Sydnor: Who the hell was he? It wasn't until the end of season 4 that I even bothered trying to remember his name, and besides his brief central moment in Season 5 he was always That Other Guy. It wasn't until I checked The Wire Wiki that I remembered he was part of the S1 Barksdale detail.
Marlo: For 3 whole seasons Jamie Hector plays Marlo almost sedate, but the payoff in the second to last episode when he heard Omar was disrespecting his name pulls the character together from a one-note slate. Omar picked on his one weakness, Marlo's obsession with not just wearing the crown but making sure everyone knew he was better then them. Case in point: stealing the lollipop from the supermarket merely to provoke the security guard. Case in point: Vondas, in S2: "my name...is not my name". Smart businessman. I'm assuming they set up Marlo with the picture phones so the police would bust him, as a bit of payback for losing their trusted Spoiler
...And how sad was Marlo's last little escape from the developer's meeting? I think there's a free market pendulum at work between the "traditional" gangsters like Avon and Joe versus the "hard" breed like Marlo- Joe might find it easier to maintain power, but they're vulnerable to a ruthless Marlo type upstart, until Marlo's excesses start bringing unwanted police attention.
Season 5: I loved the meta call out in the newspaper meeting when the editors discuss a series on the schools: (paraphrased)
"maybe we should pull back, and discuss the greater context that leads to this problem?"
"no, that'll bore the audience. Keep it narrow!"
Honorable mention of the FBI profiler's projection of the serial killer's personality.
Despite those moments, however, I'd rank Season 5 as the worst relative to the others. In terms of tone and plot execution it felt like the series was canceled after S4, then revived a couple years later. It's got the same familiar, comforting motions, but there's something off that just doesn't sit right. Specifically, I'd say way too little of the lovely Alma Gutierrez, too much of the vanilla Jayson Blair, too obvious that David Simon wanted to settle some scores with anvil-subtle monologues from middle aged newspaper editors about the decline of the newspaper business. Oh yeah, and the whole McNulty plot. He barely escaped thanks to bureaucratic bullshit, but it seems more like writer's fiat that he's not in jail and avoided the multitude of ways to pollute Marlo's prosecution.
Also a word for the oft-derided Season 2: I love the Sobotkas, even the Ziggy one. Beadie, Vondas, The "Greek". Too bad their S5 cameos were often inexplicable: isn't Nick Sobotka in witness protection? Why would the super-cautious Vondas and The Greek return to the same bar the police found several years before? Just wondering. What else....Carver is the man. Now that the man has become The Man, though, I don't think he would be quite as awesome with actual responsibility to shoulder.
I think there's a law that makes you ask this question for every Wire topic, so I'll finish it off with this: what were your favorite seasons and intros? 4/3/2/1/5 and 3/5/4/1/2
