I loved the how the old crew discussed the bigger issues that the Wire brings up. I hope Goldberg and Plotz move on to discussing the idea that the press is complicit in allowing the inner-city (especially black inner-city) to decay by not paying attention to the problems that caused its sharp decline. Maybe newsroom characters feel cliched, but shouldn't we discuss how they enter into the "War on Drugs"?

yes, yes, i see it all clearly now. the press helps to allow the inner-cities to decay. i guess that way they can sell more "press" to the suburbs detailing said decay, resulting in out-lying uplift........who says it's all bad news? thanks for the fascinating
post.

Snooze guys. I used to love this slate feature but you are letting us down here. Please beg off of the journalist on journalist porn and maybe just take in the context of a story, which is what it is. Just because the media (wink) decided to make The Wire a messianic deliverer of urban truths doesn't mean it isn't, in the end, just a beautifully written and performed and directed story.

I'll say it again. Where the urban media outlets have blood on their hands as it relates to the problems in cities is their continual endorsing of the same candidates from the same party in each election. They do it because they are too lazy to look around their city and see what these political hacks have created and what they have helped to create. Once they realize it, they blame it on outside forces. It's an easy out for them.

These guys are hillarious. Of course the newsroom characters are caricatures, but so are all of the characters in the story. Do they actually think Marlo isn't a caricature of a street drug lord? Do they actually think that every single mother of every poor black kid in every city is a crack head that is willing to pimp out their kids? They are so focused on the characters that they seem to be missing the role the newsroom is playing in the story.

There is corruption at every level - newsroom, police department, city hall, state house, etc. There is blood on the hands of everyone. But the closer it gets to the street, the purer everything is. Who is more disgusting - Marlow, Clay Davis, the newspaper editors?

The news room is supposed to get to the truth. But in covering the made up story, they are participating and uncovering the ultimate in racism - the deaths of a few homeless men are more interesting and more meaningful than the 20+ murders of poor blacks. They'll rally behinds the seriel killer of the homless but completely ignore the serial killer of poor blacks.

And they are completely missing the significance of Omar's injury. Since seeking vengence, he has become injured, "gimpy as a motherfucker". Is everyone that is out for personal reasons becoming "gimpy as a mother fucker"?

The sole criteria for Plotz and Goldberg seems to be how "realistic" or "plausible" a given scene or event is. Whether they say they like something (which is rare) or dislike something, their rationale for the opinion is always whether they personally believe the scene could occur in real life. This speaks to how great the cast and crew is at creating an immersive, genuine world. However, the show is not a documentary, and the point is not to simply show how day-to-day life really is for the city's residents.

David Simon and crew are trying to say things with this show, and Plotz and Goldberg either don't realize or don't care. The show deserves the same kind of literary and symbolic consideration when being reviewed as it had when it was made. Being plausible is not the one and only measure of quality.