The Sopranos is over and I wanted to write a little reflection on it. So, if you haven’t already watched it move on.
The show has been an integral part of my life since it’s premiere in 1999. It’s spanned my final year of high school, through college and beyond. Fond memories include the gathering around the television at ‘Scill’s house off campus to watch it every Sunday night, and re-watching the first three seasons on DVD at Sully’s and Yaki the French Tickler’s house. Throughout the last week we spent it theorizing and going over ten times what we think would happen in the last episode via email; all of us wishing it was the good old days where we could all sit around the couch, and watch a show that we loved. But we have those trips of nostalgia all the time now that we’re all professional hacks with little time for us to get together more than once every couple of months.
When the show first came out, I can’t remember exactly what it was that got me into it so quickly. At first thought, it may have been as shallow as feeling I was honor bound by my heritage to watch everything and anything that had to do with Italian gangsters. But in the waning moments of this season I finally realized that its SO much more than another gangster movie or tv show.
Sure, it respected those films and shows and had more than it’s share of send-ups to those features, but what made it so different was it was a actual character study. I’ll go out on a limb and say it was the best character driven show of my life. The show created multi-faceted characters brought to life by actors (who I’m not sure were really acting-I could see how those people actually act like that in real life minus the killing), who breathed a lot of life into those characters.
In the end, I think the show was about what family means, and how those lines are crossed in mob life. In mob life, family are your compatriots in things illegal. They are the ones that keep their mouths shut, because when you keep your mouth shut through bad moments you get closer, becoming like a family. Then the obvious family, those that succeed your name and your seed in the world. For me, the show was always about the difference between the two, and how your “family business,” can bleed into your personal life with a gun in hand. That was the constant menace. Right up until this episode the show stayed true to that with Bobby dying buying a train set for his son and Phil perishing in front of his grand kids. That was always the constant of the show, that when business came into life it meant the end. In a physical sense, it brought life to the saying, “Don’t bring your work home.” Instead, work came to you, and it was never good.
All over the internets and the New York papers are calling this final episode at the height of it’s mediocrity but I honestly think those people don’t really see it the way I do. People are hating it for its ambiguous, or surprise ending; but to call it a surprise ending must come from someone who doesn’t actually know the definition of the phrase. A surprise is a shock, as if you already had a preconceived notion before the episode started. And that’s premature and inappropriate to do so on a show of this caliber. What I always took from this show is: you take what you want from it, because of the perfectly orchestrated characters and weird scenarios that don’t seem to have anything to do with anything that David Chase created making predictable outcomes impossible. People could see that as being a downfall, but I took that as being given the freedom to make conclusions in a plethora of different angles. Essentially, making it impossible for any given person to make the same analogy as the one next to him or her. I guarantee there is still a lot left that I’ve misinterpreted that we’ll never know for its intention. That’s what I think makes good programming, it leaves concepts and moments open for interpretation, and gets you as the audience member interact with the show. Let’s face it: for all it’s existential moments (like talking fish, the dream sequence after killing Ralphie and while Tony was in a coma); there was never any better show that got you to react and think about what those moments had to do with the big picture. Which was: how was Tony and his families going to get through this?
What I took away from this episode was that it doesn’t matter whether Tony lives or dies but now that the menace of Phil has been erased we see it from Tony’s perspective. We finally see what he sees when he gets together with his immediate family; which for any of us would normally be a comfortable, serene and happy scene but for him he sees: are those black kids coming in the door coming for me? or that guy going to the bathroom? (Godfather anyone?) How ironic would it be that Meadow, a girl who this episode decides to go into something that goes against everything her father has ever done, a girl who sucks at parallel parking (c’mon, you’re a city girl) is the one to survive the family? I thought all of those things as I’m sure many did.
Though what that scene did masterfully for me is it showed that Tony is a man afraid of death, which is far worse than receiving. Living in fear is wretched, horrible, and it seems is destiny for Tony Soprano. That’s a far better ending than being told that he survives or dies, and by cutting out like that made possible our own interpretations of what happens. Which is the ultimate sign of respect for me on David Chase’s part. What people are calling bullshit on the “surprise” cliffhanger ending don’t actually have any sense of imagination. David Chase respects his viewers far more than that, he respects us enough to show us what’s going through Tony’s head in those last moments and cuts out to force us to use our imaginations to decide what happens. He doesn’t tell us, because he thinks that would be holding our hands, coddling us as if we were being led off a bridge to jump like electro shocked lemmings. We’re smarter than that, he’s believing his audience has a brain in their head and doesn’t have to be told what happens. He’s saying, “There are other shows for you Dorito chomping, reality TV watching, live-at-home housewives that will take you by the hand, but this show isn’t one of them. So, you decide.”
Again, it was the ultimate sign of respect for me. Am I wrong in these interpretations? Probably, but that’s a matter of opinion. At least I was given the option of being able to debate what happens rather than being told what does. I think Chase has more respect for us, his Soprano audience members, and that’s evident that he won’t tell us what happens, he makes us become an active part of the show which was what he was always good at. He gets us to react and fill in the blanks with his suggestions. There are so many options for debate in every episode of this show, that it’s impossible for two people to have the same exact theory. And that’s what makes this show better than most: it can be interpreted in a million different ways. And in the end, not for everyone.
