February 7, 2025

FILMHOUNDS Magazine

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Back On The Streets — ‘We Own This City’ (Episode 1-4 Roundup)

Wayne Jenkins (Jon Bernthal) leads the Gun Trace Task Force

Wayne Jenkins (Jon Bernthal) leads the Gun Trace Task Force

A HBO series set in Baltimore involving wire-taps, drug deals and the Baltimore Police Department. David Simon and George Pelecanos as showrunners and a connection with the Baltimore Sun newspaper. Any viewer with a working knowledge of The Greatest TV Show Ever Made™ will immediately think of , which celebrates its 20th anniversary this month. But no. Instead this is and, hard though it is to put the magnum opus of 2002 – 2008 to one side (especially so as so many alumni of that show appear in this), it's important you do for this is a very different beast in terms of story, tone and especially length.

Simon's The Wire wrought drama of a Shakesperian/Dickensian depth in sixty episodes over five seasons and was fictional, albeit telling true stories of the life and (frequent) death of Baltimore residents and law officials. We Own This City is a six episode miniseries telling the true tale of the corrupt members of the BPD Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), led by the notorious Wayne Jenkins (, even twitchier than usual). The backdrop is the death of Freddie Gray, a Baltimore resident arrested for (legal) possession of a knife, who somehow sustained serious injuries in the back of a police van and subsequently died in hospital seven days later. Despite the ME ruling his death a homicide and several police officers going on trial, not one was convicted and the resulting shockwave of tension and hate made for a city where the police weren't just untrusted but actively thought of as murderers.

The criminals arrest the innocent
The criminals arrest the innocent

This makes the GTTF during this time even more heinous, if that is possible. They stopped and searched everyday, law-abiding citizens on the basis of what cash they could confiscate but never declare and effectively robbed known gun and drug dealers, selling on the spoils to finance their lifestyles. And they put in thousands and thousands of hours of overtime that they never did, even being brazen enough to do so whilst they were on holiday. Jenkins was the driving force behind all of this and so cocksure in his role he kept the lion's share of many stops and raids in full view of his colleagues.

It's a complex story to tell in six episodes, but in Simon we trust. Given his choice of constantly flitting back and forth in the timeline, it could all be very confusing (Bernthals time-specific face fuzz helps) but pay attention and you'll be rewarded with a rich, layered and exhilarating tale that should shock, but sadly doesn't. Director Reinaldo Marcus Green helms all six parts and gives this Baltimore show a more cinematic, larger look and feel than its grittier forebear. Those ‘Wire alumni have carefully, mostly, been given roles directly opposite to their previous personas, but committed, multiple-viewing fans of those five seasons will still find it a little disconcerting at times (especially the excellent Delaney Williams, here playing a police chief once again). There is also frequent and heavy-handed anti Trump dialogue that does help the viewer with the setting but comes across as rather preachy, however well intentioned and realistic it is.

But this is David Simon, which is about as much a rubber stamp of quality that's possible. Would it have fared better in longer form? Undoubtedly. Do we really get to know all the players involved? In six, sixty minute episodes, of course not. But pay attention and you'll see just what vital storytelling this is. The war on drugs was always an utterly ridiculous policy, never more so when the enforcers are slinging dope as well.