It really takes a second or third viewing of season five to catch just how many dumb tiny cameos there are.
The strawberry floating
florist for crying out loud!
It really is striking how the show went from something as good as season four to something as lacklustre amd shallow as season five.
This third (?) viewing of the whole thing has given me a greater appreciation of the first season, strangely. I do wonder whether the shine will eventually wear off The Wire as time goes on, whether it'll hold up both as the exemplary standard of high quality television, or whether it simply becomes a go-to relic to remember the 2000s.
Because of the sheer volume of top, hyped TV shows from the past few years it feels like there's no longer enough time to watch whole series more than once, and watching the finale montage made me ponder whether I'll actually ever watch The Wire again.
4>1>2>3>5
EDIT - Oh yeah, Steve Earle's version of Way Down In The Hole is so bad I must have originally blocked it from my memory.