I think it is supposed to IMPLY that Tony would be whacked, but did not actually show it in case they decided to somehow revive the series. Having to dismiss several seasons activities as someone’s dream ( TV show Dallas) tends to be somewhat awkward.
If you watch the final scene, you’ll see that every time the bell on the door rings when someone opens the door, Tony looks up, and we see the person entering the door from Tony’s point of view. After the “Members Only” guy comes out of the bathroom, we see that Carmella and Anthony are looking at their menus. The bell on the door rings, we see Tony look up, and then for his POV shot, we see nothing.
(I could be slightly off on the details–it’s been a while since I’ve seen the last episode.)
My vote is for one in the back of the head.
Wasn’t Meadow coming in through the door? So isn’t that why they looked up?
And I always understood the ending to mean that Tony would never know when or if someone might attempt to kill him.
I saw it in a different way, the camera changed to a point of view (IMO that was implied with all that talk of what one experiences when dying) and then darkness. What we saw was the POW of one of the two sitting at the table with Tony (A missed shot that was originally aimed at Tony or in a twist, the target was not him?) and we experienced his/her lights go out.
This of course does not deny the possibility that Tony was next getting shot, but I don’t think it was Tony experiencing that darkness as it was not his point of view.
I can see both of the two popular interpretations (Tony lives but always has to watch over his shoulder as well Tony gets shot), but I do think the thought of Tony getting shot makes a lot of sense. The only thing that doesn’t quite match is that the final shot is a third person perspective, but the show never really used first person, I suppose.
Nevertheless, it is a brilliant series ending, maybe the best I can think of on top of my head. I heard that Journey sang in a different context and I was like “what the hell? why am I getting goosebumps from this? oh yes, the Sopranos ending”.
The build up is there for a worthy “exit” for Tony. He’s with his family and he’s actually pretty happy. He’s looking up at the door whenever it chimes, but I think it’s more because he’s excited to see his daughter rather than he’s worried. At the same time, there’s a *strangeness *in the mood that only the viewer gets: how the Journey song dominates the soundtrack, how Tony, Carmela and AJ talk and behave and especially how uneasy we as viewers get from watching Meadow fail at parking correctly.
Read the whole interview and you’ll get a better idea of what he’s talking about. There have been times when successful artists gave their audience the finger, but it’s not common.
This is another good read, by the way.
Chase also shot that possibility down. And considering almost all the major characters were dead by the end of the series, it would have been weird.
Also, we’re leaving out the fact that Chase has gone on record as saying that there’s pretty much a snowball’s chance of there ever being a Sopranos movie, but he has also said in the same breath that, were an idea irresistibly good enough to pop into his head, he wouldn’t turn his nose up at the prospect of getting it made (no cite, unfortunately; just going on memory here). Now, one can extrapolate from that statement what one will, but I personally am of the opinion that Chase views The Sopranos, as an entertainment, much in the same way Coppola view(s/ed) The Godfather story, e.g., stories inexorably about Tony Soprano/Michael Corleone. So, were he to actually make a Sopranos movie (quite unlikely, IMO), I don’t think it’d be about A.J. or Meadow or even Carmella. It would be about Tony, because the series was always about Tony (and, no, I don’t think he’d cop out and and make a Sopranos prequel; Chase may be accused of being many things, but George Lucas isn’t one of 'em).
I think, after time has gone by, that it was a brilliant ending. We’re all still talking about it, right?
My question is, if Tony was whacked, what about the rest of the family? I think Carmela would turn bad-ass and organize some kind of war of retribution if they left her alive.
I think if they wacked Tony then the gunman would also take out the whole family. No sense in leaving a boss’s family alive as they would be a prime target for the Feds.
But do we see that “theme” in the series? Seems to me they pretty much left the families of the mobsters alone.
They being the other mobsters, to clarify my meaning.
I read an interview w/ Chase somewhere once where he said that the ending wasn’t that ambiguous and if you were paying attention to the clues that it was clear what happened in the end.
Why would you have to look for clues to know someone lived? I’d say the Bobby/Tony conversation and the Gerry hit were the two biggest clues, as others have mentioned, that Tony did get whacked in the end.
Why would a prequel be a copout?
HelloNinja–Hm. I am leaning towards that it was a death because of those conversations. But were there any other clues? Those are the only two I can think of.
Well… A lot of people got really deep into the meaning of certain things, especially in that final montage - but Chase has said that there wasn’t a lot of symbolism.
I don’t remember much of it but it was mostly funeral symbology that people were pointing out. The one I remember hearing people talk about was the way they ate their onion rings, taking them in their mouths like sacrament wafers.
Yeah, but then again those mobsters’ families weren’t standing watching as their loved ones got whacked either.
Oh yeah. I remember people talking about that. I don’t see how them eating the onion rings like wafers means anything in terms of the whacking, though. You could argue that either way, couldn’t you?
Personally, I think Tony was mauled and partially eaten by a tiger.
He was GGGGRRRREEEEAAAAATTTTT!!!
The really important question: did Tony die from overconsumption of “goobagloob”? 
I’ve never seen an episode of the Sopranos in my life (not meant dismissively or to say I won’t get around to it someday) and even I know what that famous final scene was all about: lights out for Tony.
Wasn’t AJ working at a movie-making operation owned by Little Carmine? I thought AJ probably let slip where his family was to have supper to Little Carmine or one of his boys, and that’s how the hit team knew where to go.
I think Meadow got into the restaurant just in time to see the rest of her family’s final seconds.