All The Pieces Matter

A Twitter¹ screenshot was shared recently in one of my favourite WhatsApp groups:

My first instinct was rage, as these two twitwits probably intended. Walter White is pursuing purity for its own sake. That’s the whole point of the show. Then, I took a deep breath and read the tweet again. The post isn’t speaking to Walt’s ability, but that of his customers. Clearly, this person hasn’t watched The Wire.

The HBO show aired from 2002 to 2008, and is often rated one of the best TV shows of all time, alongside The Sopranos (also an HBO production – and that’s no coincidence). Over five seasons, it shows various aspects of the drug trade in the decaying city of Baltimore. It’s gritty, unflinching portrayal of the streets, the lingo and the drug economy will have you hooked instantly. But other shows have done that too, like The Shield.

The Wire shines due to its phenomenal writing. David Simon builds a fully fleshed out world and throws us in without preamble or context. He never dumbs down the narrative, never spells things out for us. The audience is forced to do the work and earn their keep, just like the characters. The violence and nudity are never gratuitous.² The show neither panders, nor tries to be edgy for edginess’ sake. It’s a fine line, but Simon walks it with elan- telling a story as it deserves to be told.

Still, I’d argue that Mad Men does all these things just as well.

What really, truly sets The Wire apart is the characters. It is a testament to the writers’ skill that as the seasons unfold, we get attached to characters who have done abhorrent things, just like we start to detest some characters we once loved. The show doesn’t do clichés like redemption arcs. Nor does it try to bring everything to a neat conclusion. Like a good documentary, it leaves you more aware of a world you knew nothing about.

Case in point, addiction. The common thread across all the seasons isn’t drugs, but the devastation that addiction wreaks within a broken system. We see it everywhere, the driving force behind all actions. But more specifically, we see it through the character of Bubbles. Played superbly by Andre Royo, Bubbles is the conscience of the show, and the closest we come to a stand-in for the audience. We witness him struggle and succumb to addiction, trying to do the right thing, often failing and falling to his disease and circumstance.

That’s the beauty of The Wire, and the reason for its enduring appeal. It creates true empathy, saving you from passing judgement on things you don’t understand. At the very least, it teaches you not to make wisecracks about decade old shows on Twitter.

For fans of The Wire, here’s an homage by CollegeHumor.

Be warned: Major Spoilers ahead!

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1. Yeah I’m not playing the X game.

2. Looking at you, Game Of Thrones