# What's your favorite Sopranos story arc? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 10, 2008, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630 "2008-12-10T22:51:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![descamisado](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@descamisado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/descamisado)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/41 "2008-12-11T23:56:14Z")
> [@River\_Hippie](#): > > What got me was that I thought he was going to at least show a little remorse at having to kill her but he had nothing but contempt as he did it. He was as cold blooded as any of the others when it came to business. Isn’t turning out to be a rat one of the worst things you can do. And a female rat at that. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/42 "2008-12-12T00:03:36Z")
> [@Erdosain](#): > > Also, Tony never does you a favor without getting something in return. If she had told him about the rape, and one of his guys killed the rapist, I imagine the Tony / Dr. Melfi breakup going a lot differently. He can hold the murder over her head, especially since she reported the rape to the cops. > > One of my favorite moment of the series is when Dr. Melfi is talking to her shrink about the rapist and she says, “just to know, that I could crush him, like a bug…” I really liked that moment. It wasn’t an obvious episode in any way. Of course we’re supposed to think Tony will crush him like a bug when Melfi tells–but then she doesn’t. But the fact that she obviously was entertaining the same fantasies as everyone who’s seen a mafia movie, and still doesn’t go through with it, is what made me really admire her as a character. Also liked that this wasn’t the last episode where the rape is mentioned. She mentions it in a couple of other episodes when she’s talking to Peter Bogdonavich in her own therapy sessions. It felt real–in real life, you don’t just get over [insert issue of the week] and then never discuss it…it has ramifications. She mentions how it affects the way she relates to her son and her husband and how she feels about it…not all the time, but it felt real. ---
**Author:** ![descamisado](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@descamisado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/descamisado)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/43 "2008-12-12T00:08:50Z")
Also, both The HBO Episode Guide and Wikipedia say she offers to give him a referral (although both have been known to be wrong on occasion and one could have copied from the other), with Melfi having realized not only that Tony might be beyond help, but that her sessions with him may actually have reinforced his sociopathic behavior. I remember it as he didn’t know why she was trying to refer him to somebody else and the conversation goes elsewhere. But maybe she did finally reach him and his conscience: Tony _did_ gallantly replace the torn page back into the magazine. 😃 > **[Jennifer Melfi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Melfi)** > > Jennifer Melfi is a fictional character on the HBO TV series The Sopranos. She is the psychiatrist of Mafia boss Tony Soprano. She is portrayed by Lorraine Bracco. > Melfi is an Italian-American, with her father's family hailing from Caserta. She is a graduate of Bard College and Tufts University School of Medicine and has an upscale lifestyle, living in a three-bedroom condominium in Essex Fells, New Jersey and shopping frequently at gourmet Italian shops (as revealed in "Meadowlands"). > At the s... [http://www.hbo.com/sopranos/episode/season6/episode85.shtml](http://www.hbo.com/sopranos/episode/season6/episode85.shtml). My favorite character and story arc was Cristofuh’s, especially as his dreams started to grow and then his life started unraveling. I thought it especially poignant that Tony – who loved him like a son – ended up killing him in an act of self-preservation. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/44 "2008-12-12T00:26:52Z")
> [@5-4-Fighting](#): > > Also, both The HBO Episode Guide and Wikipedia say she offers to give him a referral (although both have been known to be wrong on occasion and one could have copied from the other), with Melfi having realized not only that Tony might be beyond help, but that her sessions with him may actually have reinforced his sociopathic behavior. I remember it as he didn’t know why she was trying to refer him to somebody else and the conversation goes elsewhere. I don’t remember the referral…but apparently the way she handled it was wrong. I’m not a doctor, but my dad is, and he said you’re supposed to keep treating them until you know they’re safely with another doctor. They can decide to leave you at any time, but you can’t just leave them. You don’t just midway through a session say goodbye. ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/45 "2008-12-12T00:42:01Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > I don’t remember the referral…but apparently the way she handled it was wrong. I’m not a doctor, but my dad is, and he said you’re supposed to keep treating them until you know they’re safely with another doctor. They can decide to leave you at any time, but you can’t just leave them. You don’t just midway through a session say goodbye. I guess she could have at least offered a thoughtful explanation of why the therapy wasn’t working and why Tony should seek help somewhere else. She probably thought that Tony manipulated her into helping him develop his criminal skills and was too upset to give him the proper help. ---
**Author:** ![descamisado](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@descamisado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/descamisado)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/46 "2008-12-12T01:02:12Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > I don’t remember the referral…but apparently the way she handled it was wrong. I’m not a doctor, but my dad is, and he said you’re supposed to keep treating them until you know they’re safely with another doctor. They can decide to leave you at any time, but you can’t just leave them. You don’t just midway through a session say goodbye. I’m not saying she was right in the way she handled it, just that I remember her bringing up the referral and because other dramatilogicalistic things needed to happen in the scene, they moved on without resolving it. Tony also refused to accept that she was moving to end their relationship. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630/47 "2008-12-12T03:12:03Z")
Melfi did make some kind of referral - she said she’d recommend him to a different kind of therapist if he wanted, and maybe a few other things. I’m sure she violated medical ethics, but her therapist’s actions (while completely scummy) made her realize that her therapy with Tony was enabling his crimes and actually making him better at them. So continuing to treat him wouldn’t have been ethical either. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-your-favorite-sopranos-story-arc/476630.md?page=2)