God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change

It appears that everyone has already condemned the media subplot. O ye of little faith! Has The Wire disappointed yet? Do you remember the start of Season 2? Did we not all come to love Ziggy, the Pollacks, and the Greeks?

That said I agree that the characters of that subplot have thus far only been one-dimensional. I do enjoy Gus and the other old-timers at The Sun being all professional and crusty at the same time. Let me also make the most obvious of observations: Gus is David Simon. He believes that everything needs a lot of "context." You can't tell just one part of the story. ("Johnny can't read 'cause Johnny ain't got a pencil.") And as Jason observed, you see several examples of how children are not getting the upbringing they deserve. By the way, though Michael did spare the escaping child I was reminded of his brutal beating of the Namond's little lieutenant who he suspects of stealing the stash.

I agree with helen that this is going to be a very dark season and we will not be uplifted. There was a mention of some character redeeming themselves in the New Yorker profile so there may be a silver lining in there somewhere. Sufficeth to say that there will be a lot of heartache before that. There are a lot of characters that are ripe for picking...

You know, regardless of the whether or not this season is living up to the sky-high expectations that we have, it is still the best written and acted show on TV. Many, many good lines in last night's episode:

• Snoop: "Niggas need to shut the fuck up."
• McNulty: "Pro forma. Latin for lawyers jacking each others off."
• Avon: "Up in this bitch, I am what you might consider an aut'ority figure."

I am really starting to hate Carcetti. He started off in Season 3 as an ambitious politician, seemed to have risen a bit in Season 4 (even turning down a post-victory romp with his campaign manager), and has reverted again to putting his ambition above everything else. His decision to turn down the Governor's $52 million (anyone else notice Robert Erlich's cameo in the last season?) has inexorably set into motion events that can only be mitigated by a Magnolia-like finale, complete with frogs raining from the sky. We see that his dissing of the Republican US Attorney also results in the Feds turning down Freeman and McNulty.

My favorite scenes from last night's episode were the two in prison. (Jessup?) In the first, the door opens and in a masterful bit of camera-work, instead of a wide shot showing the full body of the person entering we see just the face in tight close-up, which delays the recognition of the character just a millisecond. It is Avon! West Side, yo!!!! In the second scene in prison we see the bid'ness skills of Marlo. Sure, he is a stone-cold gangsta', not afraid to take by force what he wants but he also knows how to make his case. Witness how he convinces the "Russian" to take his message to the Greeks. Brilliant.

I wanted to write this before I leave for home today because otherwise I would be colored by knowing what happens in Episode 53. I am looking forward to the drive home!