The Wire, polarising TV classic, pretentious and damaging art, or Victorian period piece stolen and passed off as modern… It doesn’t matter what you think of it (be you a West Wing fan, or Baltimore’s Chief of Police), The Wire raised some bars for television production in a manner that suggests it will be one of the lasting cultural texts of our generation, much like Dickens was for his…
You should read this – and read the particularly hilarious (but f-bomb ridden) retelling of a piece of the Wire’s dialogue, which, in the show, consisted simply of the said f-bomb being used in all its adjectival forms.
Check out this essay that treats The Wire as a Dickensian piece of culture that our current cultural milieu can’t stomach properly.
“In our age, we can never experience a modern equivalent of The Wire. We would be unwilling to portray the lower classes and criminal element with the patience or consideration of Horatio Bucksley Ogden or of Baxter “Bubz” Black. We would be unwilling to give a work like The Wire the kind of time and attention it deserves, which is why it has faded away, instead of being held up as the literary triumph it truly is. If popular culture does not open its eyes, works like The Wire will only continue their slow slide into obscurity.”