'THE SOPRANOS' FADE TO BLACK: SOME FANS PLEASED, OTHERS CRASH HBO WEBSITE (DHD, NYT, MSN, AP)

By Nancy Vialatte

“The Sopranos” finale last night seems to have left viewers puzzled. Tony and Co. are all still alive after a series of episodes that saw beloved characters like brother-in-law Bobby Bacala and nephew Christopher whacked, and today folks are wondering why. The blogosphere is rife with musings as to whether or not going out with no ba-da-bang (apart from Phil Leotardo’s head-crushing) was such a good idea.

Further, angry fans apparently crashed the HBO website on Sunday night leaving Deadline Hollywood Daily to speculate that the pay channel could suffer subscription cancellations as a result.

Below are musings from around the Web:

The line to cancel HBO starts here. What a ridiculously disappointing end lacking in creativity to The Sopranos saga. Even if David Chase, who wrote and directed the final episode, was demonstrating the existential and endless loop of Tony's life or the moments before the hit that causes his death, it still robbed the audience of visual closure. And if it were done to segue into a motion picture sequel, then that kind of crass commercialism shouldn't be tolerated. There's even buzz that the real ending will only be available on the series' final DVD. Either way, it was terrible. (DHD)

The abrupt finale last night was almost like a prank, a mischievous dig at viewers who had agonized over how television’s most addictive series would come to a close. The suspense of the final scene in the diner was almost cruel. And certainly that last bit of song — “Don’t Stop Believing,” by Journey — had to be a joke. (NYT)

That horrendous sound you just heard was a couple million "Sopranos" fans, including those without HBO who'd rented hotel rooms for the occasion, throwing shoes at their TVs and frantically dialing their cable or satellite providers screaming about how they'd lost the signal in the pivotal last minute of the show. (MSN)

But they didn't. The show was transmitted just as creator David Chase intended. The last five minutes were entrancingly filled with knee-jiggling tension. Tony went to a diner where his wife and son joined him. Daughter Meadow pulled up outside and struggled to parallel park. For someone who'd never seen the show before, it was a mind-numbingly banal scene of a family gathering in an inexpensive restaurant, popping down onion rings. (MSN)

After eight years and so much frenzied anticipation, any ending would have been a letdown. Viewers are conditioned to seek a resolution, happy or sad, so it was almost fitting that this HBO series that was neither comedy nor tragedy should defy expectations in its very last moments. In that way at least “The Sopranos” delivered a perfectly imperfect finish. The ending was a reminder of what made David Chase’s series about New Jersey mobsters so distinctive from the beginning. “The Sopranos” was the most unusual and realistic family drama in television history. (NYT)

If Tony was indeed an anti-hero, the show he helmed came to an anticlimax. There's no question fans will be frustrated. Those who've defended the show all along will claim Chase is brilliant, leaving fans to finish the plotlines in their own minds, while those who had other expectations were likely be furious. (MSN)

Many viewers are already claiming that the show fading to black was because Tony was (silently, offscreen) shot at the same time as Meadow entered the diner -- the black screen popped up as his life was extinguished, is their thinking, reaching back to the first episode of the season, where Bobby and Tony discuss how death can sneak up on you. (MSN)

The finale displayed the characters continuing, for better and worse, unaffected by the fact that the series is done. The implication was, they will go on as usual. We just won't be able to watch. (AP)