The Sopranos - General Discussion

[MagnusHex]

First time viewer currently on season 2.

My last episode was D-Girl, which wasn't as bad as people claimed because I didn't mind the amusing concept of Jon Favreau playing this corrupted director (considering how much of a nice guy he is in real life). That said, coming shortly after The Happy Wanderer, which was a solid A+ hit IMO, definitely made D-Girl stood out. I also like it whenever I get to see Tony get all serious in his mafia role, even if it just reminds everyone how much of a scumbag criminal he is. Still, I can't fault Tony entirely, because some of the fault definitely falls on David's shoulders. I've seen people in Singapore letting their gambling addiction ruin their family, leading our version of loan sharks to come spraying paint on their doorsteps (and hanging a pig's head... go figure). So David had very little sympathies from me.

I'm pretty sure Tony manipulated him into playing though. I remember reading somewhere that there's a scene in a later episode where Tony even admitted this to David, claiming he knew his gambling impulses would get the better of him, but I might be wrong. Tony is a mob boss, let's not forget that, and he makes his living off suckers like David. I do wonder how he felt assaulting his friend like that, but damn, I wouldn't be surprised if he had no guilt or remorse after the act.

[DrSpaceman73]

1 hour ago, MagnusHex said:

First time viewer currently on season 2.

My last episode was D-Girl, which wasn't as bad as people claimed because I didn't mind the amusing concept of Jon Favreau playing this corrupted director (considering how much of a nice guy he is in real life). That said, coming shortly after The Happy Wanderer, which was a solid A+ hit IMO, definitely made D-Girl stood out. I also like it whenever I get to see Tony get all serious in his mafia role, even if it just reminds everyone how much of a scumbag criminal he is. Still, I can't fault Tony entirely, because some of the fault definitely falls on David's shoulders. I've seen people in Singapore letting their gambling addiction ruin their family, leading our version of loan sharks to come spraying paint on their doorsteps (and hanging a pig's head... go figure). So David had very little sympathies from me.

I'm pretty sure Tony manipulated him into playing though. I remember reading somewhere that there's a scene in a later episode where Tony even admitted this to David, claiming he knew his gambling impulses would get the better of him, but I might be wrong. Tony is a mob boss, let's not forget that, and he makes his living off suckers like David. I do wonder how he felt assaulting his friend like that, but damn, I wouldn't be surprised if he had no guilt or remorse after the act.

I always like this episude because something about Alicia Witt I find sexy in this episude.  She definitely has issues snd doesn't live in reality, kind of likes being a character like in the movies.  She uses Christopher much like Tony was used on the golf outing with his neighbors where they treat him more like a novelty to play with rather than as a person.  She loves the mafia appeal but doesn't want to be really involved just in a superficial way. 

Tony definitely does tell David later on in an episode deep down he knew what he was doing.  He sees him at a school play or something snd they talk he admits it. But Tony really did a lot to keep him out if the game.  Then David goes behind him to Joey pants.  I had no sympathy for David. I see it as if it wasn't Tony it would be someone else in his case he was headed for trouble with someone. 

The funny thing with Tony is he then was involved later with artie in a similar manner. Artie borrows 50 k from someone in the organization and is scammed can't pay it back.  But tony doesn't take over the business and take advantage like he did with David. And he says something along the lines of you should have just come to me you know I would give you a break on it....even though he certainly didn't with David. I think artie certainly thought Tony would use the situation the same way. 

[heatherchandler]

On 8/5/2022 at 7:39 PM, aghst said:

Ringer Prestige Podcast just discussed an episode from season 5.  Apparently that's the one where Tony and Adrianna sleep together, beginning of the end for her.

They never slept together.

On 8/6/2022 at 12:59 PM, Kel Varnsen said:

Not me. I don't care what Chase says now. He left the story open ended. And it works way better for me if Tony has to go on with his shitty life after all the suffering he caused other people. Because if he dies he never really has to face how much his life is going to start really sucking very shortly. I mean the scene where Meadow tells him she would be a doctor helping kids instead of being a lawyer with a mob guy husband if he hadn't been a mob boss was brutal. Not to mention how super fucking annoying Paulie is (there was a whole episode about that) and he is the only guy left in Tony's crew.

From Chase last year: 

But two years before the finale of the legendary HBO series, Chase had a change of heart while taking a drive. "I saw a little restaurant. It was kind of like a shack that served breakfast," Chase said. "And for some reason I thought, ‘Tony should get it in a place like that.' Why? I don't know."

I think he took a while to finally just give it away, that he was killed.

There is an insanely long article about the ending, it talks about all of the clues in the last scene that Tony dies.  The bell, close up on Tony, Tony's point of view, etc.  Like Chase always said, "it's all there..."  Here it is:

https://masterofsopranos.wordpress.com/the-sopranos-definitive-explanation-of-the-end/

(Start at Part 1)

I have rewatched the whole series at least 10 times.  I love it all.

[aghst]

Wait who did Meadow end up with?

The spoiled princess made her own choices.

I remember one sequence where Meadow seemed to be reflecting on her bad behavior, like the time she yelled at her parents "is there nothing to eat in this house!?!"

That was when Tony was shot and in hospital.

I know it sounds bleak at the end.  Maybe the business wasn't going to be as lucrative and his oldest friends are dead or incapacitated.

But for all his problems, Tony was incredibly adaptable.  Presumably he was killed by the Brooklyn mob as payback for Leotardo.

[Kel Varnsen]

On 10/25/2022 at 2:30 PM, aghst said:

Wait who did Meadow end up with?

The spoiled princess made her own choices.

In the finale she is engaged to one of Patsy Parisi's sons. Between that and the brutal scene where Meadow tells Tony she would have been a doctor had he not been a monster. It's like a double whammy of things he did not want for his daughter.

Although really if Tony had not been a mobster, he would have been what a small business owner or a construction worker probably. Probably a lot harder for her to attend her fancy private high school and then NYU with actual working class parents. So becoming a doctor becomes a lot more difficult.

Edited October 27, 2022 by Kel Varnsen

[MagnusHex]

Sopranos Season 2, Episode 8: Full Leather Jacket

"How could this happen? Look how they massacred my boy..."

It's about time the Richie/Tony confrontation finally happens, though with this show and David Chase, I expect it's going to be an anticlimax and nothing exciting really happens. lol

I got spoiled about the ending when I read the review of D-Girl on AV Club, so I knew it was coming, but the details were unknown to me,

Spoiler

like how Chris fired a shot back at Sean before he blacked out, or how Chris wasn't sleeping with the fishes (that would apparently, from what I heard down the grapevine, come later when Tony ironically does the job in season 6, when Chris becomes even more of a druggie than before).

Also, I read an interesting tidbit about the scene where Carmela was talking to Richie, how she was drawing a picture of AJ before he came in. Here's the picture:

Don't quit your day job, Carm.

Edited October 27, 2022 by MagnusHex

[Kel Varnsen]

On 10/25/2022 at 10:30 AM, MagnusHex said:

My last episode was D-Girl, which wasn't as bad as people claimed because I didn't mind the amusing concept of Jon Favreau playing this corrupted director (considering how much of a nice guy he is in real life

I know Jon Favreau was playing a fictionalized version of himself, but I did find it funny to look back to a time when he was just a small time indie director, not a super A list director who could probably get any movie he wanted made.

[MagnusHex]

Sopranos Season 2, Episode 9: From Where to Eternity

I really love special episodes that touch on heavy existential issues like death because the writers get to explore different aspects of life outside of the usual genre, and this episode exemplifies very well what topics a writer could explore with it. Just to list the topics I could think of in this episode alone: religion, redemption, penance, fatherhood, the American dream, and the afterlife. I wouldn't be surprised if this makes the list for the top 10 Sopranos episodes.

It's such a solid episode even just for Tony's speech alone:

"Excuse me, let me tell you something... When America opened up the floodgates and let all us Italians in, what do you think they were doing it for? 'Cause they were trying to save us from poverty? No, they did it because they needed us. They needed us to build their cities and dig their subways, and to make them richer. The Carnegies and The Rockerfellers: they needed worker bees and there we were. But some of us didn't want to swarm around their hive and lose who we were. We wanted to stay Italian and preserve the things that meant something to us: honor and family and loyalty... and some of us wanted a piece of the action. Now we weren't educated like the Americans, but we had the BALLS to take what we wanted! And those other folks, those other... the, the JP Morgans, they were crooks and killers too, but that was the business right? The American Way."

It's a fascinating insight into Tony's worldview. We've had implied subtexts before about how Tony sees the world and even more obvious conversations with Melfi back then; but now there's just texts, laid out for us to see. He sees himself as a justified soldier merely getting his deserved cut of the share. It's all just business to him, even if it means preying on the weakness of degenerate gamblers like Davey Scatino. Every mobster (and even white collar criminal)'s out there to make a buck, so why shouldn't he?

But of course, he's simply making excuses for himself as always. Tony using AJ's possible mental incapacity to defend his adultery appalled me at first because I remembered my late father who used similarly vile words to discredit his child's worth as a human being. "I'm supposed to get a vasectomy when this is my male heir?" But to Tony's credit, he apologized and faced up to his mistake like a man; my dead father didn't. So yeah, he's got that little shred of dignity going for him at least, if nothing else, at least until he has to return to the calling he's so proud of: the killing of Bevilaqua. A bit on the nose with the phone calling Tony away from his son and back to his shady business, but I'll take it.

Maybe it's just me, but when Pussy and Tony fired several shots at Matt near the end, I was reminded of Vincent and Jules from Pulp Fiction when they fired several shots at that one guy who failed to shoot them. It looked like a cool badass scene in the movie, but within the context of the Sopranos scene here where Tony and Pussy are shooting at a kid who pissed his pants... yeah, not so cool or badass anymore. It almost feels dirty watching the execution.

On the other side of the Sopranos family, we have Carmela looking inwards to her sins and outwards to God once again since her interaction with Father Intintola in season 1. Whenever someone close to us or even close by proxy has a brush with death, it's only then that we're reminded of how much we've screwed up. I'd imagine that goes double for a mob wife, wondering just when the death and the debauchery would end, going so far as to ask Tony to snip it off so that he doesn't spread their family's ill-gotten legacy to a bastard child. Then when Chris wakes and having visions, she sees this as an opportunity to do right by Chris the way she didn't have the chance to with Tony: putting him on the righteous path of God. Funnily enough, Chris was so high on morphine he probably slipped off into unconsciousness when Carmela tried to get him to pray with her. It's a futile effort on her end from what I've been spoiled about Chris' fate in the inevitable future. But that's what Carm still feels compelled to do this early in the series, fight against the currents, even if Tony might very well cheat again in the future.

Paulie's "calculation" for purgatory is hilarious. Definitely got a chuckle out of me. "That's different for everybody. You add up all your mortal sins and multiply that number by 50. Then you add up all your venial sins and multiply that by 25. You add that together and that's your sentence. I figure I'm gonna have to do 6,000 years before I get accepted into heaven and 6,000 years is nothin' in eternity terms. I can do that standing on my head. It's like a couple of days here." You gotta love how chill Paulie tried to act towards everything. EVERYTHING. Even when Richie threatened him, he was calm and collected. And then all of a sudden, he gets all freaked out about the possible existence of Hell in spite of his best effort at denial, even when faced with possible proof in his past victims. I'm not surprised that Paulie was the one who half-believed Chris' proclamation of a literal Hell over Tony; between the two of them, in the two seasons I've seen, he's often been one who would believe in old-fashioned and traditional values (like how he felt towards Starbucks stealing coffee culture in season 1), even when the logical basis of it might be loose. If there's one thing he does share with Tony though, it's their similar penchant for denial. "Twenty-three years of donations to your parish and this is what this guy sees hanging over me? I should've had immunity to all of this shit, I should've been covered by my donations." I almost thought Paulie was gonna try to knock down the Jesus statue or something, the way he stared at it so intensely.

Then there are those who've created a personal Hell of their own like Melfi, just continuing tormenting herself with guilt towards her relationship with Tony, straddling the fence between her responsibility to her patient and her moral judgment. I do feel for her in spite of her indecision, and it is a fascinating dilemma to deal with as a psychiatrist, but I also hope that it's not dragged out too long, this constant back-and-forth. I've read that Melfi's a great character in the Sopranos subreddit, so I hope I could come to an agreement with that sentiment by the end of the series.

Overall, a very solid episode. I haven't been this thoroughly engaged in an episode since I started watching in season 1. Great stuff.

[MagnusHex]

Sopranos Season 2, Episode 11: House Arrest

As I approach the end of the season, I'm reminded how privileged it feels to have seen the show that invented "prestige TV" for the modern age, even for a slower episode such as this.

A few thoughts:

• I was wrong about Melfi, and her audience surrogate role and her dilemma towards Tony's treatment, how she's pulled into his world and possibly influenced by his behavior, it's fascinating stuff.
   
• AV Club writer Emily St. James mentioned that David Chase was trying to implicate the audience in Tony's crimes. Given how I was more interested in the mob stuff between Richie and Tony than the more mundane Family Matters/Full House suburban life David's more interested in, I'd say Emily has a point.
   
• Honestly, I have a bad temper too, but just laying it out that the drug business will set their ass on fire would probably suffice as an explanation for Richie (and particularly Junior who wouldn't want that kind of heat on his tail). "You want the DEA on your ass?" I would love to see how Tony would handle the DEA with his crew though, considering that I'm watching Breaking Bad at the same time.
  
  See, me and the mob stuff. I can't get enough of it.
   
• I'm assuming from the next episode's summary that Richie's going to punch Janice in the face. And fail at doing any significant damage.
   
• That ending with Tony reuniting with his crew after a long break was a nice scene. Emily said it's because we want to see more mob stuff again, but I just like the chemistry Tony has with his crew, especially with Sil.

Edited November 6, 2022 by MagnusHex

[MagnusHex]

Sopranos Season 2, Episode 12: Knight in White Satin Armor

Well, I was certainly wrong about the 'significant damage' part of my last post. But dang, I never saw that one coming. I guess it makes sense though since Janice's a Soprano. You don't fuck with a Soprano and get away with it. Richie might as well have planted his red flag himself when he made that punch.

Speaking of which, I don't think I've ever seen Tony hit Carmilla before in these two seasons, aside from shoving her to the couch one time (and only because she was hitting him repetitively). I was confused at first why Junior decided to stick with Tony despite his arrogance and selfishness, but between Richie and Tony, I could see why the former failed to earn any respect from everyone. I'm an old-fashioned kind of guy in that I would never hit a woman. If she hits me though, maybe just a shove to cease the hitting.

Surprisingly, despite there being a lot of plot-threads tied up this episode, I don't really have much to talk about because most of these plot-threads have been discussed by me in previous posts, I think. And besides, we have one episode left with Pussy's plot, and I know how that's going to end already because of spoilers (not that it's surprising anyway). This is definitely a solid episode that's the exemplar of prestige TV writing, tying plotlines in a way that force viewers to reexamine everything they've seen from the characters in the season thus far while also impressing and even surprising the audience. Even the Soprano siblings' relationship with Livia gets touched on by the end, with Tony finally acknowledging her narcissism out loud. Tony's probably at one of his most sympathetic moments here as a character who's punished even when trying to do the right thing. But of course, he only got into this mess with Carmilla at the end because he cheated in the first place. Sucks for you, Tony. Too little too late.

One more episode left. Hope it's just as explosive.

[MagnusHex]

Sopranos Season 2, Episode 13: Funhouse

Even though Satin Armor pretty much wrapped things up nice and good, this is still a fantastic episode though because it contains that nice atmospheric storytelling Sopranos is good at, how you could feel the tension and uncertainty in the air even though, supposedly, everything's coming up Sopranos. Even Tony acknowledged this himself, that if he had spent just a bit more time with Livia, maybe that rub with the Feds, no matter how trivial it turned out to be, might not have went down. Nothing lasts forever, not even the mighty Soprano empire. Doesn't help that the premise description for season 3's first episode says that the Feds are going to find a new way to put the squeeze on Tony. It's Pussy today, maybe somebody else tomorrow will flip. Someday, that ocean that claimed Pussy will be coming for Tony too. Really love the montage at the end, with Tony's cigar-chewing face fading away into the rolling tides.

And even with Pussy's death, despite having been spoiled, it's yet another great example of how the details of a well-written scene can give it more meaning than some Internet spoiler can give you. For example: how drawn out Pussy's execution was; how Sil had to go up to get some fresh air at the thought of executing someone he grew up with; and how even Tony was devasted by the inevitable punishment he mush dish out despite exterminating other rats before. The only one being stone-cold about it is Paulie, and some have called him sociopathic for this particular scene (I don't believe he's literally sociopathic since he's displayed emotions before, like fear). And while I do think Paulie's a bigger scumbag than Tony at times... I respect his professionalism in performing a hit. I like characters who are professional and competent at their jobs, even if they're making a living by killing the living. He knows it had to be done.

That being said, I like how Tony draws out the execution as much as possible. Shows how reluctant he is towards this particular hit and how close he was with Pussy. One could only hope he would feel as much hesitance when he does Christopher in (in season 6, I believe). Yeah, I've been spoiled a lot about this show. 😆

[MagnusHex]

Finally got to season 3, the one where the top 10 episodes of Sopranos (as rated by the community) occupy most of the space.

Annnnd we have CGI Livia. Creepy af. The conversation between Tony and her is so cringeworthy and awkward because I already know about the actress' fate watching this scene. It feels like fanfiction, like one of those fan-made YouTube videos with 2nd rate editing that you could see the seams of.

Just goes to show you can't replicate a real human being's authenticity through clever editing alone.

Edited January 5, 2023 by MagnusHex

[MagnusHex]

Sopranos 3x10: ...To Save Us All From Satan's Power

"To M.S. from J.A: I will always be true."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I was gonna call out on Tony for being a hypocrite at first, but then I realized 1) for the mafia, I think the general principle is that cheating is generally acceptable when you're married, but not before, and 2) Tony didn't want Jackie Jr. to be like him; he wanted a better life for him.

Poor Meadow though, always ending up with damaged goods like Noah and Jackie.

That "F*** you, Santa!" moment is easily one of the best moments of this episode. That's literally how a real kid would act. "Shyness is a curse."

Can't wait for the next episode, because it's the legendary one, the one that's most talked about when discussing "top 3 Sopranos episodes of all time": It's the Pine Barrens, folks.

[Electricmastro]

Watched episode 1 and am liking it so far. If anyone told me this was like "Goodfellas as a TV show", then maybe I would have watched sooner. lol

[Electricmastro]

One thing that stuck out to me early on is the suggestion that he has hatred towards his mother, which he denies. And it’s only later it’s proven true when he attacks one of his henchmen for mishandling the phone like how his mother did that shows that he’s displacing his anger.

[MagnusHex]

4x13: Whitecaps

AKA the one that got all the Emmys. West Wing still got "Outstanding Drama" (probably a well-deserved one since it's Sorkin), but at least the writing team for Sopranos took it home in 2003.

I still remember, back in season 1, I would gripe about how wives in drama series like this would put up with all the cheating and the lying because otherwise, there wouldn't be a show. Mad Men would prove me wrong as Betty Draper pretty much just kicked Don out, but I'm glad to see Carmela finally put her foot down after four seasons. As AV Club noted, this one only works because it's been four seasons, with all the history and bullshit Carmela had to put up with. There's a lot of weight behind Carm's breakdown because she had long knew about all the cheating, and if memory serves, she had this conversation with Tony before, about Tony being unfaithful. However, I think Carm just had enough when she had such a confirmation thrown in her face in such a way that had her compared to Tony's one-legged goomah.

No disrespect to Svetlana. Honestly, it's as if she's on the wrong show as it feels like she has too much class to mix around with mafioso (I could picture her appearing in Mad Men for some reason), and not even quality mafioso, because let's face it: Tony is no Michael Corleone. Chrissy there with his stupid Scarface references in the past makes Tony's gang look even more ridiculous. Always with the scenarios.

Speaking of the cokehead, I'm guessing Chrissy's gonna die of overdose somewhere between season 5 and 6, more likely 6. Once a junkie, as they say.

But back to Carmela. Many have said that Carm's not exactly an innocent victim herself. That is true. Carmela does have her hypocritical moments... with justifiable reasons, I think. Maybe not good reasons, but there are some justifications for why Carmela is the way she is. I'm not sure how Carmela got dragged into a marriage with Tony, but I could imagine that she has regrets of her own as the years went on, wondering if she wasted her life away instead of someone better than Tony. That's the reason why I don't really think the argument against Carmela's "greed" really fits that well. I agree with it to a certain extent as Carmela has sabotaged Meadow before out of pride (reminds me of my own mother), but I still think "Carmela is a materialistic snob" is an overused argument against her. She has her moments of avarice, but I think it's just that she's stuck in this life for so long, missing escape hatches like the one Furio offered, that she felt that she deserved to be compensated for being in this prison that's the Sopranos home. There were so many chances for her to be truly happy, but she missed them, so she had to put up with the misery and get the most out of this terrible situation the best she could: with material gains.

But I think after Furio left, her final escape hatch, she just hit the breaking point and just got fed up with it. She was momentarily tempted by Tony's latest emerald ring in Whitecaps, but then she got reminded by the phone call that, wait a minute, you are just another goomah who means nothing. Maybe you get better gifts because you are the mother of his children, but that's it.

Long post short, this was a long time coming. I'm not even that mad that there wasn't much mob-killing (aside from silencing the hitmen) in the season finale because of just how well-written Carmela's split from Tony was, especially with the subtle way Meadow is included in the conversation (with the way she reminisced about all the times she was a brat and took her parents for granted). From the looks of things (and the trailer), season 5 is heating up to be more explosive, so there's always that waiting for me. Carmela in the trailer looks even more dolled up than before though, so there might be some truth to accusations of avarice against her. We'll see.

5/5

[aghst]

I remember at the time it aired, fans were annoyed, because it was just soap opera, unworthy of the gangster plots they'd shown.

Very little sympathy for Carmela.  She was crimping Tony's style, according to the viewers who thought it's been too long for some whacking.

 

[BetterButter]

The Sopranos: Empire Reunites David Chase And Cast For 25th Anniversary Interview

[eel2178]

On 10/5/2022 at 8:53 PM, aghst said:

Chase wanted to end the show, didn't care about the blank check HBO was willing to give him.  So there are an unusual amount of shots of other patrons in that diner before it cuts to black.  Many repeated shots of potential assassins.

But that isn't usually the way hits have been depicted on the show.  Hit men just go directly at them with the guns out and shooting on approach.  It would be different if the hit man came into the diner, dawdled a bit, waited until all 4 were at the table and maneuvered to kill Tony from the blind side

I just finished watching this series for the first time.

There is no doubt in my mind that Tony was killed instantly in the diner; however, I think Meadow was the one who killed him.

Has anyone else considered that possibility?

[eel2178]

On 8/6/2022 at 11:59 AM, Kel Varnsen said:

 the scene where Meadow tells him she would be a doctor helping kids instead of being a lawyer with a mob guy husband if he hadn't been a mob boss was brutal.

I've got news for her: the State Bar does a thorough background check on every applicant who wants to take the bar exam. With her family history, it would be unlikely that she would ever have been allowed to take the test, especially in NJ or NY.