David Simon is back in Baltimore, where conditions have severely deteriorated since his iconic series The Wire wrapped in 2008. The crime rate is up. The cops are dirtier. We Own This City, co-created by Simon and The Wire producer George Pelecanos, isn’t so much a sequel to his groundbreaking detective drama but its dark epilogue. There have always been bad cops in Baltimore, but what happens to a city when there aren’t any good cops?
The new six-episode series chooses real-life police sergeant Wayne Jenkins – an impeccably cast Jon Bernthal (The Walking Dead, King Richard) – as its cocksure avatar for a department drowning in corruption. It’s 2017, two years since 25-year-old Baltimore resident Freddie Gray died in police custody after being picked up for carrying a switchblade. Over a week of protests followed. Six officers were eventually charged in Gray’s death, but none convicted.
