The Sopranos

Dakota

~~~~~~~
I don't care for shows where I'm even sort of rooting for bad guys, which is why I'm conflicted about The Americans. The Sopranos, I'm not rooting for any of them so it's okay to enjoy the seediness of it all. I wanted to like Carmella but I hate her. I also wanted to like the shrink, but she's a freaking nut. I'm basically waiting for when they all get killed - I was sort of sorry to see Big Pussy get killed but wished Richie's passing had been more drawn out and painful. I want to see Christopher killed, and I really really want to see Tony get killed but I know it doesn't happen on screen. I was hoping that that horrible Livia would die in a prolonged fire, but I know that's not how it happens, darn it.

I'm interested in the human nature aspect of it all, but basically I'm just waiting to see all these awful people die.

Big Pussy gets killed?


















j/k - :lol: actually I am in season #1 watching it for the 1st time. We are a few episodes to the end.


Have you watched Breaking Bad? That is a show where I found myself rooting for the bad guys.
 

Pete

Repete
Why do we love criminals and crime?

The Soprano's, all the mob stuff, it's about violence, threat of violence, deceit, cheating, lying, betrayal, addiction, abuse, murder, extortion, corruption. There are no thugs with a heart of gold. No redeeming themes or happy endings. It seems perfectly plausible that this is going on, for real, pretty much just like the show, right now, all over the nation.

I have LONG been attracted to music that is pretty heavy; thundering drums, screaming guitars, brutal lyrics, not a whole lot of happy endings or sunny, easy going so, I get the attraction to the themes. Is it the same thing?

My ex GF loved the SVU shows, the rape, the child abuse, the murder, very, very dark stuff. My music doesn't bother me in the slightest. In fact, like going to the gym, after 30 minutes of aural assault, I feel GREAT, relieved, sorta like a giant mental ####. However, the shows, and maybe it is the visual, Soprano's, SVU, all that stuff, leaves me feeling awful.

:popcorn:

Perhaps because it is all old style non bureaucratic justice. "Strictly business". all those who are due justice get it. Since all of them are basically criminals with guilt of some degree no one is immune.
 

Monello

Smarter than the average bear
PREMO Member
How are ANY of them attractive? I want to like Carmella but,

I like the fact that they show these people as the flawed humans that they are. Take Carmela. She loves the perks that come with being a mob wife. But she makes herself a tragic character with her woe is me bit. Then she justifies being a good person because she's in touch with her church. She talks about salvation 1 second then goes into a profanity laced tirade the next. Their kids are all ####ed up more so than regular kids their age.

Carmela, she's a huge gossiper. Treats the hired help like garbage. Pities the old girlfriends that don't live in Essex Fells.

The part that doesn't seem credible, even though they are portraying people living in NJ, is that everyone talks to complete strangers with contempt and profanity. Even the peripheral couples are all F this and BS that. I can't recall the last time I spoke to an acquaintance in a similar manner. Conversely nobody addresses me in that fashion.

I have the added bonus of being very knowledge able about the physical references in the show. Places like The Manor and Willowbrook Mall are places I'm very familiar with.
 

Larry Gude

Strung Out
Perhaps because it is all old style non bureaucratic justice. "Strictly business". all those who are due justice get it. Since all of them are basically criminals with guilt of some degree no one is immune.

:lol: Every single person on that show 'deserves' to be, at the very least, locked up for life. That's the thing about it to me, there is NO justice. I think it is why, by and large, we do NOT care about black boys murdering black boys; we see them as all guilty. We seem to like our raw street justice thugs/gangs shows, too.
 

Larry Gude

Strung Out
I like the fact that they show these people as the flawed humans that they are. Take Carmela. She loves the perks that come with being a mob wife. But she makes herself a tragic character with her woe is me bit. Then she justifies being a good person because she's in touch with her church. She talks about salvation 1 second then goes into a profanity laced tirade the next. Their kids are all ####ed up more so than regular kids their age.

Carmela, she's a huge gossiper. Treats the hired help like garbage. Pities the old girlfriends that don't live in Essex Fells.

The part that doesn't seem credible, even though they are portraying people living in NJ, is that everyone talks to complete strangers with contempt and profanity. Even the peripheral couples are all F this and BS that. I can't recall the last time I spoke to an acquaintance in a similar manner. Conversely nobody addresses me in that fashion.

I have the added bonus of being very knowledge able about the physical references in the show. Places like The Manor and Willowbrook Mall are places I'm very familiar with.

:lol: I'm a flawed person. You're a flawed person. These people are sociopaths and psychopaths.
 

vraiblonde

Board Mommy
PREMO Member
Patron
Thinking that Tony Soprano (or the actor who plays him) is sexy is like thinking a huge pile of rotting #### is sexy. I seriously gag every time they show him banging some woman; when she kisses him it's like watching someone suck on a pile of ####.

:shudder:
 

Larry Gude

Strung Out
Thinking that Tony Soprano (or the actor who plays him) is sexy is like thinking a huge pile of rotting #### is sexy. I seriously gag every time they show him banging some woman; when she kisses him it's like watching someone suck on a pile of ####.

:shudder:

Same thing with 'Carm'. When I see her in something else, I'd would normally think 'that's a hot woman, there' but, I can't shake it. There is not enough hot water and soap in the world.

Now, do you find Gandolfino (Tony) gross, period, presuming you knew him in roles prior? Or, is he gross because, to you, he is Tony? For Carm, for me, it is because of her role.
 

Monello

Smarter than the average bear
PREMO Member
You're a flawed person.

paulie.jpg

Got yourself a gun
 

Larry Gude

Strung Out

The one guy I can never take seriously is Tony's assistant, Little Stevie Van Zandt. Every character has a caricature, a ready one but, they all seem to have a balance, a menace to them, even "Paulie". Except for Van Zandt. I always expect him to take his hair off, adjust it, and put it back on like it's a hat. :lol:
 

vraiblonde

Board Mommy
PREMO Member
Patron
Now, do you find Gandolfino (Tony) gross, period, presuming you knew him in roles prior? Or, is he gross because, to you, he is Tony? For Carm, for me, it is because of her role.

JG is the perfect actor to portray Tony Soprano because he looks like a thuggish neanderthal slob, therefore not attractive or sexy in any way. His portrayal of Tony pushes him over the repulsive edge, although I've never seen him in anything else and might revise that opinion slightly if I did. He's like Gene Hackman: ugly in his own right, and is cast appropriately so you never find any of his characters attractive either.

Hey, Saul, we need a really ugly unsympathetic guy to play someone the audience will hate.
Well, James Gandalfini is dead, so how about Gene Hackman?

Like that.
 

Monello

Smarter than the average bear
PREMO Member
The one guy I can never take seriously is Tony's assistant, Little Stevie Van Zandt. Every character has a caricature, a ready one but, they all seem to have a balance, a menace to them, even "Paulie". Except for Van Zandt. I always expect him to take his hair off, adjust it, and put it back on like it's a hat. :lol:

Silvio is the consigliere. He's suppose to be a little less cro-magnon than the street soldiers. Think of the Tom Hagen character in the GF movies.
 

Pete

Repete
:lol: Every single person on that show 'deserves' to be, at the very least, locked up for life. That's the thing about it to me, there is NO justice. I think it is why, by and large, we do NOT care about black boys murdering black boys; we see them as all guilty. We seem to like our raw street justice thugs/gangs shows, too.
You notice they take great pains to not show the result of their criminal activities for the most part. No result of truck high jacking, no theft and so on. They portray them as victimless crimes outside their own sphere of criminal behavior.
 

Pete

Repete
Thinking that Tony Soprano (or the actor who plays him) is sexy is like thinking a huge pile of rotting #### is sexy. I seriously gag every time they show him banging some woman; when she kisses him it's like watching someone suck on a pile of ####.

:shudder:

Don't hold back
 
The part that doesn't seem credible, even though they are portraying people living in NJ, is that everyone talks to complete strangers with contempt and profanity. Even the peripheral couples are all F this and BS that. I can't recall the last time I spoke to an acquaintance in a similar manner. Conversely nobody addresses me in that fashion.

I have the added bonus of being very knowledge able about the physical references in the show. Places like The Manor and Willowbrook Mall are places I'm very familiar with.

My dad is from Morristown, NJ... He talks like that sometimes... and so do I .... sometimes. :ohwell:
 

vraiblonde

Board Mommy
PREMO Member
Patron
You notice they take great pains to not show the result of their criminal activities for the most part. No result of truck high jacking, no theft and so on. They portray them as victimless crimes outside their own sphere of criminal behavior.

Not true - they portrayed the gambler guy and the wreck his life became. Granted, he's responsible for his own gambling problem but Tony admitted he exploited it to take everything this guy owned and liquidate his business. He said it was just how he makes his own living. And this was his friend.

Also Artie Bucco - Tony torched his restaurant. And what's his face that Richie ran over and made him a paraplegic, and Tony pretty much excused it.

These are Tony's *friends* whose lives he destroyed.

As the boss, he has all these psychopaths working for him who kill and maim innocent people for no real reason, and he just fluffs it off. None of these mobsters are portrayed as sympathetic characters in any regard. They're not even decent family men, like Don Corleone was. At the end the final episode of Season 2 they show Tony in his nice home, contentedly puffing a cigar, cut with scenes of the squalor and destruction that comes from his business dealings. Its a great sequence.
 

Larry Gude

Strung Out
You notice they take great pains to not show the result of their criminal activities for the most part. No result of truck high jacking, no theft and so on. They portray them as victimless crimes outside their own sphere of criminal behavior.

I'm not a big fan but, I've seen them inflict violence on pretty much everyone including one episode where Tony and the kid rob two guys who are robbing a liquor store.
The one episode I thought was priceless, two guys go to shake down a local business and have to deal with some kid manager who tells them "look, I understand but, this is Starbucks and there is nothing I can do about it. I can't pay you for protection because I have no way to do so. If you'd like to talk to corporate..."
 
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