No TV Series Matches The Sopranos, Forum Users Say

Finishing The Sopranos: The Search for a Successor

A viewer finishes the final season of The Sopranos and asks for help: "I'm sad; recommend me another series that is equal or better." They had already seen The Wire, The Crown, and Mad Men. The response received, repeated throughout the thread, has two uncomfortable halves: there is no substitute, and almost everything proposed ends in debate. What starts as a list of recommendations turns into a reckoning with television over the last two decades.

Is There Any Series As Good As The Sopranos?

No, according to the criterion dominating the conversation. The comparison summarizing this criterion is ham: "Once you've tasted good ham, serrano ham won't do," says someone who places The Sopranos, The Wire, and Mad Men in their own league. From there, the diagnosis is that only the abyss remains: products mixing excellent seasons with others made for profit, or directly mediocre material.

The consolation list is long. Breaking Bad and its spin-off Better Call Saul appear in nearly all predictions, along with Gomorrah, The Americans, Narcos, Narcos: Mexico, and the miniseries Chernobyl, recommended precisely for being short. Banshee, The Shield, Oz, Mr. Robot, Black Sails, Yellowstone, its prequel 1883, Shogun, Andor, Foundation, Dune: Prophecy, Marco Polo, Ray Donovan, Suits, Rome, Incivil, and Jericho are also mentioned. And for those who admit the bar is different: Six Feet Under, Northern Exposure, Big Love, Bojack Horseman, or It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul: The Point That Splits the Room

They are the most repeated recommendation and the most debated at the same time. Some defend Breaking Bad without reservations and place Better Call Saul as the best spin-off in history. The reply comes quickly and bluntly: Breaking Bad would be fine only in its early seasons, then it fills with money, drugs, cars, and guns, with episodes where nothing happens; and Better Call Saul would simply be mediocre. Two viewers, two different series.

That disagreement summarizes the underlying problem. When the criterion is The Sopranos, any title proposed drags objections about its final stretch, its pace, or its status as an overstretched product. The full calculation of what each person saves and discards occupies much of the conversation, and no two lists coincide.

Series Mixing Great Seasons With Filler

This is the most useful warning in the entire exchange. There are series alternating high-level seasons with others made for profit, resulting in a product that cannot be blindly recommended. Those issuing this warning insist their opinion is limited to what they have seen, but the pattern repeats in the most cited titles.

The other recurring advice is to measure commitment. Against series of sixty or seventy episodes, short formats are championed: Chernobyl works as a closed and brutal miniseries, and the catalog of brief pieces is presented as the sensible path for those who don't want to get hooked on something that deflates.

Peaky Blinders, Black Sails, and the Ideological Filter

Part of the audience rejects titles due to what they consider anachronisms and plot twists serving a modern narrative. Peaky Blinders is abandoned when a unionist appears demanding equal pay for men: the right isn't disputed, but presenting as normal something read as propaganda inserted in an era that wouldn't accept it is. Regarding Black Sails, the complaint is different and points to the ending, where the plot reveals the sensual orientation of several characters, leading some to interpret it as a rip-off after several seasons of pirate intrigue.

On the opposite side are recommendations defended despite that label. This Is Us, a 2016 series, is proposed with the caveat that one must overlook manual ingredients and keep what it does well: exalting family and, above all, the father figure.

Where Can You Watch the Recommended Series?

HBO is the answer when asked about The Sopranos' platform, and it is also home to Six Feet Under and Chernobyl. Those accumulating platforms without exclusives that interest them say they resort to P2P or direct download, and references to Movistar for short series, Disney Plus for This Is Us, and a hard-to-find classic slip into the conversation: The Singing Detective, a 1986 British six-episode miniseries starring Michael Gambon, little known in Spain.

The closing makes it clear with another recommendation: Shogun, a recent premiere, is described as brutal due to the cultural clash between Europeans and Japanese. Television hasn't stopped producing. What it doesn't produce, in the judgment of almost everyone, is another masterpiece that withstands comparison.