I dont really have a lot to add but that first hour was as boring as it gets. The ending was kinda fun, but overall, count me in the group that was expecting a better movie. Disappointed

Turned it off at the baby Christopher crying and "other side" comment. Too cheesy.

How much this sucked has stuck with me for 3 days. The Sopranos was unapologetically gritty and somewhat realistic(ish). This waste of 2 hours was soft and condescending to Sopranos fans.

The young version of the crew were all terrible caricatures.

-How the hell is Sal a decision making 30 yr old when on the show he is maybe a couple years older than Tony?
-Why is Paulie a 20 year old goofball when on the show Tony expressed how scared he was of him when he was a kid? Paulie was supposed to be an enforcer the same age as Johnny Soprano.
-The needless shoehorning in of Carmela, Big *****, etc was pathetic

A black guy that miraculously is allowed to just walk in the back of the pork shop without worry...who happens to be buds with boss. Get the eff outta here. The tolerance of those guineas in the 1960s compared to the early 2000s is hilarious. If they wanted to make a movie about the blacks in Newark back then, it seems like there are plenty of interesting directions to go. But don't inject 40 minutes of this pandering "whitey on the moon" filler into a fcking Sopranos movie.

They had so many storylines to pick from to make this great (ie. Tony and Jackie robbing of the card game, the mentorship of Tony by Dickie, etc.). The storylines were already there! The writers had 6 seasons of cheat sheets. Instead, they vomit up this crap. For fck sake, Tony always talked about how huge of a mentor Dickie was, but yet for whatever reason there are maybe 12 words exchanged between the two in the movie before Dickie gets killed.

What was main point of this movie? Revealing that Junior ordered the killing of Dickie? Dickie's death doesn't benefit Junior in any real capacity as we know from the show. What a lazy climax.

Seems a lot of people wanted a pure prequel to the sopranos serving their own personal interests even though it's been said for months this wasn't going to be the case.

I enjoyed it. Was it an Oscar standalone movie? Of course not. But it was a new story in a sopranos world and it was able to stand alone. The Sopranos was Tony's story in his time. This was a different story in a different time.

There's no need to get too close to the show that you end up messing with its legacy imo. I was fine with what we got.

The dialogue was boring.

Reluctantly stuck with it, and now I wish I hadn't.

It tried to have it both ways, by making its central character both Tony and Dickie, yet ended up failing each for that very reason. Often it felt like Dickie's movie, but then for pockets and stretches it turned its focus to Tony, when it needed to commit fully to one or the other as its lead. This being a Sopranos movie, the choice was obvious. From the jump it should have been told through the eyes of Tony; a coming-of-age/loss-of-innocence story in which Tony gets swept up in his uncle's world, with a tragic-yet-cataslystic ending.

It could have told nearly the exact same story, and we could have met and seen all the same characters, except with Dickie relegated to the mentor character only; the Obi-Wan of the mob world to Tony's Luke Skywalker. Lose all the stuff from '67 with Tony in junior high or whatever, start it with Michael Gandolfini's Tony in '71, and lean more heavily on the stuck-between-two-worlds aspect; Tony can either choose the right path and pursue college, football, etc - or - follow the uncle he loves into a life of crime.

I don't know how much the events of the movie were referenced as canon in-show back in the day - I'm sure this probably contradicts established history in that regard - but the "easiest" fix would have been to have Tony's father not want his son to join the mob. To have his father of course be wrapped up in that world, but someone who recognizes its flaws and ultimately wants better for his son. He's already in too deep, though, gets arrested on some job, and it's during that crucial time in Tony's life (again, assuming Tony's father goes to jail in the '70s, when Tony's in high school) that Dickie then steps in to help raise Tony, Tony becomes tempted by and shows an affinity for the "family business," etc. Something along those lines.

The other maddening thing was that it had "the one" syndrome where a central character is referenced multiple times as being a great leader or showing off-the-charts potential or whatever - a la Harry Potter or Neo or any number of "prophesied" cinematic saviors - yet we never SEE that potential or greatness from the character on screen. The way both the guidance counselor and young Silvio talk about Tony being this great/smart leader felt so fan-servicy and unearned, considering not a hint of that is on screen. Yet, in a Tony/Michael Gandolfini-centric version of the movie we could have explored those traits, seen them developed, realized, etc.

I don't know... parts of it were interesting, I guess, but overall it was just a big bag of meh that never quite gelled for me. Which sucks, because it had all the ingredients to be so much better.

Just watched it. It's in the same category as the recent Star Wars sequels (7-9). Giant misstep with a few good things sprinkled in.

Pros -

Alessandro Nivola, Vera F. and the girl they had playing Janice were spot on. Great casting and acting.

I actually liked the Michael Imperioli narration. I got chills from the "that's the guy I went to hell for," not for anything that happened in this movie, but as a reflection on the series.

The way the Gandolfini son did the head tilt before he beat that guy up. Very reminiscent of his father.

And now the cons -

The race riot subplot/Harold as an antagonist to Dickie had zero bearing on the story at all. It's like they just wanted to include the race politics subplot because of 2020. If you want to make a movie about the race riots in Newark in '67, just make that movie.

Silvio/Paulie were essentially cartoon characters. Didn't like that at all.

I couldn't tell Dickie's goomar/step mom and his wife apart.

How does Tony not know Uncle Jun was responsible for his mentors death? Doesn't make sense.

It was just boring.

Overall, giant misstep.

Just my 2 cents.