“The Sopranos” — Made In America
Head-crushing spoilers and thoughts on the end of a landmark piece of television right after the jump…
Of course it had to be Journey, right?
Well, you’ve got to give credit to Mr. Chase. The man knows how to make a finale that will keep people talking — even if what they’re talking about is how infuriating they found those last few moments of The Sopranos, one of the seminal artistic achievements of the modern era, to be. It simply comes down to a personal decision. Are you going to let the intentional non-ending drive you crazy to the point of decrying the entire series? Or are you going to relish the notion that life has no visual beginning and ending because we aren’t conscious to see it?
I tend to side with the latter.
Before getting too deep into the ins and outs of the finale (which may or may not happen anyway — it ends, that’s it) I’d like to take this time to explain the impact The Sopranos had on me.
I honestly can’t remember if I started watching the show in the spring of 2001 or 2002*. Either way, it all started when a friend called me and said he had watched the first season on DVD in under 24 hours and how I absolutely needed to check it out. A short time later I rented the first three episodes on glorious VHS from my local video store. I was back for the next three episodes later that night. The experience was shocking. I had never seen television like this (luckily, HBO was quick to remind me that this wasn’t television).
I blasted through that first season in about a day and a half. The second season I didn’t get a chance to watch until much later — whenever it finally came out of DVD. By this point I was able to jump in and watch season three as it reran on HBO leading to season 4, which I finally watched live and have been watching live since.
Before I watched The Sopranos, I was a movie-guy. I loved films. I loved the medium and relished their deconstruction. For example, in 2001 I watched something like 186 movies I hadn’t seen before and maybe three television season. Watching those first seasons of The Sopranos was a revelatory experience as I was able to see the language of cinema used in a way that seemed completely new. Characters could be explored over a period of hours, not minutes. Plot lines unfolded slowly, sometimes not at all, and sometimes at a furious pace never having to worry about hitting certain dramatic cues at specific minute marks.
That, and the fact that its relentlessly entertaining. The show is extremely funny, but not a comedy. It endlessly bleak and not really a drama. All we can really say is that its delivered to us hourly and come across as nothing shy of reality. Sure, we’re not in the mob, but we’re all in a family and we can see ourselves inside these people — even the killers.
The Sopranos is responsible for me seeking out whatever other television I could find. If I’d missed something this great for so many years surely I’ve been missing a lot more. To my great fortune, television on DVD was taking off and getting a hold of new and interesting content was suddenly quite easy (growing up, my family never had HBO, which created its own problems when it came to actually watching The Sopranos when new episodes started up — thanks Kristin and Adam!). A few short years later, movies have become just a thing to do to stay out of the heat and television has (obviously) become priority number one. Last year I watched 39 seasons of television and maybe 50 movies.
In the media build-up to last night’s episode, the phrase “greatest achievement in the history of television” was thrown around a lot. Obviously I disagree as anyone who reads this site knows my allegiances side with The Wire. Still, with the modifier of “family drama” I can’t disagree. The Sopranos dared to create a series that let its characters grow. Between their epic hiatuses things in the world — the real world — would happen and when the show came back those characters would have lived through those same events. I’m reminded of the start of the fourth season when Bobby and Tony sit at a diner and Bobby says “Nostradamus predicted all of this.” The episode aired in September of 2002. The season three finale happened in may of 2001.
As the years went on the characters changed — some just getting old. The best example being my favorite character, Uncle Junior. When the series started he was a bitter old man who eventually learned to play nice. Then he began to suffer from dementia. By the end of last nights series finale his mind was completely gone. It was heartbreaking because we, along with the TV family, could see him fade away. A character who was once one of the sharpest of the bunch now barely a blip on anyone’s radar as he sits away the rest of his life in a state-run mental facility.
The brilliance of The Sopranos and the bravery of HBO executives is that everyone just let the show happen. There were no schedules. Tony Soprano didn’t show up every March. In fact some years would go by and he wouldn’t show up at all. Over the show’s nine and a half year run, they amassed some 86 episodes. By comparison, Lost has been around for less than three years, aired over 66 episodes.
Back to the finale, I love reading message boards and seeing everyone complain about the non-ending. The thing is what would could have possibly satisfied anyone, let alone everyone? As Tony sat in that diner, with members of his family showing up one by one with Journey blasting over the soundtrack, my heart began to race. I saw on the clock that we were seconds from the end of the episode and thus the end of these characters availability to us. Every cut seemed to be filled with more and more dread — and Meadow just couldn’t park that damn car!
The previous 59 minutes had tied up everything they could tie up that dealt with the season we had just watched. Phil was dead. Tony’s crew was regrouping. There was peace between New York and New Jersey. The feds were closing in, but since the show started it seems like they’ve always been closing in — this time, however, subpoenas seemed eminent. Tony finally went to see Junior, if for no other reason than to try to convince him to give the money (if he should ever find it) to Bobby’s kids, not Janice. Junior was too far gone to know what was talking to him. A.J. tried to better himself but ultimately realized that it wasn’t worth the effort when you have the opportunity to live a pain-free existence.
The only thing left to happen was Tony getting a bullet to the back of the head, or for the FBI to come storming in and take him away on RICO — or maybe he flips and goes on witness protection, or… or anything, really. He doesn’t know what’s going to happen to him so why should we.
I found the whole thing to be brilliant.
Right before the finale I re-watched the pilot. It’s startling how much that episode foretold about the series as a whole. The quote that sticks out the most, and has always been an underlying theme of the series was one of the first things Tony ever says to Dr. Melfi, “I’ve been thinking. It’s good to be in something from the ground floor. I came too late for that. I know. But lately I’m getting the feeling that I came in at the end.” Last night, we all had that feeling.
*After a brief check of my records (yes, I keep records), it looks like it was in April of 2001 that I watched the first season on VHS.
June 11th, 2007 at 1:19 pm
What do you think about the “lights out” theory — the idea that the screen going black represents Tony’s death? (The idea being that he doesn’t see it coming, the same way Phil didn’t see it coming.)
June 11th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
oooh, i like that theory. and the ending was great.
June 11th, 2007 at 7:48 pm
I like that theory. I also like the notion that the Feds orchestrated the two sides to go after each other so that the problem “would take care of itself” — kind of a stretch, but interesting.
Otherwise, I’m kind of shocked by people’s shock at the ending. Honestly, what were they expecting? Had they seen the show before?