canyonwalker (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
canyonwalker) wrote2021-10-02 10:25 pm
canyonwalker) wrote2021-10-02 10:25 pm
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The Sopranos - Season 2 Finale
This is my fourth blog in 2 days about The Sopranos. You might think I've been bingeing the show: 10 episodes in 2 days? But really I'm just catching up on a backlog of writing. I watched 10 episodes not in 2 days but over the course of almost 2 weeks. Anyway, with this blog I'm caught up now. I just finished up Season 2 last night. Here are Five Things about how the season ends, including 2 people who get whacked.
1) Tony orders a hit on Richie Aprile.
Richie has been hostile to Tony and challenged his authority since his release from prison in season 1. Their mutual dislike grew steadily more intense across season 2. The writers basically telegraphed that it would come to Tony having to order a hit on him; no surprise there. But what is surprising is how Tony comes to that decision... and then how Richie dies.
2) Uncle Junior sells out Richie.
Richie tries to convince Junior to order a hit on Tony. Again. Junior tells him it's a "go" if he can convince fellow gang boss Albert Barese. Barese is cagey and declines to support the plan. Junior then sells out Richie by telling Tony Richie wants to kill him. As Junior explains to his associate Bobby Bacala, he had to consider the options for who'd be on top and which arrangement would work better for him. He decided currying favor with Tony and letting Richie get whacked would pay out best for him.
3) Janice kills Richie!
Tony tasks Silvio with whacking Richie. But that night Janice, Tony's sister— who by this point is engaged to marry Richie— shoots him in the dining room of her mother's home after a fight.
Janice has had a strange and toxic relationship with Richie. At times it seems she's been seeing him as much to hurt Tony as anything else. And just as her mother whispered things into Junior's ear to manipulate him into trying to kill Tony in season 1, Janice, also a dastardly manipulator, groomed Richie's hatred of Tony and prodded him to plan killing Tony.
Though Janice is a villainous schemer, she kills Richie in the spur of the moment. As part of their toxic relationship she argues with him over him calling his son gay for being a professional dancer. He punches her in the face and teases her, "What, you going to cry now?" She's tolerated and even encouraged his violent side in their relationship; that's part of how it's toxic. But this time she grabs a gun moments later and shoots him twice, killing him.
4) Pussy, the rat, gets whacked.
As I wrote a few blogs back, you knew this was coming; it was only a matter of when. Tony has a fever dream in which a talking fish, speaking with Pussy's voice, tells him he's an informant. Tony basically believes the dream— because it crystallized lots of little things he'd seen or suspected for months. He arranges with Silvio to invite Pussy to come check out a boat he's thinking of buying. While at Pussy's house he feigns illness to use his bathroom for a few minutes, where he searches for and finds the wire Pussy is using as an informant. At the marina, Paulie is already there on the boat and nobody else is around. Pussy knows this is the end for him as the four men take the boat out into open water.
As much as Pussy knows they know, they know he knows they know. Their conversation is casual. Pussy asks to be killed cleanly. Tony asks when Pussy decided to betray them. Curiously it was when Tony tasked Pussy with recovering his son's teacher's stolen car early in season 1. Pussy felt it was disrespectful to be given such a menial task.
5) Christopher might get "made" soon.
At the end of the season finale episode Tony is hosting a celebration for his daughter, Meadow's, high school graduation with his two families— his kin, and his gang. He's in good spirits, having not just seen two rival gang members killed but having gotten out on bail after being arrested on a smaller, unrelated criminal charge. He tells Christopher, who helped dispose of Richie's body, that's he recommending him for his "button"— another bit of parlance for becoming a "made man". It's an important promotion the impatient Christopher has been champing at the bit for since the pilot episode.
1) Tony orders a hit on Richie Aprile.
Richie has been hostile to Tony and challenged his authority since his release from prison in season 1. Their mutual dislike grew steadily more intense across season 2. The writers basically telegraphed that it would come to Tony having to order a hit on him; no surprise there. But what is surprising is how Tony comes to that decision... and then how Richie dies.
2) Uncle Junior sells out Richie.
Richie tries to convince Junior to order a hit on Tony. Again. Junior tells him it's a "go" if he can convince fellow gang boss Albert Barese. Barese is cagey and declines to support the plan. Junior then sells out Richie by telling Tony Richie wants to kill him. As Junior explains to his associate Bobby Bacala, he had to consider the options for who'd be on top and which arrangement would work better for him. He decided currying favor with Tony and letting Richie get whacked would pay out best for him.
3) Janice kills Richie!
Tony tasks Silvio with whacking Richie. But that night Janice, Tony's sister— who by this point is engaged to marry Richie— shoots him in the dining room of her mother's home after a fight.
Janice has had a strange and toxic relationship with Richie. At times it seems she's been seeing him as much to hurt Tony as anything else. And just as her mother whispered things into Junior's ear to manipulate him into trying to kill Tony in season 1, Janice, also a dastardly manipulator, groomed Richie's hatred of Tony and prodded him to plan killing Tony.
Though Janice is a villainous schemer, she kills Richie in the spur of the moment. As part of their toxic relationship she argues with him over him calling his son gay for being a professional dancer. He punches her in the face and teases her, "What, you going to cry now?" She's tolerated and even encouraged his violent side in their relationship; that's part of how it's toxic. But this time she grabs a gun moments later and shoots him twice, killing him.
4) Pussy, the rat, gets whacked.
As I wrote a few blogs back, you knew this was coming; it was only a matter of when. Tony has a fever dream in which a talking fish, speaking with Pussy's voice, tells him he's an informant. Tony basically believes the dream— because it crystallized lots of little things he'd seen or suspected for months. He arranges with Silvio to invite Pussy to come check out a boat he's thinking of buying. While at Pussy's house he feigns illness to use his bathroom for a few minutes, where he searches for and finds the wire Pussy is using as an informant. At the marina, Paulie is already there on the boat and nobody else is around. Pussy knows this is the end for him as the four men take the boat out into open water.
As much as Pussy knows they know, they know he knows they know. Their conversation is casual. Pussy asks to be killed cleanly. Tony asks when Pussy decided to betray them. Curiously it was when Tony tasked Pussy with recovering his son's teacher's stolen car early in season 1. Pussy felt it was disrespectful to be given such a menial task.
5) Christopher might get "made" soon.
At the end of the season finale episode Tony is hosting a celebration for his daughter, Meadow's, high school graduation with his two families— his kin, and his gang. He's in good spirits, having not just seen two rival gang members killed but having gotten out on bail after being arrested on a smaller, unrelated criminal charge. He tells Christopher, who helped dispose of Richie's body, that's he recommending him for his "button"— another bit of parlance for becoming a "made man". It's an important promotion the impatient Christopher has been champing at the bit for since the pilot episode.