ABSTRACT

This chapter provides that the moral code that The Sopranos and other antihero series both exploit and explore, and that Livia violates, is loyalty with those in one's own group. It delineates how this series induces sympathy with its antihero Tony. The chapter analyses why Livia is the antagonist in first season. It argues that Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents pressuring Adriana La Cerva to 'rat' on her mobster boyfriend Christopher Moltisanti also come off as antagonistic. The chapter presents Dr Jennifer Melfi's function as a meta-perspective on Tony throughout the series, and it argues that through this character, series engages in a self-aware commentary on engagement it entails. The chapter looks at the spectator's sympathy with Walter White in Breaking Bad to illustrate how other antihero series after The Sopranos carry forward the heritage from this ground-breaking study of sympathy with its morally dubious main character; once she has sided with someone, the spectator is a stubborn sympathizer.