Note: This post contains spoilers about S5 of The Wire.
One of the things that seems to impress folks about “The Wire” is how genuine and realistic everything is, especially the relationships between the characters, the different worlds they live in and the dialogue they speak. What made this even more impressive is the fact that a show written by and directed by a bunch of middle aged white men was so popular with with the people whose lives were, to an extent, being portrayed on screen. Police officers, for example, apparently loved the show for it’s realistic portrayal of the day to day red tape and bureaucracy they deal with, and the communities where the show was filmed reportedly loved the series and were constantly impressed with the accuracy with which it portrayed their day to day living experiences.
But the most interesting reaction, for my money, is in this series of articles which kept track of the thoughts and reactions to the final season of the series of a group of genuine street-level players. For the most part, the dealers and street muscle participating in the experiment loved the show, even getting into it so much that they started betting on storyline outcomes. Serious betting, too - thousands of dollars a pop!
“Pay up fools!” Shine cried as Marlo entered Prop Joe’s kitchen. After the first episode, Shine predicted that the upstart “street nigga” would kill the “schoolhouse Negro.” He was predictably gleeful after pocketing several thousand dollars in rolled-up bills. “Chicken wings and mac and cheese on me,” he offered the losers.
This was not the only thing the self-described thugs got right about the final season of The Wire. They correctly surmised that Bunk and McNulty would split up and that our Irish detective would start down the corrupt path of a bad cop.
Much to my surprise, there was little empathy shown for Prop Joe. “It’s no one’s fault if you’re that stupid,” Orlando explained. “You can’t let that young buck [Marlo] run around like that without responding. Prop Joe screwed up, got sloppy. You never, I mean you never believe in co-ops. You got to be out for yourself … But, hey, I screwed up too. I put up $5,000 that Prop Joe would come back and kill Marlo. Just goes to show: never bet with your heart.”
The complete list of articles is here. As of this time, nothing’s shown up about the finale, but I’m sure it’s on it’s way.