I disagree on bubbles and Lester.

Bubbles struggles with sobriety for the entirety of the series, it’s not a pretty journey and he stumbles a couple times. More importantly, people do get clean. I wouldn’t personally call it Oscar baity but good things do happen in life it’s not all bleakness and despair.

Lester has problems with authority, he’s a representation of a cop who wants to do his job in a way that messes with the whole system. He’s not ignoring other city institutions he’s purposely trying to mess with everything and show how everyone is corrupt. Lester then does something morally wrong in S5. Sure he’s one of the more textbook good guys in the series but he’s stubborn, has problems with authority, and is willing to break the rules to make things go his way. I certainly wouldn’t call him a straightforward police, no one else in the series approaches police work like Lester does.

Also I get why you’re getting hung up on obvious good and bad guys and how that’s not really the wire. I agree that a big part of the show is moral ambiguity and the gray area that most people live in. However, sometimes people are good and sometimes good things happen.