The Sopranos Finale

There isn't much I can say about The Soprano's series finale that isn't already going around the net, but I have to offer my opinion about one thing: I'm sick of all of the whining about how disappointing the ending was for most people. The only disappointing thing is that America is full of a bunch of spoiled idiots that felt they deserved an exact ending spoon fed to them. God forbid that David Chase decided to leave things to the audience's interpretation. Kelly Ripa said that the ending was like a cheap one night stand, something I'm sure she's an expert at. The fact that the ending was above and beyond Kelly Ripa's comprehension level is just further proof that Chase did it right.

My interpretation is that Tony got whacked. That's why Chase went through the trouble of doing the flashback to when Tony and Bobby were on the boat talking about getting whacked. "They say you don't even hear it coming," Bobby said. During the final restaurant scene, Tony looked up every time somebody walked in the door and the bell rang. The camera showed him look up (a total of four times) and then quickly changed to his perspective (the audience saw what he saw). The fourth time when Meadow was walking in the door, Tony looks up and everything went to black. My feeling is that when the shot switched to Tony's perspective that final time, it was black, because he was dead. We saw what he saw: nothing. Probably 95% of people were expecting the show to end with Tony getting a bullet through the head, and that is exactly why I think David Chase is a genius for NOT ending it that way.

If you choose to believe Tony didn't get his, then you wouldn't be wrong either. It's your choice, which is not something traditional television shows give you. The ending also leaves the door open in the event that HBO decides to offer a trailer load of money to Gandolfini and Chase for a future Sopranos project without killing the show's credibility by using a Dallas-style "It was only a dream" bullshit sequence. I think the show is done for good though.

If you are one of the disappointed whiners, just shut the fuck up and go read a few books. Practice making up your own mind and using your imagination. The Sopranos never followed the pattern of a regular TV show, so why would you be disappointed that it didn't end like one?