Justin Cox
The Sopranos Series Finale
Earlier this evening The Sopranos took it’s final bow. In the weeks leading up to tonight’s final episode thing went from good to horrible very quickly for Tony and everyone surrounding him. He:
- killed his nephew, Christopher, after Chris caused a huge car accident after falling back into drugs.
- fell into a huge gambling debt.
- quit therapy because, after nearly seven years, Dr. Melfi (and the audience) finally realized Tony was playing her the whole time.
- had to pull his son, AJ, out of the pool after a botched attempt to kill himself.
But Tony’s biggest struggle arose out of the guy who runs the New York crew, Phil. Everything came to a head last week, when Phil ordered hits on Tony and his top guys. The week ended with Bobby, Tony’s brother-in-law, dead and Sil, his #2, on the edge of death in a hospital bed.Going into the final episode it was as if the series could end a few different ways:
- Tony gets killed
- Tony kills Phil and takes over New York
- Tony gets tired of it all and, to save his family, turns to the Feds
What happened? None of the above. After a secret meeting with Phil’s crew, Tony agreed that they all should back off, for the sake of everyone involved. Everything back to normal, Tony still had Phil killed for the sake of all the trouble he caused. The series actually ended with The Soprano family sitting at a table in a diner, Tony constantly looking over his shoulder, and Meadow entering to join them and “Don’t Stop Believing” playing in the background. Not exactly what was expected by any means.There was a ton of symbolism in the episode that I’m too tired to figure out (there was a cat that constantly starred at Chris’ picture; every episode this season, save last week, started with Tony waking up, etc) but ultimately this series was a show about Tony’s family — The Sopranos. All the mafia stuff was just what the father happened to do for a living. I’m sure it’ll be debated for weeks as to why the ending was brilliant or why it sucked, but I suppose it’s fitting that when it’s all said and done, the family is together and seemingly happy.