I have been a Sopranos fan since the first season and I was so excited to see what would happen on the final epsisode. Then when I saw what happened I had to wonder what happened.
About half way through the episode I realized that creator David Chase wasn't going to do anything truly outrageous and he would treat this episode like any other episode. The fade to black ending did freak me out. I thought my DVR timer ran out and I missed the last seconds of the show. When the credits popped up after the 5 second "black out" I realized that I had been had or that's how I felt at the time.
Looking back I like how the show went out. It's the choose your own adventure ending. If you love Tony and the family and didn't want them to die, then you should be happy because for all you know they are happily eating onion rings to this day. If you wanted the streets to run red with blood then you should be happy because we all know that the suspicious guy came out of the bathroom and popped Tony and maybe the whole family. Or was it the black guys who came in? Or was it the trucker looking guy drinking his coffee who did the deed? Whatever the case, you can't deny that those last 4 or 5 minutes were the most suspenseful, thrilling minutes that have ever seen on television. The whole time I was filled with dread just knowing that something was going down.
The ending leaves all of it up to us and while some call that a cop out (Wilbon) others will say that Chase left us with something that will keep the Soprano name alive for a long time. And the possibility of a revisit through TV or feature film.
So, what's my theory? Well, I have heard this a couple times already, but during the season, Tony and Bobby discussed what it must feel like to get whacked and it was said that it comes out of no where and everything just fades to black. Which is exactly what happened. Tony spent the whole time in the restaurant checking everyone out, checking everyone who came through the door and in the end his guard was down because he was watching his little girl come through the door as the assassin came out of the toilet with guns blazing a la Godfather 2. Or nothing happened and Tony wasn't checking out everyone in the place, but we the viewers were and Tony was content and just enjoying the company of his family.
Any other thoughts and theories? Did you like how it ended? Let me know. Comment here or email me at bombaygunrunners@gmail.com or contact me at the myspace page. If I get some action then we will discuss this on the podcast next week.
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4 comments:
I was disappointed with the ending of the show. I'm the type of person who likes to know how it really ends. They weren't MY creation, so I shouldn't be the one who decides how the show ends.
I didn't want Tony to be killed, and was nervous the whole time he was in the diner. I kept checking the time on the clock, as I saw nothing extrodinary was happening prior to the diner scene.
I feel David Chase should have made the final episode a 2-hour event, and shot it like a mini movie...pulling no punches, and going out with a bang (no pun intended.)
I agree that this isn't our creation and we shouldn't be the ones who come up with the ending.
But...after listening to the Tony Kornheiser show today I believe that now more than ever that Tony was shot and the fade to black was him losing consciousness. TK thinks this is because the whole diner scene seemed to be from Tony's point of view, we were seeing everything through Tony's eyes and the screen went dead because he was shot and his eyes went out.
TK also thought the cat was the angel of death and that it makes no sense for a mob boss, who just tenatively ended a mob war, to be out in the open like that. What happened the first time Tony's guys found Phil out in the open? He was shot.
I believe we got the ending we were waiting for we just didn't see it. David Chase either didn't want to show us Tony being shot because he loved the character and couldn't bring himself to do it or Chase thought that we really didn't want to see him shot.
Ooohhhh, those are some really good ideas and aspects I didn't think of.
I was thinking more along the lines of lets not kill Tony Soprano, so we can make a movie- like with Sex In The City.
But with how you painted all that, it makes total sense.
I can't take credit for about 99% of it. That is just a culmination of everything I have heard the last few days and the things that make the most sense to me.
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