Anthony has disciplinary problems at school, prompting Tony to recount memories of his childhood with Dr. Melfi.
Plot
AJ Soprano overhears an adult conversation at school pickup that leads him to conclude his father is in the Mafia. He asks Tony directly. Tony deflects and partially acknowledges without confirming. He tells Carmela what happened. Both of them are shaken in different ways -- Tony because his son now knows, Carmela because she had accepted this reality long ago and watching Tony manage it reminds her of what she has accepted.
The episode moves into extended flashback to Tony's childhood in Newark. Young Tony watches his father Johnny Boy chop off a man's finger with a meat cleaver at Satriale's over a debt. Tony watches and says nothing. The flashbacks show Livia as cold and volatile, making the structured violence of mob life look almost manageable by comparison. Tony and Janice as children learn to fend emotionally for themselves.
In therapy, Tony discusses these memories with Melfi. He is beginning to make connections between his childhood environment and his current panic attacks without accepting the full implications. He talks about his father with a mixture of admiration and resentment that he cannot untangle. The flashbacks suggest that for Tony, the mob was not purely economic -- it was the only coherent family he ever had.
Credits
Written by: Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess
Directed by: Lorraine Senna Ferrara