Back out in the car, Furio gently places his sunglasses in the glove compartment, and then picks up a cell phone to call Carmela. Incidentally, anyone who thinks they're not deliberately dressing Edie Falco in frumpier fashions this season needs to check out the seriously unflattering scoop-neck sweater and snow-leopard print mock turtleneck they've got her wearing here. It looks like something Adriana's grandmother would wear. Anyway, a clearly smitten Furio claims to be calling because he lost his sunglasses, and while it's never quite clear whether Carm buys that excuse or not, she does make at least a token attempt to look around the house for them. They exchange a lot of awkward small talk, and Carmela seems to be a bit more brusque than you might expect, even after Furio tells her that he found a particularly pretty picture of her from the housewarming party. Realizing that he's unable to sustain the pretense for calling any longer, Furio wistfully promises to see her soon, and looks incredibly sad as he hangs up the phone.

You know, I really do love that the producers have decided to reward the fans' obvious affection for Furio and Bobby Bacala with bigger plotlines this season. And while I have no problems buying Bobby's story, I'm somewhat disheartened to admit that Furio's just seems to be falling flat. I miss the ass-kicking, knee-capping, hat-poking, bikini-brief-wearing, bad-ass Furio of yore. I mean, all he did last week was blink at a guy. It's nice that they want to show him as a three-dimensional character and all, and the dichotomy between cuddly Bobby turning evil and evil Furio turning cuddly is clever, but the show already has way too many conflicted characters, and sometimes it's nice to just have some simple, mindless comic relief. That's no knock on Federico Castelluccio, by the way. The mere fact that I still get freaked out when I hear him speak without the accent is enough to prove how talented he is. So if you're reading this, Federico, please don't beat me up. I'll even buy one of your paintings if I have to.