Detective Freamon, you have carte blanche in picking your squad. In fact, you can pick your supervisor, for all I care. Motherfucker, as far as I'm concerned, you are the Major Crimes Unit. It's morning in Baltimore, Lester. Wake up and smell the coffee.With that, the lights get turned on, the miniatures put away, and Real Police get to start policing. Just thrilling to see Freamon put the pieces together on Lex's murder and the vacants. Meanwhile, Good Carcetti starts throwing his mayoral weight around against stats-driven policing, and Omar brings the drama to Prop Joe as only Omar can.
And then there's everything else. It's difficult to figure out which kid is most doomed: Dukie and Namond from being phased out of their protected classrooms, Randy for snitching, or Michael for having chosen to align himself with Marlo's crew and defending Randy (and seeking the One Ring). Bunny's classroom no more, and Prez's may not be for much longer (between the anticipated test scores and the budget cuts), but they're making whatever impact they can.
Meanwhile Bubbs is still getting beat up because Herc is the worst fuck-up ever, Carcetti's already being squeezed between the ministers and the school budget deficit, Prop Joe is between a shovel and a spade, and, worst of all, next week is this season's George Pelecanos episode. May god have mercy on the City of Baltimore.
Herc truly is the bloated doofy avatar of the Fuck-Up God, isn't he? Isn't it fucking amazing? And it doesn't hardly ever seem to dent him because his self-esteem is already so low from fucking up all the time. He is a seamlessly-self-enabling fuck-up machine! One of my favorite characters for being realistically constructed, well-acted, and exactly as awful as real life.
ReplyDeleteAgree with Phil on everything but the conclusion. Early on, it was easy to dismiss him as lunkhead comedic relief, but now you can see how he has the power to poison everything around him. He is not my favorite character. He is my least favorite character. In my book, he is the show's most enduring villain.
ReplyDelete"The Bunk is strictly a suit-and-tie motherfucker." And bless you for it, Bunk.
ReplyDeleteI really, really loved Carcetti busting in on the Parks & Rec, Water & Sewage, and Transpo and by being deliberately vague, getting them to do their jobs.
ReplyDeleteI'm also waiting to see if and how McNulty figures into resolving some of these storylines. I can't decide if we keep getting glimpses of him because Dominic West has lead credit and is a much-loved character, or if it's because it's a set-up that will pay off later.
I loved that, too - big smile on my face as they're yelling "what location?!?!" I never thought I'd enjoy Carcetti this much. I'm also really enjoying having confirmed for me that being a politician is terrifying - you do all this crap to get elected, and the skills (and luck) you need to get elected don't really have that much to do with the reality of the job. And the reality of the job is one big "what the f*** have I gotten myself into?"
ReplyDeleteI am not emotionally ready for the Pelecanos episode. But thank goodness for Daniels and for Freamon.
ReplyDeleteI loved Carcetti's line about "My first bowl of shit." At least he was able to say it while smiling.
ReplyDeleteNo, he is not comic relief. This is what I mean when I say that he's exactly as awful as real life. He's the incompetent asshole protagonist of a 1001 sit-coms fleshed out as the casually negligent force of darkness that those characters realistically would be if they were given guns and responsibility for important aspects of other people's lives. He's the embodiment of all that sucks because we don't hold ourselves to a higher standard. A villain this real and well-constructed deserves our love -- not within the story -- but as an artistic achievement.
ReplyDeleteSo many great Bunk lines... but that is an all time favorite. It's enough to make a a non-suit-and-tie motherfucker wish he was one, just a little bit.
ReplyDeleteThat painting of a flaming turd may be beautifully painted -- evocative and thought-provoking, allegorical, raw, disconcerting -- but it's a painting of a flaming turd and I don't have it in me to love it.
ReplyDeleteFair enough. Suspension of moral revulsion needn't accompany suspension of disbelief.
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