[SOP] Boca

TV Programme: The Sopranos
Season: 1
Episode: 9
Date I watched this episode: 14/03/2009
Time since I last watched this programme: Less than 1 day.

The story of this episode, once again, did not disappoint in its own right, whilst also developing the characters and the season-wide arc. The major twist of Hauser’s true nature was unexpected. The writers/directors had done well in making him out to be a bit of a “prude” (in the scene in the strip club) and also making the viewers feel sorry for him, feeling like he was the victim of Mafia extortion.

Then the revelation of the truth was shocking and the resulting moral dilemma was both believable and interesting. Tony Soprano actually has a conscience, and here he showed it in full force. I think this is necessary though in order to make him a believable and likable main character.

The minor story in this episode was the interplay between Tony and Junior: Tony having found out his own little secret about Junior, while Junior is aggravated to spread rumours about the psychiatrist even more. The “pie in the face” scene with Junior and Bobbi was just beautiful, quite a quirky scene which was very well directed and scored.

Some other recurring threads appeared; one of which was the whole “Italian values” thing which had been mentioned previously with Jennifer and her ex-husband, and now it is with Tony and the Italian restaurant (the guy with the cap). Another theme was the “should we tell Meadow everything” story; Tony was given added pressure on that as he doesn’t want Meadow to get as frustrated as Ali did. Jennifer and Christopher didn’t appear much in this episode though.

Once again this was a good, fairly standalone story, and made for an enjoyable episode, while not being quite as dramatic as some of the earlier ones.