The Wire (TV series) is an American police procedural television series set and produced in the mid-Atlantic city of Baltimore, Maryland. Created by writer/producer and former police reporter David Simon, the series is broadcast by the HBO cable network in the United States. The Wire premiered on June 2, 2002, with 37 episodes airing over the course of its first three seasons. Season 4 premiered on September 10, 2006.
The first season's plot centers around the ongoing struggles between police units and drug-dealing gangs in the city's west side, and is told from both points of view. Subsequent seasons have focused on other facets of the city.
The large cast consists mainly of character actors who are little known for their other roles.
Simon has said that despite its presentation as a crime drama, the show is
"really about the American city, and about how we live together. It's about how institutions have an effect on individuals, and how... whether you're a cop, a longshoreman, a drug dealer, a politician, a judge, [or] a lawyer, you are ultimately compromised and must contend with whatever institution you've committed to."
great.
The Wire has received critical acclaim for its realistic portrayal of urban life and uncommonly deep exploration of sociological themes, and has been called the best show on television by TIME,^[2] Entertainment Weekly,^[3] The Guardian,^[4] the Chicago Tribune,^[5] and the Philadelphia Daily News.^[6]


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PopMatters TV Feature | Watch The Wire: The Wire - institutional failure -how the urban world makes people what they are, and how governments, through their labyrinth of bodies and jurisdictions, have failed the people they serve, on both sides of the law - in the American city, using Baltimore, Maryland as representative. consistent & encompassing indictment of American society. the show is profoundly angry.
(as a crime drama infinitely denser in characterization, wit, and dramatic pay-off than any police procedural in TV hist)
--first season, a ramshackle police unit is assembled to investigate deeply rooted Barksdale drug ring operation run from Baltimore housing projects
--second season shifts focus the decline of Baltimore’s ports, its workers, and the compromises forced on the American working class as a whole
--third season returned the Barksdale case to prominence + City Hall machinations
--current fourth season will go into Baltimore’s schools, tracking job change of Prez, a detective in the first three seasons who has become a teacher trying to make a difference in students’ lives, even though statistics—and the kids themselves—say they’re fated to become embroiled in the drug world. (mimics co-writer Ed Burns’s real-life career path in Baltimore, where he was both a detective and a high school teacher.) mc
-fifth season (just announced this week, surprisingly early) will present a sustained analysis of the media’s culpability in urban destruction.