Wire season 5, episode 4 (major spoiler alerts)

First, what I didn't like about the episode: the Baltimore Sun stuff, so far, isn't the greatest. I don't mind it -- I remember feeling that way about the dockworkers plot at the this point in Season 2 and I ended up liking it a lot, so I'm patient. But I thought that the editor's reprimand of Gus for his profanity was over-the-top cartoonish. And Templeton's still an annoyingly one-dimensional character. But I did love the scene where the reporters try to come up with a better word than "incensed."

Aside from that, I thought this episode was pretty damn riveting, and it really brought home to me what I've heard David Simon say in interviews, that a lot of what the show is about is a critique of contemporary capitalism (poignantly timely these days). Prop Joe versus Marlo really underscores it nicely. Prop Joe and his co-op seem to represent the way that the American economy was conducted up through the '70s or so. There were big oligopolistic industries who were more interested in preservation of the status quo than cutthroat competition. Unions organized a big portion of workplaces, they got cut in on the deal, and no one really wanted to upset the apple cart too much. They all had a stake in it.

Then along come people like Marlo -- people who want more than these cooperative arrangements would otherwise get them. By trying to take down the competition, of course, they run the risk that they could someday get killed, too, a greater risk than the older, stodgy, cooperative Galbraithian parties used to run. But they're willing to go for it, nonetheless. So Marlo has to to kill Prop Joe, one of the more affecting scenes I've seen in television in a long time.

The other plot developments were interesting. I'm worried that Jimmy and Lester are headed for a fall, big-time (that and Marlo's ascendency would really cap off the pessimism of the series). If Jay keeps pissing off Bunk, who knows, maybe he'll get involved and get caught, too. With Beatrice finally ready to kick Jimmy out, he runs the risk of a loveless, jobless existence. Kima's maternal instinct got stroked, but didn't her girlfriend end up with someone else? And how many years has it been? That kid looks about four; it feels like he was born pretty recently. It was also amusing to see Herc in the office with Marlo.