The best show on television gets snubbed… again.

I am not sure who is voting for the Emmy nominations, but they need to have their heads examined. The five shows selected for “Best Drama” this year were The Sopranos, Grey’s Anatomy, Boston Legal, House and Heroes. Most noticeably off the list is the best show on television The Wire. The show suffers from one major problem, but let’s look at the nominees.

First – we can dismiss Boston Legal. The show is a farce and is being pushed as a drama? The show is a collection of has-beens (James Spader who is sort of like a more sarcastic James Woods in his delivery, but much more gay-sounding), William Shatner and Candice Bergen.

Then we have Grey’s Anatomy. I will be honest – I have never watched this show. Any show that is that hugely popular with young women (and not on HBO) is almost guaranteed to be a steaming pile of sh-t. The only thing I know is the token black guy on the show called someone a “fag.”

House – not a bad show. I just didn’t know that tense theme music and medical issues could turn 45 minutes of sarcasm into drama. But not a bad show.

Heroes – very interested in seeing the DVDs (pre-ordered for august). I have heard the show is good (same things were said about early seasons of Lost and 24). If anyone knows if there are any black characters on the show I would appreciate that information.

And then there’s The Sopranos. The Sopranos for me is like seeing a great man or woman in a wheelchair late in life. You know that it is the same person who accomplished great things, but when they’re shi–ing in a diaper it’s hard not to recognize that things have changed substantially for the worse. In the last 21 episodes of the show the single greatest thing they did was play Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’. I am a big believer in HBO, but you shouldn’t just hand them nominations just for the hell of it. Especially when HBO has the best show on television: The Wire.

Now I will try to be subtle about this, but the Wire does not get major nominations because it has too many black people (perhaps Kanye West can say that the emmys don’t care about black people at the next awards show). The fact is that despite HBO’s stellar reputation and universal critical acclaim for The Wire, its ratings are not great and the nominations are not there.

When a show like NYPD Blue or Sex and the City or The Sopranos come on and make people look at television differently and say, wow those issues or those portrayals or those sets look and feel like real life, we praise them and watch them and nominate them. And yet when a show shows a well rounded look at urban life and demonstrates from the street to city hall the issues affecting inner cities and the people who work and live in them we are not interested. You could say that they don’t speak to people, but how does the Sopranos speak to every day average Joe? Furthermore when other HBO programs are incredibly powerful and realistic (Band of Brothers as a great example) the nominations are overflowing. Even Deadwood, whose ratings were anemic secured major nominations its first two seasons.

One argument against this is that people want to be entertained and don’t want to see dreary and depressing stories on Sunday night. If that is what you assume the Wire is then you have already tipped your hand. The Wire is just as funny and entertaining as The Sopranos in parts, except at the end of each season you have thought a lot more than at the end of a season of the Sopranos.

The truth is The Wire is a once in a generation show that forces people to examine what the fu-k is going on without flinching at reality, while at the same time making its portrayal of reality as entertaining and diverse as the real thing. The Wire is the best show on television because it is well written, well acted, incredibly realistic, and most importantly thought provoking. The bottom line is that other shows on HBO and elsewhere have been nominated despite being “too realistic” or having bad ratings. I guess The Wire can only speak to you if you are listening.

If you really want to see the best show on television in 2007 just wait for season 4 of the Wire on DVD.