The Wire: Storm Warnings   Rewatch 
September 11, 2014 1:02 PM - Season 2, Episode 10 - Subscribe

Ziggy continues to wreak havoc but this time his unchecked impulsiveness takes him over the line and into a lot of trouble. Trouble that spreads and pools and spatters on everyone. – Valchek is pissed and brings in the Feds to assist the Detail. The Feds assist the Detail, and Valchek is pissed. – Just as Stringer's off-brand plan goes into effect, Brother Mouzone arrives to enforce the status quo and so Bodie and crew begin to understand the nature of the new arrangements.

"It pays to go with the union card every time." - Ziggy

Bonus link: Frank Matthews on Wikipedia.
posted by carsonb (4 comments total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
Wow that Wikipedia article is pretty horrible, sorry. But it has some good links down at the bottom:

Via the Frank Matthews Story bio-doc Facebook page:

Rise of Black Gangsters -Dr. Carl Taylor - In the late 1960's, African American gangsters began to assert their independence from their traditional bosses- La Cosa Nostra.

Butchie mentioning 'Pee Wee' Matthews in this episode puts extra weight behind Brianna's insistence about what her family/organization went through to establish their business at the Westside Projects in Philly. At some point they all had to get out from under the thumb of the Mafia, no mean feat.

Jesus Christ, Ziggy.

It seems to me that if The Wire draws parallels between the criminal and the police—and it does, intentionally or not—the one in this episode is complicated and fascinating: Ziggy kills his father's (and own) smuggling associate and Prez cold clocks his father-in-law and senior commanding officer Stan Valchek. For the people in the room it is utterly devastating, but for the organizations above and beyond the 'street' players it's just a matter of closing up shop and moving to the next thing. The Greek shuts down and begins to devise an exit strategy from Baltimore. BPD will surely shutter The Detail and move on quickly since big players there have aspirations to Maryland state politics. The ships keep coming.

Kima and Beadie's conversations about dealing with family and work sort of fly under the radar of this episode, but it's nice to see someone other than McNulty flubbing their love life.
posted by carsonb at 1:47 PM on September 11, 2014


Mouzone is one of my favorite characters. This is partly because I am also a big fan of Harper's, and also because he seems just slightly more plausible than Omar.
posted by box at 8:37 PM on September 11, 2014


Oh Ziggy. Devestating scene, and I really just didn't expect it all first time through. Meanwhile Prez punching his father in law is very cathartic (he has the most understanding wife really. I think we actually meet her on one occasion sometime in season 4).

And here the detail are just slightly too slow. This will come again in the future, but its kind of devestating here. In a way, this season actually shows the Detail at their most effective. They will catch their original target, and quite a few ancillary people, and, at the very least, supress the Greek (although not for terribly long!) We'll see the consequences of this effectiveness later.

Muzone is a great character, and does feel somewhat more real than Omar, he's also pretty careful about when he possesses a firearm.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 4:34 AM on September 12, 2014 [2 favorites]


Mouzone feels less "real" to me than Omar, but is still a great, fun character, just one who feels like he was brought in from a different series. I enjoy Cheese having no idea what to make of him. Mouzone and Omar both work via intimidation through being living legends (as does Avon himself, really.) But since Omar is a known quantity at this point, while Mouzone is holding off the Eastsiders by sitting on a bench and reading, well... it's awesomely fun to watch, but it feels less plausible that none of the Eastsiders are taking a run at him, alone or en masse. I guess between Cheese's first meeting with him being out in public, and Prop Joe knowing Mouzone from past experience, word got around quick. Meanwhile, we've seen how Omar works and chooses his time and place. He's surviving "day at a time" but it's also because he's a patient and careful hunter. There's no way he'd survive hanging out around the towers calmly asking for his copy of Harper's.

Ziggy's scene, meanwhile, is brilliant and devastating, and seeing it coming this time through made all of the build-up time spent with Ziggy a lot more bearable, ironically. Double-G, like all of Ziggy's other associates, fails to understand the key point about Ziggy in that money is purely abstract to him, only meaningful as a measure of respect. Sepinwall notes the "malaka" insult as being the thing that sets Ziggy off, and I guess it's the last straw, but really Double-G misread him on what coming at him with $10,000 means. It doesn't mean a replacement for Princess or a hundred rounds for the house or ten ducks with diamond necklaces - it means that Double-G is one more person who sees Ziggy as a joke.
posted by Navelgazer at 9:44 AM on April 24, 2021


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