Sensitivity to the Plight of Women - The Sopranos: Media Club Plus S03E09
Transcriber: Jay (jay8325)
Introduction        1
Episode 16 [00:40:21]        27
Episode 17 [02:07:43]        87
Introduction
[“Shame About It” by Jack de Quidt begins playing]
Sylvi: Welcome to Media Club Plus, a podcast about diving into the media that interests us and the stories that excite us. As always, we're brought to you by Friends at the Table. This season, we're watching The Sopranos. I'm Sylvi Bullet, and you can find me on most social media platforms @sylvibullet. And most importantly, you can support everything we do over at Friends at the Table, including this show and Side Story by going to friendsatthetable.cash and subscribing to our Patreon. Joining me as always is Keith J. Carberry.
Keith: Hi, my name's Keith Carberry. You can find me online at carberry.deals, and you can find the Let's Plays that I do at youtube.com/runbutton. Uh, the episode that I was just editing, I had to cut it out because it wasn't up when that episode was published, so I'm saying it now. On contentburger.biz, we have a new Run Button Patron Let's Play of Titanic: Adventures Out of Time, a stop-motion— Sorry, not stop-motion, a semi-full-motion video adventure game about the Titanic that came out the year before the Titanic movie came out that I guarantee you James Cameron played. It's weird. It's kooky. It's wacky. You go back in time to save the Titanic.
Sylvi: Oh, it's— It— I couldn't remember. I was— It kind of felt like you were going to launch into the Tiny Toons theme song for a second there, the way you described it.
Keith: It felt like I was going to launch into the Tiny Toons theme?
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: What do I look like, Buster and/or Babs Bunny, no relation?
Sylvi: Very important that there's no relation.
Art: I would have sworn that you two were too young for that to have—
Sylvi: We got reruns.
Keith: I, I thought that it was contemporary with my childhood, so.
Sylvi: Uh, it was not contemporary with my childhood.
Keith: It was not— It was just on Nickelodeon.
Sylvi: I mean, I got DVDs and it was on TV. Yeah. They showed this on the family channel.
Art: I want to tell you it did not originally air on Nickelodeon.
Sylvi: Not the family channel.
Art: And that is how—
Sylvi: Sorry, what was that, Art?
Art: It did not originally air on Nickelodeon, so.
Keith: Where did it originally air? I could be wrong about the channel. It was a long time ago.
Art: Uh, it's a Kids' WB show, of course.
Keith: Oh, right. Yeah. So maybe that's where I saw it.
Darcy: Oh, W-W-WB.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: I'm not gonna be able to figure out where this aired in Canada, but I do remember watching it on TV at some point, so. It was probably Fox Kids. Anyway, our Tiny Toons expert, Art Martinez-Tebbel, is also here.
Art: Hi, you can find me at tinytoons.biz. Don't go there, I don't know what's there.
Keith: Art Martiny-z Toombles.
Sylvi: Ooh!
Art: I did recently register martineztebbel.art. There's nothing there.
Sylvi: Oh, that's a good URL though.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Damn. That is good. Oh, can I name the idea? 
Art: Now you've given me an idea for a website. If you have an idea for a website, you can tell it to me at friendsatthetable.cash in the comments of one of our newsletters.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah, just inundate it with website ideas. I'm sure Janine would love that.
Art: You know, it's engagement. That's what people want.
Sylvi: Fair enough, fair enough.
Art: Gets the people going.
Sylvi: Uh, also with us, Darcy Swan.[1]
Darcy: Hey, uh, you could find me on BlueSky. I'm [username removed]. Now I'm thinking about the Tiny Toons game for Super Nintendo. Did any of y'all play that game?
Keith: Um, I did play that game.
Darcy: I remember really liking that game, but I would not be shocked if I went back to play it now as an adult and felt like the game sucked.
Sylvi: I'm not gonna lie, this looks like ass, but I believe you that it was fun at the time.
Keith: Do you know what game was fun at the time but sucked ass? Was the Game Boy Looney Tunes game.
Art: Okay.
Sylvi: I believe that.
Art: Yeah, that makes sense.
Keith: It was really hard too. As a kid, I couldn't do it.
Darcy: You know what didn’t suck ass?
Keith: What?
Darcy: Tiny Toons Adventure: Acme All-Stars. That was the sports game.
Art: That's the sports one? That one was great.
Keith: I didn't like that one as a sports game. 
Art: That monkey was busted.
Sylvi: Um, so welcome to our Tiny Toon Adventures podcast. Uh, today we're talking about, uh, that episode where the duck goes on a road trip. The one episode I remember.
Art: The movie How I Spent My Summer Vacation?
Sylvi: Oh, you know what? That is— Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry, Plucky Duck. I forgot his name is Plucky Duck. Anyway, that's not actually what we're here to talk about. And before we get into what we're here to talk about, I want to also mention that should be live now on the Patreon, the Goodfellas bonus episode we recorded. 
Keith: Oh yeah, that one's up today.
Art: Yeah, it's live right now.
Sylvi: Yeah, it is. Like, like, it would be really funny if it wasn't live.
Keith: The time was in the past.
Sylvi: Very recent. Timed exclusive.
Keith: Yeah. Timed exclusive. Get it while it's hot.
Art: Run, don’t walk.
Sylvi: Exactly.
Keith: I have an analog steak that's sitting in a hot oven, and once that steak is cold, I take Goodfellas off the Patreon.
Sylvi: Like, okay, like vampire stake or beefsteak?
Keith: Beefsteak.
Sylvi: Okay. I really was not sure what you meant by analog. 
Keith: In the oven? 
Sylvi: I don't know.
Keith: Oh no, sorry.
Sylvi: Yeah, I know, but like, I, I don't know.
Art: I don't know.
Sylvi: I thought it was like, oh, he's warming something made of precious metal. He’s warming a metal stake.
Keith: It's not analog in and of itself. It's an— it is an analog to the episode.
Sylvi: Oh, okay. I misunderstood.
Art: I was like, okay, so it's supposed to be a digital one.
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: Yeah, that Agumon eats.
Keith: I've been rewatching Digimon.
Sylvi: Digimon rocks.
Keith: Shout out to episode 21 of Digimon that was directed by the guy that did Digimon: Our War Game.
Sylvi: Oh shit.
Keith: By far the best episode of Digimon. It's unbelievable. It's like, I don't know, they did— They like, give him five times the budget to do that one episode for some reason. It's the one where Tai goes back to Tokyo. Like, it's crazy how much better that is than any other episode.
Sylvi: It's such a fucking Hosoda episode to direct.
Keith: I really like him.
Sylvi: Um, he's all right.
Keith: I really like Summer Wars.
Sylvi: I really like Summer Wars and… end of sentence.
Keith: I like The Beast… The Boy and the Beast?
Sylvi: The Boy and the Beast was like, fine. This isn't— It's been a few weeks since we've last recorded and I've completely forgotten how to host a show. We watched two more episodes of season 2 this week. Two, I think, pretty good episodes. I enjoyed both of these quite a bit. Um, we watched the third episode, Toodle Fucking Oo, and episode 4, Commendatori. Um, should I just like, leap into our summary here? Do you guys have any high-level thoughts before I do?
Keith: Just that in addition to Summer Wars, Our War Game is outstanding.
Art: What a total whiplash these two episodes had.
Sylvi: I agree. I— There is Art, you messaged me and, you know, maybe this is us kind of just planting a flag that there's so much stuff that you and I can't talk about in these episodes until we're further along that are really interesting seeds being planted. [Darcy: It is crazy—] Um, yeah, I think that's as specific as I can get without ruining shit for, for you and Keith, Darcy. What were you about to say?
Darcy: It is crazy that they introduce a character like Richie who is just a walking time bomb, and then they're like, yeah, don't worry about him for an episode. Don't worry about him.
Sylvi: Yeah, Richie is a big presence for the— For, for, for the— For— In the show, I think.
Darcy: That makes sense. It certainly feels like he is going to be here for a while causing problems for everybody.
Keith: Well, now you say that, but he also could be a guy that like, right as you think he's about to become the biggest problem in the world, they kill him.
Darcy: Well, he'll still be around for a while.
Sylvi: This is for you and Darcy to speculate on. Me and Art just have to sit here holding our tongue.
Keith: This is the sort of thing when he shows up— You know, we'll get to this, but like, he goes to Junior and is like, I'll do— You know, if this is the way things are, I'll listen. And then if not, then, you know, tell me what to do and I'll do it. And we don't get Junior's answer. And then Richie goes on like, kind of a rampage. A mini rampage.
Sylvi: Richie is a loose cannon.
Keith: He's a loose cannon.
Sylvi: We will definitely get into that.
Keith: But it's— They leave it kind of ambiguous, like, what Junior said to him. I think the implication based on his actions is that Junior wants to utilize him to fuck with Tony. Um, but that, that could end up not being the case. And there's a version of me that thinks that either way it could lead to him being kind of— Oh, I hate to say this, but Game of Thrones style killed when you don't expect it?
Darcy: Mm, sure, that makes sense.
Sylvi: That is the time we live in.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Um, where that is an easy, easy thing to grasp for.
Art: Yeah.
Sylvi: I mean, the— This is a show that I think we've already seen is not like, like, you know, we probably thought Mikey was going to be around a lot longer, right?
Keith: Yeah. And Brandon.
Darcy: True. Ehhh, I don’t know about Brandon.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Yeah. So like, I mean, the only thing I want to mention about Richie before we get into it too much, because it's not necessarily related to the plot of these episodes, but it is, I think, an interesting behind-the-scenes thing. Art, you probably already know this, that, but David Proval, the actor who plays Richie, also auditioned for Tony. Um, so this— both Aprile brothers are guys who auditioned and read for the Tony Soprano role but didn't get it.
Keith: That's interesting.
Sylvi: Which I think is a really interesting choice.
Keith: Well, what's his name again? Now, I—
Sylvi: Uh, David Proval. I'm about to add it to our, our little cheat sheet.
Keith: Yeah, so David Proval, I recognized him right away, uh, from several things. He was in Mean Streets.
Sylvi: Yes. Shawshank Redemption as well is the other big one.
Keith: I have never seen Shawshank Redemption, but that is a big one.
Sylvi: Me neither.
Darcy: Me neither.
Sylvi: It's his biggest— One of his bigger credits, so I wonder why.
Darcy: Watching Shawshank Redemption for a bonus episode?
Sylvi: I'd rather not. I'd rather not.
Art: It's a movie that struggles under the weight of what's been, like, thrust upon it.
Darcy: Yeah.
Art: When it was an underrated movie, it was fantastic. And now that it's, like, properly rated to slightly overrated, it's like, well...
Keith: Sure. Yeah.
Sylvi: It's got the Breaking Bad problem. Well, Breaking Bad has more problems, but you know what I mean.
Keith: So the other things that I know David Provol from are as Head Thug in the Weird Al movie, UHF.
Sylvi: Oh my God. I didn't realize he was in that. That's so funny. Yeah.
Keith: Um, and, uh, I think I know him from something else, but I very briefly saw him because it's been so long since I saw The Godfather. I briefly mistook him for someone from The Godfather. I don't even know who.
Sylvi: I mean, he kind of has a like, uh, like pseudo Michael Corleone vibe at some points, I think. But maybe that's just me being, uh, stereotyping Italian-American actors.
Keith: Maybe.
Sylvi: Uh, you can call me on that if I'm being problematic.
Keith: You're stereotyping.
Art: It's a stereotype, and it's offensive.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, what else?
Keith: Anyway, he's great as Head Thug.
Sylvi: He's, he's, uh, he's also in 6 episodes of Everybody Loves Raymond.
Keith: That's really funny.
Sylvi: That's— Yeah, man, replacing Junior and Tony with, uh, Raymond and his brother, his tall brother, that'd be— Greenlight it.
Keith: He shows up in stuff to be like, a scary guy, and he is a scary guy. He's intense and frightening. And, uh, there's a shot when he first shows up. Um, the drug dealer from Goodfellas is here as Bean— Beansie.
Sylvi: Um, there's a couple actors from Goodfellas in these episodes, actually. In the 2nd episode, um, Zi Vittorio, the old man in the wheelchair, is also in Godfather Part II.
Keith: Oh, okay. Interesting.
Sylvi: Yeah, I'm 90% sure of that. I'll double-check.
Keith: Yeah. The drug dealer from Goodfellas at the very end who I'm like, I recognize that guy. And then we looked at his IMDb and I was like, oh, he's in Sopranos. That's Beansie. And he gets his fucking head bashed in by Richie straight away. And when he's like, beating the shit out of him on the floor, I took a screenshot of it. I was like, oh my God, this guy is scary.
Sylvi: Sorry, my apologies. He's in Godfather Part III, uh, Zi Vittorio.
Keith: Zi Vittorio.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah. Richie is a scary character. I think Richie— I'll get into the summary and then we can talk about Richie because we're getting— This is, this is my problem is I like to hear—
Keith: Episode 2 felt like a vacation compared to episode 1.
Sylvi: I mean, in a few ways.
Keith: Because it was— they were on vacation.
Sylvi: Because they were on vacation. Okay, let me get into this. As I mentioned, this week we watched the 3rd episode of season 2, Toodle Fucking Oo, and the 4th episode, Commendatori. Toodle Fucking Oo was directed by Lee Tamahori, written by Frank Renzulli, and edited by Conrad M. Gonzalez. Commendatori was directed by Tim Van Patten, written by David Chase, and edited by William B. Stich. Phil Abraham was cinematographer on both episodes once again. Toodle Fucking Oo opens with a walkthrough of North Jersey's hottest new nightlife venue, Livia Soprano's empty house. So, Meadow threw a rager where at least one kid OD'd, and that has completely totaled the old Soprano home. When they get home, this prompts an argument between Tony and Carmela about how to discipline Meadow, a conversation that's gonna go out throughout the episode, where Tony mostly just bemoans his inability to kick out and/or physically assault his children. Meanwhile, Adriana's with her Uncle Richie, dropping him off at a pizza place where he's got some supposedly— Seemingly unfinished business. Richie— That's Richie Aprile, like we mentioned— Has been in prison for the past 12 years, and this restaurant he goes into is owned by someone who he thinks owes him. Beansie Gaeta, a, I think, still mob-connected but not as active in the sort of life of crime.
Keith: Tony calls him a good earner and he runs a cash business for money laundering. So yeah, that's definitely—
Sylvi: Yeah, the big implication is that he's moved on from— He mentions that he used to run H for Richie later on. And then the implication has sort of been that now he has these restaurants as a way for them to launder money through them. Richie tries to shake Beansie down, and when Beansie refuses, Richie beats the shit out of him by smashing a coffee mug on his head and then a chair on his body.
Keith: And a fist in his face. 
Art: It's not a mug, it's the—
Keith: Yeah, the carafe.
Sylvi: I didn't know what to call it. 
Darcy: Ooh, carafe. Good call.
Keith: Yeah, I don't— A carafe is a normal part of my coffee routine, so— 
Sylvi: Yeah, sure. My normal part of my coffee routine is walking to a place near me and going, hey, could I get a latte?
Keith: Couldn't be me.
Sylvi: Yeah, I'm millennial scum, um, in the most stereotypical way. The next morning, it's back to Carm and Tony getting ready to punish Meadow, but Janice is here to play the cool aunt and quotes a definitely real and not made-up Zuni saying, telling them that this is normal for girls her age. Uh, I think the saying— I wrote it down— Is, for every 20 child— For any— Every 20 wrongs a child commits, ignore 19.
Keith: Um, yeah, I love this. I have a button for it. Janice is a piece of shit. It's so funny.
Sylvi: Janice is so funny in these episodes. Um, she says that this sort of behavior is normal for girls her age, and then when Meadow comes down from her bedroom, uh, she starts explaining to her parents about how none of it was her fault, that people just showed up. Uh, that doesn't work though, so Meadow changes tact and lays out the punishment she thinks she deserves. Conning the absolute shit out of her parents and smiling when she walks away, much like her dad would. At Satriale's, Tony mediates a sit-down between Christopher and Richie, made at Richie's request after Chris hit Adriana in our previous episode. He tells Chris in no uncertain terms that if Chris ever raises his hand to her again, well, without marrying her, that he'll kill him. After Chris is told to leave, Richie tries to talk to Tony about loan shark— Getting his loan shark business up and running, but Tony walks off. Silvio then explains to Richie how things operate right now. Nobody talks business to the boss directly, and never at Satriale's. Moving on from that, it's girls' night! That's right, Dr. Melfi's out with two of her friends getting absolutely destroyed on red wine.
Keith: Do you know the three of them were able to finish a whole one bottle of wine?
Sylvi: It made me laugh so hard. When on the way out—
Art: That's like one and a third glasses each.
Keith: Yes, it's one and a third glasses each.
Sylvi: I don't— and I thought I was a lightweight. 
Art: ANd they’re drunk!
Sylvi: They are. They're, they're at a nice Italian restaurant, and on the way out, she runs into an old patient, Big T himself. Tony and the boys are out for dinner with Johnny Sack. Uh, Tony's getting filled in on what Richie did to Beansie before Melfi interrupts to ask Tony how he's been. He completely brushes her off before she leaves by saying toodaloo. Smash cut to Dr. Melfi seeing her therapist, Dr. Elliot Kupferberg, played by Peter Bogdanovich himself, director of Targets, for those who are unaware. And also, like, when I— The interviewer in that first season interview I kept referencing, which I think was like a fun little thing to have under my hat until it revealed that he was in the show.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: So she's explaining that she was so embarrassed with how she talked to him, to Tony, that she couldn't sleep. Followed by the two of them arguing about what her behavior the previous night meant. At her yoga class the next morning, Janice runs into, of all people, Richie Aprile, who started doing yoga in prison— At least that's implied, especially early on when he talks about meditation with Beansie. Janice strikes up a conversation with him and flirts in some of the most awkward ways I've ever seen in my life before we cut to our next scene. She calls him supple. Uh, Richie meets with Tony at a mall, still annoyed at how he's been treated and how he's been given the runaround and expected to wait for things that he believes are rightfully his. Tony also tells him that he needs to lay off Beansie because Beansie's a good earner, like we mentioned, but Richie takes it about as well as you'd expect given his previous behaviour this episode. Janice swings by Livia's to pick up her disability check, and when she goes inside to see the state it's in, immediately changes her tune about Meadow. She goes back to the Sopranos' house and starts ranting about how they didn't punish her properly or enough, and that they need to discipline her, and manages to piss off both Tony and Carmela in one scene. She got the double!
Keith: It's not her fault. She thought it was one of the 19, but it was actually the one of the 20.
Sylvi: It was number 20. Yeah, it was number 20. Junior's at the doctor's office. Uh, this is our one Junior scene this episode, I believe. And by that I mean he's there to meet Richie. Uh, they, uh, after a quick check-in with his doctor, they both grouse about how Tony's been acting. Richie and Junior, uh, grouse. The doctor is not involved with that part. Uh, with Richie making it very clear that his allegiance is to Junior and not Tony. Uh, after that, we have a welcome home party that the gang's throwing for Richie at the Bing, with various associates bringing him envelopes of cash as gifts for, uh— To help him get back on his feet after his stay in prison. Uh, the guys also set him up with a couple of girls in the back, but he's not really feeling it. Instead, he tracks down Beansie and threatens him with a pistol, even firing a couple times at him.
Keith: The next day, Carmela—
Art: I'm sure that's the worst that happens to Beansie.
Sylvi: Yeah, no, he's gonna be fine. Uh, the next day Carmela tries to make peace with Janice, who has been playing up how hurt she was at Carmela's comments, uh, both to sort of guilt Carmela into wanting her to stay longer, and then also giving us a ton of crazy lore about Janice, including that her son was named Harpo, and ultimately getting Carmela to insist on her staying with them for longer.
Keith: Her son is named Harpo!
Sylvi: Well, he changed it to Hal.
Keith: He changed it to Hal, and she doesn't want to talk about him.
Sylvi: She's one of the funniest characters in TV history. I love her so much. Richie tracks down Beansie again, running him over with his car, frontways and backways, before we transition to Meadow and Hunter gloating about their respective punishments, making a complete mess of The Sopranos kitchen, and singing along to No Scrubs by TLC. I love television. Back to Richie, he drops by to visit Livia, who's losing a battle of wits to her remote control. At first, she thinks he's Jackie, remarking that she thought he died. Janice— And then Janice, sorry, Parvati— Arrives shortly after Richie greets her. Richie, by the way, only person who respects the, the very cringe white lady name change she's doing. Uh, we get a bit more backstory on Richie and Janice's relationship here, mostly that about 20 years ago they dated. The two of them get coffee in the hospital cafeteria, with Richie biting the bullet and actually asking Janice out. At first she's hesitant, explaining that she's changed, and then Richie argues that he has as well, since— Uh, hey, when did he— Would she expect to see Richie Aprile doing downward fucking dog? I believe is his exact words. After that, we get one of my favorite dream sequences in the show. It's a quick one. Uh, we see Tony driving at night while music from The Wizard of Oz plays. He starts having a panic attack, reaches for his Prozac, and then dies in a horrible car crash while the music keeps playing louder and louder. Uh, and then when— Uh, it sort of cuts to, to the wake-up. It's not Tony there, having this dream, it's Dr. Melfi. Uh, after that we have a scene of Tony going to see Beansie in hospital, who's now stuck in basically a full body cast. It's like everything but his, his belly has got plaster on it, and even then—
Keith: Yeah, and his legs are all pinned up.
Sylvi: His legs are plastered, and then it's like from the— His neck—
Keith: He has like metal— He has like 30 or 40 metal rods through his legs.
Sylvi: It is, it is very rough. Um, it's like, I just— Yeah, it, it looks worse because he's not in like a full body cast, I think. The fact that you can still see some of, some of him underneath it makes it feel like, oh my God, this guy got fucking wrecked.
Darcy: Yeah, he's in a saw machine.
Keith: I assumed that he died until he shows up four scenes after.
Darcy: Yeah, yeah, totally.
Keith: Yeah. Um, uh, one of the funniest things in these episodes, by the way, is when he's like, he's basically moaning in pain because he's been destroyed by a car. And his sister or wife— I assumed sister because I don't know why— Is like, you're scaring your mother, or you're scaring mom or something. 'Cause the mom's there crying and it's like, uh, why is that his responsibility?
Sylvi: Yeah. Why is that his problem?
Keith: Yeah. She's scaring him.
Sylvi: Uh, while he's at the hospital, Beansie kind of implies that if he wanted to, he could rat on Richie to the cops, but Tony insists that they'll handle it themselves because they're old school. Uh, I believe he said his words are, we wipe our own asses. Uh, Tony immediately goes to confront Richie about this, reminding him who's boss, and then if he doesn't pay him the proper respect, then the two of them will have a problem. A bad one. The episode ends with Tony going to change the locks at Livia's house before he peeks inside and sees Meadow working hard to clean up her mess from the beginning of the episode, and ending the episode on a shot of Tony's confused face right before the credits hit. Commendatori starts with the boys trying to watch a bootleg DVD of, I believe it's Godfather Part II. Um, yes, it is Part II because they talk about Tony's favorite bit, uh, where they go to Italy, and that's how we find out that Tony's headed to Italy soon too. And then Paulie beats the shit out of the DVD player with the remote. I only mention that in the summary because it made me laugh. There's a scene where a random family gets carjacked, which in turn is revealed to be masterminded by Tony, who's gathering the cars to smuggle to Naples slash as a, like, part of a negotiation thing. It did— This comes up later, that Tony has a bunch of American-made cars ready to go if the dealings in Naples goes well. Junior fills Tony in on who their contact is in Italy, Furio Giunta, who is one of the few guys who speaks English there, as well as sadly remarking on how he's never been able to go. Is— I think that's also our one Junior scene for this episode. Not a ton of Junior in these, unfortunately.
Art: Not a ton of people who don't go to Italy in this one.
Sylvi: Yeah. Carmela has a good plotline, I think, in this episode. Back home, Carmela is not hiding her annoyance at being excluded from the trip, with Tony trying and failing to apologize and explain it away as just a business trip. It does not work.
Keith: And Meadow instigating.
Sylvi: Meadow is such a little shit in this episode. It's so funny. Um, yeah, Carmela just gives him the cold shoulder the whole time. Pussy’s meeting Skip, his FBI handler, at a party store, filling him in on what's going on, but not exactly offering up anything major. I think the biggest thing for us is that he mentions that there's been some, uh, rumors about Chris finally getting made. Uh, importantly though, they run into another made guy by the name of Jimmy Bones, who is an Elvis impersonator. They make up a cover story about how Skip's a made man from Delaware, but Pussy’s clearly still worried about being spotted by the time he leaves the store. Carmela goes out for lunch with a freshly recast Angie Bonpensiero and Rosalie Aprile, and at first it looks like Ro is going to break down into tears about Jackie again while, um, I know it's Botticelli, but I don't remember the actual name of the song. There's, there's a recurring opera song that plays throughout these episodes, and this is, I think, the first scene it appears in. Uh, but instead it's actually—
Art: Con Te Partiro? Con Te Partiro.
Sylvi: Thank you.
Art: Forgive my pronunciation, I'm sure it's atrocious.
Sylvi: Hey, you did your best. Um, it's— Listen, you can't be worse than Paulie is in these episodes. Uh, but instead it's Angie who starts to cry, and she explains how unhappy she is now that Pussy's home, that she, uh, may have found a tumor right under her arm, uh, and that she's even thought of, uh, ending it all because he's back, uh, and wishing that he had died instead. Uh, yeah, things are not going great in the, in the Big Puss home. In Italy though, Tony arrives with his two most capable men. That's right, Chris Moltisanti and Paulie Walnuts. Chris says he's eager to check out the nude beaches and see Vesuvius, and Paulie's just excited to try out his Italian, mostly the first word that he learns while he's there. Upon arrival, they meet Furio and his lovely ponytail, who informs them that they're not actually meeting with Zi Vittorio, the actual boss of the family, but with Nino, one of his, his capos. I think that's the correct rank for him. I didn't quite catch where he sat in the hierarchy, but he's up there, but he's not—
Art: And it’s different over there.
Sylvi: It is different over there, I'm sure. At dinner that night, Tony, with Furio as his translator, accidentally insults Nino, the man that they're doing business with, and they start negotiating a deal to sell the cars to the family in Naples. Then the Don arrives. Needless to say, he is not exactly in the best shape, having gone a little senile, uh, and with his daughter Annalisa there sort of taking care of him. Um, while Tony and Paulie are still at this dinner, we get a brief cut to Chris, who's holed up in his hotel room. And while it's been implied before in the show, I believe this is the first time we see explicitly that Chris has started injecting heroin on top of his other drug use. I know they've mentioned him doing cocaine and, and speed, but I think this is worth mentioning that his, his addiction problems are getting worse and we're seeing it like, fully on screen. Um, we cut back to the dinner and in a conversation with Furio, Tony learns more about the power structure in Naples, uh, and how different it is than he expected. Nino, as we mentioned, uh, the guy who sort of— It seems like he's running the— This dinner, has just gotten out of prison. Uh, the head of the gang is actually, uh, someone named Mauro Zucca, but he is serving a life sentence. And this is how Tony finds out that Annalisa, who is both Vittorio's daughter and Zucca's wife, is basically the real acting head of the family right now. A woman boss? What is this, 2100? Crazy. That's like 80 years from now. That's, that's far enough that that joke will work when I'm dead. I hope. A kid sets off some fireworks outside while they're on their way to the car, and Tony watches closely at how the respective gangs react. Paulie and him just sort of stand there while Furio leaps on Don Vittorio to protect him in case they were gunshots, even though like, immediately Furio is like, they're just fireworks, stop. This is also where I should mention, uh, you should watch this episode with subtitles. They subtitle the Italian in it and it's fun to know what they're saying. I don't think it is like load-bearing for the episode, but it does add some fun flavor, especially with some of the Paulie and Furio— Uh, Paulie scenes and some of the stuff with Furio and the other Italian guys.
Keith: Yeah, I had assumed that they weren't going to subtitle the Italian because, um, that it, like, it's part of it that they don't understand Italian.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: So later I, I couldn't understand something that Tony said in English, so I turned subtitles on to understand what he said and, uh, left them on. And then I was like, oh, they're translating all the Italian that I thought was going to be untranslated.
Sylvi: There's one really good joke with it with Paulie later. I think there's a few good ones with Paulie, but there's one towards the end of the episode that I really fuck with. Um, back at his hotel, Tony calls Carmela and things are just as icy as they were before his trip. So it's not exactly a very long one. He also has a really weird, quick sex dream about Annalisa where he's dressed up like a Roman centurion and she's in like a real, like, swords and sandals movie toga situation. It's really funny.
Keith: Was that his daydream or was that her imagining what he was doing over there?
Sylvi: Oh, uh.
Art: It was Tony, 'cause we come to him right after.
Keith: Yes, that's why I assumed it was Tony. It was so fast, and I was like, what the fuck? That I, like, didn't— I couldn't even tell whose thought that was.
Sylvi: That’s fair. We also cut, like, right from that into Big Pussy having a nightmare, uh, where he's threatening Jimmy about what he saw. So it is kind of a hard thing to keep up with a little bit. Uh, next day, back at home, Janice and Carmela are having a chat in the kitchen about Angie Bonpensiero thinking of divorcing Big Pussy. But the conversation quickly becomes about Tony and the dynamics of being a mob wife as a whole. For a second, it seems like Janice has really gotten to Carmela, but Carm turns it around by bringing up Janice's burgeoning relationship with Richie Aprile of all people and exiting the conversation. It definitely got to her though, as evidenced by the shot of her concerned face right at the end of that scene. Tony stops by Annalisa's home, and after ogling her while she tans for a while, the two of them talk business. Well, Tony mostly asks about why a woman's a boss, but Annalisa explains that listening to women just comes natural to her men because, like Janice said in the prior scene about all the old school guys, they're all mama's boys. Eventu—
Keith: Old school is a thing that came up a ton in these two episodes specifically.
Sylvi: Oh yeah, there's— That is gonna be a thing, is like— I mean, it's, it's something that came up a little bit in season 1, but they start really pushing on those buttons. Uh, just to not get completely thrown off by my summary, I'm gonna keep moving, but we'll come back to this. Um, eventually they get down to— They do get down to business, uh, with Annalisa rejecting Tony's asking price for the stolen cars, and then Tony asking for one of her soldiers to come back to the USA with him so he'd have someone who's loyal to him 110%. His words, not mine. He requests Furio, and since Tony's not offering something concrete, Annalisa is not into the idea. The two argue, with Toni asking to speak to her husband, and that just pisses Annalisa off more, so she leaves. Angie Bonpensiero, back home, got the biopsy back on that cancerous lump she mentioned, and it turns out it's negative. Great news. Bad news, her husband does not give a shit. He barely even hears her when she's telling him, and he is far too preoccupied getting ready to murder Jimmy with a ball-peen hammer. He does come back with roses for her afterwards, and Angie just sort of whacks him with them over and over again. I support her. Another cut back to Chris, who despite his insistence that he's going to make time to see Vesuvius, is once again in a drug-fueled stupor in his hotel room. Furio comes to see Tony, who asks him what it's like to work for a woman. Furio basically does the Flintstones dinosaur, “It's a living,” thing, while Tony tells him women bosses are not a thing in America. Annalisa and Tony then share a drink at dinner where he asks about her father, noting how well she takes care of him while she unknowingly scratches at Tony's guilt over Livia with her answers. Carmela goes to see Angie, trying to talk her out of divorcing Pussy, definitely not as an exercise in convincing herself to stay with Tony. She does seem to get through to Angie when she brings up her kids, but there's a real sadness in Carm's voice when she says, in the end, I know you're not going to leave him. I know you won't do that. Uh, to give an update on Paulie, by the way, because most of his scenes are so quick that it would completely throw off the rhythm of this to mention them, he has spent the entire episode trying to ingratiate himself with the locals, even though it seems like his one trick for that is greeting them with commendatori, the way that they were greeted when they first arrived. Um, he also sleeps with a sex worker while he's there and yaps her ear off in English right up until he thinks she says they came from the same place. This is my subtitles joke that I really liked.
Art: Oh yeah.
Sylvi: Because what she's actually saying is she's pointing out the window and saying that she just lives right over there, and he thinks it's the name of an island or village or something. Um, Annalisa and Tony have one last outing together, taking him to a Sybil, which is a type of prophet for those who don't know, uh, a Sybil's cave, where he tries to flirt and then instead gets very quickly read to filth by Annalisa as his own worst enemy. Tony says she reminds him of someone, and Annalisa uses that to come on to him before Tony shuts her down because it's bad business. And trying to explain the American idiom, I don't shit where I eat. He does use this as an opening to negotiate for Furio, as well as more guys from Italy if he needs them, by knocking the price of the cars down from— I believe it was originally $90K to eventually $75K. They get home and at the airport while Pussy's picking them up, Paulie gloats. Tony is irritable as always and pointedly lies about how much they made on the cars, saying they earned double. While Chris picks up souvenirs for Adriana in the duty-free shop because he forgot to while he was there. The episode ends with Tony announcing that he's home. Carmela is upstairs and pauses in the middle of doing some chores and then presumably goes to meet him before the credits hit. Those are our summaries. You're free to say whatever you want now.
Darcy: You did leave out a very important plot point, and that's—
Keith: Please, please, please, please.
Darcy: Uh, which is that I guess it's not a plot point, but Christopher keeps saying, I'm gonna make it to see that volcano.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: And then just getting too high to do anything.
Art: Yeah, you hear them like, announcing that the volcano tour is leaving.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: While he's just—
Darcy: And it just pans over to him fucked up in the—
Keith: Yeah, he notices the heroin. He notices the track marks on that guy like immediately, and then that's the only thing he does while he's in Italy. And it's like, you could have done heroin at home. Like, there's no—
Art: Yeah, I have that in my notes that I bet they have drugs in New Jersey.
Sylvi: We have heroin at home?
Darcy: Mm-hmm.  Maybe even better. I don't know how the heroin is in Italy.
Keith: Single black tar.
Darcy: Maybe it's better over here.
Sylvi: This is true. It's like getting authentic squid ink pasta while you're over there.
Keith: Which someone did. They did have squid ink pasta there.
Sylvi: Yeah, they did. And it's really funny.
Art: Yeah, that's what Paulie's eating when he asks for macaroni and gravy and the guy has no fucking clue. This is the first episode that I didn't remember very well.
Keith: Okay.
Art: Where if you'd asked me what happened in the episode before, I think I would've missed the B-plot entirely. And I think just been like, oh, that's the episode where they go to Italy and Paulie's a fucking idiot. And everyone in Italy treats Paulie like he's a moron. And I mean, that's true, but that's not the whole episode.
Keith: No, that's not the whole episode. Yeah, that's a— That episode is a weird one. I enjoyed, I enjoyed watching it, but it all— It was, it was slight. Um, but there was, there were some really great parts to it that I really liked. Um, but—
Art: Oh, but, and it's— But it's so fucking funny.
Keith: It is really funny. Yeah, his— We'll get to it, but his insistence that he fit right in and had a great time when he's back home with Pussy in the car is almost too sad to be funny.
Art: No, it isn't.
Keith: Um, well, almost, almost.
Sylvi: Almost.
Art: I compared him, like, by the water at the end. I compared in my book to— In my notes to Luke Wilson taking his socks off in Royal Tenenbaums on the tennis court. It's just like he looks completely fucking lost and hopeless, like not having a good time.
Keith: There's like this—
Art: And so he goes and gets a sex worker.
Keith: He is— He's so out of place, and he's in somewhere that he's built up in his mind. Him and Tony are both like, this is the old country. This is where we're from. We have our roots here. My father's from here. Both of their fathers are from there. Like, they have it as this sort of romantic ancestral home. And the one-two punch of Paulie having complete culture shock from the— Nothing. He doesn't like anything about it. He did, like, literally nothing. I guess he likes sex workers wherever he is.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: But— And he likes the fruit, but he doesn't like the— He doesn't like the dinner. He just wants macaroni and gravy. He doesn't like the bathrooms. He has to go back to the hotel in order to use the toilet. Uh, he doesn't like the people.
Sylvi: To be fair, that bathroom was fucked up.
Darcy: That bathroom did look fucked up.
Keith: Look, you know, there's different standards for bathrooms around the world.
Sylvi: Sure.
Keith: Uh, the bathroom was not that fucked up.
Art: The toilet was like on the floor.
Keith: Yeah, put it back on there.
Darcy: No.
Keith: It— Yeah, look, when in Rome, put the toilet seat back on the toilet. 
Darcy: They were in Naples.
Sylvi: So.
Keith: Yeah, they specifically weren't in Rome. They were at war with Rome. Um, uh, the, uh, the bathroom was fine. It was a restaurant. It was fine. Um.
Art: It was not fine.
Keith: It was— See, you guys are sounding like Paulie Walnuts here. This is, this is how, this is how—
Darcy: I think it would have been fine if the seat was still on the toilet.
Keith: Just put it on the toilet. Just pick it up and put it on.
Art: Don't you ever call me Paulie Walnuts again in your life, I swear to God.
Keith: This is, you know. Go to another country, you gotta use their bathrooms or you look like a fucking idiot. It doesn't matter what the bathrooms are like. That's just how they are. All, all of the people there are using that bathroom.
Darcy: Yeah, sure. I'm not saying Paulie shouldn't have used the bathroom.
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: I'm just saying I understand his hesitation.
Keith: Um, I think he didn't even like the fucking coffee. Like he didn't like anything about it. Uh, and then it's the, the second punch of that is, um, I'm getting way ahead of myself. It's my only button for episode 2 that I have.
Sylvi: Really? Okay.
Art: Uh, I think we're supposed to be on episode 1.
Keith: Yeah, we are.
Sylvi: Yeah. Yeah, we should, we should probably— Do you want to save it or you want to just say that?
Keith: Save the second punch. So keep you— Keep the first punch in your mind and we'll go, we'll go back.
Sylvi: There's going to be two hits, but one of them's coming later.
Keith: Yeah, two hits. Me hitting you with some information and then a long break and then me hitting you again with new information.
Art: And then you hitting the floor?
Keith: And then— No, that would be a third hit. You just listen.
Sylvi: Yeah, you listen.
Keith: Yeah, just listen. 
Episode 16 [00:40:21]
Keith: Uh, episode 3, Toodle Fucking Oo.
Sylvi: Toodle Fucking Oo. Great name. Great— I really enjoyed this episode.
Keith: I also like this episode. 
Darcy: Yeah, this is a good episode. Um, hey, who got Meadow to clean up the house?
Sylvi: See, she did it— Like, my interpretation has always been she decided to just do it herself.
Keith: That also is my interpretation, because Tony looks very confused, and then there's like, kind of intense music playing.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: And so I was like, well, he must not have known that she was there, so she must have taken it upon herself to do this.
Darcy: I wasn't sure if it was, like, a thing that like, Carmela did and just didn't tell Tony, or that even like, Janice maybe did.
Art: I think she heard the— She heard her parents defending her.
Keith: Yeah. From Janice. 
Art: The second time. From Janice.
Keith: She sees an ally turn on her.
Darcy: Oh! That makes a lot more sense.
Sylvi: Good performance from her during that scene too, I think. The real— The guilt sort of starting to set in.
Keith: Now, that is the absolute very last thing that happens in episode 3. So I guess I didn't rewind far enough. Let's get to the—
Sylvi: It's also related to the very first thing that happens in episode 3.
Keith: No, it totally is.
Sylvi: So, you know. We can manage it.
Keith: The— This is the worst party, by the way. There's like nothing happening. There's like, [Sylvi: Well.] Every— They're dying. People literally dying. 
Sylvi: It's over. There's no— The cops are there.
Keith: They were trying to— The lights are off. There's candles, lit candles. There's like, cereal boxes on the floor.
Darcy: Keith showing up to the music festival the day after it's done: This music sucks.
Sylvi: Look.
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: What the hell?
Sylvi: Why is that guy sweeping on stage instead of playing guitar?
Keith: When the cops show up, that's like, the middle of a party. That should be the most fun part.
Art: The cops have been there for a while.
Sylvi: The cops have been there long enough to call Tony Soprano. It's Tony Soprano who's showing up.
Keith: But I just think the mess and the candles and the lights being off, it just didn't look fun to me. I think this is a budgeting issue.
Darcy: The beer bottle candles were crazy
Keith: This is a budgeting issue and not a timeline of a party issue to me. This issue is based in a show being able to realistically portray something that might be expensive to portray. 
Art: Yeah, you know what a party has is extras.
Keith: Yes. Yeah. Tony shows up. He's pissed. He's pissed about this in her grandmother's home. That's awful. That's what he thinks. Yeah. I could have taken the ecstasy, but I didn't.
Darcy: That is the funniest fucking—
Sylvi: She might've taken the ketamine though. We don't know.
Keith: She might've taken the ketamine.
Sylvi: There were mentions of both.
Darcy: You mean the Special K? 
Sylvi: Special K. Yeah. By the way, don't— PSA, don't mix ketamine and ecstasy.
Darcy: Please don't.
Sylvi: That's very dangerous. It's not worth it.
Keith: Um, I won't.
Sylvi: I'm here. I'm—
Keith: I was going to, but now I won't. Thank you.
Sylvi: I’m here for safe drug use.
Keith: Mm-hmm. Uh, Carmela's reply to that, by the way, to, um, Meadow saying, I could have taken ecstasy, but I didn't, was, there was designer drugs there.
Sylvi: Yeah. It's so funny.
Keith: That's a very—
Sylvi: Designer drugs is also such an old phrase.
Keith: Yeah, it's very of the era. Like, they're concerned about designer drugs and Special K.
Darcy: And super predators.
Keith: Um, I never really— I know that designer drug means like a drug that was made in a lab by like, a bad guy is the idea. But it always felt like, high-fashion drug to me. 
Sylvi: Oh, that's really funny. 
Darcy: Yeah, sure.
Keith: That's what I associate that more with, like the phrase designer than like art, like an art— Of some sort of artificial nightmare drug. Like, I don't know, what is the— Like bath salts? Like bath salts is a designer drug. But I think of like, to me, a designer drug would more be like, what if Walter White was making meth for supermodels? That's like, to me, that would be what I would call a designer drug.
Sylvi: Oh, how fancy.
Keith: Yeah. Yeah. That's why it was blue, because it was supposed to be for the rich and famous.
Darcy: Gotcha.
Keith: Really quickly, Richie shows up. He shows up like, as they're still deciding to um, whether to punish her or not. Is that true?
Sylvi: Uh, yes, I think in between those scenes.
Keith: Yeah. Oh yeah, because it's the night and then they're like— Tony convinces Carmela like, let's talk about it in the morning. Then the scene with Richie. I know you're a made guy, so I lose either way, but I always respected you and your brother Jackie. I'm no victim here. I'm not some greaseball store owner. That's what Beansie says to Richie. He didn't like that.
Sylvi: Yeah, he did— He hated that. Um, because then that's when he beats him up.
Keith: That's when he beats him up.
Darcy: He does beat him up.
Sylvi: There's something about him like getting out of the car and looking at the, uh, pizza parlor that just makes me think of the Final Fantasy VII like, Cloud in front of Midgar shot.
Darcy: Um, yeah, yeah, no, I see it.
Sylvi: Someone don't— do not give Richie Aprile a Buster sword.
Keith: Um, oh man, I, uh, I did put these out of order. I accidentally sorted them by name instead of by date created, so they're in alphabetical order by mistake. So I do have—
Sylvi: Okay, it's roulette.
Keith: Yeah, no, I— So I just pulled up the files in order on my computer. Um, we're gonna listen to a little bit of the punishment. I also have— I have like two— I have both halves of the conversation. I have the nighttime stuff and the next day with Janice [Sylvi: Aw, hell yeah.] Because that stuff with Janice was really good.
Sylvi: Yeah, Janice is so good these episodes.
Keith: Uh, these might be quiet here.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Angie: Might as well have fucking cancer.
[audio ends]
Keith: Oh no, wrong button.
Sylvi: No, that's Angie.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Carmela: Consequences. What kind of parents would we be if we let her get away with this?
Tony: Typical?
Carmela: Plenty of parents still crack the whip.
Tony: Yeah, that's what they tell you.
Carmela: I cannot wait until she goes off to college.
Tony: All right, so you can be fucked up with the empty nest syndrome and go on Wellbutrin like your sister.
Carmela: As a parent today, you are over a barrel no matter what you do. You take away her car, you become her chauffeurs. You ground her, you gotta stay home weekends and be prison guards.
Tony: And if you throw her out, the social services will bring her back, and we'll be in front of the judge. She's not 18 yet.
Carmela: That's your solution, to throw your daughter out?
Tony: All I'm saying, with the laws today, you can't even restrain your kid physically, 'cause she can sue you for child abuse.
Carmela: There has to be consequences. 
Tony: And there will be. I hear you, okay? Let's just not overplay our hand, 'cause if she finds out we're powerless, we're fucked.
[audio ends]
Sylvi: Tony, brother…
Keith: This is a crazy scene.
Art: Yep.
Keith: I—
Darcy: Man, parents can be real losers sometimes, dude.
Keith: They can. And the funny thing, though, about this whole episode is it felt like a writer on The Sopranos was having a really hard time with their teenager and wrote an episode being like, isn't it so hard to raise a teenager who thinks— Okay, there's a scene, the scene where they're singing uh, No Scrubs.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: They're like, they're talking about like, we're adults, we're thinking, smart adults, and we can make our own decisions. Meanwhile, they're absolutely destroying the kitchen making lunch. Like, like they're just making grilled cheese and hot cocoa or something, and they're spilling milk. They can't flip the thing. And it just felt— It just felt— There's a scene where Meadow basically dupes the parents into giving her a lighter punishment by pretending to ask for the punishment herself, which is coming up. And it's just like, it just felt like this is an episode with a bone to pick.
Darcy: I could see that. I guess I see it more as like the— Tony and Carmela being shitty parents because they refuse to have like, consequences or boundaries for their daughter just tracks with me because that's like, the theme of the show is that Tony like, as, as conflictual and violent as he is, he does not like actual confrontation. He does not do it well, and he does not do well at like, setting and holding boundaries for people unless he can be violent.
Keith: Yeah. Well, and there's an emotionality to having to deal with your daughter that you don't need to have when you're bashing heads.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Um, and that's how I felt about that scene until the episode started digging more and more at Meadow.
Darcy: It does. Like, that scene with Meadow gives me the same feelings as like, like, Janice is a bad person, but it also sucks that like, so much of what makes Janice a bad person is like, every negative stereotype about women from the '90s.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: Like, loaded into one person. 
Keith: Like, like, like, oh, all this feminist stuff is like, self-serving. Yeah.
Darcy: It's all just like, nonsense bullshit so that you can like, trick people. And yeah, so it's— I feel you because it definitely— It feels like it's both sometimes. It feels like it is both like, look at these loser parents, but then it's also, look at these dipshit kids. They think they're so responsible.
Keith: I— Yeah, I agree. There's— There— And, and the Janice stuff is interesting because that really comes into play in this episode when she initially advocates for forgiveness for children's actions, which like, if we didn't know anything about Janice, what she's saying may have made some kind of sense. But it's so clear that she's like, making a sort of retroactively self-interested argument for how she should have been allowed to do whatever she wanted when she was a kid. Because immediately when the— When Meadow's actions start affecting her, she flips the fuck out and is, like, just as intense about her opinion, but in the complete opposite direction, uh, where it's like, yeah, she's just like, I should just be able to do whatever I want. And she just still identifies with being a kid like, with an overbearing parent instead of being an adult. Uh, which is great about Janice. Like, like that, that sort of complicated thing of like— And then Tony, Tony, you know, they have the same parents, right? And Tony kind of like Took the respecting and taking care of my parent route for most of his life, like until the— Until the end of the last season, basically was like— He's like, yeah, I was— I took the shit from my mom and I'm still taking the shit and I'm taking care of her. And then Janice like, with the same input, went the total opposite direction. But then they also use what I think is like, a good bit of characterization in that way to do that, Darcy, what you were saying, like, kind of like, make fun of women from the '90s.
Darcy: Yeah, there— Man, it really feels like we're getting into a season about— Of The Sopranos that's going to be a lot about women between like, this stuff, like, the marriage thing that's coming up. Uh, I am really curious to see where this goes.
Keith: And you know what else made me think my thoughts about this show being kind of pointedly at some unnamed teenage daughter in a writer's actual life was when Melfi is seeing her therapist, her other therapist, not her family therapist, but her one-on-one therapist.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: She's like, I can't believe I said this toodle-fucking-oo thing. I look like an idiot. And the therapist is like, well, you were hiding— You weren't hiding from him as a person, you were hiding from him as a therapist. So your non-therapist side came out to greet him so that you didn't have to see him in a patient-doctor context, but as a person-to-person context. And she responds to that by saying, that's not the whole thing. Young girls are not accountable for their behavior. I think toodaloo was the action of a ditzy young girl, and I regressed into the girl thing to escape responsibility for abandoning a patient. And I thought that that was an extremely misogynistic thing to say.
Sylvi: Yeah, no, I mean, listen.
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: And this show deals with gender quite a bit.
Keith: And I'm not saying— I need to— I want to be very clear. I don't think that a character, even a female character, can't be misogynistic.
Sylvi: No.
Keith: But there's a vein through this episode that feels misogynistic at the meta writing, like an unconscious misogyny.
Sylvi: I— Yeah, I can see the argument for that.
Keith: Rather than— But also, you know, it's sort of— It's also both. Like, I think there's like, both. There's like, on purpose and by accident. This just came up in, I think, the last episode too, where there's like, the show is maybe unknowingly trying to eat a cake that it has and then still have it, is I think the point.
Sylvi: I— I think The Sopranos, it's not perfect by any means when it comes to this stuff. I think there's plenty of misogynist writing.
Keith: Also, the show's 26 years old.
Sylvi: The show's 26 years old. It'll come back to it. I do think that it is— That, like, it is safe for me to say now that this show— The entire show smacks of gender. The entire— Like, this is— This is gonna be a recurring thing. Like, especially as, like, Meadow grows up. They talk a lot about how Carmela's looking forward to when she goes to college. And knowing that this show goes for 6 seasons, I feel like it's safe for me to mention that that does eventually happen.
Keith: They make fun of Tony for being misogynistic so often. [Sylvi: They do.] Episode 4 is full— Like, he is meant to come across like a buffoon for telling the boss of Naples, like, this is— This is— He loves this place. This is where his dad's from. He wants to feel romantic about it, but he can't even get over his misogyny enough to not be rude to this woman's face while trying to make a business deal with her.
Sylvi: This woman who is his idealized self, except she's a woman, so he can't see that.
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: Like, that is the big thing with that episode that stood out to me, is how Annalisa— And again, we're getting ahead of ourselves here, but it's thematically consistent with the conversation.
Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Sylvi: How Annalisa is very much the, like— She's got the life and attitude that Tony is fucking desperate for.
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: Like— That’s—
Keith: Totally. 100%.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah. And he can't get over himself enough to be able to deal with her being a woman. It's one thing to think it. It's another thing to repeatedly say it to her face over and over again. And so—
Darcy: And the people that work for her.
Keith: And the people that work for her. And then also to be trying to sleep with her while insulting her. Um, or, and then not trying to sleep with her. I don't know. It was, it was hard to say whether that could have happened if he had agreed to it. And—
Darcy: The rare Tony Soprano long-term thinking moment.
Sylvi: It's funny because I don't even think it's that.
Darcy: What do you think?
Sylvi: No, I think it's him like, he doesn't like that the power dynamic is not the way that it typically is.
Keith: Sounds like loser behavior to me.
Sylvi: I mean, yeah, Tony Soprano is kind of a loser. Don't, don't, don't tell him I said that, but it's true.
Darcy: Man. Someone— Man, a good dominatrix calling Tony Soprano a good boy might fix him.
Keith:  Or he could flip out.
Sylvi: I— Listen, it did— It didn't fix Don Draper.
Darcy: That's true. Or he could flip out, you’re right.
Sylvi: Tony Soprano's television son in a lot of ways.
Keith: Uh, the— So anyway, so there, there's that, like, there's that part, like, that actually shows up all the time, like this sort of like the misogyny of Tony Soprano and the people in his orbit is the focus of the show in some ways, or one of the focuses of the show. But then it also can't get out of its own way in other ways, which is not like that it's a unique thing. I just—
Sylvi: No.
Keith: It was such a big part of the experience of watching this first episode to me.
Darcy: I just was just looking through my notes again, Keith, and just to kind of like build on what you were saying, one of my notes is like, it is wild that in an episode with like six topless women and like, sex workers giving a blowjob, that like, the scenes with just Janice talking to someone feel the most misogynistic.
Sylvi: Yeah. Yeah. She, she is, um, it, it's weird how like—
Darcy: Let me be explicit. Love Janice.
Sylvi: I love Janice. No, you're right though. Like, you are right. Ithink that I think that like some of this stuff is the stuff that's aged the worst. Specifically the sort of like, cartoonishness of her. Especially 'cause they're trying to establish her as sort of the flip side of Tony. Like— Not flip side like literally as in opposites, but like, two sides of the same coin in the ways that Livia and their dad fucked them up.
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: Johnny, that's his name.
Darcy: Yeah, I mean, yeah, every time Tony and, and Janice are on screen, it's just the two of them doing the thing they're accusing the other person of doing.
Sylvi: Yeah, but like Keith mentioned before, there's a lot of stuff about Janice as a character concept that sort of reeks of like— there's a reactionary tone to it for sure.
Darcy: Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, we get the fucking thing of like, her checking the mail and opening her welfare check.
Keith: Yeah, she is remarkably less self-aware even than Tony.
Sylvi: Yes.
Keith: And it's possible, actually, that she's exactly as self-aware, but because she's being more manipulative, she's always having to lie and seem stupid. Like, she's just like— She's trying to manipulate people and kind of no one buys it, so it makes her look like an idiot. It's hard to know, is she aware that she's lying, or is she very unself-aware? It's hard to tell.
Art: I also think it's— I think that the disability check doesn't hit me in the same way because they're all doing crimes all the time.
Sylvi: They are, yeah.
Darcy: Oh, for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Keith: It's like, a highly politicized crime in a way that gambling isn't.
Darcy: Yeah. Yeah.
Keith: Yeah. As you'd imagine.
Sylvi: At the time.
Darcy: Reagan didn't win a presidential election complaining about the mob. He did it complaining about welfare queens.
Keith: Yeah, they were turned down by the mob, if anything.
Darcy: Yeah. Uh, for me anyway. I agree with you though, Art. I think there is a thing, there is a thing to be said of like, it's not like, Janice is like, a horrible character in a sea of like, really good people. She is a horrible person in a sea of horrible people.
Keith: Um, and largely guiltier, more like she's like— The ways that she has been— She is a product of her childhood are so clear to me in a really sad, fucked-up kind of way. And Tony's the same way. But actually, I think the reason that Janice is such a good character is that her fucked-up shit only— Or it also serves to highlight the way that that Tony is equally affected, but just in different ways by their childhood. Um, and, you know, I would love to see more of that. Let's get, let's get some family therapy in there. Let's get a second doctor to see the whole family. Oh my God.
Darcy: Yeah!
Sylvi: Oh boy. Hey, Elliot, we got a new job for you since Melfi's not available. Uh, Mr. Kupferberg, Dr. Kupferberg, could you please—
Keith: I would love, I would love when Melfi says the line, young girls are not accountable for their behavior. Uh, I regressed to a ditzy young girl to escape responsibility. I would have loved for that therapist to be like, why the fuck did you, why did you say that? Can you tell me more about what you fucking think about that, please?
Darcy: Yeah!
Keith: Why did you say that to me right now?
Sylvi: Okay, should we talk? Okay, no, I want to wait to talk about Elliot Kupferberg until— And how his— He handles being a therapist when we get to that scene. And because we haven't talked about the context of that scene yet, um, I do think I like—
Keith: We talked a lot about Janice. Can I play the Janice button? The first Janice button?
Sylvi: Yeah, okay, I would love that. Let's, let's stick on her for now.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Janice: You guys are making too much of this. 
Carmela: Oh no, I don't think we're making enough. She was drunk. Her choice. 
Janice: There's a Zuni saying: for every 20 wrongs a child does, ignore 19.
Tony: There's an old Italian saying: you fuck up once, you lose 2 teeth.
Janice: See? That's what all this is about. Ego and control. 
Carmela: I beg your pardon?
Tony: No, please, please, don't try to make sense with her.
Carmela: No, I want to understand this. Go ahead, tell me. 
Janice: You want to hold on to control over a young woman whose entire biological determinism is to achieve independent thought and behavior. And because she's exercised her independence, you want to penalize her because you don't agree with her choices.
Tony: Why don't you go get a fucking permanent or something? 
[audio ends]
Keith: First question, what's a permanent?
Sylvi:  Uh, a perm. 
Art: It's a perm. It's a, it's a hair—
Keith: Oh, like a hairstyle.
Art: Curls your hair.
Keith: I thought it was like a more, a worse insult. I thought that this was, I didn't know what a permanent was.
Sylvi: Hey, why don't you go get a lobotomy?
Keith: That's sort of what I thought.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: Why don't you get a lobotomy? Okay.
Art: We're not there yet.
Keith: So now I know what a permanent is.
Sylvi: See, we're always learning things.
Keith: We're always learning things on Friends at the Table. This is one of my favorite dynamics of the show. This is sort of— We were just talking about this, but I just want to like, re-lay out. In a lot of ways, Janice is right. About some of this. Like, do I think that they should ignore that she trashed this house, or— And not be concerned about the drugs and alcohol? No. But I do think that, like, her thing about ego and control, and about how, you know, they're trying to hold on to this power that they have over their daughter at the exact moment in her life that she's trying to escape that, and that by feeding into that dynamic, they're only making it harder on themselves. I agree. But also, Janice is completely self-serving in this moment. This is an ideology that she has because it's completely self-served her for her whole life.
Art: Yeah. She's also completely out of line.
Sylvi: Yes.
Keith: Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah. She does get— This time, she does get permission from Carmela to say this.
Art: Uh-huh.
Keith: Uh, but—
Art: But she should still maybe not.
Sylvi: She should maybe not.
Keith: Or say it in a different way.
Sylvi: Yeah, maybe don't make up your, your fake idioms too. I looked, I could not find that anywhere. Maybe untranslated that exists, but as far as I can tell, the only place that's attributed to is Janice Soprano.
Keith: That's so funny. And I believe that that's her personality. I believe that is the case.
Sylvi: Yeah. She is a level 99 white woman.
Keith: She just has no— She has no goodwill in this family to be so in their face about how they should be raising their child. Like, being right doesn't— She's not afforded the opportunity to be right by her past behavior because it's been so bad.
Darcy: Yeah.
Art: And of course, we find out that she has a child that she has no relationship with.
Keith: Well, she's working with the State Department, Art. 
Art: Uh-huh.
Sylvi: That line is so funny. That line made me laugh so hard.
Keith: I've got the button for us. We'll get— When we get to it, we'll—
Sylvi: Okay. Um, after this, um, I believe it's when Janice is like, you know, I've overstayed my welcome. I'll, I'll, I'll go. Oh no, wait, it's after— I'm wrong.
Keith: That's— Yeah, that's the next time when she— After she comes back from Liv's place.
Sylvi: But we did mention that before, that she goes to Livia's place, she sees how fucking trashed it is. She specifically sees the barf on the wall.
Darcy: What the fuck is she listening to when she pulls into the house? It sounds like she's listening to like, an animal being slaughtered.
Keith: It's very filmic.
Darcy: It's insane.
Sylvi: I also was— I think it's got— It's definitely like trying to do, do more like, she's new age, so she listens to music that isn't from America.
Keith: Was it not from America? It sounded like a— It sounded like— Like prog, weird prog stuff to me.
Sylvi: She has funny music tastes.
Keith: It's Prince of Peace by Pharoah Sanders, an American jazz saxophonist.
Sylvi: Sure.
Keith: Known for his overblowing harmonic and multiphonic technique on the saxophone, as well as his use of sheets of sound.
Sylvi: All right, hell yeah.
Keith: He's a free jazz.
Sylvi: That does sound kind of cool.
Keith: Yeah, it does sound kind of cool.
Sylvi: But they definitely did pick one that would, hearing out of context for like five seconds, is as abrasive as possible. 
Keith: Yeah. Uh, I mean, that's free jazz for you.
Sylvi: Sure. Hey, hashtag free jazz. Let him out. Um, Do we— We could stick on this stuff, this throughline with Janice and the stuff with Meadow, because it is kind of— It doesn't really tie into the Richie stuff too much. And if we're thinking about it, I'm totally down to move on to—
Keith: Almost all the buttons I have are these two. And so I think that we should go in chronological order so that we can get to these scenes and talk about them. And so I'm not stacking three minutes of buttons all in a row.
Sylvi: All right. Because you are making the annoying edit, though, you have to pick where we rewind back to.
Keith: We rewind back to Richie meeting Tony for the first time since he's been out, and trying to— At Satriale's? That's what it's called?
Sylvi: It's at Satriale's, yeah.
Keith: And at first telling Chris to stop hitting his niece, who I didn't know. I didn't know that there was an— Oh, maybe I did know because she— I think she called.
Darcy: She picked him up from the airport.
Keith: Oh, sorry. I mean, until this episode, did we know that she was related to Jackie? And I had just forgotten?
Sylvi: This is the reveal. Okay.
Keith: Okay.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah. So I was like—
Art: This is definitely not true last season, right? This was—
Keith: Yeah. 
Sylvi: Yeah. Because otherwise she would have— they would have mentioned that she's Jackie's niece.
Keith: Yes. Or daughter.
Sylvi: Not that— Not the case.
Keith: Um, because she's— Richie calls her her niece, right?
Sylvi: Yeah, they— They— I believe it's a different sibling or like a different sort of extended family relationship. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Art: I guess it's possible it's by marriage the other way.
Sylvi: That's also— They don't really elaborate much on that.
Keith: Family seems like muddy water in this show.
Art: It's more that at this point they've— They're introducing characters before they've decided anything. So they're sort of like, cramming it all back together.
Keith: Yeah.
Art: We meet— I know Adriana's mother is going to be a character.
Keith: I'll say.
Art: And her name isn't Aprile. So do we have to assume that her mother… is Jackie’s sister?
Sylvi: I think that would make sense. Yeah, or like, because it's the fucking, uh, Sopranos, it could be Jackie's cousin, but that's his niece now, you know what I mean?
Keith: Sure, yeah.
Sylvi: Um, uh, but yeah, because her last name is La Cerva.
Art: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Oh, it's because she waits tables.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah, yeah, she's La Cerva.
Keith: Um, it's nominative determinatism.
Art: Wikipedia calls them her maternal uncles, but— [Sylvi: Okay. Yeah.] Wikipedia could be, you know, fucking bullshit.
Keith: Uh, but that makes sense because they could— Her mother's maiden name could be Aprile.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
Darcy: Hmm.
Keith: Anyway, family's confusing and it doesn't matter.
Sylvi: Damn, that's so true.
Keith: Uh, but I thought this was a crazy scene. Uh, I, I know you're, uh, no, no, um, I'm from the old school. You want to raise your hands, give her your last name, then it's none of my fucking business. Until then, keep your hands in your pockets. And he sort of— Chris sort of stares at him for a while, nods, shakes his hand, and walks in. And, uh, he calls him a good kid, which is a very funny thing to say about a kid who's been hitting your niece. Um, and then, uh—
Sylvi: He's from the old school.
Keith: He's from the old school. And then Tony calls him capable.
Sylvi: Which he will not say to Chris's face, but he will say, uh, to Richie Aprile.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: And my note there—
Keith: Important, he's not a fucking kid. He's like, three fucking years younger than Tony.
Sylvi: In canon though, he's like, 10 years younger than Tony.
Keith: I thought it was the other way around. I thought it was that he's actually like, six years younger, but in canon he's like, four.
Art: No, they're, they're, they're— This becomes very confusing. [Keith: Okay.] But they are much closer in age, right?
Keith: Yeah, this is what I learned from—
Sylvi: This is the fucking movie throwing me off.
Art: No, it's not. The movie fucks it up the other way. Yeah.
Keith: The movie makes them further apart?
Art: There's going to be a time in a future season where we meet another character that knew both of these characters as children, at which point they get more specific with their ages and it's like, Tony's like, 5 years older or something. But in the movie, you have like, a teenage Tony holding a baby Christopher.
Sylvi: Yes. Yes. Okay. Yeah, that's why I got confused.
Keith: So there's two canon answers.
Sylvi: Until we get to the movie, the canonical answer is— Do you mind if I give the canonical answer, Art, as the other keeper of knowledge?
Art: Sure.
Sylvi: He's 8 years older than Chris, um, which is weird actually, now that you mention it.
Art: And the movie's bullshit, but we'll get to that a long time from now.
Sylvi: We'll get to that when we get to that.
Keith: Okay, so canonical ages.
Sylvi: I don't have the— I just know that Tony's 8 years older than Chris.
Keith: Oh, okay.
Sylvi: I didn't get like full-on, like, this is the year they were born, which I'm sure I could find, but I'm recording a podcast and don't feel like Googling that much.
Keith: Yeah. And I mean, still, if you're— Let's say that Tony is 38 or 40.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Uh, if I— I wouldn't, I wouldn't like to be called kid by a 40-year-old as a 32-year-old.
Art: James Gandolfini is 38 when they're making this.
Keith: Right.
Art: Um, yeah, it's, it's, it's weird.
Keith: Uh, yeah, their relationship by, by not having a well-defined— Because right now it's fine. I only know that they're much closer in age because I was told by you two earlier in the season. But now that I know that there's not that much age difference between them, I'm like, why the fuck is he an errand boy for like, his older brother, basically?
Art: We get the first signs, actually, in this episode, the hints as to why Tony is so much further up the ladder. Um, when Richie talks to Tony about, um, how he protected Tony and Jackie when they robbed Feech's card game.
Sylvi: Yeah. 
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: Um, stuck up Feech LaManna's card game.
Art: You're not gonna hear this story, I think, for another year. But, um, but that's, that's the breadcrumb. That is, that is an important thing that was said.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: Because it does tell you why there is just like— Tony and Jackie, young people, very powerful. Paulie fought in the fucking war, is fucking nothing, you know?
Keith: Right. And also, you know, Tony has his— His dad was also a guy with a crew. So he had a leg up. He started young. It makes sense. And Jackie, I don't know how Jackie became the original boss, but being best friends with the boss, I'm sure helps.
Art: Yeah. Especially, yeah, those two came up together.
Keith: Yeah. So that's the thing with Chris. And then I thought this was really funny. Chris walks in and Richie is like, okay, now time to talk business. And Tony stands up as if someone from the other room— They're outside— As if someone from the other room had said, Tony, you got a phone call, and just leaves. And he just goes. And this is where, um, what's his fucking name?
Sylvi: Silvio.
Keith: Silvio. Silvio has to be like, you can't talk to him about business, especially not here. Later on, they do talk about business in a Sharper Image, in what is obviously a Sharper Image. Uh, Tony is waiting for Richie massaging his back with a back massager, which we see from way too far away. It's really funny. He's like—
Sylvi: Is this— Oh, go ahead.
Keith: He's just like 300 yards away, and you just see him through a window massaging his back.
Sylvi: I have a question.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Uh, that I hope doesn't derail us too much. What is Sharper Image?
Keith: Do you have Brookstone?
Sylvi: What is Brookstone?
Darcy: Okay.
Keith: Sharper Image is a mall store.
Art: Sharper Image is a store in the mall.
Keith: Yeah, it's a, it's a store that sells tech for dads from the mall from 2003.
Sylvi: Okay.
Keith: Yeah. Like, if your dad wanted binoculars or like, a flashlight. 
Sylvi: Oh, it's a doodad store. 
Keith: It's a doodad— It's a tech doodad store.
Darcy: Yeah. Do you know the, uh, Hammacher Schlemmer catalog?
Sylvi: Oh, I'm friends with Jack de Quidt. Of course I do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Darcy: It's, it's not nearly as good as that stuff, but it's, it's that kind of vein.
Sylvi: Okay.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Okay, so it's the As Seen on TV store.
Keith: It's higher end than that.
Darcy: But it tries to be nicer.
Keith: It is nicer.
Darcy: Okay.
Keith: It is nicer, but it's still not nice.
Darcy: I don't know if what they're selling is nice.
Keith: You can buy a pair of binoculars that's like, good enough but not great. You could buy a massage chair. You could buy a telescope. You could buy— Anything that an undiagnosed autistic dad might want, you could get that at Sharper Image.
Darcy: And a back massager for like $150.
Keith: Right. Yes. Um, you know, if you wanted like, a like, a, uh, if you want like an expensive HDMI cable, they might have it there. If you got duped into that.
Sylvi: Um, why would I? I'm not getting duped into anything.
Keith: If you wanted a, a razor that needed a battery, that was in vogue for a while. You get like a razor that shakes because you put a battery in it. You get that at Sharper Image.
Sylvi: I thought you meant the Motorola cell phone and was like, oh, they sell phone batteries.
Keith: No, but they might have sold phones. They might have sold some phones.
Sylvi: Okay. I think that— Okay. I, I have an image now. I have—
Keith: You have a Sharper Image?
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a Sharper Image now.
Keith: Sorry. It's so funny that like, a Canadian wouldn’t—
Sylvi: That's the end of the podcast, everybody. Hit the credits.
Keith: It's so funny that a Canadian wouldn't recognize— Like, to me, the idea that that was a Sharper Image was like, so obvious. It didn't even occur to me that someone wouldn't know what a Sharper Image is.
Sylvi: I think the big thing is like, it's something I've heard about a lot. I think a big thing is it going bankrupt when I was 14, uh, and not really making it here means I just never really answered the question.
Keith: True.
Sylvi: I'm looking at it now and I'm like, okay, yeah, sure. This is a wholesaler type thing. Um, anyway [Keith: Retailer.] Retailer, sure, sure. What's most important though is it's also a meeting place for mobsters. Um, Richie's so pissed about this. He's so mad.
Keith: Yes, he is. He's being— He's— Well, he's being jerked around. 
Sylvi: He's being jerked around.
Keith: Because he also had to meet Junior in the doctor's office.
Sylvi: Yeah, at least that one, there's like— He kind of could probably understand a little more given the, the house arrest of it all, but maybe I'm wrong.
Keith: Yeah. Uh, we did skip ahead a little bit. Do you want to talk any— Do you have anything more to say about the dinner and the— Um, uh, oh wait, I, uh— Oh no, that was— I don't have a— I don't have a button. I have a screencap. I have an important screencap of Paulie pretending to suck a dick.
Sylvi: Oh my God. Right. They do have their whole— 
Keith: Oh! Sorry, I do have a button. Again, they're out of order, so forgive me.
Sylvi: Wonderful. Okay. Yeah. So to set this up, this is the— This is a different scene than the one at the Sharper Image. This is the scene before that. They are at— This is the scene at the Italian restaurant I mentioned where Melfi and her friends are having a whole bottle of wine. Can you believe that?
Keith: One whole bottle of wine for three people. Oh my God. They're crazy.
Sylvi: And the boys are also having dinner with Johnny Sack. A little Johnny Sack scene. Doesn't really do much major other than try and flirt with these women, but there he is.
Keith: So when they leave, they assume that the way that Tony knows this woman is by having had sex with her. And so he kind of tries to play it off like he— Like, ah, whatever, it was a long time ago. And then they kind of force him to get more specific. So he lies and says, okay, yeah, you know, it was a long time ago, but we did. And, uh, when he says that he doesn't remember if the blowjob he got was good or bad, Paulie— Paulie's premise is, I remember every blowjob I've ever gotten. Don't you, Silvio? And he's like, yeah, I do. And he says— Oh, here, here, here, the button. I forgot, I shouldn’t explain this part.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Paulie: Every blowjob I ever got. How about you? You remember your first blowjob?
Silvio: Yeah, of course. 
Paulie: How long did it take for the guy to come? You hear that? I said, you remember your first blowjob? He said, yeah. I said, how long did it take for the guy to come? 
[audio ends]
This is the second or third time that Paulie has told a joke and then immediately said, hey, do you remember that time one second ago? It's so funny.
Sylvi: It hits every time. That's the thing.
Art: If you're tired of this, you're tired of life.
Keith: That— It is so funny. It's such a good joke. It's honestly, it's credit to Paulie as a performer. It's a credit to the show. It is funnier the second time. It does add to it that he repeats it straight away.
Sylvi: Because it's like, it's really dumb. And then it's like, he's so proud of something so stupid and like so telegraphed. It's really funny.
Keith: And it did not escape my notice, Silvio doesn't answer the fucking question. You know? How long did it take for the guy to come?
Sylvi: He's embarrassed. Leave him alone. It's hard your first time.
Keith: Uh, yeah, that was— That's a great scene.
Sylvi: Um, and then, then we get the— Yeah, the toodaloo moment. I think her delivery here and her sort of like, wide-eyed like, nervousness at this whole interaction is really good.
Keith: Yeah, because why did she say that?
Sylvi: Toodaloo!
Keith: It sounded— It sounded flirtatious.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: Yeah, definitely.
Sylvi: It definitely came across that way.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Which like, leads into the whole conversation about, see, like, what does she mean by I don't want to see this patient?
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: Right.
Darcy: Keith, how are you feeling about Tony having to go on a quest to win Melfi back?
Keith: Well, I'm— I definitely— My use of the word pseudo-romantic popped up in my head when that happened.
Darcy: Mm, true.
Keith: So, yeah, Melfi is definitely feeling like she's— They're setting her up to take him back easily by being racked with guilt over this. And I also, I remember, I think I remember it being controversial in the episode, but I sort of defended Tony slightly against Melfi's you know, my patient died because of you thing.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: And I was like, she was taking calls and seeing patients in her motel.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: And, um, uh, you know, that real— And like, Tony did, you know, it's her fault. I mean, it's his fault that she's in this position. Um, but like, this— The therapist immediately latches onto that as a thing. Like, wait, she— He— Your patient died because of him, but you were available as a doctor. By the phone and in the motel.
Sylvi: Which, like, very— Yeah, uh, true. And, like, I, I don't know what to say about that other than like, you did everything you could.
Keith: Yeah. Uh, but it's— It seemed like she's, like, rightfully angry at him, I think. Um, and I think maybe angry— Oh, that's not the— Uh, I, I shared the screenshot of, of Paulie miming a blowjob to the wrong chat. 
[group laughter]
Sylvi: Oh my fucking God, that rocks. That's the best shit ever.
Keith: That's so funny.
Darcy: Which one? Where'd you— oh, not even in this Discord.
Keith: No, no, not even in this Discord. Totally unrelated.
Sylvi: He's really like— He's— I— Okay, I don't want to give credit to, uh, piece of shit wrestler Shawn Michaels, but there's a very famous GIF of him also miming a blowjob, and he's got Paulie form in that they are— They are both, uh, they're— Both hands are active.
Keith: Oh yeah, this is a comically large cock being mimed. This is gigantic.
Art: Well, if you're gonna—
Keith: Sure. Well, 'cause he does both good or great and good is like, already— Oh, I've seen, I have seen this GIF.
Sylvi: Yeah. It's a very famous GIF.
Keith: Yeah. Yeah. Um, he's going to town on that.
Sylvi: Best thing the guy did his entire career.
Keith: It's like a guy's going to town on that thing.
Sylvi: He's going to town on that. He, yeah, it's, it's a lot. It's a lot.
Art: Also, the balls are really far away.
Keith: Yeah. I mean, both of them, these are, these are huge. Huge dick, huge balls.
Art: This is less, I think, about this— This is a, this is a person with, I think, a very odd torso.
Sylvi: Maybe. In which, in Tony or, or, or in Paulie's one or in the Shawn Michaels one?
Art: In the Shawn Michaels one.
Keith: I just think they're hanging low. I just think these, these guys, these guys are hanging low.
Sylvi: And that guy hates it.
Keith: Yeah.
Art: It's a hot summer day at Shawn Michaels's.
Sylvi: Okay, we need to stop talking about these invisible danglers Shawn Michaels’ playing around with.
[Keith laughter]
Art: Why?
Sylvi: Um, because, because we, uh, we're an hour and a half into the— This recording and we're only on the first episode still.
Art: I would argue we're still at the first third of the first episode.
Sylvi: Yeah, I know.
Keith: Uh, Richie and Janice go to yoga together by mistake.
Sylvi: Um, it's so funny seeing—
Keith: Unless he's following Tony's family members around. And we just don't know that yet. Uh, but he does seem to have a genuine interest in Janice, and they are exes, I guess.
Sylvi: Yeah, we find out a couple scenes later that they are— They did date, uh, 20 years ago.
Keith: They don't really make sense to me.
Sylvi: No, but like, none of these people make sense to me.
Keith: Hmm. Yeah.
Sylvi: If we're really getting down to it, like, you, you all seem to dislike your romantic partners for the most part. I don't get it.
Keith: That's true. Um, uh, but yeah, they, they clearly know each other. They have the conversation about being supple. Um, that every— Everybody mentions how good Richie looks. Like, every character. I mean, I guess that's what you say when you— When someone's been to jail for 12 years.
Sylvi: You have to say that when a guy comes out of jail.
Keith: Because otherwise you'll fucking kill yourself.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: If you're, if you're like, oh my God, wow, 12 fucking years in the joint really ruined you. You look like shit.
Art: Yeah, you look like shit.
Keith: You look like absolute shit.
Sylvi: 12 years in the joint made you a pussy.
Keith: If someone mimed your danglers, they would be shriveled.
Sylvi: They'd be miming on top of it. That's how shriveled they are.
Keith: Um, I, I think this is like a real— I'm really interested to see where this goes. Uh, because—
Sylvi: This is a very mature, serious podcast.
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: Yeah, dude.
Sylvi: For serious media criticism.
Keith: Um, I'm really interested to see where the Richie thing goes, because if Richie is waging some sort of secret war on Tony Soprano at the behest of Junior, or even if he's just taken it upon himself to fuck with Tony because of not being able to get back Beansie as his… I don't know, tenant, his mob tenant.
Sylvi: His, his, his tributary.
Keith: Yeah, his tributary. Uh, um, and then he starts dating his sister. That's— I don't know, these people care about family and, and they care about rules, but like only in certain ways. It's hard to tell exactly, um, how that's gonna play out, and I'm interested to see if like— If, like, she— If he starts seeing Janice, if that changes his relationship with Tony in any meaningful way.
Sylvi: I mean, when he says, how's your sister, to him in the, the Sharper Image scene that, that's after this, um, he does not— Tony does not take kindly to that.
Keith: No.
Sylvi: And he plays it off by being like, I thought it was, you know, how's your sister, fuck your mother. Uh, and so, like—
Keith: But that is how he means it. But, like, literally.
Sylvi: But that is how— that is how he means it. 
Keith: Not how’s your sister, fuck your mother, but like, how's your sister? I'm legitimately interested in her and pursuing her.
Art: Well, I think Tony would start seeing it as like, a veiled threat, right?
Keith: Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally.
Art: How's your sister? It'd be a shame if someone ran her over with a car outside of a pizza restaurant.
Darcy: I also thought they were gonna— They were doing a joke at first where he thought like, that Richie was threatening his other sister. And then when Richie was like, threatening Janice, he's like, oh, whatever. That’s fine.
Keith: Oh, it was just Janice. Who cares? But surely he knows that they dated.
Darcy: I don't know if we know that.
Art: I do think you have to assume.
Sylvi: I think he does, yeah.
Keith: Okay. He feels like he would have to. He, you know, he would have been—
Darcy: I agree with you, it makes sense, but I don't know, man. I could see—
Art: I mean, they were close.
Sylvi: They, they, one, they were close. He was best friends with his little brother.
Darcy: Okay.
Sylvi: And also, like, I think pretty crucially, they mention how Richie would honk his horn outside of the Soprano house when he was picking up Janice.
Keith: And what would she say?
Art: Pimp's honk.
Keith: Pimp's honk.
Sylvi: Just like one scene for Livia in both episodes. And again— Home run.
Keith: Home run.
Art: Do you have a button for the Olivia scene? Or do you want me to act it out?
Keith: No, I don't.
Sylvi: Oh, I want you to act it out even if he didn't.
Keith: Oh yeah.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: All right. So she says— Hold on, I need to get into the— I need to find my Livia voice. [as Livia] I don't like that kind of talk.
Sylvi: Kind of talk?
Art: [as Livia] Pimps honk. [normal voice] That's not quite right.
Sylvi: I don't have the vowel on honk down.
Keith: It's close though. It's good.
Sylvi: It's improving every time, Art.
Art: Uh-huh. And Richie says, someone ought to warn him. Someone's gonna wash your mouth out with soap or something like that. And she goes, who, you?
Keith: Brilliant.
Art: Uh, amazing. 10 out of 10. I— How did she not win an Emmy for this show?
Sylvi: That is crazy, by the way.
Keith: That is crazy. That's crazy. And then, uh, uh, they're gonna go to the cafeteria and get coffee. And, and Livia's like, are you gonna come back? And she's like, yeah, I'm gonna come back. And as they, they're walking away, do you remember what she says? The last thing?
Art: No.
Keith: I bet he's good to his mother.
Art: Oh, yeah.
Keith: Just always imagining that everyone's getting her, but every other mother is being treated like a god. Every mother on earth is being treated like a god by their kids except me, even though I gave them everything.
Art: She won a Golden Globe.
Sylvi: She's stuck in a non-private room.
Keith: Oh my God, her friend, her big quote-unquote friend in the room is so funny. Why don't you call the nurse? That's what they're for.
Sylvi: And then when Richie comes in, she's like, she called for you. It's a good scene. [Keith: Yeah.] Um, I'm, by the way, very glad that Richie's introduction to the show has gone down well with y'all. Um, I think he's— I personally really think he's an interesting character and like, really is a fun shakeup to the dynamic of things.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: But I've definitely talked to people who are like, yeah, I didn't really— I don't really enjoy Richie on the show. And I'm like, okay, we enjoy different things.
Keith: No, I really like him. I like that he does have this kind of different thing with Janice and that he does have this— He's in some— In a way, he's like Junior because he clearly has a love for Tony that is, you know, they've known each other their whole lives, basically.
Sylvi: Treats him like a little brother.
Keith: Right. And instead of being able to see, instead of being able to process his feelings through that, it feels like that they have this relationship is like, hurting him because everything that Tony does, he goes, how could you do that to me? Because we have this thing. Or, how can you not treat me better? Because we have— You know, Livia's like this, and Junior's like this, and Tony's like this too. But I think maybe the least out of all of them of like, he can't— I guess it's he can't see any interaction from another perspective besides his own. But then wants that from everybody, uh, yeah, that he's dealing with. Like, why can't you see how much you're hurting me by not giving me back all my business from 12 years ago?
Sylvi: Uh, what's the— He— The line he says is, um, oh, I had it. What's mine is not yours to give to me.
Keith: Yeah, yeah.
Art: Yeah. Fucking great line.
Sylvi: There's, there's another really good line by— At the end of this episode too, in a different scene with these two that I uh, have to, have to, to, to point out later.
Keith: It's also— There is— It's important that Tony's not saying, no, you can't have your stuff back. He's just saying, like, give it a minute before you start flipping out. Like, we'll get you— I think he says, you'll be taken care of, we'll get you your stuff back. And that's when he says, uh, what's mine is not yours to give. That's Tony being like, I will get you all your stuff. I just need to like, get you your stuff.
Sylvi: I think, like, yeah, it's really good. I, um, this is like— I think this is related enough to bring up that like, Richie being someone who comes from the time that Tony is nostalgic for in a lot of ways.
Keith: Yes. He's fast-forwarding. He's been unfrozen. Yeah.
Sylvi: I think that, that, that ties into this scene a lot.
Keith: Totally.
Sylvi: Uh, of him being like, well, it was— This is how it used to be. It's how it should be now.
Keith: Yeah. And we know that Tony's right because he is actively being investigated by the feds. And so he does need to be careful with stuff. And I— This is like, genuine— I don't know that he should be transferring back all of the stuff to this guy who's been gone for 12 years. He's out of the loop. He's a loose cannon. And they're throwing him a fucking money envelope party.
Sylvi: They are throwing him a money envelope party. Uh, I wish someone would do that for me.
Keith: I wish someone would do that for me. And he's ungrateful still. Uh, what does this say?
Darcy: You'd think that since he understands the female condition from being in prison, that he would be a little bit more emotionally intelligent.
Sylvi: That’s a crazy line.
Art: That's such a fucking crazy line.
Keith: Sorry, wait, what was the line?
Darcy: It's so funny!
Sylvi: It's one Janice says to Carm, uh, later when Carmela's—
Art: It's in the second episode, right?
Sylvi: I think so, yeah. Um.
Art: Oh my God.
Darcy: But it's, it's, it's where, uh, Janice has just like talked about how all the mob wives like, are such like, losers basically, uh, and then Carm's like, but you're talking to Richie. And she's like, well, Richie was in prison, so he understands the female experience.
Keith: Okay, I, I lied. I actually have three buttons from the next episode, not just one. And that might be one of them.
Sylvi: Wonderful.
Keith: It was just 'cause they were out of order that I thought that.
Art: I do want to flag something that I didn't notice until this watch. And I just wanted— That Richie is a violent criminal with a real problem with his temper. I think that's, uh, you know, I don't want to give too much away about what's coming up, but that's the key.
Sylvi: I think, given his first major scene, you're fine making that claim. There's enough evidence on screen.
Art: But I think you're going to see that he is not randomly violent or, like— He doesn't have a chip on his shoulder with everyone. And I want to flag, because I think this is going to keep coming up, when Beansie— He comes to see Beansie the first time in the pizza place, and Beansie's like, where's your— Why doesn't he have a fresh coffee? Where's—
Keith: Right.
Art: And Richie looks at the kid and says, it's okay. And like, I think that there's a version of this character that is mad at that kid too, and I think it's significant that he's like, this kid's not involved in this. You owe me money. I'm not going to get— You're trying to deflect it onto this other guy. It's you.
Keith: Well, yeah. Beansie's a worm.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: Beansie's a worm.
Art: He's not willing to be like, oh yeah, where's my coffee? Where's my veal parm?
Darcy: I kind of think I see that like, what you're talking about, Art? And like, how he went to Christopher? Like, he basically was like, hey man, this is your chance. I'm telling you what the rules are, and as long as you follow the rules, we're cool.
Sylvi: I mean, he also like, I mean, you know, it's not exactly identical in any way, but like, he takes a lot of Livia's goading on the chin pretty well. Like, he's laughing about that in a way that isn't like, when you can tell people dealing with her are like, pretending to smile at it and seething. He's— I think he is the— At least in, in the performance, it comes across as he's genuinely amused by the way she talks to him.
Keith: Right. He's, he's a loose cannon. He's not like, irrational, an irrational villain.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: And we're gonna see some of those.
Keith: Yes, I imagine so. That, that makes sense to me. But yeah, I— And, and that's the thing with the— We were talking about with Janice, he's like, he seems like a violent guy who also has a, you know, how do you describe someone like this? He's a realistically drawn character.
Sylvi: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Keith: That's what he is. He has a life, and he has feelings, and he has thoughts, and he has motives and priorities. And also, he's a violent criminal.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Um, and yeah, they make it very clear that he specifically has it out for Beansie, and specifically doesn't like that Beansie's hiding under Tony Soprano. And he specifically doesn't like that Tony got to take over, uh, when Jackie died. And he specifically likes Junior for some reason. Um, and he specifically is interested in Janice. Like, you know, he's not just, you know, pinballing around, rolling people over in his SUV.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Just one guy gets rolled over. 
Sylvi: Sorry, you— I'm— My wheels are turning on a lot of stuff now with him. Um, where like, it is interesting that even his, his positive relationships with people are deeply rooted in both tradition and the past, right? Like, Junior is like, also old school, so that's who he goes to.
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: Janice was someone he was with 20 years ago before like, the, the, the— He got put in jail and before like, I imagine his criminal career really took off, and so like, there's a real like, in the way that you said he kind of came out like, unfrozen or whatever.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Um, he— There's a real bit of— It feels like he's trying to turn back the clock by seeking out these things that remind him or are associated with his past, you know?
Keith: And it makes sense because, um, you know, you're in jail for 12 years. You don't— You can't experience the world changing with everybody else. But it also means you have a lot of time to mine your past for how you feel about it. And like, it seems like— It seems like, he maybe was more of a maniac, and that he did kind of chill out in prison a little bit. [Sylvi: He’s meditating now!] And this is the chill version of Richie.
Sylvi: Yeah, that is crazy.
Keith: Yeah. But also, there is this sort of fire in him to— It's hard to know if he's out for revenge or if he's out to like, get back in the game or what. I don't know what his motivation is yet. But also, we see he is right about Beansie. He tries to tell Tony that he's a worm, he's a rat or whatever.
Art: Mm-hmm.
Keith: And then later, we kind of get that thing of like, I don't know, maybe I can go to the police. It would be really funny if Beansie ends up being a bigger problem for Tony than Richie. And— Or at least being like, maybe Richie was right about getting Beansie under his thumb. But then also, if there's a consequence to this, it would've been Richie's fault for chopping him in half with a car.
Art: Yeah, I think that's true.
Keith: I mean, there's nothing— There's nothing like being chopped in half with a car to reveal the true nature of a man.
Sylvi: Damn.
Art: Nietzsche said that, right?
Keith: Yeah, I think that that was him.
Sylvi: Uh, I couldn't think of a funny Nietzsche joke. Let's just keep it moving.
Keith: Okay.
Sylvi: Ignore that I went “uh” and paused everything.
Keith: It's fine. I cut those— I cut a lot of them out.
Sylvi: Okay, cool. Leave that one in.
Keith: Yeah, leave that one in. Um, but I'll cut that out.
Sylvi: Make the podcast worse. Oh my God.
[Keith hysteria]
Sylvi: We talked about— Now here's the thing. We keep coming back to the Richie stuff, which again, I do think is the richest— No pun intended— Richest vein to mine in this episode. However, we didn't— Did we talk about like, in depth the therapy scene with Melfi?
Keith: No, we have not talked about that.
Sylvi: I feel like we keep gesturing at it and then not talking about it.
Keith: Yeah, we gestured at it, but we didn't talk about it. The water drinker, thirsty boy.
Sylvi: Oh my God, I love his big water bottle. That is literally like, a running joke with Sopranos viewers, and like, a character trait of his that a lot of people bring up is he has a giant-ass water bottle that he always drinks. I feel very seen as a girly who likes to hydration-max. I feel very— He— I know that motherfucker holds at least a liter, and he's trying to get three a day.
Darcy: You want some inside baseball? You want some inside therapy baseball?
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Always. Always.
Darcy: Every therapist should have a water bottle, because when you don't know what the fuck to say, you just drink from your water for like 30 seconds.
Sylvi: Oh, shit!
Keith: I think it would be really funny if— Because 30 seconds is a long time to nonstop drink water. You get to about 10 seconds, you're like, whoa, I gotta triple this.
Darcy: Well, you don't have to be drinking the whole time.
Keith: Okay.
Sylvi: You can, yeah, you can go.
Keith: This isn't one long— you're not doing the chug.
Darcy: No.
Sylvi: Okay. No.
Sylvi: Uh, you're not Badlands Chugs. No. [Darcy laughter] I'm glad that got somebody, Darcy. Thank you.
Darcy: Uh, you know, despite my best efforts, I am not, I am not Badland Chugs.
Keith: I don't know what any of that means.
Sylvi: It's fine. He's a guy who chugs stuff on the internet.
Keith: Oh, awesome. Good for him. Yeah. Yeah.
Sylvi: It's great.
Art: I also don't know any internet chuggers, so.
Keith: Do I know any? Yeah, I don't think I know any.
Sylvi: I know a few.
Keith: Wow.
Sylvi: I know two, at least. Badlands Chugs and LA Beast, I think, falls into that category.
Keith: Let's talk about Janice's 180. That's fine.
Sylvi: Let's talk about Janice's 180.
Keith: Wait, no, no, no. We didn't actually end up talking about—
Sylvi: No, we didn't actually talk about it. The curse continues. He's deflecting.
Darcy: Wow, wow, wow. No, I'm not! I was talking about therapy, and then you all started talking about drinking.
Keith: No, no, no, no, no. The therapist. The therapist in the show.
Sylvi: Oh, the therapist.
Keith: Yeah, yeah. He's deflecting— He's psychically deflecting our efforts to talk about this.
Sylvi: I thought you meant Badlands Chugs.
Keith: Yeah, Badlands— And Badlands Chugs. They're using the power of their full bladders to keep us from talking about this.
Darcy: It does seem like the therapist in the show is not really all that interested in like, learning about Melfi's inner experience. So we would be acting like the therapist in the show by continuing to skip this scene.
Sylvi: Something that I think is like, really interesting about this scene in general is like Melfi wants to talk to— Like, at one point says like, as a colleague to him, but his whole— A lot of this has just felt like he's talking to a colleague, I think.
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: Uh, versus talking to a client. And I don't know if that's like, a normal occurrence [Darcy: It can be.] For psychiatrists who have their like, when they're seeing their therapist, 'cause I know that is a very common, probably smart practice to have your own therapist when you're doing this work, right?
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: I think there are therapists who specialize in that.
Sylvi: That would make a lot of sense.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: Um, but he does not seem like he's really— He's engaging with her outside of that lens for the most part. The, the, the like, there's a real like, I'm talking to a peer, not a patient.
Keith: And in a casual like, they're having a conversation. That— It doesn't feel that much like therapy. Although my impression of him was like, well, this guy's much better than their family therapist.
Darcy: True. True, true, true.
Sylvi: Huge fucking upgrade. So it's a big upgrade.
Keith: So it was like, I was almost happy that it wasn't that guy and that it was um, a different guy who's, who's much better than that. That guy was the worst. Absolutely. He— That guy is the therapist equivalent of the comedian who shows back up in this episode.
Sylvi: Oh my God. I, I like, stood up and cheered. Everybody clapped when I saw that. I was so happy.
Keith: I couldn't believe that that guy shows back up, that they gave the worst ever comedian a second shot. Like, that Tony saw him at the retirement home [Sylvi: Tony didn’t see him!] And then was like, we gotta get this guy for the Bada Bing.
Sylvi: I think, like, crucially, Tony isn't in that scene, right?
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: Tony— it's, it's Junior and, um, it's Junior and Livia, which to me reads like one of them recommended this to Tony. And I guess it would be Junior, uh, at this point in, in the timeline.
Keith: Uh, they should have done like, a hook. They should have hooked him off the stage with a big shepherd’s cane. 
Sylvi: Oh, my god. I mean, they kind of do. He's about to tell like some weird racist joke, and instead he's like, okay, it's time for boobs.
Keith: Once again, woke Tony Soprano strikes.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: Don't tell the racist joke.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah, woke Soprano.
Keith: Uh, God, absolutely the worst. It's almost— It's so bad that it's like, it's not even funny to have in the show because it's like, it's so unrealistically bad, and also the jokes are so bad that it's like, the only humor is for us is from like, I can't even believe that they have this guy in here on TV.
Art: I know that this is an actor. I disagree that that's not— 
Darcy: Yeah, I also heavily disagree. My partner has been doing standup for 2 years. Keith?
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: It's bad out here, dog.
Keith: That's a paying gig though. That's not like, an open mic. That's not like, a club. That's not like, a bringer show. You know what I mean?
Art: Oh yeah. And everyone says you always see the best standups at strip clubs and old folks homes.
Keith: I'm just saying. You do have to get out of the open mics and the bringer shows to get to the place where someone's gonna hire you to be— I'm not saying that this is the top of the top of the stand-up food chain, just that like, this is the worst fucking comedian I've ever seen. [Darcy:] No, he's awful. He's awful. He's doing— At one point, he's doing, like, am I too turtley for the Turtle Club?
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: It's crazy.
Darcy: Wait. Wait. Hold on.
Sylvi: Which in a few years will be unleashed on the general public.
Darcy: Yeah, I'm confused because you said bad humor and then you brought up the turtle club scene.
Sylvi: Am I not turtley enough for the turtle club?
Keith: Okay, I take it back. He's really funny.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Dana Carvey's greatest role. Turtle.
Sylvi: Man, bonus episode incoming.
Keith: Oh my God. I saw that movie in theaters.
Sylvi: I did too.
Darcy: Me too. 
Keith: Wow.
Darcy: Art?
Keith: Art, did you see it?
Art: No, I've never seen that movie in theaters.
Keith: Get the fuck out of here. Never seen The Master of Disguise? Wow.
Sylvi: I've seen that movie like 6 times.
Keith: You've never seen Pistachio Disguisey as the Master of Disguise?
Art: I want— I need everyone to just say the age they were when that movie came out.
Keith: Uh, I would have been nine because it came out— I would have been 9 or 10 because it came out in 2002 because it was filmed during 9/11, famously.
Art: Okay, so I would have been 15.
Darcy: I was 15.
Sylvi: Yeah, I think Keith and I probably got more of a leg to stand on with this one.
Darcy: In my defense, we bought tickets to Master of Disguise and then used that to just stay in the movie theater and sneak into a bunch of other movies.
Sylvi: Let's go! That is a classic 15-year-old move.
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: And also maybe a classic 32-year-old move. Don't tell anybody.
Keith: Why would— Yeah, why would you ever not? The only reason to not do that would be if there's not two movies out you want to see.
Darcy: Well, now, now they, they got all the assigned seating and shit. So, you know.
Keith: Not here.
Darcy: Gets tricky.
Sylvi: James Brolin plays Fabbrizio Disguisey, Pistachio's father. I didn't know that. It's been a while.
Keith: I have to say this. 
Art: You simply can't. 
Keith: Pistachio Disguisey is one of the all-time funniest names of anyone or anything.
Sylvi: I do love when this podcast just becomes one— Like us holding one of us hostage in a way. And that's how it feels like with Art right now.
Keith: Famous 1% on the Tomatometer, Master of Disguise.
Sylvi: 1%?
Keith: 1%. Um, which is crazy. Who's the one? Who's the guy? Who's the one guy? Anyway, uh, do we want to talk about the scene, the 180 scene where Janice goes, uh, uh, hey, I'm gonna go to my, to my mom's house. Oh, it's covered in shit, which I knew about. Time to be really mad about this.
Art: I sort of feel like we've covered this a little. Do you have a button?
Keith: Uh, I have a button for when they go upstairs. A request. I have a button request. 
Sylvi: Yeah, we have covered this then. We can I think we can kind of breeze through this.
Keith: Okay. Uh, I wasn't— I couldn't remember how much we talked about this. She does her 180.
Sylvi: She does a 180 on it because now it's, it's affected her and she doesn't get to be like, um, sort of like aloof about it.
Keith: Yeah, she no longer cool aunt, has to be, I'm supposed to have this home for free. I'm supposed to be stealing my mom's home.
Sylvi: She's stealing my money off the shit.
Keith: Yeah. Uh, uh, but she goes upstairs, Carm apologizes to her for being like, you shouldn't— You don't belong here. Your opinions are invalid because you're a parasite in our lives. Fuck you and fuck yourself. And Carm goes to apologize because even though she was totally right, she— No one calls her out for the hypocrisy, by the way. I would have liked that to have happened. No one says like, wait, but you fucking 100% changed your story. This is the exact opp— I think maybe because they all live and breathe hypocrisy, it's not even worth bringing up. Uh, the— But, uh, she, she knocks on the door and apologizes for having been too harsh. Uh, and this is that conversation.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Janice: I just wanted to apologize, you know, about earlier. 
Carmela: No, I should be apologizing to you. I was out of line.
Janice: You're right. I never raised a child. I was robbed of that when Eugene took him back to Montreal. I'm still petitioning the State Department, but I think they have me on their enemy radicals list.
[Sylvi hysteria] 
Carmela: When was the last time you saw Harpo? 
Janice: He changed his name to Hal. I'm sorry, Carm, can we not talk about him?
[audio ends]
Sylvi: Boom! Punchline after punchline after punchline!
Keith: That was so good. She's on their enemies radical list. She's on the enemies radical list at the State Department, she says.
Sylvi: She's on the enemy radicals list. Her ex, Eugene, took Harpo to Montreal, which is also really funny.
Keith: Yep. Well, that's why she gotta go to the State Department. This is an international issue. So funny. I mean, unbelievably funny. I love the idea that she really doesn't even have anything to say about Harpo.
Sylvi: Um, no, does not give— Only that he has changed his name to Hal, which like, hey man, don't blame you.
Keith: Well, I think it's really funny that her name is Janice and she changed it, uh, to— [Sylvi: Parvati.] Parvati. And she basically named her kid Parvati and changed— And then the kid changed the name to Janice. Like, that's the— Like, she tried to do herself to the kid, and the kid was like, no, I'm gonna be— I'm actually gonna be Hal, please.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: Harpo is boy Parvati.
Sylvi: Oh, okay, sure. Interesting.
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: Boys have a Harpo, girls have a Parvati. Okay.
Keith: Yeah. Tell your kids that. Uh, anyway, I thought that that was really funny. That was such a good scene. Janice is ridiculous. Um, I also love her, like, even when she's saying, you know, it was my fault, I was out of line, it still doesn't feel sincere.
Sylvi: Oh no, not at all.
Keith: Not at all.
Sylvi: Not at all. I mean, 'cause like, she, she starts it with like, such a like, kicked puppy vibe to the whole conversation. Oh, do you need me to turn down the music?
Keith: It was my fault. I, I was just so sad about my own kid whose name I forget, who I don't think about or want to talk about.
Sylvi: Yeah, who I don't bring up because he's in Montreal now. Um, it's just funny. Yeah, Montreal just makes me laugh at this point because I've gone through trials and tribulations there in my life. Um, it's, it's not a place you want to be named Harpo, I'll tell you.
Keith: Damn. They hate the Marx Brothers there?
Sylvi: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Keith: Damn.
Sylvi: Not a Marxist among them.
Keith: Me and my kid, me and my kid Gummo, we're gonna go up there, so. 
Sylvi: Oh fuck.
Keith: Yeah. 
Sylvi: Oh no, but there's definitely some Harmony Korine vibes, so they'll probably be fine with that one.
Keith: Oh, okay.
Sylvi: I'm talking fully out of my ass. Anyway, um, uh. I—
Keith: Richie kills the guy— Doesn't kill the guy.
Sylvi: Richie doesn't kill the guy. I was gonna also mention that, um, I think that it's— This scene is really interesting because of— In season 1, we get Carmela constantly being like to Livia, you're welcome to stay at our home. And she's like, I know when I'm not wanted. And she keeps pushing back on it. Uh, and this feels like Carm has some guilt about that, the way that went down, and is now, um, trying to allay some of that by, like, keeping— 'Cause, like, obviously, after Livia was not brought into their home, all the business with her and Tony went down. It does feel like she's trying to hold on to a sort of familial connection for Tony, even if it's with fucking Janice Soprano.
Darcy: I mean, it also reminds me of her just, like, she continues to just get really more rigid on some of these things and like, how they're supposed to be. You know, like she mentions that like, throwing her out wouldn't be Christian-like. And then in the next episode talks about how you can't get a divorce because it goes against the church.
Art: Mm-hmm.
Keith: You know, no offense to her, but that's such a fucking boring way to think.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: And self-destructive.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: I, you know… We were talking in the Goodfellas episode about how Lorraine Bracco turns down this role.
Sylvi: The Carmela role, yeah.
Keith: The Carmela role. And how, like, watching her in Goodfellas as Henry Hill's wife, it makes a lot of sense why it would be, I think, difficult to be those two characters. Um, uh, and I would hate— I would hate her to have to have this role, I think.
Darcy: Hmm. How come?
Keith: Um, she's so good as Melfi. And like, we talked about, the thing that we were talking about in Goodfellas was how like, even though, uh, both characters are like, the mobster's wife character, Karen Hill is so— Such a huge personality and is explosive in this really unhealthy way, but also is the only person who's getting into Henry's face and screaming at him and telling him to his face, all the things that he's doing wrong. Not in a heroic way, in a deeply destructive way and self-destructive way. But that like, the Melfi role is kind of weirdly analogous to that because of how she's, again, in the role of the woman who's telling the mobster about himself. Versus Carmela feels like she's been so like, whittled down by Tony and is like, constantly shrinking herself to accommodate, uh, his behavior and lifestyle and like, putting everything that he does out of her mind and leaning on this like, Catholicism stuff to, um, to let it sort of take the— To let— To forgive her, to preemptively forgive her for the difficult decisions, to the difficult but positive decisions that she doesn't want to make for herself. And it's kind of pathetic. It's kind of a— It's kind of like a— It's not a— It's a character that is having a hard time and is like, not making it through that hard time. And that is like, sad. But— And like, that's also a difficult role— That's also a difficult thing about Karen Hill. She's also doing that, but in a more explosive, louder way. And so, Melfi kind of feels like a more restorative role for her. Like, um, uh, it would be really sad to have to be Karen Hill and Carmela Soprano, I think.
Sylvi: Oh, God.
Keith: Like—
Art: Oh, God.
Keith: You know what I mean?
Sylvi: Yeah, no, I do. I do. Oh man. Um, I just started thinking about what that life would be put together and started getting very sad.
Keith: Right? Yeah.
Sylvi: Oh no. 
Darcy: Yeah. Um, do we have anything left from this first episode that we haven't, uh, touched on yet?
Keith: Uh, I mean, we talked about the hospital scene.
Sylvi: Uh, yeah, with Beansie, you mean? Or the scene with Richie and Janice at the hospital?
Art: We've sort of talked about both.
Keith: Uh, yeah, we've talked about both, but I meant, I meant with Richie. Uh, I noticed, um, uh, they talk about, uh, eating disorders again, um, uh, in the scene— We talked about it like, kind of out of order, but when Hunter's over and they're making— They're destroying the kitchen. Worth watching this scene, it's disgusting. Pouring like pouring hot chocolate from the pan directly into a mug and literally missing like, 70% of it. It is cartoonish. It is—
Darcy: Also looked like they were covering their grilled cheeses in like cocoa powder.
Keith: It was bad. It was really bad. It was made to make them look like, like stupid children. Um, and, uh, uh, during that they're talking about eating disorders again and Harpo— or Harpo— Hunter. 
Sylvi: Holy shit.
Keith: Hunter, like, brags that she didn't get in trouble because her parents thought that she would become bulimic again if they punished her. [Sylvi: Yeah, that, that—] Uh, and so she—
Sylvi: Weird, weird line, especially given who is playing that character.
Darcy: Keith, to your earlier point, that to me definitely reads as somebody being like, ah, these— I hate these fucking kids.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: And she tells, she tells, uh, uh, Meadow, like, just start purging. Like, it'll solve all your problems. Because your parents won't be able to punish you for anything because they'll be so upset about you puking all the time. So I just wanted to bring that up again. And then I did notice later everyone's eating sandwiches and she's eating ham and cheese on a plate with no bread. And so I just thought, it just made me think about the earlier eating disorder as a joke thing than like, oh, she's not— And she's like off— As a teenager, like is off carbs or something and drinking a Diet Coke. Her and— Only her and Carmela are drinking Diet Cokes. Everyone else has juice.
Sylvi: You know, I like a Diet Coke, but no. Yeah, you're right.
Keith: I also like a Diet Coke. That's why, you know. Yeah. 
Sylvi: You are correct though. It does— It does—
Keith: They're putting an eating disorder on the screen. They're talking about it multiple times.
Sylvi: Yes. And I—
Darcy: And talking about it as a thing that someone is doing intentionally as a manipulative tactic and not like a horrific fucking experience that someone suffers through.
Sylvi: I think this is one of— And like, uh, maybe, sorry, maybe I'm giving too much away here. I think this is gonna end up being one of the bigger dropped balls that, at least to my memory, Um, of, of this show when it comes to the sort of, um, various like hot-button issues they try to get into.
Keith: Yeah.
Art: Um, yes and no.
Sylvi: Again, like I said, I'm— It, you know, my memory is not perfect, so I will happily be pleasantly surprised on this. But I do remember the first time, like one of the earlier times I watched through this being like, oh, they mentioned that at the beginning, and then it doesn't really— It kind of stays in the background as like a flavor thing, but it's never really—
Art: I think they specifically dropped the eating disorder stuff because I don't know if it's this season or next season, but there's some point where the media starts getting really mean about Jamie-Lynn Sigler gaining weight.
Sylvi: I am— I, I—
Keith: We have referenced this before.
Sylvi: I think we have referenced this before. Okay. You know what? If it's dropped because of trying to have the wellbeing of one of the actors in mind, I'm not sad about that.
Keith: Yeah. Worth it, I think.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: And I mean, not that we've solved all of these problems, but the late '90s, early 2000s was a really horrible time to be a woman in media.
Keith: Hey, the boomerang's coming back, baby.
Sylvi: Uugh. Guys, don't remind me.
Keith: Uh, let me see. Uh, we talked about the— We talked about the nightmare, I think? Melfi's nightmare?
Art: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Um, I'm glad that the— That the Wizard of Oz soundtrack was playing, and I was like, this shit sounds like the Wizard of Oz. And then she writes in her dream journal, Tony Soprano dead, Wizard of Oz. And I was like, fuck, nailed it. I haven't seen the movie in a long time. Uh, that was— I thought that was a great touch. Just like vibes-wise, I just thought it was a really cool sonic choice. And we also talked about Tony finding Meadow cleaning Livia's house.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Which again, yeah, like you, Darcy, I was confused about exactly what was meant by that. And then because the next episode was in Italy, I did not get an answer to it. Um, but yeah, that was, that was a good episode. I definitely had like, a lot more thought about that one than the next one.
Sylvi: I was gonna say it's a little more focused and a little more— It's not a bottle episode per se, because I think that there are like, important things that happen in it, and like, there are things setting up like, plot movement, but it definitely, it, it has less uh, um, immediate like, oh shit, there's— This is changing the, the way the show works, uh, right, in a way, in, in comparison to episode 3, which has Richie coming in and shaking everything up, you know?
Keith: Before— I don't need a full five unless we want to take a full five, but can we have like—
Darcy: Uh, I would.
Keith: Oh, okay, great.
Darcy: I need to let the dog out.
Sylvi: Okay.
Art: Yeah, I could, I could—
Sylvi: I also need to let the dog out.
Keith: Yeah, I gotta go let the dog out real quick.
Sylvi: I gotta go let the dog out. I just have to go pee. I'll be back.
[musical sting]
Episode 17 [02:07:43]
Sylvi: Fellas, let's go to Italy. My girls, gays, and theys, we're going to Italy for this next episode. Um, I know, uh, girls, Annalisa, gays, Paulie Walnuts, theys, Chris Moltisanti in a just world. Um, yeah, so while we were talking about this, you guys kind of mentioned that you felt like this one didn't have quite as much to dig into as the first episode that we watched this week?
Keith: Yeah, this is like a comedy episode. This was like a nuts and bolts episode. This was like— I don't know why, but they decided that the show needs a real Italian guy in it. And so like, we had to go— They had to be like— They had to write an episode that was like, how do we get an Italian guy?
Sylvi: How do we get an Italian guy, and how do we make their Italian identity feel even more performative when they get back?
Keith: How do we get it so that me, David Chase, can go to Italy and get paid for it?
Sylvi: A little bit of the vibe too, yeah.
Art: Me, David Chase, and three of my favorite actors.
Sylvi: Do you think that was the motivation behind Paulie coming? Is it like, I gotta have Tony on this trip. I gotta have Tony Sirico come with.
Keith: I mean, I feel like— I feel like if that was fully the case, you'd also have Silvio there.
Sylvi: Oh yeah, that's a fair point.
Keith: Because how could you not want, uh, Steven Van Zandt there?
Sylvi: Yeah. Maybe—
Darcy: Maybe he had just been there with Bruce.
Keith: It's true, maybe he had commitments with Bruce. Um, but yeah, so there was like— They had like— There's like a— This episode needed to have, quote unquote, needed to happen in order to like get the character that they had come up with to New Jersey. Um, and other than that, it was totally fun to watch, but it didn't really feel— Again, I think it really adds something to the show to have like, kind of every— Kind of all of— They didn't like Italy. They didn't— None of them had a good time. They all had a bad time in a different way. 
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: For different reasons. 
Keith: For different reasons.
Sylvi: For different reasons. 
Art: It seems like Chris had a great time. 
Sylvi: I'm not gonna claim that Chris had a great time.
Darcy: I don't think Chris had a great time.
Sylvi: Chris did not have a good time.
Keith: Yeah, I think that there are—
Sylvi: He had a time, for sure.
Keith: He sure had a time. He may have not experienced a lot of that time. Even.
Darcy: He may have felt good about how he was spending that time in the moment. I don't think he had a good time.
Keith: Well, 'cause what else does repeatedly swearing that you're gonna go to the volcano do except for build in a regret? And there's a— There was a threat. There was like an implicit threat to him not being there, uh, being at the dinners, bringing the golf clubs. He's supposed to get made soon.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: They've like, hinted that he's gonna get made.
Sylvi: Yeah, I mean, straight up. In the first episode we watched.
Keith: They're telling him like, hey, you should stop fucking You should stop fucking up because you're not gonna get made if you keep blowing it. And he kept blowing it. And by blowing it—
Sylvi: You mean heroin?
Keith: I mean heroin.
Sylvi: Yeah. Um, there's definitely a bit of like, him getting some slack because he comes up with the excuse of like, I ate shrimp on the plane that disagreed with me.
Keith: Yeah, yeah. But then he missed the next two things because Paulie really was like, take a fucking Imodium. He didn't say like, oh my God, I hope you're feeling better. He said, take an Imodium or you're not gonna get made.
Sylvi: Uh, I-made-ium.
Keith: I-made-ium. Yeah, take some I-made-ium.
Sylvi: Yeah. 
Darcy: Oooooooooh!
Sylvi: Thank you. Thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. I need to introduce some strippers really quick.
Keith: Um, oh, Oh, hold on. Oh, two things. I talked about this in the group chat. In the last episode, uh, Meadow was wearing a t-shirt for the band that no one but me remembers, The Churchills, uh, which was like, uh, a signed indie pop band from the late '90s and early 2000s who had a run of songs being in TV shows. Including Spin City and Scrubs. I had the physical CD of that, that that song was on. Everybody Gets What They Deserve is the name of the song. So I was like, kind of like, blasted into the past by seeing the band named The Churchills, which I haven't thought about since the early 2000s when I was literally 10, 12 years old. And then the dog's name is Churchill at the very beginning of this episode. And I'm like, is there a— Is there like a secret thing with Churchill? Am I getting— Am I getting ARG'd? Do I have to figure out— Do I have to find the clues? Why does Churchill keep coming up? Um, have I missed a bunch of Churchills? [Sylvi: They’re going to England.] Is this just a bizarre coincidence?
Sylvi: I genuinely don't know, man.
Keith: Uh, it would be really funny if there's more Churchills coming up. So I am officially putting myself on Churchill watch. Um, 'cause I'm thinking back, I was like, Tony's always watching the History Channel. We see any Churchill in those? I don't know. I don't know. Uh, commemorative plates with Winston Churchill on it next to the, next to the, uh, old blue eyes. What's his fucking name? 
Art: Frank Sinatra.
Keith: Frank Sinatra. There we go. I remembered, I remembered old blue eyes, but not Frank Sinatra. Uh, anyway, sorry. Well, I derailed us to mention the Churchill thing, but I— My first note was dog also named Churchill, question mark. Let's talk about this dog. This is the dog of a family whose car gets stolen. This is, this is, uh, we don't know why this is happening until they get to Italy.
Darcy: Um, and this isn't like a person we've seen before, right?
Sylvi: Like, none of these are people we've seen before or we'll see again. 
Keith: This is a— yeah, this is like—
Sylvi: This is like, a racist family.
Keith: This racist family, or at least racist dad. The mom seemed upset about it. Yeah, yeah, the mom seemed upset. Their car gets stolen and the dad calls them N-words. And then because the joke is he's like, well, who else would do something like this? [Sylvi: Smash cut to Tony.] And then you see him laughing, the Tony Soprano laughing at the picture of the car, pictures of that car and a bunch of other cars, because this is actually So this is basically his job. He has— Or I think he has orchestrated, he has paid off these car thieves.
Sylvi: Yes. Yeah.
Art: Not like for individual— These people were not targeted, but yeah.
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: It was the type of car.
Keith: It's just the type of car. Also, I don't know that it's a plot hole, but this is maybe not something that was as known 26 years ago. And maybe it was potentially even less true, but I don't think so. All of these cars that they're stealing, these were like, Mercedes. There was like, all Mercedes. But they keep calling them American-made cars. As far as I know, these German car companies, when they're selling to American markets, they give us their worst cars. I believe this is known and documented. And Japanese car companies do this too. Like, American Toyotas and American Mercedes are worse versions of those cars. So the idea that we're taking American Mercedes and selling them back to Europe, to me this makes no sense.
Art: Um, what I think is happening here, okay, and this is worth basically nothing, is that there are definitely like, models that are only in the American market.
Darcy: Well, there's a—
Art: And there— That could have a premium.
Darcy: They have a factory in America.
Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Art: Yeah. But they also— But I think there's like— I think we're getting there. It's like, you know, American exclusive [Keith: My understanding—] Mercedes you cannot buy in—
Keith: I'm not a car guy. My understanding is that in order to keep costs low, American-made cars from overseas brands, whether it's Japan or Germany or whatever, are specifically made worse in order to [Darcy: Define worse.] Worse quality control, less expensive parts, less trained labor. We're talking, yeah, in all ways worse, because they have to pay—
Art: It sort of doesn't matter if that's what you want, right? I don't think they sell the Toyota RAV4 in Japan. So if what you want is a Toyota RAV4, then you need an American RAV4.
Keith: I think that's true. I can imagine myself as a European being like, why would I drive one of the worst American Mercedes when I could get the better— I could get a cheaper, better European Mercedes?
Art: But what if what you wanted was a bigger Mercedes because you're a rich asshole?
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: I guess I'd commit suicide.
Sylvi: Damn.
Darcy: Damn!
Keith: If that was my thought process, I'm a rich European asshole who wants a bigger car. So I'll pay more for a worse car from America? That's it. I'm done. I'm done. I'm toast.
Darcy: I wish everybody in the world thought like you, Keith.
Keith: Me too, actually. Anyway, this is Tony Soprano's car-stealing ring. It's not Black people. It's Italian people. Somebody call Dr. Melfi's ex-husband. Get him on the case.
Sylvi: Oh my God. Nobody call Dr. Melfi's ex-husband. Nobody, especially not her.
Keith: You can call him late for dinner.
Sylvi: Shut the fuck up.
Keith: It's like the reverse, 'cause normally you'd say, don't call me late for dinner, but we do actually want him late.
Darcy: Mmm.
Keith: They, uh, uh, Junior never went to Italy. I love all these Italian guys who never fucking went to Italy. They talk about it, it's all they talk about. Yeah.
Sylvi: Um, the like, wistfulness in his voice and the like, I never got to go. And Tony being like, hey, it's not over yet. And it's like, okay, man, he's not getting to go to Italy. 
Darcy: He could go!
Keith: He could go. Literally, he could go. 
Darcy: Well, he can't right now. He can't right now.
Sylvi: We don't know what his sentence is yet.
Darcy: Well, no, he's in custody.
Keith: Oh, that's true.
Sylvi: Yeah, he's in custody.
Keith: But also he can't sit on the plane. His ass broke. He broke his ass.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: It's his hip, not his ass. Come on.
Keith: That's the same part. The hip is just— It's like cow and beef. It's the same word, but it means the same thing, but one is more official.
Art: Which is the more official word, hip or ass?
Keith: Hip.
Darcy: Hip. Yeah.
Keith: Hip is when a doctor says it. Ass is what you call— What the farmers who actually raise it call it. That's gonna— That's a joke that's gonna be funny for someone who knows about England. That's why they call it that in England, because the— They call it beef because the rich people who spoke French were eating the beef, but the cow was the— What the farmers called it.
Sylvi: Sure.
Darcy: Shoutout to the Norman Conquest, man.
Keith: All of the names— That's why the names for the meat comes from French, but the names for the animal are Germanic. Learning something on Media Club Plus once again.
Darcy: I think there was like two weeks in college where we just talked about how the Norman Conquest like, totally derailed the future of the English language into a completely different thing. Anyway.
Keith: Cool stuff, honestly.
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: What is my— Okay. Um, but yeah, we get a lot of people who never have been to— Carmela wants to go to Italy. She hasn't been. Junior wants to go— 
Darcy: No, she doesn't. 
Keith: Hasn't been.
Darcy: She doesn't want to go. She didn't say that.
Keith: Okay. All right.
Darcy: She didn't say she wants to go. Don't put those words in her mouth.
Keith: Okay. Well, we'll go another time. You're invited if we go again. 
Darcy: I don't want to fucking go.
Keith: Well, then why don't you get some Chinese food, idiot?
Darcy: I, I, if I want Chinese food, I'll get it for myself.
Sylvi: Oh my God.
Darcy: Dummy.
Keith: Uh, Pussy's never been. He wants to go.
Darcy: Um, oh yeah. Pussy also has reasons that he can't go right now.
Keith: Yeah. He's busy doing home improvement.
Darcy: Mm.
Keith: Or at least using a hammer. I don't know if it's improvement.
Sylvi: [confused grunting noise] Uh, that's the noise Jimmy made when he hit him.
Darcy: I mean, yeah, that's probably a noise I would make if someone hit me in the head with a hammer.
Keith: Uh, I really love—
Sylvi: I would go, hey, stop that, please.
Keith: These two episodes in a row, uh, we didn't mention this, but the smirk that Meadow gives when she suggests being grounded in the last episode for, uh, like her, her idea of her punishment is losing access to her, uh, Discover card.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Uh, which is really funny. That's not a very good punishment. Um, uh, and she like, smirks as if she like, won, uh, some sneaky contest as she's walking away. And then in this one, she's instigating her parents to fight by being like, well, why don't you take mom on to Italy? I'm sure she'd like to get away, knowing of course that that's not going to happen. Uh, very, very troublemaking Meadow in these last couple episodes.
Sylvi: Um, she's an instigator now.
Keith: She's an instigator. Yeah, ever since she learned that her dad is a big-time crime boss—
Sylvi: She's like, I'm gonna act like that. 
Keith: I'm gonna act like that. I'm gonna act like a crime boss. 
Sylvi: She— I, I really— I fuck with, with her being like super manipulative now, honestly.
Keith: Yeah, I wonder if it ramps up from here. I don't know. What else do we have in this episode? Do we have any—
Sylvi: They learn rules don't apply to your parent.
Keith: Yeah, it's true. And in the last episode, they make a point to say, like, as parents, that we no longer have access to physical violence has destroyed our ability to, um, uh, to hold our daughter accountable to anything, which I don't think is true.
Darcy: It's not.
Keith: But it's not. Of course it's not true. But that is like, it seems like it's sort of become the position of the show in a small way anyway, at least now.
Darcy: But which does also feel like, very '90s.
Keith: Uh, yeah, I, you know, it's sort of on the cusp of like, it's at the tail end of when, when people were still hitting their kids all the time, like, as a cultural norm.
Darcy: No, I feel like the '90s is when people— Like there were enough people who were still hitting their kids, but then that's when the message of, hey, you shouldn't do that, got loud enough.
Keith: Yeah, totally.
Darcy: And then those people were like, oh, the fucking laws these days. You can't do anything! 
Keith: Yeah, you can't even hit your own— you can't even beat the shit out of your own kid. What the hell? I guess it's lawlessness in the home from now on. Is there anything else before they actually go to Italy to talk about?
Sylvi: I don't really have too much.
Keith: Okay.
Darcy: I don't think so.
Keith: So we also, very early on, actually, like, it's like right as they're leaving or right before they're leaving, Carmela is at lunch with Pussy's wife and Jackie's widow. And she's pretending—
Sylvi: Rosalie and Angie.
Keith: Rosalie and who?
Sylvi: Angie Bonpensiero.
Keith: Yeah, Angie. Yeah. Angie's pretending to be happy that Pussy is home, and she just totally breaks down and she's like, actually, I'm gonna kill myself about this. I hate my husband. I was sad when he showed up. He barely even cares that I might have breast cancer. It seems like a pretty bad situation.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: It's— It's— I—It sucks for her.
Keith: It does suck for her. Get her out of there.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Angie, I'm sorry. There's only one thing that can fix this, and it's 12 roses.
[snigger]
Sylvi: Yeah. He, he's bad at all of this, I think.
Keith: Yeah, he— Well, he's preoccupied.
Sylvi: I mean, yeah, he's preoccupied with one of the funniest bit characters in the entire show.
Darcy: Yes, it does seem like Pussy is in the middle of, uh, trying to do something to save his life, which is going to ruin every aspect of his life.
Sylvi: On The Sopranos?
Darcy: Yeah, I know, it's crazy.
Sylvi: What are you talking about?
Keith: I'm very interested in how this turns out. Like, the fact that they had— I, I actually was kind of surprised that, um, he comes back and they reveal that in addition to Jimmy having been a rat, he also is a rat. It was Jimmy, right? The guy who— Not— There's 2 Jimmies. 'Cause Jimmy was the Elvis impersonator.
Sylvi: Oh, I think Jimmy was— Jimmy Bones is the Elvis impersonator.
Keith: Yeah.
Art: And then Jimmy Altieri was the rat.
Keith: Jimmy Altieri was the rat.
Darcy: Yeah, Windbreaker Jimmy.
Keith: Yeah. So they do a pretty good job of being like, oh, I guess it was Jimmy that was the rat all along. Well, where did— Where did Pussy go then? Why is he gone? And when he came back, I always thought that him coming back was going to be a big problem, but I wasn't 100% that he was going to come back and still be a rat and that he was a rat the whole time. And so the fact that he's always been a rat for years and years, I don't know how that's going to go. Like, I don't know. It puts him as a character in a pretty jeopardized spot. He's right to feel not safe because he's not safe.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: I think maybe he took things a little bit too far. I think that Jimmy Bones might have been a fucking idiot and may not have thought twice about meeting a guy from… Dover, Montana?
Art: Dover?
Sylvi: Dover, Delaware.
Keith: Dover, Delaware.
Art: Yeah.
Sylvi: Hey, you know where they got the name from?
Keith: The cliffs.
Sylvi: That's right.
Keith: I assume the cliffs.
Sylvi: This guy is also like Austin playing a goofy NPC. Like this guy is one of those— He's Jimmy Cakes in Perpetua. Go listen to Perpetua.
Keith: Johnny Cakes. Jimmy Cone.
Sylvi: Johnny Cakes, Jimmy Cone. Yeah, of course, of course.
Keith: Because of the foods.
Sylvi: Because of the foods.
Keith: Classic New England food, the Johnny Cake.
Sylvi: Yeah, this, this guy's really funny. Sorry, I got thrown off by, by bringing up the, the Johnny Cake [Keith: The Dessert Brothers.] Jimmy Cone. The Dessert Brothers. Thank you. I was like, what's their unit name?
Keith: Their unit name, the Dessert Brothers. [Darcy: What's their stable?] A small gang of brothers. The Dessert Brothers. Uh, the, uh, where the fuck are we? Someone help me.
Sylvi: I'm sorry.
Keith: I have a button called Madonna Whore. 
Sylvi: I’m giggling too much at them being a wrestling team.
Keith: And I remember the scene, but I don't remember where it goes.
Sylvi: That conversation with Janice and Carmela. Okay. So let me, let me, let me refer back to the, the summary I did earlier. Um, we— I mean, we kind of just covered everything with, with Big Pussy’s stuff other than the scene between Angie and Carm later, uh, which is more, I think, related to Carmela's, uh, B-plot than Big Pussy's C-plot in this episode. Does that feel right to anybody else?
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: Yeah.
Sylvi: Uh, he does just murder the fuck out of Jimmy though, like ball peen hammer. You see the blood splatter. It's, it's, it's a lot. Um, and do— Is this— I think this might be the time where we want to talk about Annalisa, uh, Vittorio, um, the daughter of the Don who shows up at the dinner, and just the dinner in general. Does that sound right to y'all? Does that seem like a good place to get back to?
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Cool. Um, yeah, so I— One, the, um, Tony's charm not working because of the, uh, very pronounced language barrier, I think, is like, a fun detail. He can't really do his sort of like, jokey play-it-off thing in the same way because the idioms don't translate. We get it like, more obviously obvious when, um, he's talking to Annalisa towards the end of the episode. But then there's also like this stuff here at the dinner where he's trying to like, get back in Nino's good graces after, um, asking why he's not meeting with the big boss, um, and inadvertently insulting him.
Keith: Uh, potentially vertently insulting him, because that's— that is kind of a rude thing to say.
Sylvi: Oh yeah.
Keith: Yeah. Um, does sort of get him back when he's like, I'm honored to meet you, and he raises his glass. He's— I don't know, did he seem cooled off by that?
Sylvi: I didn't really get that vibe, but you know.
Keith: Okay. Uh, but it doesn't matter because the real boss shows up.
Sylvi: I did, uh, George Washington Parkway or whatever.
Art: George Washington Parkway… George Washington Bridge.
Sylvi: Bridge. Thank you. It was the bridge.
Art: Major Deacon Expressway.
Sylvi: Yes, I was combining the two.
Keith: Uh, what was the first one where he thought he said wheelchair? Oh, Wheelchair Boulevard. Yeah.
Darcy: [crosstalk] So yeah, anyway, Talia al Ghul is here.
Keith: [crosstalk] There’s something wrong with his wheelchair. Uh, sorry, Darcy, what did you say?
Darcy: Uh, I, I just said, so Talia al Ghul is here now.
Keith: I don't know who that is.
Darcy: Uh, Batman character.
Sylvi: She is kind of giving that, huh? I didn't really think about that.
Darcy: Also a girl boss in Batman.
Keith: Oh, is this the assassin?
Darcy: Runs an organized crime syndicate.
Keith: Assassin wife of Batman.
Darcy: Yep.
Sylvi: Okay, uh, played by— Not— Annalisa Zucco is played by Sofia Milos. I don't know if she's ever played, uh, Talia al Ghul.
Keith: That would be an insane coincidence.
Sylvi: It would be. Um, yeah, I'm, uh—
Keith: She could be an assassin.
Sylvi: She could totally— I could totally see it. She— I mean, like, this— This is— I mean, without just getting to it, like, she is definitely like play— Like portrayed as sort of a femme fatale here. Like, she is a hot lady mob boss. She like, always looks fucking incredible in all these scenes. Her outfits are good. Like, she— The camera is not afraid to linger on her ass when she's, um, taking a golf drive that Tony compliments. And then she's like, no, I shanked that.
Keith: Yeah. Um, by, by not afraid, we're talking a full 10-second ass-only shot. 
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: Bent over.
Sylvi: Uh, they are up in there. They are, they're giving her an inspection. Um, they got a colonoscopy, uh, cam going.
Keith: And you know that, you know how important it is that we know that she’s hot because we had just seen her collecting her own toenails.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: That— which, her explanation rules. Did— Does anybody else want to give a—
Keith: Uh, yeah, so I wrote, why she collect her toenails? And then in the next scene, Tony asks her why she collects her toenails, and she says, um, uh, that, uh, if someone gets your hair or toenails, they can make the evil on you.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: So she burned them.
Darcy: Yeah, that sounds smart to me.
Sylvi: I mean, honestly, even if you weren't worried about people doing, uh, evil— The, uh, what did she call it again? You just said it and it's already left my brain.
Keith: Make the evil on you?
Sylvi: Yeah, even if you're not worried about people making the evil on you, it's probably good to have less genetic material laying around if you're a crime boss.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Not trying to get framed for anything.
Keith: OK, so she lives in this insane villa.
Sylvi: Oh my god. And you can tell when they pull up that Tony's like, fuck, I wish I lived in a place like this.
Keith: But then— Then— And this is great because it shows you, I think, I don't know whose perverse perspective this is. Maybe it's crime bosses in general. Maybe it's specifically Tony Soprano. Maybe it's the people who make television in Hollywood. But later on, they have like, a big dinner at her childhood home, which is like, next door. And it's like a fairy tale, and it's a million times nicer. And it's like, I would live my whole life there rather than spend one day in the mansion next door. Like, it's like, unbelievable. Here's a— This is the, uh, where am I? Okay. Yeah, this is the right— I'm putting these in the right chat this time. This is where they have dinner later. That's like, there's cats running around. There's a statue of a dog. There's a huge table with the whole family at it. There's a canopy. There's like nice soft lighting.
Sylvi: Keith, this is such a good screenshot.
Keith: It's unbelievable. This is— And the— It's not just a beautiful place, but there's a beautiful quality to the set. Like the, the, the, the, the blocking in this is unbelievable as the camera pans across and you see the whole room and everybody's having a dinner. The cats are running around. Tony's like, sitting on a stoop like, petting a cat that's run up to him. Like, it just looks like a magical place, and they spend no time on this. Like, Tony's only comment on this place is how nice it is that she got to move right next door. And I'm— And I— And I— To me, this is like— I don't know whose, like, uh, uh, perverse perspective this is that this isn't the focal point of, of Italy for them, but it's someone's. I don't know whose.
Sylvi: There's like so much about some of these scenes that I'm like, chewing on now as we talk about it?
Keith: He's, he's sitting on the steps. He's drinking, um, this is— What is he having as an aperitif? He's having—
Sylvi: I don't know.
Keith: Uh, uh, they say what it is. [Darcy: Amaro?]Yeah, they're drinking Amaro or something, uh, on the steps with like, the most beautiful woman in the world. And the only thing he can think of is, I can't fucking believe I have to listen to a girl.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: It's disgusting. It's horrible. Just do whatever she says. Who cares? Stop being a loser.
Sylvi: This whole thing smacks of gender, I holler as I overturn Annalisa Zucca's Amaro and turn the trip to Italy into the trip to shit. Yeah, no, this episode is so funny that Tony's too misogynist to enjoy his trip.
Keith: Yeah, yeah. They're all too fucking stupid to even enjoy the one thing that they wanted.
Darcy: I feel— The only person I feel bad for a little is Paulie. He tried. He's just too stupid.
Keith: I think that he didn't let— Okay. I sort of, I threatened to do this as a joke on BlueSky earlier, but now I'm gonna do it on purpose. I think this is the second time this has come up in Media Club Plus, but probably like the fourth time that it's come up on Friends at the Table overall. But there's like an essay that I read, I don't know, 15 years ago by Walker Percy, Loss of the Creature, a horrible essay that's haunted me my whole life. It's great. It's really well written. I think it's really interesting. It's like 12 pages.
Sylvi: Oh, okay.
Keith: Walker Percy's like a conservative Catholic intellectual essayist, and he wrote this essay called Loss of the Creature about how the way that life is constructed, it robs people of the ability to have an authentic experience, even down to the wanting to have an authentic experience will rob you of that experience.
Sylvi: Sure.
Keith: By needing to have it confirmed externally. I mean, someone else needs to like— You need to be witnessed as having it. It needs to be confirmed that it was authentic. Like, there's just this little evil inside you that goes like, is this real? Is this fake? And that voice like, destroys your ability to live your life in a happy way, that— And fulfilled way. The reason I hate it is because I think it's like, perniciously close to true. Like, it's wrong. It's like, he's got blinders on and it keeps— The blinders are perfectly positioned to where that you can't see the reality, which I think is sort of what makes a good essay to me is like, closing off enough of how, like, there's no way to perfectly explain something that it feels convincing in the moment that you're reading it. But I think everybody's had this experience of like, having a desire and getting it and feeling empty. The big one from Loss of the Creature is the Grand Canyon, or one of— There's like three or four big examples. Going to the Grand Canyon and how, like, nobody can have the fullness of the Grand Canyon like the first person to ever see the Grand Canyon, because the experience gets divided up in a million pieces and distributed to each— One share to each person who sees it. Because you go to the Grand Canyon to see the beauty, and instead what you see is tour buses and tour companies and gift shops and 5,000 other people who all had the fucking same idea as you to go see the Grand Canyon.  And that, that is a destructive experience.
Art: I don't think the Grand Canyon is a zero-sum game. I think—
Keith: Again, I have to say, I believe Walker Percy is wrong. I can't be more clear. I think he's wrong. But I do think that he identifies something, a feeling that is true about having something hollowed out because you have preconceived notions. You have ideas of what things are supposed to be like, ways that you're supposed to feel. And that there's something different about spending $1,000 to take a trip to the Grand Canyon versus stumbling through… the desert? Is the Grand Canyon in the desert? I've never been.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: Stumbling through the desert, and all of a sudden you see the Grand Canyon in front of you and having your whole fucking mind blown out your ass. I think there's something to that, but I couldn't stop thinking about it watching this episode. Where, like, they have— And you can even— You can tell even before I ever had the idea that they would go to Italy, these guys don't fucking know what's up with Italy. They are— They feel Italian in this way that is different than being from Italy is.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
Keith: And so they go to Italy, and they all kind of have their hearts broken in this small way. Uh, or a big way, um, because they can't reconcile what they felt to be true with the reality that was around them. Tony mostly has this like, ancestral pull to Italy, this romantic fatherland thing.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Uh, uh, Paulie seems to have like, an almost nationalistic pride about Italy. Different like, not an ancestral romance, but a like, these are my people thing.
Sylvi: There's a real like, return to the, the, the motherland vibe with him.
Keith: Yeah.
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: Um, but for him, it's not as much ancestral as like, this is where my father came from. Although he also has that, but more like, these are my people. Like, I'm going to go fit in and make friends with everybody around me because they see how fucking Italian I am in my turtleneck.
Darcy: He did have that shit on though.
Keith: Yeah. But they had all this weight of expectation about the place. And I was talking about the one-two punch earlier, and the two punch comes at the end when, um, Annalisa is her name?
Sylvi: Annalisa, yeah.
Keith: Annalisa, like, he's like, oh my God, I have to bring my family here. I have to bring my kids. I have to show them where we're from. And Annalisa gives like, a speech that's like, there's no such thing as we. There's no such thing as from. Kind of. I'm gonna play— this is the, uh, this is the, the oracle thing.
Sylvi: The, the Sybil conversation?
Keith: Yeah, the Sybil conversation. 
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Tony: Gotta bring my kids back here, show them all this.
Annalisa: In the olden time, the Sybil of Cumae was the second most important oracle after Delphi.
Tony: I thought Delphi was in Greece. 
Annalisa: Well, the Greeks were here way before the Romans. And before the Greeks, there was somebody else. And before them, somebody else. E così via.
Tony: The rulers would come from across the ancient world to hear the Sybil's predictions of their future. She would sit inside the cave inhaling gases. I think I dated this broad. 
[audio ends]
To me, it's sort of like she's going, there's no such thing as Italian. There's no such place as Italy. And he goes— It just goes right out. It goes through one ear, out the other. As he reads the thing, he makes a joke. In the same way, he rejects— She says, this is my experience as an Italian is that your idea of this as a romantic attachment place that connects you to your past is false. And it just reflects right off of him. It bounces completely off. In the same way that when Paulie gets back in the car and Pussy's like, what did you think about Italy? And he says, fabulous. I felt right at home. I feel sorry for anyone who hasn't been. And it's like, Paulie, I just fucking saw you. But like, his own feelings, they just— He just like, buries them. Nope, don't address. I loved it. I actually loved it. I actually fit right in. Don't ask me about specifics.
Art: He's lying.
Keith: He's lying. Um, and I— That's the part of this episode that like, I thought was really, really good. This, that, this whole like, I'm actually— I can't— I'm considering how the— They've rung the bell, the, you know, “what is an Italian” bell before? You know, Paulie talking about the coffee, the rape of the culture.
Darcy: In the coffee shop, yeah. 
Keith: Yeah. Considering how they've addressed this before, I was surprised at how really well done it was in this episode. I really, really liked this. I mean, as much as I felt this episode was kind of slight, it was kind of like a means to an end, that kind of thread has been one of my favorite things in the whole series so far.
Sylvi: Yeah, I mean, I think I think that, um, this is not a bell that they stop ringing, right? [Keith: Yeah.] This, this is gonna—
Keith: 'Cause these are comedy, but it's also real.
Sylvi: Yeah. Um, I, I'm trying to think of what I can say without getting into stuff from the future, so I might actually not have much to say. 
Keith: Here’s what I’ll say. I'll add, I'll add, uh, I was gonna say something personal, but this is not quite— This is an offshoot of personal. Personal as neighbor. But as— My whole family's very interested in their Irish heritage. A lot of my family's been to Ireland. Have you met an American, especially from the East Coast? They get like that. 
Sylvi: Yeah, man. My parents are both immigrants from there. That was like all of their friends growing up. Not all of them, but there was definitely a lot of that around when I was a kid.
Keith: But this is how it's different. You know, your parents are immigrants. My great-grandparents were immigrants.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: My parents— Well, sorry, my grandparents were born in America. And so the connection is tenuous, but there's a pride to it. But I grew up finding this attitude supremely irritating, the American— The Irish American, like, we're Irish pride thing.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Increasingly less irritating as I got older for the specific reason of understanding why there's a lot of Irish people in America and kind of feeling for when you come to America because your family is starving and you don't want to die there. You come to America and you instill something like pride into your children, and that that is strong enough to last generations doesn't make it not annoying to me, but it does make it understandable to me.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
Keith: And the thing that finally sealed the deal on not thinking it's that annoying anymore is hearing Irish people from Ireland being so fucking annoyed by this dynamic that— And not annoyed— And it's like, hey, you guys know it was the— I know you know it was the British. It was their fault. So why are you mad at like, your great-grandfather's neighbor for loving the country that you're from enough that it lasted 100 years instead of being mad at the British. And this sort of diasporatic conversation is interesting to me because they managed to get across the difference between an Italian and an Italian American. One, comedically. Two, without being actually like, annoying about it, or in the way that it's annoying, it's annoying in a comedic way. I just think that they're able to walk a really tight rope of like— Ooh, actually slack ropes are harder. They walk a slack rope.
Sylvi: Whoa.
Keith: Whoa. Where it's like, I'm kind of impressed that this is both funny and also interesting. They do it— They kind of get both. It's kind of hard to do both. It's hard to poke fun at Italian Americans for being kind of oafish buffoons who don't know their own culture and also kind of sympathetic to this and also have an Italian come in and be like, I actually don't feel very strongly about the Italian identity because I've met some Italians and they're not all like that. They feel very, they often feel actually very strongly about their Italian identity in the same way, you know, Irish people who are, who also feel that about— This is, I, you know, I have one side of my family that's Irish and one side that's Italian. So I know—
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: I have these people in my family. I have, I have Paulie Walnutses and the Irish Polly Walnuts.
Sylvi: You have Paulie Spuds.
Keith: Paulie Cashew.
Darcy: Paulie Spuds!
Sylvi: Paulie Cashew is pretty good.
Keith: Paulie Spuds is good. No, Paulie Spuds is good. I kept the nut.
Sylvi: Ironically, would definitely still be named Paul though.
Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, anyway, so that's, that's— This was in this, this part of this episode. I was like, impressed that they were able to get through it without losing the comedy, without losing the interesting commentary, uh, at the same time.
Art: Yeah. But like, this is— It's Italians and Irish who do this, right? Who go to their countries and are like, hey, I'm here.
Keith: I'm here. We're the same. We're literally the same. Let me have some gravy.
Sylvi: Hey, uh, bonjour, Commendatori, buongiorno. And then the guy is like, oh, are you with NATO? 
Keith: Are you with NATO? That was so funny. Are you with NATO?
Sylvi: It's the funniest line in the whole episode.
Keith: It’s so funny, oh my God.
Darcy: So funny.
Keith: Are you with NATO? I also love the idea of looking at Paulie Walnuts and being like, that guy looks like he's from NATO.
Art: Yeah.
Sylvi: Well, you know, he's American, so.
Keith:Yeah, he's American.
Sylvi: I can only assume.
Art: Uh, that's how our military dress.
Sylvi: And is it not?
Keith: In a little turtleneck.
Sylvi: Shit, guys, is it not?
Keith: No, unfortunately it's not.
Sylvi: Fuck. I've been given— I've been like, throwing water balloons full of piss at guys dressed like Paulie Walnuts for way too long.
Art: That's still fine.
Keith: That's still fine.
Sylvi: Okay. Uh, I'll keep it up.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Uh, you give this guy a golf club, he'll probably try to fuck it.
Art: Yeah, I wrote that one down too. That's very funny.
Sylvi: There's also the line when he asks about, uh, macaroni. Can I just get some macaroni and gravy? And the Italian guys are like, man, you thought Germans were classless pieces of shit.
Art: Germans were classless pieces of shit? Yeah.
Keith: That's the one that I missed because I didn't have subtitles on at the time.
Sylvi: Yeah, I figured.
Art: Oh, that's in the, that's in the episode subtitles though.
Sylvi: Oh, is it? It wasn't on my files.
Darcy: Oh, it was on mine.
Sylvi: I'm glad it was. [mumbles] You know.
Darcy: Yeah, yeah, fair.
Keith: Uh, yeah, that, that line, the golf club line, uh, uh, Chris was supposed to bring a golf club for the boss, um, but he's both in a wheelchair and kind of— They meet him, he's having a lot of trouble doing anything but naming American roadways.
Art: Yeah, he's— And Chris didn't show up because he was getting high, right?
Keith: Yeah, yeah. So eventually they're like, actually, maybe it's good that he didn't show up because this guy wouldn't have any use for this golf club. I think it's a bad gift. I think golf club might have been a bad gift for the boss of your— 
Darcy: Do they— Is like, golfing big in Italy?
Keith: Um, I think it's like—
Darcy: I assume people play golf in Italy, but like, I don't, I don't know if it's, if it's in the, the national consciousness in that way.
Art: Maybe it's big with Italian gangsters. I mean, you have to— Yeah, you have to grade this on a curve.
Keith: True. Where in this episode do we want to jump in?
Sylvi: Uh, God, we've been all over the place, huh?
Keith: Um, do we want to talk about, um, uh, Carmela's conversation with Janice?
Sylvi: Yeah, I think that is probably the biggest thing to dig into that we haven't yet.
Keith: So I do have a button for this.
Art: We talked about it a little.
Sylvi: Uh, we have talked about it a little, but like we haven't really dug into it.
Keith: Yeah. So the back— We talked about the background that Carmela was at lunch with Angie.
Sylvi: Angie and Rosalie.
Keith: And Rosalie. And learned that Angie's gonna ask for a divorce.
Sylvi: Mm-hmm.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Carmela: She's thinking of divorcing him.
Janice: Halle-fuckin-lujah.
Carmela: Do you know them? 
Janice: Well, no, I don't know them, but, you know, to be married to a man like that. 
Carmela: You mean like what? 
Janice: Oh, the 'tude and the fucking medieval outfits. Look. 
Carmela: He is such an adoring father though. Three beautiful kids they raised who are now from a broken home. 
Janice: No sons, I hope. Three more of his ilk we don't need. 
Carmela: It is very macho. 
Janice: Macho? No, try swaggering mama's boy fucking hypocrite, shall we?
Carmela: Hypocrites?
Janice: Carm, come on, stop. I mean, just stop. 
Carmela: Is that how you see your brother? I thought you were talking about Angie. 
Janice: I mean, these OC pricks especially with their goomahs and their prostitutes. Emotional cripples. And they expect their wives to live like the fucking nuns up at Mount Carmel College. 
Carmela: It's not that simple. 
Janice: Well, of course not. Madonna-whore is a full equation, I believe. Clothes and appliances and houses. 
Carmela: You are talking about me. About us.
Janice: Carmela, no. I don't know. That a woman of your intelligence is content to ask so little from life and from herself. I don't know. I'm— It's none of my business. 
Carmela: Marriage is a holy sacrament.
Janice: Okay.
Carmela: Family is a sacred institution.
Janice: Roger.
Carmela: And you trying to fan the flames with Richie Aprile of all people? Talk about old school. 
Janice: Carm, Richie, because of his life experience in prison, he has a sensitivity to the plight of women. 
Carmela: Oh my God. Oh God. I am not even gonna touch that one. But you had me going for a while there. You really did. Oh, Janice, honey, I gotta love you. Really.
[audio ends]
Keith: Her cackling and walking away as the music swells is so funny.
Sylvi: It's so funny. Uh, there's also a moment in that when Janice is like, a woman of your intelligence or whatever. I'm like, is she about to start hitting on Carmela?
Keith: It did feel that way. I also picked up on that a little bit.
Sylvi: It really felt like that for a minute, which, like— 
Darcy: You know, who amongst us? 
Sylvi: Exactly.
Keith: Um, um, the— But it was also, it's also like this, like, I'm insulting you, so I have to compliment you. I have to like, I— You know, I think you're stupid, and so I'm gonna compliment you so that you don't notice how insulting I'm being. She's also not totally wrong.
Darcy: Mm-mm. No, I mean, this is like, this is a thing that Carmela talked about in the first season at one point, right? Was like [Keith: Yeah.] I'm— I— She was talking about religion, but it was like, you know, this lifestyle I'm living is, is opposed to my Christian values.
Sylvi: Janice isn't wrong is the thing, but because it's Janice, she is too hypocritical for it to—
Keith: Yeah, it's the same thing as the control ego thing from the last episode where it's like, it's not— She's not the right messenger because of how self-centered and manipulative she is.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: And how her criticisms of Tony Soprano are built on— Partially on misinformation, partially on refusing to acknowledge reality, partially on a desire to get something out of Tony and out of Livia. Partially out of their relationship when they were much younger, and also partially correct.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Like when she's talking to Richie and she’s like— She doesn't want to talk about the thing with Livia, and she's like, yeah, because we know the truth is that she tried to kill him. And she's like, yeah, he just always wants to have someone to blame. He can't take responsibility for anything. Um, and there's ways that that's true about him, but then there's also ways where he's constantly taking responsibility for lots of things.
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: Maybe not things that you'd want him to take responsibility for, but he is doing it.
Darcy: Not even that he's doing well. But he's doing it.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah. 'Cause the things that she's like, oh, always looking for somebody to blame. Like, well, those things were someone else's fault, actually. You shouldn't try to kill your kid. Full stop.
Sylvi: Bold stance from Keith Carberry. Very brave of you to say that.
Keith: Getting canceled for saying that parents shouldn't kill their kids. What has the world come to? You can't even kill your own kids these days.
Sylvi: Ah, this fucking pro-lifer.
Keith: How am I supposed to punish my kid if I can't kill them? They're going to run roughshod over me.
Sylvi: I'm completely powerless.
Art: A question I ask every day.
[Sylvi hysteria]
Keith: Once again, once again, Art making an oblique reference to maybe trying to kill his kid. 
Sylvi: It is so funny.
Art: Which I have not and never would do in case—
Keith: Right, because of the law.
Art: In the future, she's listening to this.
Keith: And that's the only reason. It's only because of the law.
Art: Mm-hmm.
Sylvi: Uh, oh my God.
Keith: Pussy, um, I don't think we said this explicitly, he gets a, he gets a hammer and he bashes Jimmy Bones over the head.
Darcy: We did, yeah.
Keith: Oh, we did? I thought that we only referenced it as.
Art: I thought we only referenced it.
Sylvi: I thought that I was like, by the way, he just straight up murders them. And then we did the riff about the Home Improvement noise.
Keith: Yeah. So, so his wife had, um, had told him that the cancer was benign and he basically is like—
Sylvi: Where's my other belt?
Keith: Yeah. He's like, where's my other belt? She's like, the cancer is benign. And he was like, oh, good. And then he left the house. She did not like that. He went out to murder. That's why he needed the belt. It was his extra support belt for murder.
Sylvi: It's a good murder belt, yeah. It's like a weightlifting belt.
Keith: Yeah. And then he comes back with a dozen roses, and she hits him in the face with the roses and runs away. One thing that is kind of realistic about this, and I'm sure that this is another thing that was sort of in the air at the time, this feels like a late '90s, early 2000s thing. Lots of people talking about divorce rates. But I definitely remember this idea of divorces in communities where divorce is discouraged, like if you are a sort of conservative Catholic, that divorce is contagious. That's one of the reasons why you don't want divorces, is 'cause once divorces start happening, they keep happening. And I think that's, like, the threat of this episode is like, Angie Bonpensiero is like, putting the divorce particles into the air, and they're being breathed in by Carmela.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: And we now have, like— We already have 1/3 of Carmela's like, friend group being extricated from the mob because Jackie died. 
Keith: Right.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: So she is no longer dating a mobster. And so then we can get her two closest friends not dating mobsters anymore.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: And yeah, friends who also she's friends with because of like, their—
Darcy: Yeah, I guess I shouldn't say closest, but—
Sylvi: Well, no, but you're right.
Darcy: She hangs out with them.
Sylvi: I'm not correcting you on that. I'm just saying like, it's so baked into the—
Keith: Which we also saw in Goodfellas.
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: This is the, you know, they're in a high-control community.
Darcy: Lots of groupthink going on.
Keith: Lots of groupthink, lots of rules. Um, lots of, this is what you can and can't say. Don't fucking tell anybody that I love cunnilingus or it might start a war.
Sylvi: This is what cunnilingus has brought us to.
Keith: Yeah. This is what therapy and cunnilingus has brought us to.
Sylvi: Yep.
Darcy: I cannot wait to see Carmela's psyche explode and how that's gonna play out. I can't wait. 
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Anything can happen. I have a feeling that the show— It would take being really deep into The Sopranos to break up that family for more than a short arc. That's what I— That's my gut feeling, is that the Tony— The Tony-Carmela home dynamic is so crucial to how The Sopranos functions as a media object that it would be— Frankly, it would be a bad idea to take it out of the show without giving it back pretty quickly, unless that you get so deep into the show that it's like, well, it's ending, so we don't actually need to worry about the health of the dynamic of the show.
Darcy: Yeah, because I also think it's, it's just way more interesting if, if, you know, the relationship is effectively dead, but then we get to see what it looks like as they try to like, pantomime their way through it.
Keith: Yeah, that could be good.
Darcy: Um, I don't know.
Keith: I don't know.
Darcy: I just keep thinking about that first season when Carmela looked real comfortable holding an AK, and I just, I want to bring it back for her.
Keith: I mean, hey, I think it'd be really funny if she shoots Tony Soprano. That would be a really funny—
Darcy: I hope she shoots Tony Soprano.
Sylvi: Oh my God.
Darcy: I think I unfortunately am spoiled in that I know Carmela does not shoot Tony Soprano.
Keith: At least— Well, he might get— He might— Well, yeah, sure. He might get a winger. Oh, yeah, sure. So, I'm sure multiple people shoot Tony Soprano in this show.
Sylvi: Mm.
Keith: And which means that many of them—
Darcy: They definitely tried to.
Keith: It means that until one of them is fatal, the rest of them can't be, which is always true.
Darcy: Speaking of, uh, speaking of rules, I just want to point out that it seems like Paulie Walnuts has a rule that you have to use mouthwash so that you don't taste dick when he kisses you.
Keith: I, I think that that might be common.
Sylvi: Bro's weak as fuck.
Keith: It's extremely weak. Get over yourself. It's literally yourself.
Sylvi: It's literally— It's fine.
Darcy: Well, we know Paulie has problems loving himself, so.
Keith: True. And women.
Darcy: And Italy.
Keith: This guy might be fucked up.
Sylvi: Did we mention the David Chase cameo, by the way?
Keith: No. Who is David Chase?
Sylvi: David—
Keith: In the show.
Sylvi: The creator of The Sopranos. Uh, it's just— Art, do you want to run it down?
Art: Uh, yeah, there's the scene kind of late, maybe not that late. It's when Paulie's just sitting at the cafe by himself and he goes like, commendatori, to like the guy at the next table, and the guy at the next table looks at him like he's a piece of shit. [Keith: Ohhhhhh.] That's David Chase.
Keith: That's really funny.
Darcy: Okay, yeah, I'm looking at a picture of David Chase and I recognize who this is from the show.
Sylvi: David Chase, who does also kind of look like Tobin Bell, the actor who plays Jigsaw.
Keith: Sure.
Sylvi: Hmm. Yeah, you know, doesn't mean much to you, means something to me, but that's fine.
Keith: The, uh, is there anything else about this episode that we want to talk about?
Sylvi: Um, there's a couple little things. I— There is a conversation between— I, I can just like, run through the stuff that I want to mention, and if y'all feel like having more of a talk about it, we can. Um, there's a moment where Furio asks Tony if— I mean, Tony actually asks him what it's like working for a woman, and Furio's like, there's no woman bosses back home? Um, and Tony's like, no. And then Furio does look kind of like, intrigued by that idea, which I didn't catch my first few times watching this.
Keith: Yeah, I definitely caught that. I just don't— I'm just like, what is your perspective that you would want to replace her with Tony Soprano? I just don't see the appeal at all.
Darcy: Well, he wants to replace her with him.
Art: The way he says, in America, you don't have? I just think that's a funny—
Keith: Yeah. Furio's great. I love Furio.
Art: Yeah. Yeah, I don't think we're giving too much away. Furio is coming back.
Darcy: Hell yeah! 
Keith: Yeah, I was pretty sure about that.
Darcy: Oh, right. Is that who— 'Cause that's who he asked for.
Keith: That's who he asked her for.
Sylvi: That's who he asked for.
Keith: Yeah. And she's like, he's one of my best guys.
Sylvi: I'm sorry, Keith, this is a wrestling thing, so you're not— For some reason Furio has like a bit of a Konosuke Takeshita vibe to me.
Darcy: Oh my God, he does. Yeah, no, he does. It's the ponytail, man.
Sylvi: It's the ponytail. They're both like, they're both, they're both pretty men. Anyway, we can move on from that.
Art: The wrestling, uh, the wrestling insider term that I wrote down and then didn't say is, uh, because of the, the like limited— Because they have this like Italy episode coming up and they, they obviously need to like, sort of settle things quickly. It does feel like they, um, they hotshot Richie a little bit in that first episode.
Sylvi: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Art: Richie has to come in and do everything right away.
Sylvi: Yeah. There's a lot in that first episode we watched. Um, I think season 2 is generally pretty propulsive in a lot of ways. Um, I, I, I, again, I'm speaking from memory, not from like, any recent rewatching I've done. Um, but like, I'm curious to see if that perception holds up or if that is literally just because this first like, major— Like the first two episodes were important, but because like, that's where Janice comes in and stuff. But now we've got so many of the pieces on the board that it's time to actually really start playing with them. I mentioned how Annalisa is sort of Tony's ideal version of himself. But she's a woman, so that completely disqualifies her. Uh, no, I mean, we kind of brushed over the Chris stuff. I just think like, I— That's a flag to plant, is that—
Darcy: Yeah—
Keith: He didn't have a lot of screen time. Every time they cut to him, he's like, totally zonked. So yeah.
Sylvi: And it's, it's, it's sad, I think.
Darcy: Yeah, it is.
Keith: It is sad.
Darcy: And I am, I am worried about baby girl.
Sylvi: Yeah, I think that is reasonable. He is like— It seems like the more responsibility he's getting, the worse his other problems get. Many, many such cases, but also like worth pointing that out so people are thinking about it going forward.
Keith: If only he had a best friend slash dad who asked him if he was depressed.
Sylvi: If only he had a best dad. 
Keith: Oh.
Sylvi: Yeah. Um, and then, yeah, I think the, the final shot of the episode from Carmela's perspective is really sad.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: And, uh, her saying that line to Angie about, I know you won't leave him, uh, which is like, clearly directed inward, is also really sad.
Keith: I do have that if you want to listen to that real quick.
Sylvi: I would love to.
Art: Sure.
[audio from The Sopranos starts playing]
Carmela: Yeah. Uh, so what did the lawyer say today?
Angie: He said I have a good case and we'll file on Tuesday.
Carmela: So you're gonna take Monday to think? That's good.
Angie: Monday's a Jewish holiday.
Carmela: Oh.
Angie: I'm finished thinking. Hell, I thought myself into fucking non-existence.
Carmela: Well, you are not non-existent, and Pussy doesn't see you that way.
Angie: Fuck what he sees. Not anymore. It's what I see. God gave me more years, Carmela. This very morning, God gave me a gift, and I will use that gift. I won't waste it like I've wasted 24 fucking years with this man.
Carmela: You know what the church says about divorce.
Angie: Oh, please.
Keith: Shut the fuck up.
Angie: Let the Pope live with him. 
[audio ends]
Keith: Let the Pope live with him is such a good line.
Sylvi: Yeah. Angie's great. I really like Angie Bonpensiero.
Art: Um, and I think you also get to see some of Carmela exerting that sort of soft, threatening— We get to see both— This is like a— Maybe not a mask-off moment for Carmela, 'cause the mask is very much on, but she's like—
Keith: Double mask.
Art: Yeah. She's telling her, you're not going to get divorced.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Darcy: Yeah. She's taking off her friend mask to reveal the—
Sylvi: The wife of the boss mask. Yeah.
Darcy: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Art: Yeah. Um, and, and we also get to see a little bit of that from Rosalie in the restaurant near the beginning. Um, when Angie starts crying and the people at the next table start looking over and Rosalie like, yells at them, she's like, go back to your manicotti. And it's like, oh, we're seeing, we're seeing both of, we're seeing the, the, the boss's wives act like bosses' wives here in a very fun way. Uh, fun is a little strong, but—
Keith: Just like, can't think of anything more disrespectful than your friend coming to you when you're thinking about getting a divorce and being— Telling you what the church says, and then being like, no matter how you feel right now, you'll never go through with it because you're a weak piece of shit loser wife.
Darcy: Just like me.
Keith: That's what she's saying. Just like me. We're the same, you and I. We're both fucking losers who will never divorce our piece of shit husbands. And that's good because that's what the church says.
Darcy: Maybe we'll fuck a priest every once in a while, but—
Keith: No, we'll just look at it.
Sylvi: You'll think about fucking a priest. 
Darcy: That’s true.That's true. That's true. That's true.
Sylvi: That's true.
Keith: We'll test his resolve to Jesus Christ.
Darcy: You don't get to fuck the priest until you're a widow. I forgot the rules. I'm sorry.
Keith: And then, uh, oh yeah, they've— Yeah, Rosalie and Carmela have kind of teamed up again after their falling out when she was baking stuff for Carmela's priest. That was the last time we saw her, I think, was when she was getting cozy with the priest.
Art: I mean, it's only the 4th episode, and I think there is— Rosalie, I think, clearly gets introduced in the 2nd half of the 1st season, like, oh, shit, we need someone for Carmela to talk to.
Keith: Yeah. Yeah. And someone who's kind of not a threat to her because she can't really be— She's not a rival's wife because her husband is dead. So she's kind of like a safe sounding board?
Sylvi: Yeah.
Art: Sure. And their husbands were best friends.
Sylvi: So their husbands were best friends. And like, yeah, I think, I think those are both equally important though, because like Rosalie's someone who knows what it's like to be the wife of the boss, but there's not a risk of her like, telling it back to somebody who's still connected.
Darcy: Mm-hmm.
Art: Yeah, definitely.
Keith: Uh, is that all we've got for today?
Sylvi: Unless y'all have more, uh, I think I have covered pretty much everything I wanted to talk about. It was a long one, but a good one.
Art: Yeah, then we had two— well, we had one very dense episode and then one episode with a lot to talk about. I mean, I could talk about how much of a dipshit Paulie looks like in the second episode. We skip stuff like when Tony yells at him at the first dinner because he won't stop—
Keith: Oh yeah, constantly yelling at him for interrupting. Yeah.
Darcy: Hey, Tony, you try this octopus yet?
Art: Yeah, try the octopus. And that's the same dish he ends up sending away because, ugh.
Sylvi: I think that's why he's asking, so he can be like, uh, be like, is it any good? Should I get it?
Keith: Should I? Yeah, I don't— Yeah, he's a fool. Um, what's the fake Starbucks called?
Sylvi: Uh, they call it Buttfucks, but I don't remember the actual— and I almost said the name of a real, like, coffee chain here, which is Ballsacks. [group laughter] Uh, yeah, I don't remember.
Art: Yeah, and I don't remember what episode this is. So it's hard to—
Sylvi: It's like, episode 3.
Darcy: Um, hey, what are we watching next time?
Sylvi: Oh yeah, what we're watching next time is— We're sticking with two for now, I believe.
Keith: Um, I also believe that.
Sylvi: Yeah. Uh, let me just pull up these episode names. I was tabbed over to—
Art: We have Big Girls Don’t Cry.
Sylvi: Right, Big Girls Don't Cry, um, which— It marks the, uh, writing debut of a very, uh, major creative force going forward in The Sopranos writing room, which we'll bring up on that episode. And then The Happy Wanderer follows that. That's episode 6 of season 2. So yeah, we'll see you in two weeks for that. Before we go, I did pull up a couple of reviews on Apple Podcasts.
Darcy: Woo-hoo!
Sylvi: If you listen to the show and you enjoy it, the only thing better than leaving a 5-star review, which you should also do, is tell a friend about it. Tell her, even if you don't, if you're trying to get them interested in The Sopranos or Hunter x Hunter, or maybe even M. Night Shyamalan, but like maybe not. Um—
Art: Oh my God, I have—
Sylvi: Tell them to listen to Media Club Plus. Do you have a Shyamalan story?
Art: I do have a Shyamalan story. I don’t know if it’s for air, or—
Sylvi: I have time if everyone else is done. Oh yeah, okay. If it's not for air, then I don't want to pressure you.
Art: Um, no, Jessica, we couldn't get a babysitter. We, we got tickets to see a double feature as part of Beyond Fest here in LA where they were doing a double feature of Signs and Knock at the Cabin with a Q&A with M. Night Shyamalan.
Sylvi: Oh my goodness. 
Keith: Oh my God.
Art: And we couldn't secure a babysitter, so Jessica went and I stayed home.
Sylvi: Oh my God. You were like, I saw those enough.
Art: Well, she saw all of them with me. It was— We were going with a friend and the—
Sylvi: She didn't have to talk about them though.
Art: Yeah. Anyway, and I was like, this is gonna be another one of those fucking bullshit LA director Q&As where everyone's just trying to prove how smart they are to get a job or whatever.
Keith: Oh, sure. That sounds reasonable.
Sylvi: Uh-huh.
Art: But it wasn't. The Q&A was conducted by frequent M. Night Shyamalan collaborator, but not in either of these movies, Bryce Dallas Howard.
Keith and Sylvi: Oh my God. 
Darcy: Wow.
Art: And I guess the one story that I'll tell is, M. Night Shyamalan is getting ready to make Signs, or he's working on Signs, but he's sad that Unbreakable didn't do very well.
Keith: Which is a lie. We know that's a lie.
Art: Yeah. If I remember correctly, Unbreakable did very well.
Keith: I was just talking about Unbreakable two days ago, and I looked it up, and it was either $70 or $75 million budget, and it made like $255 million.
Art: Yeah.
Keith: Off the top of my head, it's about that.
Art: But M. Night Shyamalan remembers being upset with the, the box office performance of Unbreakable, and he's sitting in a Denny's, and he suddenly realizes, I have to start making movies for people who go to Denny's.
Sylvi: Oh my God.
Keith: Oh my God. That's exactly— I think that we touched on that slightly by the end of those movies.
Art: But that's not a fucking story you tell [Sylvi: No!] In public.
Keith: No, I swear to God, that affirms a lot of negative shit that I said about him during the run. That's basically where I was at, where I was like, he's writing movies for people he thinks are stupid. And— ‘Cause that's what that means.
Art: He has that, and then he makes Signs? That's very strange to me. Anyway, the other funny thing is later on, she talked about how he’s— He like, self-finances all his own movies now. And how— And Bryce Dallas Howard says he's very inspiring to people and to multi-hyphenates. And that's the kind of thing where you realize, oh, she's never been a normal person for one second in her life.
Sylvi: That is a 30 Rock line. That is like—
Keith: That's so funny.
Sylvi: But he's so inspiring to multi-hyphenates, Liz. That is Jenna Maroney.
Keith: It sounds like a joke, which is why it sounds like a 30 Rock line.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Um, by the way, 30 Rock, one of the funniest shows of all time. Highly recommend. I've rewatched it.
Art: Oh, I, I saw a fucking, uh, Reddit thread this week where someone was like, I don't get any of these jokes because I'm too young. And it's like, then die.
Darcy: Wow. Not looking good for not killing kids, Art?
Sylvi: I like how punchy Art is on this.
Art: My kids never said anything like that.
Sylvi: Your kids don't understand a joke in 30 Rock.
Keith: When I was a kid watching 30 Rock, you know what I did when I didn't understand a joke? I fucking looked it up on my phone 'cause I had a smartphone already because it was 2010 and this person also can do that. [Art: And it was slow as shit.] That was slow to do that. No, I was on Wi-Fi. I guess the Wi-Fi also was slower.
Darcy: Yeah.
Keith: This is—
Art: People and multi-hyphen, it's Liz. Yeah, you're right.
Keith: It sounds— But also 'cause it sounds like a joke, Are you sure it wasn't a joke? 0% chance it was a joke? 'Cause maybe she was really funny.
Art: Yeah, 'cause she like, said people and then went back and said multi-hyphenates.
Keith: Sometimes you don't think of a joke until you're 80% of the way through a sentence. Ask me how I know.
Darcy: Sylvi, do you wanna read a review?
Sylvi: I do wanna read a review. Uh, this review comes from username NukeDealer. Uh, uh, title all caps, I LOVE DEFILER SO MUCH. Um, [reading] it's like Chain Bastard but hard edge like Pokémon cards. You know who we are, you know what we do. We're coming to defile, defile you. [stops reading] Um, there are many other nice reviews. I'll read some more next week, uh, or next episode. It's two weeks from now. Um, but you know, a little quick one, a little funny one. Uh, I— all caps, I LOVE DEFILER SO MUCH really made me giggle.
Keith: From NukeDealer.
Sylvi: When I saw it. From NukeDealer. Nuke, then a radioactive sign, then Dealer.
Keith: That's how you know that they're legit, because a normal person wouldn't know to put that symbol there.
Sylvi: Exactly.
[“Shame About It (Vocals)” by Jack de Quidt starts playing]
Keith: Yeah. Uh, okay, bye.
Sylvi: Bye.
Darcy: Toodaloo.
Keith: Toodaloo.
Sylvi: Toodaloo again.
Darcy: Toodal-fucking-oo!
Art: Toodaloo.
[“Shame About It (Vocals)” by Jack de Quidt plays in its entirety]


________________
[1] The name/username in the audio recording are no longer in use, hence the audio/transcript discrepancies.