WTF??? was this intended to do anything but some more? doesn't seem like it.

buh bye.

At this rate, it looks like thats exactly whats going to happen.

D

You can't possibly believe that this hour was "leagues beyond any other crap on TV". I could name half a dozen shows that I've seen in the past seven days far superior to what passes for "The Sopranos" lately. Oh, and thank you for telling us that the show is about a family, it really cleared things up for me. All of the established storylines are totally stagnant and have been for weeks. Instead of introducing two new characters who are irrelevant and will be forgotten about next week, further the existing plots. Six episodes left until another year-and-whatever hiatus, and little of importance has happened this season. Oh wait, a bear walked by the pool. Great.

I propose that the phrase "jump the shark" be replaced with "bear walked by the pool".

"Hey, man. Did you watch The Practice the other night?"
"Naw dude, ever since they fired Lara Flynn Boyle the bear has walked by the pool on that show."
"I hear ya."

As someone who has always stuck up for the show when the "not enough whacking" arguments have been made, and someone who has really enjoyed this season (although not as much as previous ones), I just have to say...

...that was probably the worst episode of my 2nd favorite show that I have ever seen.

It was boring. I don't care if what transpired was necessary for the character development of Tony. I found myself looking at the clock for almost an entire hour, thinking "When will it be 1 am (had to watch on HBO West b/c of 24)?" instead of my usual, "Damn its 10 already!"

I watch TV to be entertained. The scenes with Chris' friend--I was entertained (didn't think he would just crack him in the face like that, $15 for an Emmy, Favreau reference). Unfortunately I was already in a shitty mood thanks to way too much screentime for Johnny's woman.

Buscemi's directing credits: "Pine Barrens" and this shipwreck. Kinda ironic.

The biggest problem with last night's show was that the Tim Daly storyline was too similar to the Robert Patrick one that ran a few seasons ago...I felt I had seen this plot thread before.

This was the weakest episode of the season so far, but it was by no means as bad as some people (who seem to come in here every week saying how bad the show is...then why are you still watching it?) in this thread claim it is.

Stop this banter, I, unlike most, liked last weeks ep. However tonights ep was driven by 2 people who we've never seen, which i could care 2 shits about like all others.

Before it was we're going to see the NY vs NJ battle, then last last week i dug the soprano struggle, with she saying, "you better watch your step" ......... i wanted Tony to rip shit up tonight, not to cry over freckles. His long lost dog.

Considering i watch 4 shows per week, being enterprise, sheild, american idol and sopranos. Besides Cosby show on nick at night, which never lets me down. This is un called for, i expect better.

Right now, i don't watch 24, but the shield is soooooooooooooooooooo much better than sopranos right now, and i hate to say that too.

It seems to me that tonights episode had some good things in it, I mean like what was mentioned earlier Tony is doing some soul searching which is good for his character but having that old mistriss in half the damn episode was crap! The whole Chris and his friend thing was okay. I have liked all the seasons, even 4 and even last weeks though I had some annoyances such as too much Anth. Jr. and Carm and the teacher, but sitting through that woman talk about the old days was getting old. I mean they could have quickened it. Anyhoo I hope that the season starts to be more like the end of the 4th or what was happening a few episodes ago! OH and who said 24 SUCKED.......

I got Melfi's line about the mistress= his mother stuck in my head. Then Tony makes some comment about sleeping with his mother. So I looked at the mistress as a maternal figure to Tony. When she does the seductiion (a la Marilyn) I could just see Tony picturing his mom. It was well done.

Which begs the question, why was he playing her up at the end to his friends?

Didn't care for this episode at all and I am one who enjoys almost all the episodes, including the less 'action-packed' ones. Character development can only go so far.

wow...season 5, for the most part, has really blown so far... a few medicore episodes with a good one here and there... I miss the good ol' days when this show didn't constantly disappoint....

MATT

Watching that old broad sing and try to be sexy was cringe inducing.

At least we got to see a little bit of Johnny Sack. He's the best character on the show when they really focus on him.

I saw nothing but pride beaming from Tony as he played her up. Tony's father was able to bag a broad as classy as JFK's mistress, quite an accomplishment. It's a status symbol for him and a moment of pride. His legacy is boosted in his eyes to another level. He already had an infatuation with JFK since he had purchased his captain's hat, and finding out there were actual ties to Camelot took the cake.

The NJ/NY war was also played out a little further in this episode, since Tony laid claim to a higher percentage of the track, and it was interesting to watch Johnny Sack bite his lip as he granted Tony's share. The dissidence from Phil has set things up nicely.

The Tim Daly storyline was old hat and done with Robert Patrick, but because this time it's Christopher I did like how the show portrays the vicious cycle of outsiders getting grinded up and spit out when they invite themselves into their world.

I thought this was a solid episode. Not great, but solid. All the haters need to stop thinking about how many episodes are remaining because you're just going to hate every new show until the series finale, since the storylines you care about aren't going to get tied up until the end, if that. Since just about every episode is fresh in my mind from all 4 seasons (I didn't start watching until I got my hands on the DVDs about 2 months before the premiere of this 5th season), no single storyline is ever really tied up nicely and completely closed, like real life. I absolutely love the slice-of-life approach that the Sopranos takes, but is obviously hated by others.

Bravo. You summed it up perfectly for me.
Sopranos is not an action series, it is a family drama. Like many family dramas what the characters do at work is not stressed as much as how they interact and develope.

I believe he owed Chris $60K, $1200 was just the "points."

That storyline did interest me somewhat because it was about Chris, not the other guy, e.g. that it was perfectly normal for Chris to say, "Why didn't you call me before you shot up?"--his ability to completely separate his business from the rest of it. And the look the guy in response said it all.

That said, the whole old woman storyline was mildly interesting but way overdone. Overall a middle-of-the-road episode. (Glad I taped 24 to watch afterwards.)

That was pretty lame....

I thought this episode was hilarious throughout. Tony seeing the picture of the dog, Junior blissfully snacking while seemingly unaware that he's at a child's funeral, and the great self-mockery with the $15 Emmy ("maybe if it was an Oscar, but TV?")... it all had me rolling. It wasn't blow-me-away edge-of-my-seat drama, but I still enjoyed it.

It wasn't just that, although that was a great part of it. It also showed at how easily the mobster mentality these guys have allows them to separate the stuff they do for business and the stuff that's the rest of their life. When Chris loaned the money to his friend that was business to him, but his friend didn't see it that way. When Chris and the other guy beat the shit out of the writer, that was also business, so Chris still thought of them as friends, but the writer obviously didn't see it that way, nor would most normal people. I thought that segment, although mundane in some ways, demonstrated how violence was just a normal part of life for those guys, and how alien their mindset is compared to the rest of us.

My interpretation was that he was playing her up to rebuild his own opinion as much as anything else. When he first met her he believed her very classy and magical. I think he found the more he knew the less glamorous she seemed. In the end, he lied to himself and others to in order to rebuild that internal image. I also think it could be that he was starting to get upset and defensive towards his mother regarding this woman. When the mistress made the comment about how his mother looked at New Year's he didn't seem to take it well. Problem is he hasn't stuck up for his mother in a long time and has tried to hate her. So he could have been re-building the image of the mistress to help him further justify it being ok (in his mind) what his father did.


As a side note, I understand 24 has its fans which is fine. But I couldn't even finish the first season. Maybe it got better in seasons 2 & 3. All I know is I stopped watching w/ about 8 hours left in season 1 and I was watching it on DVD w/o commercials or having to wait for next weeks episode. How can I take seriously any show where the daughter befriends, develops feelings for, and tries to rescue (& put her mother and herself in the line of fire, as a result) her kidnapper?

That was my only complaint with this week's episode - we had seen that before.

Other than that, I thought it was a solid episode. People can whine and moan about character development all they want, but when a character develops (like Tony did) to the revelation that he may in fact be just like his father and the hate that so drives his emotions towards his mother for the past few seasons, may in fact lie behind false pretenses - deserves an hour of explanation in my book.

The final scene at the Bada-Bing was simply priceless.

This week I can agree with the people who are annoyed that they aren't following up on any previous episodes storylines. They could've thrown this episode into almost any time in the show after Chris went to rehab. And it seemed pretty weird to put it right after the big falling out with Tony and Adriana. It probably would've made more sense for this episode to be shown 3 weeks ago. Other than beating the shit out of his buddy Joe Hackett, he was very mellow and motivated to stay clean which seemed pretty weird after all that mess he went through.

The Sopranos
Directed by Alan Smithee



How long did HBO force us to wait for this? Remind me again.

They ought to get David Lynch to do a couple episodes, though I doubt that'd save it now. I really think this show is dead. The last three weeks have been the worst of the series. And yeah, maybe it's still much better than the rest of TV, but a broken-down Ferrari still doesn't move, does it??

My 2 cents...

1) This entire episode played like a 'deleted scene' in Seasons 1 or 2. Worse, like the last episode before this, there was so little carried on into another episode that it could have been put in anywhere, with a few quick edits. Very few of the arcs are advancing, what little there is. Even the previews are snoozers.

2) Interesting how most of the characters are doing cameos now, makes me wonder who worked on the show the entire season. So much for a show about an Italian-American family

3) Oh, I guess Tony is still seeing the Latin art dealer. Am I the only one that thought that little f-scene was picked up from floor sweepings in the editor's office?

4) Nice of them to to marry off Bacala w/no exposition. This would have a been pretty juicy arc to exploit, instead we're subjected to watching creepy old women act like Marilyn Monroe.

Anybody else suspect at all that the mistress was potentially playing up her role in Tony's father's life, and was lying about the whole JFK thing? Possibly as a means to impress Tony and get some cash from him? (which she did get)

I don't know. That whole thing had a weird feel to it.
I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and I thought it had when Tony brought up the thing about her buying cigarettes and smoking when his father was dying of emphasema.
For a second there, I thought maybe he had caught her in a lie.

I could be wrong but she didn't seem to be quite kosher.

I'm sure there was a certain amount of sarcasm in your post but I'll go ahead an bite. It was obviously deliberate since Tony glanced up at the art work with the dogs and was reminded of his own dog. The dog which he'd just discovered was given to the son of his dad's mistress. Ironically this occurs while he's...(drum roll)....f'n his mistress.

That probably annoyed me most. You get a rare scene with Valentina - getting screwed no less - and no good T&A shots.

You must have missed the sit down with Johnny Sack, Phil Leotardo, Hesch, Silvio and Tony. Tony didn't like the way Phil was talking to him which led to more bad blood between the families. Especially after Tony chased him with the Escalade and caused him to crash.

That's exactly how I saw it. When he first met her she seemed so wonderful, classy and exciting. The more he got to know her, the more he disliked her. I'm sure he could tell that she was just trying to get money from him.

This episode wasn't great, but it was still good. I still can see storylines expanding with each episode. It's true that some shows have slower development than others, but I believe that each show at least brings some character development.