Originally posted by Blick Winkel
I'd say Lost has The Wire beat, personally.
I respectfully disagree to the nth level.
Where do you find Lost to be superior to the Wire? I agree that Lost was very entertaining. However, once you got into the Wire, it was like a damn well-written novel that you couldn't put down.
It's a tragedy that reaches Shakespearean heights in the third and fourth seasons. The show is even taught at certain colleges due to the number of themes found in the sitcom. And the acting was phenomenal.
You type in the "best TV show of the decade" and almost all of them will have The Wire either at #1 or very close to it.
Major Lost spoilers:
Well they're two very different kinds of shows that will appeal to different tastes and don't make for an immediately easy comparison; while I would perhaps agree that The Wire is possessive of a greater level of acting, writing, and directing, Lost is inarguably the more groundbreaking and differentiated piece of television. Where The Wire, while remarkably executed, tells the story of a rather typical realistic crime drama/mystery, Lost is otherwordly in its originality and tells a story unlike anything we've ever seen before.
From its setting of a mysterious tropical island filled with smoke monsters, polar bears, mysterious hatches, the numbers, where pregnant women mysteriously die and people miraculously heal, to its characters from the lottery winning Hurley who after such a singular moment of good luck is faced with nothing but bad luck, to the cripple John Locke who crashes on the island and regains the ability to walk, to in Sawyer a man consumed by a quest of revenge that in the process becomes the man he's after and goes to take on his name, every single element of the show was faced with an abundance of originality.
The show's format of an episode-by-episode exploration of both the present time on the island and a seperate time away from the island, and the manner with which it told a single character story through both timelines while incorporating the underlying theme of the show of redemption into the development of the character in the single episode was so innovative and effective that it's likely numerous shows would have followed the same format since if it wasn't so strongly identifiable with Lost. It benefited the ensemble cast of characters incredibly, providing a forced collective emphasis that in other shows may have been ignored and forgotten, and provides what is quite simply the greatest collective character development in television history. It incorporated the primary theme of the show in an incredibly prevalent manner, where it was literally reflected in every single episode. And where it started by simply focusing on the past, the format allowed the writers to switch it up throughout the show's run, from the past to the future to alternate timelines and even the afterlife, allowing them to deceive and trick the viewer, with one particular incident in the season three finale which is probably going down as the single greatest plot twist and one of the finest single episodes of a TV show ever, where we're lead to believe that we're witnessing a flashback as we view the on-island story where the question remains as to whether they'll ever leave the island, only for it to soon be revealed that we're witnessing a flashforward and that they did indeed at some point leave the island.
Beyond its sheer originality the show was incredibly compelling and had a huge emphasis on both drama and mystery, notorious in the latter catagory, with subject matter that explores science/magic/psychology/philosophy which has great comprehensive appeal; the characters and their backstories were incredibly dark and complex, the show detailed a very thorough and complex mythology, and the journey that the characters took, while being incredibly outlandish, was also an incredibly meaningful and poetic journey of friendship and communion.
As I said, in general execution, The Wire is arguably the better show. In even that however, I would say that single acting performances in Lost, such as Terry O'Quinn's potrayal of John Locke and The Smoke Monster, or Michael Emerson's incredible depiction of Benjamin Linus, or even some incredibly powerful performances from some of the supporting cast such as Alan Dale's Charles Widmore, John Terry's Christian Shephard, and Kevin Tighe as Anthony Copper, surpassed those seen in The Wire. I feel that Lost's music was a lot better; both its original compositions (I believe this is all that needs to be linked to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5ETlShWQ_g) and its use of preexisting music (Cass Elliot's Make Your Own Kind of Music a great example), and how they were used to add to the power and drama of the show. Lost also had more in the ways of special and visual effects to create grand and powerful imagery. I also found some of Lost's dialogue to be more memorable and quote worthy, from "If we don't learn to live together, we're going to die alone" to Locke's "Don't tell me what I can't do!".
Lost to me was ultimately the more profound, emotional, memorable, mind boggling and original TV show.
Originally posted by Blick Winkel
Major Lost spoilers:Well they're two very different kinds of shows that will appeal to different tastes and don't make for an immediately easy comparison; while I would perhaps agree that The Wire is possessive of a greater level of acting, writing, and directing, Lost is inarguably the more groundbreaking and differentiated piece of television. Where The Wire, while remarkably executed, tells the story of a rather typical realistic crime drama/mystery, Lost is otherwordly in its originality and tells a story unlike anything we've ever seen before.
From its setting of a mysterious tropical island filled with smoke monsters, polar bears, mysterious hatches, the numbers, where pregnant women mysteriously die and people miraculously heal, to its characters from the lottery winning Hurley who after such a singular moment of good luck is faced with nothing but bad luck, to the cripple John Locke who crashes on the island and regains the ability to walk, to in Sawyer a man consumed by a quest of revenge that in the process becomes the man he's after and goes to take on his name, every single element of the show was faced with an abundance of originality.
The show's format of an episode-by-episode exploration of both the present time on the island and a seperate time away from the island, and the manner with which it told a single character story through both timelines while incorporating the underlying theme of the show of redemption into the development of the character in the single episode was so innovative and effective that it's likely numerous shows would have followed the same format since if it wasn't so strongly identifiable with Lost. It benefited the ensemble cast of characters incredibly, providing a forced collective emphasis that in other shows may have been ignored and forgotten, and provides what is quite simply the greatest collective character development in television history. It incorporated the primary theme of the show in an incredibly prevalent manner, where it was literally reflected in every single episode. And where it started by simply focusing on the past, the format allowed the writers to switch it up throughout the show's run, from the past to the future to alternate timelines and even the afterlife, allowing them to deceive and trick the viewer, with one particular incident in the season three finale which is probably going down as the single greatest plot twist and one of the finest single episodes of a TV show ever, where we're lead to believe that we're witnessing a flashback as we view the on-island story where the question remains as to whether they'll ever leave the island, only for it to soon be revealed that we're witnessing a flashforward and that they did indeed at some point leave the island.
Beyond its sheer originality the show was incredibly compelling and had a huge emphasis on both drama and mystery, notorious in the latter catagory, with subject matter that explores science/magic/psychology/philosophy which has great comprehensive appeal; the characters and their backstories were incredibly dark and complex, the show detailed a very thorough and complex mythology, and the journey that the characters took, while being incredibly outlandish, was also an incredibly meaningful and poetic journey of friendship and communion.
As I said, in general execution, The Wire is arguably the better show. In even that however, I would say that single acting performances in Lost, such as Terry O'Quinn's potrayal of John Locke and The Smoke Monster, or Michael Emerson's incredible depiction of Benjamin Linus, or even some incredibly powerful performances from some of the supporting cast such as Alan Dale's Charles Widmore, John Terry's Christian Shephard, and Kevin Tighe as Anthony Copper, surpassed those seen in The Wire. I feel that Lost's music was a lot better; both its original compositions (I believe this is all that needs to be linked to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5ETlShWQ_g) and its use of preexisting music (Cass Elliot's Make Your Own Kind of Music a great example), and how they were used to add to the power and drama of the show. Lost also had more in the ways of special and visual effects to create grand and powerful imagery. I also found some of Lost's dialogue to be more memorable and quote worthy, from "If we don't learn to live together, we're going to die alone" to Locke's "Don't tell me what I can't do!".
Lost to me was ultimately the more profound, emotional, memorable, mind boggling and original TV show.
Hmm, this is a nice analysis. I agree that Lost was a brilliant show. I disagree on a few points, however:
1. "rather typical realistic crime drama/mystery."
I don't find it to be simply a "typical realistic crime drama/mystery" whatsoever. The show delves into the illegal drug trade, the seaport system, politics and the city government, and the media. The crime and drug trade form a general foundation for the show, but The Wire moves far beyond that.
David Simon, the creator, stated: "[The Wire] is really about the American city, and about how we live together. It's about how institutions have an effect on individuals. Whether one is a cop, a longshoreman, a drug dealer, a politician, a judge or a lawyer, all are ultimately compromised and must contend with whatever institution they are committed to."
What made this sitcom brilliant was how all of those individuals and variant facets of Baltimore connected together.
2. The Wire was "groundbreaking" for its off-the-charts amount of realism- everything about it was 'raw', and you never felt any Hollywood-esque elements present. The story wasn't episodic, but rather was one great novel visualized on screen.
3. The characters, and the acting of those characters, were easily as compelling if not more engrossing than those in Lost.
Omar Little, Bunk, Bubbles, McNulty, Lester Freamon, Prez, Slim Charles, the list goes on and on.
4. The Wire doesn't have an score. That's what adds to its realism. It employs sources cues occasionally.
5. Both shows are masterpieces of American television. You selected a show worthy of its praise, and didn't say something like, "American Idol is zOMG teh winz! Wire iz boring!!!!!11111"
I do agree that it was a great show, my tastes are just tailored more to stuff like Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Carnivàle, The Prisoner etc. but I do also appreciate stuff like The Wire and The Sopranos and see their obvious quality. In movie terms, I'd draw a similar comparison between the Godfather or Citizen Kane and Memento or The Prestige, where on the one hand you have these incredibly well directed films of great acting and writing that explore very "human" themes in a realistic setting, whereas on the other hand you have these immensely fantastical and differentiated works that can at times be near mind boggling to comprehend; I'm a bigger fan of the latter two but I still recognise the clear quality and appeal of the former.
I just have to ask though:
sitcom
🤨
Originally posted by Blick Winkel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5ETlShWQ_g
Actually replace that with this:
Originally posted by Blick Winkel
I do agree that it was a great show, my tastes are just tailored more to stuff like Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Carnivàle, The Prisoner etc. but I do also appreciate stuff like The Wire and The Sopranos and see their obvious quality. In movie terms, I'd draw a similar comparison between the Godfather or Citizen Kane and Memento or The Prestige, where on the one hand you have these incredibly well directed films of great acting and writing that explore very "human" themes in a realistic setting, whereas on the other hand you have these immensely fantastical and differentiated works that can at times be near mind boggling to comprehend; I'm a bigger fan of the latter two but I still recognise the clear quality and appeal of the former.I just have to ask though:
🤨
Agreed, I love fantasy/science fiction (LOTR, Star Wars, all of the Nolan films) way more than drama, but The Wire was great enough to still draw me in.
And lol, I didn't want to repeat "show" so I just threw that in there. Yeah....failed wording, my bad. 😕