Shook the Spot

"The moles, they digging through your sprinklers, too?"

SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY . . . THE SOPRANOS — SEASON 6, EPISODE 2 . . . "JOIN THE CLUB" . . . NEW DEETS ON THE SHOOTING . . . IF ONLY TONY HAD A LifeAlert EMERGENCY PENDANT . . . SPOILER IN THE EPISODE SYNOPSIS . . . CHIANESE SEES HIMSELF IN SIX FLAGS GUY . . . NEW YORK TIMES NOT OPTIMISTIC FOR TONY TURNAROUND . . . "HE IS CERTAINLY OFF TO A BAD START"

Last week's premiere ended without the customary, "Next week on . . . " HBO, one imagines, wisely concluded that any shots of episode two could blow the suspense of Tony's kitchen-floor problem. The official one-sentence description of tonight's episode is, "A west-coast business trip turns into a case of mistaken identity." Shook won't spoil it for anyone, but the synopsis used to include a major spoiler, until HBO apparently realized the mistake and edited that shit out. (A number of fan sites, including this one, picked up the original synopsis, if you're curious.) But speaking of the Tony shooting, critics and fans have noticed some new details—new to me, at least—of that fateful scene . . .

Wikipedia describes the scene thusly, "Uncle Junior, suffering from dementia, thinks Tony is 'Little Pussy' Malanga breaking into his house, and shoots him in the abdomen. Tony is left bleeding on his uncle's kitchen floor after dialing 911." Junior thought Tony was Pussy Malanga? Shook, for one, had totally missed that. The painstakingly detailed Television Without Pity recap notes how Malanga figured into the hole-digging scene at the start . . .

Tony is digging holes in Uncle Jun's backyard. Tony hasn't found anything. Uncle Junior insists that he has $40,000 buried there, his share from some '70s heist. Tony suggests that the money wasn't wrapped right and disintegrated. Junior thinks that his old nemesis, Pussy Malanga, is behind it. You may recall that, in the very first episode, Tony started a fire at Vesuvio to prevent Uncle Junior from whacking Pussy Malanga there, so nice callback. Tony looks annoyed, and Uncle Junior looks more confused than usual. Tony reminds Junior that Pussy Malanga's been dead for six years. A neighbor pauses on her back porch to see what Tony's yelling about, and Tony yells, "Moles! They digging through your sprinklers too?" The neighbor wisely heads inside without replying. Tony more gently tells Jun that they can keep looking later, and leads an agitated Junior inside.

And the shooting is described as such . . .

Tony puts dry pasta into some boiling water in Junior's kitchen as he bops around to the music from the radio. He walks to the stairs and yells upstairs to Junior that dinner will be ready in ten minutes. Junior asks who it is, and says, "Don't go anywhere!" Tony heads into the living room and starts looking through record albums. Junior shuffles down the stairs and over to Tony, shouts something in Italian that includes the word "Malanga," and then pulls out a gun and shoots Tony in the gut.

Did everyone else catch that? Christ. Also, Dominic Chianese confirmed it all in an online chat with The Washington Post last Monday . . .

Washington, D.C.: Why did you shoot Tony? What did you say to him when you pulled the trigger? Did you find your teeth?

Dominic Chianese: I think there was something on my mind more important than finding my teeth and there was no logic at all to the actual incident. I think he was strictly acting on emotion and fear.

I called out a name Malanga, Pussy Malanga, somebody known by Uncle Junior in a former time. In other words it was threat to Malanga. I thought I was shooting him.

No, didn't find my teeth. I ran into a closet.

The whole thing is worth reading, really. (Some new info . . . the rest of the cast was kept in the dark about Tony's shooting.) But here's one particular gem . . .

Alexandria, Va.: [ . . . ] You are incredible on this show, and I mean no disrespect, but ... you know that dancing guy on the Six Flags commercials? Do you see a certain resemblance to yourself?

Dominic Chianese: LAUGHS. No resemblance whatsoever but it makes me laugh. I can see why. It's the glasses and the bald head. I definitely relate to that. It's probably a young kid dressed up like that guy. I've heard that from bus drivers in New York too.

And before tonight's episode, two final thoughts on the premiere. First, from today's cracked-out editorial in the Times, "Dark Days for Tony Soprano" . . .

This season's opener attracted 9.5 million viewers, down from the 12.1 million who watched the previous one. That may be due to the show's unusually long hiatus, and to competition from ABC's "Desperate Housewives." But some viewers are no doubt turning away because they suspect that Tony's life story is not going to end happily, and they may be reluctant to watch the narrative arc of a character they have come to care about start pointing relentlessly downward. Tony could still have breakthroughs, in therapy and in life. But starting the season lying in a pool of his own blood, not knowing if help will arrive, he is certainly off to a bad start.

Whaaaaaaat? Ratings are down because viewers fear an unhappy ending? Absolutely not. Nope. Not even, like, a little. That doesn't make any sense. The Times rattles off a list of "dark and bloody" scenes from the premiere as though it were particularly darker and bloodier than your average Sopranos episode. The show's viewers know better than to expect a cheery resolution to the series.

So as for potential resolutions, Shook mentioned the TWP recap earlier. It's really fantastic. And one theory floated there focuses on . . . oh yeah . . . the "Seven Souls" reading by Burroughs in the opening montage. We've given the poem a bunch of ink, and TWP provides a handy guide to what was playing on screen as we heard each line, "just in case it's important later." That gets TWP thinking . . .

So here's a theory. The seven souls departing are the people or events that are going to betray or otherwise lead to Tony's ultimate downfall at the end of the series (death, prison, take your pick). So in order, they were: Vito, Janice, Bobby, Gene, Meadow and Finn, Ray Curto, AJ, Adriana, and Carmela. And if you read the whole poem, Burroughs posits that Ka (AJ) is the only one you can trust. Interesting.

Indeed. Final question, then it's time to move on to episode two . . . What was the deal with Agent Harris throwing up in the very first scene of the season? There was no further explanation of that, right? Okay, whatever. T-minus eight hours . . .