What can you about a series like The Sopranos that hasn’t been said already? It is magnificent television. Or at least it was, because The Sopranos bowed out with more controversy than it ever managed to muster during its run (and, over the years, it had mustered a fair bit). When the screen very suddenly went blank in the final scene, HBO switchboards were inundated with calls from angry viewers, complaining that they hadn’t been furnished with a ‘proper’ ending. Only a series written by David Chase could have ended this way – he had spent the last six series leading us down garden paths, hinting at huge, explosive plot twists, only to turn the other way at the last moment. The master of manipulation, we were putty in his hands.

I rather liked the ending. Some will argue that by not completing the story he short-changed us, but for me he allowed us to make up our own minds about the fates of Tony, Paulie, Carmela and the gang. One of the best series of modern times ended with a subtle, low-key ending, not unlike many of its episodes. I’ll carry on after the jump, but be warned – the final six eps come to Channel 4 next month so if you haven’t seen it, there are spoilers ahoy.

The final six episodes were glorious. Throughout its run, The Sopranos’ telling of life on the inside of a modern-day Mafia crew, dealt with the kind of massive themes – family, love, power, death and betrayal – that you would normally find in a Shakespeare play. These grand themes may have been staged against a backdrop of New Jersey organised crime, with all the perceived glamour that some think is associated with such a lifestyle, but they were also ancient and universal.

Every scene was loaded with tension, even though there wasn’t much going on, and each character was sketched beautifully. These supreme aspects of drama making were never more apparent than in those final six episodes.

We saw AJ, Tony’s son, sinking into depression, feeling suicidal and seeing a shrink, just like his dad, and Paulie and Christopher going to war. There has always been an element of comedy to these two’s falling outs, and even in death there was an element of competition – Paulie’s mum’s wake and Christopher’s wake were scheduled on the same day. Aah Christopher. We always knew he would go, but, despite a shed-load of Chase double bluffs in almost every recent episode that hinted how he might be taken out, we never, ever expected him the go out the way he did – Tony suffocating him after Christopher crashed the car they were traveling in. Another brilliant twist.

The most dramatic episode – or at least explicitly dramatic – was the penultimate installment, when Paulie’s attempts to bump off rival boss Phil Leotardo (nasty sod he was) were botched and, as a consequence, Phil’s men took out Big Bobby Bacala and (almost) Silvio.

My favorite moment was when Tony, struggling to feel any emotion over Christopher’s death, headed out to Vegas to party with a stripper. They drove out to the desert, boxed-out on peyote, and he had one of those out-of-body revelatory moments that only Tony Soprano could have had. Brilliant stuff.

In the end, it all came down to Tony – TV’s true existential, anti-hero. As ever, just as we were beginning to sympathies with him, and even like him, an explosive piece violence checked us back into reality.

One of TV’s great flawed characters, and The Sopranos, one of the best TV shows that has ever been made.

This year’s Top 50 TV shows here.
To see a review of The Sopranos, click here.