Things are starting to line up in the multiple plotlines.
Episode #41: “Refugees”
“No one wins. One side just loses more slowly.” – Prez
As the homicide unit’s newest detective Greggs is assigned to the high-profile witness case in an attempt to stall the investigation until after the election. Freamon joins Bunk on finding his missing suspect and realizes the connection to the lack of violence from the Stanfield Organization. Freamon suggests the suspect has been killed and his body hidden. Marlo loses big in a poker game and decides to take over Bodie’s corner. Chris and Snoop assess Michael as a potential recruit. Proposition Joe manipulates Omar into robbing Marlo’s next card game. Watkins becomes more angry with Royce when he sees he has reneged on a promise to back his protege Marla Daniels for a council seat. Randy is caught truanting and becomes a reluctant informant for the teachers.
New Characters:
Bug (Michael’s little brother)
O-Dog (Marlo dealer)
Episode #42: “Alliances”
“If you with us, you with us.” – Chris Partlow
Carcetti learns that Greggs has been assigned the witness case and uses the information against Royce. Watkins forms an alliance with Carcetti. Now a sergeant in the major case unit, Herc takes part in a series of ill-advised raids that fail to render any signifigant arrests. Herc takes a video camera without permission to surveil Stanfield. Marlo tries to enlist Michael but he rejects the offer. Marlo arranges to have Omar framed for murder. Dukie debunks Randy’s theory that the Chris and Snoop’s victims are undead and shows him the bodies. Prez struggles to control his student’s behaviour. Bubbles is beaten by another drug addict and throws Sherrod out for truanting.
New Character:
Zenobia Dawson
I am beginning to question why we (I) naturally associate legitimacy with the institutions in the show as well as in real life. For example, I have begun to embrace the idea of the drug world as one that is somehow necessary. If Marlo had not paid the kids on the street $200 how many of them would have had adequate money to buy books and things. Granted, it is likely that many of the children who accepted Marlo’s money spent it on something other than school supplies. Nevertheless, a little spending money for normal, personal affects is not necessarily a bad thing.
On the other end of the system, we can all now safely say that Royce has become a full-time politician and only a part-time mayor. He does not seem to be looking out for the city. The police department has neglected the children mentioned above too. Without somebody like Marlo to pick up the slack of the Royce administration, the Baltimore Police Department, and, in some ways, the school system, then the whole municipality might be in a lot more trouble.
Something to consider with all of the institutions, the police department, the drug game, the mayoral government: each institution is inherently investing in its own self-perpetuation prior to rendering whatever service it is supposed to provide.
Marlowe is buying the support of the local kids, indoctrinating them into the game, trying to turn them into touts and soldiers.
Royce’s way of “looking out for the city” starts with ensuring that he can remain in power, by being sleazy and underhanded but with the end goal of keeping his position.
Rawls and Landsmann both “carry the water” of their superiors so that they can stay in the system, and once their positions are assured, then they can (should) focus on the jobs they are meant to do.
Even the schools play the game: Cutty is sent out as a truant officer, not so that the kids can learn, but so that the schools can keep their federal funding.
Episodes 41 and 42 demonstrate the different sectors of knowledge and wisdom in The Wire. The portrayal of the school system highlights the nature of education but the teaching is not one way: everyone is learning, everyone is teaching lessons, everyone knows something.
To give a coy example: Prezbo locks his keys in his car so Donut uses his street knowledge to jimmy the lock.
The alley kids know about the deaths in the vacants, a valuable piece of street knowledge, while Freeman racks his brains and the resources of the police system trying to find out what a few 13 year olds know.
Prez adapts his book knowledge and teaching to the needs and expectations of children schooled by the street. Conversely, Dennis (Cutty) having been schooled on the street is taking on the role of the more formal teacher and coach.
Bubbs is unique in that he spans multiple types of knowledge. His street knowledge is taken advantage of by the police, but he pushes Sharod to learn within the education system.
I was happy to hear more from/about Chris Partlow in these couple of episodes. He has remained by and large a rather elusive figure up to this point, and the children certainly play this up––particularly Randy––with the foolish idea of Chris as Zombiemaster. Joking aside, both Donut and Dukie note some of Partlow’s legitimate (and interesting) characteristics, such as his unique dress and coldblooded nature. And, as Marlo’s second hand man it is hard not to notice some of the similarities that the two share with Avon and Stringer. He is very protective of Marlo and their common interests are much more in line than Stringer and Avon’s were. As a second hand man out on the streets dealing personally with matters (the security cop, Bodie) he is shown to be a powerful and dependable stand-in for the kingpin. He knows that it only takes, at the very least, a little “talking back” to the big man to get you got.
At the same time though, he seems to be a good counterbalance to Marlo’s frequent bouts of hotheadedness. He expresses apprehension when Marlo asks for $150,000 in poker money, almost in anticipation of the bad tides that often come from playing at such high stakes. Here he seems just like a gun-wielding Stringer: he wants to be able to draw the line somewhere. And when the shit does hit the fan, he advises that they let the Omar situation play out and cites Barksdale’s failure in that department as reliable evidence of the danger in the matter. It will be entertaining to watch his character continue to develop in tandem with the growth of the Stanfield empire, not to mention his and Marlo’s relationship with the police becoming more and more suspicious of their seemingly murderless reign…
I think that my favorite line in “Refugees” comes early on in the episode when Cutty says: “I’m gonna show you as gently as I can how little you know.” I think this idea translates to several relationships in this episode, but also in “Allinaces.” Proposition Joe gently shows Marlo that, by not joining the co-op, he is vulnerable (Omar visits the poker match). The hotel manager gently puts Colvin in his place by reminding him that he is not a police officer, and that he has no authority to arrest the hotel’s wealthy client that beat up the prostitute. Bubs gently threatens Sherrod, claiming that he will cut him loose if he doesn’t show up to school. Landsman gently explains to Kima the ways of the Homicide Division (at least he closes his office door instead of humiliating her in front of the entire office.
All of these exchanges are important, and force characters to alter their perceptions of others. That said, each statement could be made in a much more forceful manner if so desired. I appreciate these scenes because they serve as educational opportunities for the characters of The Wire while simultaneously paralleling the goals of the Baltimore schools. Interestingly, and perhaps ironically, Prez fails when gently steering his students on the right course, and instead relies on empty threats and unproductive impatience.
It’s interesting to see how adults from different socioeconomic backgrounds project their own agendas and beliefs on children this season.
Councilman Gray seems to realize that reforming schools is the answer to many of the social ills in Baltimore. As Bourgois notes in his book, young people are pushed into the business because of a lack of education and a subsequent lack of opportunities. And there surely is a generational link between parents who devalue education–as opposed to those who drive their children to excel in school–and the attitudes on education of their children. While that link isn’t explicitly stated by Gray, he MUST realize, as a politician running on a schools platform, that a necessary step in combating poverty and indoctrination into the drug game is to create generations of successful citizens. At the same time, Gray is a politician, and part of his motivation for focusing on schools and children is to get elected and get power.
As Jake noted, Marlo gives the kids their 200 dollars to seduce them into becoming players of the game.
The school administration is a cynical bureaucracy, whose goal is to sustain itself at the expense of serving its children. This is evident in their truancy policy.
It’s fallen to outsiders to have the children’s best interests in mind.
Prez, though naive about this new institution, tries different approaches to get through to his students. He agonizes over a speech that ultimately never gets delivered. And while he may just be at an earlier step in the evolution of a Baltimore teacher’s attitude about teaching, he’s still focused on doing his job. He’s also Prez, which means his intelligence may lead to something substantial.
Dennis initially works outside the system to instill discipline and provide opportunities for his kids. Later, as the truancy officer, he’s appalled by the machinery of bureaucracy. Of course, it’s always interesting to see Dennis’s confusion about institutional mechanisms–his efforts to get a permit for the gym were hilarious.
Finally, Colvin tackles a major problem by not subscribing to the PC notions that cripple conventional wisdom. By placing corner kids in different classrooms, he hopes to affect change. He’s trying for real reform (again) in a stagnated system.
As we’ve seen with Omar, the freest and truest of the characters are those that can operate outside bureaucracies, or who at least have not been indoctrinated by them. We’ll see if that bears out in future episodes.
Continuing in the vein we began in class, these two episodes add to our understanding of the role of women and their generally one dimensional portrayal exhibited on the show. Yesterday we outlined the slots women fit into on the Wire as either hyper sexualized, masculine, or brass and manipulative with few characters in between. We also highlighted the lack of compassion that permeates the show and provides a sharp contrast to other media where women act as moral compasses and empathetic figures.
The character Jen Carcetti, despite a general portrayal as the clueless sweet feminine politicians wife (she never wears anything but pink) has certain flashes of insight and appears (from what we see) to be a good mother and loving wife adding another category of female character to the mix. In a much earlier episode when her husband and Terri are talking about the witness protection program she views the situation without a political lens, thinking instead about the people involved and the potential damage to their domestic lives. In the episode covering election day during the opening sequence at the church she is much more comfortable in the unfamiliar surroundings than her husband as well as far more aware of what is and is not appropriate to say to the minister. She looks out for her husband and is genuine and supportive during the campaign process, but we never see more of her thought process or understand where her compassion and love springs from. As far as we can tell Carcetti is pretty much a sleazeball of a husband and yet she is still utterly devoted. This is just another example of a female character where the wire failed to develop the personality in a way that would have added to the political and domestic worlds shown on the program.
gah sorry this really belongs in the post on “Margin of Error” but i dont know how to edit and put it in the right place.
The boys story and their journey in this episode is reminiscent of boys from “Stand By Me”. From the stories around the fire to the journey to find the dead body in the vacant houses. However, the boys from the wire barely have any innocence left and with their discovery they find themselves now ever closer to the corner life. Dukie is very similar to Chris from “Stand By Me” with both their sets of parents are alcoholics or drugs addicts and both are trying to trying to create an identity different from the perceptions of their family. Randy is feeling a deep sense of guilt over Lex’s murder because he believed Lex was “special dead” and now that he is cooperating with police, it will be interesting to see who reaches out to him and how the Marlo gang will deal with him.
Michael is very rebellious and always has his guard up. He seems as though there was no father figure in his life or if there was this person let Michael down big time. With his interactions with Marlo, Dennis, and Prez that he avoids any advice or helping hand they are willing to offer.
Avoids the ride home from Dennis and he doesn’t seem at all interested in school work even though Prez is encourage to do his assignments.
The only thing he is contemplating is the corner life as Marlo makes him an offer and he ponders the possibility of having extra cash but that means working for Marlo which he knows is a dangerous prospect.