Five seasons, five institutions, one city. Plus The Corner, the miniseries David Simon made in Baltimore first.
Season one, episode one, and keep going. There is no shortcut and the show knows you want one: it is famously slow to start, and the common advice is to give it until the fourth or fifth episode before deciding. Do not start with a later season, whatever anybody tells you about season four being the best one. It is, and it only works because of the three before it. The Corner is not required and is not a prequel; it is the same writers doing the same city as documentary drama, and it is worth watching afterwards.
Seen some of these already? Tap the circles to tick them off. The full list below fills in as you go.
Thirteen episodes. A detail is put together to make a case nobody upstairs wants made. It takes four or five before the shape of it lands, and that is normal.
Twelve episodes on the docks, with a largely new cast. The season people most often want to skip, and the one that turns the show from a cop drama into what it actually is.
Thirteen episodes in the schools, and the one most people name as the best television ever made. Watch season three first anyway; this is here to tell you what you are building towards.
Six episodes from 2000, made by the same people about the same place. Not a prequel and not required, but it is where all of this came from.
A suggested way in, not an official one. The full list is below: tick anything off in either place.
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