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09 June 2007
This comment by mudpuppie makes me wonder: am I the only person here who's never seen an episode of The Sopranos?
It's not like I went out of my way to avoid it, but we don't have any pay cable channels, and when we watch TV shows on DVD it's always 60's and 70's stuff, so it just sort of never happened.
I've never had HBO, and thus have never seen The Sopranos, Lost, Oz or any show not later syndicated on, say, TBS. And I've never seen an un-edited episode of Sex and the City,
another non watcher here as well. I have a TV but mostly use it for movies and some public television so I've truly missed out of massive amounts of recent cultural phenomena.
Which is funny, because the first 12 years of my life we didn't have a TV, then we moved to the States and had cable and the whole shebang. HBO etc during the mid eighties and fill up on it (what the hell else is a teenager in Nashville going to do), and now we have a tv but it remains pretty unused
I've never seen it, although once I was in the room while my husband was watching it and the music over the closing credits prompted me to run to the computer to find out what it was, at the same time that someone was posting to AskMe to find out what the music was.
Other than that I've never seen it. I do not want to be exposed to Sopranos ;)
I've got a tv (well, I used to--now I've got a computer monitor with two computers, a DVD player, 2 VCRs and five videogame consoles plugged into it), but I've never seen an episode of The Sopranos.
Maybe, I've been thinking, now's a good time to start watching it. From the beginning, I mean. From a distance, it seems like the kind of thing I might like.
The only currently-really-popular show I've watched (that isn't a cartoon) is CSI, but I got really sick of it. Especially after Grisom mis-quoted The Raven and it began to sink in that everything they say is bullshit.
I DO own a tv, a big honkin' tv, with a built-in VCR and DVD player. But no, I haven't seen The Sopranos. But then I only just recently got around to the Godfather movies, so gimme 20 or 30 years, I'll probably get to it.
I've never seen it. I just got TV for the first time in 7 years but not HBO or anything, just basic cable (I had the TV before but we don't get any channels without cable and I didn't have cable, so we only used it for DVDs.) However, my brother owns the first couple of seasons on DVD and I've been thinking about borrowing it.
So, are we, as teevee-watching human beings, pretty much past the era of water-cooler shows? Is there anything, ever, that almost everyone watches, these days?
To anyone who hasn't seen it, I'd recommend the first four seasons. These last two seasons have been so wishy-washy, but the first four were excellent. Probably as good as any movie I saw that came out during those years.
Having made it less than halfway through a viewing of "Godfather I" and realizing I had ZERO empathy for or interest in anybody on the screen, I totally passed on "Sopranos". Oddly, I'm similarly turned off by "The Office". It's been hard the last year to even watch shows that DO interest me like "Heroes", which is why I'm not getting my byline in the TV section of MSNBC.com anymore. Maybe after Sunday I'll make myself spend Prime Time channel-surfing instead of web-surfing for a week.
My boyfriend had never seen an episode (and staunchly insisted he had no interest) till a couple of months ago, when he was finally swayed by my raving (and his friend's raving) to start watching the whole series. He's now an addict -- there have been a few times he's had to force himself to go to sleep rather than stay up all night watching it compulsively.
Mullacc, I agree that the first 3 seasons were spectacular, but I actually think the 4th season was pretty weak (I just watched the Christopher Columbus episode and was reminded how badly written it seemed [NOT SPOILERISH!]). The 5th season seemed better by comparison, and then the 6th/7th season combo has veered wildly between excellent and tedious.
I've seen the first two seasons. I will probably watch them all, gradually, via netflix (just watched the 2nd season a couple months ago). I like the genre, and I quite like the Sopranos, but I don't love it. It's OK.
I love the genre, I always have, even though I abhor the violence. It's weird but the thing that makes the show great, is not that it's some sort of Shakespearean or Aeschylan morality play, far from it. It's how the actors fully inhabit the characters. A lot of actors can do "great", Brando pulling off the stateliness of Vito Corleone, Pacing expressing the internal conflict of Michael, DeNiro revelling in the malevolence of Al Capone, etc. What Gandolfini pull off is the banality of the characters. The simpering, self-pitying tough guy with unresolved mommy issues that leads a crew of brutal men, with similar issues. Edie Falco's thoroughly amoral housewife cheerfully overlooking the source of their income to worry about consumerist issues. And so on.
I dunno why, but to me that's what has made it something special.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE If anyone does watch the season finale: NO SPOILERS! It generally takes ages for that show to reach the UK and trying to avoid what happens is really tricky, especially as the outcomes can be mentioned on things like Google News and the Yahoo! home page.
I'm with scody on how I feel about the past seasons of Sopranos. There were times when I missed episodes and didn't particularly care. I'll rather be glad when it's over. There are certain characters I could have done without (AJ).
I'm not a fan of "The Office" either. Or "30 Rock". And there are other shows I've never seen, such as "Reba", "Gilmore Girls", "Brothers and Sisters", "Men in Trees". Even "Everybody Loves Raymond" I only started watching in reruns. I'd rather chat with people on the internet (here). Except for "House", "Scrubs", and "The Closer". Them, I love.
scody: When I originally wrote that comment, I only included the first three seasons. I changed it to the first four seasons only because I was so satisfied with the fate of Ralphie. But, overall, I agree with you--the first 3 standout from the rest.
I've never seen it. The library where I work has all of the DVDs, and all of my coworkers are rabid fans and regularly suspend work activities to discuss the latest plot twists. I've still never seen it.
I'm not ashamed of owning, loving, and spending an inordinate amount of time watching television. But I have never watched the Sopranos. Following are the movie/television genres I think are played out:
Gangster
Hospital
Police Drama (although the Police Musical genre seems woefully unexplored)
Thank you for your time and consideration,
Otis, former TV town drunkard
I haven't seen it either. Not exactly through lack of interest, though. We don't have HBO, but they started playing the first (I think) season on Showcase. I didn't realise it until they were several episodes into it. I'll rent it at some point in the future.
The only two shows I try to make sure I watch are House (I just started this last season, I'll rent the previous seasons sooner or later) and The Ghost Whisperer (shut up).
I watched part of one episode, was repelled by the fact that someone was getting killed or beaten in every other scene, asked myself why on earth I would ever spend any time watching or caring about such awful people, and then never watched it again.
Love TV. Haven't seen this show. Love Falco & Gandolfini too, based on whatever little bits of them I've seen on late night shows & in cameos elsewhere. Don't have HBO. That's part of it, but not all of it. I'd like to see Six Feet Under and Deadwood too. But it feels like when you're in your senior year of college & wish you had majored in art history or sociobiology instead. Too late, for this lifetime, unless I stop time (and the onslaught of fresh, new and interesting shows) to catch up.
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