In this weeks Initiative blog, I’d like to talk about one of the greatest, if not the greatest, television shows of all time; The Sopranos. A show (which I have just begun to rewatch) follows a New Jersey mobster who has to see a psychiatrist due to having regular panic attacks. In this show we see the character of Tony Soprano dealing with depression and anxiety while he tries to balance his life with his family and his life with in his “family”, however, in doing so, the creator David Chase also presents the characters in the show as living in an age where technology and the internet have become common place, much to the dismay of the older generation, Tony’s generation. David Chase shows Tony in various scenarios as mad at the current world he is living in, in which he believes due to the internet his son and daughter barely interact face to face like in his generation (similar to the pre-modern society described in this weeks reading) and that he hates his son “laughing at his screen like a little girl.” He, and other characters in the show, also comment regularly on how the bombardment of media has made the next generation under an immense amount of pressure, which is further exemplified when Tony’s son attempts suicide, due to apparently becoming depressed concerning the war on terror and what he believes (due to constant research on the internet) impending doom. Thus the show often begs the question, was our society better off with face to face communication as the main former of society, or now with various forms of media.

The character of Christopher, who struggles to write a screenplay, also exemplifies the readings comment that we make media to do something, a reaction, whether big or small. This is the case as Christopher, who at the time of writing the screenplay was feeling that he was not getting the recognition he deserved as a mobster, feels that not only would writing a story about the mob loosely based on his exploits would give him more street cred, but also get him out of a life he does not feel very fulfilling.