In the end, “The Sopranos” turned out to be just another gangster show, a seven-year, blood-and-guts “Goodfellas” soap opera.

Psychologically dark and complex, yes, but nothing we didn’t see in “One, or Two,” (which is how Tony’s crew labeled, with reverence, “The Godfather.”)

Funny, too, in a Joe Pesci kind of way.

But also predictable.

Because it constantly fell back on, rather than challenged, stereotypes, as TV almost always does. Let us count the ways: Italian men mostly as angry, semi-educated, gabagool-shoveling slobs. New Jersey mostly as an ugly industrial, tree-barren urban wasteland populated by angry, semi-educated gabagool-shoveling slobs. Italian wives as either fat or slender naggers, or beaten-down abuse victims, all happy to be bought off by cars, jewelry or Italianate living-room sets. Italian Rutgers students as cowardly bullies and drunken frat boys.

In “The Sopranos,” the Scorsese-variety low-brow mobsters like Paulie Walnuts were not much more than cartoon characters, unless they were a stab at the old-school Coppola-brand stand-up guys like Phil Leotardo, another stereotype. Vito was gay, so he had to be shown dancing in Brando-biker leathers, like one of the Village People.

This passes for groundbreaking genius?

Sorry. Galileo was a groundbreaking genius. David Chase is a TV writer. A very good one, but one who, like many, succumbs to the pressure of stereotyping his own kind to ensure commercial success.

The early promise of Chase’s show was it would be a metaphor for third- and fourth-generation assimilation into modern suburban life. The Great Wave Immigrants at 100.

The kids, once the silent junior partners in the family, are now overindulged and the center of all family life. The father, once unquestioned, no longer gets respect for free, if at all. The mother, once a head-down homemaker, wants more, but of what? American consumerism and pop culture have crushed traditional values.

The old ways are a wistful memory, replaced by a mishmashed family structure and the disappointment of failing to achieve a Hallmark-card home life. Life in America was supposed to be easier. Instead, this lifestyle has somehow led to incredibly corrosive stress.

“The Sopranos” seemed poised to tackle the themes of our Prozac nation.

That Chase, who grew up DeCesare, N.J., chose a gangster and his family as the vehicle was unfortunate. But predictable. Stereotypes always are more palatable to entertainment executives (those great underestimaters of public intelligence) than complex characters. From Amos ‘n’ Andy to Archie Bunker to Tony Soprano, stereotyping remains the staple of our pop culture, especially television.

This isn’t to say David Chase didn’t try to write a very honest, personal show on many levels. And he succeeded on many levels. He has said the manipulative-bordering-on-psychotic Livia was modeled after his own mother, and Chase himself wrestled with elements of A.J.’s whining depression while in college.

Still, the ambitious assimilation themes all but dissipated by mid-run. The scenes of Tony Soprano squirming as he tried to schmooze with neighbor-golfers at a backyard barbecue or rushing into his daughter’s choral recital still sweating from “work” were gone, replaced by more conventional mob “stuff.”

“The Sopranos” sold out.

This is not written lightly. This is written with some degree of pain. Because unlike the days of Amos ‘n’ Andy and early ethnic and racial stereotypes, the chief purveyors of these negative and in some cases destructive images come from within. In Italian-American circles, it has been done by the most talented directors, writers and actors. Coppola, Scorsese, DeNiro, Pacino. Pesci. Now DeCesare and Gandolfini.

Sacrilege? No, truth.

They have solidified the image of Italian-Americans as goons.

Over-emotional, anti-intellectual, hot-headed, stupid goons.

I was friends with Jim Gandolfini in college and, as a newspaper features editor, was invited to visit the set of “The Sopranos” before the first show was ever shown.

The scene being filmed was the backyard barbecue where Tony was clumsily trying to blend in with a WASP stockbroker and a doctor, who was also of Italian descent but more refined and softer than Tony. It was a great, nuanced scene. The WASP broker was oblivious to the way he was dismissing Tony. The doctor was at once trying to protect Tony and be a goomba, but not enough to alienate the WASP. And Tony was trying to be civil in the face of being looked down on, keeping a smoldering lid on his desire (and ability) to stuff the guy in the trunk of a car.

I sent Gandolfini a note later, congratulating him on the success of the show. I don’t remember exactly how it was worded, but there was a line about “making Italians proud.” But that was before the show took a severe stereotype downturn, and his character became just another gangster. Now I regret that line, because “The Sopranos” makes many Italians embarrassed, and is damaging to their image.

For those who don’t believe that, consider this story.

There was a kid in Summit, N.J., back in the ’60s and early ’70s named Tracy Morrow. He was an OK kid, a little mouthy, but just a regular kid. With braces. And a bicycle. And two parents. He lived in a mixed-race, solid middle-class neighborhood, next door or two from a no-nonsense town police sergeant named Lonnie Davis.

His parents passed away during junior high, and he moved off to Los Angeles to stay with an aunt. A few years later he joined the Army.

In between, he got involved with gangs and drugs and worked as a pimp, and latched on to rap music. His bio says all that. But it leaves out the 13 years in Summit, going to grade school and the junior high, playing on safe playgrounds, being a nice, regular middle-class kid in a nice town.

That wouldn’t fit the stereotype of who Tracy Morrow became.

Ice-T.

Too bad; his real story is actually more interesting than his invented one.

Just as the real story of American immigrant assimilation – Jewish, Italian, Hungarian, Indian, Mexican – is much more interesting and nuanced and complicated and deserves better than being illuminated in a gangster show.

But criminal stereotypes pay in American pop culture. And there is no shortage of writers and actors who will exploit that no matter how it hurts the overall image of their people or sets them back in the greater public’s mind.

Ralphie from “The Sopranos” had a word for it.

“Whoo-ores.”

Mark Di Ionno is a columnist for The Star-Ledger. He can be contacted at mdiionno@starledger.com.

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