THE WIRE SEASON TWO?
Young_Phonics
8,039 Posts
Alright Wire fans, I just spent most of the day today finishing season 1 (DAMN THEY KILLED WALLACE!!!! and D'Angelo Didn't Snitch!!!). I've heard that season two is really not that good and the Wire hits its stride in seasons 3 & 4. Should I bother watching 2? Faux:Man, that Levy lawyer is a dick! How can you ride for dude? I also hope Bubs stays around and doesn't turn, dude rules.PLEASE TO POST NO SPOILERS
Comments
You have to wait for season 3 to understand. Sheeeeeeeiiit
Damn, does Levy end up turning in Prop Joe?
DON'T TELL ME.
uh-oh! did soulstrutters get ass-hurt btw?
In my opinion they are all amazing. If I had to pick the best, which is hard, it's season four. But season two is amazing. And it's an important component of understanding city hall politics in seasons 3 and 4.
While they may have bitten off a tad more than they could chew, I think Season 2 has some of the richest storyline in the whole run. Plus, you get insight into how the bigger picture works (the Greek, Vice, FBI and Homeland Security being in the area) with the addition of the docks and union guys. And Ziggy is one of my favorite characters on the Wire.
*Don't skip a season of The Wire.
I can't even believe this is a point of discussion. I don't even see the Wire in seasons. It's 50 episodes of greatness. Shit's about humanity.
It makes no sense to skip a season. Even the most boring parts of the Wire are better than 90% of any other TV dramas.
Somebody mentioned Ziggy was their favorite character on S2. That little bastard was just so annoying I wanted him to die. That said, I kind of liked him for that too. He brought some pretty comical moments to the season.
Season 2 is really great TV. I don't know why people hate. It's not like the streets are totally gone from the show in this season, they just aren't the main focus. It's all about the east side docks in this one, plus they introduce new characters that will later become prevalent (Prop Joe, Bowtie). It's very important that you watch every episode of this show to really get the full experience. I even recommend watching it all again from the beginning once you get through season 4. I really caught a lot more the second time around. Best show ever.
I love that character because people like Ziggy exist at all levels, and in all groups. That loser, tragic clown by which people measure their own level of failure/fucked-upness. "At least I ain't as stupid as Ziggy."
What--you heard it was all white people?
To say that Season 2 is not as good as 1 or 3 is by no means to say that it is bad--Season 3 is the greatest thing I have ever seen on television (haven't seen 4 yet).
Plus, you should know that nothing is wasted on the WIRE--every word of dialogue has a function and the plot unfolds like origami. Skipping Season 2 would seriously impact your understanding and enjoyment of Season 3.
The ending of Season 2 is, for me, the best yet, although Season 4's ending runs it damn close.
You're in for a treat. Though Levy hardly appears in Season 4.
Yes. There are no boring bits imo.
And Season 4 as well.
As a Baltimorean, there's a lot of things that didn't ring true about Season 2... indigenous Baltimore white people do have a very unique accent, but the annoying kid who's one of the main characters in S2 overdoes it to a ludicrous, distracting degree (and in general I thought his acting was atrocious).
Also, some hipster production assistants fell prey to some wishful thinking with the set design and were hanging Will Oldham and Smog posters in the bedrooms of these working-class Baltimore characters. That's not impossible, but highly unlikely... the crossover/crosspolinization between born-and-bred Baltimoreans and hipster/yuppie transplants is almost nil here, and in some neighborhoods (Hampden, Remington, Patterson Park, South Baltimore) borders on all-out class war.
The same can be said of the dealers on the corner who listen to Mos Def, etc... I guess Baltimore club may not be nationally known enough yet to include, but to choose Mos Def over, say, T.I. in that situation was very clearly some white P.A.'s uninformed decision.
This may sound like nitpicking, and I admit they're small details, but as a local it really fucked with the hardcore realism most of the show attains.
All that said, DON'T SKIP anything! Every episode of The Wire I've seen has been excellent overall... season 2 is just slightly less excellent. And, it'll fuck with your enjoyment of the sublime season 3 if you skip 2.
Although didn't they rock some Labtekwon in there somewhere? Maybe I'm imagining things.
Did they? I missed that. If so, good for him. He deserves some national exposure after 15 years or so doing it.
That said... probably still not a realistic listening choice, depending on the character.
The music supe has admitted that they got a few things wrong in the earlier seasons, but they tried to get it right in later ones. There's a scene on the corner in Season 4 where Dipset's "Get Crunk Muzik" can clearly be heard booming out of a passing car, which is probably much more like it. Plus, in Season 3, the scene where Cutty gets taken to a house party after coming out of jail, and there's some B-More club joints playing in the background as he's being led around the house, clearly off his gourd on ecstasy, is the kind of detail that very few shows would even bother to try and get right.
That kid Ziggy was poorly cast--he was a totally dislikable little schitt; only from reading subsequent interviews with Simon and listening to the commentaries did I realize that he was supposed to be somewhat sympathetic.
That was a major complaint that I had with the first two seasons--the rap selections were absurdly inauthentic. I know Simon has acknowledged that they made some pretty embarassing errors there.
Yeah haha... indeed.
I cringed every time D'Angelo said "most def!" but maybe that was popular slang before I started going down there.
"I got that Li'l Jon"
You mean drugs dealers don't drive around evading police while rocking Michael Franti and Spearhead?
There's a fantastic scene in Season 4 which I won't spoil for you, but it involves Chris and Snoop, and hinges on a familiarity with Young Leek.
most Wire fans I run across, when Season 2 comes around as a topic of discussion, instantly launch into an anti-Ziggy tirade. I tend to agree- the character is annoying to the point of angering the viewer. The way the story, on a familial level wraps around his fate ( btw:
They get you hooked on disliking a character, and when it's all said and done, you as a viewer are surprised you can have that sort of emotion (positive or negative) toward someone on the screen. I was impressed with Season 2 in that they did take a huge and complex storyline and made no attempt to distill or water it down- they included every detail.
(I'm mid-season 3, btw. I can't get enough of this shit.)
Definitely. I have very few complaints with the show, and most of them they've tweaked in good ways from season to season.
I agree with 1/2 of what you're saying, but my point of disagreement is not with the character, it's with dude's acting. He was TERRIBLE. That character exists, I know the type. That accent does NOT exist, not how he rendered it (which to my mind was borderline offensive).