The Sopranos: Last Season

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/james_gandolfini_shot_by_closure

Check out this link for a good laugh! Gotta love The Onion.

 

Interesting article regarding the Sopranos finale:

'Sopranos' Creator Defends Famous Finale

By FRAZIER MOORE – Oct 23, 2007

NEW YORK (AP) — Just when we had made our peace with "The Sopranos" finale and moved on with our lives, David Chase has stirred things up again.

Breaking his silence months after the HBO mob drama ended its run, he is offering a belated explanation for that blackout at the restaurant. He strongly suggests that, no, Tony Soprano didn't get whacked moments later as he munched onion rings with his family at Holsten's. And mostly Chase wonders why so many viewers got so worked up over the series' non-finish.

"There WAS a war going on that week, and attempted terror attacks in London," says Chase. "But these people were talking about onion rings."

The interview, included in "`The Sopranos': The Complete Book," published this week, finds Chase exasperated by viewers who were upset that Tony didn't meet explicit doom.

Chase says the New Jersey mob boss "had been people's alter ego. They had gleefully watched him rob, kill, pillage, lie and cheat. They had cheered him on. And then, all of a sudden, they wanted to see him punished for all that. They wanted 'justice'...

"The pathetic thing — to me — was how much they wanted HIS blood, after cheering him on for eight years."

In the days, and even weeks, after the finale aired June 10, "Sopranos" wonks combed that episode for buried clues, concocting wild theories. (Was this some sort of "Last Supper" reimagined with Tony, wife Carmela, son A.J. and daughter Meadow?)

Chase insists that what you saw (and didn't see) is what you get.

"There are no esoteric clues in there. No `Da Vinci Code,'" he declares.

He says it's "just great" if fans tried to find a deeper meaning, but "most of them, most of us, should have done this kind of thing in high school English class and didn't."

He defends the bleak, seemingly inconclusive ending as appropriate — and even a little hopeful.

A.J. will "probably be a low-level movie producer. But he's not going to be a killer like his father, is he? Meadow may not become a pediatrician or even a lawyer ... but she'll learn to operate in the world in ways that Carmela never did.

"It's not ideal. It's not what the parents dreamed of. But it's better than it was," Chase says.

And as for that notorious blackout in the middle of the Journey power ballad, "Don't Stop Believin'"?

"Originally, I didn't want any credits at all," says Chase. "I just wanted the black screen to go the length of the credits — all the way to the HBO `whoosh' sound. But the Directors Guild wouldn't give us a waiver."

And while this unexpected finish left lots of viewers thinking their cable service was on the fritz, Chase insists it wasn't meant as a prank.

"Why would we want to do that?" he asks. "Why would we entertain people for eight years only to give them the finger?"

 

I just read the interview in the book while at Borders. It's not much different than the interview he gave right after the episode aired. He literally gives NO clue as to what he intended. I'm glad he didn't because it would ruin a great ended.

Obviously the above article and the way it chops bits of the interview up is completely misleading. And Chase defended nothing in it either.

 

If you haven't read this yet, you really should: http://masterofsopranos.wordpress.com/the-sopranos-definitive-explanation-of-the-end/

 

I maintain that if David Chase wanted the ending of the series to be Tony getting shot and killed in a diner, why not just show him getting shot and killed in the diner? Why be so obtuse about it?

To me the scene was about how he *could* be killed at any moment, and would live his whole life under that shadow.

 

This is what I thought had happened-the show abruptly faded to black because that particular shot was from Tony's POV, and the fade was him being shot and killed. Nothing new here for me.

Evan

 

Actually, it wasn't from Tony's POV. We were looking at him.

 

Presumably because what happens isn't as significant as how it happens. To just show Tony being killed like every other asorted whacking we've seen on the show would lower Tony to a minor character's level.

Or maybe because David Chase was annoyed that people were gambling on whether Tony would live or die and really wanted to drive the point home. You live like Tony, you die like Tony.

 

Brilliant scene. I really miss the show.

 

That was my impression. I thought the ending was fine.

 

Well, leaving things intentionally ambiguous has always been a staple of the show. We never did find out definitively who really killed Pie-O-My, did we? The characters didn't take violent action based on concrete proven evidence, but on their "gut instinct" and their own prejudices.

Isn't it more fun when the audience has to interpret for themselves? I don't actually believe there's any "RIGHT" answer to what happened or didn't happen, but I do find the essay's detailing of the camera shots of various earlier whackings to make a pretty convincing (or, at least; interesting) argument.

 

I think he meant that the "fade to black" was Tony's POV. At least that's how I took it.

 

Thank you for the recent link.


I think its hard to argue that the link isn't well thought out
and thorough.

I especially like the fact the writer references things Chase
has said in interviews.

He also admits that the ending is somewhat amibiguous
but takes it one step further and gives reasons WHY the
show was presented the way it was...

 

Well, he does make the best argument for the "Tony's dead" interpretation that I've read. Watching it myself, I felt like Chase was playing with the audience's expectation that something big was going to happen, and that the business with the Members Only guy was just misdirection -- but then that doesn't really give Chase any reason to do the cut to black. He could have communicated "Life goes on" by just fading out on the Sopranos in the diner. And the writer makes a good point that the "Tony has to watch over his shoulder" interpretation isn't really borne out by his behaviour in the scene; it's the audience that's apprehensive, not Tony.

What seems wrong to me is that Tony would be hit while he's with his family. In a restaurant, sure, but not with his wife and kids there; it seems totally against the code. Were there other hits like that in the series?

 

The above link addresses that issue.

And the easiest way to rebut your concern is to point out how
Phil Leatardo died.

Phil died ten minutes earlier in the episode with a gun to the back
of his head - right in front of his wife and grandkids.

The argument is that this was a "boss for a boss"... with each boss
killed in front of his family.

Both NY and NJ would see that as "even".... and the feud between
NY and NJ could end.


But the most compelling/interesting stuff in the above link is about
complacency... and how Chase shows us that Tony is complacent.

And he ties the discussion back to quotes where Chase talks about
complacency - and how that relates to the 9/11 theme that invaded
the series towards the end.


The fact is Tony just had the boss of NY killed... he SHOULD have
been looked a little more closely at his surroundings - or increased the
number of bodyguards from none to one.


I saw a comment one time in a magazine or newspaper where the
writer asked a real life mobster (or ex-mobster) what he thought
of the show and that was his first complaint...

"C'mon - this guy has ZERO bodyguards... that's a complete fantasy"

 

While there was no smoking gun shown, I think it was pretty much revealed from Ralph's admission about the insurance money that he directly or indirectly caused the horse to burn.

 

'Was re-reading this thread just cuz I love this damn show so much and felt I should bump it with the quote from musicalbeds. Great call that was made prior to airing. I'll go out and purchase a cigar for our lucky winner!

 

I would have appreciated an actual gun going off over the stark cut to black.

 

I was glad to see that the link provided in post #954 in this thread is still active... but I was even more happy to see that the owner of that site has continued to add additional details...

The interview quotes he provides from Chase are fascinating. Especially interviews that were conducted BEFORE the episode was aired - when Chase was actually a little more apt to talk about the show.

Even the director's commentary for the very first episode on the very first DVD release are interesting... Supposedly Chase says in that voice-over that at one point he considering doing the "WHOLE SERIES" from Tony's point of view (Doom style)... but he knew it was too radical and dropped the idea... or gave us the sessions with Dr. Melfi as a mechanism to let us crawl into Tony's head.

I was also amazed to read additional details about the significance of the Members Only jacket. Eugene (the guy who wasn't allowed to move to Florida) killed a fat guy (with the initials "T.S." !) in a crowded diner while wearing a Members Only jacket. I barely even remembered that happened.

 

You just blew my mind...I don't remember posting that, lol, although I do remember the thread I started; it's still my favourite show of all time.

And yet, I have no memory of making that "predication"...it was just me, typically thinking out loud.

Thanks very much for noting it...I'm very proud to have posted that.

Oh, and thanks for the cigar!

 

You guys know when 2 through 5 are coming out on Blu-ray?