Treme Brings New Life to New Orleans and HBO

Lovers of “quality” television, and especially fans of The Wire, have been eagerly awaiting Treme, the new HBO series from Wire creator David Simon.
It’s here at last, with its premiere Sunday night and I’m very happy.
Set three months after Hurricane Katrina, the series is blunt about the damage, destruction and death that visited the Crescent City. But more importantly, like the New Orleans of the past, and hopefully of the future, it teams with life, laughter and music.
It is also dense with characters that over the weeks, and probably years, who will delight, disappoint and ring authentic. Many are played by actors fans know from other Simon projects such as Homicide and The Corner, as well as The Wire.
The Wire was a huge hit with critics, many of whom dubbed the series the best show of the decade, if not all time. And some reviews compare Treme favorably to The Wire.
“Expectations for “Treme” (pronounced “Truh-MAY”) are sky-high, as are assumptions that the show will be one long screed about Katrina and its aftermath, writes Alan Sepinwall of The Star-Ledger. “The former is unfair, and the latter is inaccurate. Critics have seen three episodes of Treme. After three episodes of The Wire, no one knew it would be the Best Show Ever; we were all struggling to remember everyone’s name and figure out what a “re-up” was.
Sepinwall goes no to say that “Treme may lack the obvious narrative engine that the cops vs. drug dealers narrative gave The Wire, but it’s already a smart, engaging, moving and funny series, one that in many ways is more accessible than its predecessor.”
Hank Stuever of the Washington Post also addresses the obvious comparison.
“So is it good? Yes, it’s quite good. Sunday’s episode is nearly flawless and a textbook example of how to launch an ensemble saga that may eventually embroider itself into a haunting tapestry,” Stuever writes.
“Will it be as good as The Wire? Three episodes in, I’m willing to say Treme has the potential to be better than The Wire . . .  It will, at this rate, undo innumerable mediocre New Orleans-based movies and TV shows that only served gumbo and bad accents with dime-store voodoo mysteries. Treme is not going to make the people of New Orleans 100 percent happy and, as in The Wire, the crime promises to be brutal and unforgivingly portrayed. But soon, people at parties will start saying that Treme is the only television show they ever watch.”
That doesn’t sound like something you want to miss, now does it? Let us know what you think.