The Verdict on “The Many Saints of Newark”

HBO’s streaming service, HBO Max, began streaming the much-hyped Sopranos’ prequel “The Many Saints of Newark” on Friday, October 1, 2021 and, despite some misgivings, I watched it. The film is set in the late 1960s and the 1970s in Newark, New Jersey, where Tony Soprano grew up. I was a teenager living in Newark during the Newark riots and I wondered if I would be able to watch the film without nitpicking if events were off. I needn’t have worried about nitpicking.

Spoilers after this point. Read no further if you haven’t seen the film yet and don’t want it to be spoiled.

The purported purpose of the entire prequel was to examine the early life of young Tony Soprano and what put him on the path to mob leadership. At least, that’s what I thought. Instead, the film was mainly about Christopher Moltisanti’s father, Dickie. During the 6-season run of “The Sopranos”, Dickie was mentioned but never as a big influence in Tony’s life. Tony’s uncle Corrado “Junior” Soprano and Paulie “Walnuts” Gualtieri were Tony’s mentors. In “Many Saints”, however, young Tony follows Dickie around, and sees things he shouldn’t be seeing. They did include the amusement park scene from the regular series where young Janice and young Tony watch their father, Johnny, get arrested. It was one of various callbacks to the TV series that all felt like they were just thrown in there to justify calling “The Many Saints of Newark” a prequel.

Dickie Moltisanti’s story begins with him meeting his new stepmother. Giuseppina is a beautiful Italian woman around his age. Dickie’s father, Aldo, has brought her back from the old country and married her so he can start a new family. When Dickie finds out that Aldo knocked his bella spousa down the stairs, he overdoes it in a physical fight with Aldo and kills him. Young Tony didn’t exactly witness this. He just happened to come by and ask Dickie if he could watch him work on his car, but was rudely shooed off. The main purpose of the Newark riots in “Many Saints” was to cover up this patricide. Dickie blamed the rioters for doing Aldo in. He felt guilty enough about it to go visit his Uncle Sal in prison but it didn’t prevent him from taking up with Aldo’s widow.

Ray Liotta played Aldo and I was not happy at all that he got killed off so early in the film but they made up for that when Liotta came back as Aldo’s brother Sal. However, I continued to find it difficult to appreciate Dickie’s role in anything, nevermind in shaping Tony Soprano’s future, especially when other distractions popped up on the regular–

Like Silvio Dante calling Tony a kid… c’mon! Sil and Tony were childhood friends. Sil was only a couple of years older than Tony.

Like Giuseppina sleeping with Dickie’s former runner and now rival, Harold. How about that pillow talk, eh?

Harold: There’s stories about Dean Martin and Rossano Brazzi, how they’re great lovers.
Giuseppina: If you feed them…
Harold: (laughing) Oh! You gotta give Dickie his meatballs and his noodles

What a waste of an opportunity to mention gabbagool that was! To top it off, Giuseppina stupidly confesses her affair to Dickie, when he had no idea that had been going on. What? Am I supposed to believe she didn’t know how jealous Italian men are? It was no surprise that Dickie went ballistic and, with the Atlantic Ocean right there, it was curtains for Giuseppina!

And how about that hamburger that Livia made Tony? “I thought you’d like a change from a mortadella sandwich,” she said, then the conversation went from her bunions to drug addicts and prescription medicine to Livia’s children and their pot. When Tony objected to being accused of smoking weed just because Janice does, Livia let loose with her trademark “Oh, poor you!”

When you sum it all up, this prequel just doesn’t cut the salcisse.

NOW, HOW ABOUT A SOPRANOS SEQUEL?

Back when the Sopranos TV series ended, creator David Chase said it was unlikely but not impossible for the Sopranos to return in a movie, but “… any projected Sopranos movie would have a problem, because so many characters died during the final season.” I didn’t think so. I even had some ideas for a Sopranos sequel movie or a miniseries, perhaps. It’s true that some of the characters can only return in flashbacks but these little details are always worked out on other shows and who wouldn’t love to see a resolution to some of the puzzles that were left hanging?

In the series finale, Tony Soprano’s fate was left in limbo. In that final scene, he could be shot in the face but survive. Some plastic surgery and new casting would bring Tony back.

Tony’s main capo, Silvio Dante was in the hospital and it wasn’t looking good. Even if we want to kill Sil off, he could become delirious and spill the beans on a few of those killings before he dies, like Christopher Moltisanti’s hapless fiancée, Adriana. If we want him to survive, he still could receive the last rites and make his “last confession” with his wife, Gabriella, and maybe even Carmela, overhearing him. What could suck more than a deathbed confession, and you don’t die?

Many will recall that Tony worried that he would talk in his sleep after killing his junkie nephew, Christopher, but we wouldn’t really want to overdo the inadvertent loose lips thing. However, there just wasn’t any evidence, or was there? You may remember the headlights that went by while Tony was snuffing the life out of Christopher. Perhaps Heidi and Kennedy had a severe attack of conscience and went back to try to help. Could either have possibly seen anything incriminating? That could just be a way to show that someone besides the ghost of Christopher knows what really happened.

Remember when Carmela had a thing for Furio Giunta? If Tony is out of the picture, Furio could return and send Carmela right into the office of Dr. Jennifer Melfi. Carmela’s mental health would surely deteriorate as she comes to grips with inevitable revelations that Furio is no knight in shining armor. In fact, Furio was worse than Tony. He had no problems whatsoever in beating on women and kids.

When we left Tony’s son, A.J., he had just been telling his own therapist that he liked seeing his car burn down. This fascination with fire can lead A.J. to be a ‘torchman’ for the mob, setting fires both for insurance fraud purposes, but also when revenge is a factor. Tony’s daughter, Meadow, was engaged to marry Patrick Parisi, one of two sons of mob accountant and extortionist, Patsy Parisi. While Patrick and Meadow have aspirations to become respectable attorneys, Patsy has another son, Jason, who is a natural candidate for inclusion in the crime family. Meadow and Patrick will surely have their hands full trying to keep their family members out of jail.

Then there’s Bobby Bacala’s widow. Janice Soprano Baccalieri made a habit of mating with mob members even before she married Bobby Baccalieri. Her romance with Richie Aprile ended very badly – for Richie. Her next target was Ralph Cifaretto, but she dumped him right after she set her sights on Bobby. It was just as well since Ralph’s future in the mob, or anywhere else for that matter, was soon to be cut short. Janice is not like the other mafia wives with their heads in the sand. Janice not only knows the score, she has a lust for power. We need a powerful man for Janice. A marriage between Janice and a member of the Lupertazzi family could only spell more headaches for everyone.