On January 10, 1999, American television changed forever: the first episode of The Sopranos aired on HBO, kickstarting a revolution in terms of how shows were plotted and shot. Its impact on the TV landscape was both direct (the creators of Boardwalk Empire and Mad Men got their start writing for the show) and indirect (Tony Soprano led to a whole generation of antiheroes such as Vic Mackey and Walter White). The infamous final shot is still a hotly debated topic. On a personal level, I love the show so much it’s the only TV series about which I own multiple books (highly recommended: The Sopranos Sessions, by veteran TV critics Alan Sepinwall and Matt Zoller Seitz).
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