The Sopranos: Denial, Anger, Acceptance

“And the Romans- where are they now?"

"You're lookin;' at 'em, asshole."

An unusually short third episode starts with Christopher and Brendan being absolute bell-ends in a way which makes it quite clear that at least one of them (and Brendan is the bigger bell-end) is going to get “whacked”. But this episode, as ever, is about Tony- and the anger which he, the classic exemplar of what we now call toxic masculinity, uses as a displacement for other difficult emotions. His reaction to the Impressionist-ish painting in Dr Melfi’s waiting room is revealing- he sees decay where others don’t. But his experience here is, of course, legitimate, in spite of his obvious inferiority complex where it comes to education and culture.

What is affecting Tony more than anything, at the moment, is Jackie’s cancer, which is obviously killing this much-likes man- and the title obviously mirrors the process Tony goes through. He arranges a girl and a party with booze for his friend, whose life has now shrunk to the hospital room within which he will very shortly die. It would upset anyone.

But Tony uses anger as a displacement emotion elsewhere too. Artie and Charmaine are broke, moving to a smaller house near the Sopranos, and the insurance company suspect arson which will leave them in penury. This is, of course, all Tony’s fault, so he reacts angrily to the pathetically loyal a Artie recounting his woes while acting as chef for a charity do at their house- and Charmaine, acting as waitress, is humiliated. A sudden class rupture seems to be destroying Carmela’s attempts to get close to Charmaine again, leading her to reveal that she once slept with Tony- but ultimately chose the decent, honest Artie.

There’s an interesting sub-plot with a family dispute between some Hasidic Jews who behave with an old-fashioned honour which Tony admires.

We end with a nice juxtaposition. Meadow and her friend Hunter perform the choir recital they need to do to get some kind of points to get to a good uni (ridiculous) which moves Tony deeply- but Junior has had a chat with Livia, who drops some wonderfully subtle hints. So Christopher gets a traumatic mock execution but gets to live- mistakenly thinking its Tony’s doing after he supplied crystal meth to Meadow. But Brendan is killed, in true Roman fashion, in the bath, ending a truly awesome episode as Junior watches...