The End Of An Era.....

Aiight, so I like many other loyal followers of The Wire am still digesting the series finale and all it's little intricacies. I'm still reeling from the pain that I felt when Kima turned her back on Mcnulty and Freemon, and consequently got them thrown off the Homicide division. I just coulden't understand why her character had to go out like that. I didn't like what they did in the end with Lt. Daniel's character either. They relegated him back to the life of a lowly attorney after he had risen meteorically through the law enforcement stratosphere. After Stringer Bell was killed he and Omar were the 2 biggest beacons of Baltimore strength, hunger and courage on that show. I would've liked to see him sling a little mud at Nareese Campbell and the city council and then we woulda finally found out what misdeeds he committed and covered up all those years ago in the Eastern. It didn't happen tho. We only got to see him smiling at Rhonda Pearlman; the self- serving, razor sharp prosecutor who actually managed to move up with her career, only after begging Daniels not to speak out against the corruptness that the both of them were embroiled in. I felt like Daniels made another selfless move for someone he cared about, so I take solice in that at least. One thing about the finale that I was actually discussing with my boy was the fact that we never got any resolution on Cuddy AKA Dennis Wise. While Bubbles finally seemed to get his shit together, our main man Cuddy was left out of the finale. I guess we're all just sapposed to assume that he's in west Baltimore teaching kids kids how to squab. I was surprised that Weebay got a smidgen of camera time there at the end. He deserved more though, he was the coldest gangster on the show next to Marlo. Therein lies another paradox as well. The whole thing with Marlo getting off and then rushing back to the street almost getting his head blown off. I'm not sure I know what the writers were trying to say with that. Maybe that Marlo was untouchable, maybe that anyone can be touched in a heartbeat, Maybe they just were showing that he still possessed the mentality of "the boss", despite having to give up his crown facing a trial. I don't know, all I know is that Jaime Hector is a steller thesbian, whom I hope will be given chances in the future to be apart of good, thought provoking and big budget projects like this one and in Hollywood. As for my other favorite character's like Herc and Carver, I definitely hope that they continue to set it off in Hollywood and New York as they have been for years now. It's all very sad to me truthfully. I always thought that The Wire woulde become universally recognized as the best crime drama on Cable, but the facts were that even at the height of the show's popularity, the ratings never were that impressive. Even though it was masterfully written and the plot was as deep as the soul of Baltimore itself, the show always struggled to appeal to those who weren't willing to think in order to entertain themselves. The Sopranos I always felt was a runaway hit because the public has always had a love affair with the mob and it's activites and like The Wire it had characters on it that were so strongly and well written that they just came to life and resonated with the viewers. Still, the Sopranos was very, very unrealistic. From the enormous amounts of laundered money that went undetected to the 12 or so some odd murders that the boss Tony Soprano committed himself, that he surely would've been implicated in at some point in real life, (but then again in real life the italian mob bosses never wacked people themselves) The Sopranos got at times as cheesy as a lot of these daytime soap operas. The Wire was based on countless real events. From the phone codes the drug dealers used to confuse the police, to the scandels that routinely took place at the docks in the 90's, The Wire was a much greater work of fact than The Sopranos ever was and it relayed the stark and gritty realities of the the world of Baltimore in a completely honest light. From the drug laden street corners and the hoppers that operated there to the addicts and recovering addicts, the politicians, the city council members to even the people that work within the church, the show was able to bring Baltimore to your living room every sunday night. No other show on Television was ever as good at putting you right in the middle of the hood or the holding cell as The Wire was. Yet and still, the respect and the accolades seemed to escape this wonderful series. The awards and the off hand refernces never manifested. Why didn't The Wire jump off like The Sopranos did? Why did it only seem to amass a cult following instead of a huge, broad one? I'll tell you why. It was because The Wire was comprised of a cast that was 70 percent black and the storyline revolved around a predominantly black city's problems and political corruption. The show served as a reminder to white folks that they are still very much to blame for a lot of the struggles that poor blacks endure. Those facts are inconvenient for white folks, and something they'd rather not deal with. They love when Tony Soprano flips out on his daughter Meadow for dating a black guy in college or when he lovingly refers to them as "shines" or "butter heads" though. This country time and again exposes it's racism in many different ways, and sadly The Wire was another way that racism and white peoples total disconcern for social problems within the black and latino communities don't interest them. Not even for entertainment value. So we close the book after the final chapter, a great show with the finest actors from all backgrounds has concluded, perhaps never to be duplicated ever again. Only to be sorely missed by myself and I'm sure many other fans.

-BIG D O