Join the Club

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"Join the Club"
The Sopranos episode
Episode no.Season 6
Episode 2
Directed by David Nutter
Written by David Chase
Cinematography by Alik Sakharov
Editing byWilliam B. Stich
Production code602
Original air dateMarch 19, 2006 (2006-03-19)
Running time54 minutes
Episode chronology
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"Join the Club" is the 67th episode overall and the second episode of the sixth season of the HBO television drama series The Sopranos . Written by series creator/executive producer David Chase and directed by David Nutter, it premiered on March 19, 2006 in the United States. The episode focuses on Tony Soprano being hospitalized with a coma after being shot by Uncle Junior and having a dream about having a mistaken identity, along with his friends' and family's reactions to his hospitalization. The episode had nearly nine million viewers on its premiere date, and critical reception was highly positive.

Contents

Starring

* = credit only

Guest starring

Also guest starring

Synopsis

Two days after being shot by Junior, Tony remains in an induced coma. Doctors encourage Carmela and others to talk to him and play music in hope of recovery. However, they also warn that he could die or be left with brain damage. Carmela, Christopher, Meadow and Barbara keep a vigil over Tony, while Janice sobs uncontrollably whenever she sees him. Meanwhile, a confused Junior is held in custody and denies that he shot his nephew. At Eugene’s wake, Silvio assumes Tony's responsibilities as acting boss; it is decided to cut Junior off from the Soprano family, making Tony the official boss if he survives. Chris, Paulie and Vito vie for small opportunities to assist Tony's family during the crisis, such as sending presents to his room and bickering over giving a ride home to A.J.

Alone with Tony, Carmela passionately expresses her love for him. Meadow reads him a translation of the poem Pater Noster by Jacques Prévert. A.J. becomes increasingly withdrawn and avoids Tony's hospital room, claiming to have a stomach flu. He admits to Meadow that he is embarrassed and angered by the actions of his family. A.J. finally gathers enough courage to talk to his father when they are alone, and vows to kill Junior. Afterward, he admits to Carmela that he has flunked out of college. She looks at him in stunned disbelief but holds in her anger and sends him away.

At Satriale's Pork Store, Chris encounters FBI Agents Dwight Harris and Ron Goddard, who ask him to pass along any information he might hear about terrorist activities. At the Bada Bing, he talks briefly with two Arab men who are now regulars there.

While he is in a coma, Tony has a long dream-like experience that is woven through the episode.

Tony awakens as a precision optics salesman, without his New Jersey accent, in a hotel room in Costa Mesa, California. That night, he notices a strange beacon of light on the horizon as he looks out the window, and at the hotel bar watches a news report about a nearby brush fire. The next morning, Tony goes to a convention and is asked for ID to gain admittance. He realizes that he has someone else's wallet and briefcase, belonging to a man named Kevin Finnerty of Kingman, Arizona, to whom he bears a resemblance.
When Tony returns to a bar where he thinks he unintentionally picked up these items, some business travelers overhear him telling his story to the bartender who, when asked what Costa Mesa is like, replies, "Around here, it's dead." The group invite Tony to join them for dinner, during which he discusses his "life" in more detail, alluding to a midlife crisis. As he and his group leave, Tony notices a religious commercial on TV, which shows the question, "Are sin, disease, and death real?" Outside the hotel, Tony makes a pass at a woman from the group. She responds at first but then cuts him off, telling him she saw his face when he got off the phone with his wife (whose voice is not Carmela's). Suddenly, a helicopter spotlight shines on the pair (the lights of the hospital surgery room). The woman says, "They’re looking for a perp."

Tony briefly awakens from his coma and rips out his breathing tube. The dream resumes when he is placed in another coma.

Tony checks into a different hotel under Finnerty's name. Two Buddhist monks overhear him checking in and, thinking he is Finnerty, confront him over installing a faulty heating system at their monastery. Tony tells them that he's not Finnerty, which angers the monks; they scuffle briefly and the monks flee, leaving Tony shocked at the violence. The next morning, the hotel elevator is out of order, so Tony takes the stairs. As he is walking down, he slips and falls; when brought to an emergency room, he is told by the doctor that aside from having a minor concussion, his MRI scan shows some dark spots on his brain caused by lack of oxygen. The doctor states that this indicates early stages of Alzheimer's disease. When the doctor leaves him, Tony says, "I'm lost" to himself. After he returns to his hotel room, he picks up the phone but hangs up before dialing, while the beacon flashes on the horizon. [1]

First appearances

Title reference

Production

References to prior episodes

Other cultural references

Music

Reception

"Join the Club" was watched by 9.18 million American viewers on its premiere date. [3]

Since its premiere, "Join the Club" has frequently been singled out by critics as one of the best episodes of the series. Edie Falco's performance was highly praised. [4] [5] [6] [7] Alan Sepinwall of The Star-Ledger ranked "Join the Club" among the ten best Sopranos episodes in 2007, calling it the "finest example of the show's deft blend of the metaphysical and the mundane." [5] In his original 2006 review of the episode, Sepinwall found that Tony's dream was "much more linear and coherent" than dream sequences in past episodes and praised the acting of Michael Imperioli during the scene of Christopher embracing Carmela at the hospital. [2] Television Without Pity graded the episode with an A. [8] : 1  Its review noted about the scene of Janice's hysterical reaction to seeing Tony's wound: "She's got more drama than Inside the Actor's Studio ." [8] : 6 

References

  1. ↑ "Episode guide - Episode 67 - "Join The Club"". HBO . Retrieved November 11, 2007.
  2. 1 2 Sepinwall, Alan (March 20, 2006). "Tony checks into the Hotel California". The Star-Ledger . Archived from the original on September 29, 2007. Retrieved April 6, 2025.
  3. ↑ Kiley, David (April 6, 2006). "Sopranos Ratings Slide Exposes Flaws in Ratings System". Business Week . Archived from the original on April 17, 2006. Retrieved August 10, 2009.
  4. ↑ Poniewozik, James (April 4, 2007). "Full List - The Sopranos - TIME". TIME . Archived from the original on November 29, 2009. Retrieved September 10, 2010.
  5. 1 2 Sepinwall, Alan (June 6, 2007). "The Sopranos' Top 10 hits". The Star-Ledger . Archived from the original on June 26, 2008. Retrieved April 6, 2025.
  6. ↑ Cullin, Liam. "The Sopranos (The Complete Series) DVD / Blu-ray Review". Empire Movies. Archived from the original on July 20, 2011. Retrieved September 10, 2010.
  7. ↑ Meaney, Patrick (June 7, 2007). "The Sopranos: The Top Ten Episodes". Blogcritics . Archived from the original on September 14, 2010. Retrieved September 10, 2010.
  8. 1 2 Kim (March 23, 2006). "Join the Club". Television Without Pity. pp.  1, 6. Archived from the original on March 27, 2014. Retrieved April 6, 2025.
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