Wired

Be back on WEDNESDAY.

When the weather is as bad as it’s been around my parts you tend to veg out with a good book or two or a good series. I haven’t seen grass since before Christmas.

But I am proud to say that I have seen every episode of “The Wire” since (around the last time) I saw Kansas City’s grass.

D-Milz badgered me into watching the first few episodes, as a few others had tried before. But this time, I was almost immediately hooked. I couldn’t stop watching the show because I wanted to see what happened next. I’m actually glad I didn’t sit through five years of waiting a week to see the next episode, and watch the entire thing. It is that good.

I do hate that I missed out on the conversation about the show back when it happened. So, I’m gonna add my two cents hear with a few reasons why I think every breathing American should be forced to watch “The Wire.” Again, I apologize for being a few years late on all of this.

1. Idris Elba’s character Stringer Bell. I wondered for the longest time who this Idris dude was when he showed up on the big screen in 2007 (Daddy’s Little Girls, American Gangster and This Christmas). Come to find out, he played maybe the most compelling character on The Wire and did so brilliantly.

2. The cops. There are just as many who receive the same kind of play as the drug dealers… and they’re lives are just as interesting. They’re maybe more vital to the show. My personal favs are Pryzbylewski (because of the transition he makes from horrific police officer to a teacher) and Lester Freamon (he seems to be the brains behind the operation). I find it interesting that not one of them was killed, though.

3. Omar. If there’s one street character who rivals Stringer Bell for most compelling, it’s Omar Little, the homosexual stick-up artist who robs drug dealers and has most everyone scared to death (He’s everything The Boondocks’ Gangstalicious aspires to be). If it seems like it might scare you away, just watch the first season, you’ll be endeared to Omar, and see him as the hood Robin Hood.

4. The writing. It’s overwhelming and amazing. I read somewhere that the show’s creator David Simon wanted the show to read like chapters of a novel. And it does just that. It’s a seamless story that never skips a beat. It’s witty, edgy, imaginative and bold. More than anything, it’s real. There are several scenes that are classic (like the convo between Avon and Stringer before Stringer gets got). They make you wonder how someone could write something so real.

5. Season 4. This is hands down (and up) the best thing I’ve ever seen made for television. The writers take what seems like a major detour for the drug trade and tell the story of children in the education system of Baltimore and how they end up in the game. The child characters come to mirror some of the characters of the previous seasons, and in a way, show how they ended up where they were.

6. It’s methodical. It’s a story that couldn’t possibly be justified in a three-hour time frame. It’s sorta like American Gangster tried to tell a similar story, and where it succeed in some places, it couldn’t possibly show the depth this saga does in that time span. And that they don’t try to shove too much of the story into one season forces you to watch it all because you really invest in the characters. (It actually makes me wonder if the story of Precious wouldn’t have been better told like this. Random, I know. But it’s just a thought)

The only things that upset me about the show were Wallace getting killed and the Jayson Blair-like reporter and the level of play he received in the fifth season. I understood why Wallace had to go. But I’m still shook about it. That reporter, though, was the worst thing to happen to the show, period.