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The Wire
"After five seasons, what’s clear is that the messed up situations in places like Baltimore, or Oakland for that matter, have been untreated for so long, life seems hopeless."
By Orlando Campbell
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The Wire has received critical acclaim for its realistic portrayal of urban life and uncommonly deep exploration of sociological themes, and has been named the best show on television by several magazines and newspapers. Youth Radio’s Orlando Campbell explains why the Baltimore-based drama, whose series finale airs this Sunday, has relevance to his childhood in San Francisco. (March 7th on NPR Day to Day)
When I saw The Wire for the first time, I thought “finally, a show about us”. HBO’s groundbreaking series brought me to a place I knew all too well. The show is about the inner workings and struggles of people in a city on the decline and how the police and government respond to these realities.
The characters remind me of my friends. They’re products of the 80’s and early 90’s. They’re the sons and daughters of crack heads, and single parent homes, and they’re living in an environment that forces them to adapt for survival.
My friends and I deal with some of the same issues The Wire’s corner kids, from going in and out of jail to stealing cars for joyrides, to getting pulled over and illegally searched by the police.
One of the main characters is Mike, a teen born and raised in West Baltimore. At just sixteen, he’s the muscle for the biggest drug dealer in town. From an outside perspective, he’s a menace to society. But instead of portraying him as some lost child stereotype, The Wire takes us deep into his world. We see him overcome the sexual abuse of his step-father, and provide for his little brother, all while his mom is out selling any food in the house for crack. On The Wire, no character is one-dimensional.
And the show doesn’t make the mistake of giving solutions to the problems it addresses. After five seasons, what’s clear is that the messed up situations in places like Baltimore, Oakland, or any inner city…have been untreated for so long, life seems hopeless. Many people I know feel that same hopelessness and The Wire gives viewers a tablespoon taste of that feeling.
It tells outsiders there’s more to our lives than the ghetto stereotypes in their heads.
The Wire is the first time I’ve seen a series depict the gritty life so accurately. And I’m upset that I won’t get to be a part of the characters’ lives anymore. But more importantly, I’m angry that when the show comes to a close, so will viewers’ window into a world many Americans would never dare to understand.
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