TVSquad

We've waited a long time for season four of The Wire, both with anticipation and apprehension. In anticipation, because the show has been so unbelievably good up to now. And apprehension, because most series fall off in quality eventually don't they? Maybe the wait will have been worth it, if only that it has given many new viewers the chance to discover the series on DVD. The first two seasons have been out for awhile. That's how I found it, at that is the reason I ordered HBO for the first time in my life this summer. The Wire seems positioned finally to receive the accolades it has long deserved.

In season four, as in past seasons, we follow a group of Baltimore law enforcement officials as they slowly, painstakingly, build a single case, often just as much at odds with the city legal establishment as they are with the criminal organization. However, this is not NYPD Blue or Law & Order where all is neatly tide up by the final act, and then next week we're on to the next adventure. Instead, this series seeks to show the drug war in all its complexity. We follow the lives of the criminals and become equally involved with them as we do with the police.

This takes hours to develop and resolve, something that can only be done in a novel or in long-form television, and riveting hours they are. Not that many novels, let alone the vast majority of television shows, bother to aspire to this level of complexity and authenticity. It's not merely some stunt that two of our best contemporary crime novelists, Richard Price and Dennis Lehane, have been tapped previously to write episodes, in addition to the show's regular compliment of former Baltimore police and journalist scripters. And no American television series has ever used the medium to greater effect. I can think of no other series that succeeds in showing so many characters (on either side of the law) all as fully human beings. From the addict Bubbles, to the drug lord Stringer Bell, to the incompetent police detective Roland "Prez" Pryzbylewski (a relatively minor character in the past, who has a much larger part this coming season) the sum of human experience is laid out before us, from our loftiest desires to our greatest frailties. If you think I'm overselling it, then you likely have never experienced The Wire.

I mentioned apprehension before: what will the series be like without Stringer Bell? Stringer was one of the drug lords, partner to Avon Barksdale, and who aspired to move into legitimate businesses just as, say, bootlegger Joseph P. Kennedy had done in his day, but who instead met his end late in season three. His last words were: "get on with it then."

Ed Burns, one of the series creators, is an ex-cop and an ex-teacher. In a preseason documentary about season four that HBO is running, he mentions thinking of each graduating class in the Baltimore school system as being about the eight grade. By the eight grade, new players and new leaders are emerging. Stringer Bell is gone, but there are plenty of other young men left to the streets, and this new season will focus on them. The vacuum left by our society's failures demands to be filled. Marlo is more powerful now. Bodie, by virtue of his luck at being able to stay alive, if nothing else, is now much higher in the Barksdale organization.

Last season examined the failures in the nation's drug enforcement policies. Now season four of The Wire will take us inside the contemporary inner-city school system where we will meet four new middle-school-aged characters, described as the heroes of season four. We also become reacquainted with two fallen police who have entered the school system as educators: the aforementioned Prez, and also disgraced police Major "Bunny" Colvin, who took a gamble on a bold, socially-progressive, crime-control tactic last season and saw his career destroyed for it. Councilman Tommy Carcetti is back, as is his long-shot bid to elected mayor -- even though he is white -- in predominantly African-American Baltimore.

If you haven't seen The Wire yet, give it three episodes. By then you'll be hooked.

The Wire premieres on HBO On Demand September 4th, and on HBO proper, Sunday, September 10th.