you don't think that human beings possess free will you're born to this [ __ ] you are what you are [Music] what makes a man change and what makes a man no matter how hard he tries unable to the sopranos is a show all about relationships and decisions and the entire family's well-being and business rests on the shoulders of one man tony soprano a man whose life is filled with contradiction he's both surrounded by people but deeply alone generous but selfish calculated but chaotic gentle but violent protective but possessive loving but cold stoic but vulnerable principles but crooked with all of these contradictions in play and death constantly knocking at his door the unavoidable question becomes is tony soprano on balance a good person we first meet tony at a crossroads in his life in which he's suffering from panic attacks depressed and in need of change but no matter how hard he tries year after year he begins to accept that he may just be a prisoner of circumstance while there are always many different paths he could theoretically take due to his history his vices the people he needs to protect and the persistent threats around him those options quickly narrow down and he continues to participate in an endless cycle of destructive behavior partially because he hates the world and partially because he hates himself but his relationship with dr jennifer melfi is what gives tony the best possible chance to understand why he is the way he is and change for good that is if it's even possible for a man like tony soprano to really change let's examine his journey through six seasons of therapy and how it made him both a better and worse person before the famous cut to black the very first episode indicates that tony believes the golden age of the mafia is over but lately i'm getting the feeling that i came in at the end the best is over which shows us that for tony happiness is always out of reach he presumes there was a time when he could have thrived and been happy but this isn't it tony is overjoyed at the sight of ducks in his swimming pool flattered at the idea that they chose to give birth in his family's pool as it validates that he has created a safe hospitable environment but once the ducks leave tony passes out from a panic attack this moment reveals two of tony's deepest fears the fear of losing his family the same way he lost the ducks and his fear of rejection throughout the first season jennifer uncovers tony's issue surrounding rejection instilled in him from his unloving mother with a borderline personality disorder who spent her life making others miserable this lack of affection from his own mother leads tony to seek out validation from other women persistently cheating on his wife carmela as if graduating to the most physical act of intimacy with as many women as possible will make up for his complete lack of emotional intimacy with his own mother however he's not used to being nurtured and cared for so immediately confuses his professional relationship with his therapist for romantic feelings and tries to hit on her when she rejects his advances and explain that she's only acting like a generic therapist would nothing more he exits like a hurt young boy you don't love me we see tony feel rejected again when his neighbor invites him to a game of golf and he's made to feel out of place with his friends and he's then informed that membership to the club is allegedly closed even the therapy itself has to be a secret as tony fears being rejected by his friends and colleagues if they hear he's weak enough to be attending therapy but aside from the theme of rejection season 1 also introduces tony's concerns about his son aj's misbehavior and how it may be a reflection of his own as his son may learn the truth about his criminal activity the same way he did with his father this suggests that tony believes a life of crime is something that's handed down from generation to generation that free will doesn't exist jennifer says that these are just predispositions but not destiny which is a key difference in their world views tony believes in determinism and that people can't change but jennifer believes in free will and personal growth when tony discovers a football coach is having an affair with a girl on his daughter's football team he takes it upon himself to enact revenge until jennifer confronts him asking why he believes that he tony soprano has to be the one to set this right having been influenced by her belief in free will tony decides not to take action and leaves the coach unharmed but then tony barely survives an assassination attempt planned by his own mother and uncle as his mother was bitter at tony for putting her in a nursing home when he confronts his mother she has an unremorseful smile on her face look at the look on her face this is what makes tony feel like an unwanted monster that his own mother wants him destroyed leaving behind a hole where his heart should be however the one good thing that this near-death experience gave him was snapping him out of his depression tony now realizes that he doesn't want to die which suggests the only thing that keeps tony going is active danger but it's a vicious cycle the constant threat of death is what makes tony appreciate being alive but it's also what makes him depressed in the first place but with his uncle in jail tony now becomes head of the family in season 2 meaning he's taking on even more responsibility tony makes emotional progress by telling his friends that he's attending therapy but as always the world tries to force his progress backwards as now jennifer's life could be in danger and she goes into hiding this danger doesn't appeal to her and she brutally cuts ties with him get out of my life tony can't handle this rejection as he views jennifer as a mother figure and thus needs her acceptance however adopting a maternal role she begins to worry about tony in her spare time haunted by dreams of him having panic attacks and crashing his car so they continue their sessions together tony has one key goal with therapy to be in total control of himself meaning no more panic attacks and the ability to direct his anger appropriately but tony's panic attacks are a symptom of feeling out of control of his own destiny because life is just carrying him along a path that he can't stop he tells her that when she called him to take him back as a client that he was waiting outside a whorehouse brutally beating someone up inside and he wished he was the one in there she asks him if he means he wants to be the one giving or taking the beating which taps into tony's self-hatred if his own mother can't love him then he doesn't deserve to love himself it also touches on the cycle of violence that it takes a hurt person to want to hurt others as a projection of what they want to do to themselves but tony's destructive behavior doesn't just affect him it spreads like a disease when his ex-mistress irena tries to kill herself after he ends their relationship and when his nephew christopher gets shot later in the season tony is forced to reflect on his own mortality and morality as christopher says he crossed over to the other side and experienced what it's like in hell when asked if he thinks his nephew will end up in hell tony goes on a long rant about how only bad people deserve that sick people who take pleasure in hurting others people like hitler or paul pot when she asks if he thinks he'll end up in hell we see a very different look on his face with christopher he had a defensive answer about how he's not really a bad person but for himself he has to create a new justification for his behavior we're soldiers soldiers don't go to hell we follow codes orders but when jennifer doesn't accept that tony deflects to a story about how mistreated italians were when they were let into america and then tries to blur the lines by saying that all the other big american businesses were crooks and criminals too the the jp morgans they were crooks and killers too but that was the business right the american way this is textbook tony soprano when he's confronted with something he can't emotionally engage with he either deflects lashes out or shuts down sometimes emotionally or sometimes physically as jennifer states later rage is a big loud self-distraction from feelings that are even more frightening just being posed a simple question do you deserve to go to hell requires conflict he has to fight the feelings inside of himself and then reaches for a justification something honorable like an innocent soldier following orders and then when he realizes he's the one giving the orders the story switches to a victimized underdog story in which they are no worse than anyone else a big theme for tony soprano is the word responsibility and it takes on a dual meaning responsibility isn't just something you take when you do wrong it's something you possess for others on the one hand tony can't accept responsibility for what happened to christopher or the violent life that he's built for himself and placed his family in and on the other hand he has the responsibility to lead and can't afford to soften or he puts everyone at risk especially himself this is what makes tony not believe in free will as there's an internal battle between wanting to attend therapy and heal himself and an external reality of being trapped in a top position this scene is one of the first signs that no matter how much progress they make in their sessions tony will not be able to fully change as his internal revelations aren't compatible with his external realities for instance in season 2 he then has to clean up richie's body to protect his sister and then has to murder his friend [ __ ] because he was wearing a wire as this way he protects everyone so it's no wonder that when jennifer tries to confront tony's true feelings about his mother and all the pain that resides there tony acts like a bold child deflects insults and storms out it's almost like he realizes i can't afford to have these revelations as i need to be able to keep functioning to keep myself and my family alive in essence it's not worth the risk season 3 starts with tony's mother dying which tony says he's happy about but then uses the fact that he's happy about it to conclude that he must be a bad son i mean is that right wishing her dead that being a good son i mean bad son said bad sons what they should die this is his way of always taking full responsibility for his mother not loving him that he should have been a better person and if he were then she would have given him what he needed unable to accept that perhaps it was his mother who was the problem not necessarily him tony might hope that once his mother is gone that she can no longer be a problem in his life however he seeks out a romantic relationship with gloria a woman he meets at therapy he says gloria reminds him of jennifer but perhaps she only really reminds him of what he talks about in therapy his mother as tony later discovers that gloria is just as toxic my mother was just like you bottomless black hole oh the mother now despite his toxic dynamic with gloria there's a running theme throughout season three of tony trying to protect women which turns the audience on his side more and more as we tend to agree with tony when he follows his own moral compass the theme starts in therapy when jennifer has a breakthrough with tony after he experiences a flashback to his first ever panic attack he had just witnessed his father cutting off a butcher's finger when he was only 11 years old and seeing his mother excited by the free meat delivery and then slicing into the flesh for the family to eat caused him to pass out and hit his head so we can see that even as a boy he felt trapped and suffocated by the realities of the world he was raised in and terrified that one day he too will have to step up and participate in it this shows us that tony was also an innocent child just like his son aptly named anthony junior but when jennifer is brutally assaulted in the parking lot after work her husband is useless and the criminal justice system fails we can see there's a temptation for jennifer to tell tony what really happened and the audience feel a real sense of anticipation and excitement about what tony will do to the guy once he finds out however after having such a breakthrough with tony in the previous episode jennifer resists her temptation and doesn't tell him what really happened to her as tony would inevitably revert to his old ways and corrupt their relationship just like the rest of the relationships in his life as much as tony engages in morally repulsive activity this situation shows us that it's not also black and white that there is a place for tony soprano in the moral sphere beyond that when jackie jr wants to date his daughter and tony sees him out of clubs not taking his studies seriously he threatens him showing us that tony fears his daughter meadow could fall for someone like her father in the same way he searched for someone just like his mother with gloria and when ralph kills tracy the young stripper who had tried to befriend tony now we see that tony really has nothing in common with a soldier following codes and orders as he actively breaks the rules and assaults ralph a made man as revenge this all feels like progress tony is seeing the connection between how his behavior affects the world around him as it seems to act like a feedback loop if he wants to be less miserable then he has to create less misery and do what he feels is right but season four takes on the theme of self-medication and self-harm it starts with tony thinking about how his story will end realizing that his current destiny is to wind up in jail or killed dead or in a can big percent of the time you've never talked this frankly jennifer proposes giving up the life which may appear to be the most logical choice but if he quit he would be too high risk to keep alive and may have to pay for his sins instead he decides to channel all of his messages through christopher to avoid getting caught as he's his blood not thinking about how doing this may impact his nephew who already struggles with addiction problems tony is then deeply disturbed to discover that his ex-girlfriend gloria had killed herself his other ex irina may have attempted it but gloria had followed through this incident not only hunts but changes tony so he begins to show more affection and care for those he perceives as vulnerable or innocent for example he validates irena's feelings for him by beating up her new boyfriend to show her that he still cares and when a depressed arty can't pay the money he owes him tony lets him off the hook and rushes to his side to ensure he's okay as he doesn't want to be responsible for another suicide but tony also struggles more to let people go when he tries to end his secret affair with ralph's girlfriend valentina he writes her a goodbye note stating it was great while it lasted the routine of this visibly stirs something within him the words it was great while it lasted reminds him that nothing ever lasts and despite it being against the code he steals valentina away from ralph rightly not trusting someone as destructive with women after what happened with tracy similar to the ducks in season one tony expresses his nurturing side with an innocent animal ralph's racehorse doing whatever it takes to care for the animal through thick and thin but then he discovers ralph burned down the stables for insurance money killing his horse in the process here tony is trying to become a better person and looking out for people and ralph is harming innocent creatures tony's rage boils over and he kills ralph having to become a monster in order to defeat another monster but this is totally against the rules and could get tony killed so he calls his nephew christopher to help get rid of the body as always tony demonstrates hypocrisy he spends all this time trying to be a good person and not harm anyone that he views as vulnerable but he doesn't recognize the trauma that he's putting christopher through in helping him clean up his mess and while tony is focused on all these other women in his life he neglects carmella his wife who deals with tony's distance by developing an emotional relationship with yurio hearing about one of tony's many affairs pushes her over the edge and she leaves tony and as they argue she clarifies i know you better than anybody tony even your friends which is probably why you hate me which is an interesting way of understanding tony self-hatred when it comes to others who don't know him fully he fears rejection and wants to win them over but the people who know him most intimately like carmella or christopher he's willing to put through hell tony ends his therapy seeming to have made peace with the fact that he's always going to be miserable and talking about it doesn't help but then in season 5 he tries to date his therapist claiming he intentionally gave her time away from their professional relationship so they could start a new romantic relationship he's persistent even suggesting there's a romantic side to him that she doesn't know about there's two tony sopranos you've never seen the other one however tony doesn't realize that due to who he is this sentence carries a dual meaning this other side to tony soprano could be viewed as his nice soft romantic side or as a brutal murderer when he corners her about why she won't date him jennifer states that she doesn't like his values that he's not truthful that he's not respectful of women or people and that he takes things by force this painful rejection causes tony to reevaluate how others perceive him this happens again later in the season when he nearly hooks up with christopher's fiance adriana jennifer commends tony for not automatically sleeping with her that this is something of a milestone for him that he didn't just act on impulse and give in to his vices and he did it with the motivation of not hurting others this is real progress however when tony and adriana wind up in a car accident at 2am while christopher is out of town everyone jumps to conclusions it's at this moment a raging christopher tells tony what he really thinks of him so now we see tony paying the price for a crime he didn't even commit because it's in line with his normal pattern of behavior this yet again teaches tony that the world is a mirror you get back what you hand out having seen how much he has hurt chris and carmela tony tones down his womanizing finds a way to make peace and reunites with his wife he also sees that his sister janice is doing much better when she starts attending anger management classes and later learns from jennifer that depression is rage turned inward but despite being told all of this information it doesn't actually help tony to resist or control his violent outbursts after his cousin is released from jail tony reveals the truth that he was meant to be on the same job that got his cousin pinched but that he missed the job because he had an argument with his mother had a panic attack fainted and hit his head his panic attacks appear to be caused from feeling overwhelmed or in danger a form of self-protection a quality that he hates about himself as it's a weakness yet ironically it's the only thing that keeps him out of harm's way when his cousin turns bad and kills phil's brother he has to go into hiding as powerful mobsters are calling for his head but driven by pure sentimentality and guilt for his cousin going to jail instead of him tony refuses to give him up despite how weak it makes him look but the stress of all of this results in tony having a recurring dream in which he's in the back of his father's cadillac which suggests that tony is out of control of the direction he's going his father being the driver of the car suggests that this fate was something handed down to him it seems as if tony feels his own death is coming the dream expands to tony going to dinner to meet his daughter's fiance's parents and tony's teeth start falling out showing concern for what other people think of him and he then ends up having to run away from an angry mob showing us that tony's realizing that he has no choice except for taking his cousin this happens consistently no matter how much progress tony makes psychologically whether he try to be a better person or stand up for what he believes is right the rules of this world won't seem to allow it it's always one step forward two steps back or as michael corleone noted in the godfather part 3 just when i thought i was out they pull me back in therapy and personal growth aren't compatible with this world tony's fatalistic view of his life means there's no turning back he doesn't feel he ever really had a choice but he still resents himself because he's not sure he really believes that so he's constantly interrogating himself with the question was i born a monster or am i just choosing to act like one the end of season 5 is all about sacrifice and the horrors of the world that tony inhabits christopher has to sacrifice the love of his life adriana as she's been talking to the feds and tony has to sacrifice his cousin with adriana tony disposed of her like she was human garbage which crushed christopher but when it comes to his cousin he resents himself for not finding a way to stop the inevitable all my choices were wrong however he chooses to get his hands dirty and do it himself resulting in his cousin staring at him with his eyes wide open signaling his actions have been seen tony has spent this season worrying about his reputation and what other people think but how will the dead view him how will god judge him on the one hand he killed his cousin to prevent him from being tortured and brutally killed by phil but on the other hand he chose to be the one to do it so is killing his cousin progress or regression in season six tony pays the price for keeping his uncle in his life after he attempted to assassinate him when his demented uncle shoots him in the stomach and he now has to face death again when he wakes up from his coma the first questions he asks his wife are who am i and where am i going this near-death experience is causing him to wonder about his identity and whether he'll end up in heaven or hell either way tony is now given a second chance and he adopts the attitude that every day is a blessing however yet again there's an immediate conflict with who tony wants to be and who he needs to be in order to survive when jon breaks down into tears for being taken away at his daughter's wedding tony sees how quickly everyone loses respect for him so in order to not be perceived as weak tony has to violently lash out at a subordinate just to remind everyone who he is better to be perceived as too aggressive than a soft touch otherwise someone else could get ideas and take him out it seems as if no matter how hard he tries he can't escape this fate when his highest earning captain vito is exposed as gay the other mobsters want him to be taken out for bringing shame on all of them tony initially seems to agree with them but in therapy jennifer challenges his close-minded view causing tony to reveal his true feelings some inside me says god bless i salute when i had a second chance why shouldn't he so tony doesn't pursue veto letting him simply run away so it appears that tony is becoming a more open-minded and better man but the world has other ideas as when vito resurfaces phil wants him killed and as tensions rise with tony's reputation on the line he realizes he has to pick his battles and gives vito up as if they were perceived as weak it could reflect badly on all of them and put more people in danger than just veto when his son aj almost attempts to stab his uncle as revenge for shooting tony he discovers that he only did it because he thought that's what he would want because every time we watch godfather when michael corleone shoots those guys in the restaurant and you say it's your favorite scene of all time this shows tony that his worst fears from season one are becoming a reality that he's still setting a bad example for his son however when he sees his son happy and laughing away at his computer just a few episodes later he harbours resentment for how easy aj's life is this anger stems from tony being exposed to brutal characters like phil he feels that he has to toughen up himself just to take on phil and therefore can't stand seeing his own son so ill-prepared for the harshness of life but jennifer points out that if he kicked his son's ass like his father did to him that it would only perpetuate the cycle of violence it would only make his son just as controlling and violent as he is the hypocrisy of tony is that he resents his wife carmela from protecting his son from him yet that's exactly what he wished his own mother had done for him tony has two conflicted feelings constantly at war with one another wanting his children to end up nothing like him so they're safe and have better opportunities than he did and being offended that his kids don't want to emulate him as that in itself is a form of rejection it means they don't truly value or admire him tony values what other people think of him because ever since the coma he's trying to figure out if he's a good person or not which is why he's so hurt when his nephew christopher's movie depicts tony as a gross violent bully although he may not want to be remembered this way this is who he portrays himself as in his daily life often intentionally he strikes fear in anyone who crosses him even people close to him like bobby or paulie both of whom feel as if this drive or boat trip with tony could potentially be their last with the stress building inside of him as phil takes over tony resorts back to gambling and goes on a severe losing streak taking his financial problems out on his wife when jennifer asks him why he gambles tony says the risk of losing is the best part of it when she asks if he's chasing money or the high from winning he can't answer but that's because it's not really about winning to tony it's just about not losing similar to how in season one before the attempt on his life he didn't want to live but the fear of it being taken away makes him value it more and fight for it so when it comes to gambling financially he has so much money that unless he risks losing it constantly then he won't value what he has tony soprano has been in multiple car accidents over the course of the series but his final one is the most defining when his nephew christopher steers them off the road and as tony escapes the wreckage christopher confesses that he needs help as he won't pass the drug test tony sees a destroyed baby seat in the back meaning if christopher's child had been with him they would have died christopher asks for help and tony decides that the best help he can give him is a helping hand to die as he's a danger to everyone else so instead of calling the police tony blocks his nose and lets him choke on his own blood tony harbors a hatred for christopher as he's a reflection of himself as much as tony worries that aj isn't tough enough because he was cuddled christopher is like his other son that he chose to funnel all of his darkness into he may try to hide the truth from aj but christopher knows everything evil he's ever done as carmella said at the end of season 4 i know you better than anyone tony that's why you hate me and the feeling is mutual as tony can see that christopher subconsciously hates him too based on his depiction in his movie if he can't trust him to be sober that he can't trust him to not rat him out to the police what's disturbing is that tony feels no regret about what happened with christopher whatsoever he not only justifies it but takes a trip to vegas to hook up with his mistress and when his luck finally returns at the casino revels with the reality that he's dead indicating that tony believes all of his bad luck came from christopher although most looked on in horror as tony ended his nephew's life tony has no remorse whatsoever which again is hypocritical he considers his own mother smiling to be a crime against humanity but he expresses even more joy in what he did to his nephew whatever darkness his mother had put him through tony exposed christopher to even more maybe he was going to die from his injuries anyway maybe everyone is safer without him around but tony still chose to be the one to snuff him out despite everything he had sacrificed for him but if christopher symbolized tony's evil side being put to rest aj his light side is in just as much danger as he tries to take his own life and luckily tony is home just in time to rescue him he resents his son for doing this calling it the coward's way out but jennifer reminds him that whoever came up with that phrase doesn't understand depression but he does and that becomes clear in how he talks about himself my rotten computer genes have infected my kid's soul tony self-hatred seems to emanate from him he's the common denominator in everyone around him's misery they engage in self-harm whereas tony constantly self-medicates with alcohol drugs women gambling and violence to avoid doing the same jennifer is disturbed to learn that apparently sociopaths do not benefit from talk therapy that it only serves to validate them more as they only use it as a means of sharpening their skills to become better con men with that in mind she can't bring herself to treat tony anymore accepting that they never really got anywhere just spinning in circles essentially defining tony soprano as a lost cause this symbolizes the ultimate rejection for tony being abandoned by the person that he shared his most intimate vulnerabilities with going as far as to judge her actions as immoral as a doctor i think what you're doing is immoral but when we reflect on tony soprano's time in therapy it serves as a sort of rorschach test was tony ever really getting better or was he just getting better at justifying his bad behavior to both himself and others while still at the mercy of his vices and capable of engaging in the most repugnant acts except now with no remorse has this talk therapy only served to make him more accepting of his own flaws when he first started therapy tony said that only evil people who take pleasure in killing others deserve to go to hell but over six seasons did he take any pleasure in his many acts of violence and revenge does merely resisting an immoral act make you a better person if you ultimately give into it after his son tried to kill himself tony reflected on whether or not he deserves this why me huh i'm a good guy basically and that's the key question what makes you a good person does having redeeming qualities define you as good does having destructive qualities define you as irredeemably bad do positive changes only count if they stick or is it the attempt that counts the show proposes that it's not a simple black and white that although tony has done many evil things the mafia would still exist without him so the real question becomes would the world be a better place with tony soprano in it or out of it but maybe even thinking that way is playing into his mindset taking sympathy on the devil as on paper this is a man who murdered his own cousin and nephew who still cheats on his wife who still gambles who still lashes out who still has people killed so did the therapy actually make tony soprano a better person or did it only serve to make him feel better about himself no matter what he chooses maybe that's all tony was ever looking for as deep down he's always believed that he never had a choice to begin with if you enjoy content 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