The father and two kids were not killed in the train store when Bobby got hit. The last scene there showed the assassins walking by them huddling on the floor.

I think it'd be far too prosaic to have Tony shot in a hail of bullets by Phil's guys. Besides, the complex characters have all died strangely. And there's more to what Phil said about the tiny New Jersey family - I've never thought of the Soprano family as a "glorified crew," so to put them in that light so close to the end, it makes me think that all of this will go out with a whimper. A compromise...

Anyone else (aside form Heather and I) find it interesting that they keep alluding to the whole terror aspect of it? The info on the website... AJ's obsession with instability in the Middle East, the government agent at Satriales sketchy attitude. Maybe Aj's increasing depression as the season has progressed can potentially been a dark harbinger of the Soprano Apocalypse?

It would be quite the statement for our present american situation if the whole show went out in a terrorist attack. It may not be what the "fans" want but I think it would be rather satisfying for David Chase if his creation received the ultimate end as a modern day tragedy. Thats where I put my money

Is not whether Tony will end up dead or in prison--he's already accepted either of these as inevitable risks of the profession--but whether such a fate will befall one of his family members, whom he continues to believe are somehow insulated. What does he tell Carm? "Don't worry, they never go after family members?" (right after he sends her into hiding, "until this blows over"). Knock on wood, Tony, knock on wood. Phil was willing to knock off members of his own mob family to become top dog. Even his own closest associates are shocked by his decision to take out Tony. Clearly, this guy doesn't play by the rules.

Phil is turning out to be the Osama bin Laden of the show in many ways (no accident that AJ is seen watching war footage on TV). Again, Phil doesn't play by conventional rules. Phil has drawn Tony into a fight he probably can't win, because Tony is just reacting whereas Phil has obviously been planning this for months. By the time Tony plans a hit on Phil, Phil is already in hiding (in a cave somewhere, perhaps?).

What's also striking is the near-total eradication of Tony's inner circle. When we were watching the opening credits last night, I saw Michael Imperioli's name and said, "Oh, look, I guess they keep the cast member's names on even after they die." And then I thought, "Wow, if they didn't, there'd be almost no names left for the opening credits by this point." Bobby, who was always second-tier, was only moved up because Tony whacked Christopher. Now we don't even have Bobby, or more importantly, Silvio, the one person whose loyalty to Tony was never in question. Do we even know any of these people who are now sharing a house with Tony and guarding him with their lives? Aside from Paulie, of course, the real wild card. Paulie's comments about mob warfare in the 70s last night make clear that he is nothing if not a survivor. I foresee Paulie having to make a key decision that affects Tony's fate.

Yes, Melfi was deeply disingenuous and unethical. That's why she's going to live, and why we're never going to see her again. The writers needed to close that loop with her, now it's closed. Very abruptly, I might add; I didn't see it going quite that way, but it was brilliant. Especially in the next scene where Tony tells Carm he's quit therapy, and she basically confirms exactly what Elliott was trying to tell Melfi all along: "Yeah, except for that one brief period right after the shooting, she didn't really seem to help you all that much."

What may take Phil down is not Tony, but the FBI. Stop me if I'm wrong, but I saw exactly two people in the room with Phil when he ordered a hit on Tony. Next thing we know, the FBI is tipping off Tony that Phil has ordered a hit on him. So...who's the informant? Phil's ultimate fate is in many ways more interesting than Tony's, and will depend on what kind of message David Chase is trying to send. If he just ends up top dog, then the message of the show is, "Whoever is the most ruthless always wins." If he ends up being taken down by the FBI either before, during or after his big confrontation with Tony, then the message of the show will be more like "these people are all just small fish in a much bigger pond," placing the show in a broader context.

I have to admit, I hated this season until last night. It seemed like they were trying to convince us that Tony was nothing more than a thug, and we should feel guilty for any connection we felt with him - and doing a poor job of it.

Christopher needed to die. He was clearly a danger to Tony and his family, beyond help. I didn't blame Tony for killing him. Same with the beating he gave Coco. Well deserved and just enough, all things considered.

Last night, though, it all started coming together for me. This is going to be an M. Night Shamalan type ending, where we see Tony for what he always was and we never noticed - a big fish in a small pond, respected in the same way Silvio and Paulie were respected because he was reliable, but mostly tolerated by New York because of his father. A boy prince, just like AJ. All this time we were led to believe that the big New York crime families were petty and small time, but we were seeing them through Tony's eyes, the eyes of a child, basically. The deals were small because small deals were all they trusted Tony with. The Feds are interested in Tony not for himself, but for the information he can give them about the important crime families.

Phil isn't acting out from emotion, he just doesn't have the affection for Tony that Johnny and the other guys had. He sees Tony with clear eyes, recognizes that he has brought his weakest people closest to himself instead of distancing them, which makes him a liability to everyone. The asbestos deal was Phil giving Tony an opportunity to accept the role he is most suited for, a captain reporting to New York, and when Tony refuses Phil is left with no choice but to kill him.

The comparison between the 2 attacks sums everything up - Phil trusts his people because he knows he has surrounded himself with reliable professionals, he doesn't care if everybody knows he did it, and they get the job done. Tony and everyone who works for him are scared to death that they are going to get caught, they handle everything badly, and they botch the job. Silvio gets killed (close to it anyway) because he didn't have his gun on him - so even the most professional guy on his crew dies from an amature mistake.

After all these years of seeing Tony through the eyes of the people in New Jersey, we are finally seeing him through the eyes of everyone else, and so is Tony. Ultimately, he will be stripped of the shell he has built around himself and he will do exactly what AJ would do - save himself.