The Wire

I can barely stomach conventional television, so like a lot of folks I now watch pretty much anything that comes from HBO via DVD. For example I was late getting into The Sopranos by 5 years, so we watched he first 5 seasons in 6 weeks. Y'know what? When you watch them all back-to-back like that it's actually not that great a show – really redundant in fact.

Which brings me to The Wire. We've just finished watching season 4. This is without a doubt one of the best shows ever. It's gritty, but not in that fake commercial television kind of way (think David Caruso – no wait, don't, it'll make your ass hurt). The characters are rich and well developed (the cast is quite large), and the writing is crisp and taut, without being over-the-top. In fact part of the shows' beauty is its' subtlety. Often it takes an entire episode to make a single point. That's good storytelling. And 4 seasons in I only just noticed that there is NO incidental music (correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure I'm right). No hit singles to incite pathos because the actors can't pull it off (yes, I understand musical underscore, that's not the point).

Storytelling. How cool is that?

BTW I used to LOVE A&E, in it's pre-"Dog The Bounty Hunter" days. Too bad – A&E could have been HBO.