Monday, May 1, 2006

IT STILL DOESN'T EXPLAIN THAT WEASELY GUY WITH THE GUNS WHO SPOKE ITALIAN SO WELL: Matthew Gilbert of the Boston Globe analyzes this Sopranos season through the prism of male insecurity:
In the first seven episodes, he has been depicting the male gangster psyche through a prism of weakness, insecurity, and fear of fading masculinity. He's giving us a sort of anatomy of the school bully. All the guys are being depleted in the power department this year -- Tony by Junior's gunshot, Junior by Alzheimer's, Johnny Sack by a jail sentence, Silvio by asthma, Bobby by an infantilizing Janice, and Christopher, once again, by Hollywood and drugs.

The result is a spectacle of compensation, as the boys' ongoing fight to be alpha dog has taken on a desperate edge. The more their masculinity is threatened, the more extreme their "masculine" behavior becomes. . . .

Many of you, I imagine, will keep reading.

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