Sopranos TiVo-ers: super-duper, colossal, mammoth spoiler alert!
Waiting almost two years for a new Sopranos episode has felt something like being cruelly yanked off the Prozac that Tony would deny having ever ingested. But we’ve finally managed to move on with our lives. And now, again, we’re supposed to submit to the same downward spiral, embracing the show’s return with the full knowledge that it’ll leave us again–soon for good? Are we to let The Sopranos bully us like we’re FBI informants or something? Well did you see the season six premiere? Because while the maddening hiatuses shall never be forgotten, all is most certainly forgiven…for a sixth time!
Back and whacky as ever, the show’s sixth (and quasi-final) season opener had it all. Blood flowed as freely as marinara sauce at Artie (John Ventimiglia)’s ristorante, and drama swirled like ominous storm clouds, all of which leads to the tornado that rocked the premiere’s final moments. (We’re not without mercy, TiVo-ers.) OK, so not everybody had his or her arc this episode–Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) bares little more than her midriff, A.J. (Robert Iler) only reveals his new hipster ‘do, and too much of Paulie (Tony Sirico) is never enough–but patience delivered us a new season, so we can wait and speculate for weeklong intervals, right? Maybe not, but, uh, whattaya gonna do?
What did happen in this episode was quite a bit, of course. Tony (James Gandolfini) is in the midst of shadily reconciling with Carmela (Edie Falco), a reunion which bears creator David Chase’s subtle winks of doom. There’s also the issue of New York boss Johnny Sack (Vincent Curatola) rotting away in jail as he awaits trial, much to his crew’s continued discontent. On top of that, one of Tony’s underlings, Eugene Pontecorvo (Robert Funaro), inherits a large sum of money and wants to, along with his wife, “get out of the game” and move to Florida; he should’ve never taken the oath. Finally, there’s Uncle Junior (Dominic Chianese), who’s totally off his rocker. He’s aged realistically since the last episode, and is now more than a handful for Tony, who’s forced to take care of him on one particular evening by boiling up the water and throwing in the pasta. Does it merely simmer, or does it overflow? On The Sopranos, it overflows–always–and still manages to come out just right.
The three best things about The Sopranos? No. 3: Its conflicts aren’t contrived because trying to run the mafia is more inherently problematic and fascinating than, say, trying to run a funeral parlor named Fisher & Diaz. No. 2: The brilliant writing staff wouldn’t dare limit these conflicts to Mafioso unrest. No. 1: The acting. These characters are truly characters and to think that the actors are merely taking their own lives to the small screen is to buy what they’re selling. There is so very much more to Gandolfini’s performance than his cursing and screaming–for example, every audible breath, be it from a panic attack or bites of veal parmigiana, is the product of superb acting that remains with you. As for Falco, anybody who knows a middle-aged person torn between as many different things (even if under different circumstances) as her Carmela is knows that her portrayal is still TV’s most real, vivid and visceral.
BOTTOM LINE: Bada-bing! The return of The Sopranos is well worth the wait…at the water cooler. An instant classic that leaves us salivating, something no other TV show would ever attempt.
