By Spence Blazak
Originally featured in the September 12, 2013 issue of "The Daily Targum."
What is the biggest problem with
“The Godfather? Simple. It’s only 3 hours long. 6 hours including the second.
But what if it was 87 hours long? This
summer, I discovered the answer in the form of HBO’s “The Sopranos.”
After this June’s passing of
Rutgers Alumnus James Gandolfini, who plays main character Tony Soprano on the
show, I decided to embark on the Herculean journey of completing “The Sopranos”
before the end of the summer.
Unlike all the other shows that
I’ve binge watched in my time (that was a dark weekend when I watched
“Homeland” Season One in 3 days), there is something about “The Sopranos” that
made it more addicting than all the others. What is the secret ingredient that
makes it, as the prophet Drake put it, “the best I ever had?”
The New Jersey element definitely
helps. The electric feeling I got when Paulie mentioned his summer home in
Point Pleasant (the humble burg I call home) was like no other. Even when
Jackie Aprile Jr. and Christopher rob a fundraiser at Rutgers, I had never felt
prouder about my New Jersey heritage.
This firm NJ base establishes a
good place for the show to start, then it builds from there. The most notable
part of the show is how it embraces its characters and their faults, then puts
moral conflicts through this sieve. I’ll explain. Let’s use the example of
racism. As the first few seasons go on, the main characters are all established
to be racist towards…well, most minorities. A brilliant episode happens about
halfway through the series where the Native Americans in the area boycott the
Columbus Day parade since Columbus allegedly murdered their ancestors. The
Italian main characters, losing out on their favorite holiday to celebrate
their ancestry, start a political war.
The episode features some of the
strongest dialogue in the series, where Tony, Silvio, Paulie, and Christopher
sit around and discuss the philosophy of racism. The writing treats them like
real, flawed people rather than just “some guys who are pure evil because they
are racist.” “The Sopranos” is so much more complex than that. Between
depictions of racism, depression, hyper masculinity, homosexuality, and the
sociology of why they all wound up in the mafia, “The Sopranos” gives a fresh
look to many subject matters that are hard to show new perspective on.
During all the TV dedications that followed
the passing of Gandolfini, the character of Tony Soprano was hyped up to be the
best flawed hero in TV history. Having seen the likes of Walter White, Dexter
Morgan, and Don Draper, I was skeptical of how good he could actually be. Then
I began watching. A sociopath as a main character who has redeeming qualities,
the idea is brilliant. Tony Soprano is
why “The Sopranos” works so well. He keeps falling into his same horrible
patterns, making him feel like a real person and the perfect axel on which the
show to run. While Walter White has become hated by many of the show’s fans due
to his actions in the last few seasons of “Breaking Bad,” Tony Soprano might be
a worse person, but you still can’t help but love him.
At the end of the day, the secret
to “The Sopranos” is that it just doesn’t care. About political correctness,
about happy endings, about nothing. Now that I’ve finished it, and nothing will
ever be the same, if you need me, I’ll be watching “The Wire.”
