David Simon's 'The Wire'

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If there is one TV series I would recommend you watch, watch HBO's "The Wire". It is a mesmerizing series, one that has all the ingredients of dissecting a troubled American city, Baltimore. Over the course of five seasons and sixty episodes, David Simon's HBO series, poignantly points out in great detail what plagues not only Baltimore, but most inner cities; the tyranny of a corrupt political system, its failed institutions, and it's disastrous consequences on the citizens of Baltimore. The series has received only average ratings and has never won any major television awards, however, many television viewers have described "The Wire" as one of the best television series of all time. David Simon, a former police reporter and creator of…show more content…
The show also reveals how all of the different institutions, the Baltimore Police Department, City Hall, the Baltimore public school department, the Barksdale drug trafficking operation, The Baltimore Sun, and the stevedores' union are all dysfunctional in one way or the other, and the individuals representing these organizations are "screwed" by the institutions that they accept in their lives. The show explains how corruption is pervasive in these institutions, using lower level subordinates as scapegoats in a major scandal. Throughout the show, we are constantly reminded the struggle between individual desires and the eventual subordination to the group's…show more content…
Omar gives McNulty information on the Barksdale Drug family. The police were closing in on the Barksdale drug empire. There is pressure from above to wrap up the case and forces the unit to make arrests, however, owing to the department's dysfunction, the investigation is intended as a façade to appease the judge. An intradepartmental struggle between the more motivated officers on the detail and their superiors spans the whole season, with interference by the higher-ups often threatening to ruin the investigation. The detail's commander, Cedric Daniels, acts as mediator between the two opposing groups of police. Season two continued many of Season one's stories while opening up a new front: the Stevedores’ union at the Baltimore dock. You begin to see the uneasy racial tensions and balance of power. As dock manager, Frank Sobotka, finds out the hard way the price for taking money from the mafia even though he had good intentions to use the money to keep the docks from
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