And he wonders why he has hip problems?!

EPISODE 10: Moe 'N Joe

Only two things happened this week to further the narrative of Season Six of the Sopranos: Johnny Sack entered a guilty plea and Vito returned to Jersey. I will freely and voluntarily admit that the Janice = Livia sidecar was worthwhile, but it can't be said to have taken us into uncharted territory. It's more of a continuation of Chase's attempt to make Janice, now that Livia is no longer with us, the person currently on TV most likely to make me punch myself in the nuts. Point taken... painfully.

As for Johnny Sack's allocution, it set the dominos in motion for what I hope is a more action-driven final two episodes. Honestly, the same can be said for Vito's returning to Jersey. No way that ends well for him... it almost feels like he's looking for suicide by cop. He wasn't happy at home, so he did what he did (ad nauseum) and now he CAN'T go home. So what does he do? Go back to Tony or Sil with hat in hand or just hole up in a rat-infested motel and kill himself? It doesn't look like even he knows yet, but if he drives by Satriale's too many more times, that decision is going to be made for him. Hopefully it happens soon, so we can get on with the war with New York and Jersey.

*****

Something strikes me as I write "hopefully something happens SOON" for the 1000th time... Chase and co. used a cinematographic device they almost never use in "Mr. and Mrs. John Sacrimoni Request": the explicit leap forward in time. After three episodes centered around Tony in the hospital, "Request" begins with Rusty Milio receiving an invitation to Allegra's wedding... fade to black... and then "SIX WEEKS LATER." This was a conceit that I questioned somewhat on our podcast (which can now be subscribed to on iTunes, by the way). It felt amateurish, unnecessary and could have been accomplished with the already existing dialogue in the episode where Tony told Melfi he had been in a hospital bed at home for a month and a half. But, it served a purpose that pleased most viewers, judging from the internet uprising against dream sequences, which was getting Tony out of the hospital and away from the coma-induced dreams. Now, my question is this: Why was this potentially lengthy but interesting storyline (and all the power-struggle/crisis at home side-stories it could have produced) truncated in this way in favor of six weeks of Johnnycakes? WTF?!?!? I would much rather have seen the fallout from Sil's failure under pressure, internal strife with a leadership vacuum while Tony rehabbed and moped (which he does well), and a horse head in Sir Ben's bed than six weeks of Vito and Morgan Spurlock shacked up in New Hampshire. The writers seem not only to have squandered an opportunity from a narrative perspective but have also done so... ahem... with no viable exit strategy.

Vito getting caught by Finn at the construction site was water cooler fodder at its finest. It produced weeks' worth of "Holy Shit! That's going to be an interesting problem to have to resolve!" But after six weeks of Vito getting his hips displaced, I really don't care how it is resolved anymore... I just want it resolved. As I've said before, my main problem with it is not that Vito is gay, but that Gannascoli is not an actor who can carry six weeks worth of primary storyline. In inimitable Chase fashion, he has left untouched Bacala's shooting the rapper to boost album sales and AJ's bungled assasination attempt on Jun, not to mention we still don't know where the Russian interior decorator is... but we get half an already short season dedicated to THIS?! At this point, I don't even want an explanation of why the writers thought this was a good idea... I just want it overwith.

*****

Johnny Sack's plea dredged up the "I can talk about by Family but them's fightin' words if you do" scenario. Just as Phil trashed Johhny at the wedding for breaking down and then toed the party line when comments were made by an outsider, this episode showed Tony and Sil doing the same thing. They renounced Johnny as a friend and man of honor, but when Sal Vitro referred to him as "guilty" the stonewalling commenced.

Nice Fila track suit on Tone, by the way. I gotta get one of those. Or I could just start a Sopranos Fila Track Suit Counter, like the guy who does the Sopranos F-Bomb Counter.

If you don't know, now you know...

Live from the Pine Barrens is a Go

Finally, after much weeping, rending of garments and gnashing of teeth, my boy Nate D-O-Double has come through with a great new site where we will post our podcasts... Check it out.

LIVE FROM THE PINE BARRENS

Also, found a comprehensive history of the DiMeo (Soprano) Crime Family on Wikipedia. Nicely done.

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Link: Mel Kiper's NFL Draft Drinking Game

How pissed am I that I didn't find this before the draft?

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This isn't Gwyneth Paltrow's head is it?

EPISODE 8: Johnnycakes

Skipped last week for time reasons and was tempted to skip this week based on not being able to remove my head from the commode after seeing Vito's "afternoon delight" with Morgan Spurlock. However, watching AJ pretend to be Frank White with everyone acting like his best friend until the tab came (or until they needed to break an apartment lease and still get their deposit back) revived another Sopranos memory for me... Tony's image of the "dancing bear."

AJ got a taste of what it's like to be on display this week, just as Tony did when Cusamano and his band of Merry Boardroom Dipshits pretended, in the massively genius episode "A Hit is a Hit," that the books of their Country Club were going to be opened soon just to get Tony on the golf course and jack him up with questions about John Gotti and the realism of The Godfather trilogy.

Other analogous situations are Christopher's forays into the movie business, Artie's attempt to invest in the French liquer that probably never existed and Paulie's being completely out of sorts in Italy in the episode "Commendatori." In short, when a Sopranos character tries to operate outside the area into which he has compartmentalized himself, the consequences are simultaneously funny and revealing. Chase's point seems to be that, even though these characters are, for the most part, big fish, New Jersey is a relatively small pond, and none of them are above looking lost or being treated with a lack of respect. Even the Eighth Wonder of the World, who could wreck shop on 3 T. Rexes while swinging from huge vines and juggling Ann Darrow between his hands and feet, had no chance once he was taken out of his natural habitat.

Tony may be the Boss of Jersey, but "the mayonnaises" are more interested in John Gotti, a preening, high profile former Boss from New York, who talked his way into prison for the rest of his life. AJ may be the son of the Boss of Jersey, but the idiots he surrounds himself with just want him around to get them into places that wouldn't lift the velvet rope otherwise and, once they ride his coattails in, they show their gratitude by letting him pick up the tab. Christopher may be a Captain and be like God to the dopeheads and degenerate gamblers in Jersey, but Jon Favreau and Ben Kingsley give two shits about Jersey. Even Paulie, when the guys go to Italy on bee-za-nees, can't find any friends in the old country other than putan's.

It really plays out as an illustrative sub-theme of Chase's primary theme, which is that people's personal lives can be so complex that mob life may actually easier to manage, and that, while the characters are in a line of business that most of us are unfamiliar with, their lives consist of the same bullshit we all have to deal with on a daily basis. Very cool, and an arguably more powerfully delivered message since, if you look close enough, Chase is preaching the opposite of what the Italian anti-def people and detractors of The Godfather harp on. This is not a glorification of Italian mafiosi, actually quite the opposite. These are real people, who just happen to have a very different job/lifestyle than the rest of us, but who also have shitty cell service, wives and kids who bust their balls and co-workers they can't stand. They too do dumb things for love or to hurt those they love. They too stereotype Middle Easterners as Al-Qaeda, eat cold cuts out of the fridge and are momentarily paralyzed with a knee to the nuts... and then they go slice people up in the back room of a butcher shop and feed them to junkyard dogs.

*****

On a related note, good news for gamers! The Sopranos video game was announced today and is slated for an October release on XBox and PS2. Obviously they hope to buy us off for the next decade while Chase and Co. tinker with the final season, but I'm not even going to pretend like I won't buy it.

*****

Favorite line from the past 2 weeks? "Enjoy ya success!" Little Carmine "The Belt Buckle" Lupertazzi, not knowing what else to say to Lauren Bacall, but knowing she's important enough to be respectful to.

If you don't know, now you know...