Disappointing lack of resolution.

That ending felt like my first year of law school. Or, if you prefer, being gang raped by a herd of elephants.

Not disappointing at all! Typical David Chase fashion leaving the story open for discussion. Great ending to an even better series.

clearly they just want to leave open the possibility for a movie...

It's too bad Paulie Walnuts didn't get whacked. I would have enjoyed that. He is my least favorite character.

The point of the FBI agent tipping off Tony to the location of Phil Leotardo was so that they can nail Tony for Phil's murder.

Right?

Disgusting sitcom ending

Great ending.

A non-ending wasn't all that surprising given how many new and different storylines were in the show this last season.

That final scene in the dinner was brilliant. Unbelievably suspenseful. I could barely watch.

Good description from the AP write-up:

"[E]very moment seemed to foreshadow a disaster: Suspicious-looking people coming in the door or sitting at a nearby table. Meadow on the street having trouble parallel parking her car. With every passing second, the audience was primed for tragedy. It was a scene both warm and fuzzy, yet full of dread. It set every viewer's heart racing, for no clear reason."

Damn. I thought I was going to be able to make this $170k joke. As usual, I'm not as clever as I sometimes think I am.

David Chase is a sick fuck.

Tony was whacked with a bullet to the head. We went to black because we saw it through his eyes. It was just as he told Bobby it would be ('You never see it coming'), and just like one of the songs in the jukebox foretold ('No Where to Run').

Brilliant, but man was I pissed...

P.S. Anyone else think Adriana reincarnated as that damn cat?

Very interesting, 11:34. But some responses:

1. Doesn't every episode fade to black like that?

2. Nobody else seems to be reading the episode the way you read it. E.g.:

"Angry 'Sopranos' Fans Crash HBO Website"

http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/thats-what-we-were-waiting-for-angry-fans-crash-hbo-website/

The article suggests that viewers are pissed off at the indeterminate nature of the ending.

The AP write-up nailed it. Every time the camera focused on a new patron, my heart jumped a bit as I waited for that patron to pull a gun and put a round into Tony Soprano. Meadow's inability to park added even more suspense, as I waited to see how she would factor into her father's demise. Instead, she entered the diner and everything faded to black. Brilliant.

As for the poster, who thought Tony Soprano was whacked with a bullet to the head... I think you missed the point. Chase was allowing you to draw that conclusion, however, he hardly designed the final scene around that single conclusion. Tony Soprano looked up at the door as his daughter walked into the diner. Whether he was shot in the head or just ate another onion ring was up to you to decide...

If we were seeing it through Tony's eyes and he got whacked with a bullet in the back of the head, wouldn't we have heard something? A click? A blast?

Amen, 12:17.

Who would have fired the shot? Watch where all the suspicious people were located right before the end. Nobody was in the right position.

1140 - Every episode does cut to black and then rolls credits, but this was a smash cut (generally used in screenwriting when someone is waking up from a nightmare, for example).

The last two camera shots are Meadow running across the street toward the restaurant (seen from the perspective across the street) and then in the last shot, all you hear is the sound the door makes when someone is coming in the diner (presumably it is Meadow) and we see Tony look up before it goes black. The camera angle is on Tony, not from Tony's perspective, but presumably he is looking at Meadow enter the diner when he gets popped by one of the shady suspects in diner. You get know screaming or noise from anyone else because it is the blackness from Tony.

Btw, I replayed the jukebox songs. Here they are. Read into them what you will:

A Lonely Place -- Tony Bennett
I've Gotta Be Me -- Tony Bennett
Who Will You Run To -- Heart
Magic Man -- Heart
Don't Stop Believing -- Journey
Anyway You Want It -- Journey
Somewhere In The Night -- Sawyer Brown

And, no, I will not be cancelling my subscription to HBO and burning my DTV receiver. HBO has the best shows on television. And while David Chase may not have written the finale I might have wanted, so be it. That's why he has the millions of dollars to be able to tell us all to fuck off. The NYT wrote a great article about him about sick months ago -- the guy's a total depressive nut job, as most geniuses are.

It is clear there is no singular conclusion -- just throwing around theories girls. It is all good.

11:34, I still don't agree with you about the ending.

But I think you're dead-on about Adriana being reincarnated as the cat (which keeps on staring at that photo of Christopher, and is described as "a snitch with fur" by Paulie).

Also, remember that there is a delay for several seconds before Chase actually rolls the credits. He holds that black screen with no sound for several seconds. Why? Not just to make us all think that our cable boxes went out. In my theory, it is to emphasize that the shot is from Tony's perspective -- which also gets into questions about the afterlife, but I disgress...

10:36 PM: I think you're right.

When the FBI agent learns that Phil Leotardo has been killed, he says: "We're going to win this thing!"

Presumably "this thing" = the eventual trial of Tony Soprano.

1:04: You can't be serious. He is rooting for the Jersey Crew, that's all.

The Agent wants Tony to win in the end, the relationship the two of them have is interesting, but, in the end, he is rooting for Tony.

The NYT's take on the Agent Harris situation:

"Soon both Tony and the F.B.I. learned that Phil Leotardo, a rival mob boss, planned to take down the Sopranos and rub Tony out. Last night when Tony asked for a secret meeting with Harris to seek his help in locating Phil, he was sent away."

"Later Harris changed his mind, leaking to Tony Phil’s whereabouts, which he learned during postcoital pillow talk with a female agent. And that breach of F.B.I. ethics led to one of the series’s most revolting death scenes..."

I saw it the same as 1:22. I thought he was rooting for NJ.

Anyone else notice that when Tony first walks into the diner, it looked like he sees himself sitting at the table? I cannot take credit for this theory, but apparently seeing your double while alive is a very old superstition as an omen of death.

However, one countervailing theory: going back to the first episode, maybe Tony had one of his stress-induced blackouts?

Don't forget the "six-digit future with O'Melveny & Myers" from an earlier season.

http://www.prettyclip.com/play.php?video_id=nc6REWMfNAQ

I don't know if Tony got whacked or not, but he deserved to, if only for playing Journey on the jukebox.

9:23: finally, a sensible, non english-major explanation from somebody!

11:34 -- Your list just made me relealize that "Anyway you Want It" was thenext song. What a perfect statement for Chase's view of the ending.

The theory that Tony got whacked is an interesting one, and one that I did not think of until 11:34 PM proposed it this morning.

If I remember correctly, the last thing we see is Meadow running into the diner, and we see that from what would be Tony's perspective. I also remember -- because I recognized it at the time but thought nothing of it -- that Meadow had a somewhat concerned, rushed look on her face. Did she the "killer" about to kill Tony from behind?? Of course, she could have merely been concerned that she was late. But it's an interesting theory.

The theory that the abrubt cut to black is from Tony's perspecitve is an interesting one and it woke me up at approximately 2AM as I replayed the final scene over and over in my head. As is his custom, Chase has left it unresolved, just like the multitude of plot lines unresolved throught the course of the series. Here's another observation: The Journey song, "Don't Stop Believing" is an admonishment (sp?) to the audience. The chorus is "Don't stop believing; hold on to this feeling." It's that feeling--ambiguity, suspense--that we've been experiencing for the last 8 years waiting for every episode.

The more I think about it, the more I think that it is just a "life goes on" ending. The cut to black was not Tony being shot. There was no one in position to shoot him at that time.

Tony's conversation with Junior shows how this thing has been going on forever, and will continue to go on.

Phil's death is more evidence that life goes on, b/c things in NY will continue and the NY/NJ business will continue as well. It also gives Tony even more proof that his life could end at any second (which was why he kept checking the door suspiciously.)

AJ is now out of his depression, dating the model, driving the M3, and basically becoming the new Little Carmine. He'll be pulled into the family business, eventually, after he gets involved with Tony bank rolling his club and movies.

Carmella is still a mean and jealous person. The way she spoke to Hunter and then how happy both she and Tony were once they realized you make more money as a Lawyer than as a Physician shows how shallow and self-obsessed they are. She'll continue on in her extravagant world, despite the fact that her husband was almost killed and now will possibly face homocide charges.

Meadow will continue to be the only one with her head screwed on straight, but now she's open to the possibility of being a mob lawyer?

And Tony will continue to spend each day looking over his shoulder, checking the door each time it opens, walking slowly down to the curb to pick up his paper, and generally distrusting everyone and everything he sees.

Nothing changes, and, as Tony said before, "[a]nd in the end, you're completely alone with it all."

10:36 and 1:04

I disagree. The agent had moved awhile ago from org crime to counter-terrorism. He'd received a valuable lead from Tony and was chasing a cell as a result. He'd spoken with Tony last week about getting the mob's help protecting the ports.

I think he'd first become pragmatic working with Tony, and tooks sides in the war between the families.

http://www.hbo.com/sopranos/episode/season6/episode86.shtml

Tony didn't die. HBO.com summarizes the episode scene by scene.

"Tony is the first to arrive at Holsten's for a family dinner. He sits in a booth and plays a song on the jukebox, watching the door. Carmela enters and joins him, asking about his meeting with Mink. He tells her Carlo's gonna testify and she takes the news with a sigh. AJ arrives next, complaining about the more mundane tasks of his job but quotes old advice from his father: "Try to remember the times that were good." Meanwhile, Meadow struggles to parallel park outside. Customers come and go - a shady looking guy who's been sitting at the counter enters the restroom. Finally parking the car, Meadow runs inside to join her family, just in time for dinner."

Anyone see the last supper in this scene? The onion rings as communion wafters?

10:50, that description doesn't preclude the tony dies theory. It just describes what the last scene looked and sounded like.

10:50 does raise a literary criticism issue:

When interpreting a text, are we bound by the subjective intention of the author? Or are we free to put our own spin on the same literal text?

11:09, I agree - each of Tony, Carmella and AJ put the entire onion ring in their mouth, not the way most people eat those things...

More symbolism - when presumably Meadow has entered the restaurant, and Tony looks up in the last shot, we hear the bells jingle - has the bell tolled for Tony too?

As for no one being in a position to shoot him, the dodgy character with the Ahmedinejad style members-only jacket could have been coming out of the bathroom... the whole setup of the scene seemed to allude to the Godfather when Michael shoots the Turk.

A lot of brilliant things between the lines in the episode. One classic is Junior responding to the news of Bobby's death - "Ambassador Hotel."

Meadow was running acorss the street in a semi paniced state. Me thinks she had news of a pregnancy.

so many major plot points were taken care of. why not a little ambiguity? i don't need to see tony's brains splattered all over the place to know that one day, certainly, it is going to happen. this episode was about the wait for it. last episode was the big fireworks display.

the characters were all at times repugnant. why should i be pissed there was no act three personal revelation? THAT wouldn't have been true at all.

a.j. flip flops for a bmw and a high school age girlfriend? yep, sounds about right. carmela just wants to go back to her mcmansion and lifestyle? yep. meadow wants to practice law to help out her poor italian people who are picked on by the fbi? oh jeez, yes. that sounds like dumb-assed her. janice (as the new livia) whines about how bad she has it? (and truly, those kids are as good as fucked- just like janice and tony were) no duh. and tony has to keep on looking over his shoulder all the time, with a crew reduced to numb-nuts paulie and old fart patsy? yes. no easy answers.

it was a fantastic ending.

i just got forwarded the following:

so here is what I found out. The guy at the bar is also credited as Nikki
Leotardo. The same actor played him in the first part of season 6 during a
brief sit down concerning the future of Vito. That wasn't that long ago.
Apparently, he is the nephew of Phil. Phil's brother Nikki Senior was
killed in 1976 in a car accident. Absolutely Genius!!!! David Chase is
truly rewarding the true fans who pay attention to detail.

So the point would have been that life continues and we may never know the
end of the Sopranos. But if you pay attention to the history, you will find
that all the answers lie in the characters in the restaurant. The trucker
was the brother of the guy who was robbed by Christopher in Season 2.
Remember the DVD players? The trucker had to identify the body. The boy
scouts were in the train store when bobby got shot last week and the black
guys at the end were the ones who tried to kill Tony and only clipped him
in the ear (was that season 2 or 3?). Car jack episode

2:12: WOW. So does this mean there won't be a Sopranos movie?

Everytime the diner door opens the Chimes sound, Carmela walks in, Chimes, AJ walks in Chimes, this when Meadows parallel parking, still trying to get inside the restaurant....at this point the camera switches back to the trucker who goes in the bathroom......Then it goes to a scene where meadow finally parks and starts running in the diner....
the doors about to open, Tony looks up....and No Chimes....No Music...Everything just goes black...Tony's dead.

Isn't it possible that Nikki Leotardo was one of Phil's grandchildren? No male named "Nicky" spells his name "Nikki" - that's the female version.

As to the two black guys that tried to clip Tony in the first season, Tony killed at least one of them.

2:43 -- Not only that, but there is the double meaning with respect to the bell ringing. What does it mean to say that someone has had their 'bell rung?'

2:12 - that was not Nikki Leotardo.
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/111-06092007-1360360.html

Great line:

'I liked the little touches...like Meadow's inability to parallel park symbolizing Jamie Lynn Siegler's inability to act."

apparently, the cat was a reference to edgar allen poe's, 'the black cat' (the husband was also an alcoholic/junkie who kills his wife) and other poe stories where the dead interacted with the living to reveal information about their murders.

"What's with Meadow starting at $170K? Does David Chase know something we don't?"

As usual, yes.