"The Sopranos" Season 1

Introducing the biggest baddie since Michael Corleone, Tony Soprano explodes onto the scene as the heart, soul and mind of one of the biggest mob families in New Jersey. Every episode we see the ups and downs of running a mob with the FBI breathing heavily down their necks while, at the same time, managing a dysfunctional family, featuring a stressed out wife, a rebellious teenage daughter, and an awkward preteen son.
After several strokes, Tony seeks counsel to cope with the constant stress. At first, he was adamant, often swearing and telling the psychiatrist off, but he always returned by the end of the episode. As the season progresses, however, he becomes more loose about his secret. I guess to kick it up a notch on whether the psychiatrist will alert the authorities.
Outside the home and the therapist office, the DiMeo clan struggle to keep their grip tight with their clients only to often lead to disasterous results, like Tony losing his friend Artie because he intentionally blew up Artie's restaurant. Chris, Tony's protégé, struggles with an existential crisis of trying to make his own name. He even tried to write gangster film screenplays to gain some fame.
Even though Tony runs everything, it's his Uncle Junior who's the head honcho, and much of the season has them clash on how to efficiently run the family, which makes you wonder how this show managed to stay on for 5 more seasons after this.
The biggest chip on Tony's shoulder is his mother is always comparing him to his father, calling him a saint. This is actually the reason I decided to check out this show. It is rumored that a spin off film is in the works, The Many Saints of Newark, with James Gandolfini's son, Michael, filling in the role of Tony Soprano, as it will show Tony's father during the time of the 1967 riots in Newark. But the flashbacks were enough to see that he wasn't always a saint. But who knows?

The season got off with a roaring start that makes want to stay tuned every week. Then the season kind of waned when the FBI made a move on the family's less important members. When the season ends with the Sopranos enjoying spaghetti at Artie's refurbished restaurant, you wonder if it's worth continuing to season two. I wonder if HBO had no idea how the viewing audience would react, so the gave the show a neutral ending in case the show bombed.

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Aired on HBO: January 10 - April 4, 1999
Rating: TV-MA
Stars: James Gandolfini, Lorraine Bracco, Edie Falco, Michael Imperioli, Dominic Chianese, Vincent Pastore, Steven Van Zandt, Tony Sirico, Robert Iler, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, Nancy Marchand
Directors: David Chase, Dan Attias, Nick Gomez, John Patterson, Allen Coulter, Alan Taylor, Lorraine Senna Ferrara, Tim Van Patten, Andy Wolk, Matthew Penn, Henry J. Bronchtein
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 100% Certified Fresh
IMDb Score: 8.7/10 (Average)

Awards
Primetime Emmy Awards

• Outstanding Drama Series - Nominated
• Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series (James Gandolfini) - Nominated
• Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series (Edie Falco) - Winner
• Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series (Lorraine Bracco) - Nominated
• Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series (Nancy Marchand) - Nominated
• Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series (John Heard) - Nominated
• Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series (David Chase) - Nominated
• Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series (David Chase) - Nominated
• Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series (Robin Green, Mitchell Burgess) - Nominated
• Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series (James Manos Jr.) - Winner
• Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series (Frank Renzulli) - Nominated

Golden Globe Awards

• Best Drama Series - Winner
• Best Actor in a Drama Series (James Gandolfini) - Winner
• Best Actress in a Drama Series (Lorraine Bracco) - Nominated
• Best Actress in a Drama Series (Edie Falco) - Winner
• Best Supporting Actress in a Series, Miniseries, or Television Film (Nancy Marchand) - Winner

(Click here to view more awards for "The Sopranos" Season 1.)

Videos
TV Sins - Everything Wrong With The Sopranos "Pilot"

"Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan"

To the people of Kazakhstan, I am very sorry this movie exists. Actually, no I'm not. The dude is from England. He's England's problem.

I honestly hate mockumentaries. It's rather infuriating to watch such pure sh*t where people are conned into making a fool of themselves. I read that Sacha Baron Cohen was arrested 92 times over the course of the production. That should tell you something. If 92 people call the police on you, maybe you shouldn't do it. 

There really isn't much to say; the film kind of speaks for itself on what NOT to do. 

I want to applaud Pamela Anderson for being such a good sport in this sh*tty movie, and I am glad this didn't ruin her reputation. Kid Rock could get a grip, however, and not divorce her over this movie.

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Released On: November 3, 2006
Rating: R
Stars: Sacha Baron Cohen, Ken Davitian, Pamela Anderson, Luenell, Alan Keyes, Former Rep. Bob Barr (R-GA)
Director: Larry Charles
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 91% Certified Fresh (Are you serious?)
IMDb Score: 7.3/10 (*sighs*)

Awards

Academy Awards

• Best Adapted Screenplay (Sacha Baron Cohen, Anthony Hines, Peter Baynham, Dan Mazer & Todd Phillips) - Nominated

Golden Globe Awards

• Best Motion Picture Musical or Comedy - Nominated
• Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture Musical or Comedy (Sacha Baron Cohen) - Winner

(Click here to view more awards for "Borat".)

"The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas"

This movie would have been good if it wasn't a musical. Many of the numbers took me out of the movie from the Aggies number to the Governor dodging reporters. Otherwise, it was a cute movie.
This is my first movie starring Burt Reynolds (*gasps* I know). I'm sure many first time viewers at the time were as surprised as I was to see Smokey carry a tune.
This is also the first time I saw Dom DeLuise's ugly face. I knew him from voice roles in several Don Bluth movies, An American Tail, The Secret of NIMH, and All Dogs Go to Heaven.
I'm having a hard time understanding that the Chicken Ranch was still functioning in the early eighties. I understand prostitution was harder to catch at the time, but Miss Mona's girls weren't going nowhere. And what's worse, the sheriff does nothing about the illegal prostitution. Hell, he's engaged in a hot relationship with the madam. But it only took some schmuck from New Jersey to stick his nose into the Texas institution. Of all the dirty laundry Ed Earl hung up about Melvin P. Thorpe, cheap toupee, sock in his underwear, how come his place of origin never came up to show that this Texas lover is a fraud?
The governor brings up a recent memory of our real government where our leader constantly avoids his job that he was voted in for. Sometimes I wish we were a parliament instead of a congress. The British Parliament has the vote of no confidence. House of Lords vote the Prime Minister out simple as that. No trial, no bullsh*t. However, at the same time it's probably a good thing we don't have the vote of no confidence because then we'd have a revolving door of Presidents.
Despite all this, I'm disappointed that the Chicken Ranch closed for good, and all they did about it was Ed Earl and Miss Mona got married. That's it. There's two hours I'll never get back.
If it was the best, why did they close it? Melvin P. Thorpe's message is that prostitution is illegal and immoral. Wait until he finds out in 15 years that Tony Soprano is running a brothel in his home state of New Jersey. Yes, it's a strip club, but he uses those girls as an influence to his clients.

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I hope you liked this. Be sure to subscribe and leave a comment about what you thought or if you want to recommend a movie or TV show for me to review. Thank you for reading. I'll return next week with another movie. See you then.

Released On: July 23, 1982
Rating: R
Stars: Burt Reynolds, Dolly Parton, Dom DeLuise, Charles Durning, Jim Nabors
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 56%
IMDb Score: 6.0/10

Awards
Academy Awards

• Best Supporting Actor (Charles Durning) - Nominated

Golden Globe Awards

• Best Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy) - Nominated
• Best Actress in a Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy) (Dolly Parton) - Nominated

"Deadpool 2"

F*ck Deadpool.

I know he may ask for time, place, and position, but f*ck him! Yes, I laughed my ass off at this movie, but then I sat down thought.

While Wade was contemplating that "Do You Want to Build a Snowman?" and "Papa, Can You Here Me?" sound similar, I'm contemplating that...

That's right, Deadpool 2 and X-Men: Days of Future Past have the same plot.
Deadpool has a habit of trolling Wolverine, and I think it's because they are very similar. They're both Canadian, they have healing powers, and they have a dead girlfriend they killed.
Okay, Deadpool isn't responsible for Vanessa's death, but he feels just the same. As he struggles to cope with Vanessa's death he begins to feel for another person. A young mutant, named Firefist, fights against a scientist destined to wipe out the mutant race through a series of Mike Pence conversion therapies. Deadpool tries to teach him that he doesn't need to resort to violence to get revenge, although that sounded pretty nice to Deadpool. But it take his act of sacrifice to actually bring Firefist around, and not destroy the world.
Hot on their heels is Cable, a futuristic humanoid, who sounds a lot like Thanos, who travels back in time to kill Firefist before he kills the scientist and brings on the apocalypse. So it up to Deadpool to set things right before Cable gets is metal arms on him.
Deadpool continues to defy stereotypes as he decides to build his own team, the X-Force, but it becomes short lived because every member, except for Domino, die in a parachute drop with one gruesome death after another. But Deadpool manages to assemble his X-Force in the end, with Cable, Domino, Firefist, Dopinder, and Weasel.
The end credits has Deadpool playing with Cable's time traveling device, which he uses to go back to X-Men Origins: Wolverine to kill the Deadpool in that movie. As funny as that was, the bastardization that the original Deadpool is the reason we have Deadpool now. Based on the logic of Professor Hulk's time travel, that timeline won't have a Deadpool that coincides with his original timeline. Deadpool goes to when Ryan Reynolds is given the script to the now disastrous Green Lantern film, and kills him as a favor to Canada. Again, Reynolds' Green Lantern is the reason we have Deadpool now, so that's two timelines that no longer have Deadpool because he's too stubborn to let go of his past.
Speaking of his past, can we have a portion of Deadpool 3 dedicated to Wade Wilson's past before he became a mercenary with Sister Margaret's. I want to know the reason he quit after his 31 confirmed kills.

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I hope you liked this. Be sure to subscribe and leave a comment about what you thought or if you want to recommend a movie for me to review. Thank you for reading. I'll return next week with another movie. See you then.

Released On: May 18, 2018
Rating: R
Stars: Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin, Morena Baccarin, Julian Dennison, Zazie Beetz, T.J. Miller, Brianna Hildebrand, Jack Kesy
Director: David Leitch
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 84% Certified Fresh
IMDb Score: 7.7/10

Awards
Grammy Award
Best Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media - Nominated
(Click here to view more awards for "Deadpool 2".)

Videos
CinemaSins - Everything Wrong With Deadpool 2 in 19 Minutes or Less
Screen Junkies - Honest Trailers - Deadpool 2 (feat. Deadpool)
How It Should Have Ended - How Deadpool 2 Should Have Ended