The Meaning of the Cat in the Sopranos' Finale: A Blog Must Live up to Its Name

I don't know how to put all the pieces of that puzzling finale together, but let me talk about one of the pieces. Let me suggest that the cat -- which wandered up at the safe house and which is a good "earner" in that it catches mice -- is in some ways an anti-thug, the opposite of Tony's Mafia soldiers.

I mean Tony's guys are dog like, at least in function. They are dutiful, vicious, dependent and slow-witted. The cat certainly isn't any of the first three -- not exactly; give me some room -- and as for slow-witted....

It's cat-witted.

Who knows what in the hell a cat is thinking or even if it's thinking. But whatever is going on, it isn't slow. Cat brains *buzz*.

Maybe Tony likes the cat's independence. After he presses Paulie into heading a jinxed crew, which last was headed by Bobby and whose top guys tend to end up dead, the camera shows a wide view of the front of the Pork Store. The cat enters from the right and lies down, balancing Paulie who is sitting table left. Now, if you take seriously the whole business of the cat staring at Christopher's portrait, maybe the cat is a harbinger of Paulie's demise?!?

Or maybe David Chase just likes cats. It's a handsome ginger cat, very professional, hitting its marks with its tail high. As for the episode's ending, it doesn