I Heart Chris Moltisanti

Weird little episode of Sopranos last night. No real progress was made with any of the current storylines, so it was more of an amusing episode than anything else. Nonetheless, I enjoyed it.

The episode started out with a fun Sopranos killing when Rusty gets taken out by the Italians as he and his driver are backing the Benz out of the driveway. This show always has a way of giving you a little detail at the end of a death to make it more genuine - in this scene, the Benz kept rolling down the driveway after the two men were shot. I was hoping that a car would come and side swipe the Benz, but I guess that would have been a little overly-dramatic/overly-Hollywood. I understand.
Artie has troubles at the restaurant with dwindling patrons. To add to his misery, he finds out that Benny has been stealing credit card numbers from the restaurant, causing Artie's Amex privileges to be revoked until the investigation is concluded. Artie goes to Benny's house in the middle of the night and beats him to a bloody pulp. Tony wasn't happy about this, but I say, good for Artie.
Chris goes to LA to see if he can get Ben Kingsley to star in his "Saw meets The Godfather" movie. It's obvious Ben can't believe he got roped into meeting with Chris and Little Carmine, so he goes to the "Luxury Lounge" while Chris and Little Carmine tag along, still trying to get him interested in their "project." Chis is blown away completely by all the free stuff that celebrities get at these things (I was pretty blown away too - and disgusted that celebrities get so much stuff for free when they can totally afford to buy these things. How about they have Luxury Lounges for law students??!! I think Westlaw and/or Lexis Nexis should TOTALLY spring for that). For the rest of the episode Chris haunts Kingsley about getting into the Luxury Lounge for himself. When Kingsley makes it clear that he can't get Chris in, Chris and Little Carmine rob Lauren Bacall of one of those "celebrity" baskets as she's coming back from an awards show. The best part is, they punch Lauren Bacall in the face!!! I mean, the woman is practically a relic and they punch her!! She's a tough cookie though - she drops a couple of F-bombs after the robbery. Classic.
That was pretty much it - one upset with the episode, though. I SERIOUSLY love animals, and I was disturbed when Artie shot the bunny in the yard that was making a little snack of his plants. Bunnies have to eat too; and then he later COOKS UP the bunny for a couple of restaurant customers that came in as the place was closing for the night.

The moral of the story? Don't eat at any restaurant at closing time.