June 30, 2022: Twice as Nice

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I did it. I finally finished watching The Sopranos for the 2nd time. Let me tell you: that’s some great television. Maybe you’ve never watched it; maybe you don’t understand the hype. The Sopranos is always in the discussion for best series ever; the hype is real. I watched it the first time around, making sure to be planted in front of the TV for each new episode released on Sunday night, yet I think this time around was better. There were episodes I didn’t remember, and probably never watched originally. There were moments that I didn’t recall. Watching it again, episode by episode in order, was really twice as nice. It filled in the gaps, and reminded me why I loved this show so much, and why I kept wanting to watch it over again from start to finish. Mission accomplished.

I’m going to start with the controversial ending; if you don’t want to know, stop reading now. Actually, I’m going to talk about a few different series’ endings; you’ve been warned. When I watched Sopranos the first time around, I was pissed. The only reason I accepted it was the potential for a Sopranos movie to follow, which was talked about at the time. We did eventually get that movie, except it was a prequel; now I can finally watch that movie, with everything fresh in my head. But yeah, the way it abruptly ended, leaving us all hanging… This time around I appreciated it a bit more. How do you really end a series as epic as this? I think of other great series… I like the way Breaking Bad ended, although we did lose WW; it was nice that Pinkman escaped though, which brought us El Camino. Not that crazy about how the Wire ended; definitely didn’t like how they did Omar. I think about Ozark… definitely didn’t like seeing Ruth not make it. I think about others that I’ve watched… Boardwalk Empire, Shameless… about to finish Stranger Things. There is something that all these great series share in common; they all end. The fact that your favorite, or one of your favorite TV viewing experiences is over, sucks, period, regardless of how it ends. Your favorite character(s) will die… or not… although after the fact, David Chase has said Tony was about to die. Did you really want to see that? Tony Soprano is my favorite TV character of all time. To see him killed? Would that have pissed me off more than how it did end?

We did lose Christopher, along with many others throughout the 6 plus seasons. You know who’s kind of underrated; Carmela. She brought us some of the funniest moments in this journey IMO. The whole “what kind of animal gets high on their confirmation day” line that we were reminded of during AJ’s therapy session. The many times she threw stuff at Tony, including after the whole “pulp” dispute. How about the whole dream sequence Tony had about the hot foreign exchange student that was living next door? She snapped at him… so good. Tony did get her pretty good late in the series, talking about how her house was going to fall apart and kill the family that bought it… haha. I like the whole gambling run Tony had late, including the trip to Vegas and meeting up with another nice looking broad… probably the nicest IMO. There are so many great moments… moments that made me stay up another hour… moments that kept reminding me how great this truly was.

Now what? Rewatch Breaking Bad? Finally watch Sons of Anarchy? Peaky Blinders is out there; definitely will hit that up. Need to watch the end of Stranger Things first; talk about a great last season… Yeah, plenty of great TV over the years, but at the end of the day, The Sopranos remains #1 for me… I’m sure about 20 years from now, I’ll watch it for the 3rd time… haha.

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