Hit episode 100 of a show I nearly quit after season 2

I forced myself through 15 slow episodes of The Wire back in 2019 and now I'm somehow at episode 100 wondering why anyone would skip a show that takes that long to hook you.

2 comments

2 Comments

gavinhunt1mo ago

Think about all the people who bailed on The Wire after a couple episodes because they thought McNulty was just another drunk cop. They missed the whole point that the show wasn't about him, it was about the city itself. Each season zoomed out like a camera lens, showing how the drug trade bleeds into the docks, then politics, then schools. You don't get that payoff until you sit through the slow burn of season 2 with all those boring stevedores, which turns out to be the key to understanding why Baltimore works the way it does. By episode 100, you've basically taken a master class in urban decay and institutional failure, stuff that most shows would gloss over in a single monologue.

the_wyatt1mo ago

Exactly had a buddy who quit after season 1 because he thought McNulty was just a cliché. Tried telling him @gavinhunt nailed it, the show's whole deal is zooming out. Had to practically beg him to get through the dock workers, told him to treat season 2 like a separate documentary that just happens to share characters. Once he saw how the union corruption connected back to that first season's drug towers, he finally got why the slow parts matter. What finally sold him was pointing out how Stringer Bell's whole business move in season 3 only makes sense because of those boring dock politics from season 2. You ever manage to drag anyone through the rough patches of a show like that?