In looking for a TV series to tide me over until Deadwood and The Sopranos are back with new episodes, I discovered another intelligently written, finely acted, well produced drama from HBO. The Wire is a crime drama that makes you sit up and pay attention. Close attention.
Set in Baltimore, the story centers on a detective squad that’s assembled Dirty Dozen-style from department rejects and screw-ups. Dumped in a windowless basement office, the unit is tasked with bringing down a drug dealing empire in the projects. Unraveling the drug hierarchy, tracing where the money goes, and battling their own bureaucracy is all part of the dance.
From the creator of Homicide: Life on the Street (a TV series I still miss,) The Wire has so much going on in each episode, an hour feels like two–but in a good way. Nothing is wasted. Storylines are complicated and interconnected, characters are fully fleshed out and the dialog pops. [*****]
2 Things @ Once 
Thanks for the tip — I’ve added it to my Netflix queue. I hadn’t heard of it before.