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{{work}}
[[File:wire.jpg|
{{quote|''[[Crapsack World|"It's Baltimore, gentlemen. The gods will not save you."]]''|'''Commissioner Ervin Burrell'''}}
Baltimore is ''back'', baby. If you feel the need to make stories that blow past the boundaries of detective/crime drama, you need to be working a Baltimore setting. ''[[Homicide: Life on the
''The Wire'' is a show about Baltimore, taking you through a different segment of the city in each season.
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''The Wire'' is rife with social commentary and the liberal political views of show creators Simon and Norris. The most overt theme of the series is the notion that the "War on Drugs" is a complete and total failure in its current form of "lock up the drug dealers and throw away the key" logic. In addition, there is the more nihilistic notion that the institutions that make up the American way of life are irreversibly corrupt, and that it is impossible to reform them. To try to reform them is to be crushed by the system.
Although the series has been critically acclaimed, ''The Wire'' never managed to earn anything more than a small but devoted following. Part of the reason, says co-creator [[David
{{tropelist}}
* [[Abandoned Playground]]: Several, considering that Baltimore is a shooting gallery. Most notably, Nick laments Ziggy in one in Season 2, Marlo holds court in one for most of Season 3, and Lex is ambushed by Snoop in one in Season 4.
* [[Absentee
** Dominic West during much of the fourth season (his character, McNulty, works as a beat cop); this was done largely to accommodate West, due to him landing several movie roles during the period that season four filmed.
** McNulty disappeared through much of season two as well, getting assigned to "harbor unit", which the writers then promptly turned into a key plot point of the season. The writing is overall so strong that major characters cycle in and out of the narrative, and if something life-altering happens to a character (for instance, a life prison term), it's ''permanent'', and the overall arc is so strong that it supports it completely, and we simply focus on other characters.
** For whatever reason Leander Sydnor is not included in the Major Crimes unit in Season 2, but returns for 3-5, the only original member still on the unit at the end of the show. His absence from the Second Season is mentioned in universe, but never explained.
* [[Abusive
* [[Adaptational
* [[Aesop
* [[Affably Evil]]:
** Proposition Joe. "Don't believe we've met. Proposition Joe. You ever steal from me, I'll kill your whole family."
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** Clarence Royce.
** Brother Mouzone.
* [[Alliterative
* [[All Lesbians Want
* [[Amoral
* [[Antagonist in
{{quote|{{spoiler|1='''McNulty:''' I caught him, Bunk. On the wire, I caught him. He doesn't fucking know it.}}}}
* [[Anti-
* [[Anti-
* [[Anyone Can
* [[Arc
** "New Day!" Carcetti runs with the slogan "It's a new day in Baltimore", and multiple drug crews form the New Day Co-Op.
** "The game": ''"It's all in the game."''; ''"The game is the game."''
{{quote|'''Cutty:''' The game done changed.
'''Slim Charles:''' Game's the same - just got more fierce.}}
* [[Artifact
* [[Back for the
* [[Badass Beard]]: {{spoiler|Prez}} in the series finale.
* [[Badass
* [[Badass
* [[Badass in a Nice
* [[Badass
* [[Bad Guy
* [[The Bad Guy
** Played earlier and a lot more devastatingly at the end of {{spoiler|the second season}} when {{spoiler|The Greek and his cronies}} get away scot-free with the police still having no idea who they really are. Made worse when they resurface in the story a couple seasons later and we see that they've managed to avoid prosecution and are back in business in Baltimore.
* [[Bald Black Leader
* [[Battle
* [[Being Evil
* [[Being Good
* [[Big
* [[The Big Board]]: A corkboard laying out all of each case's suspects. Also, the white board in the Homicide division that shows all the open cases, unsolved ones in red. The big board eventually spilled out over the walls as the cases grew larger.
* [[Big
* [[Bilingual
* [[Black and Gray
* [[Black
* [[Blood
* [[Blue and Orange
* [[Bluff the
* [[Break the
* [[Brick
* [[Brief Accent
* [[Briefcase Full of
** Marlo's bribe for the Greeks in the fifth season. Mocked, because the Greek won't accept it as it comes, dirty from the streets.
** Stringer Bell also gives a case full of drug money to "the faucet", a corrupt public official willing to approve building plans in return for a bribe {{spoiler|only to later find out that the man he sees is just a random public official and the whole thing was just an elaborate scheme by Clay Davis to swindle him out of cash. This can be seen as a subversion of the trope of sorts as Levy points out that a State Senator like Davis wouldn't be willing to risk his career by walking around with briefcases full of drug money to give to public officials who might rat them out}}.
* [[Butch
** Kima drinks, sleeps around, and kicks in doors right along with the men of the series.
** Snoop as well. She has the "one of the guys" aspect down nearly to a tee, wearing almost exclusively baggy men's clothing (concealing her fairly feminine build seen on the one exception), being one of the top two enforcers for Marlo, and with a voice deeper than most males on the show. Her sexual orientation is only once referred to, and that fairly obliquely (where she claims that she, like Bunk, is "thinking about some pussy"), but the actress who plays her is also a [[Butch
* [[But Not Too
* [[Butt
* [[Camera
* [[Cardboard
* [[Career
* [[Catch
** McNulty: "The fuck did I do?"
** Bunk: "Happy now, bitch?"; "Givin' a fuck when it ain't your turn to give a fuck."
** Proposition Joe: "I got a proposition for you."
** Clay Davis: "Sheeeeeeeeeeit." This is apparently [[Actor Allusion|the actor's
** Omar: "Indeed."
** D'Angelo: "Mos' def'."
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** The real Jay Landsman plays Lt. Mello, while Delaney Williams plays "Jay Landsman". Made more confusing in a scene in the fifth season where Lt. Mello, Jay Landsman, and [[Homicide: Life on the Street|Detective Munch]], based on Landsman, all appear in a bar.
** Omar is a Fan of HBO's ''[[Oz]]'' although many Actors (Herc, Carver, Rawls, Daniels, Bodie, Freamon and Cheese) on ''The Wire'' have appeared on it
* [[Characterization Marches
* [[Chastity
* [[Chekhov's
** The "get out of jail free" card.
** {{spoiler|Chris' spit on Michael's step-father}}.
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** The nail gun in season four.
** Daniels' past corruption investigation, which is mentioned briefly in the Pilot and becomes relevant in the Finale, 5 seasons later.
* [[Chekhov's
** Colvin, who appears briefly in Season 2 only to become very important in Seasons 3 and 4.
** Kenard, who appears briefly in Season 3 as a kid on the street proclaiming, "It's my turn to be Omar!" He returns in season four, and then in Season Five {{spoiler|is the one to shoot Omar}}. The best part is that this wasn't even intentional on the writer's part, they only found out later that it was the same kid and he just happened to be cast for both roles. In one interview, [[Dennis
* [[Chekhov's Skill]]: Michael learning "The Game".
* [[The
* [[Children Are
* [[Child
* [[Chronic Backstabbing
** McNulty for pretty much the entire series.
** Proposition Joe.
* [[The
* [[Clear My
* [[Cluster F-Bomb]]: In Season One, McNulty and Bunk spend an entire scene investigating a crime scene while muttering nothing but variations of the word "fuck".
* [[Comically Missing the
** O-Dog suggests to Snoop and Chris to execute someone via drive-by, like in the movie ''[[Boyz N the Hood]]''. [[Do Not Do This Cool Thing|"Shit was tight, remember?"]] The negative context of the drive-bys from the movie must've gone completely over his head.
** "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ttbQTz8tAE Like a 40 degree day!]" (NSFW).
* [[Consummate
* [[Continuity Nod]]: Frequent references to prior events and conversations; especially evident in the final two seasons.
* [[Cool Old
* [[The
* [[Corrupt Corporate
* [[Corrupt the
* [[Country
** McNulty fails to get away with indirectly applying the word to his ex-wife in Season One. The word also features in a line in Season Three which is so offensive it shocks ''Stringer''.
** Bird, the charming gentleman who spouts this word, and many other slurs, several times at Kima and the other detectives while in homicide's interview room. {{spoiler|He's actually so offensive and obnoxious that even Daniels joins in on the ass-kicking}}.
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{{quote|"Thieving. Greek. Cunt."}}
* [[Cowboy Cop]]:
** Some fans think of McNulty as a [[
** In the second episode of the second season, a dead body floating off the coast of Baltimore and a container full of suffocated European women set the plot of the season in motion. The case of the dead women was supposed to go to the marine unit in a different sector of the city, but Jimmy McNulty (who had been [[Reassigned to Antarctica|transferred to the marine unit out of
** Lester Freamon would also qualify as a bit of a "quieter" [[Cowboy Cop]], thanks to him being easily the best [[
{{quote|'''Rhonda:''' Shit, Lester, you've got this all figured out.
'''Lester:''' Me? I'm just a police.}}
** Herc and Carver at various points in the earlier seasons, especially in the "roughing up suspects" department. They certainly see themselves as this in seasons one through three. Needless to say, it doesn't work out for either of them.
* [[Crapsack World]]: Almost every aspect of the setting.
* [[Creator
* [[Crime-Time Soap]]: The show focuses drastically more on personal and professional relationships and favors than "real police work", yet still portrays police work in an accurate manner. It's the way it shows how such relationships ''shape'' crime and police work, always in a realistic and believable way, that makes it so authentic.
* [[Crime-Time TV]]
* [[Cuffs Off, Rub
* [[Cultural
* [[Da Chief]]: Commander Rawls, who rips his underlings to shreds with gusto.
* [[Darker and
* [[Dartboard of
* [[Dead Guy on
** {{spoiler|Brandon}} in Season One, presented on the hood of a car as a warning.
** Also in the case of every informal policeman's wake held in an [[Good Guy Bar|Kavanaugh's Pub]], when the body of the deceased is put on the pool table with a cigar and a glass of whisky in his hands.
* [[Deadpan
* [[Death Is Dramatic]]:
** Usually averted, but the scene of {{spoiler|Stringer}}'s death had quite an aesthetic tinge to it.
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** {{spoiler|The death of Omar}} is a ''biting'' aversion, {{spoiler|from the initial killing shot, to his murder not making the paper, to his name tag almost being switched up}}. Also [[Played With]] for the rest of the series {{spoiler|whenever a corner boy tells some tall tale of how he fell}}.
** {{spoiler|Snoop's}} death is also surprisingly poignant.
* [[Demoted to
* [[Derailed for
* [[Despite the
* [[Disposable
* [[Disproportionate
* [[Dissonant
* [[Divided We Fall]]
* [[Does This Remind You of Anything?]]: {{spoiler|1=In Season 5, when (McNulty) goes to the FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit for help on the serial killer he made up, the profile describes him perfectly}}. You can see in his face that this isn't lost on him.
* [[The
* [[Don't Answer
** Zig-zagged; in the first season, a detective tries to make one of the Barksdale clan's top soldiers (D'Angelo Barksdale) write an ''apology letter'' to the (fictional) family of a man killed for witnessing against him. [[Amoral
** Played with hilariously in a later episode, where they convince a young punk that a photocopier is a lie detector. The kid confesses because he assumes the jig's up now anyway.
** Or the infamous Big Mac Bluff.
* [[Double Meaning
** It can refer to the act of "walking the wire"--that is, to the metaphorical "balancing act" that Baltimore cops must perform in order to fight crime while staying loyal to the forces that perpetuate it.
** It can refer to the proverbial "thin line" that separates cops from the criminals that they fight.
** It can refer to the metaphorical wire that connects Baltimore citizens of all walks of life, thus ensuring that one group's actions always affect the other.
* [[Do You Want to Haggle?]]: The reason for Proposition Joe's name.
* [[The
* [[The Dreaded]]: Omar fucking Little. Even Chris and Snoop -- Chris and Snoop -- get nervous when he's hunting them. Chris and Snoop themselves also count.
* [[Driven to
** {{spoiler|Bubbles}} in Season Four. {{spoiler|He is [[Interrupted Suicide|saved]] just in time}}. Also, "No Heart" Anthony Little (Omar's older brother) got his nickname from a [[Bungled Suicide|failed suicide
** {{spoiler|1=McNulty comes VERY close to the edge over the course of Season 3, he seems very tempted to simply stay on the the train tracks}}.
* [[Drowning My
* [[Dying Moment of
{{quote|{{spoiler|Yo this is my corner, I ain't goin nowhere.}}}}
* [[Empathy Doll
* [[Empty Cop
* [[Ending
* [[Enemy Civil
* [[Enhance
* [[Epigraph]]: Each episode begins with one, usually spoken by a character in the episode. The only episodes which avert this are the finales for Seasons 4 and 5, where the quotes are instead a notice for animal control ("If animal trapped call 410-844-6286.") and a quote from H.L. Mencken ("...the life of kings."). However, they are both displayed prominently in the episodes themselves.
* [[Equal Opportunity Evil]]: The Greek's syndicate includes Greeks, Ukrainians, and Israelis (in addition to whatever nationality the Greek himself really is) and does business with both Polish and black associates.
* [[Escalating
* [[Establishing Series
* [[Even Evil Has
** Many of the gangbangers respect a "Sunday Truce" prohibiting violence on that day. When two clueless hitmen spot Omar taking his Grandma to a church, they make a move on him. Both Omar and Avon are completely livid at this breach. Avon orders the hitmen to replace Omar's grandmothers hat, which was ruined in the attack.
** Omar's code of not killing anyone not in the game as well.
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** Omar doesn't curse at all for four seasons. Only in Season 5, he refers to Marlo as a "Bitch" twice in response to the {{spoiler|death of his old friend Butch}}.
** Avon and his sister put family before everything else, Stringer and Avon always put a high value on their genuine friendship {{spoiler|until business gets in the way}}.
** In Season 4, Chris killed {{spoiler|Michael's step-father}} in a drastically different fashion than anyone else. Whereas Chris executed other people in a calculated way to avoid being discovered (i.e. by killing people in a vacant house and then boarding the houses up to hide the body), with {{spoiler|Michael's step-father, he beat him to a bloody pulp using nothing but his fists and spit on his face after doing the deed}}. Most viewers understand that he was murdered with extreme prejudice {{spoiler|[[Berserk Button|because Chris was disgusted that he molested Michael]]. Despite Chris being a cold-hearted assassin for Marlo, [[Paedo Hunt|he has no mercy for
** Bodie bordered on evil territory at times, but even he couldn't stomach Marlo's methods for dealing with his enemies.
* [[Evil Matriarch]]: De'londa Brice and (to a lesser extent) Brianna Barksdale.
* [[Evil Will Fail]]: In ''The Wire'' Season 1, the nature of "The Game" of drug dealing has everyone looking out for themselves, to the point where innocent bystanders or even friends who might pose a risk have to be dealt with. It's this repeated brutality that ends up winning allies for the investigation team again and again from players who want out after someone they care about gets hurt.
* [[Expecting Someone
* [[Expospeak]]: ''Very'' little from a story standpoint, and ''no'' [[As You Know]] explanations. You [[Continuity Lock Out|can't skip an
{{quote|'''Lester:''' Ain't he married or some shit now?}}
* [[
* [[Facing the Bullets One-
* [[Failure Is the Only
* [[Faking the Dead]]: The audience is led to believe that {{spoiler|1=McNulty}} is dead, and a wake is being held for him {{spoiler|in a Baltimore pub}}; that is, until {{spoiler|he then starts laughing uncontrollably when one of his fellow officers makes a joke about him. It turns out that the "funeral" is a retirement party in the uniquely morbid style of the Baltimore P.D.}}
* [[False Rape
* [[A Father to His
* [[Five-Bad Band]]: Two notable ones:
** The Barksdale Organization (Season 1).
*** The [[Big Bad]] - Avon Barksdale.
*** [[The
*** [[The
*** [[The Evil
*** [[The Dark Chick]] - Brianna Barksdale.
** The Greek's organization (Season 2).
*** The [[Big Bad]] - "The Greek".
*** [[The
*** [[The
*** [[The Evil
*** [[The Dark Chick]] - Ilona Petrovich.
* [[Flash Back]]: Used ''once''. In the ''[[
* [[Foil]]: In the second season, Nick and Frank Sobotka serve as a foil for D'Angelo and Avon Barksdale. Both are uncle-nephew duos who are born into the same business, and both involve the nephew trying to break away, but their respective environments (working class Polish vs. inner-city Black) and subtle differences in character dynamics form a contrast.
* [[
* [[Four Lines, All
* [[Freeze-Frame
* [[The Fun in Funeral]]: The Baltimore police have a tradition of holding rowdy Irish wakes for their own, collimating in a passionate sing-along of the Pogues' "The Body of an American". Even the black cops seem to love the tradition.
* [[Gangsta
** Played straight frequently, but [[Deconstructed Trope|shown to be
** Actively defied by Marlo, Chris and Snoop - the first thing they do on recruiting Michael is teach him how to shoot properly. He lampshades the trope later when he's teaching Dukie how to shoot; he tells him not to do any of that "gangsta bullshit" when using his gun. Cutty and Slim are also shown aiming down the sights when shooting. The minor drug dealers may not know how to shoot, but the professional muscle know how to do it right.
{{quote|'''Snoop:''' Fuck them west coast niggas. In B'more, we aim to hit a nigga, you heard?}}
* [[Gayngster]]:
** Omar.
** Snoop.
* [[Generic Ethnic Crime
* [["Get Out of Jail Free" Card]]: Omar in Season Two (for testifying in a court case). {{spoiler|In the end, the card itself hardly matters}}.
* [[Gilligan
{{quote|'''McNulty''': I'm looking you in the eye, Gus, and I'm telling you, I'm not driving a car tonight!
''(cut to McNulty driving across three lanes)''}}
* [[Go-Karting with
* [[Good Adultery, Bad
* [[Good Cop, Bad Cop]]: Subverted: season one, episode five has this shtick turning into "Bad Cop, ''Pissed'' Cop".
* [[Good Guy
* [[Good Scars, Evil
* [[Gratuitous Foreign
* [[Greedy Jew]]: Maurice Levy, the [[Amoral
* [[Greek
** Or in once instance, "Haha! Check out that little kid getting his ass beat!"
* [[Grey and Gray
* [[The Guards Must Be
* [[Guns
* [[A Half Dozen Guys in A
* [[Harmless
* [[Headbutting
* [[Hidden
* [[Hooker with a Heart of Gold]]: Shardene.
* [[
* [[How's Your British Accent?]]: McNulty (played by Brit actor Dominic West) puts on a ridiculous English accent to go undercover at a brothel in Season Two.
* [[How We Got
* [[In-Series
** Bird (real name: Marquis Hilton).
** Bodie (real name: Preston Broadus).
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** Also concealed a minor bit of characterization: Cheese is Randy Wagstaff's [[Disappeared Dad]].
** Herc and Carver try to cover up using the listening device (hidden in a tennis ball) by crediting their information to a fake informant (Herc's cousin) they named "Fuzzy Dunlop".
* [[Incredibly Obvious
{{quote|'''Carver:''' Fifteen... ''hundred'' dollars.
''(beat)''
'''Herc:''' Twelve-fifty with the police discount." ''(sigh)'' It just couldn't stand up to the modern urban crime environment, man.}}
* [[Incredibly Obvious Tail]]: Stringer should really have been concerned that Bodie and his friend didn't notice the black SUV that was no more than one car behind them every step of the way from Baltimore to Philadelphia and back again. If it hadn't been Stringer's men, there would have been trouble.
* [[Infant
* [[Inherent in the
* [[Insistent
* [[Instant Death
* [[Invisible to
* [[Ironic
{{quote|"I'll take anybody's money if he's giving it away." Senator Davis, Namond Brice.
"I'm tired of this gangster shit." Stringer Bell, {{spoiler|Marlo}}.
Line 314:
"Move, Shitbird." Prez in the first season, then Valchek in the second.
"Fuck you, fat man." Bird in the first season and Kima in the fourth, both times said to Jay in the same exact tone.}}
* [[Ironic
* [[It Will Never Catch
* [[John Munch]]: Makes a cameo in the fifth season as a bar patron
* [[Jurisdiction
* [[Just a Kid]]:
** Bad idea, {{spoiler|Omar}}.
Line 323:
{{quote|'''Vinson''': "But you just a kid."
[[spoiler: (Michael fires his shotgun at Vinson's knee)
'''Michael''': "And that's just a knee."\\
* [[Karma
* [[Karmic Death]]:
** {{spoiler|Omar is killed by a small child in a convenience store in the fifth season. The same kid who had seen Omar having a shoot-out in the street back in season three, and who Bunk noticed imitating Omar. He had previously stated in the series that he didn't consider children as a threat}}.
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** {{spoiler|Snoop's death, as Michael got the better of her by using the same techniques and advice that she and Chris Partlow had taught him}}.
** {{spoiler|Stringer's}} death also qualifies, as it's a direct result of {{spoiler|his attempts to set Omar and Brother Mouzone against each other}}.
* [[Kick the
* [[Kick the Son of a Bitch]]: Whenever [[Obstructive Bureaucrat|Obstructive
* [[Killed Mid-
* [[Kingpin in His
* [[Knight in Sour
* [[The Last DJ]]: Lester Freamon was this before getting a second chance in the first season. McNulty and Daniels too, {{spoiler|even though Daniels does eventually enjoy a string of rapid promotions, he is ultimately forced to retire his post as commissioner because he's unwilling to compromise his principles}}.
* [[Last Stand]]: {{spoiler|Bodie}}: "This ''my'' corner, I ain't runnin' NOWHERE!"
* [[Law Procedural]]: Occasional, especially in later seasons.
* [[Loads and Loads of
* [[Lovable
* [[Lyrical
* [[
* [[Make It Look Like an
* [[Mama
** Averted. Namond and D'Angelo have some of the worst mothers around. Both continually press their sons into the drug game (read: mortal danger) to maintain their own lifestyles. Both are eventually called out on it, in a brutal manner. Wee Bey allows Namond to live with Bunny Colvin, for a chance at a real future. When D'Angelo is "suicided," McNulty goes to his girlfriend with his suspicions instead of his mom because [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|"Frankly, I wanted to tell someone who cared about the kid."]] The ironic and sad thing though, is that his girlfriend didn't really care about him either.
** Wallace, Michael and Dukie's mothers were even worse, since they were all junkies who couldn't care less about their sons' well being. Wallace ran away from home and lived in the low rise projects with other (presumably) runaway kids for this reason. Dukie was constantly deprived of essential needs, and had to rely on what his teacher gave him, and eventually {{spoiler|stayed in Michael's place, which he acquired after getting involved in the drug game}}. In Michael's case, he was forced to take responsibility of the welfare money issued out to his mother every month, because she kept using it on drugs instead of food, clothes and other household essentials. If Michael didn't step up to the task, he and his little brother would have starved.
* [[Manly
** Omar fixing up and then walking on a broken leg. Ouch.
** Seeing his boyfriend, Brandon's, mutilated corpse.
** In the aftermath of {{spoiler|Dante accidentally shooting Tosha during an ambush because [[I Just Shot Marvin in the Face|he wasn't paying
* [[May-December
* [[Minor Crime Reveals Major
* [[Missing White Woman
* [[Mobile Kiosk]]: In Season 3, Bubbles starts selling white t-shirts to the drug dealers and users around Baltimore from a shopping trolley. Later in the season and in Season Four, he starts to expand his operation, offering cans of paint, pirated DVDs and other such assorted goods from his trolley. Later, he uses two trolleys, so we can say that he goes ''trolleys akimbo'', right?
* [[Mob
* [[The
* [[Momma's
{{quote|Bodie: "Your momma is what niggas call a 'Dragon Lady'."
Namond: "Yeah, she don't blink."
Line 362:
Namond: "To what?"
Bodie: "Why you is, what you is."}}
* [[Montage
* [[Mood
* [[Mother Russia Makes You
* [[Never Heard That One
{{quote|'''Bunk:''' Not gonna give us your name? How 'bout we just call you Boris, then.
'''Sergei:''' ''[
* [[New Job
* [[No-Holds-Barred
* [[Not-So-Harmless
* [[No Good Deed Goes Unpunished]]:
** Before Season 1 started, Lester Freamon had been forced to work in the pawn shop unit for, well, doing his job investigating a homicide.
Line 376:
** Haynes and Gutierrez also find this out the hard way in Season 5.
** Bunny Colvin's reward for cutting the felony crime rate in his district by 14% and improving the general quality of life for its citizens is {{spoiler|to be busted down to lieutenant, fired in disgrace, and vilified to the media as an "amoral" and "incompetent" man who "buckled under the pressure" of his command}}.
* [[Not So
{{quote|I got the shotgun. You got the briefcase. ''[[Nothing Personal|It's all in the game right?]]''}}
* [[Number
* [[Office Golf]]: Burrell does a lot of this.
* [[Old Media Are Evil]]: Averted, as many of the staffers at the Baltimore Sun decry the death of traditional newspapers, and are just trying to make it through the day without getting hit with buyout offers or a lack of people to cover story beats.
* [[One Steve
* [[Ooh, Me Accent's
* [[Pac-Man
** Michael's little brother is clearly playing [[
** Namond is shown playing on his X-Box, without the TV in view, and, despite showing him playing ''Halo 2'' in other episodes, we hear random stock ninja sounds playing over and over.
* [[Pet the
** Rawls telling McNulty that {{spoiler|Kima's shooting}} wasn't his fault - albeit in the most abusive way possible.
{{quote|"You, McNulty, are a gaping asshole. We both know this. Fuck if everybody in C.I.D. doesn't know it. But fuck if I'm gonna stand here and say you did a single fucking thing to {{spoiler|get a police shot}}. You did not do this, you fucking hear me? This is not on you. No, it isn't, asshole. Believe it or not, everything isn't about you. And the motherfucker saying this, [[OOC Is Serious Business|he hates your guts, McNulty. So you know if it was on you, I'd be the sonofabitch to say so.]]"}}
Line 396:
** The only time Chris Partlow isn't seen scowling is when he discusses his love of club music. Also with his kids
** Even Marlo Stanfield gets one. Despite repeatedly demonstrating that he's the coldest motherfucker in the series, he also keeps good care of a coop of pigeons, even hiring someone to take care of it.
* [[Phrase
* [[Plot
** The cops and politicians [[Justified Trope|
** Highlighted effectively by the Barksdale crew's panic after accidentally shooting an {{spoiler|undercover}} officer.
** Also shows the consequences as the police then kick in every damn door they have a lead on the very next day. Shooting a cop is VERY bad for business.
* [[Poirot Speak]]: Omar's boyfriend Renaldo.
* [[Police
* [[Police Procedural]]: In this case a huge [[
* [[Politically-Incorrect
* [[Prequel]]: Omar, Proposition Joe, McNulty and Bunk's backstories were shown in short vignettes before the premiere of the fifth season, to heighten speculation about [[Tonight Someone Dies|who would
* [[
* [[Product
* [[Punch Clock
* [[Putting the Band Back
* [[Rabid Cop]]:
** Detective Collichio in the fourth and fifth seasons; he becomes so exasperated by the actions of the street dealers in Baltimore that he takes out his frustrations on a middle-school teacher driving to work.
** Officer Walker decides that the most reasonable response to Donut's constant car thievery is to break his fingers.{{spoiler|The boys get their revenge on him for this}}.
* [[Ragtag Bunch of
* [[
* [[Reality
* [[Real Men Wear Pink]]: Omar is so tough that he can walk down to the corner grocery store in a turquoise silk bathrobe and drug dealers will still toss their stashes to him out of fear.
* [[Real Song Theme
* [[Reasonable Authority
* [["The Reason You Suck" Speech]]: Happens more often than the average show. McNulty has gotten more than one over the course of five season, even Rawls slipped one in while trying to console Jimmy in the wake of Kima getting shot. Omar got a nasty one from Bunk in Season 3. Carver got a rare lenient one from Colvin on how he isn't much of a police officer. Even Avon calls Stringer out when he grows tired of him trying to avoid war even after Avon is almost killed. The best one had to be Nick Sobatka slapping Frog hard with his "You Know You're White?" speech.
* [[Reassigned to
** McNulty, at the end of the first and third seasons (the latter being used to allow Dominic West to be [[Written-In
** Daniels, when he's assigned to Evidence Control.
** D'Angelo after he returns home from jail.
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** Lester Freamon, stuck in the pawn shop unit for thirteen years. [[Insistent Terminology|And four months.]]
** Alma at the end of Season 5 to the bureau in rural Carroll County after {{spoiler|backing up Gus when he revealed to the bosses that Templeton was making up stories}}.
* [[Reckless Gun
{{quote|{{spoiler|Det Norris: So these idiots are shooting forties two blocks down, and now this Carcetti fuck gets to be mayor? What a town.}}}}
* [[Red Oni, Blue
** Jimmy McNulty is the Red Oni to Bunk Moreland's Blue Oni. On occasions when he's paired with them, Lester Freamon and Kima Greggs fill the Blue Oni role as well.
** Avon Barksdale is the Red Oni to Stringer Bell's Blue Oni.
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* [[Right Hand Versus Left Hand]]: When Avon Barksdale gets sent to prison at the end of Season 1, he and Stringer Bell start pulling their gang in separate directions. Stringer is a businessman at heart, and wants to turn the gang into a mostly nonviolent [[Thieves' Guild]] that finances legitimate business investments. Avon is a thug at heart, and is obsessed with controlling as many corners as possible, even if it inevitably leads to war and police investigation. Their conflict reaches its nadir in late Season 2, when Stringer {{spoiler|tries to trick Omar into assassinating Brother Mouzone, Avon's new enforcer}}.
* [[Road Sign Reversal]]: played for ''lots'' of drama.
* [[Running
* [[Rustproof Blood]]:
** Subverted: at first, it appears that {{spoiler|Michael}} has shot {{spoiler|Chris and Snoop}}, but it turns out that it was a training exercise with paintball rounds.
** Played straight, however, with the blood of the store clerk left to frame Omar.
* [[Ruthless Foreign
* [[Sarcastic
* [[Save Our
* [[Scary Black
* [[Schmuck
** Herc and Carver roust a corner of the drug dealers, when one of the youngest ones grabs the drug stash and takes off through the alleys. The cops all tear off in pursuit, and then another kid comes walking by, casually picks up the ''real'' drug stash, and disappears.
** Season 5, during one of the corners "time out" moments. Kenard blatantly stashed a brown bag "package" in plain view for the western "knockos" to see. Without question, militant cop Colicchio snatches the whole corner. When he reaches inside the package, he pulls out a hand full of dog shit.
* [[The
* [[Screw the Rules, I'm Beautiful]]: In Season 3, Rhonda uses a short skirt and a seductive smile to convince Judge Phelan to authorize a wiretap that the cops technically don't have a valid probable cause for.
* [[Secret Test of
* [[Series
* [[Serious
** The annual basketball game between the Barksdale crew and Proposition Joe's men. The entire neighborhood shuts down to watch it and Avon thinks nothing of paying $20,000 to hire a ringer for his team.
** Business doesn't get more serious than a stained glass window at Father Lewandowski's church. Because of a beef over that window, lives are destroyed, careers are made, a union is brought low, and the MCU is formed.
* [[Shaggy Dog
* [[Sherlock
* [[Shirtless
* [[Shout-
** Cutty's roommate in the hospital is watching ''[[Deadwood]].'' The man chuckles to himself, "[[Heh Heh, You Said "X"|Ha ha
** In Season Four, Little Kevin mentions ''[[SpongeBob]]'' in a conversation with Bodie and some other runners. Bodie chides them for watching too many cartoons.
** In Season Five, Dukie and Bug watch ''[[
** When Bunk and Lester are interviewing the crew members from the ship in Season 2, at one point Lester yells [[Pulp Fiction|"English, motherfucker!"]]
** Omar and Dante are shown watching a season six episode of ''[[Oz]]'' together.
** Some of the cops choose music on their car stereos to compliment their mood. When rallying to shut down Hamsterdam, Rawls plays [[Apocalypse Now|"The Ride of the Valkyries"]]. When prepping to chase drug runners down alleys, Herc chooses the [[
{{quote|'''Herc''': He's a complicated man, and no one understands him but his woman.
'''Carver''': Seek professional help.}}
** In the second season, Brodie discovers that radio stations are different outside of Baltimore by accidentally tuning into ''[[A Prairie Home
* [[Shown Their Work]]: When it was on the air, ''[[The
* [[Shrouded in Myth]]: Omar. After {{spoiler|he is shot by Kenard}}, the story makes the rounds through the streets getting bigger each time it's told. When another character who knows the truth tries to correct someone, no one believes him. 'The bigger the lie, the more they believe.'
* [[Sir
* [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus
* [[Smoking Is Cool]]: Omar and Bunk.
* [[Smug
* [[Sophisticated As Hell]]:
** Used in both a verbal and non-verbal sense when {{spoiler|Stringer}} is shown attending an Introduction to Macroeconomics class (and uses the lesson in the next scene).
** This trope is to David Simon as [[Buffy-Speak]] is to [[Joss
{{quote|'''Bubbles:''' You're equivocating like a motherfucker, man.
'''Carver:''' Did you just use the word 'habitat' in a sentence?
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'''Bodie:''' Man, better go on before I lose my composure out this bitch!}}
* [[Spell My Name with a "The"]]: The Bunk.
* [[Spoiler
* [[String
* [[Stylistic Suck]]: McNulty's intentionally horrible British accent--Dominic West is British himself.
* [[Super Window Jump]]: Unfortunately, it [[Deconstruction|doesn't work too well]] for {{spoiler|Omar}}; he ends up with a broken leg that never fully heals.
* [[Surrounded by
** Stringer feels this way at times in Season 3.
** Don't forget Jimmy 'I'm the smartest asshole in three districts' McNulty.
* [[Suspect Is
* [[Suspiciously Apropos Music]]: Subverted with the music that plays as Ziggy gets his ass handed to him in Season Two.
* [[Swiss Bank
* [[Sympathetic POV]]: The story is seen through the perspectives of cops, drug dealers, foreigners, students, politicians and the media.
* [[Ted
* [[Terrible Interviewees
* [[Theme Music Power-Up]]: Omar whistling "[[Ironic Nursery Tune|The Farmer in the Dell]]".
* [[Thieves' Guild]]: Stringer trying to run syndicate meetings according to Roberts' Rules of Order.
{{quote|''You ain't got the floor. Chair don't recognise yo ass.''
''Nigga, is you takin' notes on a motherfucking criminal conspiracy?''}}
* [[Third Person
* [[Those Two Bad
* [[Those Two
* [[Took a Level in
** In the series finale, we find out that {{spoiler|like many rookie teachers after a few years, Prez has become a pillar of authority, with a [[Badass Beard]] to boot}}.
** Between the third and fourth seasons, Carver also [[Took a Level in
* [[Trademark Favorite Food]]: Omar loves his breakfast cereal, particularly Honey Nut Cheerios, which he finds hard to get.
* [[Tragic
* [[Trauma Conga
* [[True
* [[Two-Teacher School]]: Averted in the fourth season. Multiple scenes show teachers at an inner-city Baltimore school debating issues such as curriculums, test preparations, and overall teaching structures; we also see shots of teachers giving lectures to their classes. Played straight when it comes to actual class focus, however.
* [[Twofer Token
* [[Ubermensch]]: Omar Little, personal-code warrior.
* [[Utopia Justifies the
* [[Viewer-Friendly
** Apparently, on ''The Wire'', ''[[Halo 2]]'' features [[Title Drop|its title at the bottom of the screen at all
** For the most part, however, this is averted: most applications seen on the show are plain Win32 GDI apps running on Windows XP. The animations on the dock monitoring software are a little unbelievable (a little truck drives away with the container?), and once a search for "suspects" was done using what appeared to be the Windows Explorer File Search (with a call to the contact done through the Windows Telephony dialog), but jaggy, aliased 2D polygons and unframed text boxes in clunky custom programs are far more believable on a city police computer than full-3D operating systems that [[Magical Computer|can enhance a 4 pixel
* [[Viewers Are
* [[Villainous
** Omar shows signs toward the end of Season 5 as his physical condition deteriorates and his [[Roaring Rampage of
** Marlo screaming into an empty corner at the end of the series.
** Stringer has one in "Middle Ground", unfortunately for him it gets cut short by {{spoiler|Brother Mouzone and Omar showing up}}.
* [[Villains Out
* [[Villain with Good
* [[Vomiting Cop]]:
** McNulty in Season One, when he listens to {{spoiler|the tape of Kima getting shot}}. Slightly different from most examples in that he's not even at the scene, and when it actually happened he kept his cool. It's only in reliving the experience when he loses it.
** In Season Two, it looks like Beadie's about to throw up after the discovers the 13 dead girls in a shipping container, but she keeps it together. Not bad for a woman whose main work experience up to that point was taking tolls, and a hint that she's a lot tougher than she looks.
* [[Watering
* [[We Will Not Use Photoshop in the
* [[Wham!
* [[What Have I
* [[What Measure Is a Mook?]]: Averted. Nearly every one of the street thugs has a backstory and character development, and the deaths of even minor mooks are given dramatic weight.
* [[What the Hell, Hero?]]: Bunk on the night after Jimmy's [[Jumping Off the Slippery
* [[Where Are They Now?
* [[Where Were You Last Night?]]: In Season 5, McNulty has such a scene with his lady, who knows he's cheating.
* [[White Gang-
** The hoppers in white neighborhoods are generally portrayed as posturing wanna-bes. Herc visits Kima just to joke about how incompetent they are and suggests there should be Affirmative Action for white gangbangers. Herc and Nick Sobotka both deliver a "You know you're white, right?" line to a white gangbanger.
** White Mike is a mid-level dealer who seems to have a better grasp of the game. Given his nickname, he apparently associates with black gangs.
* [[Window
* [[Worthy
* [[Wretched
{{quote|'''Rawls:''' If we were the size of New York, we'd be clocking over ''four-thousand'' murders at this pace.}}
* [[You Are Too
* [[You Bastard]]: David Simon is very clear that everyone is responsible to some degree for the problems depicted in the show. [http://www.hbo.com/the-wire#/the-wire/inside/interviews/article/finale-letter-from-david-simon.html His finale letter basically tells his fans to get up and do something about it.]
* [[You Have Outlived Your
* [[Young
* [[Zipping Up the
----
<small>It's all in the game.</small>
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Police Procedural]]
[[Category:Live-Action TV of the
[[Category:American
[[Category:Crime and Punishment
[[Category:HBO]]
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