After lots of thinking -and LOTs of reading- here's more thoughts on the "Sopranos" finale.
- Was I disappointed about the ending at first? You betcha. But the more I've thought about it, the more I realize it probably worked better than a conventional shootout ending would have. All the whacking fans would've loved a "True Romance"-like shootout in the restaurant, but that wouldn't be true to the spirit of the show.
- A few theories I've heard to indicate Tony did in fact get shot: There's a long real-life tradition of mobsters getting gunned down in restaurants in front of their families... the guy sitting at the bar was wearing a Members Only jacket; the episode where Junior shot Tony was titled "Members Only"... supposedly there's some clue in the credits that one of the people there had the last name "Leotardo" (nope, that one's not true)... in the first episode of the season, on the boat, Tony tells Bobby that when you get whacked, "everything just goes black"... if Tony did in fact die, that means they went with the "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" ending- that movie, you may remember, concluded with dozens of guns being pulled on the heroes, but a freeze frame ended the film before they actually died.
- But here's the thing: We don't know. And we'll never know. And that's the point. This e-mail, which had been making the rounds, is totally wrong on multiple levels. No, those weren't the same two black guys who shot Tony in Season 1; unless you think all black people look alike.
- I'm also loving seeing the OUTRAGE from "Sopranos" fans, who crashed HBO's website, are calling the cable company in anger, and even threatening to cancel their HBO. Mostly, it's the same idiots who for the entire run of the season have screamed bloody murder every time a whole episode went by without anyone getting whacked. And you've gotta love the absurdity of canceling HBO to protest a series that will never air another new episode, HBO or no HBO. Reminds me of the people who tried to organize a boycott of baseball during the strike, even though there was no baseball to be boycotted.
- I loved the juxtaposition between the vanishing Little Italy (which, aside from one block, is all Chinatown now), and the houses being built around the Johnny Sack/Janice house. And Janice ends up a bitter widow, just like her mom- it would've been too unsubtle for her to say "I wish the Lord would take me now."
- Even though Uncle Junior stopped being an interesting character sometime around the second season, that last scene with him and Tony was just perfect.
- You know who liked the episode more than anyone? Journey!
- Theories on the cat: It's either the reincarnation of Christopher, of Adriana, or of Big Pussy. Probably Chris, but who really knows?
- Meadow can't possibly believe her own bullshit, can she? Does she really think the reason her father got led away in handcuffs all those times is because he's Italian, and not because he's, you know, actually a criminal? Either she's really dumb, or in a state of Carmela-like denial (I'm guessing the latter.)
- At the same time, AJ turns into Tony- right down to the blond girlfriend, bathrobe, leggy therapist, and the near-death-experience-in-an-SUV-curing-depression (remember Tony getting shot in the "Tiny Tears" episode in Season 1, and suddenly feeling better?) But I don't buy for a second that AJ went in the space of two minutes from spouting Chomsky talking points to wanting to fight in Afghanistan. The only American I can think of who went from adamantly opposing a war to inexplicably deciding to fight in it was John Kerry.
- Agent Harris exclaiming "we're gonna win this thing" apparently was lifted from something some FBI agent once actually said. But was "we" supposed to refer to the Soprano side in the mob war, or to the FBI, "winning" their war on organized crime now that Phil is dead?
- It's official- nothing good ever happens in an SUV on "Sopranos." There was Tony's aforementioned shooting in Season 1, the car accidents with both Adriana and Christopher, Christopher shooting the SUV, and now AJ's exploding SUV and Phil's running over his head.
- Alan Sepinwall has the first post-show interview with David Chase.
- While you're still piecing everything together, TVTattle has all of the relevant links on the finale, pro and con. Meanwhile, I still have to go and watch it again.
Good thoughts blogger...I think people will be talking about this one forever whether Tony did die or it was the viewer or the viewer in Tony's perspective...oh well...I still love the show and can't wait to buy the box set!
Posted by: A at June 12, 2007 11:22 PMI too had a change of heart about the ending. Initially, I thought it was a cheap "lady or the tiger" ending, but after seeing clips, I have joined those who believe that it's the audience who got whacked. It's not Lady or the Tiger -- Tony lives and goes on and on, the audience gets whacked, and as Bobby said in that first episode, you don't see it coming.
David Chase said Tony lives. In all the choices you and others have run through in mob movies, the one thing that no one has done has whacked the audience.
Viewers have been getting off voyeuristically on these mob hits, and were waiting for one last hit ... then everyone thought their cable went out.
An analogous technique was in Trey Parker's Orgazmo. There are all these scenes that follow the progression of a porn scene, but every time you are about to see a naked woman, a man's hairy ass appears in the camera and blocks it.
It's the same basic idea -- you want the mob hit, viewer -- no, you die ... while there is a lack of moral closure, it does say something about the relationship between viewer and the moral emotions therein. I don't think this is a particularly clever thing, lots of folks have done this "alienation" thing for at least 80 years, but for the Sopranos, it is an appropriate ending.
Plus, as you and others have said, the rest of the characters have "arrived" somewhere -- there is a sense of closure, even though, frankly, like so much in the Sopranos, it feels really forced.
Tony lives; the viewer dies.
Your mileage may vary.
BTW, Robert Coover's short story The Marker from Pricksongs & Descants (along with a lot of 60s metafiction) does something similar, and predates, Orgazmo. But Brecht and others were doing the "alienation" thing far earlier.
Posted by: Mr. Anon at June 14, 2007 08:56 AM