Beverly Hills meets Maryland (again)

Beverly Hills 90210 will always have a special place in my heart because the characters were roughly my age (on screen, at least), and the show's creator went to the next suburban Maryland high school over from mine, and allegedly based the show on his experiences there.

There will be a new generation of 90210 coming out soon, and unless this trailer is lying it will be "cooler, sexier and more provocative" than the original.

But beyond recycling an old show, 90210 2.0 is also recycling the streetwise-black-kid-adopted-into-privilege theme that made hits out of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Different Strokes.

Fans of The Wire will notice this time around the color will be provided by Tristan Wilds, the actor who portrayed doting-older-brother-turned -remorseless-hitman Michael on the critically acclaimed Baltimore-based crime drama.

So will this career step put Wilds on a Will Smith-trajectory towards 100 million dollar Fourth of July movie openings, or a Gary Coleman-trajectory towards having to sell really embarrassing things on Ebay?

Or does it mean a revenge-minded Marlo will overcome his agoraphobia, take a trip across the country, and wreck havoc in West Beverly?

Watch some history with Hoops McCann

Tonight's match up between the Boston Celtics and Detroit Pistons boasts the third highest combined winning percentage of the NBA's shot clock era. Tomorrow night "The Wire," a television show some critics consider the greatest of any era, returns for a fifth season.

JSB basketball correspondent Hoops McCann also returns -- from wherever he was -- to compare the gritty crime drama to the Boston Celtics' best player. Check it out here.

The Wire

I started watching The Wire this season because of the parade of critics -- professional or otherwise -- who had declared the barely watched crime drama the "greatest show in the history of television." I figured, if nothing else, my viewership would help bridge the paradoxical gap between praise and audience.

After watching the season finale last night I'm not prepared to part with my greatest of all-time tag -- the twelve episode season sagged considerably in the middle, and my greatest of all-time wouldn't do a thing like that.

But I am certainly willing to anoint The Wire the best show I've seen in years.

I won't even attempt to explain what went on in season four. One of The Wire's endearing attributes, especially when compared with HBO's more popular crime drama, The Sopranos, is that lots of things happen. If you haven't seen the show and want to learn more about the details check out its website.

The reason you do want to learn more about The Wire is that it's compelling story telling that never sentimentalizes and rarely moralizes -- despite being loaded with material that usually gets that treatment.

And, despite a completely unknown cast, the acting matches the writing. The acting is so good it calls into question how difficult acting really is. At the very least it proves there is a deep pool of undiscovered talent that can perform at the same level as the famous faces you usually see.

So you can mostly believe The Wire hype. If you haven't seen it, check it out on DVD and spread the word.

DC -- back on top?

The results still need to be reconciled -- because the FBI counts Washington DC as a state and has all sorts of different ways of defining cities -- but it looks like The District could be "Murder Capital" once again. Washington grabbed the top spot during the crack epidemic of the 80's and held it until a few years ago.

If DC is to regain the title it won't be because the murderers in our nation's capital are working harder or learning to kill with greater efficiency. In fact, The District's murder rate has been pretty static since the city relinquished the crown.

Enter Hurricane Katrina, which forced many of New Orleans' best murders to relocate. It is expected the New Orleans' homicide rate -- so dominant in '04 -- will fall off considerably. (How's that treating you, once manageable murder rate of Houston, Texas?)

Detroit has been a threat in the past, but it's likely '05 will be remembered as the year The Motor City finally ran out of people to murder.

Leaving DC and its neighbor to the north in a Baltimore-Washington Parkway battle for murder supremacy.

Even with all the hype surrounding the gritty, "realistic" Baltimore-based crime drama The Wire, aka "the greatest show in the history of television," it's hard for me to imagine Baltimore being number one at anything. Remember, nobody actually watches The Wire.

So that leaves DC: First in war, first in peace, first in murder and last in the National League East.

Finally. It even has a nice little rhyme.

I have to confess: As a long time Washington-area resident I've never, during my hundreds of trips inside the constitutionally mandated district, been murdered. Not even remotely. Nor have I ever known anyone else to be. I did eat some really bad sushi there once.