Fans of “The Sopranos” are going to want to own this season and it is nice to see the series make its debut on Blu-ray.
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I am not a tremendous fan of television. I love my movies. DVD has given me a lot of reason to sit down and enjoy older television shows and has become my preferable outlet of watching those hour and half hour serials that have graced the airwaves for ages. When it comes down to actually watching television, there are only a few shows I truly enjoy. Network television brings me "Lost" and "My Name is Earl." Cable television delivers "Penn & Teller´s Bullshit!," "Deadwood" and "The Sopranos." I had previously found a love affair with "Carnivale," but HBO canned it. If it were not for HBO, I would watch a considerable lesser number of television shows. Sadly, "Deadwood" is now as dead as "Carnivale" and "Sopranos" is nearing the edge. The final sixth season is being split into to parts. April 2007 beings the home stretch for the long running show and the first part has already aired and has now been released on all three formats – DVD, HD-DVD and Blu-ray.
Season Six has not been accepted with wide open arms by a large number of fans of the long running Mafia drama. The series began with a shock, but quickly slowed to a tedious pace. Once things started to get rolling, the series seemed to be building up to a full-blown mob war, but quickly settled down with a timid "Season Finale" with episode 12. For the first half of the final hurrah for HBO´s award winning show, the sixth season has been weak when compared to the previous five seasons. It had potential, but never quite lived up to it. My own personal feelings are a bit conflicted. Every week, I expecting something grand and startling to happen, but though there were some significant events, much of it was either expected or glossed over in a fashion that was anti-climactic. Of course, "Deadwood" was very timid in its final third season and had a horribly dull season finale. "Carnivale" ended beautifully, but its story may never again be told. Sadly, "Sopranos" followed closer to the footsteps of "Deadwood."
At the end of season five, we saw Tony´s friend and sometimes rival John Sacks (Vince Curatola) being taken away by the FBI and Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) walking home after narrowly avoiding being arrested in the same sting operation. Johnny Sack´s number two man, Phil Leotardo (Frank Vincent) has bad blood with Tony after Tony´s cousin gunned down Phil´s brother and with Johnny behind bars, the stage was set for instability between the Soprano family and the crime family led by Little Carmine (Ray Abruzzo) and Johnny Sacks. Much of the focus on "The Sopranos" has been on either the importance of family and friends and the fragile control of a crime family. The events of season five put in motion questions on the relationships between Soprano and his people and those loyal to Little Carmine and Johnny Sacks. With a questionable loyalty between Tony and his wife Carmella (Edie Falco) and the growing up of his children, Tony found himself trying to juggle not only the responsibilities of being the head of a crime family, but also being the head of his own household.
Very early in the sixth season, Tony is shot in the stomach by his Uncle Corrado (Dominic Chianese) and falls into a comatose state where his own life and survival is under question. Carmella stays by Tony´s bedside and discovers the level of love she has for her formerly estranged husband. Tony´s daughter Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) is attending college to become a lawyer and has moved out of the family nest. She returns to New Jersey to help keep watch over her father and finds stress in her relationship to her fiancé Finn (William Janowitz). His son Anthony (Robert Iler) has become a disappointment. He is unable to keep his grades up to remain in college and cannot even hold a job at Blockbuster. However, he feels strongly against Uncle Junior after his father was shot and seems intent on enacting some sort of revenge to either prove his love or to prove his worth to the "Family."
While Tony is in a coma, the control of his family starts to blur. His own Captains are fighting amongst each other for control and Paulie (Tony Sirico) feels he deserves more as Silvio (Steve Van Zandt) takes temporary control of the Soprano family. Tony´s sister Janice (Aida Turturro) feels her husband Bobby (Steve Schirripa) deserves to be a Captain as well. Paulie is not giving Carmella the required percentage of his take and is holding back on Tony. To make matters worse, one of Tony´s highest earning Captains, Vito (Joseph R. Gannascoli) has been outted as a homosexual and is on the run from the family. Vito is related to Phil Leotardo, but finding that his sister is married to a gay man has him enraged and certain to put further stress between himself and Tony Soprano. Eventually, Tony awakens from his coma and finds that those close to him question his leadership and have been undermining him. He also finds added problems with Leotardo and the stage is set for a full-blown mob war between the two gangsters.
Looking back, it does seem like a lot of ground was covered in season six, but watching these twelve episodes, it felt disappointing. Vito and others found the conclusion to their storyline. The first few weeks had questions arising as to whether or not Tony´s final season would be spent in flashbacks and it was uncertain if he would survive. With Johnny Sacks in prison, the temperature did rise between Tony Soprano and Phil Leotardo, but the situation calmly resolved itself. The finale was heavily criticized for not having much happen. The final moments of the episode was a calm Christmas gathering at the Soprano household with Meadow calling home and Anthony showing the first signs of growing up. Where the season started with Tony nearly dying and hinted at a full-blown mob war, it ended up terribly tame.
There are hints that the final eight episodes could get even more hectic. Leotardo has had a heart attack, but Tony Soprano is given information by an old FBI agent, Dwight Harris (Matt Servitto) that he has developed a repertoire with over the years. Where Harris had spent much of his early seasons trying to put Tony behind bars, he seems to have developed respect for the man and gives him information that may save his life, but provide hints of things to come in the second half of the season. Tony´s nephew Christopher Moltisanti (Michael Imperioli) is sleeping with a woman that Tony desperately wanted, but cracks are appearing where Michael´s relationship with Tony could again become strained. These two minor events and the Leotardo heart attack were the big revelations of the season finale for part one. It was disappointing and given that Sopranos only has eight or nine episodes left, myself and other fans certainly wanted more and we pray that our beloved show doesn´t end as flat as much of this first part of season six felt. It wasn´t a bad season, but it was not quite as good as the precedent created over the previous five seasons.
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