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Buzzing Over The WireJeffrey Goldberg and David Plotz take readers' questions about HBO's hit urban drama.


Posted Thursday, March 6, 2008, at 4:59 PM ET

(Continued from page 5)

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The courthouse snitch: Has to be Rhonda.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Such a cynic, you.

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Southeast Washington: Let's not forget the best potential byproduct of the wire—"Hampsterdam." For all the nonsense, I think that could work in the U.S.

Jeffrey Goldberg: It didn't work so well on The Wire, though, if you'll recall. To the show's credit—and it is a show that is opposed to the Drug War—Hamsterdam wasn't prettified. It was a nasty place which trapped innocent people in its despair and perversity.

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Albany, N.Y.: The two of you have spent a lot of time questioning the "realism" of the Baltimore Sun plot. Why is perfect adherence to real life such an important factor in your enjoyment of the show? Isn't it possible that other institutions have been portrayed with just as much deviation from real life and you just did not notice? More importantly, is documentary-style realism the true goal of a series that is compared to Greek mythology, or is the verisimilitude just a well-executed artistic device?

David Plotz: I agree with that beef. I dislike the newspaper portrayal, but I am willing to grant Simon liberty to play around. I doubt his police department or drug gang is perfectly accurate either. The problem with the newspaper is less that it's an inaccurate portrait of a paper than that the characters are not very compelling. They are psychologically narrower than the characters in the others seasons/plots

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Vancouver, Canada: Am I the only one who thinks McNulty's deception is going to be covered up? Maybe he takes a fall inside the police department by being forced to resign (or sent back to the marine unit/evidence locker), but is Carcetti (or Rawls for that matter) really going to let the big drug bust go up in smoke? That would end his chances for Annapolis in a pinch. The only wild card is Levy, but Lester appears to be cooking something up on that end...

Jeffrey Goldberg: You sound like a very clever person.

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Washington Post: Have you read the blog "Stuff White People Like"? It fits you two exactly, from knowing what's good for poor people to not watching TV.

David Plotz: I love that Web site! Multilingual children! Pretending to like soccer!

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New York: Why didn't you tell me about The Wire? I just started watching it two weeks ago and am now finished with Season 3. I am now Bubbles, begging my neighbor for a Season 4 fix. Will not read the chat for fear of learning. Stupid HBO put Omar RIP on the Web site, and that was beat.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Yes, that was indeed beat.

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Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada: Jeffrey, you clearly came into this TV Club with an axe to grind against David Simon and his newspaper subplot. Are you normally this unobjective in your writing, or was it just because this was "only a TV show"? Regardless, I found it very amateurish, and it certainly doesn't make me want to read anything else you've written.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Axe to grind? I've called him a genius.
Some axe.

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David Plotz: Thanks for all the great questions, and have a wonderful Sunday night!

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Jeffrey Goldberg is a national correspondent for the Atlantic and the author of Prisoners: A Story of Friendship and Terror. David Plotz is Slate's deputy editor and author of The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank.
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