20
by zwingli
It has to be Funhouse. It's simultaneously a perfectly mind-blowing hour of television, but also a thoroughly satisfying season finale. Beautiful build-up of atmosphere in this episode. The way it just plunges you headfirst into the dream sequence is excellent. Tony and Carmela making love, you let your guard down, then boom, cut to the "spring snow" scene. The use of "Thru and Thru" by the Stones hits that perfect sublime cohesion with the mood of the show.
And I love the way that Pussy was revealed to be an informant not through any one tangible clue, but through a build-up of suspicion in Tony's subconscious. Pussy, despite his facade of joviality, is a profoundly stressed man, and Tony comes to recognize this. He sees the signs - a brief, awkward comment, a strangely timed or forced laugh, a statement that just seems too well-rehearsed. Tony dismisses it and sweeps it under the rug, but it can't stay buried. Eventually he has a fever dream in which his subconscious confronts him straight up, and tells him the hard truth. This is what his therapy with Melfi truly does for him, he learns things about the human mind that allow him to manipulate his subordinates, or recognize treachery, and it helps him climb the ladder in the mafia. This is partly what makes Tony so impressive yet frightening. He can see through lies, no matter how well conceived, and stare into a person's soul, accurately deciphering their intentions and judging them based on this.
Taps, lights out, 2200 hours. What's missing? Give up? Television.