Thirty-six characters were considered to be regulars on The Wire over its five-year run, but that tally doesn't include the many, many others who turned up in plotlines involving the police force, the school system, the political arena, and elsewhere. While the HBO series—which debuted 13 years ago this month—remains one of the most ambitious ever to appear on TV, it is the drama's intense, outrageous, and often tragic human moments that make The Wire so relatable more than a decade down the line. Here, we look at the 25 characters who put the most emotional charge into the show, and we ranked them in ascending order of our admiration. Whether we loved them or hated them, and whether they were redeemed or died in the game, they're worth remembering all the same. Even Ziggy. Yes, even Ziggy.

25. Ziggy Sobotka

Everyone has known a fuck-up kid, that guy who can't get his life together no matter how many chances he's been given and who therefore will always be, in some sense, a kid. Ziggy Sobotka was that kid on The Wire, not just within the fiction of the show, but for its fans, who projected their distaste with season two's deviation to the white people of the docks on to Ziggy himself. In retrospect, season two proved David Simon's masterful sleight of hand and intense focus on institutions over charming characters. You want more inner-city gangsters? Sorry, you get hard-knock Polish-Americans, who get churned through the system like everybody else. Ziggy was the tragedy of that story, the guy who got too close to the fire, and his fall gave us the single best season-finale montage on the entire show, as his cousin Nick mourned everything that had been crushed around him. But hell, Ziggy was also a lot of fun. He enjoyed displaying his genitals to strangers at the bar, and he killed his pet duck by loading it up with booze. Okay, so you don't want to get too close to him. But he could sure put on a show. —Paul Schrodt

24. Cedric Daniels

One of the most interesting questions the series forces you to ask is whether or not Cedric Daniels is actually a good cop. On the one hand: He helps the likes of Rawls and Burrell juke stats, he's a law school graduate who's in the game for the political capital he can drum up, and one of his hardest-hitting early scenes depicts him—in no uncertain terms—instructing one of his subordinate officers on how to lie to Internal Affairs after that officer hospitalized a black teenager sitting on his car. In 2005 or 2015, that scene is still a police brutality coverup, enunciated with witheringly stark rhetoric. Then again, Daniels gets results and ultimately contributes to some great police work, but he does so like this, by using the shitty system to his advantage. When he and Rawls dress down McNulty in the final episode, Daniels barely says a word. Sure, he's pissed as hell, disappointed, and likely a little worried about McNulty the same way any superior might be when a subordinate goes off the rails. He just knows how rusty the tracks are. —Eric Vilas-Boas

23. Joseph "Proposition Joe" Stewart

Though a relatively minor character in the grand scheme of things, Prop Joe is to The Wire as Cyrus is to The Warriors. He's the guy who puts the "organized" in organized crime and, along with Stringer Bell, creates the New Day Co-Op, a formal alliance of all of the city's top drug dealers who are business-savvy enough to see the upside in banding together and sharing in the heroin trade as opposed to competing with each other. He is a voice of reason for those who need it most, even if they choose not to heed his advice (read: Marlo Stanfield), and brings a much-needed levity to the heavy topic at hand. Can you dig it? —Jennifer M. Wood

22. William Rawls

Everyone has dealt with—or worked for—a Williams Rawls in his or her lifetime. He's that kind of unrelenting asshole who's managed to climb his way to the top most likely through threats and intimidation. Regardless of how he got there, he's still at the top of the heap and relishes the fact that shit rolls downhill. Which makes him all the more susceptible to the laws of hubris. For all his deft maneuverings, he's only ever maintained a laser focus on the next rung of the ladder in his upward ascent. If only he'd taken a moment to look down, he would've seen the many individuals attempting to race him to the top and been able to do something about it. Which doesn't meant that Rawls isn't "a reasonable guy." Also adding to his character's intrigue: the fact that we know nothing about him beyond what we see at the office... until there's a split-second shot of him hanging out at a gay bar (and it's never referenced again). —JMW

21. Randy Wagstaff

Of the four kids at the center of The Wire's fourth season—Namond, Michael, Dukie, and Randy—Randy just may have the best chance at a normal life. Though he's part of the foster system, his foster mother Miss Anna is committed to keeping Randy on the straight and narrow. And while he's not against a little hustling (like skipping class to sell candy during lunchtime), his endeavors are pretty PG-rated. But in his naiveté, he played an unwitting part in the murder of a neighborhood drug dealer. Sadly, it's only when he decides to come clean about his actions that they come back to haunt him, and it's the police who are to blame. —JMW

20. Chris Partlow

Even though he appeared in three seasons of The Wire, not much is known about Chris Partlow, Marlo Stanfield's most trusted soldier (and constant companion of the frighteningly sociopathic Snoop Pearson), which is part of what makes him so intriguing. Though he probably boasts the highest body count of anyone on the show, Chris kills out of a sense of loyalty and duty—not for the thrill of it. And despite what his job duties call for, he maintains a fierce sense of loyalty to the people around him—Marlo, first and foremost, but also his wife and children (who we see in just one scene, in which he makes it clear that he does not want to be separated from them for long). While it's Partlow who recruits good kid-turned-badass Michael Lee to "the dark side," there's also a genuine sense that he does this out of respect for his talent and abilities—not to just have another foot soldier. —JMW

19. Ellis Carver

If The Wire taught us anything about law enforcement, it's that there are generally two types of officers: those who are there for the paycheck and pension, and those who want to rise up the ranks to truly make a difference in their city. Ellis Carver (unlike his longtime friend and onetime partner Herc) falls firmly to the latter side. Though he has been known to bend the rules when he deems it warranted (like moving a body out of Hamsterdam in season three), Carver mostly operates by the books. And he knows a good opportunity when he sees it, even if that means playing mole within his department to get ahead. But even beyond all that, Carver is one of the few seemingly goodhearted officers who is genuinely committed to making Baltimore better. Lieutenant Daniels would be proud. —JMW

18. Preston "Bodie" Broadus

Though he's not averse to killing when it's called for, Bodie treats the drug-dealing business as just that: a business. (Sometimes murder just comes with the territory.) Fiercely loyal to the Barksdale organization, even when there's no real Barksdale organization of which to speak, Bodie is quick to follow orders but also operates on a principle of fairness. After losing both his mother and brother at an early age, Bodie's criminal companions have filled the role of family for him over the years. But when Marlo steps in and the rules begin to change, Bodie isn't about to idly sit by and watch everything he has worked for be ripped away from him. In many ways, Bodie was a Stringer Bell in the making—and like Bell, earned the respect of McNulty (even if he would turn witness against his crew), which was ultimately (and ironically) his downfall. —JMW

17. Wallace

Though he didn't live to see season two, Wallace—the 16-year-old drug dealer with a conscience—remains the true heart of The Wire. And its most memorable cautionary tale. He's a kid struggling with the responsibilities of what it means to be a man, and isn't always successful in striking that balance. While on the one hand he has become a sort of father figure to all of the neighborhood's abandoned kids—putting a roof over their heads, using his drug money to feed them, and making sure they go to school each morning—he also has yet to outgrow playing with toys himself on occasion. He's become a member of D'Angelo's crew because that's his only option, yet he often dreams about going back to school and making something out of his life. It's a dream that D'Angelo encourages him to pursue, and covers his back when he tries to make a go of it. Only for the entire endeavor to come crashing back down in gut-wrenching ways that will forever change how the viewers see D'Angelo, Bodie, and even Poot. —JMW

16. Kima Greggs

We're not going to say that women are woefully underrepresented in The Wire, as there are plenty of examples of females in powerful positions (i.e. Rhonda Pearlman, Marla Daniels, Brianna Barksdale). But for the most part, The Wire is a boys club, and the breast-wielding characters are forced to play within those confines. But Detective Greggs is the exception to the rule, not just because she's the most fleshed-out female character, but because she's one of the series' most complex characters, period. Like her male counterparts, Greggs shares many of the same failings when it comes to finding ways to separate real life from work life. Unlike Beadie Russell, Amy Ryan's port authority officer who kind of/sort of manages to tame McNulty for a spell, Greggs' gender doesn't exempt her from the temptations of a night of drinking with the boys or an occasional bout of infidelity, even though she's got a devoted girlfriend and child at home (at least for a while). Translation: Greggs is just as dedicated and talented as her colleagues, and just as fucked up. —JMW

15. D'Angelo Barksdale

There are few more poignant moments in The Wire than "The Chess Scene" that takes place in "The Buys," the show's third-ever episode. The setup is simple enough: D'Angelo Barksdale heads to The Pit (his drug-selling territory) and finds two of his key underlings, Wallace and Bodie, playing checkers on a chess board. And he's not having any of it. Explaining that chess is a better game, D'Angelo proceeds to explain the rules of chess to his two young protégés, but in a way that most makes sense to their corner-boy mentalities. But the scene is really not about chess at all: It's an analogy for the life and business that all three of these young men have chosen for themselves, and a harbinger for the idea that just because the game ends doesn't mean there's not something else out there. And D'Angelo, unlike his uncle Avon or Stringer Bell, is more than willing to encourage these kids to go out into the real world and discover that for themselves. In just those three minutes, the viewer learns everything they need to know about D'Angelo—namely, that while he may understand the mechanics of how the Barksdale family business works, he's not cut out for the mechanics of it. —JMW

14. Dennis "Cutty" Wise

When we first meet him, he's Cutty, but we eventually get to know him by his birth name, Dennis. Cutty's readjustment to civilian life post-prison is heartbreaking to watch. There's a vacancy in his eyes. He speaks slow, moves slow, lumbers through the city trying to figure out who he is. Luckily, he turns his back on the game before it's too late, and his redemption is one of the most uplifting parts of the whole series. He's so viscerally moral, or trying to be, at least. We should all be so lucky. —John Hendrickson

13. Clay Davis

Though he appeared in less than two dozen episodes of The Wire's 60-show run, the charmingly corrupt Senator Clay Davis managed to become one of the series' most indelible characters with one word: "Sheeeeee-it." It's appropriate, given all the sheeeeee-it Davis managed to bury himself in by bribing anyone willing to part with a pocketful of cash, be it a kingpin like Stringer Bell or a cocky mayoral hopeful like Tommy Carcetti. Even today, more than seven years after the series' finale, fans of the show are still trying to perfect Davis' catchphrase, so much so that actor Isiah Whitlock Jr. has put together an instructional video. —JMW

12. Avon Barksdale

Avon's very presence gives every scene on the show a little extra spark. He's classy and cool but still wholly of the streets ("Just a gangsta, I suppose"). At times, he even appears soft, holding D'Angelo's son in season one, letting Cutty walk away from the operation without repercussions. Avon's relationship with Stringer drives the better part of the series, and things get downright Shakespearean during season three. Avon respects the game more than anyone else on the show. He loves it, needs it. It's all he knows in life and he's fine with that. Proud of it, even. Avon is a worthy adversary for police and drug dealers alike. He commands your respect, for the right or wrong reasons. —JH

11. Jay Landsman

Jay Landsman is fat, wheezy, gassy. He sucks down cheeseburgers. He's a dick. He taunts his detectives, pranks them, he cares for not much of anything except making the brass happy. Except, of course, when he doesn't. Like when he gives McNulty a hot mug of coffee after pulling an all-nighter and bringing home a big case. Or when he breaks down crying while eulogizing Ray Cole, who lays sprawled out on the pool table at Kavanaugh's. That night, and others, Landsman is utterly poetic ("sharing a dark corner of the American experiment"). He loves his guys, no matter what. He loves good police work. He's an asshole, sure, but, at the end of the day, he's the kind of guy you'd like to have as your boss. More than anything, you get the sense that he has your back. What more can you ask? —JH

10. Roland "Prez" Pryzbylewski

Over the course of five seasons, we meet three versions of Roland Pryzbylewski, a.k.a. Prez. First, there's Dipshit Prez, the son-in-law of a high-ranking officer who announces his arrival into Lieutenant Daniels' unit of misfit cops by accidentally shooting his gun into the wall; he's the character whose scenes you use to make a run for the fridge. Then comes Analytical Prez, the office-bound drone who realizes his knack for puzzle-solving can actually be of use to his unit. This is where the personality behind the badge—and perhaps the series' most likeable character—begins to emerge... until an accidental shooting of a fellow cop while out on a food run makes it all go away. While it would have been easy to write Prez off the show completely once his badge is snatched up, it's in his post-police life, as a teacher at an inner-city middle school, where Prez finally finds his calling. While many fans of the show lamented the anthology approach creator David Simon tried to take in season two (by shifting the focus from the Towers to the docks), the fourth season's focus on the city's education system (or lack thereof) was one of the most effective storylines in reinforcing the series' point of how law enforcement, education, politics, and the media are "all connected"—and it's Prez who spearheads that. Making him the one character who actually does a full turnabout and changes his life for the better. On his own terms of his own volition. —JMW

9. Lester Freamon

The Wire's MacGyvering, knickknack-building, case-cracking wise man, maybe the closest thing the show had to a superhero or a Sherlock Holmes. In early seasons, we're immediately shown that Freamon is more than his rank suggests, detail-oriented, and a dedicated police officer—willing to call bullshit on McNulty and Kima in the middle of the squad room, but still follow up on the work they were doing. In many ways he's the ideal officer: incorruptible, thriving on his own curiosity, and operating mostly by the book. That's why he had to be the one to fake a serial killer with McNulty in season five. We know Lester knows better ("The job will not save you"), and it kills us. —EVB

8. Marlo Stanfield

It's his eyes. Those piercing, menacing, expressionless eyes. "Like a cat," a girl tells him at a nightclub in season three. Marlo doesn't drink, doesn't smoke. He doesn't have time for relationships. He has no real friends. He wants nothing except money and power. If he doesn't have it, he's a failure. Marlo is cold-blooded. His first line of dialogue in the whole series comes as an emotionless reply to his crew's question as to whether or not they should kill Bubbles. "Do it or don't, but I got some place to be," he says. Marlo is fierce. He outlasts Avon and Stringer's crew because, unlike theirs, his universe is devoid of drama. He has no respect for human life (see the bodies in the vacants for reference), and yet, what he wants more than anything is for his name to mean something in and around Baltimore. —JH

7. Jimmy McNulty

If you were to judge The Wire based solely on its first season—or even its opening moments—you would think that the series is Jimmy McNulty's show. And in a way it is, even if there are long, McNulty-less stretches at certain points throughout the series. Whether that was intentional or the result of Dominic West's burgeoning movie career, the fact is that diluting our exposure to McNulty's in-too-deep cop routine is probably one of the smartest decisions the show's creators could have made, as McNulty's brand of intensity is the kind best taken in small doses. Yet at the same time, one can easily imagine that McNulty's worst character traits—the drinking, the womanizing, the willingness to bend the rules if it means getting closer to solving a case—aren't all that uncommon in real-life murder police. And that, like McNulty, they're guided by a fairly strict, albeit often fucked up, moral compass that allows them to do what they do for a living and still be able to close their eyes and sleep at night. (Though faking a serial killer may be a stretch.) —JMW

6. Howard "Bunny" Colvin

If The Wire has a father figure, Bunny Colvin is it. In what was undoubtedly the show's most so-crazy-it-could-actually-work schemes, the veteran Western District Major decided to, well, kind of-sort of legalize drugs. Or at least look the other way. Yes, Colvin is the man responsible for "Hamsterdam," an informally sanctioned city zone where all of Baltimore's drug dealers and doers were invited to buy, sell, and get as fucked up as they pleased—as long as there was no violence. He even organized needle-exchange and condom-distribution programs. And it worked, at least for a time, until the media caught on and the police and political higher-ups had to answer for its existence. (Which is never good in an election year.) Like any dutiful soldier, Bunny offered himself up as the endeavor's sole scapegoat, and was forced out of the department on a lieutenant's pension. But it wasn't for naught. After a misfit stint as a hotel security guard, Bunny took his social-experimenting ways to the Baltimore school system, where he helped a team of researchers (and viewers) delve into the fascinating mindset of the city's at-risk youths. And he even managed to save one of them.

5. William "The Bunk" Moreland

If you like The Wire, the main reason is William "The Bunk" Moreland. He is the show's moral center, a cop who doesn't beat the shit out of kids and who wants to solve murders without alienating his bosses. A normal and compassionate person in a world of freakish desolation. Bunk is who the writers want you to sympathize with—a good man "in a dark corner of the American experiment." It's really pretty simple: The Bunk is the best-written character in the best-written show in the history of television. Possibly because he represents the view of the show as a whole, the writers gave him obviously the best lines. It's not Omar who first says "A man must have a code." It's Bunk. Omar just says "no doubt" in response. It's Bunk who says "The bigger the lie, the more they believe." It's Bunk who gives the show's one really moving moralizing speech about the urban decay of Baltimore: "As rough as that neighborhood could be, we had us a community. Nobody, no victim, who didn't matter. And now all we got is bodies, and predatory motherfuckers like you. And out where that girl fell, I saw kids acting like Omar, calling you by name, glorifying your ass. Makes me sick, motherfucker, how far we done fell." He has the second-best catchphrase (after McNulty's "What the fuck did I do?"): "You happy now bitch?" He also is one half of the famous scene in which he and McNulty say nothing but "fuck" to each other for four minutes.David Simon and co. also gave him the best bits of comic dialogue. Bunk: "I'm just a humble motherfucker with a big-ass dick." Freamon: "You give yourself too much credit." Bunk: "Okay, then. I ain't all that humble."He also had the advantage of always wearing excellent clothes. "The Bunk," as he said of himself, "is strictly a suit-and-tie motherfucker." —Stephen Marche

4. Duquan "Dukie" Weems

Dukie breaks your heart, plain and simple. He doesn't belong out there with the tough kids, even though his parents sell his clothes for drugs and his mom orders turkey grease from the Chinese takeout place. Dukie is not a corner boy, not by a long shot. He's too frail, too soft, too innocent. Duke is a sensitive soul growing up in a world that destroys such people. He steps in as a surrogate older brother to Michael's younger brother, and he forms a bond with Mr. Pryzbylewski. And later, when Dukie takes advantage of that bond by hitting Prez up for money, it's devastating. As the show ends, we're led to believe that Dukie is on a path to become the next Bubbles. He's smart enough and kind enough to be something more, but that's not the way the system works. Dukie deserves better than the hand he's dealt, though he has no illusions about what sort of hand that is. —JH

3. Stringer Bell

The wannabe legit gangster is hardly a new trope (see: The Godfather), but few fictional thugs have come as close to making the leap to full-fledged entrepreneur as Stringer Bell, Avon Barksdale's second-in-command. Let's face it, we all know who was really running the show. Whereas most of The Wire's criminal contingent are people who are born into the life and have no real way (or genuine desire) to escape it, Stringer's rise to the top of the Barksdale organization is a carefully calculated one in which the sole purpose is to parlay the skills he has acquired dealing drugs to become Baltimore's answer to Donald Trump (though Stringer thinks before he acts—or opens his mouth). While he wouldn't hesitate to kill a man (or at least be the guy who authorizes that to happen), Stringer somehow still manages to be the kind of "bad guy" you're always rooting for in the end. The one who has a copy of Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations on his bookshelf. —JMW

2. Reginald "Bubbles" Cousins

We see so much of ourselves in Bubbles. No, not the wide-eyed junkie. Not the saggy, soiled clothes nor the dopey bucket hat. Not the been-through-hell face or the yellow, crooked teeth. Not the mumbly voice that sounds like an AM radio dial searching for a signal. No, we see ourselves in Bubbles because we see someone trying like hell to make himself better. Someone who wants to make the right choices but can't help making the wrong ones. Someone who's clever and cunning but, at the end of the day, someone who's kind. Bubbles is more or less alone in this world, but he cares about others. We see a redemption narrative, the traces of one, anyway. Bubbles is enterprising (buying white tees in bulk), and he always wants more than what he has, though not in a particularly greedy way. Bubbles sees things most men miss. He sees himself, too, way down beneath the terror of the needle. Bubbles knows his soul is worth saving, no matter how long it takes him to do so. —JH

1. Omar Devone Little

"Come at the king, you best not miss."

Of all the characters to pimp-roll into our hearts during the five-season run of David Simon's celebrated and groundbreaking HBO series The Wire, none is as unique and evocative as Omar Devone Little, the notorious Baltimore stickup man and out homosexual known for his sawed-off shotgun, Wild West duster, menacing facial scar... and lethal streak of righteousness. A man has to have a code, he agrees with Det. Bunk Moreland during their first meeting at the station house. In the end, it will be his undoing... —Mike Sager

Also read: Mike Sager's essay about why Omar is the greatest character on The Wire

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