Used subtitles to watch The Wire? The writer says that's just criminal
So you thought the subtitles button was the best way to decipher the acclaimed US crime series? Wrong. You've turned genius into comedy, its writer tells Arifa Akbar
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Independent Minds
Detective William "Bunk" Moreland and Officer James "Jimmy" McNulty in The Wire, written by George Pelecanos
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Ever since drugs lord Stringer Bell picked up his burner and ordered a re-up for his corner hoppers, bemused Brits addicted to the Baltimore-based police drama The Wire have been reaching for the subtitles button to figure out what on earth is being said.
The series may have garnered critical recognition for its unflinching realism and searing dialogue, but the street argot spoken by its characters – most of whom are black American drug dealers and street-wise detectives – has left many viewers straining to make sense of the dialogue.
Now, one of the central writers of the show has lashed out at those who turn on the subtitles, rendering the show a "comedy" rather than the gritty, intelligent drama he intended it to be.
The seasoned detective fiction writer George Pelecanos, who has worked extensively on The Wire – which was originally an HBO series but is currently being shown on BBC2 – said those who watched with subtitles in order to comprehend every sentence spoken were missing the point entirely.
"We wrote it so audiences would have to work at it!" he said in an interview with The Independent.
"We were not going to compromise in making it immediately accessible for everyone.
"It [subtitling] kind of reminds me of scenes from that [1980 disaster film spoof] comedy, Airplane!, when two black guys speak, and subtitles appear on the screen."
Pelecanos, an American of Greek origin worked most intensively on the second of the five series programme which is based around longshoremen and the Greek mafia. He was brought aboard by the show's creator, David Simon.
When The Wire was first aired on BBC2 earlier this year, a flurry of middle-class commentators criticised the impenetrable dialogue and admitted seeking help.
The columnist India Knight wrote: "I have friends who have been addicted to The Wire for ages but I didn't see the point, despite having watched the pilot twice, because I could never understand what anyone was saying... Then someone lent me a box set and suggested I turn on the subtitles."
Ms Knight went on to effuse about the show, but added a note of caution: "I implore you to watch it... but please take my advice and turn on the subtitles – they make all the difference."
A Daily Mail critic, meanwhile, observed the "mumbled patois of the Baltimore dealers", adding: "Most people I know – and these are people in their mid 30s – prefer to watch The Wire with the subtitles switched on."
Even some of the characters have had difficulties with mastering the script. In the "extras" section of the show's box set, several actors admit to problems understanding the Baltimore drawl in some interviews.
JD Williams, the New York actor who plays a character, Bodie Broadus, who "runs a corner" (facilitates the open air drug market), said he found some of the phraseology confusing.
And the Eton-educated lead actor Dominic West, who plays the detective Jimmy McNulty, said in an interview earlier this year that his late father, who was alive for the first two years that The Wire aired, "couldn't handle the language" in the show, "so he didn't really watch it".
West added: "My mum managed five minutes. My wife has managed 10 minutes of episode one about five times and falls asleep."
The BBC, which began broadcasting the series at the end of March this year, makes subtitles available for viewers, but a spokeswoman said this was the case for every programme broadcast by the Corporation, in order to help deaf viewers.
The last episode of the final, fifth series will be broadcast on BBC2 later this week.
Baltimore talk Lost in translation?
*The hopper from Balmer carrying a burner
A child drug dealer from Baltimore is carrying a disposable mobile telephone used by drug dealers to stop the police monitoring their conversations.
*Crew up with corner boys for a re-up
An instruction to form a team of young men who can sell drugs on a street corner when a re-up, or a re-stock package from drugs wholesalers, arrives.
*The G pack
A wholesaler's package of 100 vials of cocaine
*He's a Yo
Police term for a corner boy.
*The civilian's carrying weight
An ordinary person who is neither a drug dealer nor an addict who has been served a custodial sentence.
*The Game
Life of a drug dealer in which the dealer accepts a distinct set of ethics in which even apparently minor transgressions may be punishable by death.
*There's been a humble
An arrest or search of a corner boy on flimsy or no evidence, intended merely to humiliate.
*Stash house
A heavily guarded property in which drugs are stored and cut.
*Those Red tops/blue tops/yellow tops are worth a lot of cheese
The colour-coded vials of cocaine (use to identify quality) are worth a lot of money.
*He's not a fiend, he's slinging
He's not a drug addict, he's selling drugs.
*Walk-around money
Petty cash used by corrupt politicians for the purposes of persuasion on election day.
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Comments
I am frankly surprised that the British public in general seem unable to follow the dialogue in "The Wire". The series itself I consider one of the finest I have ever watched on TV, & I still credit the show with having included, in one episode, one of the finest staged street gun-fights I have ever seen in entertainment. The only comparison I can make to it is the firefight sequence in Kubrick's "Dr.Strangelove", where US Marines are doing their best to dislodge the deranged Ripper from his headquarters. The sequence runs like a war-correspondent's footage, shaky, grainy, & utterly convincing. Likewise for the gunfight in "The Wire". Kids running around, discharging handguns haphazardly, hitting nothing in particular, with rounds flying everywhere, until one finds an accidental target in a child standing by a window. The sequence makes a telling social point, & the street-combat itself is light years away from the usual, implausibly glamourised, Wild-West inspired nonsense one usually encounters on film.
Admittedly I spent five years of my life in the USA, & lived in a neighbourhood not unlike that featured in "The Wire", so perhaps I have had an advantage in terms of acquaintanceship with American "Street Talk" - but on the other hand, I feel that much of this incomprehension springs from sheer indolence. People simply don't make the effort to listen. Brits are also apt to shorten names they are unfamiliar with, claiming they "can't pronounce" the name. Again, it's usually indolence. They resist getting their tongues around a name like "Devakrishna", preferring to opt for "Dave" or some such other nonsense. When will people get over this impulse to be spoon-fed at every turn? Subtitles for "The Wire"? - we have reached a new high in absurdity!
I remember Jurassic Park very well. I couldn't understand a word until Attenborough came on screen.
It was a pleasure for me to see the latest Harry Potter - I heard and understood every word from beginning to end.
No wonder so many British actors are popular in the States - I suspect even American audiences like clear diction.
Don't have a go at us Brits - try to improve the quality of your audio so we can get clear wording.
But as for The Wire - it is quite brilliant with or without sub-titles.
R
P.S. saharapage: if you want news don't read The Independent. For me The Indy is more a collection of daily articles - and I really hope you survive. Great newspaper - - and I would pay for your on-line content!!
Are you saying that you can understand the accents and slang of Baltimore street kids but cannot make out what Jeff Goldblum says?
A lot of films these days tend to have English people in supporting cast roles playing Americans (Black Hawk down was littered with them!) as for Harry Potter - all this film does is helps to reiterate the sterotype to American audiences that we Brits all speak with a plum in our mouths and are 'terribly well to do'. Even Little Harry who supposedly lived in a cupboard under the stairs through his formative years, still spoke with a public school boy accent. Thank God for Ron Weasley . . .
ALthough that quaint 1950's thing is quite attractive, is not the reality is it. it is nice to hear the English language delivered well but unless your making a period drama , then its seems a tad inappropriate in most films.
Hella Beauchamp
Watching The Wire is an intellectual challenge at first because of the slang the different accents and the different culture that it presents. If you have at least an ounce of brains and any kind of willingness to make some intellectual effort then you can 'get into it' after a couple of episodes. It is one of the best TV series I have ever seen and is totally compelling.
The example glossary provided at the end of this article makes me laugh. If you can't work out what a 'Stash house' is (without even seeing the programme) and you can't figure out that 'Walk-around money' is used by corrupt politicians for bribes - when you are watching them using it and talking about it - then you really should stick to reality tv and games shows; that would be your natural limit.
Exactly. I've lived in Baltimore nearly all of my life, but even that gives me no special insight to the slang used in The Wire. Yes, that's right - even us Baltimoreans have to contextual clues and logic to discern what the hell is being said in the show. Well, us non-drug dealings Baltimoreans at least. The show has a sprawling, complex storyline and an incredible attention to detail, all of which you will miss if you shut off your ears and fix your eyes to the bottom of the screen.
Look, I'm a thirtysomething white, middle-class female, and if I can get what's being discussed most of the time then you guys seriously need to pull your collective finger out. You'll get an ear for it quickly enough if you stop relying on your eyes.
I'm at a loss to figure out how deliberately making something incomprehensible is considered good writing.
What's the big deal about subtitles? I watch 'most everything that way; I'm not hard of hearing, I just find I enjoy it more that way.
Not all subtitles are good, though, and occasionally the results are hilarious. Try watching Gladiator with the English SDH subtitles on - you'll never be able take the movie seriously again!
For goodness sake don't turn subtitles on! It's far more effective without them and you can always tell what's happening anyway.
(Incidentally, before we get the comments of "Why are we talking about The Wire again?", it's because it's one of the best tv shows in the last 20 years. So just be quiet and watch it for yourselves. Without subtitles.)
I also Imagine these are the same people (Subtitle viewers) who couldn't handle Rab C Nessbit, trainspotting etc and thats only Scotland
Quite keen on Boston too - or should that be 'Bworston' . . . . thought the actors did a great job of it in 'THe Departed'.
I'm a Mancunian, we just sound common when we talk :)
Nice one, sorted ;)
How long do you think the Americans have been interpreting English, Irish and Scottish accents? They have consumed just about anything that's worth anything produced in the UK, and don't complain too much when they have to work out what people are saying.
You are a bunch of pansies! You have missed the point altogether. Even the police have trouble keeping up with the patois on the streets of major US cities, it's deliberate, because that's the way it is.
From someone who lived in the US for more than 20 years it's still difficult for me, but the value of working out just what is going on is very high. It provides one an insight into something that is characterizing all western societies.
Grow up!
The Shield which ran alongside it in America was and always will be streets ahead.
is not true. The last episode of the penultimate series, series 4 will be shown later this week.
Series 5 starts on BBC2 next Monday
as for having to have subtitles on to undestand the terms, I find that amusing. most of the trems used are either semi known or easily understandable if you link what you're hearing to with whats being shown on screen. ei if G pack is mentioned & theres a pack of ready to sell drugs of a large quantity in shot, then bingo, you've got the answer.
As a side note, I was once at baseball game, sitting next to a lovely British couple. I could understand the wife perfectly, but was having a difficult time understanding anything from the gentleman. After asking him a few times to repeat himself, I gave up and just started nodding and agreeing a lot. Finally he asked a question that obviously required more than a smile and nod, and I had to admit that I was having trouble understanding him. He laughed and said that he had gotten that quite a bit in the States. I said I was sure that he had run across a few heavy accents here, like the ones in the south, that he also had a hard time keeping up with.
"Oh no," he replied. "We have American tv over there...I grew up watching Jerry Springer."
Ahhh, our cultural exports, always making us proud.
----------------------------------------
Not so, it refers to a $1,000 worth of one product. A G-note is a thousand dollar bill, though they have taken them out of circulation.
Of course those of you who've seen every episode of every season more than once got used to the accent eventually (and I'm sure you didn't understand every single word of the first few episodes)! But try to bear in mind that not everyone has the opportunity to become acclimated through such regular viewing. Some of us even have to make do with watching it on decade-old 14" TVs with awful sound quality that make characters like Snoop sound like one of the adults in an episode of Peanuts!
I thought brits were supposed to be smart.
If you want to say "enunciate" or "pronounce" don't use the diction to mean that, it is a "common" way of speaking.
Thing is though, I had the subtitles on, so I guess I messed up and missed the point. Turns out I was making the whole thing into a comedy. Wow, silly me! I had no idea I was doing that.
As others have already commented, sure, you can watch it w/o the subtitles. But seeing the hundred or so major character names in print helps you learn them quickly. Seeing unknown slang and police jargon terms in print helps you learn them quickly. The characters in the show know who's who and what's what; it's only fair for the audience to know the same. Also, if you aren't watching on some amazing home theater system with the volume cranked, the subtitles help rescue dialog that's often lost in the somewhat muddy (or naturalistic) sound mix.
Pelecanos wrote some the the very best episodes for the show, but he's no idea what it's like for the audience and he's completely off base here.
That some of the show's greatest admirers watched with subtitles ought to assuage his "Airplane" fears.
This is an odd case of an artist being a poor authority on the best way for one to experience his art. What's even funnier is that here we have a professional writer warning people off of the written word.
I'm Scottish and had no problem watching all 5 series of The Wire - heck, i never even knew there were subtitles...
My middle class English Mother needed subs for Rab Nesbit, there's no way she could watch the wire without them.
I don't think it turns it into a farce at all. I still thought it was a gritty drama.
I think that sometimes it was very hard to figure out what people were saying. Not the slang, but the mumbling.
The comparison of the two jive dudes in Airplane is a straw man because the *subtitles don't translate what is actually said.* They merely tell you *what* is being said. They don't tell you what a 're-up' is - you still have to work that out yourself.
Would he say that deaf people watching the show were 'making it into a farce' because they used subtitles, I wonder...?
I think he's talking sh*t.