I’ve been covering The Wire in my Jane After Dark column at TV Squad, and I can’t help but think about the similarities to another favorite HBO show: The Sopranos. They’re both edgy and well-written and filled with knock-out characters, but they’re also very different. Here’s my rundown on these two top-notch shows:

Reality vs. Storytelling. The Sopranos is an awesome example of great storytelling. We’ve got the panic-plagued mobster dealing with his biological family and his mobster family. What could be better? I know there are people like Tony Soprano out there, but to me, The Sopranos is just a really good story.

The Wire, on the other hand, is so real that you feel like you”re watching a documentary. I’m into season three now and just noticed that there’s no soundtrack, no music at all (yeah, it takes me a while). It’s like someone is following these guys around with a camera.

Good Guys vs. Bad Guys. The Sopranos is mostly centered on Tony Soprano and his thugs and family, while The Wire gives equal time to thugs and the cops, with some politicians and dockworkers thrown in (as mentioned, I’m just into season 3, so haven’t gotten into the school system or press yet). I guess you could say that Stringer Bell, Avon Barksdale and Omar Little are the Tony Sopranos of The Wire; Stringer’s got his real estate business, and Tony’s got his sanitation business. But that’s not quite right either.

Read the rest of this entry »

(Season 5, Episode 10, Series Finale)

I knew that the end was coming, and I had myself prepared for it, but I have to admit that I miss The Wire. After having experienced the full run of the series, I understand completely why every fan I talked to about the show said it was the best series to ever be on TV. I don’t know that I would heap that particular praise on the series, but it was definitely as good as anything I’ve seen, and better than just about anything on the tube these days.

There was a lot to wrap up going into the series finale, and the show really did an excellent job tying together all the loose ends. This really was one of the best, most satisfying, conclusions to any show that I’ve been a fan of.

Read the rest of this entry »

(Season 2, Episodes 5-7)

Well, I’m more than halfway through season two at this point and things are just starting to come together. The jigsaw puzzle isn’t quite done yet, but I’m pretty sure that all the pieces are on the table and all the edge pieces have been put together. Now that tricky middle portion needs to be figured out.

This season has definitely been slower than the first. So many more characters are involved, but luckily I am finding them engaging and interesting. Watching TV on DVD is a much different experience than watching it live, waiting a week or more for a new episode. I could definitely see myself getting frustrated having to wait in-between episodes during this slow-developing season. Luckily, I don’t have that problem, so I really don’t have anything to complain about.

Read the rest of this entry »

CBS

Don’t get me wrong. In their heyday, I was all about the characters of Bobby Goren (Vincent D’Onofrio) on Law and Order: Criminal Intent and Gil Grissom (William Petersen) on the original C.S.I. While Goren was always odd, he’s gotten stranger (and a lot chubbier and unkempt) over the years. Now we all know that Jeff Goldblum will be joining the cast to replace Mr. Big Chris Noth. I can’t think of Goldblum not playing a role full of quirks, can you?

But I started thinking about things. You know, there are very few cops out there in TV land who just lead mundane normal kind of personal lives. It’s not Adam-12 or Dragnet out there and it’s been a lot of years since normal was the norm. Read the rest of this entry »