June 21, 2011

The Wire: Season 3


It's no secret to long-time readers of this blog that I've struggled to get through the first two seasons of The Wire with the kind of passion and addiction one expects to have for what many consider to be the greatest TV show of all time. But I'm happy to say that watching Season 3 was an immensely enjoyable and rewarding experience. It's as if once I stopped actively trying to like the show too hard, I was capable of honestly and actually enjoying it. I have several theories on why this season was capable of sucking me in in a way that the previous two were unable to do, but they all combine to form one basic sentiment: that Season 3 is simply better than Seasons 1 and 2. (Which, again, isn't to say that those two seasons were terrible. They were very good. But I came in expecting "best show of all time," and since it took two full seasons to get to this one - in which I'm beginning to understand the "best show of all time" argument - I was unfairly slightly disappointed in the first two seasons. But you already knew that.) At any rate, I'm extremely glad that I've come around on The Wire and I look forward to watching the fourth season very much. Many people call the fourth season the greatest single season of any show in the history of television. I'm excited. (But not to the point of having unattainable expectations for it, thankfully.) There's no telling how soon I'll start Season 4, since a lot of other shows remain on my backlog. Completely unintentionally, I've now logged seasons of The Wire in August '10, January '11, and June '11. If that five-month pace holds, I'll finish Season 4 in November and Season 5 next April. No promises, but let's just say I severely doubt either season will remain in the backlog by summer's end.

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