The Wire - The Complete Second Season

Rating:
Summary: Buyer Beware of version in Amazon warehouse
Review: Great series!!! No question about it.

Just want to drop a word of for-warning to those looking forward to being able to view the Second season in widescreen, compared to the 4:3 aspect ratio, season 1 was only released in.

It seems that HBO released two verions of season 2... a Canadian version (in green packaging) and a US version (in beige as depicted above). The problem is that it appears that the stock that Amazon has in their warehouse is the Canadian version... which is NOT in widescreen, unlike the US version listed.

I received two of the Canadian versions from them in the hopes it was just a fluke.

If you could care less about the presentation ratio... order away, and enjoy!!!

Rating:
Summary: Something perfect just got BETTER...
Review: How do you improve on perfection? Ask David Simon and co., because Season Two of THE WIRE somehow managed to surpass the flawless first season. I love this series. It's THE SHIELD with a brain, it's HOMICIDE with balls, it's THE SOPRANOS in the ghetto, it's HILL STREET BLUES in the 21st century. In short, it's the best of all TV worlds, all rolled into one, and thus, comparable to nothing else out there.

Season Two takes us into a world that is seldom seen, and never before explored in this depth on TV-- the world of dockworkers/longshoremen. If you had told me that I'd come to be fascinated by the lives of a bunch of doughy Polish dockworkers in Baltimore, I'd have laughed at you. Well. Cut to five minutes after the season two Wire finale: I was blubbering like a baby, brought to tears by some seriously epic storytelling, thoroughly invested in the triumphs and tragedies of these men.

Hats off to anyone and everyone involved in this show-- you're doing GREAT work!

Rating:
Summary: It's a world so real you change your view on the real world
Review: I'll start with a caveat: the dialogue can potentially be difficult and the pacing is completely different from any show on television. However, the dialogue is the heart of the show, essential to its realism, and the pacing provides you with such a heart-breaking last episode that you wish every television show so finely crafted their season. The more you invest into the show, the more it gives back to you. So if you're not up for some serious immersion, this isn't the show for you. I watched each episode of season 2 twice when it was first airing on HBO to pick up on everything. That's why DVD is an ideal format for the show. You can really absorb the language and action in a way that's impossible when watching it in weekly installments.

Season 1 stunned me. I hadn't seen anything that completely submerged me into a fictional world while influencing the way I viewed the real world. And I watch a lot of television, good television. Even the other amazing HBO shows (and that includes The Sopranos) fails to have the intellectual and emotional impact on me that The Wire does, especially in this second season. Second season raises the bar to something approaching the Shakespearean. I'm serious. I watch these episodes and get something completely different and profound out of them each time.

The outer struggles of the characters against bureaucracy and for power are fascinating and thought-provoking, but it's the inner conflict of the characters that really elevates the show. No one is good and no one is evil. Characters, all the characters, are morally flawed. The Wire doesn't gloss over the immoral actions of the "good" guys and it doesn't omit the human details of the "bad" guys. All these characters are human and the makers of the show take a humanistic approach to portraying them by inviting the audience to embrace the characters in all their flaws and moral ambiguities.

If you don't start reevaluating our nation's drug policy, you weren't paying attention. If you see this show and don't start thinking, really thinking, about what's going on with the urban poor and working classes, you don't have a heart.


Rating:
Summary: Wow, what a show!
Review: I'm going through a bad case of "Wire" withdrawal (sort of like the dopers when the package is too weak) but today I bought Season 2 of "The Wire" and the fix is working beautifully.

People whine and howl about how there's nothing good on TV, but I've always said that if you know where to look, you can find gems amid the dreck, and "The Wire" is just superlative drama.

Season 2 continues the excellence, and seeing again the dockworkers and their struggles and watching again McNulty stick 14 murders in Rawls' craw just made me glad to have laid out the money today, the first day of the release.

I just hope HBO gives the green light to a fourth season. I read somewhere that they would explore the failings in Baltimore's schools and how it relates to the drug trade.

It's great to have these DVDs to add to my collection, but we forewarned that when you pop in disc 1 (I don't know about the others yet) you are forced to watch a long HBO promo for the other series and movies, and a promo for "The Corner." If you try to hit the Menu button, Pause button, Fast Forward button or even Reverse button, at least on my DVD player, you get nothing. You can't stop the promos from playing!

This is so unacceptable in an otherwise worthwhile package. I realize that in the corporate state that we live in, the wealthy decide what's right, but this is just B.S. that I can't skip ads on a DVD. It's almost as bad as going to a movie and sitting through 20 minutes of commercials and trailers for movies that are definitely not the next "Citizen Kane" and eating a $6 bag of popcorn.

Sorry for the venting. "The Wire" -- once you get past the ads -- is still worth it.

Rating:
Summary: Truly one of the greatest television series, ever....
Review: The second season of The Wire continues where the first left off. The story is multi-layered, complex, and absolutely fascinating. While we've all seen the premise before - cops and robbers, The Wire moves well beyond any stereotypes to show us the human beings who play these roles. Particularly interesting in this season is in-depth look we get into the modern labor movement. Sound dull? - far from it. One of the central charaters is Sobotka, a labor leader, who comes to represent the tragedy of the modern working man in America- the loss of the dignity we once had from doing hard, honest work. A warning - this series requires patience to really appreciate the complex story told. Take the time, it is worth the effort.

Rating:
Summary: A great show gets even better
Review: The second season starts with a classic cop show scenario - McNulty, now working for the marine unit, pulls a young girl's body out of the water. From there, another season of perfection unfolds. It's not fair to give spoilers in these reviews, but suffice to say that the show moves once again with its unhurried pace, building towards some kind of resolution. And who knew that they could make the tribulations of a bunch of stevedores seem so interesting?

Once again, Dominic West anchors possibly the best cast on TV, with continued great work from Idris Elba and the rest of the group. Season two also brings the welcome return of Michael Williams as Omar, who I think we were all sad to see leave during the first season.

The writing is whip smart, and all of the varied directors do an excellent job. It's a credit to the show that it always manages to keep the same feel despite input from so many different directors. West and Williams both provide audio commentaries, but this set isn't about the extras - it's about the show.

If there was any doubt about this show's lasting power, it should be erased with the second season. It's truly one of the best shows to ever grace television.


Rating:
Summary: Anxiously awaiting the second installment on DVD
Review: This series is beyond superlatives. It is a true thinker's show. The twists and angles are no different from the real world. There is no mystique or trickery, but there is the complexity with which the whole of the world works. One scene, one hour, one day is not enough to tell a story as intricate as real life. The physics of existing and functioning on a moderate scale is presented in this detailed expose of the underworld of drugs and illicit dealings.

Where season one was a roller coaster of exploring the depth of the drug trade on the street, season two is focused on how this could possibly happen. It unfolds a rich tale of corruption at the docks necessitated for the longshoreman's very survival. A drama of seeming Robin Hood quality where the needs of the many in the culturally divided existence of the life on the docks takes an ugly turn from simply doing as asked and taking the payoff to a series of cascading failures intertwining the flawed security of the harbor ports into carnage afflicting the lives of the union workers struggling to get by and get paid.

The mysteries of how things flow into the country, at least a little, are set naked in front of us, the viewer. The depths of a different kind of despair on the streets, a different struggle are made apparent. And the prequel to the first seasons is set right in showing the `how' of the drug trade as in how does it get here (honestly this installment could not have been first).

The second season moves with a different urgency, at a different pace. The orbits of politics must be explored to provide the viewer with the information that helps us comprehend all that is happening on the other side of the lens. It is a story that requires almost every episode to appreciate the complexity. In this case, all to the episodes perfectly complement the first season (and ultimately the third) where it is not a new story, but another chapter that leaves you wanting to turn that next page.

The DVDs are great value to the viewer as the production team does so much in the visual that it is almost impossible to appreciate everything that is happening. The clues provided take the ultimate payoff of watching each episode to a new height. They make the viewer more attentive, more inquisitive. They are different they anything you have ever seen. This humanization of the story changes the game and raises the bar for what television can be.