steelers + the wire = more than my heart can hold
So, the Steelers lost last night, ending a rather tumultuous season. But what an exciting game! Indeed, it is frustrating to see how the team’s collective insecurity prevents them from soldiering through. It’s like they don’t think they can beat a team if they’re not completely crushing them, when they so can. As soon as their opponents put up a fight, they get shaky. But they rallied in the fourth quarter and even though the outcome wasn’t as great as it could have been, it was fun to watch.
I will admit to being a tad relieved about not having to stress through games anymore. I’m certain I gained a few gray hairs during the Super Bowl a few years back and last night, as I tried to get my hands to stop shaking, I thought, “Yeah, I don’t miss this.”
Anyway, psychotic football fangirl crap aside, the final season of The Wire premieres tonight. I’ve been anticipating and dreading this day for a year and a half. I can’t wait to see how hard this season is going to rock but I’m extremely sad that in ten weeks it will all be over.
I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that The Wire is the best show ever. Sure, the writing is incredible, the acting is all amazing…all of those basic criteria are blown out of the water. But what makes it really wonderful is it’s simple statement of the world that we live in, how we have all failed, how we try to succeed. In this fantastic article, actor/director Clark Johnson says, “You don’t want to preach to people, but you want them to think about why things are the way they are, the history that is there as well as the possibilities.” The show certainly offers up its own ideas of how things got to where they are and what would need to happen if things are ever to change, but it does it carefully enough that the viewers are able to consider those possibilities and still develop their own opinions about it. The folks behind The Wire and the people and situations it portrays may not agree with other assessments, but through the show they are heard and considered, which is saying a hell of a lot more than most “dialogues” about the current state of affairs.
This season focuses on the media, which should be of interest to everyone. Considering what a sad, sad state the media is in today, when we need it more than ever, I don’t know how we can’t watch art like this.
At the very least, consider the fact that the man who took this image:
took this image 35 years later, to the day:
Frighteningly similar political climates between then and now. But in those days the biggest image of the year was of the horrors of our foreign war. Last year the biggest image was of a perpetual child in grief over being punished.
Perhaps this year we can start giving a shit.
January 6th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Amen! It drives me CRAZY that celebrities and celebritards are our main news fodder. WTF?
January 6th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
I am also a huge fan of THE WIRE but Im wondering how can you wait until the Sunday night broadcast? Did you know that new episodes of the show are on the ON DEMAND channel starting on Monday morning? So you can watch the first one tonight, and then the second one tomorrow night?
January 6th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
I had no idea the photographer for the latter was the same as the one who took the Trang Bang pictures. A sad state of affairs indeed.
January 7th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
Akira, I am aware of that feature but I can’t bring myself to use it. It feels like cheating to me. I’m weird.