Today's the day...

...the best hour of television (every week, by far) comes to an end. Also, happy birthday Leslie! =)

Actually I am definitely dreading the end of this series, whose characters now feel like real people in my life. There are very, very few tv shows I actually get that into, and I feel like The Sopranos is probably it for me, for my lifetime. I cannot even imagine what would surpass it. I mean, I hope something does, don't get me wrong - but given the extraordinary interplay between excellent writing, acting and directing - not to mention the seductive subject matter - I'm not sure if the roulette wheel of today's entertainment world will allow such a superb combination ever again - are we really that lucky?

Which brings me to the point of this post. I'm approximately t-minus 3 hours to the East Coast airing of the show, and I said I'd put some of my predictions up, in writing, just in case. So here goes - Melinda's thoughts to add to the hundreds (or more) of others up on the net (honestly, every single publication in this country - including both the reputable and trashy ones - have written about the end of this show):

First off, I think Tony will live - he'll end up on top and Phil Leotardo will sleep with the fishes. Given last week's precarious situation for our (anti)hero, this is most definitely a risky bet; however, given past trends in writing, in addition to public sentiment (not that that alone would be able to stop the writers), I don't really know how they'd get away with offing Tony.

Secondly, I think Sil won't wake up - I think he's done for, which is completely heartbreaking to me as he was definitely one of my favorites. I think Paulie lives. I think Junior dies. I think Carmela lives. I think there's potential for one of the kids to die (most likely AJ).

I think if there's a Judas - it's Patsy. I think there's potential for a conflict with family to bring both players out of hiding (I'm still not sure how they're going to swing that - if I were the head of either family, I wouldn't show my face anywhere!). Also, I think there will be something relevant to the fact that Patrick Paresi and Meadow are dating - that plotline has been of absolutely no consequence thus far, and they made such a stink about it the second half of this season, that I feel it'll become important.

Melfi is gone, and I don't think she'll return, at least not significantly (I think her rejection of Tony was a way to get her out of the picture so the NY-NJ war could go on without having to revisit the whole "Melfi has to go into hiding" thing from the first season. Although I (and I think all the other Sopranos fans) would LOVE if her and Tony finally got to make something out of that lingering mutual sexual attraction - but I doubt it'll happen.

Like I said, I think Carm lives, Tom and I did speculate on the reasons for her demise, should it become an HBO reality. Here are some possibilities:

NY gets ahold of one of her kids - she turns on Tony in order to save either Meadow/AJ/both - retributive strike by a Tony alliance or a nasty double-cross by New York puts Carm out of commission. Why this is unlikely: "families don't get touched, you know that" - Let's hope Phil holds it down old school - I have faith that he'll at least do that. He's a mean cocksucker, for sure (to borrow from Paulie Walnuts), but I think he respects the traditional mafia values.

Second Carmela possibility is far more likely - she gets terrified (rightly!) and goes to the Feds - I don't see Tony ever turning, so he has to take her out, Adriana La Cerva style - sends Paulie to get the job done, final scene - "Wings" wiping fresh blood of that brand new cappuchino machine.

Oh man, what were some of the other, more original ideas? I feel like I've talked to so many people about this (the show really was a cultural phenomenon) that I've at one point or another envisioned almost every possible ending (which I don't actually think is the case - my safest bet at this point is to put all my money on the writers doing something nobody expects!).

Here's one of my ideas from a google conversation with Tom:

"what if junior gets out and somehow finds phil (or phil seeks jr. out for an alliance - remember his talk about how tony fucked over his "father's brother") and then junior manages to off phil to pay back tony for all the wrong he did to him
then junior dies of old age
and tony can begin his real tenure as boss... fine\(italian for "the end" and not fine, as in "i'm fine") =)"

But there's a good chance the Junior plotline is over. Where are they hiding out currently? I never did find out - is it Junior's house? I don't know.

So I think I'm going to end it here. I could go on forever, as I'm sure the show could as well, but I think it's a bit better to stop when you're ahead and leave some issues unresolved. Here's food for thought though, lifted from a San Francisco Chronicle column:

"After every possible theory about what will bring Tony down -- some cheap mistake, unknowable moment of familial retribution or even sharp detective work by the Feds -- will it really be something so pedestrian as a turf war that does him in? It seems so ... predictably mob-like. And "The Sopranos," though often misunderstood as a whack-of-the-week mob drama, has never been about predictability."

Happy watching.