Which really wasn’t an ‘end’ at all. So many series these days are existentialist, the prevailing philosophy of nihilism which permeates our lives. It’s the idea that nothing really matters, essentially it is the death of right and wrong, of judgment. reward and punishment. For those of us looking for/expecting/wanting the Sopranos to experience some sort of hard core repercussions for their actions, it didn’t come.
Or maybe it did. I suppose the producer decided to leave it up to us. A tad anti-climactic, but it’s not the first time I’ve been disappointed. I suppose this is what I get for watching something which reinforces what I think is one of our more serious social issues–that nihilism which we saw most recently manifest in the amnesty bill.
Sopranos ends without a bang
Maybe Tony Soprano makes it, and maybe he doesn’t, but this much we know: Our last look at the mob boss left room for either outcome.
With Journey’s Don’t Stop Believing playing on the tabletop jukebox of a local diner, Tony was still breathing, still functioning and still believing he’d be doing both for some time to come as The Sopranos ended its nine-year run.
Was this what we wanted to happen on the series finale of one of the best dramas in television history? Or did creator David Chase cop out by cutting to black without resolving what happens to America’s most famous crime family?
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Tammy, I have been writing my fingers off over this finale! My husband, best friend and I were sitting here with our mouths agape; I cannot post what we said, (family blog and all) but it was not good. The worst finale of the best drama ever is all I can say. The internet and blogs are just abuzz over it and I am more upset that I am this upset over a tv show!! LOL.
Tony did not get whacked. As the lyrics say, “it goes on and on and on and on”..the more things change the more they stay the same..and Tony will keep doing what he does..but that cut to black thing, come on now, I think it was we who got whacked after 8 years of loyal devotion. Granted, I may need my own withdrawl counseling from the show, but I we will always have the “Pine Barrens” episode to see us through.
David Chase has some explaining to do, until then I will watch my DvD’s for solice. LOL Ciao
At first, my breath caught in my throat at the “cut to black”. “Oh No! The darned Cable signal went out!”…but then I saw the end credits.
I thought that most people would hate or be disappointed in the ending, myself included, until I weighed what I had seen and what Chase had done. In hindsight and in relection, this ending was perfect. No matter how much resolution was done, no matter how many odd little loose ends were tied, no one ending would have made the legion of fans satisfied…so why bother?
No, the ending was left by Chase for us all to finish in our own way…fill in the blank. True genius.
A local (Portland, Oregon) media critic says he thinks they want to make a “Sopranos” movie, and left Tony alive for that purpose. I have no idea — never seen the show, only ever saw promos for it after A&E picked up syndication for it.
I am actually suprised at how much I LOVED this ending. I don’t think people would have been satisfied seeing him killed or locked away. There would have been something defeating about seeing him flushed away. On another note, taking it as a series, perhaps he is gone. As he and Bobby had discussed in the previous episode “never knowing its coming”, maybe the last thing he saw was the last thing we saw….
All I can say is I’ll never complain about the “Seinfeld” finale ever again. It laughed at this one. Existentialist ending aside, it may have been the most boring episode of the entire series. Did we really need THAT MUCH screen time spent on that little twerp AJ, the most annoying and useless character on the show?
Personally, I detest endings that require the viewer to “figure out” what it all means. All that says to me is that the writer (in this case, David Chase) took the easy way out, neither making you-know-what NOR getting off the pot.
Somtimes there is a fine line between artistic creativity and self-pleasure, and Chase seems to have really blurred the line here. In the end, after seven (nine) years, all we really know about these charaters is that they never change, Meadow can’t park to save her life, and perhaps HBO should have let Tony and his crew go two seasons ago.