The Sopranos - Family Values

Richardson's Review

Richardson's Review
By Matt Richardson
(Episode 72 - LUXURY LOUNGE)

Yet another disappointing, uneventful episode "Luxury Lounge" revolves around a tired theme. Chris goes out to California with Little Carmine to work on convincing actor Ben Kingsley to join the cast of their new movie ("The Ring meets The Godfather.") Meanwhile back home in Jersey Artie Bucco runs into his own problems when his restaurant profits plummet 40 percent and he gets his ability to use American Express credit cards revoked after official discover some foul play in the "fine dining establishment." Turns out the reason he's getting his cards revoked is because of Benny (along with a new Albanian hostess) is scamming the place with phony cards and numbers. When Artie discovers this he goes to Benny's house in the middle of the night, confronts him and proceeds to beat him up on Benny's front porch. Tony comes thru and tries to amend the situation, giving Artie a pass for beating up a made guy. In one of the best lines this season Tony tells Benny that he shouldn't have done what he did. "You don't shit where you eat," T tells Benny. "And you especially don't shit where I eat." But just when it looks like Artie and Benny have reconciled, Artie makes a subtle joke at dinner one night and Benny promptly meets him in the kitchen where he proceeds to stick Artie's hand in the sauce, causing the skin on his hand "to come off like a glove." Back in California, meanwhile, after harassing Kingsley to get him into another "luxury lounge" (a place where companies give celebrities free gifts) the actor turns down Chris on the project.

Also: No word on Vito, though Phil is growing agitated....Tony grows angry with Chris towards the end of the episode and wonders aloud if the problems between Artie and Benny couldn't have been avoided if Chris was around taking charge of his crew...The two Arab men continue to trade and receive credit card numbers from Chris and his guys...You have to wonder if there not going to be involved in something big soon...But seriously, what's up with the season? There's no main story line, no nemesis for Tony and the episodes are frequently slow and uninteresting. I'm not saying I need to see someone killed every episode, but with the loss of Johnny Sak and Junior in one season is a blow I don't believe the show has recuperated from...

Shock Factor: C +. Richardson's Review: B

Questions, comments and suggestions are welcome via e-mail to BoxingWriter@AOL.com

Back to 6th Season Episode Guide