By now most Sopranos fans have seen the series finale and have reacted to the mysterious ending. David Chase talks about the ending but offers no clues other than “It’s all there.”

“I have no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting, or adding to what is there,” he says of the final scene.

“No one was trying to be audacious, honest to God,” he adds. “We did what we thought we had to do. No one was trying to blow people’s minds, or thinking, ‘Wow, this’ll (tick) them off.’ People get the impression that you’re trying to (mess) with them and it’s not true. You’re trying to entertain them.”

Come on - only a fool would think that fans wouldn’t be disappointed by such an ambiguous ending.

Therein lies the problem with the show - it’s now obvious that the showrunners had no end game in mind. Plot lines were set up but never concluded, nothing built up, and there was no satisfying wrap up.  It seems to be the norm these days to tease the audience with endless mystery, but a series finale should serve as the grand finale and at least wrap up the major plotlines of the show.

The first season finale ended well. Tony’s hidden rage against his mother boiled into a near-suicidal hospital attack, and concluded with a combination of his two “families.” With all the dream episodes, Johnny Sack misadventures, and Steve Buscemi diversions of the past few seasons, I almost forgot that the show was originally about a mob boss trying to balanace his personal family (Carmela and the kids) with his mob family (Paulie, Silvio, and the other ne’er do wells), while trying to keep the overlapping family (Junior and Livia) from taking him out.

Hard to believe that a show that came in with a bang would go out with such a whimper.  However, at least it resulted in this hilarious mashup of Battlestar Galactica finale as directed by David Chase.

Heroes has ended, more with a whimper than a bang.  After building all season to a major showdown between the villainous Sylar and the multi-powered Heroes of the title, Sylar was dispatched with a quick 10 minute finale that wrapped up all the plot threads in a pretty unsatisfying manner.

But I had lowered my expectations before the finale aired, so I wasn’t too underwhelmed.

It happened during the “grand” finale of the episode set in the future - where Hiro Nakamura (the hero who can travel in time) traveled to a future where the explosion wiped out most of New York and caused a slightly dystopian future.  The future episode ended with a showdown between Sylar and Peter (the ultimate hero of the show, if there is one).

The last scene of the show had several heroes barricaded inside a room, with Sylar trying to break in.  Peter shows up and challenges Sylar. Sylar taunts Peter and ignites his fists in blue flame, and Peter responds by producing red fireballs around his hands.  They stride towards each other - and the camera cuts back inside the room, where the heroes inside talk while blue and red flashes begin pounding behind the metal barricade.

And at that moment I set my expectations for Heroes lower, because I saw that the showrunners needed to create a visual that accommodated the show’s budget rather than one that would impress the viewer.

Sure enough, the finale of Heroes should have been a half hour epic showdown between the multiple powers that had been showcased throughout the season, but was instead a standard television fight that involved the superpowered Peter punching the superpowered Sylar punching each other in the face.  These guys can throw people around with telekenisis - aren’t they way too advanced for a fistfight?

So, Heroes was a bit of a letdown.  You only get the chance to tease the audience once - I doubt people will be as fanatic about Heroes Season 2 as they were in the first season, which built the story up to an ultimately unsatisfying conclusion.

A blog called Pick the Brain offers 5 ways to make the most of your intelligence. They are:

1. Minimize Television Watching
2. Exercise
3. Read Challenging Books
4. Early to Bed, Early to Rise
5. Take Time to Reflect

Overall, sounds like good advice - the kind that seems self-evident once you read it.

Here’s how I stack up:

1. Minimize Television Watching - I could do better at this, and now that most of my shows (30 Rock, Heroes, The Office, etc) have ended I should have more nights free. For me this is related to number 3 - I’ve been mired in a poorly written book for the past few weeks but should probably learn to put down a book once I realize it’s going nowhere.
2. Exercise - I was in a pretty good workout habit until about a month ago. I still do pilates once a week but could hit it more often.
3. Read Challenging Books - Just finished A God in Ruins, currently rated as 1.5 stars on Amazon (with good reason). I’m now one part done with the thought-provoking Values in a Time of Upheaval, and am addicted to Solaris after only one chapter.
4. Early to Bed, Early to Rise - I was doing well on this for a while. This also relates to points 1 and 3 - I’ve gotten in the habit of watching TV reruns late into the night rather than reading before bed. After a while I’m just cleaning out the Tivo one half-hour at a time, rather than enriching my mind with good literature.
5. Take Time to Reflect - In my case, this takes the form of the Liturgy of the Hours twice a day, as well as long walks through Boston at night.  The other night I went on a bit of a walkabout around Boston without even using my iPod, and entered my place feeling refreshed.

So - overall I should watch TV less, work out and read more, and move my circadian rhythm up an hour or two.

A series of random clicks (originating from Metafilter, of course) led me to the clip below.

Like so many other cartoons of the 80s, the opening intro was probably the best animated part of the show, which was otherwise a He-man clone translated to the Wild West.

I completely forgot about this cartoon till now.  Then again, I’m not sure why I’d think of it.  You never hear statements at lunch like “Deputy Fuzz was indeed better than Snarf, but lacked Orko’s gravitas.”

I briefly indulged my nostalgic haze at Wikipedia and of course the eerily large fan site (which has been around long enough to upgrade to “version 2.0″).  I am once again amazed at the Internet’s ability to provide the exact amount of information I need to satisfy my 80s cartoon fix.

Ain’t It Cool News posted major spoilers for the Battlestar Galatica finale on their web site. If the details of the finale are true, they jibe with my theory about BSG, which could provide answers to the larger mysteries of the show.

MAJOR spoilers below, so keep reading only if you’ve seen every BSG to date.  I’ve avoided references to the Ain’t It Cool News spoilers for those who still need to see the final episode of this season.

SPOILERS

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My theory: They’re All Cylons.

All humans on BSG are Cylons. Every one is a unique model, with a corresponding model waiting to be resurrected on “Earth.” When a human dies (as Starbuck did two episodes ago) he or she wakes up on Earth.  All beings known as “Cylons” are actually outdated models of Cylon; the real Cylons are the 13th colony of humans which now exist on Earth in an advanced state of existence.

If true, here are my answers to the major questions of the show:

Is Starbuck dead?
Starbuck did “die” when her body exploded in the maelstrom, but immediately woke up on Earth on the 13th colony equivalent of a resurrection ship.  This is the thing that she was destined to do - be the first human to pass over to the other side (Earth, where the 13th colony lives) and meet the humans living there.  This is why she says “they’re waiting for me” before her ship explodes, why Leoben (her Cylon stalker) keeps telling her death is not hard to embrace, and why she will see Lee “on the other side.”

I predict Starbuck will return in some form, to lead the BSG humans back to Earth.

Do other people know they’re Cylons?

Sort of.  Chief Tyrol and Baltar have already thought they were Cylons, and if Ain’t It Cool is accurate, more people will think they’re Cylons before the season ends.

However, the truth is that everyone’s a Cylon - it’s just that some of them are more sensitive to their Cylon nature than others.  Until someone dies (and wakes up on Earth in a new body) they don’t realize their true Cylon nature.

This, again, fits in with Starbuck’s destiny - to show the humans on Galactica that the true way to Earth is through death (and resurrection).

If everyone’s a Cylon, what’s with the current Cylons (Six, Leoben, the Priest, etc)?

Right now there are seven humanoid Cylons we know about, and a set of “final five” Cylons that have been seen in a vision.

The current Cylons (like Six) are an outdated model of Cylon.  These humanoid Cylon have “tribes” that all look alike - all the Sixes are blond models, all the Threes look like Lucy Lawless, etc.  However, the “13th tribe” represents a new breed of Cylon which have evolved to have individual looks - so there is a model for a Chief Tyrol, but ONLY ONE unit looks like a Chief Tyrol.  If Tyrol were to die in the hangar bay, his consciousness would be downloaded to a Tyrol unit on Earth and would wake up in a new Tyrol-shaped body.

I’d further hypothesize that the 12 tribes that currently exist in the humans  are analogous to the 12 tribes of Cylons.  So the Caprican tribe of humans on Galactica is actually a race of worker Cylons - each one on Galactica corresponding to a unit existing in the 13th tribe on Earth.

What’s going to happen?

The 13th tribe is waiting for Galactica humans and Cylons back on the real Earth.  They’ll send Starbuck to BSG to guide the way home.

The current Cylons (Six, etc.) are in the dark about the 13th tribe Cylons waiting on Earth.  Over the next season they will continue to chase Galactica through space, as the true nature of the Earth Cylons is revealed.

More people on BSG will start thinking they’re Cylons.   Debate will rage on message boards and wikis about who is and isn’t a Cylon, until all are revealed to be Cylons.

Possibly, the last episode of the series will end with BSG and all the humans dying… only to be reborn in new bodies on Earth.  This would fit in with the overall theme of spirituality and resurrection that’s run throughout the series so far.

END SPOILERS

To say more would spoil next week’s grand finale, so I’ll hold off on saying more till the episode has aired.