Is We Own This City a sequel to The Wire?

We Own This City isn’t a sequel to The Wire. Both, however, are based on real-life experiences of Baltimore residents and their interactions with law enforcement.

We Own This City is based on a book by Baltimore Star journalist Justin Fenton, with some dramatised details thrown in, rather than David Simon and writing partner Ed Burns’ experiences.

We Own This City takes a step further than The Wire in suggesting that the system is flawed but not corrupt. In some ways, it’s a spiritual sequel to The Wire, because it responds to the original’s hopes with a fear that everything is far more broken than it appears.

We Own This City is a dramatised but very real account of the BPD Gun Trace Task Force, led by Wayne Jenkins (Jon Bernthal), who was revealed to be running a criminal racket throughout the city, set in a Baltimore still fighting the never-ending drug war that The Wire called “endless.”

Jenkins’ crew stole money and drugs from Baltimore’s drug dealers for their profit, much like Michael K Williams’ Omar Little did in The Wire, taking an era of police brutality to new heights.