Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Of all the great things about television, the greatest is that it’s on every single day. TV history is being made, day in and day out, in ways big and small. In an effort to better appreciate this history, we’re taking a look back, every day, at one particular TV milestone.
IMPORTANT DATE IN TV HISTORY: April 9, 2000
PROGRAM ORIGINALLY AIRED ON THIS DATE: The Sopranos, “Funhouse” (Season 2, Episode 13). [Watch on HBO GO.]
WHY IT’S IMPORTANT: By the end of its second season, The Sopranos was already well entrenched as an American TV phenomenon, an Emmy-winning, magazine-cover-gracing, watercooler sensation. The second season established a plot template that would continue, with this and further HBO shows: major season-long plot arcs would get disposed of in the season’s penultimate episode, leaving the finale for things like wrapping up loose ends and more artistic pursuits. In the case of The Sopranos season 2, that meant that with the Richie Aprile storyline taken care of, the show was free to have Tony deal with things like his mother. And it especially left him free to come down with killer food poisoning and embark on a series of fever dreams that set a different kind of standard for the series: the occasional Sopranos descent into Freudian weirdness.
Like everything in The Sopranos‘ first two seasons, Tony’s dream sequences in “Funhouse” became iconic. The scene with Tony conversing with a fish speaking in Pussy’s voice was the kind of bizarre interlude that would have birthed a million memes today. But this was also Sopranos fans’ first taste with thwarted expectations. The hype for the season 2 finale was huge, and the fact that David Chase paid that hype off with boardwalk dream logic and bathroom humor was, to one degree or another, not what fans have been clamoring for.
That said, it’s tough to get on Chase’s case for being a tease when “Funhouse” ended up paying off one of the biggest story arcs of the first two seasons. We knew since season 1 that Big Pussy was informing to the Feds on Tony’s activities, but as season 2 had bigger fish to fry, it had seemed like Tony wasn’t going to deal with it. But those fever dreams forced Tony to reckon with what his subconscious already knew: Pussy was a rat and had to be dealt with.
Big Pussy’s death ends up becoming a major turning point for Tony. A Rubicon he can never un-cross. After the funhouse mirrors of the first half of the episode, the realities of Tony’s mob life come crashing down hard. Friendship, business, loyalty, and grim death all converge on one boat in one iconic scene. It’s a pretty literal depiction of the metaphor, but Big Pussy really did end up sleeping with the fishes that day.
