Christmas came a little late this year. Don't feel bad, one of my best gifts was the debut of Season 5 of The Wire tonight.
Look, I've been pretty much shouting at the rain about this show for five years. Half the APCB entries in this category are probably related to it. Every major TV critic and publication have described it as everything from "the best series on TV, period"[1] to "deserving of the Nobel Prize for Literature."[2] I may have turned a handful of people on to it, and if any of my blog entries compels someone to go get the first four seasons on DVD and check them out for themselves, I'll be happy.
But it's still a sad situation. This is the last season, according to creator David Simon, and I have to temper my enjoyment of each new episode with the realization that every week brings me one step closer to the end of a series that has been one of the only beacons of quality in a spectrum of televised crap. The Wire is the only show, bar none, that I go out of my way to make sure my ass is on the couch to catch every week at its appointed time; no TiVo, no tape. Make of that endorsement what you will.
For tonight, The Wife and I had crab cakes to celebrate, Baltimore-style. I got some 90 Minute Imperial IPA from Dogfish Head (a Delaware brewery would have to suffice, seeing as Spec's doesn't carry Baltimore City or Clipper City), and you couldn't slap the smile off my face at seeing Bunk, McNulty, Freamon, Bubbles, Carcetti, Marlo, Rawls, Daniels, Prop Joe, Carver, and Herc on my TV again.
I won't nag you folks again. Well, not until the series finale, and you have two months to watch the first four seasons before that happens, so get on it.
[1] Entertainment Weekly
[2] Joe Klein
I’ve finally come around to your (and others’) way of thinking — Matt’s been watching it all along, and until now, I would just retire with a book or a chick flick to the bedroom. But now I’m hooked, making my way through season 1 on DVD. (Of course, when Daniels kissed the state’s attorney in the lobbby of the courthouse, I gasped, because THAT’S NOT HIS WIFE!!!!)
This may indeed be a great show, but you’re going to have to give me more to go on. I’ve had a long run of disappointment after seeking out shows that came highly recommended. What’s so great about this one? And even better, what are its weaknesses, because it has to have some.
I definitely will, Pete. I’ll reserve one of my Netflix slots for it.
Big Ed has 2 x 4 packs of the Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA in the beer fridge and considers it among his favs…nice choice…any chance of you visiting the Delaware area anytime soon…you know we are only 15 minutes from that border..
I used to date someone who lived in Baltimore, and I’d fly there fairly regularly on the last Southwest flight out of Hobby on Friday nights. The last items to be loaded on the plane every trip were the boxes and boxes of crabs. Apparently, the Chesapeake has been de-crabified, and Texas Gulf crabs are in all those expensive crabcakes in those seafood restaurants on the Baltimore harbor.
Your dinner was culturally correct!
Seeing as how I don’t have HBO, I have to wait for each season to come out on DVD. Once it does, I get to spend a glorious couple of days watching this magnificently written and acted series. Thank God for Blockbuster Online.