Re-viewing the Wire

 

2/1

For the last two weeks, I’ve been binge watching the Wire, whose  last episode ran March 8, 2008. While I had watched the last season, I had never seen the first four. My boys, and countless critics, have agreed it was the best television series ever. I figured it was time for another Covid project. And now having finished all five seasons, I have to agree. For one who loves cities with all their "...paradox, perplexity and profound beauty..", no other show has ever done such an anatomy of how a city lives and breathes. In successive seasons there was special focus on the drug trade, the Baltimore harbor and dockworkers, the school system, politics and finally the news media, all in correlation  to the police department. The interaction of these various institutions is what  makes the portrait complete.

At the end of the day, what does the Wire show us?

  

* All the characters are complex, with even drug dealers and killers having redeeming qualities. Like drug kingpin Avon Barksdale taking business courses and implementing Roberts Rules  of Order on his crew.

* The conflict between old school gangsterism and the efforts to create a business coop 

* The impact of gentrification. Favorite quote of season 3, related to Barksdale’s investments in real estate: He’s worse than a drug dealer, he’s a developer. (Been there.)

* The general respect for the time honored “Sunday Truce” in deference to the centrality of the Black church to the community.

* A graphic portrayal of the school to prison pipeline

* Parallels between the emptiness of teach to the test education in the school and stat driven police work

* The sense in which the drug trade is just a DIY form of capitalism, perhaps the most efficient and effective business in Baltimore. 

* In the portayal of the demise of the docks of Baltimore, no other show has ever more effectively portrayed the plight of blue-collar workers. For the dockworkers, like steelworkers in my home town of Pittsburgh, their work was their life. Socially, culturally economically. A way to the middle class.When the “Men of Steel” chorus ended, a world had ended. Watching season 3 helped one understand the desperation that led two time Obama voters to vote for Trump. That desperation must be responded to by the Democrats if there is any desire to keep the House and Senate.

* It was jarring to hear drugs being sold under the “brand name”pandemic in season 3. 

* Vision or even reform and institutions are antithetical. The primary goal any institution is survival, self preservation. Any, and every other value becomes secondary. I’ve learned through painful experiences that this is  true even of the national church.

* The phrase the Dickensian aspect took on  meaning, both true and ironic.

The most prescient year of the series was the fifth and last, focusing on the Baltimore Sun newspaper and media in general. But the main focus of season 5 is the truth versus lies. Lies towards the “greater good,” for even just survival, are central to the plot. In the end, mutual accepted lies are necessary for everyone just to get by. And what is lost in the process? As Terry, a lied about veteran homeless person says,” A lie ain’t a side of a story. It’s just a lie.”  We have lived through four years where the lie has become so common that there is even  no shared truth anymore. Which puts us in a very dangerous position. The Wire was onto this before Obama was elected. In the end some characters decide that integrity is necessary for the greater good  even if it doesn’t appear so in the short run.

Baltimore was special to me when I worked my first years as an urban consultant for the church in the early ‘80s. The city was going through an exciting and dynamic renewal with creative church leaders and city leaders working hand in hand. From the inner harbor to “driving back the frontier” urban re-creation had momentum and vibrancy. (Despite the two times  inherent racism of that  frontier phrase.) I seriously considered a move there for awhile, Since then it’s been up (Camden Yards Baltimore) and down..Trump’s calling it a “…rat and rodent infested city..” 

The church does not appear significantly in the city except for a location for 12 step meetings. “The ministers” remain a to be reckoned with political constituency in season 4. There’s even a “good Samaritan” not moment wot a pastor passing by on the other side.  Still, as an urban minister, I continue to fantasize over what a season with a wirelike focus on the church might have  looked like. While on the whole, the wire is grimly pessimistic in its outlook, some redemption is offered, if only to individuals. That’ll has to do for now. But for a critically analytic look at how  a city runs, the wire is essential curriculum.