So to answer your first question: no, we didn’t miscount. We’re having a technical issue with Episode 98. If we can fix it, great and we’ll release it when it’s ready. If we can’t, we’ll have to re-record it. It’s actually happened before, for a different reason, and while it’s an interesting experiment to re-hash the discussion we already had, we realized that we don’t really like doing it.
Show Me a Hero is a 2015 miniseries that was produced for HBO and helmed by David Simon, the mind behind The Wire, Treme, The Deuce and Homicide: Life On The Street. So most of his projects are fictional with a dash of real-life in them, but this one is based entirely on a true story and relies only on a few typical embellishments (e.g. combining characters or rearranging events to fit the broader narrative).
The title comes from an F. Scott Fitzgerald quote: “Show me a hero and I’ll show you a tragedy.” It’s the story of Nick Wascisko, the former cop and (as the show starts) city council member in the city of Yonkers, New York, which is just north of New York City. In 1987 Yonkers was embroiled in a segregation issue involving public housing, which was clustered in a specific part of town. A lawsuit led to forced desegregation of the public housing, and Wascisko’s efforts to make it happen, but it’s important to note that he initially opposed the order.
As the city resisted, the courts punished them with increasing fines, to the point that ordinary city services began to suffer because the workers couldn’t be paid. Ultimately the city did comply with the order, and the entire lawsuit was settled in full in 2007, but unfortunately Wascisko wasn’t there to see that part of it happen.
COMING ATTRACTIONS:
Many Podcasts like to mark their 100th episode with some kind of spectacular retrospective or something; we’re going to do it with…chess! Next time around we’re going to spend time with six hours and change of chess with the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit. Yes, it’s about chess but it’s about a lot more and you don’t have to understand the game to enjoy this one. Join us, won’t you?
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