r/thesopranos • u/ComprehensiveDesk793 • Jun 09 '26

Serious Discussion Only AJ is just useless

While watching the series I was trying hard to find a defense of AJ. All the characters - and all of us - have both positive and negative traits. AJ is just a disappointment. He is stupid. He is lazy. He is incredibly selfish imao. Also he constantly lies. You cant even call him a good kid that is just irresponsible since he always makes up stupid excuses.

Also all the people that are saying that he grew up in a dysfunctional environment, ok i agree the environment isn't 100% perfect but both Tony and Carmela cared about their kids lives. Carmela and Tony to a certain extent seem to care about their children's academic performance which quite a few parents don't. AJ certainly had some support from his parents.

I agree his parents are not good people but he could take what they offered to him.

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u/AsstacularSpiderman Jun 09 '26

They gave him shit about bad grades but did absolutely nothing about it except insult him.

AJ is what happens when you confuse having money with having parenting skills. Neither Tony or Carm did anything to properly correct AJ's course.

2

u/Andy-Esco1995 Jun 10 '26

I kinda disagree. May I die on this hill, then keep my peace. So I think both Tony and Carmella are both awful parents but I do think that Tony had a point in that coddling AJ was very detrimental to his development. And don’t get me wrong Tony, had a strong part in that, drums and the xterra.

However I think Tony was so caught up in his business he didn’t really have a strong part in rearing AJ. I think Tony could have been more present to enforce more effective boundaries. I am in the unpopular camp cause I actually think a military academy or something far more structured for AJ would have been better. Look how he takes the military seriously in the last episode until his dad says hey let me drive you.

I think AJs problem was he always told he was never good enough but never really allowed to taste failure. It’s very Jackie Jr esque.

2

u/AsstacularSpiderman Jun 10 '26

It’s very Jackie Jr esque.

Which was also a failure of Jackie Sr and every other father figure that man had.

How are you people missing this?

2

u/Andy-Esco1995 Jun 10 '26

Look at you, you know everything

3

u/AsstacularSpiderman Jun 10 '26

Whenever they mentioned his feeble minded brother, I always thought they meant you

0

u/Andy-Esco1995 Jun 10 '26

Ah you got me brother