![]() ![]() Though programs like The Sopranos and The Wire are often credited as more influential, watching Oz is like discovering the adolescent journals of HBO’s production team. Even in its final seasons, which included a bizarre musical episode, Oz shaped the ambitious television drama as we know it today. ![]() Sometimes Oz moved like a crime procedural, but often it soared like Shakespearean tragedy. What’s more, it was heavily stylized, beginning each episode with a prelude from wheelchair-bound prisoner Augustus Hill (Harold Perrineau), who waxed poetic on larger themes affecting the prisoners in Oswald State Penitentiary. The show was ruthlessly violent - criticizing the penal justice system, portraying both rape and homophobia, interrogating race relations and pitting Muslims against Christians. When HBO produced Oz in 1997, American audiences had never seen anything like it on television. ![]()
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