OTH: The Sopranos- "Fortunate Son" / "Employee of the Month"

Let's talk about a Dr. Jennifer Melfi this week. TW: sexual assault

Season 3, Episode 3

Aired March 11, 2001

Directed by Henry J. Bronchtein

Written by Todd A. Kessler

Synopsis: It’s Christopher’s big day- he officially becomes a made man. Before he can enjoy the status, however, Paulie sets up a new deal with Mr. Moltisanti, handing Chris his sportsbook, which he can make a majority of the profit on as long as Paulie gets a 10% cut. Not a bad deal at first, but Chris soon learns that this isn’t a very profitable sportsbook, focusing on poorly-performing college football teams. He ends up short on what Paulie owes him and struggles to make up the rest. It gets to the point that he has to rob a benefit concert Jewel is performing to catch up, using an anxious Jackie Jr. as the getaway driver.

After Jackie Jr. rudely skips dinner at the Sopranos house, Tony decides to have a meeting with his late boss’ son. Tony can tell that Jackie Jr. is resentful towards him, even blaming him for his Uncle Richie’s “disappearance”, which Tony insists that he’s in witness protection. Tony also shoots down Jackie’s interest in joining the family, sticking to his late father’s wishes. This is something Tony relates to, as he also hopes to keep his son out of the family. Speaking of his children, Tony is having problems with both of them- while AJ is making moves in freshmen football, he’s becoming increasingly quiet to his parents, although at least Meadow will talk to Carmela and AJ, as she coldly dismisses Tony’s attempt to talk to her on the phone. It turns out that his racist comments to Noah from the previous episodes still have her upset, which is why she refuses to talk to him. Carmela tries to reason with her daughter to no avail. AJ, meanwhile, becomes defensive captain of the team after his most recent performance, but despite the promotion, he becomes uncomfortable and passes out before practice.

Janice stays at her old childhood house, where she continues to ask Svetlana, who is in the process of moving out, for her mother’s record collection. When she continues to refuse, Svetlana wakes up to her prosthetic leg missing. Tony comes by the house to get to the bottom of this, where he runs into Svetlana’s cousin- Irina, who despite her engagement is still holding a torch for him. While rebuffing her advances by digging into a sandwich he finds in the fridge, Tony has flashbacks to when he was eleven and sees his father in the middle of one of his hits, cutting off a finger from a client who owes him money. He brings this up to Dr. Melfi, and continues the story with a later encounter that evening, where Johnny Boy tells his son about what he does for a living, which is followed by Johnny Boy and Livia cutting up a roast, which causes the first of Tony’s panic attacks. This confirms Dr. Melfi’s belief that meat triggers some kind of response to Tony. She suggests Tony sees a behavioral therapist, which he turns down.

My initial thought of Dr. Melfi’s breakthrough regarding meat being at the root of Tony’s panic attacks is if she’s trying to say that he should diet.

While I may just be acting a little silly there, this does show her worthwhile contribution to Tony’s mental health, how she’s wisely able to deduce some of the causes behind his history of weakness and fainting… maybe. And this is why she’s stayed as his psychiatrist despite the danger he’s not only put her through but that he has potentially made her culpable of.

That said, it does seem like she’s ready to give Tony away, after cracking one of his codes and encourages him to receive behavioral therapy. Or that could just be one way to read her suggestion. Does Melfi want fame for delving into a famous mobster’s psyche? She could easily write a book detailing their sessions, keeping his descriptions to an absolute minimum while detailing her psychiatric analysis and easily sell a movie out of this, possibly painting herself as Clarice Starling to Tony’s Hannibal Lector.

But this would be highly unethical, wouldn’t it? Thus far, Dr. Melfi has kept her work professional, but there’s something still keeping her around Tony. Be that a possibility to cash in or a genuine desire to help, I’m not sure how honest she’s being about this as of now.

I want to talk more about Jennifer Melfi with her next episode, a very heavy episode about her (in more ways than one), but let’s look at the rest of “Fortunate Son”, primarily Christopher’s material. The show loves itself some obvious symbolism, and this week, Chris has his own callback to Tony’s duck story in the pilot as he spies a different kind of bird during his coronation- this time, a raven.

Ravens are often associated with bad omens, and seeing how certain members of the DiMeo crew take such warnings seriously (recall Paulie’s personality shift after Christopher’s supposed trip to Hell, or purgatory, last season), it makes sense that he expects the worse after seeing one at the window side. Still, if he recognizes this as bad news, why does he go through with his induction? We know this is something that he’s wanted his whole life, but Tony advises Chris that he and the family won’t think anything less if he opts out. Why not fly free like the bird and leave, finding a life with Adriana elsewhere?

I think besides his own history with the family, Christopher just isn’t smart enough to handle or think of a different life. He knows crime, and when he’s not doped up, he’s good at pulling his weight. What else is he going to do, construction work?

The thing is, Chris isn’t too young to pull out and change professions, but he’s clearly afraid to do so. Still, he sees that he should have taken more of a hint when he receives Paulie’s book and realizes what a dead end this is. To be fair, as we’ve learned thus far, Paulie Gualtieri isn’t very bright himself, so I’m not entirely sure if he’s purposefully giving Chris a raw deal or if he’s just very bad at picking hedges. If all of his business prospects are this middling, it’s hard to imagine that he makes much of a profit at all.

I’ll delve into Christopher’s crime spree with Jackie Jr below, but let’s look at the other son of of a capo before doing so. We’ve seen AJ prepare to join his school’s freshman football team, even leading a memorable victory in his first game. This progress, for Tony’s son to find a way to prove his masculinity without entering the family business, only for Anthony Junior to disqualify himself the moment things are looking up is unfortunate, but it’s worth detailing, especially as it potentially throws away Melfi’s entire meat hypothesis. There wasn’t a cold cut in sight when he fainted. For that matter, there wasn’t when Tony and the family took his mother to her future retirement home.

Dr. Melfi may have some more work to do, but knowing where the next episode goes, I’m not sure if she’ll get there. At the very least, this made for another excellent episode.

If there’s one problem that I have with “Fortunate Son”, it’s that CCR wasn’t played at all. C’mon, David.

Season 3, Episode 4

Aired March 18, 2001

Directed by John Patterson

Written by Robin Green & Mitchell Burgess

Synopsis: Dr. Melfi’s breakthrough in the previous episode seems to be all for naught as Tony continues to refuse her request for not only behavioral therapy, but to bring his wife for a session. When she’s leaving from another session going nowhere, Jennifer is confronted by a person in her office’s parking lot, who pushes her over to the stairs and violently rapes her, leaving her heavily bruised but not severely damaged. While she’s able to give an accurate assessment of the perpetrator, the police are ultimately unable to do anything due to a change of custody. Frustrated, Jennifer tries to go back into society, but after seeing her rapist’s photograph as employee of the month at a fast food establishment, she realizes that this is harder than it appears. That night, she has a dream that her hand is stuck in a soda machine when her rapist returns for seconds, only for a rottweiler to attack him. While relaying the dream to Dr. Kupferberg (who Jennifer earlier accidentally revealed her “special client”’s identity to), she pieces together what the dream represents, and deduces that the dog is meant to resemble Tony, who she knows would be more than willing to get vengeance for her. She tells Dr. Kupferberg (probably realizing that she’s close to breaking attorney-client privilege) that she’s not actually considering this, but the thought comforts her. During their next meeting, Tony suggests that he’s open to both bringing Carmela to a session and even looking into behavioral therapy, when Dr. Melfi soon starts weeping. Concerned, Tony asks what’s wrong, but she asks him to sit down and resume their appointment. When he asks if there’s anything he can do for her, Dr. Melfi pauses and states “no”.

Ralphie Cifaretto, who has begun dating Rosalie Aprile, takes an interest in Jackie Jr. and even has him tag along to a couple of “meetings”, even offering Jackie some of the money he makes from a hit. Tony is already upset with Christopher after using Jackie Jr. as the getaway driver for his robbery, but he quickly forgives his nephew. He decides to not confront Ralphie yet, but instead meets with Jackie Jr. once more and reiterates his father’s wishes, which are perfectly timed to Meadow’s disinterested return to the house. Tony later denies Ralphie’s promotion to capo, instead offering it to Gigi, a move that disappoints him greatly.

Tony gets a call from Irina, who is adamant that his sister returns Svetlana’s leg, but he’s unable to convince her to do so. Instead, Svetlana sends a couple of other cousins, much burlier men, come and harm Janice until she returns he leg. This time, she has no choice but to relents and returns the leg, which is hidden in a locker at her old high school. Tony finds Janice at the hospital, who insists that she’s turning a new, religious leaf, although he’s rightfully skeptical.

Ho boy.

It’s unfortunate how common rape is as a topic, in series that I have or will cover in this blog series, and in general. Few events are more traumatizing to the average person than sexual assault, which is why I understand that when any work of fiction that features rape can be upsetting to many.

Still, for those who can handle such a heavy topic, I do think that rape is an important subject to tackle maturely. Consider HBO’s excellent miniseries I May Destroy You, which features the aftermath of one SA victim, leading us into a well of similarly triggering events. The series wasn’t afraid to make any of its characters, including Michaela Cole’s protagonist, look unlikable as they suffer from their own baggage. I recommend the series, but I know that isn’t for everyone, and have seen genuinely worthwhile criticism regarding it.

With “Employee of the Month”, we see another example of sexual assault, this time a violent, if almost underwhelmingly brief, encounter Dr. Melfi receives after another meeting with Tony Soprano. To the show’s credit, John Patterson does as fine of a job as possible directing the scene, making its impact land without staying too long or lingering. The Sopranos has been no stranger to cruel violence thus far, but here, it’s understood that this shouldn’t be an epic, and that the bulk of the episode should be about the aftermath rather than the incident.

“Employee of the Month”, thanks to the winning team of Green and Burgess, gives us more time with Jennifer Melfi than in past episodes, constantly taking us back between her family and her own psychiatrist as she attempts to return to normal after the encounter. The framing as she tries to do so, with seemingly everything becoming harder than usual, is effective. It will take a while, if it ever happens, when Jennifer can become her past self, and she knows this.

If anything stands out to me, however, it’s the last few scenes, where Dr. Melfi deduces her dream, seeing the son of a bitch who raped her once more, and sees his ripped to shreds by a rottweiler. She knows that Tony, who possibly resembles the hungry dog in this scenario, would be more than willing to offer his services to his psychiatrist if she asks, and it’s in the very last scene where she contemplates the idea of coming clean.

Yet, she doesn’t. In the past, Dr. Melfi has rebuffed Tony’s gestures, like cups of coffee (but not advancement to the front of the line at a popular restaurant), as she’s attempted to keep a professional distance between the two. She has the opportunity to give herself restitution when the law can’t, yet she decides against it. I think this speaks to her character, that despite how she may appear otherwise, Dr. Melfi is a good person who won’t take advantage of her good breaks. And considering how many are willing to use Tony’s influence to their advantage, like his wife and family, this really stands out.

“Employee of the Month” isn’t entirely about Dr. Melfi, however. Ralphie and Jackie Jr continue to have an influence over the course of this season, as the former starts taking the latter into his wings despite Tony and Jackie Sr’s request. Tony reminds his late best friend’s son of his father’s dying wish while confirming what we’ve already suspected- Tony feels the same way about his son joining the family as Jackie does his own- but he doesn’t seem to be listening.

Not only has Jackie Jr been following his mother’s new boyfriend on odd jobs, but he helped Christopher rob a charity concert (again, not a smart move on Mr. Moltisanti’s part). While Tony is quick to forgive Chris, realizing that he was between a rock and a hard place and that his nephew is good for it, it’s becoming clear that Ralph Cifaretto is becoming a problem, as he isn’t following the chain of command. Tony had the same problem last year with Richie, and now he has another person with ties to the former boss trying to get in over his head. And it’s here that we have some conflict to build onto over the coming season. Let’s bring it.

Also, does anyone expect Janice to follow through with her new leaf shtick? This isn’t the first time she’s promised the same thing, only to turn to some form of violence. The Sopranos isn’t afraid to show that Tony isn’t the only one of his siblings to fall victim to his father’s history of violent tendencies, while Janice arguably takes more of their mother’s narcissistic mentality than he does. This is likely why Tony and Carmela can only handle her in small doses.

“Employee of the Month” is not an easy episode. I’m sure many viewers were just as disgusted to see Dr. Melfi’s rapist’s face in the restaurant she visited as she was, and this is a perfectly valid way to feel. But I think the episode offers plenty for those who can handle the subject matter, and for Sopranos viewers on the whole.

Dr. Melfi’s Notebook:

• I’m writing this just as The Sopranos turns 25. It would have been nice if I could have planned something for that anniversary, but say la vie. I did rewatch the pilot in time for the anniversary, at least… It’s fantastic how the series only continues to look better with time and remain as entertaining as ever.

• You can hear Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” in the pizza place, which is interesting as the first time Zeppelin, who are notoriously difficult to approve licensing of their music for, allowed one of their songs to be featured on a television series. Although it’s more interesting to me as I recall a famous interaction of David Chase from a while ago- “Tony doesn’t listen to Led

  Zeppelin!”

• One piece of evidence that AJ may be some kind of neurodivergent- his inability to catch on to Adriana’s attempt at small talk. “There’s no cheerleaders in freshmen football”. Harsh.

• Tony’s review of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past- “this sounds very gay.”

• Next Week (Or so): Tony and Carmela attend a session with Dr. Melfi together, and Ralphie becomes a problem.

• Spoiler Corner: I haven’t used this in a while, have I? But I want to talk about Christopher once more here. He probably should have taken that omen to heart and walked away, instead of sealing his and Adriana’s fates. I say this, although I only really feel bad for Ade, who was between a rock and a hard place as an informant. It’s a little harder to feel empathy for Chris, who’s damning addiction will only continue to jeopardize not just the family, but his life as a whole. Does he deserve dying at Tony’s hand, though?