University

From the moment he showed his nasty face in the second episode of the season, it was clear Ralph Cifaretto (Joe Pantoliano) would cause a truckload of trouble. His bouts of madness reach their peak in University, one of the most truly disturbing eps of the series.

The story focuses on two relationships becoming what Woody Allen wittily described as "a dead shark" - a fitting moniker, given death is heavily involved in one break-up. On the one hand, we have Meadow and her boyfriend Noah (yep, the African-American one) drifting apart after a third person starts getting in the way. Nothing too dramatic, though, as opposed to Ralphie's affair with Tracee, a 20-year old stripper who works at the Bing: she is young, naive and optimistic about her future, not to mention pregnant with the man's child; he is arrogant, kinky, easily irritable, hung up on drugs and tends to get violent with random people for random reasons (at the start of the show he hits a guy just because the latter wasn't familiar with Ralph's favorite movie, Gladiator) - not the ideal father for the unborn kid. Tracee desperately asks Tony for help, but he doesn't respond to her pleas, claiming he can't be friendly with employees. Eventually, he has a change of heart, though not in time to stop an unwarranted explosion of brutality.

For the first and only time in the program's history, more focus is granted to the women who work for Tony and Silvio: most of the time, they're just a nice bunch of tits and ass, but through Tracee the previously labeled "stripper" emerges as a more complex, lovable person, and credit is due to the writers for not indulging in predictable "hooker with a heart" characterizations: this is a real human being we're talking about, and it's this unseen humanity that makes it damn near impossible for everyone involved, both in the show and outside of it, to stomach the bloody outcome of Tracee's attempt to lead a better life.

The whole episode is so brutal even fans of the show could find themselves surprised by Ralph's manic acts. Such is the profound insanity of the character, accompanied by the courage of the actor: a subtle bad guy in The Matrix and Memento, Pantoliano reaches levels he's never approached before, not even in Midnight Run, where he played a sort of proto-Ralph; and yet it never feels like he's going over the top, perhaps because with guys like these there is no top. It's an incredible performance, so strong it makes you wonder how come he won an Emmy for Season Four, but wasn't even nominated for Series Three: based on this episode alone, he would have won as easily as his character kills.

The Sopranos is a show equally at home with stark drama and hilarious black comedy. This episode is definitely on the dramatic side, telling parallel stories of Tracee, a stripper at the Bada Bing who has a very troubled relationship with Ralph, the show's newest arch-psychopath, and the charmed but also troubled relationship of Meadow and Noah at Columbia. The show does an amazing job intertwining the stories, with the creepy subtext that Meadow's education is in fact being paid for by the disturbing plight of Tracee and other strippers at the club. Meadow's college roommate plays something of a comic relief role in the episode, but her plight as a manic-depressive does not really lighten the mood much.

As this episode progressed, I got a feeling of impending doom. I won't say more because spoilers would need to follow, but suffice it to say the parallel endings are fascinating in the way that they play out. University, like many Sopranos episodes, is a profound and very thoughtful piece of art, something so unusual for TV. Watch and admire, your 50 minutes will be well spent.

I'm not sure what else to say about this episode that hasn't already been echoed by the others who posted but this episode actually gave me an uneasy feeling after viewing.

The uneasy feeling it gives, to me atleast, is due to the young 20 year old stripper. Her performance is what really makes this episode hard to watch but at the same time hard not to. She's grounded and real. You see her flaws but you also see her hope.

It's hard to put in words but this may be one of the best episodes of this show I've seen, it's shows so much raw emotion from start to end and per usual, perfectly edited, great score and amazing writing couple with amazing acting.

Very few episodes of any show have left me more with a pit in my stomach than this one after viewing. I'm starting to see why this is often referred to as the best tv show ever made.

It just went on & on & on & on, all about Meadow & Noah. No one was remotely interested in either of them. Meadow being a peripheral character. A tiresome uninteresting one at that.

You just don't spend so much time on peripheral characters. Just spend it on the core ones and their interactions with core characters or on occasion their interactions with peripheral ones. ........... Not spend time on peripheral characters and their interactions with even more peripheral characters.

Followed by that peripheral peripheral characters interactions with an even more peripheral character. .......... You end up with a scene of some guy down the street shown waxing his car for 20 mins cause Carmela's hairdresser's tax accountant passed by down that street once on the way to a shopping mall.

This is where David Chase should have tidied things up. It was sloppy & boring, wanting to attract a then growing wider audience but instead alienating the core audience. Nobody was interested in Meadow Soprano from START to FINISH, or her dozy brother, especially with the Meadow & teen gang SINGING fiasco. Cringefest.

Anymore than anyone was interested in the Chris Moltisanti acting & Hollywood movie script malarkey later on. That story line was totally scraping the barrel, we already had that earlier on, which went on & on & on. More POOR script writing by David Chase, he didn't get it right all the time. No hero of mine.

Yes this episode also has Ralph Cifaretto killing his girlfriend in the Badda Bing car park. It was a shame for her, it brought out the fact these organised crime characters were absolute scumbags, that we should not warm to any of these nasty criminals or their enablers, total mismanagement by Tony S that it ever got that far.

No CCTV though you notice. You would have thought the whole place would be surrounded by them & constantly watched in case the Feds & Cops showed up in great numbers or even a rival mass hit. So Tony S was paranoid about being heard in his house but not paranoid enough to have CCTV cameras around the Badda Bing. Very inconsistent & also very unlikely.

So even with the Ralphy Badda Bing murder it can't be worth more than 2 stars for this episode of The Meadow & Noah show. That almost totally spoilt it. At least we found a use for the Fast Forward button.

Later on in the later dragged out seasons we certainly need it. There are memorable moments and also quite a bit of dross as well. An entertaining series over all though I bet Chase wished he'd have cut some of the scenes out. Someone needs to sit down cutting out all the rubbish, don't matter who they are. As much as 5 or so mins an episode if needed. It'd be interesting to view. We may enjoy the series even more then.

This episode has everything. You got your brutal parking lot beat-downs (but it wasn't Ralphie's kid!), a jabbering crazy homeless woman with the New York Times in her butt, a hilariously depressed roommate, and restraining orders. The best part involves Noah. I won't drop any spoilers here but he doesn't build an arc. Like Chrissy and Paulie, Noah doesn't got no ark. But I digress. Truly one of the best episodes in the series. This is dark, dark comedy, fellas and you're gonna love it!

Props to Jamie Lynn Sigler in her portrayal of Fielder... the absolute worst daughter, who's too negative to maintain relationships. The actress herself is a lovely person and plays her role well.