The Sopranos might just be the ultimate example of the
premise of this column. Observed clinically, the brutal violence and family turmoil
should be pitch black drama, with nothing more than a snicker emitting from the
withered decay of North Jersey. Yet, I think I laugh as much at The Sopranos as
I do at any sitcom or supposed comedy movie. Plus, there's just so much
whacking.
Boca
One of the things that The Sopranos lost over the years as
it became more brooding and literary is the original conceit: the juxtaposition
of the gangster world with suburban life. In “Boca”, Tony and Silvio are among
a group of parents who are supportive to the point of obsession with their
daughters’ high school soccer team. The Soccer Godfather joke is funny enough,
but becomes darker with the revelation that the coach is sleeping with one of
the players. It's one of those moments when you might actually be happy that
Tony Soprano lives on your block, if just to scare the shit out of the scumbag
diddling your daughter.
The other plot line in the episode is about Uncle Junior's
ability to go down to the well of souls. To score in Happy Valley. To ace her
deuce. To perform cunnilingus, if you get my meaning. Apparently, and you
should know this if you are hanging out with the "boys" anytime soon,
it means that you are gay. I took a logic class in college and I'm pretty sure that
argument is what they call a slippery slope. Junior likes a slippery slope. But
you can't tell anyone, or there will be a whacking off.
College
Where were you when you found your dad was in the mob? I was
probably watching The Brady Bunch or something else all Generation X like. But
Meadow Soprano was touring tony colleges in New England when she confirmed her
suspicions. The scene in the car, when she elicits a tacit confession from
Tony, echoes the garden scene in The Godfather where Vito told Michael that he
never wanted him to be another gangster. It's also the best scene for a Brando
impersonation, like mine. Sometimes, I do Brando doing Gandolfini.
I never
wanted this for you Meadow. Art-History major Soprano. Women Studies major
Soprano. Semiotics major Soprano.
The sight of Tony rushing around between Meadow and hunting
his prey transcends comedy and becomes an insightful commentary on a world that's
too busy for a man to have time for a good whacking.
Pine Barrens
Like Paulie and Christopher, I once had to take a “work
trip” to the Pine Barrens. It didn’t involve killing a Russian, but it did
involve three days of sand in my crotch and returning home to find that my
fiancé had spent the entire time with her new boyfriend. They had it worse:
freezing cold, hungry and waiting for word from Tony like Vladimir and Estragon
waiting for Godot. The Russian who escaped from the trunk was in the Russian
Interior Ministry and once single-handedly killed 16 Chechen rebels, which
leads to this hilarious piece of dialogue:
Paulie: “You're not gonna believe this. He killed sixteen
Czechoslovakians. Guy was an interior decorator.”
Christopher: “His house looked like shit. “
Christopher and Paulie are trapped. If they go after the
Russian, they most likely freeze to death. Or they let him go, and face the
wrath of Tony and a crazed, professional killer seeking revenge. In the end,
they do what we would all do: find a empty van and eat ketchup packets until
the head of the family saves us. Or whacks us.
Commentadori
The guys finally get to go to Italy and Sicily, but they
find that the land that they had conjured up from repeated Godfather II
viewings is not all that hospitable. The episode makes me laugh, but it also
creeps me out, because every time I watch I feel completely sorry for Paulie,
who seems mortally wounded by the way the denizens of his fatherland reject
him. It's sort of the way I feel when I watch one of those countdowns of
One-Hit Wonders. Here are all these people who finally got what they wanted, were
at the top of the world, doing what they love and then whack! it's all taken
away. Plus, like Paulie, they are usually total douchebags.
Matt Tobey and I once had a fairly awe-inspiring Internet
Dork-athon over the last six episodes of the series, focusing especially on the
dream sequences and Godfather references. Funhouse, the final episode of Season
2, sets the groundwork for more complex, ambiguous dream sequences later in the
series but manages to be hilarious anyway. Tony has come to suspect strongly
that Pussy has been talking to feds and his fears are confirmed by a bad case
of food poisoning and talking fish.
"See these fish next to me," the fish says in Pussy's voice. "They're
sleeping."
The much talked-out bathroom sounds (that's diaherra and
vomit to us less sensitive readers) don't really play for cheap laughs and are
completely necessary to make me feel like I should never, ever eat seafood or
inform on my Capo or I just might get whacked. And that would be, you guessed it, whack.