Missing "The Wire"

SUNDAY MARKED THE END of an era on American television. HBO’s brilliant series The Wire concluded its five-season run with a 93-minute finale. Over the past several months, the show’s devotees in the media lavished the show with praise. The most common assessment? “Best TV show ever.”

The Wire is only the most recent groundbreaking HBO series to bid farewell in the past year. The Sopranos, Deadwood, and Rome also ended in the past 12 months. Together, these shows pioneered a new art form–serial television dramas with the depth and texture of the finest novels.