Tony Soprano didn't just walk into a psychiatrist's office in 1999; he dragged the entire medium of television with him. Before that, TV was mostly procedural, safe, and reset itself every week. Then came the heavy breathing, the gabagool, and the existential dread. Now, decades later, we’re all still chasing that high. You finish a rewatch—maybe for the fifth time—and the silence that follows the "Don't Stop Believin'" cut-to-black feels heavier than usual. You want more. But finding shows like The Sopranos isn't actually about finding more mobsters or guys in tracksuits.
It’s about the "Prestige TV" formula that David Chase perfected. It’s that specific blend of mundane family drama and high-stakes violence. It's the dream sequences that actually mean something instead of just being weird for the sake of it. Most people think they want more crime, but honestly? They usually just want a protagonist they can hate and love simultaneously.
The Succession Connection: Boardrooms as the New New Jersey
If you take the DNA of the Soprano family—the entitlement, the generational trauma, the way the kids are both victims and monsters—and move it to a Manhattan skyscraper, you get Succession. It’s probably the closest spiritual successor we have.
Logan Roy is Tony, just with a private jet instead of a pool in the backyard. Instead of physical hits, they use NDAs and hostile takeovers to bury people. Jesse Armstrong, the creator, famously used the Murdoch and Redstone families as blueprints, but the emotional core is pure Chase. You’ve got the eldest son who can’t live up to the father, the daughter trying to play the man’s game, and a level of cynicism that makes the North Jersey crew look like boy scouts.
The dialogue in Succession is faster, sure. It’s meaner in a "clever" way. But the feeling of being trapped in a cycle of family dysfunction is identical. You watch it and realize that whether you're fighting over a garbage route or a global media empire, the therapy sessions would look exactly the same.
Why Mad Men is the Only Real Answer
Most fans of the genre jump straight to Boardwalk Empire because of the Terence Winter connection. That makes sense. Winter wrote some of the best episodes of The Sopranos (including "Pine Barrens," the GOAT episode). But if you want the soul of the show, you go to Mad Men.
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Matthew Weiner was a writer on The Sopranos before he created the world of Don Draper. He learned the "show, don't tell" philosophy from David Chase. Mad Men isn't about advertising any more than The Sopranos is about the waste management business. Both shows are character studies of men who have everything they were told to want—the house, the car, the prestige—and yet they are fundamentally hollow.
- Don Draper: The quintessential anti-hero hiding a secret identity.
- The Pace: It's slow. Very slow. It lets the silence do the heavy lifting.
- The Humor: People forget how funny Tony Soprano was. Mad Men shares that dry, often cruel wit.
The "Family Business" Trope Beyond the Mafia
Let’s talk about The Bear. It sounds like a stretch, right? A show about a sandwich shop in Chicago? But listen. Carmy Berzatto is dealing with the exact same weight of "The Family" that Tony dealt with. It’s about the crushing pressure of inheritance.
The kitchen in The Bear is a war zone. The yelling, the flying pans, the frantic energy—it mirrors the backroom of the Bada Bing. It captures that specific Italian-American subculture of "love through aggression." When you look for shows like The Sopranos, you’re often looking for that feeling of a claustrophobic community where leaving isn't an option. The Bear nails that. It’s stressful. It’s loud. It’s brilliant.
Breaking Bad and the Myth of the "Cool" Criminal
We have to mention Walter White. But here is the thing: Breaking Bad is a thriller. The Sopranos is a psychological drama. Vince Gilligan famously said, "Without Tony Soprano, there would be no Walter White." That’s true. But the experience of watching them is different.
In Breaking Bad, the plot is a runaway train. You’re constantly wondering "How will he get out of this?" In The Sopranos, the plot often doesn't matter. Sometimes a character just disappears or an entire storyline goes nowhere because that’s how life works. If you loved the "chess match" aspect of Tony’s life, you’ll love Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. But if you loved the therapy scenes, Breaking Bad might feel a little too "action-packed" for you.
The Forgotten Masterpiece: The Shield
While HBO was doing its thing, FX produced The Shield. It’s often overlooked in the "Greatest of All Time" conversations because it looks a bit grittier and more "TV-ish" than the cinematic HBO style.
Vic Mackey is a corrupt cop who runs a Strike Team in LA. He’s a family man. He’s a murderer. He’s a hero. He’s a villain. The pilot episode ends with a moment so shocking it rivals anything Tony ever did. What makes it a great recommendation for Sopranos fans is the ending. No spoilers, but The Shield has what many consider the greatest series finale in the history of television. It’s a masterclass in consequences.
Beyond the American Suburbs: ZeroZeroZero and Gomorrah
If what you actually liked was the cold, hard reality of organized crime, stop watching American TV for a second.
Gomorrah (the Italian series, not the movie) is the most realistic portrayal of the mob ever put on screen. There is no glamour. No one looks cool in a suit. It’s just decay, concrete, and betrayal. It’s based on Roberto Saviano’s book, and the realism is so intense that Saviano has been under police protection for years.
Then there is ZeroZeroZero on Amazon Prime. It follows a single shipment of cocaine from the sellers (the Mexican cartels) to the brokers (an American shipping family) to the buyers (the 'Ndrangheta in Italy). It’s global. It’s cinematic. It shows the "business" side of crime with a clinical, almost terrifying precision.
The Psychological Depth of The Wire
You can’t talk about one without the other. It’s a law of the internet. The Wire is often cited as the only show better than The Sopranos. While Chase focused on the individual and the family, David Simon focused on the city of Baltimore as a whole.
It’s a different kind of "like." You don't get the same intimacy with one lead character. Instead, you get a sprawling look at how the institutions—the police, the unions, the schools, the media—all fail the individuals within them. It requires a lot of attention. You can’t look at your phone while watching The Wire. But the payoff is a level of world-building that makes the Soprano crew’s gripes about "the old neighborhood" feel like part of a much larger, much sadder story.
Nuance and the Anti-Hero Fatigue
Honestly, we’ve been flooded with anti-heroes for twenty years now. Everyone tried to make "The Next Tony." Most failed because they forgot Tony was actually funny and sometimes, frankly, a loser. Shows like Ray Donovan or Ozark are great, but they often lean too hard into the "darkness" and forget the humanity.
Ozark is fantastic for that feeling of being in too deep. Marty Byrde is essentially what would happen if Artie Bucco tried to run a cartel. It’s high tension, but it lacks the dream-like, surrealist quality that David Chase injected into his show.
Actionable Steps for Your Next Binge
If you are staring at your streaming queue wondering where to go next, don't just pick the first show with a gun in the thumbnail. Think about what specific part of the Sopranos itch you need to scratch.
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- For the Family Dysfunction: Start Succession. It’s the closest you’ll get to the feeling of "the kids are not alright."
- For the Psychological Character Study: Go with Mad Men. It’s the same DNA, just different clothes.
- For the Raw Crime Reality: Watch Gomorrah. It will ruin the "cool mobster" trope for you forever.
- For the Moral Decay: The Shield. It’s fast, it’s dirty, and it’s deeply brilliant.
- For the Modern Vibe: The Bear. It’s short episodes but carries that same heavy emotional weight.
Start with Mad Men if you want the art. Start with Succession if you want the drama. Start with Gomorrah if you want the truth. Television has changed a lot since Tony walked into Satriale’s, but the blueprints he left behind are everywhere if you know where to look. Each of these series takes a piece of that legacy and runs with it, proving that while there might never be another Sopranos, the Golden Age it started is far from over.