In the "Sopranos" movie, the Virgin Mary appears to Paulie and explains how she stopped the bullets...
UPDATE: A fan has posted a detailed explanation of the final scene, claiming to identify three mystery guests in it. I am skeptical of this explanation as I do not have a second confirmation of these roles from any trusted "Sopranos" authority. So believe it at your own risk! -- AB
UPDATE 2: Paul Harris and I yakked about the "Sopranos" finale some more today on KMOX.
1. My god! What an ending! Leave it to the guy who's gotten more mileage out of HBO's lack of prohibitions against showing violence to end his masterwork by making the viewers imagine a scene far bloodier, far more awful than anything he could put on screen!
2. So I guess this means no "Sopranos" movie?
And with that final imagined last frenzy of bloodletting -- and did I imagine David Chase, creator of "The Sopranos," appearing in the final scene, Hitchcock-like, under a ballcap? I'm in Iowa and don't have a DVR to rewind -- it was over, the eight-year-long meditation on the violence that never ends, whether on the killing fields of mob-controlled New Jersey or the farthest reaches of American military involvement.
But let's not get carried away with philosophizing. (Or second-guessing the critic's imagined ending.) There will be plenty of time for that.
Acting very much like a composer who's got this symphony business down (cue the Haydn), Chase brought all the various parts of "The Sopranos" together. Paulie Walnuts, after much frittering about getting cancer and being hexed by kittycats -- "snakes with fur!" -- and seeing the BVM right there in the Bada Bing, finally accepted what, in that imaginary world we call Spinoffdom, is essentially control of the Sopranos enterprises, post-Tony.
Meadow and A.J. plotted their future storylines, which of course would never have seen the light of day, anyway.
Commentaries about American military might were inserted, through the ever-convenient mouthpiece of the shrink (not Melfi, though): "He wants to get past the hate," A.J.'s therapist helpfully explained to Tony. "Only focus it on the terrorists."
In another scene, Tony started spilling his guts to said shrink before Carmela gave him daggers.
The FBI got their man. Oops, someone else got to him first.
Uncle Junior returned to his boyhood, when things were much better.
Tim Goodman can't write, "Bring me the head of Phil Leotardo," because it ain't there.
Whew.
And as I think I predicted one place or two, the episode ran long. Right up till Journey sang, "Don't stop!"
But it did.
I wasn't checking around the Web much this week, but it seemed to me that in the leadup to the "Sopranos" finale NO ONE saw anything like this playing out. Nonetheless, many of us in the media -- where "The Sopranos" has always enjoyed disproportionate influence -- were willing to offer published guesses about how it would all end.
Just this morning on ESPN's "The Sports Reporters," host John Saunders led off the show by talking about the NBA Finals Game 2 by noting how everyone was in suspense about the outcome that night ... of "The Sopranos." And then each of the sports reporters offered a prediction. Indeed, I suspect a lot of viewers across America were altering their usual Sunday night plans: Tonight, watch "Sopranos" live and tape the game.
Me, I couldn't get into this guessing game. I mean, what was the point? When Tony Soprano was taking the hand of Phil, lying stricken in a hospital bed, and squeezing it affectionately last year -- putting an aptly awkward finishing touch on the least satisfying stretch of episodes in the show's long run -- who would've anticipated it would go badly so quickly? All right, a Kreskin or two, but for my money Chase and Terry Winter and the rest of the "Sopranos" brain trust saw this coming. So why not, I reasoned, sit back and leave it to them?
HBO, of course, wasn't about to say that. You KNOW they loved the anticipation, the buildup to tonight's finale. Here was a show seemingly playing out the string, having overstayed its welcome (although HBO is largely to blame for that, making Chase and Co. an offer they couldn't refuse). In the same situation, other shows' creators figured either they would squeeze a little more blood from the stone or that, considering what the network was paying them, it really didn't matter what they did.
Well, Chase and Co. certainly showed us that if nothing else, they cared enough to send the very best -- and save it for the ending.
That's not to say these last episodes were immediately gratifying, because that often happens when you take chances. Even tonight's episode, I suspect, will start to develop little imperfections tomorrow morning. And the choices made in the leadup -- killing Christopher, taking out Bobby and Silvio, even some of the smaller decisions will likely be questioned for years to come, like the decision to write Melfi out in the second-to-last episode. In fact, the figure of Melfi, who dates back to the very start of "The Sopranos," has been handled oddly over the years. Her relationship with Tony seemingly stalled after the fireworks of early seasons, where she ran for her life and then survived a brutal rape that Tony avenged (though unbeknownst to him, as a reader noted). Was writing her out, on a quickie plot line, the right move? Analyze that.
On the other hand, there will be more to appreciate, I suspect, once we get some distance from "The Sopranos" and can watch it over and over on DVD. Did anyone else catch the rich irony of the fact that, after several seasons of looking like clueless idiots, the feds finally got some things exactly right? Some fans many argue with the decision to have the FBI/Homeland Security guy tip off Tony to Phil's diabolical scheme to have the Jersey mob "decapitated" ... but I liked it. Having an employee of Michael "Katrina" Chertoff be not only in possession of excellent intel but knowing what to do with it, serves as a fine reminder that "The Sopranos," after all, is fiction.
OK, let's all catch a breath ...
