The Wire

I watched last night's finale of the Wire. It was good, not as good as the rest of the show has been, with a few exceptions. Like what was Season 2 all about? Did they try to take them away from the streets and fail so they put them back? Or was the whole season setting up for the Greek connection this year? I can't imagine they'd spend a whole season setting up for a few episodes much later on so I have to assume it was the former option.

The episode tied things up a bit too nicely for my taste. Actually not nicely at all, but everything was wrapped up. I prefer loose ends, like the Sopranos did. If they did have to wrap everything up and put a bow on it at least they wrapped it with really crappy paper and put a used stick-on bow on. Carcetti not being able to look Rawls in the eye when appointing him superintendent, Daniels having to eat it and resign just as he was getting settled in, McNulty resigning without pension, none of it a perfect wrap-up.

Thinking about the episode last night I was thinking about how everyone's morals kept shifting over the season. Only a very few number of people had a real moral code and stuck to it. Those people being Chris Partlow, Wee-Bay and Omar.

As horrible as Partlow was made out to be, he certainly had a code and stuck to it. He took life without parole apparently without a peep out of loyalty to Marlow and his family. As many people as he killed, I have to give it to Chris for sticking to his principles. Same for Wee-Bay.

Omar apparently started off with his code as a child, if you watched one of the two minute long things On Demand. When he was like 7 his friends robbed some poor guy and he took the money from them at gunpoint and gave it back. Omar was possibly the only noble character on the show. He only killed in self-defense although he did shoot a lot of other people. He only stole drug money, he wasn't in it for the money, he was a good guy.

And Michael is the new Omar? Wow... That was a shock. I was expecting Michael to either be the new Bodey (dead) or the new Marlow. But the new Omar? Possibly the only shock in this episode. I was hoping for more of Michael but we only saw him for a few seconds in the ending montage. I also liked how Chris stuck by Michael to the end, when it seemed to Marlow that he was guilty beyond a doubt Chris stuck by him.

I will miss this show.