Shouldn't all shows be made like The Wire?

It's funny how The Wire is just beginning to seep into TV viewers' collective psyche. The show received a plethora of gushing reviews following its premiere back in 2002, but was met with a somewhat muted response from the television watching community. TV critics praised it to the hilt, crediting it with having the bravado to tackle some of the most chronic sociocultural ailments of modern society. Some critics were less effusive about their enthusiasm for the show, on the basis that many of the the themes trod ground firmly worn by the director's prior cop series, Homicide: Life On The Street. While an element of that accusation holds true, The Wire is much more than that, probing far deeper than Homicide, despite its commendable and revelatory attributes, ever quite managed. In part, this is because Homicide tackled issues which lay at the more fundamental level of detective policing, holding as it did, a more acute focus on the day-to-day grind specific to the lives of detectives, with the added encumbrances that come with limited resources, dispiriting working conditions and the ennui of poring over reams of intricately-worded legal paperwork. The Wire still shines a light to these aggravations, although in a somewhat less self-pitying way than Homicide and with a much more grandiose and emboldened purpose, running its televisual finger over the surface of a rotten societal core, not just at the level of the Baltimore police force and the undercurrent of corrupt local politicians with whom they interact, but also throughout the echelons of government, major institutions and the debatably even more deviously-minded drug gangs. Homicide was the plucky and brash first album, while The Wire holds rank as its more assured and refined follow-up.

Returning to the theme of diluted popularity, there may be a certain element in which the show has come too early for particularly the American community, to delve forth into a period of critical introspection. Americans don’t want to believe that the society they live in is decomposing. In spite of strong evidence to the contrary, America doesn’t want to believe in the palpably uncomfortable conclusions that emerge from The Wire. In short, it may be the case that the show has only been able to achieve cult status because of its damning, accusatory tone and perhaps more despairingly, the irremediable depiction of a problem that has not only become warped, but something that lies ingrained at the foundation of the societal building block that is the modern institution. The Wire doesn’t provide any goofy-toothed, saccharine endings, the geek doesn’t overcome the odds to get the beauty and political discourse is not self-correcting to the point where individual political ambition is annulled. On the contrary, it is one of the show’s true strengths, that it highlights the stark effects of the decision-making process and moreover, how every move made trickles down the institutional hierarchy to a population that is, at its core, blissfully unaware as to just how dishearteningly self-serving those in power can be.

Perhaps at this juncture, I should preface any further commentary by stating that I am not usually one who gets easily engrossed in TV series – partly because I am reluctant at the prospect of heavy emotional investment and partly because I find it difficult to immerse myself in a world which requires the viewer to attack each visual piece on autopilot, where the demand from a viewer amounts to nil and plotlines opt for the formulaic, rather than the refreshingly revelatory. Most of us can’t relate to the profligate environments that the “bright light” cities of West Coast USA use to coax people in their millions and that is a reality that leaves me with little more than The Sopranos for drama-based company.

But the fact is, I’m writing this article after a whirlwind two weeks of coffee-fuelled Wire sessions. It’s somewhat bewildering to ponder where exactly my life has disappeared to in the last 14 days, but (and I didn’t think I’d say this after gorging on a TV series for such an extended period of time), more than that, I think it has rejuvenated my belief in the power of television series as a potent tool for addressing socio-cultural issues. The Wire has instilled in me a renewed belief of television as a medium that can be used to awaken the senses and perhaps most importantly, act as the best means at our disposal of reflecting on the nature of the built environment around us and detailing the development of our post-modern communities. While the show still has its failings (yes, they do exist), The Wire should be used as a springboard for television to move forward, to place an onus on shows that don’t just exist within the sphere of visual entertainment, but have the potential to take on aspects of the didactic, submerged in realism and confrontation.

The Wire is one of the best shows I’ve seen and certainly one of the most effective, in de-coding the flipside of the all-American experience, exposing the pale-faced pomposity of governmental institutions, partnering crime alongside the corrupt underbelly of a system that quenches its thirst from the well of capitalism. A vital element in The Wire’s success is the use of Baltimore as its backdrop. It’s intriguing that the series deviated from the oft-worn locations of New York, LA, Boston and Chicago. It’s that dogged leap from the cities for which America is known, to cities that shelter it’s “forgotten” underclass that gives a unique snapshot at what life is like for people in the second-rate, industrialised cities of the US, for whom the “American Dream” amounts to little more than pithy rhetoric and where people are forced to live their lives picking at the scraps that money-grabbing society left behind in pursuit of the bigger and the better. The Wire wouldn’t work in LA. The Wire tells the tale of cities whose time in the limelight was little more than a temporary flash, left in limbo to fend for itself, while the big coastal guns further amassed their economic armoury. The Wire, in truth, tells the story of the Jersey Citys, Clevelands and Pittsburghs of the States.

It’s been a long time coming.