Sopranos Out With A Whimper

We expected pearls from swine? Well sure we did. Time and again. But Chase detested rapping things up all neat and tidy and as for me I'm still looking for the lost Russian in the Pine Barrens whenever I head back to Jersey. All the Sopranos ever featured was T&A to a tommygun beat. Three or four halfway decent actors surrounded by the absolute worst of rank amateurs, screaming and beating on one another until we'd had enough and longed for the Bing girls. So what else COULD we expect from a show whose claim to fame was Temper and Tits?

"Fictional New Jersey mob boss Tony Soprano faded to black last night as TV's most feared family man, sharing a plate of onion rings with the wife and kids at Holsten's restaurant.

But the finale of the wildly popular HBO series left many fans feeling let down that the show went off with too many loose ends - and not enough bloodshed.

"It was the cruelest thing I've seen in my life. I'm totally disappointed," said Tom Bauccio, 49, of Manhattan, who watched the last episode, titled "Made in America," at 1020, an upper West Side bar."

More From Linda Stasi:

"THERE was nothing wrong with your television.

That's the way the creator of "The Sopranos" wanted it to end after eight years and 80 dramatic hours - with a blank screen and a long silence.

For those who thought Tony Soprano was going to get blown from here to Canarsie in last night's finale, the disappointment might be hard to take.

There was no spectacular end for the big guy. He didn't get blown up by a bomb after turning his car's ignition.

There was no spectacular splatter on Satriale's sidewalk.

There was just fried food, which may be the only thing that will kill Tony. But for now, he lives to eat another day.

To the shock of most viewers, Big Tony Soprano went out with a whimper and an onion ring.

After all that therapy and all those murders, the last words before the screen went black were, "I got these for the table." Onion rings.

What the . . . ?"

About 10 years ago there was this sit down with David Chase. He agreed to have lunch with an investor as well as a perspective writer for his upcoming HBO offering the Sopranos. "I don't want the story told from the perspective of an Italian-American," Chase mumbled around his Caesar Salad, "it's going to be FOR white breads and written by white breads. Nobody will pay attention if it turns into one big gumba party with inside jokes and what I definitely want is a far broader appeal..." The investor looked at the writer and both shrugged. "Guess he never heard about The Godfather," the investor said after they'd parted ways with the seemingly clueless Producer. "The thing sounds like its just a ripoff of Analyze This, and it made a killing so maybe he's on to something," the writer replied. "Who ever thought Bobby D could co-star with Billy Crystal and act so NOT Italian? Hey, it'll be different, and after all its only cable."