Two weeks ago, I was looking for a new show to watch and someone suggested Slow Horses. I finished the first season, found it pretty meh, and ended up quitting.

Then I started The Shield… and holy shit, I got hooked.

Finished all 7 seasons in 10 days. What a banger of a pilot and an incredible finale. The pacing was great, and I genuinely enjoyed the hell out of this show.

Absolutely loved the ride. What a show. 🔥

It’s pretty dope that they have The Shield on there.

Honestly I can’t decide which is better than the other because they’re all equally as superb to me and among the best television I’ve ever watched (alongside The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Deadwood, The Crown, The Americans, etc). Seasons 4 and 5 were almost single-handedly made by Glenn Close and Forrest Whittaker respectively, they delivered the most powerhouse performances of the whole show and both Rawling and Kavanaugh as characters bounced so well off of the Barn crew (especially Rawling, I loved her whole dynamic with Claudette).

Season 7 was climatic as fuck with the whole ICE storyline and all the dominoes falling down around Vic

Is it just me, or does Dutch look exactly like a young Ingmar Bergman.

Was it a small hit or would it completely destroy them? They weren’t mentioned in Sons of Anarchy which is also in California and they deal with powerful cartels in the sane universe.

They’re both played by Benito Martinez if you didn’t get it.

Why does everything remind me of her?

I think she was too concerned with being one of the guys tbh

Claudette didn’t give a fuck what you thought

She would fart in your dinner and call it Beef Wellington

And you would like it

I digress

I really liked the Danny character it was a really honest portrayal of being a female in a male dominated line of work

Unlike some other cop shows (looking at you NYPD Blue) Danny is a cop first and person second

Sure she is given an air of desirability but it’s FAR from the main focus of her character

I mean she pegged Julian (pun intended) as a homosexual from a mile away

That lady knew the score when given the context of the players involved

But at the end of the day she was loyal to the men in the uniform and not the job itself

This leads me to believe she would never achieve the no-nonsense broad down at the precinct title

Discuss

tldr question at the bottom if you dont want to read all this, but im making fair points so may be worth the read.

if you look up the greatest anti-heroes in tv history, you will find Vic Mackey on the list. not because he deserves to be there, but because he DEMANDS to be there. its really absolutely genius work. but when it comes to pop culture, all these tik tok and instagram edits nowadays, the memes, the lore etc. Vic is nowhere to be found for what i think is a couple reasons.

1. How this show has aged in modern culture. im glad this show came out before the 2010s 2020s culture shifts because its the gods honest truth on crime, and an amazing show. not too realistic on the little details, but extremely realistic on crime in gang controlled ghettos. Shawn Ryan didnt need to show gore to make you sick, he just showed you what really goes on(some of the pedophelia like those tapes was some crazy shit) but thats realer than ever, and Mackey truly believed he was the antidote to the chaos on the streets. but simply put a lot of people dont want to watch four white thugs with badges terrorizing ghettos so im not surprised The Shield just isnt on the radar whatsoever in pop culture these days, as well as anyone parading Vic Mackey like they do Walter White, Saul, Don Draper, Soprano, Dexter

2. He is so unlikable. i dont know how anyone can come away from literally any episode thinking "hey, i really like this guy Detective Mackey" even for a second, he just ends up doing something crazy that ruins any goodwill he managed to put together for a con that spikes his ego and either fills his pockets, fills his lust, or his pride at the end of the day. Chiklis was amazing. but Vic wasnt written as charming. he was just either terrifying, or an asshole, or REALLY terrifying. Women in the show werent attracted to him for any charm, they were attracted to his raw power.

his smart ass dialogue gets pretty old pretty quick, especially considering the brutality hes willing to commit and mouth his way out of with a filthy smirk. its not cute, its not cool, it even makes you uncomfortable, especially with the rest of his team conducting the same vicious actions and corny wordplay stuck under his cult like "i AM the law" mindset. it got old after the first 3 episodes if im being honest. Vic did have some crazy aura thats for sure, not an ounce of fear in his body, high IQ highly intelligent in strategical and tactical situations plus a dollop of good luck which always made the watch extremely compelling.

i waited 7 seasons for what i think truly makes an anti-hero great: redemption- of any kind. him to redeem any shred of dignity, any redemption whatsoever to give him any redeeming qualities, and it was literally the LAST scene of the ENTIRE show!! and god knows what his plans were but he damn well was going to destroy his immunity deal.

7 seasons to arc his character; the arc trended downward. i respect the showmanship on the writers end. the twists and turns, it was all worth it in the end to see him cradled up alone in his cubicle under fluorescent lights beaming down on him, no one left.

9/10 series finale- Ronnie deserved better than a 1 dimensional character in the show just to have his life destroyed devoting himself to Vics strike team cult. their confrontation in the barn was devastating but real short.

do you think Vic Mackey is one of the greatest anti-heroes in tv history, and why?

After Claudette tells him about Shane/Mara/Jackson.

In this lists I mostly focus on reoccurring characters as we don’t really get to know one offs that much

10 Juan Lozano: He raped Aceveda, is a known drug dealer/user killed a hitman without even blinking and tried to blackmail Aceveda. He’d probably would’ve done a lot worse stuff but he’s a low ranking gang member and didn’t have a lot of power.

9 Smooth: he is a pimp in the episode Bottom bitch, the only character to only appear in one episode. He beats one of his girls for not earning enough and is known for still brutally beating the hookers who work for him as he enjoys it. Also sells drugs to client. Not that much else is known about him but he really comes off as a scumbag in this episode.

8 Shane Vendrell: Vic’s closest strike team member at the beginning of the show. Shane is racists and does some terrible things even early on, makes the gf of a gangster think he’ll SA her until she tells him where the guy is, pisses on a gang member just for telling him to fuck off. Murders Lem and countless other things.

7 Vic Mackey: The leader of the strike team responsible for the group taking bribes and putting drugs back into the street, he justifies his actions as they’re for the greater good. He even kills Terry, his own team member in the first episode and never shows any remorse. Murders a mob boss, beats a drug smuggler half to death before shooting him. Gives two gang members to a rival gang to be beaten to death, in order to stop a gang war. Vic and Shane never intentionally hurt any innocents or theyd rank higher on the list.

6 Guardo Lima: a high ranking El Salvadoran drug smuggler, that has 11 people slaughtered at once and has his soldiers blowing up houses in a rival gang neighborhood. Not that much is known about Guardo, he meets his end as earlier mentioned where the strike team executes him.

5 Kleavon Gardner: serial killer that started in Texas and moved to California. Had many victims, where as most others on this list mainly did it for financial reasons; he killed for his own sick pleasure and later basically blackmailed the DA into a deal to not bring up Claudette’s sickness in court.

4 Antwon Mitchell: a ruthless drug dealer and head of the One-Niners, Antwon gets released from prison and immediately starts committing high levels crimes again, smuggling more Heroin into Farmington than anyone before, as Rawlings says it was a record bust. Has a gang member dragged by a car to death, murders a little girl for snitching. Frames Shane and he’s him to evade his people being arrested. Antwon spends the rest of his life in prison for murdering two cops, but has enough juice in prison to live better than most inmates.

3 Guillermo Beltrán: A high ranking Cartel member and former cop, is responsible for dozens maybe hundreds of murders in the US and Mexico. Orders Vic to kill his associate Peuzela pretty much on a whim, is taken down by Ice and Vic at the end of the show.

2 Margos Dezerian: An Armenian mob boss, commits a lot of brutal murders torturing and cutting off victims feet, attempts to murder a teenage girl, kills his own people for minor inconveniences. If he hadn’t become a mobster he would’ve been a serial killer.

1 Armadillo: highly connected to the cartel, he burns many gang members to death. He SA’s a young girl who gave police info on him. Burns Ronnie’s face to match his. Sells drugs to grade schoolers who OD and die. Might be one of the most evil characters in TV history.

What did you think of the list and would you have changed anything?

I’ve been doing a re-watch and i just found myself sitting there going “holy shit, this is so fucking good!”

The gritty feeling, the character nuances, the dialogue, the acting, the soundtrack. It’s just all so fucking good. It’s such a relief to see a show that’s not polished and where every character doesn’t look like a super model.

That’s all. That’s my message.

I mean that thing was clearly rotted from the bottom, so good on him for noticing that and choosing the path of least resistance. He really did the landlord a favor that's a building code violation...

My beef here is he did not acknowledge the Kool-Aid man with a healthy

OH YEAH!!!!!!!

When he apprehended the scumbag who fled

Thank you for your attention to this matter

Wow... I have to say, I saw Shane's ending coming. I did NOT, however, expect the Mara and Jackson part. I mean damn.

I thoroughly enjoyed the show overall. I still feel like we were left wondering on a few smaller storylines. I have a decent imagination though so I am ok with it.

That being said... I want to hear opinions on the last scene. For a second I thought Vic might take the same exit as Shane, but then it looked like he grabbed his gun and jacket and headed somewhere with purpose.

Where do you think he was going? What do you think he had in mind?

Hello, I’m 19, and I grew up watching The Shield (2002–2008). I often think about that original era and how meaningful it was to me—following the characters through their stories, struggles, friendships, conflicts, and unforgettable moments.

When I watch it now, the episodes are still there, but the feeling is different. The people who created the show have moved on, the original era has ended, and I’ve grown up. Back then, I never imagined that something I loved so much would eventually become part of the past.

It makes me wonder why shows like The Shield can’t continue forever with the same characters, cast, creators, and feeling. Why do series end, change, or simply become memories?

Maybe that’s what makes The Shield so special. The show didn’t have to last forever for its impact to last. When I return to those episodes, I’m not only remembering Vic Mackey, Shane, Ronnie, Lem, Claudette, Dutch, and the other characters—I’m remembering who I was when I first watched them.

The original era may be over, but it hasn’t disappeared. It still exists in the memories of everyone who experienced it. I can’t return to that exact time, but I can still appreciate what The Shield meant to me.

I just don’t get why it had to end and move on. Does anyone know why The Shield had to end?

In my mind, I group the seasons like this:

Season 1-3 - early times, Strike Team-centric

Season 4 & 5 - Turbulence and issues for Strike Team

Season 6 & 7 - Everything falls apart

Which grouping is your favorite? I would probably have to go with Season 1-3, because they are so nostalgic.

I'm rewatching Oz reruns right now, and he reminds me A LOT of Vendrell, not just appearance but overall mannerisms and demeanor. Don't get me wrong Goggins was fine, but in some parallel universe where he wasn't available, I think Winters could have filled the role.