Chase is possibly the only man in America who could get away with such a thing, and maybe he shouldn?t. While it is one thing to flout the conventions of television, it?s another to flip dramatic tradition, not to mention your audience, the bird. No, he didn?t owe us any neat endings, nor some sort of final word on the nature of good and evil. But after eight years, he did owe us catharsis, some sort of emotional experience that would, if not sum up the entire eight years, leave us with something more meaningful than instant panic and lingering irritation. In the end, the art of writing is the art of making choices. Ending a series with the social weight of ?The Sopranos? is not an enviable task, but end it must, and not with the sophomoric gesture of a blank screen.

Yes, people will be talking about the show tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, but they probably won?t be talking about Tony Soprano or any of the work the very fine cast of actors and writers has done over the years. They?ll be talking about how frustrating the blank screen was. In fear of tainting the legacy of ?The Sopranos? ? if Tony really was just one more truly bad man, some viewers would feel betrayed; if he went from antihero to hero, others would feel the same ? if he went from antihero to hero, others would feel the same -- Chase has offered us instead an epic novel with a do-it-yourself ending.

And, of course, the distinct possibility of "The Sopranos: The Movie."