New around here? Register your SA Forums Account here!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
Count Roland
Oct 6, 2013


You're quite good at these.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

zenguitarman
Apr 6, 2009

Come on, lemme see ya shake your tail feather


Jerusalem posted:

Awww yes, I love this, can't wait to see how you react to how things shake out.

And yeah, I absolutely love the SWAT guy just going blank and having no idea what to do when the loving door just opens and all his training goes out the window, and the detective has to motion at them to get the gently caress in there :lol:

Does anybody have a link to this? I've been looking for this clip forever.

HootTheOwl
May 13, 2012

Hootin and shootin
does anyone have a clip where they name Fuzzy Dunlop?

escape artist
Sep 24, 2005

Slow train coming

Jerusalem posted:

Awww yes, I love this, can't wait to see how you react to how things shake out.


Right? I was enjoying the hell out of his thoughts. I love rewatching vicariously

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

zenguitarman posted:

Does anybody have a link to this? I've been looking for this clip forever.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uy1UqoBFPc

HootTheOwl posted:

does anyone have a clip where they name Fuzzy Dunlop?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GJa1_u-VLE

"But that's your loving job, right? You get paid a salary for that."

Jerusalem fucked around with this message at 23:02 on Feb 13, 2024

deoju
Jul 11, 2004

All the pieces matter.
Nap Ghost
https://twitter.com/githii/status/1757500612143407501

The Spirit of Prez lives on.

Xiahou Dun
Jul 16, 2009

We shall dive down through black abysses... and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever.




It’s not worth watching to the end, but this is some superlative dipshittery.

I hope no one was hurt when he just loving mag-dumped down a residential street. Holy poo poo.

God Hole
Mar 2, 2016

Xiahou Dun posted:

It’s not worth watching to the end, but this is some superlative dipshittery.

I hope no one was hurt when he just loving mag-dumped down a residential street. Holy poo poo.

mag-dumped into his own car with a person handcuffed inside (no injuries, miraculously)

ShaneMacGowansTeeth
May 22, 2007



I think this is it... I think this is how it ends

Jerusalem posted:

Awww yes, I love this, can't wait to see how you react to how things shake out.

And yeah, I absolutely love the SWAT guy just going blank and having no idea what to do when the loving door just opens and all his training goes out the window, and the detective has to motion at them to get the gently caress in there :lol:

I also like the scene at the end of season one where they send an entire SWAT team for an arrest, but Daniels and McNulty just casually walk past them almost in disgust with an air of "seriously, what the gently caress are you guys on?"

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

ShaneMacGowansTeeth posted:

I also like the scene at the end of season one where they send an entire SWAT team for an arrest, but Daniels and McNulty just casually walk past them almost in disgust with an air of "seriously, what the gently caress are you guys on?"

"Open it up man, no sense in ruining a good safe..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0-uAVCpyEY

Who knew that Wood Harris and Idris Elba were the perfect casting for Achewood's Ray and Roast Beef all this time.

Jerusalem fucked around with this message at 10:01 on Feb 14, 2024

FlamingLiberal
Jan 18, 2009

Would you like to play a game?



Prez wishes he could do that many barrel rolls

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

God Hole posted:

mag-dumped into his own car with a person handcuffed inside (no injuries, miraculously)

Also had to resign, iirc, so a best case scenario for someone to do a Prez.

I miss this show, I'm due for a rewatch.

surf rock
Aug 12, 2007

We need more women in STEM, and by that, I mean skateboarding, television, esports, and magic.
Season 3, episodes four through six:

- I've been growing to appreciate the show's dialogue more and more. I've considered it pretty good from the get-go, but some of the street talk felt a little corny. The thing that's grabbing my attention more recently though is how many characters have some room for doubt in what they say or how they say it, which feels kind of unusual for this genre of television. That's really apparent with Bunny Colvin, who is taking a big stand but is completely forthright about having no idea whether his idea will work, just the certainty that he needs to try something different after 30 years of ever-worsening failure with the old approach. There are some exceptions to this like Rawls, but by and large, even the most hardheaded characters like McNulty or Avon will sometimes second-guess themselves or concede some level of openness to the person they're debating with.
- Speaking of, I'd love to know the percentage of the show's scenes that feature people arguing with each other. It has to be like >80%.
- Kind of nice to see Freamon cuss out McNulty. It was a good slow burn over the first few episodes of the season, him covering for McNulty or gently trying to nudge him to do his actual job instead of his lone wolf vengeance quest, only to boil over when McNulty started taking shots at him. McNulty really is the worst.
- I like that it's unclear whether or not Kima cheated, although she's such a poor partner regardless that it almost doesn't matter. I'm pretty sure she did cheat though given the degree to which she's being presented as McNulty's new partner in crime law.
- Goddammit McNulty, you're holding that volcano way too lackadaisically! It's not a pizza; it's your kid's science project you dope.
- Sydnor is back... I think? I swear I've seen him in a couple of scenes this season involved in stakeouts or whatever. What the gently caress is up with this character?
- Somebody in Colvin's district would've ABSOLUTELY leaked his plan to Burrell or Rawls the second that meeting ended. Probably half the people in that room. I'm sure all of these districts are loaded with deadbeats like that sad old man duo asking about overtime in the first season.
- Colvin explicitly endorsing police brutality for anyone who doesn't go to the free zone is, uh, not what I was hoping for.
- I liked the successive scenes of Herc and Carver trying to get the hoppers to move over to Vincent Street, but it drives me fuckin' crazy how bad they are at messaging it. It's in-character, but when the hoppers are like "why would you do this, why would this matter" it would be so easy to say "because your poo poo gets violent sometimes and at least over there it's a bunch of vacant houses that would get shot up instead of a loving residential area."
- Last season the big technological marvels were the internet and texting, and this season it's burner phones. God I wish I could've watched the show when it first aired. It must've been absolutely mindblowing.
- "gash-hound" has to be the worst slang term I've heard in my entire life, jesus christ ughhhhh
- Forgot to mention Cutty last time. I liked how his story started, but it would be nice to have just one character who decides to go straight and then sticks with it despite temptation without either backsliding or getting killed for his trouble. Fingers crossed, maybe it'll be Bubbles.
- I'm not going back to check, but I wonder if Johnny's anti-snitching passion only started after Bubbles was beat up in the interrogation room.
- I wonder if someone will ever notice these cops running around with binoculars on rooftops and in cars. Not even the targets, just someone walking by knocking on the window being like "hey are you guys perverts, what the gently caress are you doing in there?"
- Pearlman, I desperately need you to start having some expectations for your love life. This is a pretty thankless role, especially after the first season.
- Gotta love Stringer's deputy getting so deep into the minutiae of Robert's Rules of Order that he started taking meeting minutes.
- McNulty is just the lamest and most divorced dad. However, can't blame him for getting with Terri D'Agostino, goddamn
- Really, really liked how they handled the Avon and Stringer reunion. I thought they might leap straight to the power struggle, but instead, it's just these little ripples of discord. I imagine the fracture will come once Avon realizes that he's basically being treated as Stringer's trophy wife partner rather than actually being the head of the operation.
- The little speech that Stringer gives Avon about how it doesn't matter who has the corners, you can just feel that he's been rehearsing that in his head for months leading up to that moment. And it's so hard to tell whether Avon actually isn't able to see it from a non-gangster perspective like he says, or if he's right and Stringer is deluding himself, or if he's just unwilling to lose the battle of wills.
- Sometimes I wish the entire show was just the street side of things, these interactions between Stringer/Bodie and Stringer/Avon, etc. We're getting to the good part now, the walls starting to close in on the Barksdale organization as the police, success, past mistakes, and hungrier newcomers all start chipping away at the foundation.
- "Y'all are too fickle for Bubs, I swear!"
- OK, if the councilman doesn't turn out to be a secret serial killer, I'm gonna have to rewatch this season with every scene of his in a different frame of mind. Right now, I'm just sitting there in suspense waiting for the mask to fall off. I thought he was gonna go after his wife for the son's little sandwich VCR stunt.
- I'm going to assume that Carver has some kind of upward trajectory or turnaround over the remainder of the show, because the amount of screentime he gets with zero growth would otherwise be insane. Herc is a dead-end joke character and gets treated as such.
- loving hell Omar, what an unbelievable loogie
- For a show with as many plots and characters as this, you'd think there would be a ton of other shoes waiting to drop, but I feel like there aren't that many. There's the full story of Cedric's history in the Eastern district and the presumable return of Brother Mouzone. But the show keeps most of its developing stories front-and-center or at least touched on fairly regularly.
- I know there are multiple good options but this should be the #1 gif associated with The Wire:

HootTheOwl
May 13, 2012

Hootin and shootin

Jerusalem posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uy1UqoBFPc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GJa1_u-VLE

"But that's your loving job, right? You get paid a salary for that."

I thought there was a scene where they figure out they need suitable cover for the bug, before this scene.

Cranappleberry
Jan 27, 2009
Donut easily gonna be the most successful kid from that year at Edward J. Tilghman Middle School

deoju
Jul 11, 2004

All the pieces matter.
Nap Ghost
Donut is my dude. Love that kid.

If they ever do a sequel series I want to see him running a BMW dealership.

FlamingLiberal
Jan 18, 2009

Would you like to play a game?



Re:Sydnor, without spoiling anything, a lot of the cops from Season 1 go in and out of the show a lot until the end

Cranappleberry
Jan 27, 2009
Donut is is going to be a character in Fast 11, wherein he steals Dominic Toretto's new car which is so fast that it can fly. He takes it on a joy ride before returning it with a full tank.

roomtone
Jul 1, 2021

by Fluffdaddy
sydnor is an odd character in the sense he's mentioned a lot and just sort of hangs around but he never does anything to distinguish himself

everybody else has a bunch of personality traits, sydnor just has 'pretty competent at his job'

FlamingLiberal
Jan 18, 2009

Would you like to play a game?



roomtone posted:

sydnor is an odd character in the sense he's mentioned a lot and just sort of hangs around but he never does anything to distinguish himself

everybody else has a bunch of personality traits, sydnor just has 'pretty competent at his job'
No, and he's also in Season 1 more than any other season. He doesn't really have a huge arc but they try to give him one at the very end for some reason.

Ainsley McTree
Feb 19, 2004


In a way, Sydnor having a full life and character arc entirely offscreen would be fitting with the themes of the show

FlamingLiberal
Jan 18, 2009

Would you like to play a game?



After watching the final episode over the weekend, I can say that they somehow managed to give all of the characters endings, which considering there are like 25 of them by the end, is an accomplishment on its own

Count Roland
Oct 6, 2013

FlamingLiberal posted:

After watching the final episode over the weekend, I can say that they somehow managed to give all of the characters endings, which considering there are like 25 of them by the end, is an accomplishment on its own

Yeah lots of shows can't figure out an ending for even a single character.

BiggerBoat
Sep 26, 2007

Don't you tell me my business again.

surf rock posted:

Season 3, episodes four through six:

- Kind of nice to see Freamon cuss out McNulty. It was a good slow burn over the first few episodes of the season, him covering for McNulty or gently trying to nudge him to do his actual job instead of his lone wolf vengeance quest, only to boil over when McNulty started taking shots at him. McNulty really is the worst.

No spoilers but keep watching.

Really enjoying your write ups and reading reactions from a new viewer so thanks for keeping the thread alive.

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Loving these observations, can't wait to see you see how they play out!

One of my favorite somewhat meta-jokes from the series re: Sydnor is when one of the characters mentions the Sobotka Detail to him and is confused that he doesn't know what he's talking about, and Sydnor gets this exasperated look on his face like they've had this conversation many times before and reminds him,"I wasn't on that detail :mad:"

GoutPatrol
Oct 17, 2009

*Stupid Babby*

if you go back into the first convos in S1 about making the first task force they haggle about Syndor being there because they said they actually needed some good police to do something, it couldn't be all humps.

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

And what I loved about that is when Sydnor is prepping to do his first undercover gig for the detail, he shows up in his outfit and Bubbles immediately schools him and shows him all the ways he would immediately stand out as not being a real junkie to the dealers (and the other junkies). He was one of the few not sent to the Detail as either punishment or just an opportunity by other Lieutenants to offload their humps (the other being Kima, who was Daniels' protege) so I loved that he immediately found out he was lacking.

Of course, the reveal that many of them had skills and talents that were either hidden or just not being properly brought out was another major part of the series, showcasing that the police institution itself was massively failing its own officers. But yeah, Sydnor was genuinely sent in as an asset!

roomtone
Jul 1, 2021

by Fluffdaddy
i think you've hit it on the head regarding the police storylines

the detail generally either brings out the hidden strengths or obvious weaknesses of the various cops who get brought into it, and the thing with sydnor is you get the sense he's exactly as competent as he always was outside of it - professional work, nothing remarkable

he's to policing what jerry seinfeld was to comedy

AtraMorS
Feb 29, 2004

If at the end of a war story you feel that some tiny bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie

roomtone posted:

i think you've hit it on the head regarding the police storylines

the detail generally either brings out the hidden strengths or obvious weaknesses of the various cops who get brought into it, and the thing with sydnor is you get the sense he's exactly as competent as he always was outside of it - professional work, nothing remarkable

he's to policing what jerry seinfeld was to comedy
Series finale spoiler:

This is a little funny considering the final montage has him talking to the same judge that McNulty used in season 1. Kima gets all the new-McNulty shame, but she's not the only one with that honor.

Sydnor's mostly competent though--more competent than most, but that's a low bar to clear--but crucially, he wants institutional competence, too. His best strength is that he learns; he takes criticism well and applies it constructively. I mean, he was brought onto the detail precisely for his ability to blend in with a line of junkies, and an addict informant with no training tore his whole act down in about a minute. He took it, he got better at it, and so on. He learns from Lester too, and even tries to teach some the paper-trail-habits to a dumbass like Herc.

So I kind of like the back-handed compliment it is to McNulty. It's like at one point, McNulty was completely and totally mediocre. Not bad, but no "natural" police either. He just learned and got better at it until he learned enough about how poo poo works, and got frustrated enough about how poo poo works, to start throwing some of the poo poo back up the hill. You don't need high-functioning alcoholism and self-destructive tendencies to get to that point.

Xiahou Dun
Jul 16, 2009

We shall dive down through black abysses... and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever.



McNulty is 100% natural police.

You can’t learn to be that much of a drunken gently caress-up.

Ainsley McTree
Feb 19, 2004


AtraMorS posted:

Series finale spoiler:

This is a little funny considering the final montage has him talking to the same judge that McNulty used in season 1. Kima gets all the new-McNulty shame, but she's not the only one with that honor.

Sydnor's mostly competent though--more competent than most, but that's a low bar to clear--but crucially, he wants institutional competence, too. His best strength is that he learns; he takes criticism well and applies it constructively. I mean, he was brought onto the detail precisely for his ability to blend in with a line of junkies, and an addict informant with no training tore his whole act down in about a minute. He took it, he got better at it, and so on. He learns from Lester too, and even tries to teach some the paper-trail-habits to a dumbass like Herc.

So I kind of like the back-handed compliment it is to McNulty. It's like at one point, McNulty was completely and totally mediocre. Not bad, but no "natural" police either. He just learned and got better at it until he learned enough about how poo poo works, and got frustrated enough about how poo poo works, to start throwing some of the poo poo back up the hill. You don't need high-functioning alcoholism and self-destructive tendencies to get to that point.


I completely forget the phrasing of the line at this point, but I think there's some conversation between Landsman and Rawls, I think the one in season 1 where Landsman is trying to get Rawls to back off a little, where he describes McNulty's origin story along the lines of "he thinks he's the smartest guy in the room; hell, in that room, he probably was" that I feel sums up his character nicely. That and the scene where he tries to go on a date with the lobbyist (or whatever her job was) and humbly is confronted with the fact that the only thing he has to talk/brag about is policing and nobody but cops are impressed by that

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

There's also a scene in I think season 3 where McNulty is bragging to Lester about what great police the two of them are and how few others in Baltimore can match up to them (namedropping Ed Burns as one of them, which was very sweet) and Lester hits him with that "the job will not save you" line and points out how there is more to life that just big cases, and each one ends and then you gotta have something in your life or else you're just hanging out waiting for the next big case. I like to think that part of that is because, for as good as McNulty is at his job in particular circumstances, Lester probably balks at the idea of McNulty lumping himself in with him and thinks he is far, far, far better police than McNulty is (and he's right!).

escape artist
Sep 24, 2005

Slow train coming
sup guys

Only registered members can see post attachments!

ilmucche
Mar 16, 2016

I was, in a way, the one who had to leave.

Jerusalem posted:

There's also a scene in I think season 3 where McNulty is bragging to Lester about what great police the two of them are and how few others in Baltimore can match up to them (namedropping Ed Burns as one of them, which was very sweet) and Lester hits him with that "the job will not save you" line and points out how there is more to life that just big cases, and each one ends and then you gotta have something in your life or else you're just hanging out waiting for the next big case. I like to think that part of that is because, for as good as McNulty is at his job in particular circumstances, Lester probably balks at the idea of McNulty lumping himself in with him and thinks he is far, far, far better police than McNulty is (and he's right!).

It's one of my favourite scenes in the show.

roomtone
Jul 1, 2021

by Fluffdaddy
i think of that 'the job will not save you' line all the time. it's really good advice to remember just in general.

surf rock
Aug 12, 2007

We need more women in STEM, and by that, I mean skateboarding, television, esports, and magic.
Season 3, episodes seven through nine:

- Literally laughed out loud when Sydnor showed back up at the task force meeting and complained about being on rooftops fighting cicadas for weeks while monitoring Kintel's people. Love that one of the Baltimore Police Department's few "good police" is just always offscreen doing poo poo work.
- Did Under Armour sponsor this season? Buncha characters showing up wearing those shirts, including main cast. Very trendy for this time.
- I really like Cutty's Dennis's actor. Good, lived-in performance.
- Also a big fan of Colvin's deputy's mustache. That guy really landed on his feet after being transferred in from the Fargo unit.
- Hamsterdam at night is an ugly place, drat. Get outta there Bubs!!!
- Very curious to learn more about Roman.
- Of course McNulty plays up the racism angle when talking with the rural cop, and of course it blows up in his face.
- There are a lot of pretty thankless female roles in this show, but the role of Bernard's girlfriend has got to be the worst.
- "Prez has exactly one skill but boy howdy does he enjoy it, and that's enough." <-- that's what I had typed up before midway through episode nine. I knew something bad was gonna happen when he left his hermetically sealed office, but I didn't think it was gonna be THAT bad. Thought the aftermath of that was really well-handled.
- Nearly passed out holding my breath the last few minutes of episode eight. We got to the fireworks factory sooner than I expected, and it was a real struggle to go to sleep instead of jumping forward to episode nine to see what happened next. So, after 30 minutes of failing to sleep, that's exactly what I did.
- Given the amount of poo poo that Stringer has been dealing with for years, it's unbelievable that he didn't snap until that confrontation. Still, pulling the "actually I am street enough for this, and my proof is that I murdered your family" card is a wild move.
- Love that that fight wasn't the end for those two, though. It's gonna take more than that to break up Avon and Stringer, even when they've started diverging down different paths so heavily.
- Omar's got a new vengeance quest, folks.
- Feels like Jimmy's big speech about how almost everyone in the department sucks other than his detail will turn out to have been recorded and will be used against him at some point.
- "The job will not save you, Jimmy."

Xiahou Dun
Jul 16, 2009

We shall dive down through black abysses... and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever.



Colvin’s dude with the giant mustache is the real cop that Jay Landsman is based on.

Also I bet you Bernard’s girlfriend’s actor had a very fun time. “Be as annoying as possible” is a very fun acting demand.

ShaneMacGowansTeeth
May 22, 2007



I think this is it... I think this is how it ends
Under Armour is a Baltimore company, so it makes sense there's a lot of their gear

Eason the Fifth
Apr 9, 2020

ShaneMacGowansTeeth posted:

Under Armour is a Baltimore company, so it makes sense there's a lot of their gear

:hmmyes: It was also one of the bigger brands related to the military and the Global War on Terror. Season 3 parallels 9/11 and the american response in a lot of ways (e.g the towers falling, turf wars in the aftermath, "dead soldiers").

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Count Roland
Oct 6, 2013

Jerusalem posted:

There's also a scene in I think season 3 where McNulty is bragging to Lester about what great police the two of them are and how few others in Baltimore can match up to them (namedropping Ed Burns as one of them, which was very sweet) and Lester hits him with that "the job will not save you" line and points out how there is more to life that just big cases, and each one ends and then you gotta have something in your life or else you're just hanging out waiting for the next big case. I like to think that part of that is because, for as good as McNulty is at his job in particular circumstances, Lester probably balks at the idea of McNulty lumping himself in with him and thinks he is far, far, far better police than McNulty is (and he's right!).

This was especially good because it had a lasting impact.
McNulty wasn't the same for the rest of the season. He was visibly shaken and was clearly looking at things differently. It ended up with him spending the entire next season at patrol, and he was much better off for it.

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply