hanslaurentius Greatly written, well played painful, realistic portrait of multilayered but damaged people on all sides of the story. We 'Enjoyed' it every second, with pain in our guts. Funny thing with Americans: their relentless clinging to a Dream, not noticing that to believe in it one has to be asleep! And not noticing that the US is one of the sickest of societies and spreading it like a virus. We dream to be free, but are the slaves of money & succes, having the most egocentric heartless untruthful beings run the show...what a dreamAlso funny the never ending weirdness of religious beliefs: the inconsistency of it, praying and pleading and wanting 'justice'... if 'the lord' has a plan for everyone, why complain, why be upset, why pray? Doesn't make sense. It's not Insight, it's magical thinking...it's sad that basically good people are so unclear. Religion, like Amercanism and communism are not dreams they are delusions, pollution the world. Neo-liberalism tore up society even more. We got a lot of stuff, but no depth. Money rules everything, and there will be more division: more have-nots and drop-outs created by the 'dreams', and it will express itself : another shooting, another wave of addiction, depression, anxiety. It's a sad and beautiful world. Mostly sad i'm afraid...I'm afraid of Americans :)

Maria D I don't know who was responsible for the casting but I haven't seen this spot on character casting in tv and movies for a long time. While I'm sure some viewers will not be used to the necessary length of each episode (might seem slow or long) each episode really made you sit with each character to really know them and each actor in this series played their character with an intensity and excellence I haven't seen for a long time. I think this is an award winning tv series on the same caliber of Breaking Bad.

caratzas66 If you want a complete recap of series this is not the review for you. I'm just going to mention what I liked and what I did not like. Also, spoilers ahead!Liked: Good, if not completely original premise. I really liked some of the acting. Standouts for me were Isiah, Latrice, Fish, and Hennessy. I did not like the actress playing KJ so much. And pretty much all the other cops except Jablonski were not so hot IMO. The writing, in places, was pretty good as well.Did Not Like: Too long! Did not need to be 10 episodes. Did there need to be the little subplots about KJ and her boss or Beton and Kedeuce? Personally I don't think they added a whole lot. Yes, in the case of Benton it shows his parents didn't really know him. KJ and boss was total filler and not very interesting filler at that. Here's something I didn't get at all: Fish lived in presumably Jersey City. Nadine went to school in Jersey City. So far, so good. To keep Nadine out of harm's way Fish has her stay with his ex-wife on Long Island. One of his conditions for Nadine to stay with Fish's ex-wife is for Nadine to volunteer at a dog kennel, which Fish said he give her directions to. OK, again, so far, so good. HOWEVER: Is it plausible that Nadine would escape the rehab in Jersey CIty and go all the way back to Long Island to get the dog whiskey? You'd think she would've been intercepted somewhere along the way. On the off chance the kennel was in Jersey City area, would Fish really trust Nadine to commute all the way from the Island to Jersey City to volunteer? Either way it makes no sense. I'm sure there are other plot holes as well. The one I listed was really bothering me, though.In the right hands, with a tighter script, better acting and few episodes/less filler, this could have been a really good series.

h h It is a good series to watch if you do not mind the usual clichés about racial issues. It takes a while to take off and you might be angry at some characters but it's part of what makes it good. On the negative side of things I wish the production would have skipped the ''police officer eating his gum furiously'' cliché. You end up liking Joe 'Fish' Rinaldi but his constant stressed-out state is quite boring.