I’ve sat on this review for a few weeks now to try to get past the reaction I had every week the show aired, most especially after the season finale: “The Wire, it ain’t.” The problem is that I still feel that way and I don’t think it’s just that Treme was not The Wire, but rather that the series had some major flaws.
There was the excessive sentimentality, the terribly slow pacing, and the weak story lines—traits that were only accentuated by drawn out pedantic musical interludes that felt less like sonic celebrations, more like the painful hours of my fifth grade teacher forcing us to listen to Mozart. (The exclusion of hip hop other than a couple of Mystikal moments was emblematic here, not that I have any love for those No Limit kids.) The acting was fine, though most of characters read as types, with the exception of Clarke Peters' memorable portrayal of Big Chief.
