The Wire - All Prologue: The Green Lights of Baltimore

The Wire – All Prologue

Season 2, Episode 6

Directed By: Steve Shill

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Ed Burns and Simon

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the previous episode here, or click here to see the total coverage. Assume spoilers for the episode

            Why does David Simon identify with D’Angelo Barksdale more than any other character? Of all the members The Wire's sprawling cast, it is often D'Angelo who becomes a microphone for Mr. Simon’s themes. Mr. Simon never sold drugs or had a childhood that led him to prison. Sure, he spent a lot of time around drug culture (see: The Corner), but there is something truly unique about why he chooses D’Angelo; the man continues to hold onto the fact that he can escape. McNulty and the cops see that their efforts will have little effort. Stringer and the higher up drug family know they are tied to a certain life and cannot rise above it. And the port men see their livelihoods slowly fading out of existence. But D’Angelo still believes in the possibility of escape.

            But it is an impossibility, nonetheless. The highlight of “All Prologue” is a speech where D’Angelo explains The Great Gatsby to the prison book club. “There are no second acts in America,” someone quotes Fitzgerald, which inspires D’Angelo to explain that as much as we want to escape our past—our crimes, our passions, our family—we are inextricably linked to them. And many characters slowly realize in this episode that they are, in fact, tied to their past.

The Wire - Cleaning Up: The Big Sleep

The Wire: Cleaning Up

Season One, Episode Twelve

Directed By: Clement Virgo

Written By: George Pelecanos, from a story by David Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the previous episode here, or click here to see the total coverage. Assume spoilers for the episode.

            David Simon’s The Wire is not really a show that comments on itself or the genre of cop shows, but there is one particularly fine meta moment in “Cleaning Up.” The pieces aren't set up, but the order is made to arrest Avon Barksdale without the needed evidence to convict him. McNulty and Daniels drive up to the club with SWAT, and we see inside that Avon and Stringer are sitting in an empty office, calmly watching the take down on security televisions. “I didn’t expect this to be so anticlimactic,” McNulty mutters to himself. 

            It’s very on the nose, but for this heartbreaking and devastating episode before the season finale, it couldn’t be more perfect notice. This isn’t a show where the heroes are going to walk away feeling good about themselves, and the bad guys will receive justice. This isn't even a show where "good" or "bad" make much sense. This is a show where everything comes at a balance, and things goes on in temperament. “Cleaning Up” is the first Wire script written by George Pelecanos, who before writing his first of many episodes, was a DC boiled fiction writer. This episode feels very indebted to film noir, especially a shot after McNulty and Daniels take Avon. McNulty stands in a doorway, covered half in shadow. He is like Dave Bannion of The Big Heat or the Phillip Marlowe of the Raymond Chandler novels, a detective who must persevere, even when the possibilities for real change are impossible.

The Wire - The Cost: Showtime

The Wire: The Cost

Season One, Episode Ten

Directed By: Brad Anderson

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the previous episode here, or click here to see the total coverage. Assume spoilers for the episode.

            When shows like The Sopranos and later The Wire came along, it’s easy to forget they really attempted to do something that was seen as insane in the television world: tell stories. Now I don’t want to say that shows from beforehand didn’t attempt to do that—Buffy the Vampire Slayer had an intricate cast of characters and a complex plot, and of course Twin Peaks really changed everything and then some—but it was HBO that really pioneered the idea that television could tell stories like cinema, and not waste a minute. There’s no place for “drug dealer of the week” on The Wire, and I’d be surprised if we ever get a bottle episode.

            And in “The Cost,” we really get the ball rolling on the numerous plot developments this season. I’m not sure whether David Simon knew he was going onto four more seasons, or for that matter one, so much of this episode is set up for the final three hours. But what an intense hour it is! “The Cost” opens in perfect bliss, and ends in total ugliness and shock. Much of the tone of this thrill ride comes from director Brad Anderson, a no name in 2002 who has gone on to make some great thrillers like The Machinist and Transsiberian.

The Wire - Lessons: The Ties That Bind

The Wire: Lessons

Season One, Episode Eight

Directed By: Gloria Muzio

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the previous episode here, or click here to see the total coverage. Assume spoilers for the episode.

As the title suggests, many people are learning lessons or giving lessons in this eight episode of the first season of The Wire. But why those lessons can be given or taken is often more interesting, and the real heart of this episode is about bonds, both familial and fraternal, and how those shape our ideas of the world. The opening functions as both a comic piece and a frightening warning for McNulty. While at a market wit his kids, he sees Stringer Bell, and has his kids follow him. The boys are masterwork detectives already, getting the license plate number of Bell’s car. But McNulty loses his boys in the process, and I’m sure this is not the last time he will realize he has put his children in danger.

But family can also be metaphorical. Despite the setback on the phones, the crew is able to pick up the trail and arrest a driver coming out of the towers with $20,000 in drug money. Excited about their arrest, Greggs and McNulty celebrate, until Daniels realizes the driver also works for an influential state senator. The upper echelons tell Daniels they are finished, but then Judge Phalen, citing his superiority as a judge, keeps it going. He mockingly tells McNulty, “Who’s your daddy now?”

The Wire - Old Cases: Meditations in an Investigation

The Wire: Old Cases

Season One, Episode Four

Directed By: Clement Virgo

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the previous episode here, or click here to see the total coverage Assume spoilers for the episode.

            After three rapid fire episodes of plot from David Simon’s The Wire, “Old Cases” gives us a slower tone and more character-based episode. As the title implies, “Old Cases” is not only about an old case that detective McNulty tracks down, but about the old cases that define many of the characters we’ve already grown to learn about. Everyone has a story to tell, and each of them has their own investigation that needs to happen.

            Unfortunately, this is the first time that I feel that Mr. Simon has started running over the same ground at a few points. Most notably is the very unmemorable opening where Herc (Domenick Lombardozzi) is attempting to get a desk through a jammed doorway. Each cop comes to help with no progress, until they realize Herc isn’t trying to get the desk out, but in. It’s a bang-your-head-against-the-wall metaphor for their police work, except the whole thing is kind of pointless and a silly gag. We’ve gotten the round-a-bout efforts of our heroes in this story numerous times already, and as compared to the other cold opens, the gag is simplistic.

            No worries, though—no baseball player bats 1000, and it’s the character details that really lead this narrative. The case that McNulty and Bunk Moreland hunt down seems like a wild goose chase, a murder of a college student in an upscale part of Baltimore where the killer may have been nicknamed “D,” which might be D’Angelo. I think the scene where they solve the murder is more than a bit self-indulgent (they only say variations on the word “fuck” throughout, cause, well, why not?), but still fun.

The Wire - The Target: Kafka Comes to Baltimore

The Wire: The Target

Season One, Episode One

Directed By: Clark Johnson

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Assume spoilers for the episode.

            Or a series that I assumed about the dark and dangerous world of crime along the streets of one of the most destructive cities in the United States, the first episode of The Wire, “The Target,” opens with a humorous parable. Jimmy McNulty, played by Dominic West, listens to the tale of a kid shot for stealing money from a craps game named Snot. Snot would steal the money every week at the end of the game, but was never shot. When asked why he would be allowed each week despite this, the witness tells him, “[You] got to. This is America, man.”

            On one level, a line like this is a deeply profound parable about the twisted nature of the American dream. But on another, this is a ridiculous and hilarious story not far from the works of Franz Kafka and Joseph Heller. The fact that Jimmy repeats the line to his partner as a joke shows that Simon, acting as writer for this pilot episode, knows that the trap he’s laid for us can also be seen as humorous from the right angle.

            Much of “The Target” is about setting up the dangerous world that the characters of The Wire inhabit—where drugs and weapons are as common as water—but it’s also setting up what I believe will be the Kafkaesque nature of the Baltimore streets. Everything is a circle on end, where the choice is either drown oneself in sorrow, or simply laugh.

           
     Consider the impetus for the season, a court case that Jimmy sits in on where D’Angelo (Larry Gillard Jr.) is being accused for murder. The two eye witnesses are lined up, but in walks Stringer Bell, an agent for a powerful crime organization, who simply sits in the back with a fine suit and a leather notebook. The eyewitnesses shut up, and Bell is on his merry way. This is a classic set up and payoff, and its only when Jimmy tries to break the system that everything goes to hell.

            Jimmy explains to the judge that this is one of ten unsolved murders related to Avon Barksdale, the leader of the crime organization. Instead of getting a pat on the back, everyone in his unit is furious—Major Rawls chastises him for making this a case, point two middle fingers at him the entire time. Again, we have a scene built on dark pathos—speaking truthfully, even within the Baltimore Homicide squad, is a one way ticket to hell—but played essentially for laughs.

            On the other side of the street, we also get to follow D’Angelo, who has to pay for his crime, but not through jail time (The other maxim established in this episode, every action has a consequence). D’Angelo is moved from working the towers to the low-rise projects. The visual look is one of absurd fear: it is daylight and children play around, but the addicts in the corners and junk thrown around make it a place of uncomfortable tension. Director Clark Johnson (he’ll direct the next episode, and one more this season), seems very much rehearsed in the style of Sidney Lumet. His camera is never flashy, but it captures details about the streets that hit the realism that Simon is aiding for. It’s also interesting to see a show shot in classic Academy ratio (4:3), so most shows now are shot in widescreen (1.68:1). The environments are more claustrophobic, though the shots not as expressive. It'll be curious to see other directors take on this material. For a pilot, you set the standards, and Johnson lays things out plainly, the way you should in a pilot.

            The last thing I want to point out about this pilot episode is its context in the wake of September 11^th. Jimmy visits a friend in the FBI, who has installed a live feed camera, along with two audio devices, to record a drug operation. This is the kind of supreme work that Jimmy needs, but as his friend reveals, it’s the last drug case in Baltimore—all the other funds are being diverted toward the new War on Terror. While this is a true statement, Simon frames it in this again ironic way; the best force out there to do the job is sent away on another mission. As one character refers to it later, he says not to call the drug war by the lingo; “Wars end.”

            There are a number of other characters that Simon sets up in this opening 60 minutes—many who I didn’t exactly get the names of other characters, or exactly their positions—and boldly, he doesn’t make lay out the details all at first. This is a show that is built on complex relationships between people, places, and words that will slowly reveal themselves. Not all of it will make exact since. But there was never an explanation to why Gregory woke up as a beetle. Sometimes the most painful things are the funniest too.