Cos I'm alive!

[I totally meant to talk here about wearing make-up in a gay club, Wollongong adventures, extravagant Moroccan meals, whether or not I'm a bad person and how the loss of $5 showed me what a local I am, but an almost-total inertia has taken hold of my extra-curricular writing. So instead, this ill-informed ramble.]

Last night, after a delicious meal whipped up by yours truly (a man who has never before referred to himself as "yours truly"), I settled in to embark upon an audio-visual journey that would launch me back into the world of informed television viewers. You see, I'm not one to enjoy a book, song, movie or programme on its own merits. I'm only in it for the cultural references.

Since I'm possessed of all five seasons of The Wire, it was high time that universally lauded series entered my mind tanks. I received said show from m'colleague Chas at the same time as all five seasons of Peep Show. An excellent combo, critically speaking.

Anyway, I watched the first episode. And here follows some vague impressions, which I won't bother researching. The last thing I want is to fact-check IMDB or Wikipedia and learn some bullshit spoiler. So I'll keep it general. Although...if you haven't seen it, the following will probably spoiler some stuff.

Firstly, my two viewing companions were clearly less enamoured of the pilot than me, considering it more of a male-oriented show, despite Greggs being a strong and capable female character. I thought the dialogue clunked in parts (especially when the higher-ups were talking tough to McNulty after he spilled his guts to the judge), but overall, there's plenty of interesting conflict set up from the get-go.

And even a couple of Rosencrantz and Guildernstern characters for comic relief.

The aftermath of Snot Boogie's death was a weird intro, but one that eased us into the world of Baltimore. We got a shorthand impression of the kind of man McNulty is, and at the same time he was introduced as a cipher for us, translating Snot's story for the benefit of we privileged white folk who don't speak urban.

So far, the main impression I got was of a decaying, underfunded city descending into tribalism. There's an us-vs-them mentality in both police departments, as well as within the crime gang. The contrast between local police and FBI resources was particularly interesting (typewriters!). Yesterday I read this column about Redfern's Block by Pastor Bill Simon, so the poverty and despair of the drug dealers' world - especially the Pit, but also the seediness of the strip club - resonated with me.

I have a feeling that there'll be a lot of strange-bedfellow-making politics, as well as enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend interaction - the last couple of scenes seemed to be foreshadowing alliances between both sides of the law, driven either by vengeance (Bubbles) or conscience (D'Angelo).

So yeah, I'm keen to see how things play out in the next couple of episodes - whether the endlessly bleak tone lightens and which characters become foregrounded as doings transpire. One thing's for sure...I'm glad I don't live in Baltimore.