SEASON 4 SPOILERS
1. so what do we know about Daniels' shady past. I recall mention being made way back in Season 1 of "lots of dirt in the Western" back in the days, etc. but do we have any concrete facts, examples?
Not yet, no. It's worth considering that we're expected to assume that nobody is completely clean, but as Daniels rises, I can imagine a plot thread in Season 5 where the press does an expose on his past, possibly with the complicity of rivals like Rawls or Burrell.
2. was Mikey's crackhead mom's man really molesting his little bro? that seems to be what they want you to beleive early on, when Mikey runs home when he hears dude picked up his little bro at school, and he is clearly afraid to leave his lil bro alone with him. and of course he tells Chris and Snoop that dude's a molester in order to get him offed. wolf tickets? just a ply or real?
I think it's more about Mikey having been molested by him (or another older male) in the past, and subsequently being aware that little mans is at risk. There's all kinds of signals pointing to it, most notably the way Mikey feels uncomfortable being alone in the car with Cutty, and the wordless exchange between Mikey and Chris when Mikey asks him to whack the guy, which suggests that Chris has been there too. The scene where Chris literally beats the guy to a pulp is one of the most shocking scenes of violence I've ever seen on the screen.
3. anyone else experience a profound Carcetti shift? I thought he was a total scumbag in S3, playing Grey, cheating on his wife, etc. but he emerges in S4 as somewhat of an inspirational figure. anyone still feel negatively toward him?
I thought he was just another ambitious politician at first, and there's still traces of that at points during his campaign, but he seems to become increasingly more troubled by this, and the ambition is replaced by something closer to actual integrity. The later scenes, after Royce concedes and Carcetti gets to work as the mayor elect, are beautiful studies in the way one kind of political ambition can so often be thwarted by another altogether different kind, and one that uses bureaucracy almost as a weapon.
i was more sympathetic to royce after the whole hamsterdam thing. but carcetti developed a real good bullshit detector and that dude who was his campaign advisor/manager was the fuckin man. royce's office "passing of the baton" was graceful too, although he should have told carcetti after carcetti sat in the mayoral chair, "boy, you wouldnt believe how much head i got in that there chair."
yeah, chris definitely looked like he was exorcising some demons on mikeys pop. molested as a child = marlo's assassin later in life...natural progression?
i want to see some of snoop's girlfriends in season 5
Omar vs.Bird & LEvy is the illest. "i shot him in the hind quarters"