Anthony Soprano, Jr.

Anthony John Soprano Jr. is a fictional character on the HBO television series ''The Sopranos'', portrayed by Robert Iler. He is the son of Carmela and Tony Soprano and the younger brother of Meadow Soprano.

Biography

Anthony was born July 15, 1986, and is the younger child of Tony and Carmela Soprano. Unlike his older sister, AJ is a chronic underachiever with moderate self-esteem issues. During his high school years, he began developing a rebellious streak that leads him to crashing his mother's car, smoking marijuana at his own confirmation, getting drunk on stolen communion wine, vandalizing his school's swimming pool, and getting expelled from school after cheating on a test. As Tony and Carmela get to their wits end with his antics, they decide to send him to military school to teach him tough love and discipline, but after learning he gets panic attacks just like Tony, they decide to keep him in public school by sending him to another school, but keep a closer eye on him.

In the episode " D-Girl", after reading '' The Stranger'' and Friedrich Nietzsche, AJ states that " God is dead" and that he does not want to get confirmed. Despite his objections, he receives his confirmation. In the episode " Pie-O-My", he is heard listening to "The Gift That Keeps On Giving", a song about accepting the word of Satan, by Deicide, an anti-Christian Satanist death metal band that is named after deicide, the act of killing a god.

Despite all of his troubles, AJ is a spoiled child. In the episode " Two Tonys", it is revealed that Tony bought him an elaborate $5,000 drum set. Additionally, in the episode " All Happy Families...", Tony gets him an almost new Nissan Xterra as a "motivational tool". A.J. is excited about the SUV, however, he comments about the environmental impact of the car, and also states he may encounter social pressure from school friends to drive a different vehicle.

During the fifth season, A.J. shows an increasing amount of disrespect to his mother, presumably due to his parents' separation. He tends to relate better to his father, and ends up moving in with him during the separation. However, in the episode "Sentimental Education", A.J. and Tony get into a scuffle over A.J.'s lack of respect. A.J. soon decides he wants to move back in with his mother, threatening to call social services due to the ongoing "violence against children" present in his father's home. Carmela demands certain things from A.J. in return for allowing him to move back in (e.g., showing respect to his mother, not swearing, tending to schoolwork).

Frequently throughout the series, Tony and Carmela express concern about A.J.'s future. Tony has no desire to offer his son a position in the mafia. In the fifth season of the show, A.J. displays an unexpected interest in pursuing a career in event planning, but later derides his parents' mentions of it (e.g., in " Mr. & Mrs. John Sacrimoni Request...").

In " Full Leather Jacket", A.J. says that he wants to go to Harvard University or West Point for college. Tony dismisses the idea as unrealistic given A.J.'s poor academic performance. During Season 3, when Tony asks him about it at a family dinner, A.J. claims that he never said that, as he knows his grades wouldn't be good enough. Throughout Season 5, references are made to the unlikelihood of A.J.'s being admitted to a four-year university.

In Season 6A, A.J. admits to his parents that he has flunked out of the community college he was attending, a worrying parallel to Tony's own youth. After a senile Uncle Junior mistakes Tony as an intruder and shoots him, A.J. steals a large knife and goes to the institution where Junior is being held, in a futile effort to exact revenge for his father. He is arrested, but later released without charges thanks to his father's political connections. He delves deep into the New York City club scene and begins using cocaine.

After several days of Anthony's claiming to be searching for jobs on the Internet to no avail, Tony intervenes and arranges a construction job for his son. A.J. claims he cannot do it because he will be trying again for community college, but Tony says that is not a problem as many of the men who work in construction are high school and college students. A.J. is reluctant to accept the job because of the early hours and outdoor work, which makes Tony angry.

Tony grabs a football helmet and smashes the windshield of A.J.'s Nissan Xterra, warning A.J. not to test him. A.J. reluctantly works at the construction site where he meets Blanca Selgado, who he soon begins dating. Carmela disapproves of Blanca, who is Dominican, 10 years A.J.'s senior, and has a three-year-old son named Hector. Tony is more approving of the relationship, commenting that at least Blanca is Catholic (like the Sopranos).

In Season 6B, A.J. proposes to Blanca at a fancy restaurant dinner, telling her that he will own a couple of restaurants in a couple of years. However, Blanca soon gives the ring back and breaks up with him, leaving A.J. severely depressed. His father tries to cheer him up.

He quits his job and mopes about until his father forces him to attend a fraternity party with the college-age relatives of his fellow mafiosi. A.J. grudgingly attends, and soon starts to enjoy himself. Several of the boys run a sports betting operation at the college and after a night of drinking, they beat and torture a college student who neglected to pay them by pouring battery acid on his foot. A.J. joins in to help forget his relationship problems. Later, he joins his new friends as they physically harass other students on campus. Afterwards, A.J. is seen telling his psychiatrist that he is once again depressed about the world due to that incident.

This depression leads to a botched suicide attempt, wherein A.J. ties a cinder block to his leg with a too-long length of rope and attempts to drown himself in the pool at the Soprano home. His father hears his cries for help and dives into the pool to rescue him. He is then placed in psychiatric care facility, where he meets Rhiannon, an ex-girlfriend of his former friend Hernan. After Tony tells him that his uncle Bobby has been shot dead, A.J. begins to cry and complain about how Bobby's death negatively affects him. Tony loses patience with him, violently drags him out of his bed, slaps him around, and tells him to pack as the family leaves home quickly to elude a possible attack by the Lupertazzi family.

In the final episode, A.J. is in his Nissan Xterra with Rhiannon, his new girlfriend, and starts making out with her, but they both rush out of the vehicle when it catches fire due to A.J.'s parking it over a pile of leaves. After getting chewed out by Tony, A.J. decides to join the Army and begins vigorous training. This scares A.J.'s parents. Tony decides to sit down with A.J. and successfully talks him out of enlisting. Instead, Tony gets him a new BMW M3 and a job working for Little Carmine's film production company. The new job, paired with the possibility of opening his own nightclub, seems to alleviate A.J.'s depression. He is seen having dinner with his family at last.

In all seasons, A.J. is portrayed as a fan of heavy metal and nu metal, via product placements (shirts, coats, posters and stickers) of bands like Pantera, Nevermore, Mudvayne (whose concert he attends in the episode "All Happy Families"), Slipknot, Limp Bizkit, Coal Chamber, Marilyn Manson, Stuck Mojo, Machine Head, Soulfly and Fear Factory. By the end of the series, having grown more worldly and introspective, he discovers and begins analyzing the early work of Bob Dylan. Through various plot points and pieces of clothing, A.J. is identified as a fan of the New York Giants, New Jersey Devils and New York/New Jersey MetroStars.

Analysis

Critics have found A.J. Soprano to exhibit behavior resulting from a lack of parental discipline. For Television Without Pity, Kim Reed described Soprano as having a "lack of work ethic" due to "overly permissive parenting". Reed also observed in 2007: "...AJ has caught plenty of breaks in his life, starting with being born to rich parents who give him pretty much anything he wants."

Reviewing the season five episode " Two Tonys" in 2004, ''New York Times'' critic Alessandra Stanley also considered A.J. to be a product of "spoiling" by his parents and likened a scene of his with another popular drama of the time: "A. J.'s sullen hostility to his mother is a chilling N.J. version of ' The O.C.'"

References

External links

HBO Profile: Anthony Soprano Jr.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Soprano, Anthony Jr.
American male characters in television
Atheism in television
Fictional atheists and agnostics
Fictional attempted suicides
Fictional characters from New Jersey
Fictional cocaine users
Fictional players of American football
The Sopranos characters
Teenage characters in television
Television characters introduced in 1999
Fictional Italian people
Fictional Catholics