Monday, June 7, 2004

SACRIFICE BUNT: And so, with both drama and comedy, Season 5 of The Sopranos ended last night.

It stands, in my estimation, as the second best season in the show's history, a thirteen episode stretch of drama matched only in recent years by the second half of season two of The West Wing, as the MS scandal heightens, cantakerous cartographers invade the White House, Marlee Matlin and Adam Arkin start showing up and the President starts screaming in Latin.

But back to The Sopranos. I can't say enough good things about this season, and I've said them enough. The season finale brought something I didn't anticipate -- some endings to plots, as the Continuity Fairy sprinkled her magical pixie dust over everything from the Pie-Oh-My portrait to A.J.'s declining college aspirations to the big black bear lurking in the backyard.

One way to look back at this season is to remember what creator David Chase laid out before it started:
[I]t's really very easy to write "The Sopranos," because everything that everybody says is untrue. Complete falsehoods, self-justifications, rationalizations, outright lies, fantasies and miscommunication. For that reason, I think there's always sort of a joke going on, which is that these people aren't communicating at all. These people are kidding themselves, and lying to themselves and to each other all the time.

If that's the case, worry about Christopher. Just not until 2006.

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