New Day

“You’re my boys right? I’m here for ya’ll and ya’ll here for me?” – Randy
“I don’t trust him, but I trust his fear.” - Omar

At its most basic level, what “The Wire” is really about is the breakdown of American urban society – at the very least in Rust Belt cities like Baltimore that have never adjusted to the flight of blue-collar jobs. Every segment of Baltimore we see is broken, balkanized and divided. The police, the operatives of City Hall, the gangsters all backstab each other in a circular, Machiavellian, zero-sum game of survival.

The middle schoolers are the exceptions. The most uplifting and poignant aspect of this season is the loyalty they display towards each other. As they start to go on divergent paths we’ll see how Namond, Michael, Randy and Dookie treat each other but it is a sense of belonging and mutual responsibility arising out of their shared background and heritage that define their interactions towards each other right now. As we see in “New Day,” they are a wily bunch but they still abide by a basic honor code of pride that the adults have learned to avoid in the name of self-preservation. They have all followed Valchek’s advice to Herc, “Just shut up and play it up.”

The most instructive dialogue on “New Day” was the exchange Michael and Namond had in front of the jewelry shop. It builds on another of the great themes of the season – pragmatism versus idealism. “The Wire” has always been preoccupied with the idea of “How much should one stand up for one’s self and what one believes in?” You’re taught to do this instinctively for this is what heroes do, but Namond throws out his own bit of “discretion is the better part of valor” wisdom to Michael when he tells him, “It’s not what you do, it’s how you do it.” Sounding very much like the security guard that Marlo had killed, Michael explains why he stood up to Randy’s attackers, “I ain’t gonna let some chump-ass niggas think I’m took. I ain’t.” These are the sort of benevolent values that struggle so dramatically on "The Wire."

(A little frustrated that they haven’t done much with Dookie. While Namond, Michael and Randy all have strong plotlines, Dookie just plods along. Nothing has really challenged him directly. He’s just the teacher’s pet in the background of everything, sad and depressed and deprived. His character hasn’t really changed much all season. A missed opportunity if you ask me.)

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Like Michael, Carcetti is learning the price for valor. “Yummy, my first bowl of shit,” he says as he has to balance the needs of the police versus the ministers. But that’s nothing compared to what he has to do with the schools. What place does society have for idealists? Still, I like Carcetti. He seems like a pretty ideal leader, trying to balance a visionary’s idealism with the realities of the vested interests of the city. But you look at him in that room where everybody has ties to Barksdale drug money and you just wonder whether it’s a matter of time till he becomes like Royce.

It is telling that this episode was written by Ed Burns. Both he and David Simon have voiced their belief that “individuals are worth less every day.” Whereas the political culture in our country is absorbed with advancing the mantra that personal responsibility is everything, “The Wire” is very interested in showing how the individual is affected – and often crushed – by society acting as an aggregate. We’re all born good – like the middle-schoolers – but it’s the world that makes us wicked and selfish. It’s all systemic and any positive change will have to be enacted on the system not the individual. Their take is more akin to some LBJ Great Society view on the world and a complete reversal about everything you hear from the contemporary Republican Party.

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A word on Bodie. One of the comments from last week talked about him and it got me thinking. You know who he is starting to remind me of? As a lonely drug dealer, D’Angelo Barksdale, but who he really reminds of are the dockworkers from Season Two. He is the working man who is controlled by larger forces. Whether he sees members of his crew getting picked off and stuffed in a vacant by Marlo or has to hide from the police, the man has no control over his life. He’s stuck in a dead end job and without any union to protect him.

That was a nice scene with him and McNulty with the cop talking to him like they’re friends. At least McNulty knows he can be honest with him. When he’s honest with Officer Walker, “Since when is yellow paint a declaration of war?” he gets nowhere.

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Another superb ending scene. Rather than, say, “Lost” which leaves you with questions and cliffhangers, “The Wire” likes to leave you with a shot to ponder which are mysteries in themselves. The writers and directors really want to impart this whole idea of “soft eyes.” It’s softness and vision that solves murders, that teaches kids, that leads the way forward. But in a bottom-line society “obsessed with juking stats” as McNulty remarks, it is rare to find the individual that knows how to use these “soft eyes.” It’s the difference between Lester and Bunk, who can never really learn anything new it seems.


Random comments:

- Disappointed that Prez didn’t tell them anything about knowing that the bodies were in the vacants. He seems to completely not trust the police nor the schools for that matter. This is the crucial bit of information and he abstains. It wouldn’t hurt to tell them.
- Good scene with Namond in the trust-building exercise. He really responds to Bunny. He’s the strong but kind father figure he never had.
- A real Shakesperean line from Prop Joe when he talks about Omar having a shovel and Marlo a spade and "no way I'm crawling back in" to my grave.

I also would like to thank everyone who reads my blog and takes the time to write comments.