual auteur of the show) keeps us in the same leveled realism with a
shade of dark gray morality.
As you
might tell, there’s not so much heavy in theme for this episode, entitled “Hot
Shots,” or at least the narratives being spun together have little in common
with each other. Each is great in its own right, though not as much stands out
visually. We've also got the return of Omar, which will be fun to watch.
