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Favorite character: I’m not at all good at picking favorites, but I guess I’ll go with Tony.
The great thing about the Sopranos is that I love so many characters, at so many different times, and in so many different ways. There are even times when I love Janice. But I think I’d have a hard time staying interested in the show if he weren’t in it, and I don’t know that I could say that about any other character, so maybe that makes him my favorite. Plus, if Tony wasn’t my favorite, then how could I even be that into the show, since he’s the main character and the show is primarily about him?
Least favorite character: Jennifer Melfi
I understand why the show needed her - she’s our ticket into Tony’s inner world, but beyond that I felt like the show didn’t really know what to do with her. Giver her her own storylines? Keep her pretty much a cipher? They brought up the alcoholism in S2 (as sort of a stand-in or corollary for her addiction to Tony), but then dropped it completely. It’s like they gave her character too much and not enough at the same time. But I was never very interested in watching her scenes without Tony, so that’s why she’s the least favorite. There were certainly other characters who I found infuriating (Janice, AJ, Ritchie, the list goes on and on), but I still enjoyed watching them. Melfi I was just bored by.
Favorite couple: I guess I’m forced to go with Bobby and Karen Baccalieri, even though we only see them together in the same scene for about two seconds
Almost all the couples in this show are so riddled with dysfunction and adultery that it’s really hard to choose. My runner up would probably be John and Ginny Sacrimoni, because John apparently doesn’t cheat on Ginny and loves her just the way she is, but they’re disqualified because of John’s bad temper with her (he yells at her on quite a few occasions over pretty trivial stuff, and though I’m not sure how much this bothers/frightens her, I still don’t think it’s healthy) and because I think John actually fetishizes her weight, which I also don’t think is healthy.
Bobby seems to genuinely love Karen (though we hear almost nothing of her until after she’s already dead, so it’s kind of hard to tell), and he apparently doesn’t cheat on her either. And though we don’t really see Karen and Bobby together, I think we see enough of Bobby to know that he probably was a pretty decent husband to her.
On the other hand, if by favorite we mean couple I enjoy watching the most, I guess I’d have to say Tony and Carm just based on their hateful, angry fights alone. Their dynamic is so layered and well written and fascinating, and I have so many thoughts about them as a couple. They’re so fun to analyze.
Least favorite couple: Probably Chris and Ade
I mean, don’t get me wrong, Tony and Carm personify dysfunction, but at least he’s never physically abusive with her. Chris beats Ade (several times), cheats on her, has her murdered, encourages her to use drugs, etc. And Ade isn’t exactly a great girlfriend either. When Chris is in recovery she continues to drink right in front of him despite the fact that he asks her not to on several occasions. Also she rats him out, but that might be more a function of her being dumb and easily manipulated.
If we’re talking couple I least enjoy watching, it might be Furio and Carm (not that they’re exactly a real couple), because I always found Furio’s interest in Carm to be fairly inexplicable. Or maybe Vito and Johnny Cakes. Maybe it was the actors, or maybe it was supposed to be this way, but all their intimate interactions seemed awkward and kind of forced. I know Vito is kind of a weird, creepy guy, but it just seemed off.
Who would you hang out with? Probably Ro.
If I was a man I might say Tony, because it seems like he can be fun when he’s in a good mood. But he’s a complete misogynist, so as a woman I’d have to stay way clear. Ro seems like a nice person (as Sopranos characters go). She says some hilarious shit, and she seems to genuinely care about her friends. Sometimes she can seem like a bit of a simpleton, but then she can say something that shows amazing depth (like when she immediatly realized that part of Ange had wished Pussy had died when he was gone after season 1, and Carm just stared like this had never ever occurred to her before). Ro seems to understand and accept the complexities and conflicting emotions of being a mob wife in a way that Carm never grasps, and she just sort of rolls with it. I like that.
Who would you date? This show is littered with undateable men, but if I had to pick one I guess I’d go with Agent Harris.
There really aren’t any guys on the show who are really my type - either as far as looks or personality goes. And as much as I am a little attracted to bad boys, it’s more too smart for their own good smartass bad boys, not thugs who threaten to beat you up if you don’t give them what they want bad boys. So really all the mob guys are out. Plus I feel like they all have a shitty view of women, and I couldn’t deal with that. Plus I wouldn’t want to date someone who could easily get shot or have to go to prison at any time.
So by default that kind of leaves the FBI guys and a few other straggling minor characters (not that the FBI guys aren’t minor characters). Most of the FBI guys we see are kind of assholes, but at least they have real professional jobs. And even though these FBI guys never seem to accomplish much, you do have to be smart and in good shape to get into the FBI Academy. It’s actually pretty difficult. And we see a few clues that indicate that Harris might have gotten in straight out of college, which is even more difficult (In S6E17 Agent Harris tells Tony that he does not like Phil Leotardo because he, Phil, set up a female rookie agent with whom Harris was acquainted/working to be beaten and raped during the time that Harris was himself a rookie agent. So, let’s do the math. Harris probably graduated college around 22 years old. Even if he was accepted directly into the FBI Academy from college, that puts him at 24 years old for his first assignment. Phil was in prison for (around?) 20 years (Phil says he did 20 years). So that would make Harris at least 45 if this story is true, which is 3 or 4 years older than the actual actor. I’m assuming that this rape/beating thing was something that Phil arranged before going to prison.) Plus he seems like the nicest one, so he’s my pick.
Now there is the issue that he cheated on his wife, which is unacceptable no matter the situation (even if, say, she cheated on him while he was in Pakistan). And he is bald, which is not my thing (though I found a picture of him when he was young with hair, and he was actually really good looking - like, my type). But he’s still the best of a lot of shitty options in my opinion.
Unpopular opinion: Adrianna is not sweet and innocent.
I don’t know why people always seem to categorize Adrianna as ‘good’ and ‘innocent’ - one of the few characters on the show to exemplify these traits. There are many instances of her being kind of awful. In season one she shit talks Carmela (her supposed friend) behind her back - making fun of her for doing nothing with her life other than popping out babies and trying to exercise her stretch marks away and for (supposedly) not knowing or not being able to acknowledge where the money comes from.
As far back as season one she’s completely aware of Christopher’s criminal activities (pointing out that some laptops are stolen), but she clearly isn’t bothered by it. She clearly knows he’s in the mafia (openly discussing with him his making ceremony on two or three occasions), but is always happy to receive expensive gifts from him (shoes, a diamond bracelet, a night club to run, a car). She likes that Chris is advancing up the ranks of the Mafia because of all the great swag they’re now getting. She’s also happy to hear Christopher’s opinion that Carmela won’t be the queen bee forever.
In season two she is clearly happy and impressed to see Chrissy successfully intimidate a group of people into leaving a nightclub (D-Girl). Adrianna is a regular drug user, and whatever your opinions are on that, it is at least clearly illegal. She’s had an abortion, which she claims to think is wrong (independent of what anyone else thinks of it - she thinks it is wrong), but she did it anyway. She snitches on Christopher - and it’s not because she’s decided it’s the lawful, moral thing to do. It’s just to save her own skin. She rats out one of her supposed closest friends (her maid of honor) to the Feds because she’s pissed that said friend was flirting with Christopher. She lets drug dealers hang out in her club even though Chris has expressly forbidden it. I’m not sure if this is because she likes getting free drugs from him or what. Maybe she is trying to be nice and not get him beaten up by Christopher, but the obvious solution is just to tell him to leave because Chris could pop up at any moment and be angry to see him there.
I honestly don’t see how she is more ‘good’ or more ‘innocent’ than Carmela (or Ro or Angie or Gab or any of the other mob women), but people seem to think Adrianna is an angel and Carmela is horrible. Carmela doesn’t do drugs. She hasn’t had an abortion (granted that we know of, but I really can’t imagine it). I don’t think we ever see her shit talking anyone behind their backs. She doesn’t rat on anyone (though on one isolated occasion she does suggest that Tony go the witness protection route). The only bad thing Carm does that Adrianna doesn’t is cheat on Tony (or at least try to), but Carm’s had way more provocation than Ade in that department.
I guess the reason people think Ade is a good girl is because she’s so desperate for love - especially from Chrissy. But that doesn’t in any way make her a good or nice person. It just makes her a person who is desperate to be loved. I’m not saying she never does a nice thing in the entire run of the show. But almost all the characters on occasion do nice things. Ade is just not a consistently good or nice person - no more so than plenty of other characters (though certainly nicer than some). Add to that the fact that she’s really not very bright (she never seems to put 2 and 2 together and realize that since ‘Danielle’ is actually a Fed, there’s very little chance that she was trying to hit on Christopher, and it was in fact Christopher who was trying to initiate a threesome with Ade and Dani, and so maybe Chissy is a scummy piece of shit that Ade shouldn’t bother protecting) and there really isn’t that much to like (other than the fact that she’s hot).
Worst storyline: Either the Furio/Carm thing or the FBI’s investigation involving Ade or maybe Vito and the gay thing
My main problem with the Furio/Carm storyline is, as I’ve said, Furio’s interest in Carm. Now Carm gets a crush on pretty much every guy who gives her the time of day, so that I can believe. But why would Furio be into her? He says he wants a woman he can communicate with, but whenever he tries to have a deep conversation with Carm, so just stands there and says something inane to try and preserve the propriety of the situation I guess. She’s very impressed with his deep thoughts, but I don’t know how Furio would really know this. We never see her saying much of anything to him other than talk of real estate and decorating. Maybe they wanted him to have an interest in her to try and up the ante - show the audience that Carm actually had a chance at happiness before they dash it away, as opposed to just showing her having an unrequited crush that never would have gone anywhere anyway.
As for Ade the informant, I think I read somewhere that of all the FBI investigations on the show, this is the least realistic. The FBI certainly does seem to put a lot of effort into an operation that seems unlikely to bear much fruit. Not that I didn’t enjoy watching this storyline.
And a lot of the Vito storyline seemed forced and thrown together. I think they decided to expand S6 at the last minute and then just had to come up with some filler material, and that’s what a lot of the Vito storyline felt like.