The Sopranos Discussion/Appreciation Thread (Renewed)

In season 6 part two (2007) AJ is depressed over losing that hot latina girlfriend and Meadow is trying to console him and he says:

"Do you realize we're gonna bomb Iran? You watch... just before Bush leaves office... you know I'm right."

Awkward Jim Carrey GIF
 

Never seen anyone talk about how this scene literally shows a Madonna/Whore complex by placing the Virgin Mary next to a stripper pole. Janice explains it to Carmela earlier in the show, but Carmela hated the truth of it. For people like Tony, they cannot see their wives as objects of sexual desire. They can only see them as affection givers, like a good mother. The mistresses are seen as sex objects, but not respectable enough to marry.

Something else I find interesting, could just be a coincidence; stripper poles are said to originate with Asherah worship. They are called Asherah poles in the Bible. Asherah was a sex goddess called the "Queen of Heaven." Some Christians refer to Mary as the Queen of Heaven. Not sure if the show was making a connection there, but I wouldn't underestimate these writers.
 

On my latest rewatch, I picked up on the use of teeth as a symbol of lost innocence. I never understood why Tony's teeth fall out in The Test Dream, but I believe it represents his maturation into adulthood/criminality. Due to his circumstances, growing up = becoming a gangster for Tony. It's also why AJ pukes when Tony tells him that he's "gotta grow up" after his failed hit on Junior. Tony traded in his baby teeth (childhood innocence) for "tooth fairy money."



Would've been neat to have a flashback scene of Johnny Boy knocking one of Tony's teeth out. Tony's conscious anger towards his mom is displaced. His subconscious anger is towards his dad.


Tony notices he's wearing a tooth from the guy he curbstomped during his therapy session with AJ. He notices it right when AJ says that he was afraid of Tony.

Tony is both Victim and Victimizer. As a victim of his own father, Tony is happy that AJ does not go down the same path he did and loves him for it. As a victimizer, Tony is jealous that AJ is not forced by his father to go down the same life he did and hates him for it.
 
Last edited:
Watched this series for the first time recently, very good stuff. However I don't think I'll ever be able to do a full rewatch, the later seasons are just too dark and Tony's evil is so nakedly on display that it's quite hard for me to handle.

Best characters: Johnny Sack, Ralphie, Tony ofc, Christopher, Junior
Worst characters: Vito, Tony B, Janice, AJ

I'm a big Buscemi fan but he didn't fit into the show well at all, lacked charisma in the role which wasn't written well either.
 

In the first episode, Tony describes himself as the sad clown: laughing on the outside, crying on the inside. It's an image of a good person. But Tony's self-diagnosis is exactly wrong. The final episodes make it clear that Tony is one who cries on the outside (to convince others he is sympathetic to them and to garner sympathy for himself) but laughs on the inside (because his evil nature enjoys getting it's way). I love this scene because Melfi sees through Tony's facade, and because it shows the nature of all evil people, that they ultimately blame God and not themselves for all the evil that is done in the world.


Tony can barely even pretend to mourn for Christopher so he goes to Vegas to get away from everyone else who is genuinely mourning. In Vegas, he is able to take the crying mask off and laughs about his good luck in gambling, which he consciously attributes to the death of Christopher and subconsciously attributes to the death of his father. The image of the devil on the slot machine is able to sober Tony up for a few brief moments. Also, kudos to the show writers for setting this scene in Ceasars Palace.

It's easy for people to watch a show like this and point their fingers at someone like Tony and tell themselves that they're not as evil as him, so that they can tell themselves they are good. That's the point of the restaurant scene in Scarface. But when we do that, we our doing the same thing that Tony does, we are putting on a fake mask of self-righteousness and avoiding accountability for the evil we do in our own lives.

Tony is at his most depressed when he has a true assessment of himself:

Tony's therapy scenes are like Christian confessionals but flipped in reverse. The point of confession is to recognize that you are evil and to take responsibility for it, and to receive grace as a result. Tony takes his therapy as an opportunity to self-justify, deflect responsibility, and in the end he will receive God's judgement.
 
Last edited:
Spoilers

I’d love to get thoughts on something from the rest of you. In the episode “Kennedy and Heidi “ , where Chris is doped up on heroin and drives off the road. 2 girls driving by witness the wreck and one wants to go back, the other says she’s on her learners permit and keeps driving, in true sopranos fashion. The girls are Kennedy and Heidi.

Tony opined at Christopher’s wake that his widow looked like a rockstar mourner like Jackie Kennedy. But who’s Heidi?

There’s a comic strip about an orphan named Heidi who lost her father in tragic circumstances.

There’s a famous football game, jets vs raiders in 1968, the same year Bobby Kennedy was assassinated. The Raiders came back in the final 2 minutes to score 2 touchdowns and win. But nbc cut away to a tv movie called “Heidi”, and everyone missed the ending to the greatest game of all time. After this Heidi game, tv networks were contractually obligated to show the endings of football games so the Heidi game was a watershed moment in tv history.

It’s been suggested that Tony’s arc is basically over at this point and the last few episodes are an epilogue. And the final seconds are a blank screen and the audience missed the best part.

But what exactly is the reference to Kennedy and Heidi supposed to mean?

The kennedys are a tragic family with many crimes and assassinations.

Tony owns a captains hat that was supposed to be jfks that he won at auction.

Fran felder, one of johnnys goomars allegedly had sex with the kennedys. Junior was in love with her and even bought her a ring but chickened out and never proposed.

What’s the significance of Kennedy and Heidi?

Edit
Tony made a split second decision to kill Chris thinking it was the right decision. The nbc producers made a bad decision to cut away from the greatest football game in history to continue with regularly sheduled programming.

It could be a reference to the end of made In America?

Ted Kennedy got into a car wreck while dui, killing the girl in the car with him. chappaquiddick

But who is Tony a parallel to? JFK? And Chrissy is an addict like Ted Kennedy?

JFK had a hard ass abusive father like Johnny
 
Last edited:
What’s the significance of Kennedy and Heidi?
Heidi refers to the football game which ended just like the show. The football theme is everywhere, even in the last scene.

Kennedy is a way of connecting Christopher to Johnny Boy, Tony's dad. Throughout the show, Johnny Boy is compared to JFK. If Chris's wife is Jackie Kennedy then that makes Chris JFK. Johnny Boy is also JFK.

Read this: https://thechaselounge.net/viewtopic.php?t=2503
 
Last edited:
Oedipus doesn’t just kill his father, he marries his mother

On more comical news, in season six Vito offered to get a note from his doctor that states that his blood pressure medication made him want to have gay sex. If he were to obtain such a note from his doctor, what would that note say exactly?

“To whom it may concern,

the blood pressure medication that I prescribed to Vito forced him to enjoy sucking the security guards cock.

Sincerely yours,
Vito’s doctor”
 
Last edited:
Yeah Tony’s parents marraige is completely dicked up. Johnny would bring home meat and other foods that he collected from Satrielle when his gambling clients couldn’t pay, he’d take their food instead.

Livia’s sexually turned on by this food, and yes of course she knew where the food came from and understood it was spoils of the mafia life, and absolutely loved it
 
Back
Top