The Sopranos Ending Explained: What Really Happened When the Screen Cut to Black — and Did Tony Actually Die?

Fans are still trying to figure out what happened at the end The Soprano family‘series finale.

The crime drama followed mob boss Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) as he tried to be a family man and keep his life of crime at bay. During its six-season run on HBO from 1999 to 2007, viewers fell in love with the high-stakes plot and heart-wrenching family dynamics.

During the latest episode titled “Made in America,” Tony is having dinner at Holsten’s Diner with his wife Carmela (Edie Falco) and son AJ (Robert Iler) while expecting his daughter Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler). As the episode draws to a close, suspicious characters begin to enter the diner and Tony appears to be eyeing someone in particular as the screen fades to black, ending the iconic series.

There are still many theories about what happened, whether Tony was killed or the cliffhanger insinuates that the mob boss would always live with the possibility of being killed for his dangerous profession. Some viewers even thought their cable had broken.

“I had no idea [the ending] would [cause] so much noise,” The Soprano family said creator David Chase The Hollywood Reporter 2021. “What was embarrassing was how many people wanted to see Tony killed. That bothered me… They wanted to know that Tony was killed”.

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Chase has remained pretty ambiguous over the years about what actually happened to his complicated lead character, telling PEOPLE in January 2024 that he really “hates[s] spoon feeding the audience.”

Here’s everything you need to know The Soprano family finale and what really happened when the show went black.

How is it The Soprano family End?

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano, Edie Falco as Carmela Soprano and Robert Iler as AJ Soprano in the series finale of ‘The Sopranos’ (2007).

HBO

The last episode The Soprano family shows Tony visiting family and friends, inspired by a scene from a Stanley Kubrick film 2001: A Space Odyssey. In the scene, the astronaut sees potential iterations of himself in the future.

“This simple technique has always hypnotized me,” Chase said in the 2024 documentary. Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranos. “IN [The Sopranos] episode, [with] everyone he goes to see, he enters his POV. It got me thinking about time and, I guess, getting close to death or getting close to something. There’s something mystical about it.”

After fellow mobster Bobby Baccalieri—who is married to Tony’s sister Janice—is murdered, the mob boss visits his sibling as she tries to pick up the pieces. Tony later visits his uncle Junior, whom he once feared, but now feels humbled to see him in a nursing home with no memory.

Tony also helps organize a successful assassination during the episode in which his rival mob boss Phil Leotardo is executed. He then goes into Holsten’s Diner to meet up with Carmela before their son AJ shows up and the three of them wait for Meadow.

Various suspicious characters begin walking through the restaurant’s doors – including a suspicious man in a “Members Only” jacket – as Don’t stop believing by Journey is playing on the jukebox.

“What you’re watching is a lot of s— going on. [Meadow’s] trying to park the car. There are a lot of people, a lot of characters, a guy in a members-only jacket. Other possible threats are coming,” Chase said Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranos.

Tony seems to focus on one of the potential threats, the screen dramatically fades to black and the sign-outs for the final episode begin to roll The Soprano family.

Did Tony Soprano die at the end The Soprano family?

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano ‘The Sopranos’ (2005).

Anthony Neste/Hbo/Kobal/Shutterstock

More than 15 years after the last episode, fans are still questioning Tony’s fate at the end The Soprano family.

However, Chase alluded to the idea that Tony died without explicitly confirming it. The show creator seemingly acknowledged Tony’s death in 2019 when asked The Sopranos Sessions co-writer Alan Sepinwall on the series’ final scene.

“Yeah, I think I had that death scene about two years before the end… But we didn’t do it,” he said.

After accidentally referring to the scene in Holsten’s diner as “that death scene,” Chase further alluded to how he envisioned the show’s final scene as Tony’s death in a 2021 interview. THR.

“The scene I had in mind was not that scene. I didn’t even think about cutting to black,” Chase said THR 2021. “I had a scene where Tony is coming back from a meeting in New York in his car. At the beginning of each show he was coming from New York to New Jersey, and the last scene could be him going back from New Jersey to New York for the meeting where he will be killed.”

Perhaps the biggest clue that Tony has died is found in the 2024 documentary Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranoswhen Chase mentioned the scene in the second episode of the third season. In the episode, AJ and Meadow have a seemingly innocuous conversation where AJ says that he thought black represented death, which Chase refers to when talking about why he decided to go black.

“Why reduce to black?” Chase said. “There was that scene between Meadow and AJ. That was a long time ago. He was doing his homework. ‘Forest on a Snowy Evening’ I think the name of the song is … a poem by Robert Frost. ‘I thought black meant death’ But, you see, now people will say, ‘See, he confessed, Tony died.’ ”

Chase began his next line with “It’s true” before the documentary cut to black just like the series finale. The audience may never have a definitive answer, but Chase dropped many hints that Tony never made it out of that diner.

Were hints about the finale hinted at in The Soprano family?

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano, Michael Imperioli as Christopher Moltisanti, Tony Sirico as Paulie “Walnuts” Gualtieri and Steve Van Zandt as Silvio Dante in ‘The Sopranos’ (2005).

HBO/Kobal/Shutterstock

Besides AJ and Meadow’s conversation about death representing the black man, there were other clues The Soprano familyincluding the final episode, which could have hinted at Tony’s fate. One of those clues is that Adriana La Cerva, who Chase said was one of his beloved characters, died off-screen.

“I couldn’t bear to see Adriana shot. I couldn’t watch it. So, we broke down the style of the show. Any other victim on that show, you saw him get hit,” Chase said Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranos.

This is no different than what Chase said about Tony. The series creator previously said that while he knew Tony had done terrible things, he grew to love the character and was surprised that fans wanted to see him die on screen.

“What was so embarrassing was how many people wanted it see Tony was killed,” Chase said THR. “They wanted to see him go face down in the linguine, you know? That bothered me.”

Another clue Chase gave was the song choice. Fans The Soprano family will never forget that Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin'” played in the diner as the Soprano family reunited, potentially for the last time.

“I was thinking about the universe going on and on. You may not go forever, but the universe will go forever. The movie will go on,” Chase said Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranos.

Another theory claims that a man in a “Members Only” jacket goes into the bathroom to get a gun and shoots Tony as he watches Meadow enter the restaurant. During an in-depth review with the Directors Guild of America, Chase revealed that he used Godfather scene in which Michael Corleone takes a gun in the bathroom to commit an assassination as a reference when writing the final episode.

What’s up The Soprano family what did the actors say about the finale?

The cast of ‘The Sopranos’ with the Emmy for “Outstanding Drama Series” during the 59th Primetime Emmy Awards at the Shrine Auditorium on September 16, 2007 in Los Angeles, California.

Ethan Miller/Emmys/Getty

The Soprano family the finale shocked not only the viewers but also the cast members. Michael Imperioli — who played Tony’s hot-headed “nephew” Christopher Moltisanti — said he couldn’t believe the finale’s final moments.

“There is tension in that diner scene. We expect something,” Imperioli said Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranos. “And then it goes black. It was so sudden and strange. He really surprised everyone.”

Drea de Matteo — who played fan-favorite Adriana — was among the audience members who thought their cord had cut during the episode’s closing moments.

“I started calling everybody and I’m like, ‘Whoa, did my TV just break?’ “, said de Matteo in the documentary. “And I think to myself, ‘This is David… This is exactly how he wanted to end the play. He doesn’t want anyone to know what’s going on right now.’ ”

In 2017, Falco told the Television Academy Foundation that she thought her script was missing pages, before recognizing the importance of the finale ending.

“Then I knew in a large part of me that there was meaning and significance that had eluded me,” she said. “I never doubted that it had significance and that it meant something or that it was significant in some way because I trusted David. I know he thought a lot about how to end it.”

In 2019, Sigler echoed Falco’s sentiments about Andy Cohen Watch what’s happening live. “I think it ended perfectly,” she said. “I think people would be upset or unhappy whether he died or not. So I think it’s up to everyone to have their own perfect ending for Tony Soprano.”

Iler said the ambiguous nature of the episode is exactly why people are still talking about the show.

“If the last scene was just Tony getting shot in the head, that would have been it,” he told Radio Times.com in 2017. “People would be talking about it for a month or two, and then it would be over . But to have an open debate still going on 10 years later, it’s obvious what he did was genius.”

Lorraine Bracco — who played Tony’s therapist, Dr. Jennifer Melfi — revealed that Gandolfini himself was just as shocked as those watching at home.

“I was with Jim and Jim said, ‘That’s it? Is that it?’ He couldn’t believe it – said in Wise Guy: David Chase and the Sopranos. “I think he was as shocked as everyone else.”

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Source: HIS Education