"The Sopranos" Gets a Pass

All everyone seems to be talking about today is the season premiere of "The Sopranos".

Yet, when Uncle Junior shot Tony in the final minutes of last night's episode, the scene didn't shock as many viewers as intended. Why? Because, after months of locking down the sets and keeping the world at large spoiler-free through various means (one imagines omertas being uttered), HBO screwed up by posting a full description of what happens in the episode a day before the episode aired.

I would not want to be a member of the website team for HBO today.

But the funny thing is that no one's talking about that, at least within the media. Via Google News, I find no newspapers mentioning this little tidbit (although the television critics -- who were able to view the episode in advance -- could have verified the details were correct). And the only two postings I can find via Technorati are posts on Nikki Finke's "Deadline Hollywood Daily" and Defamer. It's being talked about on the shows' various fansites and large TV communities like TelevisionWithoutPity. I'm sure I'm overlooking some stories, but, really, the silence is deafening.

Interesting.

Added note: Both the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times posted stories on their websites scant hours before tonight's episode of "24" aired on the East Coast, revealing that Carlos Bernard's Tony Almeida would meet his maker tonight. Ouch, way to ruin another big surprise.