The Sopranos: "Meadowlands"

This is a weekly feature.  I'm reviewing The Sopranos episodes starting from the beginning.  This is the fourth episode of the first season.  

Past Episodes
Pilot
46 Long
Denial, Acceptance, Anger

Meadowlands starts off with a dream sequence that really highlights Tony's fear of being found out in therapy.  This is cleverly done as at first it appears to be a real session and then quickly it becomes obvious that it's a dream when everyone starts appearing by her office.  It accurately portrays a dream in that it's crazy and disorderly yet it seems to be real at the time.

These doubts manifest and make Tony question therapy.  He is able to appease his wife, who really wants Tony in therapy, and appease himself by having Dr. Melfi followed.  It's quite devilish in fact.  While we've seen Tony beat up people before (in fact it happens this very episode), this is probably the worst thing he's done, only because Dr. Melfi is as innocent as people come.  Usually in a show like this, we rationalize Tony's actions, because the person he is doing it to is also a bad person.  But in this case, that is not the case.

Also in this episode, the aftermath of Junior's actions (if you need a reminder, he beat up Chris and killed Brendan; although Chris completely missed the message) occur.  Chris is still not sure who was responsible for his beating, thinking Tony could be the reason.  This is quickly removed when he picks up Meadow from school and talks with Tony himself.

He also sees Brendan was shot in the eye.  This leads to kind of a funny sequence in Jackie Aprile's hospital bed if watching Jackie wasn't so sad.  The funny part of the sequence is that Big Pussy, Silvio, and Paulie are all discussing when Mo Greene was shot in the eye in The Godfather.  There's just something funny about mobsters idolizing The Godfather as much as normal people, putting it in a mythical light.  (Also, I think something fairly unique at the time happened as three conversations are mixed at once effectively.)

Tony retaliates by stapling Mikey Palmice in the chest with a stapler gun he picked up in the hospital.  It's pretty clear when Tony has the dinner with the captains that Mikey is not well-liked.  (Though I wish there was an alternate universe where Mikey was working for Tony)  Also, from that dinner, Tony is almost unanimously favored to become the next acting boss.  It's also clear Tony doesn't want it.

So Jackie dies in this episode and everyone assumes Tony will become the new acting boss.  Tony  doesn't really want it and knows Junior wants it so he gives him the job.  Tony wrongly assumes he will still be making the calls.  Thus begins the reign of Junior, a not very smart or good acting boss.

On a lighter note, Anthony gets in a fight with a fellow student.  Through this storyline, he finds out Tony is in the mob.  It's kind of remarkable and sad how naive Anthony seems.  Anyway, this is the first episode where he gets any kind of story and it was a good and necessary one.  One suspects Meadow had a similar experience (without the fighting; probably the sarcastic comment though).

A couple of complaints: who plays Nintendo 64 like that?!  Tony's doing it wrong.  Not only he is doing it wrong, but I looked closely and I don't see how it's physically possible he was able to play Mario Kart holding it like that.  Also, the website Meadow visited to see Anthony was similarly lame.  I didn't see much of anything about Tony when I looked closely and it wasn't really convincing.  Maybe that's more of a 1999 thing though.

Deaths
Jackie Aprile dies of cancer (Not the typical death of The Sopranos I suppose)

Surprising Guest Appearances
Guillermo Diaz, who isn't famous or anything, but I just watched Half Baked and when I saw his face, I did a double take.  (He's only in a few episodes of Chappele's Show and Weeds and is in the movie The Terminal)

Quotes
"That's Heshie.  He's got a 3:00." - Dr. Melfi in Tony's nightmare

"I heard the nurse said you made number two in your pants.  Is that what happened?" - Adrianna to Chris in the hospital

"In the city, grown men are soiling themselves." "Mothers throw their babies out of skyscraper windows" - Livia Soprano

"You know, I come here to get cheered up.  You think that's a mistake?" - Tony to Livia

"Not for anything, God bless your uncle, but he's living in the wrong century and New York knows it." - Larry Boy Barese

"If you don't do something, I got to question your leadership." - Chris, with the worst timing in the world

"Fucking moron" - Tony whispering to himself, perhaps revealing to Dr. Melfi who was the cause of her misfortune

Playlist (New Feature)

New feature on every post!  I'm really interested in sharing my musical tastes, but don't think making a new blog is necessary.  So I'll end the posts with five songs with as much variety as I can manage.  Don't expect any country though (or electronic) (or dub step) (or heavy metal).

1. "Can I Kick It" - A Tribe Called Quest
2. "The Ghost Inside" - Broken Bells
3. "All Star" - Smash Mouth
4. Lights - Ellie Goulding
5. "Fame is for Assholes" - Hoodie Allen ft. Chiddy Bang

That's pretty much what you can expect on my playlists.  Classic rap, indie rock, 90s Rock, a poppy song I like, and a newer rap song.  Been listening to a lot of 60s and 70s music as well so that may make some appearances.