Someone seriously gave this a ten? This is a pathetic excuse for television, I have never seen an episode of TV more boring and uninteresting. When are people going to stop lying to themselves and see this show for what it is?
This is probably becoming the best series of TV I’ve ever seen. Feels like the show is a lot less dated, and is finally able to cash out the character development that I sat through in earlier seasons. It is also much funnier than Breaking Bad, although I don’t know that there is the same kind of tension. It was only whilst Tony was in the hospital that I wanted to continue watching to find out what happens next.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2015-08-05T19:46:12Z
If the last episode was about the potential of Tony changing, about his ability to become a different, possibly better person, this episode is about how it may be too late, about how he's too deep into this world that any move toward his becoming kinder and gentler and more sensitive would only make him weaker in the eyes of his colleagues and competitors.
Institutional fatalism is really more the realm of The Wire, The Sopranos' HBO cousin that was on the air at the same time as this season of the show, but there's a sense of it here too. There's the idea that to be a major player in the mob, you have to be ruthless, to constantly show strength, that any hint of compassion or care only shows you as vulnerable. The Mafia, at least the incarnation, doesn't just welcome in ruthless individuals, it makes them and reinforces them. Anyone who deviates from the plan gets whacked or marginalized. Even if Tony wants to change, if he starts moving down that path, it won't be long until people are literally gunning for him. So he starts to turn back into the pitiless gangster we know, even when it makes him vomit up blood.
We shouldn't give too much credit to the mob, though. Even before Tony listens to Melfi's advice and sizes up his men for a fight to reestablish his image of strength and dominance, there's a sense that his patience for sensitivity is fraying. It's summed up best in the metal detector scene, where his having to go back and forth is clearly irking him, but he's trying to keep it under control. There's all these little things nagging at Tony's happiness. It's sweet when he talks about the idea of wanting to hold Meadow's kid (it's frankly the sweetest moment we've probably seen from Tony in the whole series), but it's clear that certain nagging things keep bringing the easy-to-anger Tony back to the fore.
It's an interesting contrast with Johnny Sack, who always seemed like a kinder, gentler mobster in some ways. Sure, he clearly had a temper and wasn't above ordering Ralphie killed for insulting his wife, but that's just it. In contrast to Tony, Johnny seemed to legitimately love his family, not in an idealized sense, not in a "this is the kind of life that's expected of me, but I'm not going to put real effort into it" sense, but in that he legitimately loves his wife as she is, that his heart is undeniably full at seeing her get married and bringing his son-in-law into his circle, and that he is truly devastated when the feds interfere with it. (Make no mistake, the feds come off as pretty big dicks throughout here.)
And while Frank is likely looking for an in to becoming boss regardless, he uses these qualities to tear Johnny down. It clearly makes an impression on Tony, who had his own (different) moment of weakness after collapsing at the party. He's not wrong to notice that Chris is more apt to challenge or disagree with him since the coma. He sees Johnny and admires him, wants to move in that direction perhaps, but sees what it would cost him, and so he beats up his own soldier to show that he's not weak like Johnny, that he's not vulnerable, that he needs to be respected.
There's thematic resonance with Vito's storyline, where he too wants to embrace something other than the tough mobster stereotype and pursue his real sexual desires, but he realizes that once his fellow mobsters see him (and ignore his sad and cringe-y attempts to pass it off as a joke) that his goose is likely cooked. The mob doesn't tolerate differences from the paradigm very well. Vito leaves his home and checks into a cheap motel.
And there's the contrast again. Johnny walks to his prison cell after his daughter's wedding. Vito is scared for his life a dingy rented room. Tony lies in McMansion with his wife. If Tony wants to avoid ending up like Johnny or Vito, or worse, he's got a lot more blood to throw up, and the show underlines how this is, in some ways, a tragedy, that keeps Tony from being the better man he might be.