Everybody Wants a Thrill

***SOPRANOS SPOILERS**** - also, like the Knocked Up post, I don't have time to reread this but wanted to get it up as soon as possible, so apologies for poor grammar, etc...

There are a lot of angry Sopranos fans out there today. Instead of resolution, we were left mid-scene, with the family waiting for their onion rings to arrive. For many, it seems almost like a practical joke, with series creator David Chase rewarding his loyal audience by ratcheting up the tension as far as possible, only to cut to black as Journey's Steve Perry sings mid-sentence "Don't Stop..."

I was not disappointed by this ending. Then again, I think my expectations were much lower than other people's. I did not foresee or expect the series to end with a twist or a bang. People had been speculating about the finale as if it were Lost (Carmella will kill Tony! The Russians will return for revenge! Paulie is working for NY! Etc.). The Sopranos has never been a show with a beginning, middle and end. For all its mafioso whackings, it has always been compellingly true to life (excluding the first season, which was remarkably more conventional than what followed). It would have been completely out of character for the show to have some sort of big bang ending. For Chase, life does not end neatly with resolution. The Sopranos has never passed judgment on its characters, no matter how despicable they've acted. It's never been a show with a beginning, middle end, but more akin to our own lives. It goes on and on and on, with your family meeting for dinner Sunday night to talk and worry about the same things you always have. I'd never listened closely to the lyrics of "Don't Stop Believing" but after the finale, I looked them up:

Working hard to get my fill,
Everybody wants a thrill
Payin anything to roll the dice,
Just one more time
Some will win, some will lose
Some were born to sing the blues
Oh, the movie never ends
It goes on and on and on and on

So life goes on, even after the camera stops rolling. This made me think of Tim's quote from the finale of the original BBC version of The Office:

But if I’m really being honest, I never really thought it would have a happy ending. I don’t know what a happy ending is. Life isn’t about endings is it? It’s a series of moments, and erm...it’s like if you turn the camera off, it’s not an ending is it? I’m still here, my life’s not over. Come back here in ten years, see how I’m doing then. Because I could be married with kids, you don’t know. Life just goes on.”

There are really only a few ways the show could've ended: somebody kills Tony, or he ends up in prison, or turning to the FBI or even him being killed by some random act of violence. But really, these stories have already been told. People are randomly killed off in the Sopranos all the time, and frankly, I don't see how having someone shoot Tony in that restaurant would have offered any real sense of resolution except, well it had to happen. They've already told the story of the gangster who had it all, rotting away pathetically in jail (Johnny Sach). They've told the story of mafioso's turned FBI snitch (Adriana, Big Pussy). I thought having Tony die by some random act of violence might be interesting - that is, have him become the victim of a hold-up or something, making him just another collateral victim of violence in America. The irony of that though, would be forced, and with the exception of Tony's sudden gambling problem in Season 6, nothing about Soprano's has ever been forced. Moreover, we've seen characters die not from the lifestyle, but from random acts of fate: Bobby Baccala's wife Karen in a car accident, Gigi dying on the toilet, etc.

I'm not trying to argue that the finale was brilliant, but rather that it was appropriate. The only brilliance is that David Chase didn't give in to pressure to end with a bang. There was really one way to end the Sopranos: true to life, going on, surrounded by your family and your fears. If you were expecting anything else, I don't think you were appreciating the show for what it was - a slice of modern, American life.