"Stage 5"

Tony finds art imitating life at the "Cleaver'' premiere; Johnny Sack copes with more bad news.

solid episode. i cant imagine how they are going to wrap things up within 7 episodes.

Wow, what an episode. For all the people who complained about 'nothing happening' in season 6 part 1 (even though lots did), it looks like that pace they want is here for the final nine. The ending of this episode with that music... Phil... the close-up in the church between Chris and Tony... all chilling.

i'm not sure i understood what Phil was getting at in his speech towards the end.

What? Chris = Dead.

He was complaining that when someone wronged him or his family, he stood by and did nothing. He's done with that now and, IMO, will seak revenge on Christopher and, probably, Tony... At least that's how I heard it.

my thoughts exactly.

The cousin Phil was speaking of was Blundetto, wasn't it? I just took Phil's speech to mean that he has decided to take control of the NY family instead of letting it continue to fall apart.

Wow, great episode. Very Progressive. They've build up the New York vs New Jersey angle as far as they can and now it's going to explode.

Judging by the previews for next week, it looks like Paulie might have some trouble making it to the finale. Over the weekend someone told me about the Vegas odds for the characters making it. He said Phil was 6-1, Tony 5-1, and Christopher was 4-1.

Why do you assume that everyone watches the previews for next week? Is it really that hard to spoiler your post? It wasn't for me.

You can't tell shit from the previews anyways. They always try to trick you.

WOW, a Sopranos episode that FELT like it was leading twords something good.

(Thats the problem people have with this show..usually even when something IS leading to something else, we just dont trust Chase to follow through)

Very un-Sopranos like with the last 5 minutes...it was SCREAMING "SOMETHING IS HAPPENING HERE!!!!"

I also had to laugh, because my Grandmothers family name was changed on Ellis Island too

IMO kind of a dissapointing eposode...the whole Johnny Sack thing just felt unneccesary.

My bad about the spoilers. I just assume people know what I know.

The Johnny Sac thing was important because now Phil doesn't have to be loyal to his wishes and is just gonna go nuts. And anytime Ginny Sac can get some screen time I get excited.

This was the fattest we have ever seen James Gandolfini and Steve Van Zandt. Compare that to how they were from season 1. It's unreal!

Terrific episode - you could feel the future bearing down on them.

Anyone checked to see if those CLEAVER coffee mugs and leather jackets are on sale at the HBO Store?

Are you kidding here? Now it's about control and now Sack isn't around to even care about what Phil would do...

Like SonOfStu's post above, I took Phil's speech to be about the Buscemi character, not Chris. Buscemi is the one who killed Phil's brother.

That scene in the restaurant with Silvio when everything slowed down, I cursed out loud because my first thought was, oh jeez freakin Time-Warner cable box is screwed up again. And then *bam* back to realtime. I was like whoah! Yes, it has been done before but I never would have expected it in the Sopranos. Sydney Pollack was awesome also.

Man...am I the only one that took Phil's speech as meaning he was stepping away?

Well, he was going to step away.

But then that whole scene with his bro's birthday party? A birthday party for a dead man? It was very obvious Phil was very upset over this still, and this birthday party really pinched a nerve in him. Not only that but now he's regressing even further and letting anger well up inside of him for other things... such as his family's name change from long ago. I think Phil is ready to finally take a stand... that's what I got out of it.

No, I thought that too. Sounded to me like he wanted to retire.
Even though the Johnny Sack storyline was good, it felt VERY rushed...like they needed to kill him off right away. we find out he has cancer and then dies in the same episode?
Another thing, he seemed very fat (alot heavier than last season) for someone who has lethal cancer and has undergone 2 treatments of chemo.

So are we supposed to think that Johnny Sac is modeled after Gotti (who was imprisoned at the Fed Med center in Springfield, MO and died of cancer)?

It was odd to have it mentioned given that I drive by it every day.

When your dieing of something like lung cancer your body and organs start to shut down and you become bloated because your body isn't functioning properly.