No surprise to you I'm sure, HB, but I disagree. The gambling, the reflection on his first whacking, the "[murder] is a big fat pain in the balls" comment, the jealous sabotage of Bobby by soiling HIM in the same way that Tony feels irrevocably soiled by his own father, the more urgent lack of inner peace, the sudden desire to whack Paulie in an episode dominated by paternal nostalgia and where we learn he once wished Paulie was his father, these are all signs that Tony is coming ever closer to finally seeing Johnny Boy for the rotten father he in many ways was. And that doesn't indicate Finnerty going farther away but coming ever closer to breaking through the most stubborn frontier of Tony's self-justification and deception.HagensBing1977 wrote:All due respect, De'c'unt, but an extended therapy session would be anticlimactic and a letdown to all the viewers. Tony has ventured too far from Kevin Finnerty already and not even Melfi can set him straight.
The epitome of anticlimax to me would be to waste 7 seasons of buildup to Tony confronting his real demons -- the internal ones -- in favor of him battling it out with NY or being double crossed by some Muslim terrorists. All the other can play a role, but it will feel incredibly empty if it's not ancillary to Tony's arrival at a different place, a consciously-acknowledged different view of the life he's led. I really want Melfi to be a catalyst for that as a reward for her years of patience and faith. But her involvement is less important to me than Tony actually reaching that destination.