So, I finish up with The Wire the other night and whilst flipping through the HBO-Go app on my trusty Xbox I spied the prison drama Oz.

I hear/read great things, it was HBO's first episodic dramatic show and I decide to give it a whirl.

Well...I like it a lot, the characters are great, acting is alright, some good violence and the story seems to be pretty good. I finished up Season 1 the other night (I'm on S2 -Ep 3) and, while I enjoy the show, it's fucking dumb in some ways.

So "Em City" is supposed to some experimental take on incarceration, a fishbowl, camera's everywhere, no privacy, guards all over, not one place you can hide...they have room with windows that the guards can see into! This should be easy, right? Eyes everywhere, no where to hide, no where to get away, all this shit is on lock down crazy tight, yo!

But in just the first episode you come to find out that.....
-There are about 1 or 2 guards in the whole prison
-There are no camera's
-You can brand someone's ass and fuck them/torture them/terrorize them and no one will see it.
-You can have a boat load of drugs brought in because apparently no one is checking anything.
-You can sit out in the open, or in a corner by the stairs or a classroom, and snort heroine, smoke pot in your room 15 feet from the guard station.
-The mafia guy can get special food sneaked in from the kitchen and eat it with no guards seeing anything or saying anything.
-There are crooked guards who let prisoners kill other prisoners and meet other prisoners in supposedly locked down areas.
-Apparently no one does any background checks on the guards and lets them come into Em City without any signed transfers or whatever...that guard (West Baltimore!) gives a gun to prisoner in the laundry room.
-A prisoner gets lit on fire while in solitary confinement, guard lets guy in to dump lighter fluid on him (Where did that come from?) and drop the match. The big meeting to find out who dunnit sees everyone trying to find the prisoner who did the killing, one person states that a guard had to let the murderer in to kill said greaseball...his thought is dismissed.
-Apparently, prisoners can go wherever they want and do whatever they want.
-Even when evidence of a riot is brought forth there is no additional guards (still only 2) brought in or security provided. And of course there is the guard station which controls all doors, lights, alarms, cameras is right in the middle of the prison with no protection around it. The other guard stations have glass (not shatter proof or anything) and they don't have door locks either.
-A riot composed of 40 or so prisoners is enough to take Em City over. I guess when you only have 2 guards on duty it should be easy.
-Guards can/will torture and beat the shit out of any and all prisoners whenever they feel like it, out in the open, in front of the warden, the Nun, McManus and even Charles S. Dutton during his investigation into the riot...no one bats an eye and then have the gal to ask why the prisoners are pissed and do whacky shit. Even McManus sees it, condones it, sure he pushes for suspensions at one point but come on!

I still like the show, a love the characters and their interactions and the story itself seems really good.

But DAMN, is the whole Em City setting fucking dumb as all hell. I shouldn't have to suspend disbelief in a show about prison.


McMannus - "Man, these prisoners are getting out of hand, no following instructions and fighting back! If only we could get down to the heart of the matter!"

2 Seconds later McMannus watches and ignores the guards beating the living shit out of someone with a night club and then throwing them, naked, into a dimly lit room with only a pot to piss and shit in.

Em City and Oswald Penitentiary and all the staff are like Carl's mom from the Walking Dead. Or it's like the Breakfast Club but in prison.

It was a pretty good series overall...

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@audioidkid

Like I said, I like it....but it's pretty dumb in some areas, dumb enough to take it down a few notches.

I do loving seeing the beginnings of the "HBO Series Recycled Actors Club."

Tony Soprano's wife
Avon Barksdale
Commissioner Burrell.

Even Law and Order: SVU star Christopher Meloni is in it!
And Schillinger also appears in Law and Order as well, B.D. Wang...I mean Wong is also the priest!

Crazy stuff.

Honestly, if you think season one is free and easy with the boundaries of believability, just wait.

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I don't remember half the time if I'm hiding or I'm lost

"Everyone is on drugs in the prisoner population! What do we do about it!"

Apparently you're not supposed to check the guards, monitor anything coming in very closely, no guards in the kitchen, no cameras and while the Warden is saying all of that you have multiple prisoners snorting dope and smoking weed in plain sight.

And the prisoners are just murdering each other left and right but no one anywhere sees anything ever.

Jesus H. Christ.

I recall towards the end the prisoners put on a staging of MacBeth, directed by one of the prisoners's [the Mayhem Guy from the Allstate commercials] Mom.

I can't make this stuff up!

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I don't remember half the time if I'm hiding or I'm lost

One of the best shows ever. Yeah it does some weird shit but if you think season one is a trip wait until the last two.

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

I caught a handful of episodes..too over the top and unrealistic for me gave up on it....Wait til you see the drop ceilings in prison ....The wire is one of the best shows all time maybe the best.

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I totally agree with your thoughts concerning The Wire. Great show, maybe my favorite of all time. I have never been that satisfied by a T.V. or any form of entertainment (Sex excluded) in my life. I thought the final episode was also one hell of a way to wrap everything up.

I will give Oz some more time but the whole premise of Em City and all is really bothering me. Again, it's like Carl's mom from Walking Dead..."You can't ever leave us alone, ever again! What is wrong with you!? You're a horrible person!" and then she gets in a car, with no map, leaves Carl alone, almost dies, loses a car and sees nothing wrong with it.

I mean, Double U Tee Eff.

Carl's mom is the worse than all of the zombies put together. If there never was a zombie attack she still probably would have gotten her family nearly killed several times over.

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I watched the whole series (of Oz) a couple of years ago and it's one of the few shows that really drew me in. I thought most of the characters and storylines were compelling. It also frequently scared the hell out of me and to quote Darkside is often "too penis flappy."

I'm halfway through season two of The Wire and this might be the best show I've ever seen. Man, Ziggy is annoying as hell and one tremendous fuck up. His character must either end up, though sheer dumb luck, smelling like a rose or else he meets a pretty gruesome end.

And yeah, the guys who were in Oz are all over the place. Although I haven't really seen Kirk Acevedo (who played Miquel Alvarez) in much. There's also a prison guard (can't remember which season(s)) who kinda looks like Mike North.

The Wire is good. Last season was a notch below. McNulty making up a serial killer was a stretch and Omar becoming a Marvel comic book hero was a tad unbelievable. First 3 seasons are great. I always preferred the Barksdale crew to Marlo's.

Oz is good entertainment. Kind of like 24. It's unreal but it's ridiculousness makes it amusing. It is very penis-y. The worst shit doesn't happen until the later seasons with the two white suburban douchebags who become prison bitches and the one guy who gets "spooned."

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Back off, Warchild. Seriously.