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Protocol 5 posted:The worst thing is Andre Royo apparently being condemned to get bit parts forever, despite his amazing work in the Wire. It seriously blows my mind that an actor with his charisma and comedic timing doesn't have a regular gig in something. I saw him in The Collection recently and he has only 1 or 2 lines, so to me he was still Bubbles. A flak-jacketed, machine gun toting Bubbles that gets a meathook through the face. Very disturbing to see that happen to Bubbles.
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# ¿ Jan 25, 2013 15:06 |
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# ¿ Sep 16, 2024 23:48 |
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Parachute Underwear posted:Is that what he says? Well I think its both. When Koutris sets up a huge bust like the ink pigment, we can assume he has to use some kind of "official" informant for the paperwork. I assume they trade favors back and forth, but as far as the FBI is concerned The Greek is probably just another asset. I doubt anybody but Koutris really knows how much of The Greeks activities are being ignored/swept under the rug. Koutris just has enough status in the FBI that he can list someone as a CI and nobody will look too closely at whats going on.
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# ¿ Jan 30, 2013 15:40 |
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DarkCrawler posted:Also still the best quote of the show, delivery, acting, content, prelude to the pay-off moment, all: Totally agree, this has been my favorite line in the show for a long time. The way Bunk squirms in his seat as he's talking to Omar, its like at that moment if he could press The Button and set the whole world back to the stone age he would. He's so bitter and just sad about the way his generation went.
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# ¿ Feb 7, 2013 22:36 |
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Jerusalem posted:There's one situation I can think of where - through no fault of his own - he ends up totally hosed, when Omar comes after him thinking he killed Butchie. Slim KNOWS he is dead and he accepts that there is nothing he can do about it. He lives thanks to Omar's promise to Bunk, but I think also because he didn't try to bluff his way out or take a wild lunge at Omar. He also said something to Omar that made him realize he had nothing to do with Butchie. I can't remember exactly what he said. Always remember though that Slim Charles is still a cold-blooded murderer when he has to be. When him and Cutty go after Fruit's corner in Season 3, the kid he shoots is like 15 years old. And it wasn't a gunfight, he just walked up on the kid and shot him in the back. Slim has loyalty and is a smart dude but thats about as far as I can go with it.
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# ¿ Feb 13, 2013 16:43 |
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3spades posted:Lance Reddick does play a junkie on The Corner though. Well as a Fringe fan as well, its really difficult to see Reddick as anything other than the Daniels/Broyles character. I think he defined himself as a character actor with those two roles.
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# ¿ Feb 14, 2013 19:33 |
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Jerusalem posted:I really don't think either suspected the other of selling them out (not until they were told/shown, anyway), but during that (amazing) scene, both are aware that THEY have sold their best friend out and they're making one final effort at a good and happy memory of togetherness, not knowing what the other is up to. Yea this is how I always interpreted it. Its so great how they are both thinking "drat, I can't believe I'm standing here about to gently caress my best friend over, how did it get to this point?" without realizing that the other is thinking the exact same thing.
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# ¿ Feb 19, 2013 22:04 |
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Yea the whole season they build Ziggy up as a guy who is basically a good person, but he gets no respect from anyone in any aspect of his life. His father thinks he's a loser and has basically written him off, his co-workers think of him as a joke who only has a job because of nepotism, and Nick does his best to be his friend but as soon as poo poo gets serious he wants Zig as far away as possible so as to not gently caress things up. You can see when he leaves Double-G's shop and sits in his car, the look on his face says "No, not this time. This is one time I will not be disrespected and thrown aside like garbage. I will make them respect me or they'll regret it." You can also tell when he buys the gun that he doesn't even really know why he's buying it. He's just got so much anger inside and he has no clue what to do with it.
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# ¿ Feb 28, 2013 20:57 |
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Buane posted:When Nick tells Frank what's happened and Frank and Nick both trade "Where were you?"s, they might as well be asking us, the audience, where we were too. Between this scene and the following one with Frank and Ziggy in prison I really don't understand how some people can be so down on Season 2. I mean at first I totally get that the switch to the docks can be jarring, but by the end how can you not be invested in these two characters? Those two scenes are two of the most powerful in the whole series, I'm having a hard time thinking of any others that affected me as much as those scenes. Not even Wallace.
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# ¿ Mar 1, 2013 15:37 |
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BrBa posted:Am I the only one who actually liked Ziggy less a second time around? I mean, yeah, he's a great tragic character, but drat he's obnoxious. Not to mention his dumb rear end essentially gets Frank killed, since he wouldn't have gone back to the Greek if it wasn't for the hope of bailing Ziggy out. I mean yea he's obnoxious and I doubt I'd want to hang out with the guy, but once you know where its going every scene turns into me rooting for something that I know won't happen. Every time he's being a dick I just want so bad for one of the guys to pull him aside and talk to him, or suggest therapy, or something. Anything but what they(everyone in his life) do, which is mock him and put him down every chance they get. The closest anyone gets to being nice to him is just dismissing him and ignoring him, but he's so damaged at that point that negative attention probably feels better than none at all. Honestly on repeated viewings I dislike the other guys on the docks more because they are watching him drown day by day and never once think to throw him a life line.
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# ¿ Mar 1, 2013 18:46 |
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Randomly Specific posted:Which is a commentary on the environment they're in. They're fighting for survival, Everything you say is correct, but none of those other guys ended up completely snapping the way Ziggy does, so my natural reaction to those scenes when I watch them now is to wish something would have been done differently. Much like I imagine Nick replays those moments in his head and regrets brushing Ziggy off so harshly.
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# ¿ Mar 1, 2013 20:26 |
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melon farmer posted:To add to the funky math, white mike sells to Nick at "4 a pack for you" which is the extreme friend price - he tried to wholesale at 5 until Sergei vouched for him. I think even if they're "worth" $1000, they probably sell $10000 worth of drugs off them, which would make sense with the "we just lost 40" (I think prop joe even mentions $40k when omar brings the drugs to him) and Lester/McNulty's estimate for how much money they pull in could be right. Yea theres two values, how much a street dealer would pay for the g-pack wholesale, and how much money can be made from a g-pack once its split up into vials. So when White Mike is selling a g-pack for "4 or 5", he means Nick will buy it from him for $400 and then get $1000 back once its sold on the street. So for each g-pack he gets a profit of $600, a hundred more than if he wouldn't have gotten the "friend price". So the "g" in g-pack refers to the money that it is worth to someone who is willing to split it into vials and take the risk of going out in the street and selling it.
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# ¿ Mar 13, 2013 19:10 |
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escape artist posted:Oh, I know. I'm not laughing at all. Dread is more of an apt description of what's going on in my head. I feel like O'Malley is just too robotic, too stereotypical slick politician to get elected. These days people really don't like guys like that, its a big reason why Romney had no chance. Why I'm clinging to optimism when it comes to American politics I'll never know.
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# ¿ Apr 4, 2013 16:37 |
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SpookyLizard posted:I seem to be in the minority that "got" Ziggy on the first run through. It really surprised me how many needed a rewatch to get him I think it happened as intended for me. I was annoyed by Ziggy for the whole season, much like everyone in his life. Then when it all comes crashing down it hit me like a ton of bricks that his entire life had lead up to this disaster. For me the saddest scene in the entire series is the conversation between Ziggy and Frank in prison.
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# ¿ Apr 10, 2013 18:14 |
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Jerusalem posted:The way ratings are worked out is such a lumbering dinosaur, one of the smartest things HBO ever did was look deeper into the details/motivations of their viewers. They found out that while The Wire rated relatively poorly, the vast majority of those who were watching had subscribed SPECIFICALLY for The Wire and nothing else. HBO realized that if they dropped The Wire and replaced it with another show, they were going to lose a good number of paying subscribers. I don't really have any knowledge of HBO politics then or now, but I always heard that The Wire was just really really highly regarded by a few important people at the network who gave it a few extra seasons than maybe it deserved(based on ratings). I've always thought of HBO as the only network that will once and a while make artistic decisions based on quality and not business, but I suppose that is only true to a degree if not completely false. T.V. is a business after all.
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# ¿ Apr 16, 2013 15:42 |
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Grumpwagon posted:Maybe this is just me being a David Simon fanboy (I am), but I attribute a lot of the 5th season's problems to HBO cutting the order down from 13 (?) episodes to 10. It just felt rushed. Not enough time to develop the nuance of the "bad guys" (the higher ups in the newspaper), etc. I totally agree. Imagine Season 4 with three less episodes to develop the school system storyline or Season 2 with three less episodes to establish the docks and its cast of characters. Its easy to see how the newspaper storyline could have been a lot better with more time to develop the higher-ups and the Gus character. Gus especially, with more room to breathe maybe he would have felt more like a fully realized character. Edit: ^^^^I assume if he knew the show was continuing then Simon would have held back a little more on completely ending the McNulty story. Maybe something similar to what happened but less definitive. I suppose maybe thats an example of why its a good thing the show ended when it did. No half measures(sorry to mix my references) Basebf555 fucked around with this message at 20:39 on Apr 16, 2013 |
# ¿ Apr 16, 2013 20:35 |
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cletepurcel posted:The ending for McNulty was perfect as it was though I think, at least as long as he was going to have him hit rock bottom in the way that he did. I'm not sure it is definitive - just like Marlo, he's a man without a country. Not being on the police force is definitely better for his life, but is he really self-reflective enough and not self-destructive enough to always recognize this and keep himself together? I am biased because I don't like the character but I'm not sure. Yea I guess when I think of his ending as definitive, I'm thinking in terms of every other T.V. show I've ever seen, which doesn't work with The Wire. "McNulty's not a cop anymore, welp, story over!" Its cool to think of what they may have done with him in his new life and how it would connect to whatever mainline story they decided to go with.
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# ¿ Apr 16, 2013 21:15 |
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watt par posted:McNulty's also a much higher-functioning person than Nick. I think this was probably true at some point in Mcnulty's life before the show starts, but by the time we get to know him he's an alcholic who lives in what we would consider the gooniest of goon lairs. He has no furniture and sleeps on a mattress on the floor. So really the fact that he has a job that he goes to every day is the only thing separating him from Nick. If Nick had that in his life, I have no doubt he'd be able to show up to work every day and do a good job. McNulty has no idea how to handle relationships of any kind, and would be a much better cop if he could get his personal poo poo under control. I'd say he's barely functioning.
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# ¿ Apr 18, 2013 19:51 |
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Frostwerks posted:Marlo not getting his is kinda like Chigurh not getting his at the end of NCfOM. Sometimes the bad guys don't get their proper comeuppance. It drives people loving bananas. Also a lot of people don't really get what an ending like that is trying to say, some just see it as a gently caress you to the audience. But Marlo and Chigurh are supposed to represent constants; forces of nature that have always been there(in the context of the show/movie) and will never come to an end. It doesn't matter if Marlo is arrested or killed, there would be a new Marlo to take his place and the community would hardly notice there had been any change. Chigurh could have been killed any number of times, but the forces he symbolizes would overwhelm the naive Moss regardless. Its like surviving a plane crash and thinking to yourself "I defeated Death!" No, you didn't. Death has all the time in the world to wait.
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# ¿ Apr 22, 2013 19:51 |
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I think Avon's various community connections also demonstrate that he understands the difference between fear and respect. Cutty comes to Avon for money because he respects him and thinks of him as someone who cares about the neighborhood. Avon cares about respect, and he himself has a deep respect for certain things when he sees them in others. He clearly admires the way Cutty is so up-front about leaving The Game. Marlo just wants power and doesn't really care about the fear/respect ratio as long as people know who the boss is. He would have killed Cutty for having the gall to quit on him, to inconvenience him.
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# ¿ Apr 25, 2013 19:35 |
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ChairMaster posted:D'Angelo's mother basically convinced him to go to jail for 20 years because she wanted to keep getting paid by his cousin. I think its because we the audience are privy to a few scenes that McNulty isn't. Primarily the final scene between her and D'Angelo where its pretty clear that everything she's done is coming crashing down on her all at once as she realizes that she flushed the only really important thing in her life down the toilet. After that McNulty comes off as just piling on. Its also worth mentioning that Brianna, like Avon, grew up in this world and she only knows that set of rules. In order for D'Angelo to get out of going to prison he would have had to snitch, and its understandable why Brianna would never see that as a viable option. Final point: McNulty is just an rear end in a top hat in general as we all know, so its easy to see all of his scenes through that lens once you feel that way about him.
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# ¿ May 2, 2013 19:46 |
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cletepurcel posted:
I wouldn't say he's making a mistake by saying that to Frank as much as he realizes by Frank's reaction that he may have made a big mistake by getting into business with him. Like the write-up said, The Greek is used to dealing with people who are greedy and selfish, only out for themselves. I think at that moment he sees Frank as a new animal he has never dealt with before, or has gone out of his way to avoid until now.
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# ¿ May 8, 2013 20:24 |
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Regarding the fate of Bodie and Poot, it feels like they are showing us the natural progression that all of these lower level guys(pawns) go through. There are slightly different paths to take, but they always burn out. They start out young and idealistic; they're a soldier, just playing the game, grinding, whatever. They are conditioned to see that life as noble. Then over time, like Poot and Bodie, they begin to open their eyes to what the game is really about and who really benefits from it. Some get out in time, some don't. Poot is an example of the former, Bodie the latter.
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# ¿ May 17, 2013 16:00 |
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I can only assume when Chris Bauer's name gets brought up in casting meetings its in the context of "We REALLY need someone in this part that is going to feel like a real person, who's so good that its hard to tell they're even acting?" My first exposure to him was the show Third Watch where I remember specifically noticing that he felt like a real husband of female cop. I had never known a real one, but his character just felt so genuine compared to a lot of the other characters on that show. Its great to watch The Wire where he gets to do his thing along with other people that are really loving good at what they do. Not that I'm down on Third Watch, but obviously these two shows can barely be said to be in the same genre.
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# ¿ May 23, 2013 18:46 |
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I live in Baltimore and you can get a strawberry soda sure, but its not like a big thing that people know about like lake trout for instance. Its just one of the kinds of soda on the shelf.
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# ¿ May 23, 2013 21:12 |
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Jerusalem posted:Will there be a write-up for episode 2 anytime soon? Yea I hope I'm not being a dick but I depend on these write-ups to get me through the work day! But seriously, the thread really slows down when there aren't any new episode write-ups to discuss so thats kind of a bummer.
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# ¿ Jun 12, 2013 21:15 |
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Meltathon posted:I think Freamon justified it in his mind because they were on the case originally and then he had to move to the Clay Davis stuff, so it's what he was supposed to be doing all along. Plus he probably justifies it that what he's doing would be legit, if they had enough funding to properly work the case. I can't remember if he specifically defends his actions to someone at the end of the season, I'll have to rewatch and see. Honestly I think something like the fake serial killer is the reason Freamon didn't quit when he was originally hidden away in the pawn shop unit. He really finds his place in the department over the course of the series, but I always got the feeling that he's been more than willing to give it all up for the right cause since day one. He's like one of those Musketeers who's been hiding out waiting for the chance at an honorable death.
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# ¿ Jun 17, 2013 20:58 |
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ShaneMacGowansTeeth posted:I always saw the "dead in a zip code that don't matter" not in geographical terms but simply departmental priorities: she's dead in a shoot-out with no witnesses aside from the kids, no physical evidence and no suspects. It's simply a case that will never be closed, so in terms of the department, it does not matter. Dozerman's gun on the other hand, is very important to the department because they don't want the general population thinking that it's okay to steal an officer's weapon. Interestingly enough, the stolen gun was lifted straight out of the Homicide book as well, except in real like the detective was using some home made porn tapes of his prime suspect as leverage to get the gun back. Unfortunately for said detective, he never signed them into evidence and as such was suspended while attempting said negotiations so being found interrogating someone with his service weapon was not a smart move. Hell, Edgerton in the book kind of reminds me of McNulty in a way Well its a combination of the two. There's a geographical aspect because if two people had been shot dead in the street in the suburbs it would be all over the news, therefore the police would have to pull out all the stops to solve it. What they call a red ball. But because it happened in a neighborhood that the media and general public doesn't give a poo poo about, they are freed up to look for Dozerman's gun which the higher ups in the department care about much more than the 267th murder of the year in Baltimore.
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# ¿ Jun 18, 2013 21:26 |
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the black husserl posted:I never forgave him for wallace though This is how I feel about Bodie too. Wallace's murder is the most affecting and memorable of the series to me, it never left my mind even by Season 4. By then I had sympathy for Bodie's lot in life, as I do with most of the characters on the show, but when it came down to it my first thought when he died was "Hey, you get what you give, he finally got what was coming to him." Just not with that satisfied feeling you usually get when some rear end in a top hat finally gets their comeuppance, this was more a depressed sigh.
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# ¿ Aug 27, 2013 20:43 |
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Skeesix posted:I never faulted Bodie for Wallace's murder. If there's any one person to fault it is Stringer. But even that's not exactly right. Stringer wanted to build a drug empire. A drug empire doesn't treat each person as a special case - if a drug empire catches a whiff of snitching, it demands the snitch be killed. Bodie and Poot certainly didn't want to kill their friend, but since they were specifically asked by the head dude, they did it. And yes, they could have said no. But the best case scenario there would be that their boss gets to think of them as having no heart. Stringer gets some actual muscle to kill Wallace and Bodie/Poot stop advancing in the Barksdale organization. Their apparently hopeless lives get a little more hopeless. Worst case, Stringer thinks they might be snitches, and has them offed as well. I guess it depends on what you mean by "faulted". If you're saying you understand what drove them to do it, then yea I can agree, which is why I gradually developed sympathy for Bodie and Poot over time. But some things, even if you aren't 100% to blame, even if you didn't want to do it, even if there was no decent alternative, are so heinous that they are unforgivable. No rationale or logic can justify murdering a friend in cold blood. Edit: Bodie and Carcetti are human and flawed absolutely, and its important to keep that in mind. But that doesn't preclude judging their actions on the basis of (my own personal) morality. There does come a point when personal choice should come into play, like when you're being asked to murder your friend. If you make the wrong choice, which may also be the most human choice, you still gotta pay the piper for your own actions. Like I said, just because the system is against you doesn't mean you have no moral responsibilities whatsoever. Basebf555 fucked around with this message at 21:27 on Aug 27, 2013 |
# ¿ Aug 27, 2013 21:15 |
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the black husserl posted:Even still, he also said he regrets making those comments. He wasn't talking about you, he was bitter and frustrated at people who treated the entire thing like a fun fiction to binge through in a week. Yea I think at the time he made those comments The Wire was in a much different place in terms of pop culture. When the 5th season aired, and even shortly after, a lot of people were very focused on the wrong stuff(how "badass" Omar is being the most common example). It had Sopranos syndrome where there was a large part of the audience that seemed to be watching just to see who got got every episode. But its now been several years and I really think the fanbase of the show has grown up a lot, many of us have rewatched the show several times and are now seeing it the way it was meant to be seen by Simon. I hope he'd be able to acknowledge that, I haven't seen any recent interviews. Edit: Did Obama really say that? I thought he just said Omar was his favorite character, I don't remember him specifying a reason. Basebf555 fucked around with this message at 14:39 on Aug 30, 2013 |
# ¿ Aug 30, 2013 14:35 |
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Boywhiz88 posted:Considering I just watched the 5th season, what happens in holding is that Chris has the murder charge on him and that's why they think Michael rolled. He's not up high enough to know anything about distribution, but he could put the murder charge on Chris and so they wonder if he snitched about that, not the whole operation. This is correct, they think the only way Chris could have the murder charge on him is if Michael flipped when really Chris just hosed up and left DNA behind.
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# ¿ Aug 30, 2013 21:09 |
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Orange Devil posted:Gotta go with that lesser evil every time and so the system perpetuates itself and nothing ever changes. And Carcetti's idea of which option is the lesser evil is based on his own career advancement, not what's best for the city. Pretty much everything he says he wants to do when he becomes governor he could already be doing as mayor if he could just be humble and take the money. His rationalization that if he takes the money he wont be governor and therefore won't be in a position to change anything is bullshit, what he really means is he wants to change things HIS way, and doesn't want the credit going to anyone else. And politicians are public servants for a reason. It really is wrong to go into politics with a self-serving attitude, even though as we all know most seem to have it. In my opinion any politician who makes a decision based on their own career versus the greater good is not doing their job properly. So to the guy who said he wants to get into politics but is self-serving: Its good that your self aware but please don't get into politics. Basebf555 fucked around with this message at 15:46 on Oct 10, 2013 |
# ¿ Oct 10, 2013 15:39 |
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Ainsley McTree posted:The way I saw it is that the state is crushingly bureaucratic, with no real interest in the students on an individual level; if the state takes over, it just means more rules for the teachers to follow instead of actually responding to the needs of their students (like Teaching the Test, except for everything). I think all of this is probably correct, but we the audience know that this is not in Carcetti's head at all when he decides not to take the money. Its 100% a political decision.
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# ¿ Oct 10, 2013 16:25 |
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Holy poo poo as much as I love The Wire I always assumed it was still somewhat hyper-realistic in the way it portrayed the police department's non-stop politicking and stat games. I work in a law firm outside a city that will remain nameless(lets call it Schmaltimore), and today a detective client of ours came in with a referral for us to call one of his fellow officers. I don't want to say the guy's rank, but he is a mid to high level guy who is responsible for several units. Apparently he reported a subordinate of his multiple times for juking the stats, changing aggravated assaults to regular battery or some poo poo like that. The third time he reported the guy he(the potential client, not the stat gamer) was demoted, he is now a regular beat cop.
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# ¿ Nov 8, 2013 18:05 |
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Frostwerks posted:If he is from Schmaltimore I'm sure he's familiar with the show, especially at this point in time. Did he mention it in any way? I'm always curious to hear about LEO's impressions of the show. Given that Ed Burns was former Po-lice and David Simon was a crime journalist and had a close contact with the police, I always figured that it was drat near spot on (with the exception of dramatic liberties of course) representation of police culture. My friend's stepfather was a narcotics and SWAT guy and I know he owned the box set. Never spoke with him directly about it but I assume he liked/loved it if he had the box set. I didn't mention the show specifically, I figure cops around here get asked about The Wire non-stop and they're probably sick of it. I did say something like "Wow I never thought T.V. was so close to how things actually work down there" and he totally agreed.
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# ¿ Nov 8, 2013 20:30 |
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Thaddius the Large posted:Man, he's very talented and capable and all, but the way his career has developed makes it seem like McNulty would have been a MUCH different character. Yea it is hard to say how he would have played McNulty because at that time in his career he hadn't really found his niche yet. Now its hard to see him as anything other than a comedic actor.
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# ¿ Nov 8, 2013 21:52 |
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The cats are there I think just for the sake of realism. In downtown Baltimore there's probably a few strays on every block, they probably eat pretty well what with the extensive rat problem the city has. It does make you wonder if a few just wandered into the middle of shots during filming though.
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# ¿ Nov 12, 2013 22:26 |
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Its funny too because you can imagine that many people over the years have wanted to kill Cheese but his relation to Prop Joe would have always saved him. So once Joe is dead Cheese demonstrates just how long he would have survived in the game had he been on his own. He acted like a dick(something he's spent his whole life doing) one time in front of people who didn't respect him and bam he's unceremoniously killed. Cheese wasn't in the game for real until Joe died but he never realized it.
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# ¿ Dec 2, 2013 17:18 |
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Orange Devil posted:Hey so I'm curious about something here. Given the level of rampant homophobia in the game, how is Michael so comfortable to go out and put a beating on whoever touched his weaker, male friend that he lives with? Like it's clear to us that they're just good friends, but it seems like it'd be an awful easy rumor to start, and as we learned, people get killed based on rumors and drug dealers hate gays. Michael at that point in the show is fairly high level muscle for Marlo, he doesn't have any fear of people loving with him for stupid poo poo that isn't even true, and the people that he actually does need to impress(Snoop, Chris, Marlo) know exactly what the situation is with him and Dukie.
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# ¿ Dec 5, 2013 19:24 |
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# ¿ Sep 16, 2024 23:48 |
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Radiohead71 posted:McNulty's serial killer angle is the most asinine thing of the entire show. Everything else in the show is fantastic but I think this really brings down season 5. Also, I have a hard time believing that Lester would both go along with this stupid idea and also use an illegal wire tap. They needed to focus more on how pissed off McNulty gets when it becomes clear that Carcetti was just bullshitting them with all the "New Day" talk. That one ray of hope being squashed was the last straw that sent him over the edge but its not given enough time to develop so his behavior does seem pretty over-the-top and out of the blue.
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# ¿ Dec 27, 2013 20:16 |