You're right, David. The show has the ring of verite to it. I will not see the final episodes until they are avaiable for purchase on dvd, but I have a bad feeling about how things are going to end. I don't think any of the main characters are going to get out of these last nine episodes unscathed. I haven't heard anything supporting this, it is just based on my own gut instinct. In the last episode of the prior season everybody had gathered for Christmas at Tony's house and everybody was, for the moment, happy. It was a highly anticlimactic ending to the season. But, knowing that the end of the series was in sight I thought that this was an ominous foreshadowing of the carnage and despair to come. The calm before one last big storm. Ba-Da-Bing! But, hey, wotayagonnado?

Can't wait to see these episodes when they are released on disc!