Two transformations

I've mentioned before what a complete waste of a character I think AJ is. Throughout The Sopranos he's been around to whine and complain and never really adds anything more than a few great Tony blowups.

Sunday's episode brought his storyline to a close quite nicely I think (even if they go farther, this is his character's swan song). He hits bottom, having a teeny-bopper-movie breakdown and becoming more whiny, annoying and useless than ever before. And of course it's daddy's well-phrased advice (following his own whiny breakdown at Melfi's office) that brings the kid around.

AJ becomes a grownup in the span of 20 minutes, finally giving in to his station as "Tony Soprano Jr." as was well put by his goofy bookie friends. It's the only place he really could have ended up if you really look at his story -- the only place that would have been viable as an ending. Make him interesting. He finds his happy place as driver/thug.

Chris, though ... he passed his happy place 10 exits ago. And now he'll never get it back. Looking for compassion to help him in his quest for sobriety isn't really advisable among a bunch of testoterone junkies it seems, and his transformation is the mirror image of AJ's and puts him on track to become a pretty good Tony if we had two more seasons to come (if you're scoring at home, AJ->Chris->Tony seems the obvious parallel Mr. Chase is trying to draw here). Here he was doing fine with the family and the recovery, and in comes another (ANOTHER!) stupid conflict with Paulie (who simply hates that the young'un is in the same class as he).

Side note 1: Annoying as he is when he's got his own storylines, Paulie is the MAN when it comes to providing some comic relief.

Side note 2: Did you notice the seemingly immediate degeneration of the characters' language in this episode? They've always tried to show off the lack of traditional education in these guys but this week was like none of them took vocabulary in 4th grade either. Maybe it was part of the growth pattern Chase was trying to show, but it seemed like an awful lot more than normal.