The Sopranos: Joke's on YOU
The finale of the Sopranos series aired last night. Just some thoughts on the last scene.
First of all, it's very clear that the show jumped the shark years ago. Arguably at some point midway through season 3 when HBO demanded more seasons than what Chase had plotted out, but certainly in the lackluster, sloppy, meandering season 4. Like Junior's dementia, it was an ugly, gradual decline, lightened occasionally by a few stellar episodes and moments of great writing, then suddenly darkened by classic shark-jumping action (Steven Buscemi, Tony's cousin, suddenly shows up at the start of the godawful season 5, even though we had never heard anything about him before and suddenly we're supposed to accept him as cannon; then fat minor character Vito and a gay turn -- yes, I am not joking, a gay character in a MOB DRAMA -- with several episodes devoted entirely to him in a gay friendly NH town).
A quick detour: the term jumping the shark refers to when a show begins to go to hell. It originated in Happy Days when the Fonz literally jumped over a great white shark on water skis.
HBO threw David Chase so much money that basically he had an offer he couldn't refuse. Then he put the same offer on James Gandolfini, who had come to hate the show and the characters obviously as much as its creator (their hatred for the material is only matched by their non-subtle disgust and contempt for people like me who have watched this garbage for years and years).
End result is a finale season full of blatant social commentary and parody of itself. David Chase hates television, hates HBO, hates Sopranos fans, and he rubs this in your face. Repeatedly. His contempt for the viewers was about as subtle as Vito's gay plotline... i.e. not subtle at all.
The show ended in a very tense scene in a diner with Tony and his immediate family. Lot of strange guys around, including an Italian guy who looked like he'd pop Tony any second. They're talking about onion rings, the daughter is having trouble parallel parking (tension adding), then suddenly, the screen cuts to black, music cuts, thirty seconds of black passes, then the goddamn credits.
Note it CUT to black, no fade-out. I really believe Chase did this to make people think their cable cut out or HBO screwed up. It was the ultimate punch-line, a huge joke on the millions of people who have made Chase probably more than a hundred million dollars in take home cash.
And that was it.
As any decent writer or storyteller will tell you, this is the cardinal sin. The Lady or The Tiger. Or in the case of the Sopranos, the fries or the onion rings. No conclusion... just a tripe "whatever you want it to be" ending. The ultimate lame, the ultimate cop-out.
Honestly, I'd be laughing my head off if I didn't feel like such a fool for watching the stupid show after the quality died back in... the year TWO THOUSAND. Millions and millions of people had been had, and David Chase got the last laugh on HBO (you know he had to have absolute creative freedom in his contract when he agreed to do the later seasons). I feel like one of those joke Star Wars fanboys who stood in line for months to see George Lucas' "great vision" of the absolutely stupid and terrible Phantom Menace. I really do want to laugh, but when I think of all the people out there who will say the ending was "brilliant" and Chase is a "genius," I have no urge to laugh at all.
- Josh
First of all, it's very clear that the show jumped the shark years ago. Arguably at some point midway through season 3 when HBO demanded more seasons than what Chase had plotted out, but certainly in the lackluster, sloppy, meandering season 4. Like Junior's dementia, it was an ugly, gradual decline, lightened occasionally by a few stellar episodes and moments of great writing, then suddenly darkened by classic shark-jumping action (Steven Buscemi, Tony's cousin, suddenly shows up at the start of the godawful season 5, even though we had never heard anything about him before and suddenly we're supposed to accept him as cannon; then fat minor character Vito and a gay turn -- yes, I am not joking, a gay character in a MOB DRAMA -- with several episodes devoted entirely to him in a gay friendly NH town).
A quick detour: the term jumping the shark refers to when a show begins to go to hell. It originated in Happy Days when the Fonz literally jumped over a great white shark on water skis.
HBO threw David Chase so much money that basically he had an offer he couldn't refuse. Then he put the same offer on James Gandolfini, who had come to hate the show and the characters obviously as much as its creator (their hatred for the material is only matched by their non-subtle disgust and contempt for people like me who have watched this garbage for years and years).
End result is a finale season full of blatant social commentary and parody of itself. David Chase hates television, hates HBO, hates Sopranos fans, and he rubs this in your face. Repeatedly. His contempt for the viewers was about as subtle as Vito's gay plotline... i.e. not subtle at all.
The show ended in a very tense scene in a diner with Tony and his immediate family. Lot of strange guys around, including an Italian guy who looked like he'd pop Tony any second. They're talking about onion rings, the daughter is having trouble parallel parking (tension adding), then suddenly, the screen cuts to black, music cuts, thirty seconds of black passes, then the goddamn credits.
Note it CUT to black, no fade-out. I really believe Chase did this to make people think their cable cut out or HBO screwed up. It was the ultimate punch-line, a huge joke on the millions of people who have made Chase probably more than a hundred million dollars in take home cash.
And that was it.
As any decent writer or storyteller will tell you, this is the cardinal sin. The Lady or The Tiger. Or in the case of the Sopranos, the fries or the onion rings. No conclusion... just a tripe "whatever you want it to be" ending. The ultimate lame, the ultimate cop-out.
Honestly, I'd be laughing my head off if I didn't feel like such a fool for watching the stupid show after the quality died back in... the year TWO THOUSAND. Millions and millions of people had been had, and David Chase got the last laugh on HBO (you know he had to have absolute creative freedom in his contract when he agreed to do the later seasons). I feel like one of those joke Star Wars fanboys who stood in line for months to see George Lucas' "great vision" of the absolutely stupid and terrible Phantom Menace. I really do want to laugh, but when I think of all the people out there who will say the ending was "brilliant" and Chase is a "genius," I have no urge to laugh at all.
- Josh
posted by Josh Day at 10:51 AM
1 Comments:
I don't think I've watched more than a total of a couple of hours, hit and miss, of any Soprano episodes, so don't consider myself a fan by any stretch. But after chuckling at your animated commentary, I felt I should at least drop a note that I understand where you're coming from. I often wonder what my $65 a month buys me in TV programming. Anyway, thanks for letting me know I didn't miss anything not following this last Soprano episode, or the ones preceding it.
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