Quote from The Moose :

I'd go so far as to say it's the best series ever created.

You really ought to watch The Wire, then. I love The Sopranos, but The Wire is easily the single greatest thing ever created for TV, IMO (Band of Brothers maybe a distant 2nd). It's kind of ruined the rest of TV for me.

On the surface it looks like your average police procedural, but it's about as far from, say, Law & Order or CSI as can be. It takes the drug war in Baltimore as a microcosm of social/cultural systems in the greater world and just lays them bare. It was co-created by an ex-Baltimore City homicide cop and an ex-Baltimore Sun crime reporter, and the amount of local detail is just stunning.

Bar none the best writing and direction I've ever seen. The common thing to say about it is that it's more like a visual novel than an episodic TV show, and it's true in ways that The Sopranos (good as it is) couldn't ever match.

Check out these two very good reviews of Season 1 for a good introduction: 1 & 2

And here are a few words from the creator (David Simon, also writer/producer on Homicide: Life on the Street, which was based on his nonfic book):

Quote :

Reason: Would you describe The Wire as a cynical show?
David Simon: It's cynical about institutions, and about their capacity for serving the needs of the individual. But in its treatment of the actual characters, be they longshoremen or mid-level drug dealers or police detectives, I don't think it's cynical at all. I think there's a great deal of humanist affection.

Reason: The Wire draws heavily on Ed Burns' experiences as a policeman. But though you cast yourself as a reporter in one episode, there hasn't been an inside-the-job look at a journalist's life. Is that something you're thinking about doing in the future?
Simon: We might glance at it a little bit. One of the sad things about contemporary journalism is that it actually matters very little. The world now is almost inured to the power of journalism. The best journalism would manage to outrage people. And people are less and less inclined to outrage.

I think if you look at what journalism has achieved in terms of parsing the events that got us into this war in Iraq, or the truth about what happened in the election -- I've become increasingly cynical about the ability of daily journalism to effect any kind of meaningful change. I was pretty dubious about it when I was a journalist, but now I think it's remarkably ineffectual.

Reason: Do you think you can raise that kind of outrage with a TV show?
Simon: I don't. The Wire will have an effect on the way a certain number of thoughtful people look at the drug war. It will not have the slightest effect on the way the nation as a whole does business. Nor is that my intent in doing the show. My intent is to tell a good story that matters to myself and the other writers -- to tell the best story we can about what it feels like to live in the American city.

Reason: What's the show's underlying message about the drug war?
Simon: That it's a fraud. It's all over except for the tragedy and the shouting and the wasted lives. That'll continue. But the outcome has never been in doubt.

Reason: I've seen one writer citing The Corner to make the case that the drug war needs to be fought harder.
Simon: What idiot was that?

Reason: His name was Eli Lehrer. [Lehrer said the book "vividly describes just how bad life became in a typical inner-city neighborhood" after Baltimore's then-Mayor Kurt Schmoke came out for a less punitive approach to the drug war. In fact, Schmoke's police department locked up more people for drug crimes than any previous administration.] He was writing in the American Enterprise Institute's magazine.
Simon: Ed Burns and I spoke at one of those groups. There came this point where a guy said, "Well, what is the solution? Give me the paragraph; give me the lede. What's the solution, if not drug prohibition?"

I very painstakingly said: "Look. For 35 years, you've systematically deindustrialized these cities. You've rendered them inhospitable to the working class, economically. You have marginalized a certain percentage of your population, most of them minority, and placed them in a situation where the only viable economic engine in their hypersegregated neighborhoods is the drug trade. Then you've alienated them further by fighting this draconian war in their neighborhoods, and not being able to distinguish between friend or foe and between that which is truly dangerous or that which is just illegal. And you want to sit across the table from me and say 'What's the solution?' and get it in a paragraph? The solution is to undo the last 35 years, brick by brick. How long is that going to take? I don't know, but until you start it's only going to get worse."

And the guy looked at me and went, "But what's the solution?" He said it again. Ed Burns restrained me.

Reason: You've suggested that the third season is going to look at political reform.
Simon: Reform of all kinds. Political reform, reform within the department, reform within the drug trade. Reform is the theme.
You'll see a political component. But the theme of reform is not just political. There will be several characters who will present themselves as potential reformers. Some of them actually will be reformist, and some of them will not. Part of the season, from the viewer's perspective, is figuring out who's who.

Reason: What kind of reaction does the show get from the police?
Simon: I thought we'd get a bad reaction, because it clearly is very down on the drug war. In the middle of the first season, after it was clear what the tone of the show was, I went to the FOP [Fraternal Order of Police] lodge off of 41st Street [in Baltimore]. I basically was going to say, "OK, I'm ready to take everybody's shit. What do you have to say?" And they just kept reciting scenes back to me that had made them laugh, that felt real to them.
Ed was a cop for 20 years. I covered that world for 13. We didn't get the shit wrong. A lot of the guys knew the stuff we were referring to, the cases that we were stealing from.

Quote from DeadWolfBones :

You really ought to watch The Wire, then............

Thanks DWB That looks like a really good show.

Does anyone know if it airs on any UK channels? I cant find it to download at my usual torrent site(and i cant be arsed downloading from public sites)

I'd like to see a couple of episodes before committing to buy it on DVD

Quote from The Moose :

Thanks DWB That looks like a really good show.

Does anyone know if it airs on any UK channels? I cant find it to download at my usual torrent site(and i cant be arsed downloading from public sites)

I'd like to see a couple of episodes before committing to buy it on DVD

Tried TV Links for a stream ?

http://tv-links.co.uk/listings/1/107

Be warned that, like a novel, it's a bit slow to start. It probably won't be till about the middle of the first season that it really starts to hit you, so give it time to sink in.

Wow, TV links is great ...thanks for that guys

Unfortunately season one ep one wont play for me

Quote from deggis :

Scorsese is my favourite director but I have still not yet seen The Departed. Just recently saw Infernal Affairs from which Departed was adapted. But as far as I know Departed is about Irish mob...

If you've seen Internal Affairs, don't bother with The Departed... It's almost a 1:1 copy, clearly not what one could expect from a big director like Scorsese...

Quote from bbman :

If you've seen Internal Affairs, don't bother with The Departed... It's almost a 1:1 copy, clearly not what one could expect from a big director like Scorsese...

Agreed. All of the best scenes in The Departed are ripped directly from IA, and then Scorcese adds a bunch of unnecessary bs on top. Still a good movie, but unnecessary if you've seen/liked IA.

Quote from DeadWolfBones :

Agreed. All of the best scenes in The Departed are ripped directly from IA, and then Scorcese adds a bunch of unnecessary bs on top. Still a good movie, but unnecessary if you've seen/liked IA.

I don't know about IA, I liked it but it wasn't very optimal condition when I saw it... tv broadcast went down just in the middle of the movie climax. After thinking about throwing the tv out of the window I quickly used "internet tv" and watched the end of it but I really gotta see it again.

Many people say Departed is a rape but the director IA doesn't seem to think that way. Well I can't comment because I have not seen it yet. Also it's big tribute towards any movie if maybe the most important director currently alive decides to do a remake, though I think Scorsese took kind of "the easy way" this time, he could have done some original script also. From wikipedia:

"Andrew Lau, the co-director of Infernal Affairs, who was interviewed by Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily, said, "Of course I think the version I made is better, but the Hollywood version is pretty good too. [Scorsese] made the Hollywood version more attuned to American culture." Andy Lau, one of the main actors in Infernal Affairs, when asked how the movie compares to the original, said, "The Departed was too long and it felt as if Hollywood had combined all three Infernal Affairs movies together."[10] Lau pointed out that the remake featured some of the "golden quotes" of the original but did have much more swearing. He ultimately rated The Departed 8/10 and said that the Hollywood remake is worth a view, though "the effect of combining the two female characters in the original into one isn't as good as in the original", according to Lau's spokeswoman Alice Tam."

And I have really missed The Wire. It has the HBO quality stamp and I'm fan of NYPD Blue so I believe I could like it much but I have totally missed it so far. It was shown here long time ago but in the middle of night with zero promoting.

.

I have a question - it's probably only Americans who can answer it.
Sometimes when there's an advertisement for the next episode of a show, they say "Characters welcome". What the heck does that mean? I know the meaning of each individual word, but put together like that it doesn't make sense to me. It's bugged me for a while now, so would be cool to know what the expression means.

Quote from arco :

I have a question - it's probably only Americans who can answer it.
Sometimes when there's an advertisement for the next episode of a show, they say "Characters welcome". What the heck does that mean? I know the meaning of each individual word, but put together like that it doesn't make sense to me. It's bugged me for a while now, so would be cool to know what the expression means.

http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=575966

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There are few tv series that I have really liked. The Oz, Babylon 5 and the X-files. The Sopranos is nice too, although the 9pm time was a bit early for my tv time... I never open the tv (unless it is motorsports) before 11pm

Ehm, Heroes is nice too, dunno

Quote from Hyperactive :

http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=575966

Lol! Good to know, finally I can stop wondering.
Weirdo Americans though.

I can't read the whole topic (spoiler danger?), but I've seen 15 episodes, and I agree that it's total Hollywood bullshit like someone said.

But it's damn good bullshit, because I can't stop watching
The endless repeating gets on my nerves though...