The Wire
Collateral Damage
TV Flash files “Collateral Damage” as hour 15 of 60 in the TV Flash guide — The Wire (2002–2008) on HBO, season 2, episode 2, aired 2003-06-08, 60 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S02E02: listed hour 15 of 60 in the The Wire guide, hour 2 of 12 in season 2. It aired 2003-06-08 (60 min). The listed hour before it is “Ebb Tide” (S02E01). Next is “Hot Shots” (S02E03).
Catalog log
Broadcast listing — not a TV Flash recap.
"They can chew you up, but they gotta spit you out." – McNulty Officer Russell is assigned the murders of the thirteen women discovered in the cargo container. McNulty offers to help and again ensures that the case goes back to Rawls' homicide department. Valchek strikes a deal with Acting Commissioner Burrell—in return for supporting Burrell in his aspirations for promotion, Valchek demands Burrell set up a detail to investigate Sobotka and his union. Sobotka, angry at not being informed of the container's contents, considers cutting his ties with The Greek and demands a meeting. "Horseface"complains of sudden police pressure to Sobotka and the two come up with a plan to further embarrass Valchek. In prison, Avon Barksdale's relationship with his nephew D'Angelo begins to sour. Bodie Broadus finds that the new shipment of drugs for the Barksdale Organization is missing.
Viewer FAQ
Where does Collateral Damage sit in the The Wire guide?
S02E02 is listed hour 15 of 60 — hour 2 of 12 in season 2, season 2 episode 2.
When did The Wire S02E02 air?
Collateral Damage aired 2003-06-08 and is listed at 60 minutes.
Where should I start The Wire?
Episode one of season one. The show is a five-volume novel; skipping the corner season to “get to the good part” is how you miss the grammar.
In the series
Why this series still plays
Watch it as a civic novel that happens to be television: each season a new institution, the same city refusing to be solved. Characters function inside systems, not merch. Start at the corner; stay for the report card — and for a newsroom closer that still argues with the first wire.
Open on a street that is already an argument. The first hour of The Wire does not introduce a hero so much as a jurisdiction: a corner, a courtroom, a police department already lying to itself about what it can solve. David Simon and Ed Burns write Baltimore as a set of interlocking machines — drugs, docks, City Hall, schools, the newsroom — and then ask television to behave like a novel that refuses a narrator’s mercy. If you came for an antihero origin story, the text will starve you politely. If you came to…
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