"The Sopranos" creator may have accidentally revealed the fate of Tony Soprano during the closing moments of the popular HBO series.
For years, fans have debated over whether or not the mobster was killed in the final scene, which ends with a black screen after depicting Soprano and his family sitting in a restaurant.
Many believe this was symbolic of his death, and David Chase made comments that indicate this is the case during an interview published in the book, "The Soprano Sessions," according to the U.K's Independent.
During the exchange, co-author Alan Sepinwall spoke about the "end point" of the series.
"When you said there was an end point, you don't mean Tony at Holsten's, you just meant, 'I think I have two more years' worth of stories left in me,'" he said.
"Yes, I think I had that death scene around two years before the end," Chase replied. "Tony was going to get called to a meeting with Johnny Sack in Manhattan, and he was going to go back through the Lincoln Tunnel for this meeting, and it was going to go black there and you never saw him again as he was heading back, the theory being that something bad happens to him at the meeting. But we didn't do that."
Matt Zoller Seitz, co-author of the book, then pointed out that Chase had referred to the finale as a "death scene."
That caused a long silence in the interview before Chase said, "f*** you guys."
It's being taken as a pretty strong indicator by "Sopranos" fans that Tony was killed. Chase tried to back away from that later in the interview and said: "[The point was] that he could have been whacked in the diner. We all could be whacked in a diner. That was the point of the scene."
The show creator has just wrapped up work on the "The Sopranos" prequel, "The Many Saints of Newark," which was confirmed in 2018 and will be released on March 21, 2021.