The Sopranos Vs. The Wire

I don't find the Sopranos to be similar to other mob shows/films at all

lol unlike the Wire and its many cop show cliches

― Οὖτις, Tuesday, October 8, 2019 11:56 AM (two minutes ago)

cop show cliches like experimenting with drug legalization and the logistics of it?

The answer is still The Wire. Longevity be damned: Sopranos may have a later expiration date, but when the Wire was on, it was on, unlike any other television series. Standing the test of time vs initial impact? In this case I choose the latter, which is the Wire (despite really liking the Sopranos).

I don't find the Sopranos to be similar to other mob shows/films at all

― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Tuesday, October 8, 2019 11:58 AM (forty-two seconds ago)

idk, I liked it, but it was like a standard mob film crossed with a sitcom like Taxi or All in the Family ...

Sopranos was, most of all, a soap opera to me. The best I've ever seen, but a soap opera notwithstanding.

Woody Allen too

I tried hard with the Sopranos and borrowed all my dad's dvds, like 10 years ago, ready to binge it out. But I couldn't deal with all the sad sack men bitching all the time. It's not my genre.

Woody Allen is a soap opera?

sometimes combining 3 of the best things ever makes the best thing ever . art can be that simple

oic

it was an xp to sarahell

like butter, onions, and garlic

i don’t think Sopranos is a soap. i have watchEd soap operas

I think Chase's nods to those other shows and films are deliberate (I mean, the casting of Michael Imperioli alone) and anyway, the set pieces are relatively infrequent compared to what's at the shows real heart, which is an exploration of domesticity - in the narrow and broad sense of family life.

Edie Falco was really great. ... obv the nods to other stuff was deliberate, because it relied on those tropes and conventions to make its points.

Similarly, I feel like the Wire used/relied on the cop show rubric (and yeah, cliches) in order to not be a nerdy discourse on racism, urban planning and the failures of government and capitalism.

ugh "urban planning" should be "public policy"

xp Edie was extraordinary for sure. I can think of so many examples of her subtlety but her acting when Tony was in his coma was all time.

Sopranos is a story. The Wire is a lecture.

ridiculous

nonsense

this is before we even get into the sopranos looong looong nothing/nonsense arcs

i love it but its not close

i am gonna watch the sopranos this year and i expect to like it more than the wire simply bc it seems like more of my thing, but the wire isn't a lecture ffs

"SNAT BOOGIE"

it approaches every social problem through a fuckin STORY

you've never seen sopranos?

nope not yet

i've seen one episode actually, one of the season openers? lotta dream sequences (why it seems like my thing)

report back. I am curious. I can usually make it through a lot of bad shows but it was super boring to me. maybe it picks up in the later seasons.

Dream sequences with Tiny Tears by Tindersticks, no less.

Actually, have I remembered that right?

I can see Sopranos as a soap opera, in that it's a domestic drama, which soap operas are -- like Sons of Anarchy is a soap opera, Game of Thrones is kinda a soap opera ...

if you like dream sequences there are some real doozies in later seasons of the Sopranos.

FWIW I wasn't fully on board for at least the first half of S1 -- thought it was good enough but it def gets better later.

nonsense

this is before we even get into the sopranos looong looong nothing/nonsense arcs

i love it but its not close

― too many cuckth thpoil the broth (darraghmac), Tuesday, October 8, 2019 9:12 PM (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

otfm.

And Sarahell otm, too. Sopranos, in essence, is a domestic soap opera. Nowt wrong with that, it's a stellar show. But it's nowhere near as immediate as The Wire, it never cuts as deep imo.

Dream sequences with Tiny Tears by Tindersticks, no less.

― Life is a meaningless nightmare of suffering...save string (Chinaski), Tuesday, October 8, 2019 12:18 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Actually, have I remembered that right?

― Life is a meaningless nightmare of suffering...save string (Chinaski), Tuesday, October 8, 2019 12:19 PM (one minute ago)

this features twice in an episode but neither time is during a dream sequence iirc. one of the best parts of the show tbh

have any of yous watched a soap opera?

I think it's silly to call the Wire a lecture but I think it takes a different view of individuals, where character development is slightly less important (not unimportant) because the story is really their unwitting roles in the larger system. Sopranos takes an equally tragic but more personalized view of its characters.

I watched the Days of Our Lives / Another World / Santa Barbara daytime block every summer for a couple years back in the mid 80s

Yep. Bold & The Beautiful, ATWT, Eastenders lol. Sopranos isn't those shows, but it's not miles away.

Sopranos is more zoomed in, hinting at the bigger picture but never showing it, Wire is about the bigger picture.

I think I watched the first season or two of Eastenders when it came out as well

The Wire is a lecture is the most ridiculous hot take in ILX history.

it's definitely a bit "do you see" quite often and i don't think this is controversial.

simon really let the "do you see" take a hold with treme

I also studied soap operas academically in college. And how the structure, content and context is gendered feminine and thus often used as a pejorative

Wire is also very much "Here comes another person who thinks they're different, let's watch how the system gradually thwarts them," Sopranos is much more about people who mostly know that they are not going to escape the system they're in, where the rare exceptions are thwarted almost immediately (Vito's brief escape, Carm's confrontation with the therapist, etc.)

Chris's dabblings in acting, film, etc. -- they are played comically, the audience is in on the tragic joke and knows he doesn't stand a chance.

"One thing you can never say, is that you haven't been told." Best line in all of The Sopranos.

not to accuse anyone of sexism who is saying "how dare you call the Sopranos a soap opera" -- I think structurally, with the popularity of multi-season "premium" dramas, with seasonal "arcs," that there is a tendency to emulate the structure and content of soap operas, and, there is a tendency for certain viewers or critics or creators to not see that they are basically reinventing the soap opera, as opposed to creating something totally different, because, the soap opera was seen as not-serious and deemed a pejorative

I cared more about every single one-scene corner boy than Meadow and AJ combined.

Sopranos is much more about people who mostly know that they are not going to escape the system they're in

ohhhhh? uhhhh ... did you watch the Wire? Did you?

some of these criticisms fail to acknowledge that the Sopranos did wide-lens stuff on systems to great effect: police, local and state govts, schools, etc.