The final season of any show often feels like the last leg of a marathon to myself, it needs to be the season which brings everything to a head and closes the stories it wants to close (not all stories have to be closed, sometimes it's more interesting to leave threads hanging open). The Sopranos Season 6 Part 1 (here to referenced as Part One) in some ways manages to walk into this while also avoiding it. I'm not sure exactly how it gets away with being the first half of the last season, pacing and story-wise there's no doubt that it is half of a construct that is only completed with the second part. But it's also a dominant season with exceptionally strong moments that stand alone.

At the end of the last season Tony fled from Johnny Sack's home as the feds closed in on the head of the New York family. The final season opens with the episode 'Members Only' and delivers one of the biggest moments of the show - Junior Soprano - who started to slip with Alzhiemer's last season - takes a huge step further into his illness by shooting Tony at the end of the epsidoe, making this the second time Tony has been shot during the series. His coma, his experiences in it and the attitudes of the New Jersey crew form a huge part of early episodes.

One of the other main threads of the season follows the gradual decline of Johnny Sack and the rise of Phil Leotardo as a dangerous threat to Tony and his boys (Philly still unwilling to let Tony Blundetto's killing of Angelo go as he was unable to extract revenge from Tony B because Tony S had already killed him to spare the man being tortured to death - and to try and close the issue between New York and New Jersey).

Another character brought to the front of the season is Vito, one of Tony's highest earners - he moves from being a supporting character with a few unusual, interesting and notable traits (his rapid weight loss and suppressed/concealed homosexuality being the primary two) into the limelight when he is outed. I was rather surprised by the expertise and skill involved in the entire story. Vito comes across very strongly as a sympathetic and likeable individual during his time away from New Jersey, which is not to say that you'll forget this is the man who killed Jackie Jr. But you do come to appreciate him a a rounded personality.

The show is as tight and superb as ever, this season has a stronger direction than any before as it's building up towards the final block of episodes. Providing plenty of foreshadowing, metaphors and hints at the storm brewing between the New Jersey and New York families in the final part.

It's a great season that is followed by an amazing one.
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The fifth season of The Sopranos marks the moment where that legend of an actor Steve Buscemi (seriously, name something he's not good in) steps out from behind the camera and onto the screen. Taking the role of Tony Soprano's cousin Tony Blundetto. He'd been involved in the show previously - directing the episodes Pine Barrens and Everybody Hurts. Tony B's story is one of the major arcs of the fifth season, the man did grow up alongside Tony Soprano and, as it turns out, went to prison at least partially because of Tony S.

Tony B's story is a pretty interesting one, for those of you who've seen the season before and need a refresher I do recommend the wikipedia article on it (here) - as long as no-one has amended it to mention that Tony B was in fact an intergalactic time traveller from Vogon 6 who came to Earth in order to determine the secret of making really good cheese. (Unlikely as, let's face it, Americans don't know how to make decent cheeses - they'd be better off snooping on the British or French). Tony B's story is also strengthened by Steve Buscemi's unholy Acting Talent, (did I mention how good Steve is in his performances? I did, well let's mention it again). Fortunately for The Sopranos the show is filled with accomplished actors providing charaters that are deep, meaningful and very real - so Steve's performance as Tony B fits into the show like Cinderella's foot in the glass slipper (such a daft fairy tale) - he doesn't overwhelm the plot, instead he remains a low key prescence who gradually grows, changes and becomes more significant in an entirely natural fashion.

The rest of the season continues in the solid, real and above all else, brilliant style you should have come to expect from The Sopranos by now. Tony is dealing with his seperation from Carmella in the only way he can, by persuing Dr Melfi, Meadow and AJ are dealing with their parent's break up in their own ways. And Uncle June begins to show mild, early signs of Alzheimer's disease - which would be a tragic (if somewhat fitting) end for a man who lived a life that was pretty dispicable in the terms of normal society.

The mounting tension between the New York families provides another thrust of season five's plot - the struggle naturally has a great deal of influence on the lives of the New Jersey crew as they (in essence) live in the shadow of the "New York Mobs". And when other events begin to strain the relationship between the two groups things really begin to break out.

There's an awful lot to like about the fifth season of The Sopranos, it's on par with the fourth one in terms of quality and is a fantastic piece of television in it's own right.
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I was a little mixed with my feelings on the third season of The Sopranos, it had some great moments - but it was uneven enough that as a result The Sopranos won't ever be surpassing my perennial favourites - The Wire and The Shield - in my top ten. But that said it was still light years ahead of most (non-HBO) television.

The fourth season, I'm happy to report, was a far more solid and coherent piece of quality entertainment. The family is struggling with tough economic times (sound familiar?) Uncle Jun is heading for trial and Tony himself is still struggling with his internal conflict.

I could repeat myself here by gushing about the performances, as across the board they are enchanting. In particular James Gandolfini's performance as Tony - he has this one particular expression which looks like a mix of a shark that scents blood and a toad at the bottom of a deep putrid well. There's something completely predatory and unwholesome about it, and it's always a delight to see him use it to express Tony's reaction to the situation. It's almost like he draws a foggy curtain over the front of his mind and retracts back the humanity, leaving only an animal in place.

I'll leave a further look at Tony Soprano for a later post, one which takes a look at some of the more... unpleasant leading men in television and compares/contrasts them. Suffice to say Tony's in the top tier, especially after his performance in this season (the horse incident is just superb in the way it blindsides you and then reminds you just how brutish Tony really is - if you haven't seen it, don't worry calling it 'the horse incident' is not a spoiler ;).

As with series three, series four has a handful of episodes which outshine the rest by light years - this time the vast majority of them revolve around the always entertaining Ralphie Cifaretto who initially joined the show in the third season and fast became a hugely entertaining arsehole of epic proportions. Whoever Did This is one of the greatest episodes of the show I've seen so far as is The Weight. Both of which owe a great deal to Ralphie's presence and general douche-baggery.

I think at this point it's also worth giving large props to Tony Sirico's performance as Pauile Walnuts - I've always had a fond soft spot for the character since the start of the show - and that grew a great deal after the quite brilliant 'snow' episode in the third series (Pine Barrens). He goes from strength to strength in this season; I especially enjoyed his completely inappropriate overreaction towards Christopher in Everybody Hurts - you can almost bank on Paulie getting himself into some trouble that's entirely his own creation any time he makes a decision.

I think it's fair to say that the fourth series of The Sopranos is quite excellent, I still feel that the first two seasons pulled off the strongest story lines - but there is no doubt that number four is a more complete and enjoyable entity than number three was.

The Extras:
Audio Commentaries on four episodes.
Episodic previews and recaps (for the REALLY hard of memory)
Recaps of series 1, 2 and 3 (For those of you who want to get someone up to speed quickly without having to rewatch the previous seasons).
Cast/Crew Biographies
Interactive Menus (Seriously, this is listed as a bonus feature. I wonder what the non-interactive version is like, maybe it tells you that you're not allowed to watch the show.)
Scene Access (...words fail me)

The Details:
Audio: 5.1 Dolby Digital
Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
Languages: English
Rating: 18
Region: 2
Run Time: 11hours 48mins
Subtitles: The box only says English, but I found German, Italian and French amongst others.
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I've been meaning to write about the third season of The Sopranos for a while now, I'm actually close to watching the end of the fourth season at the moment of writing this. But I've been putting it off and it took me a while to understand why.

Now there is no doubt in my mind that The Sopranos is in the top 1-5% of television in history, and it's been utterly fantastic to watch. In particular the additional depth provided by the ongoing psychiatric treatment of Tony Soprano makes it a delight to watch. James Gandolfini (in addition to having a most excellent surname) continues to bring us a character who's both compelling and completely sociopathic - there is no doubt that he's brought Tony to life with such completeness that the character is amongst the greatest of criminal protagonists to have graced our screen. He's a likable monster who can make you forget the terrible crimes he's committed at times much like Vic Mackey, Shane Vendrell (The Shield), Stringer Bell (The Wire) and to a lesser extent characters Dexter Morgan (Dexter) & Walter White (Breaking Bad). He really is a complete human being, even if he's from the more loathsome side of humanity.

Likewise performances across the board are fantastic, to name everyone who puts in class work would be effectively naming the entire cast one after another. Returning (surviving) faces and new ones alike they're all spot on what they should be - even if that's annoying, amusing, disturbing or some mixture of negative traits. It's almost impossible to find fault with the performances as even if you dislike a particular character it's because you're supposed to dislike them.

The thing about the third season is this, while it's consistently better than (approx) 99% of everything shown on television, this season just doesn't feel better than the two seasons before it. The cardinal rule of seasons here at Rev/Views is "each season must be better than the one which came before it" and if I'm honest I enjoyed the first two seasons a lot more than this one. Don't get me wrong some episodes were amazing - Employee of the Month, University and Pine Barrens in particular blew me away with their stories - but a lot of the rest just felt par for the show, not terrible but also not great.

[Incidentally I found Employee of the Month a very difficult episode to watch, but the final scene in it was just superb. To take a character on such a terrible journey like that, and then to give them the power back is one thing. But to have a character so ethically strong as to not then use that power - it was just great.]

Additionally, the end of the season didn't have that same feeling of release as the first two seasons. They both built up to moments which blew me away and left me feeling justified for the investment of time. This season at the end instead felt more like things were just happening and it was setting up for the fourth season - there was no real over arcing plot to properly serialise the show. It was mainly life, happening one day at a time.

Maybe this sounds rather negative, and if so I do need to clarify that I was still enthralled by the show and it is no doubt one of the best shows in the medium of television - all time - it's just I was left feeling a little "that's it?" at the end.

Fortunately, the fourth season has been nothing short of fantastic so far. So seriously, if you're not watching The Sopranos (and haven't already seen it)... What's your excuse?

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Last month I started watching The Sopranos, a show which has been on my "to watch" list since The Wire and The Shield both finished their respective (and amazing) runs on television. But the prohibitive cost and large size of the complete DVD boxed sets meant I wasn't willing to start watching them. The release of the complete set in a small box at a very reasonable price was enough to sway me over and as my first season review will attest - I'm rather glad I did.

I'm afraid this review is rather more spoiler-tastic than I had intended at first, but it's a difficult season to write about without being more explicit in the details. Hopefully I haven't given away anything major, but in case you haven't already seen the season, you might want to stop reading.

The second season feels somewhat different to the first season, it's hard to pinpoint exactly what it is which causes this different feel, but there's a definite shift in focus over this season. There's also a widening of the Soprano's world as well, which results in some great storylines and episodes.

But while some parts of the show widen out, others become smaller or disappear. In particular after having such a prominent and excellent role in the first season, Livia (Nancy Marchand) is greatly reduced in her appearances and potential influence - this isn't surprising at all considering what happened last season, but it did leave a bit of a gap. While Tony's sister Janice (Aida Turturro) and released wiseguy Richie (David Proval) step up to provide a fair amount of antagonism, they're not on the same level as Livia's brilliance. Janice in particular I found to be nothing more than an irritating waste of screen space - while this is intentional, it doesn't stop it being annoying.

Some of my favourite moments in this season include Christopher's film script arc, which initially started out as a "where the heck are they going with this?" and ended up with some fantastic scenes involving a few familiar faces. And the entire episode Commendatori which switched things up and was very interesting to watch.

I must admit while watching that Paulie's story arc (a great one by the way) initially slipped by me, it took a while for me to realise why he was so stressed out and acting up. But it built up wonderfully and resulted in some fantastic scenes, especially near the end of the season.

My favourite part of the show remains the scenes between Tony and Dr Melfi, these therapy scenes aren't as prevalent in the second season, but the ones that are there - brilliant. There's a great relationship between these two characters and I also like the widening of Dr Melfi's life, we get to see the knock-on effects of her treating Tony. Which means we also get to see more of the world outside the circle of the Sopranos.

In all the second season is a different beast to the first one, it has a wider scope and a different texture when compared to the first one. I wouldn't call it an evolution or even a direct improvement, it was certainly more enjoyable to watch and had some stupendous moments, but it was also very, very different. Almost to the point of heading in a different direction, I guess kind of like the way The Wire does it - same characters, different story.

Great stuff.
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This one is for those of you who've watched the first season of The Sopranos. For everyone else I'd recommend sticking with the lighter and spoiler free 1st Season Review.

For everyone else, remember I've only seen the first season at this point, I'm about to start the second season - but I wanted to get these thoughts down before watching any more and having future events colour my experience.

Read on, but spoilers lurk beyond...

So you can, of course, colour me completely impressed by The Sopranos first season. I can see why people and critics alike rave about it, it's an exceptionally brilliant - and accessable - show.

First of all, there were two slightly odd experiences I had while watching the first episode. These were both caused by other shows - the first is the completely different appearance of Edie Falco when compared to Nurse Jackie. Nurse Jackie is the first place I've encountered her, and while I'd read comparisons which talked about how different she looked in the two series experiencing this was pretty amazing. In Jackie she looks, well tired, strung out and her haircut doesn't flatter her at all. But in The Sopranos she's pretty good looking indeed, I guess haircuts do make a difference.

The second slight jarr comes from the opening sequence, which is parodied in the Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law episode 'Dabba Dabba Don". The opening sequence is re-cut with scenes of Fred Flintstone travelling in Bedrock. I've watched Harvey Birdman many times (mostly thanks to it's light nature and short episode length) and as such I cannot watch the opening credits to The Sopranos without reflecting on it's cartoon parody.

Outside of those two highly personal oddities the show is nothing short of amazing. It looks good, it flows well and the performances from some of the cast members are nothing short of superb. I can see why the show is one of those which is most commonly referrenced as 'one of the best shows of all time' already, and I've only seen the first thirteen episodes.

For myself, largest and most interesting points of the first season are revolve around Tony's depression and his therapy sessions with Dr Melfi. I've studied psychology and psychiatry quite extensively over the years, especially depression, a condition I have a considerable interest in. While I'm no recognised expert, I was pleased with the way Tony's depression was portrayed, most of the time he's quite capable and able. But his language is very negative and at times everything just overwhelms him. Depression being portrayed in the media is something which needs to occur more often, especially complex and intelligent portrayals like this one. It's a major thing for the show to tackle, and they do it well.

Depression and mobsters, seems like two of the big American issues all wrapped up into one package.

Performance-wise there are quite a few which are of great and worthy note. As I mentioned in the DVD review before James Gandolfini is dynamite as Tony, Edie Falco is also great as his wife Carmella, and many of the other actors give believable and amazing performances as well. But the major praise in the season would have to be given to the lovely Lorraine Bracco and most of all Nancy Marchand as the completely Machavellian Livia Soprano. I could see what she was up to fairly early on, or at least suspected and gradually had it proven. The passive agressive manipulation of her family is something to really behold, and the moment where Dr Melfi suggests that she might be a borderline personality was one which just rang true.

Another thing I feel the show really succeeds on is the rhythm of it, while the season as a whole progresses with a gradual storyline, each individual episode rises and falls with it's own beat. You can watch a single episode and enjoy it somewhat standalone as there's a story in each episode with hanging threads that connect each. But the season also holds together as a complete entity. This means it lies somewhere between the extremes like Murder One/The Wire with their ongoing season long storylines and House M.D./Star Trek which extensively use the episodic story of the week format. I'd compare the weighting of the storytelling to that of The Shield on this front - some ongoing stories, some which are wrapped up inside the episode. It's a good style, but a hard one to achieve.

Ultimately I'm highly impressed, some of the episodes in particular really stood out; now the first episode was decent, but not gripping. But after that things really took off. College was one of those episodes which was great, mixing the relative mundanity of taking your daughter to various universities against the issue of dealing with an ex-wiseguy turned rat. The future in one hand, the past in the other - this, combined with the viseral and unrelenting brutality of the execution makes it probably the first 'memorable' episode.

Speaking of which, I do adore the violence in this show, it's not glamourised and it's often harsh and very messy. Something which could shock, but at times it amuses - mostly because of the impliments used. Seeing someone whacked in the head with a service bell (ding! ding! ding!) or a phone handset really does provoke a laughter reaction. It's a trick that Evil Dead 2 achieves as well, mixing the horror of the situation with something comical - it blunts the blow from watching and make it a little easier to enjoy. Of course, the killing in College is not amusing - well except for maybe Tony's sudden appearance, but after that it becomes very messy.

There's absolutely loads more I could write about here, but I think that's enough until I've watched the second season. Suffice to say; I think the show is very special indeed.
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