#commendatori

ok i thought this episode was way later in the series. having a woman who has more power and mob influence than tony so shatters basically the entire world we've seen in the 16 episodes up til now and tony doesn't know how to cope with it. everything in the show so far has necessitated this gender binary men are like this women are like this logic to function, and i love seeing tony in this environment where that logic is impossible (and also somewhat reinforced in season 1 with tony having to interact with melfi, a professional who he can't terrorize or pay off into doing what he wants). i also love how this parallels with the at home plotline of the mob wives reevaluating how sidelined they are

wowwwww strideofpride didn't lie that end of episode sequence killllllls. god i wasn't expecting that much from this episode but i think it's up there with college for me for sure, that was just. pitch perfect, the pacing, the flow of the episode, the way all the different stories intersected with themes the show has laid out since the start. i love these seemingly self-contained episodes that have more long lasting implications than you would expect. it's gonna be hard for season 2 to beat this i think (although the last two episodes are really amazing from what i remember, although they have a different vibe with being a culmination of two seasons of storytelling vs this and college that are just great standalone character explorations.) like really with both college and commendatori they're these perfect encapsulations of the show's most important themes

i love these very brief paulie interludes where he just mopes about his disillusionment with italy lmao, just to underscore the rest of the show

"in the end i know you're not gonna leave him" this feels like this could be a line at the end of a horror film. in the end carmela knows she can never leave tony

ohhh my god Janice WAS trying to call her out. there's another version of this scene where janice says all this and carmela shrugs and defends pussy and even though this is kind of hitting you over the head i'm glad they like come out in the open and say it. maybe because it moves from the obvious subtlety of janice judging carmela to the more unclear subtlety of janice and carmela's very complicated feelings about tony. carmela is quick to defend the mob lifestyle but we've directly seen how much misery it causes her. janice is quick to call out tony and yet she's happy to be here and live in this house for at least several weeks now, and of course no matter what tony is her brother. and it's also just great to see someone tell carmela what the audience has been thinking since episode 1

lmao yeah tony does think about the roman empire. a lot