The Wire Season 3 Episode 6: Homecoming Throughout its five seasons, The Wire's most intriguing battles were fratricidal, both literally and metaphorically. The betrayal of a brother -- even more than attacks against a parent or child, though those are also heinous -- strikes me as peculiarly depraved. Perhaps it's because, traditionally, the murderous contentions that can exist between fathers and sons, mothers and daughters are so often presented through the prism of base greed or envy. But to go against a brother born of blood or battle is in a way to deny the core of one's humanity. So, in this episode, the writers begin the countdown to the last day of the Avon Barksdale / Stringer Bell alliance. It will be a stunning -- though inevitable -- conclusion to one of the truest depictions of a real and grounded relationship between two men who are criminal to their core, bound by a crushing desire to be more than they are -- by any means necessary.