It was such an excellent show. I recently rewatched it. I wish they'd make more, or a follow-up set in another city. Instead of all this formulaic and totally unrealistic NCIS and CSI crap.
there´s
- We Own This City
and
- Homicide: Life on the Street
WOTC is indeed a follow-up of sort (same author as The Wire, produced recently), but the real follow-up to The Wire (i.e. what David Simon did straight after, bringing with him a bunch of actors from The Wire) was the short-lived Treme.
The taboo thing about any sexual topic is very American. I never understood where that comes from. I always suspected it came from religion as I don't have any but American society seems to be more religion-centric. But here where most people aren't religious, things like sex work are pretty normal.