THE WIRE: SEASON FOUR – david simon – 9.7 / 10

As great as The Wire unquestionably is, the tone and aesthetics of the show sometimes work to keep the audience at arm’s length. By foregoing most of the standard tools of the television trade that make wringing tears or goosebumps out of the viewer much easier, The Wire has-- by design-- always had an uphill battle when it comes to drawing emotion out of its audience. The show doesn’t use music to heighten the mood. It doesn’t use close-ups to foster audience identification with the characters. It doesn’t use handheld camerawork to heighten the action sequences. It doesn’t use long-winded monologues or dramatic speeches to pontificate on a particular subject or make a point. Basically, The Wire doesn’t use any of the standard tricks of the trade that make forging an emotional connection with the viewer easy. They have to work for it. And because of that, the show cannot hide any of its flaws. If a performance is flat or an action scene boring, it can’t be hid with quick edits or crash zooms or the perfect musical choice.

But that’s what makes The Wire a singular artistic achievement. (That’s also probably why it takes the average viewer three or four episodes to really understand what the show is trying to do.) Without all the bells and whistles hiding their faults, just about any other show would, if they were to take the same approach as The Wire, immediately reveal their artistic shortcomings. That The Wire is able to maintain such a high level of both quality and entertainment value without having to resort to these tricks is remarkable and leads to perhaps the most enjoyable television viewing experience out there.

But often that enjoyment is somewhat intellectual, more an enjoyment for the head rather than the heart. Although it’s impressive, even admirable that the show doesn’t have to trick its audience into getting emotionally involved, this approach can put the audience at a bit of remove. For instance, many viewers love characters like Stringer Bell, Bodie Broadus and Omar Little more than perhaps any other characters they’ve seen on television. But unlike on other shows, when these characters meet their tragic ends, The Wire doesn’t play up the moment with slow motion or sad music. The moment isn’t drawn out, giving the audience time to process their death and grieve for it. On The Wire death comes as it does in real life, quickly and randomly. So even though the loss of Bodie or Stringer might sting more than the death of almost any other character on any other show, they are mourned in a different way. There are no tears shed as a somber tune plays on the soundtrack, no lingering tracking shots over the dead body, no goosebumps raised as another character recites a heartfelt homily over their grave.

If I had to guess, I would say that David Simon and Co. chose to do it this way because giving the audience a chance to cry also gives them a chance to get it out of their system. They weep for a few minutes and then forget it ever happened. But done without all the tricks, the loss of these characters lingers, much the way a real life tragedy might.

And make no mistake, the fourth season of The Wire is a tragedy. Primarily concerned with the Baltimore city public school system and the people that make it (not) run, season four introduces the audience, for the first time, to major characters who are just barely in their teens. And by the end of the season, as the stories of Randy Wagstaff, Duquan Weems and Michael Lee begin to draw to a heartbreaking close, The Wire doesn’t pull any punches. The audience can see where these characters are going to end up but is powerless to stop it. There's nothing more tragic, especially when kids are involved, than to know that something horrible is coming and not being able to do a damn thing about it.

Widely hailed as the best season of the show, season four is, I believe, so revered because it’s impossible to forget. The stories of these four kids linger, festering in the back of your mind, popping into your thoughts at random. They have the sort of gut punch emotional power not usually seen on television (not as fiction anyway). And yet these stories are told with The Wire’s trademark realism, making them that much more tragic because of their believability. Any show that can so deeply engage both the head and the heart is a truly remarkable achievement.