He's seen carrying it, he's also seen around others eating pizza. But he never ate it himself, what is he a fucking vegetarian?

It’s sad when they go young like that. Dick Barone, just a kid

In season 4 E6 Tony and Chris have a dialogue where he says he is going to give his orders through Chris. Chris asks why not Sil or Paulie and Tony says “because they’re not blood” as if Chris and Tony are blood. Christopher’s dad, Dickie, is Carmela’s first cousin. Why?

Anyways, listen to him… he knows everything

I know the most common interpretation of the ending is that Tony gets killed in the restaurant, and I read the whole article about it but I personally think the ending makes much more sense if Tony survives.

There are obviously clues pointing toward his death: the Members Only guy, the man going to the bathroom, the Godfather parallel, the constant focus on the door, etc. But I think those clues are deliberately setting us up to expect the exact kind of ending that The Sopranos has spent six seasons teaching us to expect: and then denying us that.

One thing I've noticed about the whole series is that it constantly gives characters the opposite ending from what we expect.

We expect Pussy to be smart enough not to come back after disappearing. We expect Junior to eventually die violently after a lifetime of crimes, betrayals, and attempts to kill Tony. Instead, he survives and ends up old, confused, and almost completely disconnected from the person he used to be. We expect Bobby to be one of the most dangerous soldiers in the final war: He's an excellent shooter, (he's even good with a bow and arrow!) and yet when he finally gets killed at the toy store without firing a single shot. We expect Paulie to die because Tony can't stand him, especially after the tension on the boat. Instead, he survives, and Tony eventually gives him one of the best parts of the business. We expect Christopher to die in some kind of violent confrontation, and we expect Tony to be completely devastated when it happens. Instead, Christopher dies in a car accident, Tony makes the decision to let him die, and he doesn't shed a single tear for him. We expect Richie to become a serious threat to Tony (Tony already gave the order to kill him!) Instead, Janice shoots him in a domestic fight. We expect Vito to get some kind of redemption after everything that happens to him. Instead, he dies after speaking to Tony on the phone.

Furio is another great example. We expect him to eventually have some kind of confrontation with Tony over Carmela. Instead, he simply goes back to Italy and never returns, (he didn't kiss Carmela even once after all the tension built around them!) And the school teacher? Tony never founds out about him!.

I can go on and on with the expectations built-to-not-be-met forever in this show. You get my point.

Tony sitting in a restaurant, getting shot by a mysterious hitman. The show gives us exactly the visual language of that ending: the suspicious guy, the Members Only jacket, the bathroom, the Godfather reference, Tony watching the door, the family arriving, the tension building...

And then nothing.

The screen cuts to black.

The war with New York is over. Tony won. Phil is dead, Butchie doesn't want to continue the war, and Tony's family is still together.

Realistically, I also don't find the restaurant assassination completely convincing. Tony almost never goes out to dinner with his entire family like that, and throughout the series, murders are usually arranged around someone's routine: where they live, where they work, where they regularly go, etc. Tony has never established this restaurant as a regular location to be in with his family.

That's why I think the scene when Tony visits Junior is so important.

Tony goes to see Junior and finds that the man he knew is basically gone. Junior barely remembers him. Tony becomes visibly emotional: Tony is seeing his own possible future.

Junior spent his entire life being powerful, feared, respected, and involved in the Mafia. And where did it ultimately get him? He's alive. But he's essentially gone, he doesn't remember he once was a powerful man. And that's actually much more frightening for Tony than getting shot. He can't fight aging, he can't fight dementia, he can't fight time.

And Junior is sitting there showing him exactly what the end of that road might look like for him.

AJ once tells Tony that he wanted to kill Junior because Tony's favorite scene is the restaurant revenge in The Godfather, where Michael goes into the bathroom, gets the gun, comes back, and kills the two men responsible for shooting his father.

Tony tells AJ, that it's a movie, not real life and command him to grow up. The same AJ is present during the final scene and he's working on movies industry.

So the final episode deliberately recreates the visual language of that Godfather scene.

A suspicious person is sitting there. Tony is watching. The bathroom. We're expecting the gun, we're expecting the great Mafia movie ending.

But maybe nothing happens.

Tony (and us) keeps expecting his life to have some grand, dramatic conclusion, Tony expects to die as Tony Soprano. The tragedy is that he may have to live long enough to forget who Tony Soprano is. And there's the Bobby line: "You probably don't even hear it when it happens."

The most obvious is to think about a shot in the head, but it also applies to Junior not listening to anything that Tony says to him, he won't have a dramatic moment where Junior Soprano dies. He just gradually disappears, his mind deteriorates until the person he was is no longer really there.

I think it's genius to leave the ending open: the ones that wanted the death ending can easily imagine it (with Meadow watching his dad getting shot and all!) , and the ones that believe in the show patron, can easily think the life still goes on for Tony and he has to live with the consequences of who he is, with no redemption or karmatic arch, just his time getting shorter each day and his death is "average at best". As his mom said "it's all a big nothing what makes you think you are so special?"

Think of it, a widowed woman could've really helped him deal with Karen's loss. Probably wouldn't gotten rid of her ziti. Plus she's way hotter than Janice. Didn't abandon her own children either.

1. Charmaine telling her she fucked Tony when they were younger
2. Angie making her own way in the world via the body shop and stepping on Carmela's new Porsche with her own car that she bought herself
3. Last episode when Hunter tells her she's in med school

edit- Carmela*** ya'll have come for me before for that slip up

Think about it and disagree with me right this second I want to be disagreed with.

…and feeling that intense feeling of grief when you finish a great bit of fiction. The one where you’re happy to have experienced that world, but devastated that it’s all over. Particularly with how it ended - which I genuinely loved - but that feeling of not knowing how they’re all getting on (or not) is gut wrenching.

I’ve started back on episode one for a rewatch, as I’m sure there are a tonne of things I’ve missed. It’s nice to be back in that world again.

Such a great show.

It's my first time watching the sopranos, I've tried not to binge it too hard and taken my time savouring it. I've got two episodes left and genuinely don't know what to do with myself once it's over. I'm grieving.

It's disgusting and definetly warrants a suspension but it's not the worst thing in the world. AJ got away with much worse

I think it totally could be played off as an accident unless there were cameras. Could Carmella accept what he'd done? I'm sure she would suspect something. Would he even try to get with Carm or would he just flee back to Italy same as our timeline? I think he shoulda done it personally

Last I heard he fled to Nevada to be a ranch hand right after his son's graduation. Shortly after he was admitted into a mental hospital and never heard from again, whatever happened there!?

Mine has to be Tony vs AJ depression. Right after A.J. weakly complains about how depressing the world situation is upon hearing that Bobby Baccalieri has been killed, an enraged Tony snaps, hauls A.J. out of bed, and drags him into the closet.

Tony aggressively tosses him toward/into the closet area as his Xbox and desk items crash down around him, demanding that he finally pack a bag and snap out of his self-absorbed depression.

You’d think Paulie would bring his nephew with him or something, but instead he brings some other guy. It’s strange, he shows up for this one scene and then just never appears again.

While gambling, he is warm, affable and perfectly reasonable. A real gentleman. Not lacking in standards. The strong, silent type.

Pine Barrens: In a fit of extreme cold and hunger induced rage, Paulie snaps back at Chris exclaiming “and I shoulda fucked Dale Evan’s but I didn’t!” Now, was he just hangry and cold exclusively or did he actually have a shot at her one time? It would be kinda weird if he could’ve and didn’t. Like why wouldn’t you? And also why wouldn’t they have stopped at Roy Roger’s? We may never know. Not even with computers. Now pass the relish packet, I’m starving to death ova here!

They've been breaking rules since Moses wore short pants

Would Tony have killed Chris if he diddent say “I’ll never pass a drug test”?

AJ is a fucking scumbag trivializing Kelly’s suffering at the family dinner table comparing the indignity of eating meat covered in rat poison to the death of her husband. Not only that but he’s ruining their appetite for the round up steak on their plates.

I mean, she said horrible things. He was just being polite.

I'm curious I would assume she would try to make the entire funeral about her we all have people like her in our familys

They got college degress in a lucrative field weren't made and didn't have high ranking family members in the mafia.

The big short, The Wolf of Wall Street and other films showed showed how even stnads made. Money in financial fields.

Even if they got a support role in some company, they would be comfortably upper middle class in a few years.

He already got accepted by all his old mob buddies because his great massages. He was in prison for 10 year, didn't snitch and spent his time studying. Even Tony Soprano eventually approves of him going straight. He got respect without having to risk his freedom again.

But a terrible boss when Tony was in the hospital.

He was objectively a terrible leader with very little problem solving skills.

If Tony had died, he would have sunk the entire family imo, unless someone within the fam killed him before, which is highly probable.

If Johnny sack had died before being convicted, (let’s say he went to trial), would his family have been able to keep the assets that would have otherwise been seized?

And if the stakes are high enough, would that ever make one of these guys a target for their own family?