The Sopranos Ends With a ... 519
If you still have your copy sitting unwatched on your Tivo, I'd suggest that you stop reading before you are spoiled. The show is done at last and apparently fans are freaking out over the bizarre ending. At my house, we thought at first that the DVR crashed until the credits appeared in silence. Personally I thought that a show known for such excess tried to take an artful bow: It didn't work for me, but I get it at least. Anyway, I had a number of Sopranos submissions this morning and figured I'd just post this comment to give people who were interested in discussing the end of the show a nice place to discuss before they cancel their HBO.
He's dead, Jim (Score:5, Funny)
Re:He's dead, Jim (Score:5, Insightful)
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The 2nd to last episode was a trick to make people think they he had given in to the complaints and was going to have a whack-fest, but it was just a diversion. He was just setting the audience up to m
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Re:He's dead, Jim (Score:5, Insightful)
The break away to black was a crescendo to the tension they created with the folks walking in, looking shifty. "OMG, that guys gonna whack him!", "OMG, that dude is gonna shoot AJ", "OMG, Meadow's car will blow up."
Why kill him? Why not show him being killed if he is? What lesson would we learn from that that we don't learn by him being alive, but trapped. By the life, the fear, the machine. He's not afraid to die, he's afraid of that senile old man in the chair.
"This thing of ours, once you're in, there ain't no gettin' out." Which is a fitting prison for Tony, locked in a life of his own making, nostalgically trying to reach out for the "old days" when his Dad and Uncle June ran N. Jersey. But those days are gone, if they ever existed. There are no good old days, just days, and life goes on. Let's get some onion rings tonight, b/c there's a good chance we'll all be dead tomorrow.
Re:He's dead, Jim (Score:5, Interesting)
"So here is what I found out. The guy at the bar is also credited as Nikki Leotardo. The same actor played him in the first part of season 6 during a brief sit down concerning the future of Vito. That wasn't that long ago. Apparently, he is the nephew of Phil. Phil's brother Nikki Senior was killed in 1976 in a car accident.
Absolutely Genius!!!!
David Chase is truly rewarding the true fans who pay attention to detail. So the point would have been that life continues and we may never know the end of the Sopranos. But if you pay attention to the history, you will find that all the answers lie in the characters in the restaurant. The trucker was the brother of the guy who was robbed by Christopher in Season 2. Remember the DVD players? The trucker had to identify the body.
The boy scouts were in the train store and the brothas at the end were the ones who tried to kill Tony and only clipped him in the ear (was that season 2 or 3?). Absolutely incredible!!!! There were three people in the restaurant who had reason to kill Tony and then it just ends.
This was Chase's way of proving that he will not escape his past. It will not go on forever despite that he would like it to "don't stop".
Not the fans!!! Tony would like it to keep going but just as we have to say goodbye, so does he"
Re:He's dead, Jim (Score:5, Funny)
Don't worry about it. It's just some obscure reference to a short-lived TV show from the 60s.
Re:He's dead, Jim (Score:5, Funny)
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He's dead, Jim. Leave the gun. Take the canoli.
mmhm... (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess their main objective was to leave question, but leave everyone realizing that he's got to spend the rest of his life in anxiety, wondering if he's going to get shot at any time.
Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Funny)
If Schrödinger wrote the script, all you had to do is open your TiVo box to know.
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Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Funny)
Thanks for the suggestion!
(Spoilers below):
Tony makes a loud buzzing noise and catches fire. My house burns down. Damn, an interactive show finale! Great job, HBO!
Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Funny)
some say he was a physicist but he was really a veterinarian who had been attacked by a cat during his childhood
Re:mmhm... (Score:4, Funny)
Try being a Blakes 7 fan. Meh.
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Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Interesting)
I guess their main objective was to leave question, but leave everyone realizing that he's got to spend the rest of his life in anxiety, wondering if he's going to get shot at any time.
Their main objective was to have everyone talking about it, weighing in with their own theories as to what happened as the screen went black. I think it worked flawlessly.
You may not like it, but you are still talking about it. Isn't that the goal of art? Not to produce something that everyone likes, but to produce something that has people thinking and talking about long after it's gone. You have to admit, it is brilliant!
Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Insightful)
I unapologetically believe that you are an arrogant snob.
Sad-ending vs happy-ending, or realistic-ending vs fantastic-ending, is just a matter of taste, not a matter of maturity.
Intelligent dialogue might be more "grown up" than fart jokes, but only someone who wants to gaze down his nose at anyone with different tastes would say tragedy is more grown-up than comedy.
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Now tragicomedy... That's smart.
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But doesn't being able to enjoy more complex issues make you more mature in general? Or at least require an individual with an "aged" outlook on life.
Rather than a matter of taste, it would be simply impossible for someone to enjoy a tragedy unless they themselves understood it from experience themselves?
Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Insightful)
I have nothing against people who enjoy tragedy. To each their own. But to me, happy endings in entertainment will never be cliche. No matter how many hundred shiny happy people appear on screen, you can see billions of tragic endings in real life.
Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Or maybe tradegy is just the hack writer's easiest way to make his story seem more profound than it actually is, because people think the way you do?
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It certainly worked that way for The Departed.
"Hmm, curious, I wonder how they'll resolve this loose end, it could end up being trouble for---oh... I see, everyone is conveniently killed."
Re:mmhm... (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, total non-sequitur. It's like playing memetic telephone.
The Sopranos (Score:5, Insightful)
Last night, it was very easy for me to accept the ending of the series finale. Because I wasn't addicted to the show. Logically, not all mob stories end in a Scarface-like explosion where everyone dies
I kept waiting for an assassin to pop out & kill Tony for the last half of the show. But, I didn't have a reason why that should have happened. Am I so trained by movies & books on endings that I can't accept one without a climax? My roommate new it was coming because he kept looking at his watch and saying stuff like "ok, shit better start happening because they've only got like 15 minutes." But you know, you're at the mercy of the writers and creaters of the show.
It was unorthodoxed for it to end that way. I'm reminded of the utter ripoff I felt when I saw the last episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion. But that was due to funding, I think this was the idea of the minds behind the show. Good for them. I like seeing deviations from normality when I don't have to suffer from it.
In the end, there were a lot of things that weren't wrapped up and I think that's the big problem a lot of fans are having to deal with. I think the reason so many fans are going to feel this is that the show started off as a badass mob series that attracted viewers of a certain nature who enjoy living a vicarious life of crime. Unfortunately, the ending just wasn't juicy enough to satiate that kind of appetite and I think that's why you'll hear so much about this. Personally, I liked it although I recognize that too many questions were left unanswered, too many futures were left uncertain & too many problems were left unresolved.
But, hey, that's life, isn't it?
Re:The Sopranos (Score:5, Insightful)
This show started off as a show about a mobster who's mother had driven him to panic attacks.
It was not really until the actress playing Livia Soprano died that the show really took its turn into
badass mob series. It was the quirk of a mobster in therapy that drew me to the show. It made for
interesting drama.
Unfortunately, the ending just wasn't juicy enough to satiate that kind of appetite and I think that's why you'll hear so much about this. Personally, I liked it although I recognize that too many questions were left unanswered, too many futures were left uncertain & too many problems were left unresolved.
You have to give credit where its due. They sure as hell created massive tension in the last 5 minutes with all the cuts between the family at the table, the guy at the counter, meadow trying to parallel park, the other customers in the diner. The cut to black left me sitting in my dark living room, with my heart racing. It was a great ending. Life is tense. Life goes on. Life sucks, then you die. Shit happens. Shit fails to happen. Resolution is for the lucky.
That was significantly better than a climactic gun fight, a last second hit, a wake-up from a dream, or, heaven help us, an animal-house-style what-happens-to-the-characters montage.
Go black. Never go back.
Ciao Tony Soprano. Thanks. It was fun while it lasted.
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The Sopranos [imdb.com] premiered in January, 1999.
Analyze This! [imdb.com] was released in March, 1999.
Given production lead times, it's hard to say which one "ripped" the other, if at all.
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The complaint was about the last couple episodes of the TV Series, not the End of Evangelion movie. Though apparently there is a compelling theory out there that the two are not only compatible but in fact take place at the same time (some flashes in the episodes are of events from the movie.)
Congratulations, congratulations, congratulations, you made her sick.
So it ended... (Score:5, Funny)
Not just because the ending sucked but because there's nothing else I watch on those channels.
But that episode really sucked. I get it, "You won't know it's coming. Everything will just go black."
I don't care.
Besides I really wanted to see Meadow and AJ beheaded. There I said it. I can't take it back. It's out there.
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Just so you know.
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Re:So it ended... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:So it ended... (Score:5, Funny)
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Popular online explanation (excuse) (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Popular online explanation (excuse) (Score:4, Insightful)
People didn't get that? Christ, it was like a fucking neon sign. All they needed was a slow pan of a white wall.
They set it up exactly as though there we going to be a hit on Tony. They did 3-4 minutes of just exposition, showing the happy couple, the Cub Scouts, the creepy guy at the bar. They played a memorable song (Journey's Don't Stop Believin' -- "it goes on and on and on and on...").
People feel gyped because it wasn't a Hollywood ending. I loved the ending. It was memorable and it spoke to exactly what the series was about.
Hey, this is like theold days... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hey, this is like theold days... (Score:5, Funny)
what is this place? what is 'slashdot'? i searched google for "stuff that taco" and ended up here.
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News For.... (Score:2, Troll)
Can I see the rest? (Score:2)
I thought EW had a pretty good take on the ending (Score:2)
My wife was horribly dissapointed but I'm glad we get to wonder what they might be doing now, albeit without us watching...
-S
He's dead (Score:5, Insightful)
Earlier in the episode, he was eating an orange, which is a reference to the Godfather files that has been made before in the series. They signify death, don't they?
I thought it was an excellent episode. It would be so cliche if they just showed him getting his head blown off, or even ended with a black screen and gunshot. If you pay attention, you pretty much know what happened. But you have to think about it.
Re:He's dead (Score:4, Insightful)
The oranges, etc are red herrings. The show is full of red herrings. Not to mention that the show isnt from the POV of Tony, so going black doesnt mean the "camera" died.
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Re:He's dead (Score:4, Funny)
Re:He's dead (Score:5, Interesting)
Agree: The viewer was wacked (Score:3, Funny)
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Re:He's dead (Score:5, Interesting)
"Is that that that that man talked about?..."
Lady or the Tiger? (Score:2, Interesting)
Sounds like.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sounds like.... (Score:5, Funny)
Tony: Nothing?
George: Nothing.
Tony: WTF do you mean about nothing?
George: What'd you do this evening?
Tony: Well, I had a meeting with some guys, then I went to dinner with my family.
George: There, that's a finale.
Tony: How is that a fuckin' finale?
Jerry: Well, uh, maybe something happens on the way to dinner..
George: No, no, no. Nothing happens.
Jerry: Well, something happens.
Tony: Get the fuck outta here!
B-bye HBO (Score:2)
I could have tolerated the ending of the Sopranos if Deadwood was still there to help you fogetaboutit. But they canceled that, too. Didn't even bother to wrap it up. Suck ending to the Sopranos, no Deadwood and instead some stupid surfer show that doesn't even make sense and Big Love which should be renamed Big Snoozer. No decent concert series, their comedy shows have gone down the toilet and all the movies you want to see are available on Netflix. C'ya.
That giant sucking sound you hear today are m
Big Pussy and the Zombie Mafia (Score:5, Funny)
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Comming next: "a made for sci-fi orginal movie"
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spoiler alert! spoiler alert! (Score:2)
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It was a comment on our current state of FEAR! (Score:2, Insightful)
TV.com (Score:2)
HBO giving the finger to the Tivo generation.... (Score:3, Interesting)
It has been stated many times that Chase filmed several endings. He did not do that to keep the actors and writers from knowing the ending.
He did that so that HBO could put the better, alternate endings onto highly marked up "collector's edition" DRM'ed DVDs for us to buy.
Here's my belated Sopranos prediction: Within a few short months, certainly in time for Christmas, the alternate endings will appear on DVD. This will be heavily advertised. The base price DVDs will be a piece of crap. Ysou'll have to buy the collector's edition to get the alternate endings plus other "exclusive" content. The DVD will use a "better" encryption than ever before, followed by the inevitable posting of the decryption key or keys by some geek on digg.
It's not personal, it's just business.
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huh? (Score:5, Informative)
huh?
If it's a plain ol' DVD, that will play back in any regular ol' DVD player, then there's no DRM. There's encryption, sure, but the CSS encryption was cracked completely. Done. They *could* encrypt the thing better, but then it won't play back on DVD players - it's no longer a DVD.
Now perhaps you actually meant it'll only be available on HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, and by some magic way the HD-DVD version won't be 'cracked' almost instantly (as the keys have been found for HD-DVD perpetually).. or, knowing that HD-DVD's only protection is swiss cheese, only go with Blu-Ray and its additional protection layer.
Or maybe it is a DVD - but a data DVD, and you can only play it back on a special HBO set top box media center thingamajig?
Anyway.. if it comes out on DVD at all, it'll be ripped in no time.
===
Other than that, I fully agree with what you're saying - production companies are exploiting the Regular > Special Edition > Collector's Edition > Director's Cut > Director's Cut Collector's Edition > etc. thing up the wazoo. I wish it would stop - but it's a moneymaker, so I doubt it will. As you said - it's just business.. but it's pretty dirty business.
I don't mind the model in general - I don't mind paying extra for additional content if that's what I want to see. What I do mind is if you have e.g. a Special Edition which has bonus features A, B, C and a Collector's Edition which has bonus features B, C, D, and a Director's Cut which has features B, D, E and F You'd have to buy all three to get the full extras. That's just lame.
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Question for older fanboys (Score:2)
This probably reads like a troll, but I'm genuinely interested, because I so don't get it. Think of it as a personal failing on my part, and point out the cultural riches I'm missing out on.
Re:Question for older fanboys (Score:5, Insightful)
This probably reads like a troll, but I'm genuinely interested, because I so don't get it. Think of it as a personal failing on my part, and point out the cultural riches I'm missing out on.
Mobsters were simply the latest flavor of the generation. Before the mobster fascination we had cowboys and gunfighters. Before that we had romantic notions of pirate kings and exotic foreign lands. If you think the mobsters are bad, you don't even want to read about what hardcore pirates were like. The level of violence and brutality is sickening to see described in words on paper, I cannot even imagine what it looked like in person. And somehow, despite all that, we see pirates celebrated as shady but with hearts of gold.
But here's the funny part. What do you call a truly successful pirate or mobster? Your majesty. Seriously. Where do you think the ruling houses and nobles came from? Sure, ten generations down the line the House of Someguy is represented by some effete twit but I guarantee you the original Someguy was a badass you did not want to cross. And the best mobsters were the ones who figured out how to operate with the law on their side. Robber-baron was not a title of pressroom hyperbole. Where did Daddy Kennedy make his money? Rum-running. How did George W. Bush's grandpappy get rich? Doing business with the Nazis.
We don't see movies made about average joes living contented lives. We never read about the farmboy who stayed home, obeyed his fathers wishes and took over the farm. We read about his brother, the one who ran away to join the Navy, who decided to fight in some noble war in some far-flung land. We read about the man with the ambition to do something great, no matter how much blood was needed to grease the wheels. It is spectacle, it is horror, and it is a dreadful fascination, and newspapermen will continue to make money feeding that curiosity.
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Mobster movies never end wit
Re:Question for older fanboys (Score:5, Interesting)
Made the viewer feel like Tony... (Score:5, Insightful)
But then I realized we were looking at every action around him as a source of danger... Expecting anything to happen. And for that short few minutes we knew what it was like to be Tony. Could be the FBI waiting to grab you, could be some hired killers edging their way toward your table and entire family, the whole damn place could explode, etc...
No nice tidy bow wrapped ending for us or Tony, just another rev of the same wheel.
Offer the viewer no solace (Score:3, Insightful)
...a cop out (Score:5, Insightful)
Catching up - Season 6 (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Catching up - Season 6 (Score:4, Funny)
I hope you weren't a fan of The Lone Gunmen.
Like that Beatles song (Score:5, Interesting)
Sopranos is drama and they took a tactful road. (Score:4, Insightful)
That being said the ending had me hooked because every couple seconds I was saying "oh god don't do it here" and I had a feeling it was his final scene. But I believe the ending was his death, as Bobby Baccala said in the first episode this season you don't even hear it. Why else cut the music and the screen? I think the show was over and so was his life.
But that will be a series ender people will talk about for years, and as such kudos to David Chase.
Good riddance (Score:5, Interesting)
The last show I was this happy to see check out was Friends. Finally, another execrable piece of shite not wasting any more resources that could be used for a worthwhile purposes.
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As far as a 'waste of resources,' I'd be perfectly happy if they put their effort towards shows that are worthwhile. They don't have to be shows that I want to watch (there are tons of shows out there that are decent or mediocre or quite good that I don't watch)
Whaddya know (Score:3, Funny)
I'd just like to thank those involved for learning a lesson over the Lone Gunmen fiasco.
Tony's reply: "nothing, everything just goes black (Score:5, Insightful)
The ending left a lot open to speculation, but one thing that it didn't leave open (IMO) is Tony's fate.
Tony is dead - if you watch episode #78 "Soprano Home Movies," while Tony and Bobby are on the lake they are talking about what happens to people like them, and specifically about what it's like to get killed. Tony says something along the lines of "you don't hear the one that gets you," and Bobby asks "what do you tin happens when you die," to which Tony replies "nothing, everything just goes black."
Then, in last week's episode, "#85 The Blue Comet," Tony flashes back to this scene while he is lying in bed "everything just goes black."
Even David Chase said in an interview that the key to how it ends is in that first episode (Soprano Home Movies), and to make sure people would remember this he put Tony flashing back to that moment at the end of "#85 The Blue Comet."
On top of all of that there was so much death symbolism in the episode...I definitely had to watch it twice, but he definitely got clipped - and I think the finale was awesome.
In addition to the death symbolism and foreshadowing, the show made a lot of points about America - hence the title.
Re:Tony's reply: "nothing, everything just goes bl (Score:3, Informative)
'Bobby: "I mean yeah, our line of work, it's always out there...bet you don't even hear it when it happens, right?"
Tony: "Ask your friend in there, on the wall"
Bobby: "(laughs) Listen to us...morbid fucks." '
Nowhere does anyone say 'everything goes black', or anything even remotely like that (and if you want to see what it looks like to 'not even hear it', I suggest you re-watch the execution of Jerry Torciano). The truth is that there are some people o
Tony is not dead! (Score:5, Interesting)
No. *We* got shot by the suspicious Italian guy when he was coming out of the bathroom, or perhaps by the two African-American guys (just like Tony's close encounter in Season 1).
Clearly the end was meant to be somewhat ambiguous (to understate the point), but I truly believe that the intention was to kill US, not to kill Tony. Life goes on for the Soprano family, just like it has in every other episode. It does NOT go on for us. The viewer finally experiences what has happened to so many other characters on the show. We're dead before we even hear the shot.
Tony didn't get whacked. WE DID.
I find it hard to believe that anyone would complain about the ending. It's difficult to get more closure on a TV show than one's own death.
I feel... (Score:5, Funny)
The point wasn't alive or dead (Score:4, Interesting)
The absolute paranoia. The focus on every single little detail. The search for the smallest scrap of meaning in anything as if our lives depended on it because they do.
I watched it with a bunch of friends and every single one of us was on the edge of our seats, every single one of us was muttering something along the lines of "oh, no, here it comes," and every single one of us jumped when it went to black, just completely confused.
As endings go, Six Feet Under was *closure* and it was brilliant. The Sopranos wasn't closure, not by a long shot, but it left me with something just as satisfying - I got it. I finally understood, just for a minute, how Tony Soprano works and I felt sympathy for this monster.
That's pretty good in my book!
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It's a news site with a heavy tech influence. Get over it.
Re:Soprano's and tech? (Score:5, Funny)
In which case you're absolutely at the right site.
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Re:Soprano's and tech? (Score:5, Informative)
Why did you post story X?
Slashdot is many things to many people. Some people think it's a Linux site. To others, it's a geek hangout. I've always worked very hard to make sure that Slashdot matches up with my interests and the interests of my authors. We think we're pretty typical Slashdot readers... but that does mean that occasionally one of us might post something that you think is inappropriate. You might be interested in my Omelette rant.
Personally, I have a pet peeve when people post comments saying things like "That's not News For Nerds!" and "That's not Stuff that Matters!" Slashdot has been running for almost 5 years, and over that time, I have always been the final decision maker on what ends up on the homepage. It turns out that a lot of people agree with me: Linux, Legos, Penguins, Sci (both real and fiction). If you've been reading Slashdot, you know what the subjects commonly are, but we might deviate occasionally. It's just more fun that way. Variety Is The Spice Of Life and all that, right? We've been running Slashdot for a long time, and if we occasionally want to post something that someone doesn't think is right for Slashdot, well, we're the ones who get to make the call. It's the mix of stories that makes Slashdot the fun place that it is.
Re:Soprano's and tech? (Score:5, Insightful)
I personally haven't watched a single episode of the Soprano's. But, I came in here to read the comments because enough people have talked about the show over the years, and the build up to the final episode, that I was interested in hearing how it ended (especially in light of CmdrTaco's description of it).
Re:Soprano's and tech? (Score:5, Interesting)
Same here. There are a lot of angles you could take on this story as to why its posted here. I for one find it interesting to see how people react to a television show ending in such an unorthodox way. Television is so pre-packaged and easily digestible and it has affected our perception of reality. People want quick fixes, they want stuff to resolve, all within the space of one hour. Well, sometimes it doesn't work that way. I for one, not having watched the show, find the concept of this particular ending ingenious.
Plus, in accord with GP's point about
People who complain about this story is a bit like me grousing about another article about the end of BSG just because I don't particularly care for the show: Frankly, nobody gives a damn.
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Mod this whole thread offtopic already (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't even watch that show, I just came to know what's the big deal about the ending. I do not, however, want a list of the stuff you don't care about, so STFU already.
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There's your tech flavor.
Now shut up.
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