ones  -- ultimately prefer comfort to integrity and familiarity to change." That's why the most heartening ongoing story on Simon's show may belong to Bubbles, the drug addict played by Andre Royo. It took him five seasons to get clean, but he finally did it. Society itself has a much harder time giving up the junk. These are each tough, in some ways pessimistic points of view, but they're not glibly presented or argued. They're the result of much thought and careful embellishment of characters, events, and imagery. Verdict: Tie. Criterion No. 3: Characterization If The Wire and The Sopranos had no other virtues but rich characterization, they still might have made it into this contest and endured for one or more rounds. Both created vast, interwoven communities, and no matter how much or little screen time they had, they just seemed to pop. The most vivid transcended the context of their stories. They became emblems of personality types, even existential conditions, that hadn't been seen before, and claimed their character tics for all-time. Among Wire fans, "Pulling a McNulty" has become shorthand for winging it without authorization and/or fucking up in spectacular fashion, and "The Farmer in the Dell," Honey Nut Cheerios, and sawed-off shotguns will forever be associated with Omar. When I've caught myself in egregious moral rationalizations, I've sometimes pictured Carmela giving up her well-earned righteous ire over Tony's infidelities in exchange for a new car or house, or Tony and Janice regurgitating faux epiphanies and psych-speak