thesopranos
The Ultimate Series Finale Quiz
Can you remember how it all ended? ...With finale season underway, we're taking a look back at some of television's best show-stopping moments.
Can you remember Hunnicut's final message to Hawkeye on 'M*A*S*H'? Or what happened to the 'Seinfeld' gang?
Test your knowledge with our end-all series finale quiz.
TV Squad Ten: Signs your show has made it
The TV is a weird beast. Your show can have ridiculously high ratings, receive greater critical claim than the Mona Lisa and achieve a cult following not seen since the People's Temple, and the network can still pull the plug on you. TV Land doesn't work like Reality Land, if the Reality Land is in fact reality and not some bizarre reality land where meat-hungry producers are the gods of fate. TV has a different equation for success.
Here are the ten telltale signs that your new show will spend eternity shining in the pantheon of the cosmos and the rest of its life on Best Buy's DVD shelves.
50 Best TV Dramas Ever
It's not easy winnowing more than 50 years of small-screen gems into a list of 50.But AOL TV's picks of the top TV dramas include the most brilliant doctors and lawyers, the angst-iest teens, sci-fi series that transcend their genre molds, family dramas that both warm and break your heart, terrorist- and mobster-fighting heroes ... and a show that combined the best of family and gangster drama into one unforgettable series.
Click through to see all 50 of the best TV dramas of all time.
TV Squad Ten: Shows I'd like to see come back as a TV movie - VIDEOS

When TV shows have made the leap to the big screen, the results have not always been great, except when they keep the same cast and come up with a good story that builds on the series, like Sex and the City and Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan. The same is true of some TV movies that have built on a show's lingering appeal even after it's been canceled. James Garner came back for a couple of Rockford Files movies, for instance, and The Return of The Man from UNCLE with David McCallum and Robert Vaughn was excellent. Of course, it doesn't always work -- the Rhoda and Mary reunion was painful to watch -- but I'm still a fan of the follow-up TV movie.
Here's my ideas for ten TV shows I'd like to see as TV movies.
Eight of TV's weirdest dreams - VIDEOS
There is no better way to get inside a character's head (without resorting to charging up some power cutting tools and laying down some newspaper) than writing in a dream sequence. Some of them, however, try to explain too much or cover too much ground and end up becoming the kind of dreams that keeps our Paxil dosage high and GlaxoSmithKline's stock price higher.
These are those mindfreaks.
Best '90s TV Shows
We know, we know ... another "best of" list.But this isn't any old list – our Top 40 TV Shows of the '90s is just the first in a new series of countdowns in which we'll put our AOL Television seal of approval on the top 40 series of every decade.
Every other month we'll tackle another decade, going all the way back to the '50s, to recall the best comedies (hello 'Lucy'), the best prime-time soaps (do you remember who shot JR?), the best cop shows, animated series and groundbreaking TV shows.
So kick off 50 years of silver-screen bests with the greatest shows of the '90s, including everyone from 'Beavis,' 'Buffy' and 'Simpsons' to 'Freaks and Geeks' and teens on the 'Creek.'
Sick of the Super Bowl? Here's a sampler platter of what else you can watch
If you're like me (you have my deepest sympathy), you don't have a dog in this Sunday's hunt. Thanks to the Arizona Cardinals' first appearance this weekend, my hometown team, the New Orleans Saints, will now be one of only five left in the NFL that have never made a Super Bowl appearance. Three if you don't count the expansion clubs.
So if you're a Cardinals fan and don't have the stomach to endure their slow, agonizing and inevitable defeat at the hands of the Pittsburgh Steelers, here are some alternative shows you can watch instead of the Super Bowl.
Michael Pitt in talks for Boardwalk Empire
I'm crazy for HBO, and one of the shows I'm really looking forward to is Boardwalk Empire, a pilot executive produced by Martin Scorsese (who's also directing), Mark Wahlberg, Stephen Levinson, and Terence Winter (who's also penning the pilot).
Based on the Nelson Johnson book Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City, the project chronicles the 1920s origins of Atlantic City, New Jersey. From what I've read, it sounds like a mix of The Departed, The Sopranos and Goodfellas -- all favorites of mine. And the cast they've got lined up couldn't be better.
Steve Buscemi plays Nucky Johnson, a businessman who runs a liquor distribution ring at the beginning of Prohibition. Michael Pitt (pictured) is in negotiations to play Jimmy Darmody, a bright, young, ruthless WWI veteran who serves as a flunky for Nucky, but yearns for more power.
Why do series finales have to be so final?
Last week another terrific cable drama, The Shield, took its final bow in a series finale that still has fans talking. The talk is mostly about the last three minutes, which featured Vic Mackey's silent contemplation of the life he now leads after losing his friends, family and, some say, his freedom. Right before the screen went dark we saw Vic stride out of the cubicle that is now his home -- unsure of what his fate would be from now on.
Some fans of the series were unhappy with this ending, saying that there was no closure to the life that Vic had led over the last seven seasons. Some hearken the ending to the now-famous series finale of The Sopranos, which featured several seconds of nothingness before the credits rolled. This concept of not giving finality to a series finale is a new one for viewers to grasp onto. But, when you look at it further, it makes complete sense. Why should the lives of our favorite characters come to a complete ending when our own lives don't?
Matt Weiner of Mad Men: The TV Squad Interview
When Matt Weiner was a successful sitcom writer -- CBS's Becker -- he had this idea for another kind of show. He couldn't figure out how to pitch it, so he wrote a sample script. The Sopranos' creator David Chase read it and hired him. After copping a couple of Emmys for his work on that HBO drama, Weiner finally got his spec script sold. Now, Mad Men has earned 16 Emmy nominations and Matt Weiner is working on the second season of the show.Recently, for TV Week, I interviewed Matt about the Emmy nominations. Here are some other thoughts he shared with me about Mad Men:
TVS: What's the show all about to you?
Matt Weiner: A lot of the episodes are about "who am I." A lot of the shows are about what's embarrassing. A lot of it's about denial, about how we juggle our work and our private lives. A lot of the issues that came up in the early 1960s are really hitting us right now.
General Hospital snags a big cat
If there's one thing we can count on with General Hospital, it's the mob. Other soaps lean on corporate shenanigans, the fashion business, medical drama. GH used to be about the latter, but that was a long time ago. Now, the hospital storylines are thriving more on Night Shift, General Hospital's SoapNet spin-off. But on GH proper, the mother ship if you will, the main thrust remains Sonny, Jason, the Zaccharas and mob wars.They're bringing in a new actor to the scene, and he carries major TV mob credentials. Vincent Pastore is joining General Hospital as Maximus Giambetti, father of Sonny's two main bodyguards, Max and Milo. Vinny is best known as Sal "Big Pussy" Bonpenserio on HBO's The Sopranos. On GH, Maximus comes to Port Charles to see his boys, under the false assumption that Max and Milo are running the syndicate in town.
Huge payday for Sopranos actor
Some actors from The Sopranos have won awards, Emmys, Golden Globes, et. al. At least one has achieved another kind of infamy. Federico Castelluccio, who played the Italian hit man Furio, has sold a painting inspired by the show for $175,000. The image, a variation on the famous 15th century dual portrait, Duke and Duchess of Urbino, is called The Duke and Duchess of North Caldwell. That would be Tony and Carmela Soprano of Caldwell, New Jersey.Federico, who has no less that eight film roles to his credit for release this year, doesn't need to paint to pay the rent. He paints because he's an artist and -- clearly -- a good one. This original work was created after his appearance on the show. As Furio Giunta, the Italian made the mistake of becoming a wee bit too enamored with his boss's wife. Rather than stay in Jersey and potentially have an affair with Carmela, Furio returned to Italy and never came back -- as far as we know. David Chase may have a whole other story that was written and never filmed involving Furio. Chase is funny that way.
That Sopranos big screen movie? Fuggeddaboutit
Last week, the rumors about the Friends movie were shot down by Warners. Now, you can put The Sopranos feature in the dead zone, too. Who's the voice of authority with the lowdown on what's really going on in David Chase's fevered mind? A psychiatrist, of course. Okay, seriously, he's not a shrink, he just played one on The Sopranos. Director-actor Peter Bogdanovich was asked about a possible big-screen Sopranos and he said it's not going to happen.
"I spoke to David Chase a month ago, and he said no. He said he thought about it, and he can't figure out a way to do it. So I don't think it will ever happen. I don't think you can ever say never, but my hunch is it won't happen."
Bogdanovich should know. He played Dr. Melfi's psychiatrist, Dr. Elliot Kupferberg, and he spoke directly to Chase. No middle men, the big enchilada himself, the creator of The Sopranos himself, told it to him straight.
More info on Edie Falco's new Showtime series
Remember back in February when we told you that Edie Falco was signed for a new dark situation comedy from Showtime about a harried nurse? Well, they've started filming the show in New York and given it a tentative title, Nurse Jackie. What's more, the cast surrounding Edie includes some familiar faces.
Nurse Jackie will have a boyfriend and he will be played by Paul Schulze. The name may not be familiar, but the face sure is. Paul was Father Phil on The Sopranos, the priest who spent a lot of time with Carmella and had her thinking they were going to replay The Thornebirds.
On this Showtime series, he's Eddie and he works in the hospital in the pharmacy. That's important because reportedly Edie's character has a problem with drugs.
What's this, she's a female House? Could she be popping Vicodin as prodigiously as he does? Could anyone?
Tony Soprano's bloody costume auctioned for charity
Yesterday at Christie's in New York, Tony Soprano's costumes went up for auction. You not going to believe how much money a bloody wifebeater goes for these days. One fan of the show paid $43,750 for the outfit pictured to the right: a bloody tank, a stained button down shirt, and pants. The outfit was the one the Jersey mob boss wore when Uncle Junior mistakenly shot him. Also up for bid was a four-piece set containing boxers, a robe, a sleeveless undershirt, and a pair of slippers (a costume Gandolfini donned many times on the show). It took home $21,250. Another robe (the tan one with an "S" monogram that Gandolfini wore in the pilot) went for $13.750. Overall, the iconic mafia boss's clothes brought in over $185,000.
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