Knew Omar was going to die walking around like that. Sigh. And we didn't even get a Omar/Chris face off. Really wanted him to kill Chris and Snoop.

Is there a Slim Chareles write-up?

I think he is becoming one of my favorite characters

I kinda like the serial killer plot so far. Love the scenes between mcnulty and the lying reporter, as well as FBIs description of the serial killer.
I really hope bubs gets a happy ending. Maybe a job on the Sun.
I'm thinking Chris won't survive to answer for his murders.
Also, good seing old faces from past seasons.

Slim charles is really elite

wee bey > slim charles

You keep fighting on that lie

same. One character that i didn't see an analysis for, who i think deserves at least a short one, is rawls.

Thought they did a pretty good job with a character who could easily have turned into a cliche.

fav. rawls moment is his reaction when he finds out about hamsterdam.

Pretty much any Rawls moment is gold. Think my favourites are his comstat ownage in 3.

Insecure seems like a good descripition. Cares more about Omar calling him out and others perceiving him as not accepting a challenge than the potential end to his organization, Chris (and possibly himself) getting life in prison etc.

I disagree. I think he realizes that, on the streets, perception is reality. That his image is all that keeps his rivals at bay. When he thought barksdale was weak he attacked and if his rivals or underlings smell weakness (by letting Omar call him out, and having his name in the streets) he no longer has the power necessary to wear the crown. Marlo is not more concerned with his name than the end of his organization, he relates his name being out there like this with the end of his organzarion, Omar knows this and it's the last example of how well he understands the street. He may be overcome with vengence but he knows Marlo will not stand for his name to be out there like that and is faking weakness knowing that marlo will show his face. Which is why Chris knows decides not to tell him and why monk and snoop are never really on board with that plan, they see the game the way Marlo does.

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Watching the series finale atm.
The serial killer plot end reminds me of the ending of watchmen.

-I came when mcnulty told scott he was full of ****.
-Almost cried during the mcnulty wake.
-Whoa, Cheese's death was awesome. I almost think slim charles is cooler than wee bey now. Almost.

I think marlo is supposed to be a perfect sociopath, and therefore a perfect human representation of "the game".

I don't buy that he is at all concerned with others' perception of him, either in terms of personal insecurity or how it could eventually effect his business. Yes, i know he makes a few half-hearted justifications along those lines for some of his hits, but this can just as easily be after the fact rationalization for violence/killing for its own sake. If you were a psycho who had his own druig syndicate, and you wanted an excuse to kill people for no reason at all, what would you use? "he was talking trash on me" or something like that.

Prior to the final episode, i think you can make an argument for marlo the pragmatist (albeit marlo the pragmatist with a disturbing lack of affect), who is aggressively managing his image because having a strong rep makes it easier to do business and stops people form screwing with him, but the last episode leaves no doubt as to what he is really about.

nothing pragmatic about what he did to that security guard. That was straight evil.

he talked back

Could you elaborate on this?

In the final episode he has his millions and is all set up to go legit with the real estate business, but chooses to turn away from them and return to the corner. That to me implies that he doesn't understand the legitimate world and is scared of it. What he does understand is the street and bullying hoppers.

I think he does care about his image and status in the eyes of others, even people like the security guard, who someone like stringer bell wouldn't have even noticed.

It's all a game to him, those leeches that he loves so well sucked all the passions out
of him years ago.

At the end, he is all set up and has his millions, but i interpret his final scene differently than you do.

I guess you're taking it to mean he's like barksdale --he's unwilling to give up the drug territory he fought so hard for to become a legit business man and the scene on the corner is step one in him getting back to his drug dealing roots and reclaiming his empire.

But this doesn't really make sense. He's not going to get his drug empire back, or even start to get it back, by beating up some random on a corner somewhere out of the blue.

My interpretation is a lot more simple. He's just a psycho. He's going out to the corner to beat the hell out of some randoms because he wants to hurt/maim/kill someone.

Up until that last point, there is some room for interpretation -- marlo could be committing all this violence and murder as a matter of rational, if unprincipled, self interest (for all the reasons discussed before)

But his actions is the final scene are contrary to his self interest in every way. With all his reasons to kill/hurt people gone, he does so anyway.

just finished the show. Im really let down by Omar's cheap death and Dukie's ****ty end while douche namond got it good. At least its nice to see the boy taking over Omar's important job.

Wow, you have a crappy way of looking at things. Namond was a child with no direction and no good role model. The whole point of his arc is to show that it's not the children, and in a lot of ways it therefore isn't the adults that are to blame, but systemic issues in our society which cause kids to grow up this way. But all Namond needed was someone to challenge him and have positive expectations.

Dukie's arc was similar to start, a child of a broken home. Unfortunately for him, his arc had to end the way it did to show how overburdened the school systems are, and that even when you have a teacher who truly cares, there's always the next wave of kids who have their own problems. Prez couldn't adopt them all, and so to be able to make any sort of positive impact, he had to let Dukie slip threw the cracks.

As for Omar's death... I'm not sure how else you want his story to end. I thought it was perfect. If he died in a shootout, it would have been meh. We already saw him try to leave the life behind-- that's not an option. Also it ushered in the next generation on the streets. Now that little bastard (I always forget his name) has a name on the streets.

I didnt say that it was a bad choice i just said it let me down. Omar and Bell are fan favorites and most of us wanted a non-realistic death for them. I was commenting purely on entertainment value.

I thought the shocking, yet anti-climatic death of Omar was the most entertaining. There was the shock factor, but when that wore off, there was so much to think about. I guess I understand where you're coming from, I just was personally completely satisfied by Omar's arc.

I didnt realize that it was the same small kid. After i did it felt a little bit better. Omar was almost real for me. Never been invested that much into a TV character.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1dnq...&feature=share

Ah, yeah, Kenard doing the killing is pretty important. Not only because who he was, but who he wasn't to many of the characters. In the press and to the police it was just some random corner kid. It's a completely different narrative in the two nearly separate worlds. It's almost illustrative of how a Marlo or an Avon can seemingly pop up out of nowhere, as far as the police are concerned.

Randy Wagstaff is another great example of this. The system ****ed him up. He was no longer the smiling kid he often was in season 4. In season 5, his brief appearance, he blows off Bunk and pushes a smaller kid down to the stairs. Showing everyone in the home he isn't a snitch.

I agree. His character was larger than life the entire series, but even he went down easy by a nobody and wound up just another body in the morgue. The mixed up name tags was the icing on the cake. It was a perfect statement on how fragile life is and how and the glorification of urban violence is just an awful cycle.

They could have had him go out in a blaze of glory with lots of drama versus some arch-rival, the standard Hollywood style cliche hero death. But that's not how things tend to go IRL and kudos the the writers for recognizing that. Why should Omar be afforded a noble end any more than any other character, minor or otherwise? As it was he ran pretty hot for a long time.