After yet another thread on formatting urban legends, someone's rules or whether some screenwriter deserves the success and recognition he/she is getting or not, how about we talk about storytelling for a change?
Now I should probably write a paragraph making the case for The Wire being an excellent subject of study, but anybody who's seen the series should already know that, so why bother, right?
I thought it would be enriching and productive to start a discussion on the different choices the writers of The Wire made over the course of five seasons, how they portrayed their characters, how they wrapped some storylines... you get the idea.
Of course, this thread should and will be full of spoilers (that is, if some of you decide it's not a complete waste of time) so if you haven't seen the series but still plan to, stay away.
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I'll start.
The death of Omar Little.
I have mixed feelings about the way he died, because it was so anticlimactic. He was so bent on revenge against Marlo and his crew that, from a traditional storytelling point of view, a final confrontation was almost an obligatory scene. In a way, I felt robbed of that.
But then, it makes sense that Omar didn't get to win or even to go out with a bang. He lived in a world of senseless violence, where innocent children were victims of stray bullets, just because they lived in the wrong zip code. It wasn't dramatic, the way he died, but it was probably more realistic.
******
Okay, so it's not much to start with, but it's a start. Let's see what you guys think of this and other aspects of The Wire, its world, characters and storylines.
Now I should probably write a paragraph making the case for The Wire being an excellent subject of study, but anybody who's seen the series should already know that, so why bother, right?
I thought it would be enriching and productive to start a discussion on the different choices the writers of The Wire made over the course of five seasons, how they portrayed their characters, how they wrapped some storylines... you get the idea.
Of course, this thread should and will be full of spoilers (that is, if some of you decide it's not a complete waste of time) so if you haven't seen the series but still plan to, stay away.
===========
I'll start.
The death of Omar Little.
I have mixed feelings about the way he died, because it was so anticlimactic. He was so bent on revenge against Marlo and his crew that, from a traditional storytelling point of view, a final confrontation was almost an obligatory scene. In a way, I felt robbed of that.
But then, it makes sense that Omar didn't get to win or even to go out with a bang. He lived in a world of senseless violence, where innocent children were victims of stray bullets, just because they lived in the wrong zip code. It wasn't dramatic, the way he died, but it was probably more realistic.
******
Okay, so it's not much to start with, but it's a start. Let's see what you guys think of this and other aspects of The Wire, its world, characters and storylines.
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