Ok so we had a lot of articles to read for this week, and my computer wouldn't let me open a couple of them...so today I'm going to start off by talking about the McCabe article for the most part, and briefly touch base on the Sharma article. The Sharma article was a little confusing---at least for me. From what I understand, the beginning of this article was a conversation between "thugs" who were critiquing and watching the Wire, and voicing their opionion to whoever was writing this article? In that case, I don't think they believe that The Wire was a true depiction of what the ghetto is and how it is represented. One thing that stuck out to me when reading this article was when Sharma says that "Part of the enjoyment of the series is the requirement to sustain an unfaltering drive to grasp the various interweaving plot-lines and social issues being presented" (Sharma 3). Right away in my mind, I thought immediately to Lost. I will admit, I haven't gotten a chance to watch The Wire yet for class, but I plan on it in the next day or 2, but Lost has the same characteristics of interweaving plot-lines. It made me think, if The Wire's producer wanted to make it similar to Lost? Wanted viewers to be so entangled in the show, that it's something you can just watch lightly and you have to take each episode seriously so it hooks you for more episodes to come.
With that being said about the Sharma article, I want to talk more about the HBO article because I find it very interesting on how they keep talking up so much when it comes to how great HBO is compared to regular tv shows. I will say this, HBO has made phenomenal shows, and miniseries, that I have been fortunate to watch----anytime I go home to my parents house in Indy, because my poor college ass can't afford to pay for the premium channels, like HBO and Showtime. Which is weird because in the article, they were talking about how HBO has become so popular to watch if you're a college student...well, every college student that I know does not have a subscription service to watch shows on them. I think that HBO will lose the abililty to have to charge people in order to use their channel and watch programs because there are 1. so many ways to get around watching these shows online for free, and 2. network/cable television is really stepping it up with their shows and dramas that they have tough competition. The only time I ever was so anxious to want HBO subscribed to my house here at IU, was so that I can watch the miniseries "The Pacific" last year. I love movies and anything on WWII so I was really bummed I couldn't watch it. Luckily, my parents have U-Verse in Indy so they were able to tape the series for me for when I went home on weekends/breaks. Most shows now that were once on HBO are now on regular network stations. For example, I watch Curb Your Enthusiasm and Sex and the City all the time, but never did I once watch it when they played on HBO. HBO isn't a bad thing to have, because I will agree with McCabe when he stated at the very end of the article that "It is still HBO, but television has caught up" (McCabe 92). I completely agree, and I also agree with him when he said that HBO set the bar for network shows to have better programming and drama series.
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