The 48 Laws of Power in the Sopranos: Law 1

hey sopranos fans and welcome to another episode here on bully whispers by viewer request we will be starting a series evaluating shows based on robert greene's 48 laws of power and in this episode we will be taking a look at the first law never outshine the master according to green this is the worst mistake you can make even if inadvertently with it becoming increasingly more important and difficult when dealing with masters who are insecure or have an enormous ego you answer me like i'm jesus christ himself and if you [ __ ] lie to me may your mother die i can't try the eyes unfortunately for everyone in the soprano crew both of their leaders they have to contend with throughout the show possess these traits so when evaluating how the first law plays out in the sopranos we will look not only at tony and junior's relationship but also how other aspects of the law are reflected in characters such as richie april johnny sack muscles marinara and jackie jr in further clarifying the first law green expresses that you should always make those above you feel comfortably superior and your desire to impress them do not go too far in displaying your talents or you might accomplish the opposite inspire fear and insecurity make your masters appear more brilliant than they are and you will attain the heights of power he then goes on to give examples of people who broke the law people who follow the law what keys to power can be learned and the reversal of the law all of which we will get into but the example he used for the breaking of the law was an interesting one when king louis xiv of france's prime minister died the financial minister nicholas phuket expected to be appointed as his replacement but when the position was abolished instead phuket decided to throw a lavish party at his grandiose estate in an attempt to get back in the king's good graces through this party phuket intended to showcase his good taste connections and popularity proving himself to be valuable to the king it did not go over well instead of being impressed the notoriously insecure king thought that phuket was flaunting his influence and wealth at his new home the next day he was arrested and ended up spending the rest of his life in prison while the insecurity of louis xiv opens up the evaluation of tony and junior's relationship which we will get back to in a bit let's first take a look at the more direct parallel richie showing tony his new house in this instance richie was intentionally doing what phuket inadvertently did rubbing his wealth in his boss's face without subtlety these wolves skim coat not that uh plain sheetrock [ __ ] not only that they've been alone this year's new did you put you online yeah around the time you put in that dance floor for your son to prance around on at least that's normally the type of sarcastic jab tony would have responded with your opponent is of choleric temper irritate him but he was feeling clammy and left shortly thereafter either way tony was never really threatened by richie so we don't see insecurities come into play here in the same way we do with king louis the better example of the first law when dealing with insecure leaders or in this case supposed leaders is junior from the pilot episode one of the first things we learn about junior is that he is very insecure and as a result it's always difficult to make him feel comfortably superior in the way that the first law dictates during the period when junior truly thought he was boss before finding out about the capos having their moms in green grove he demonstrates exactly how easy it is to outshine an insecure master despite tony trying to play up junior as the boss something as simple as asking tony's opinion on the upcoming federal indictments angered junior and disrupted his sense of status and what are we going to do close shot we can't do that tony what do you think what the [ __ ] you asking him for i'm just i just gave him the answer interestingly enough the person who did the best at making junior feel secure in his position of superiority was someone who was arguably above junior johnny sack while technically junior was the boss of a family and johnny sack was an underboss at this point i think it's fair to say and let me know if you disagree that the underboss of a new york family would carry more weight than the boss of a new jersey family so the general idea still applies this means despite not having to do so johnny goes out of his way to make junior feel like a true dawn do you think i got the balls to drive in from new york and tell your uncle how we should run his family i shouldn't expect to see the statue of liberty again if i did that and it works like a charm the example robert green gives as to someone following the first law is galileo rather than trying to gather bits of money and gifts from many different patrons as was the custom at the time he focused entirely on the medici family and the strategy worked the discoveries he attributed to them and the fashion in which he did so made them willing to become his sole sponsor sparing him the endless begging for support that his spears were subjected to we see something similar in a mafia context when richie april attempts to put all his eggs in one basket with junior i'm yours junior whatever whoever you just said which makes sense because junior does seem to have a genuine affection for richie you and your brother were always good boys but unlike galileo richie was unsuccessful for two main reasons first and most obviously he chose the wrong basket junior was never going to come out on top with tony but even still richie never suspected that junior would sell him out when you're lying in the street in a pool of your own blood don't say your uncle didn't try to tell you what are you talking about richie april is moving against you he assumed junior would be as loyal to him as he was to junior and as robert greene points out in the first law the master can be cold-blooded in their own quest for power which is a principle that will pop up again later in evaluating his historical examples green identifies several keys to power including two rules which must be understood one of which is to never assume just because the master loves you that you can do anything you want he tells the story of a japanese artist who was born a peasant but was loved by the emperor so much that he ended up becoming a trusted advisor with an apartment in the palace unfortunately for him he forgot that he wasn't actually nobility and proceeded to act as though he had earned that rank which ultimately cost him his life and how can this not bring to mind jackie jr jackie jr viewed himself as a noble because his father had been boss but in a mafia context he really wasn't because he himself was never made in reality he was just someone who was loved by royalty though not as much as he thought and proceeded to act as though his father was still alive and he was still the fresh prince of new jersey this unforgivable miscalculation of his own importance as robert greene would call it quickly cost jackie jr his life in his quest to rise up the mob ladder the other rule green points out is that it's possible to inadvertently outshine the master simply by being yourself which brings us to perry aka muscles marinara following his recovery from being shot tony is insecure and feels his men are second guessing him where they hadn't before he needs to show that he is not weak and to do so he decides to pick a fight but he has to choose the right target perry inadvertently outshined everyone in the room just by being in good shape so tony took the opportunity to beat him down for no real reason other than to secure his image as green pointed out masters are ruthless themselves when it comes to their own rise and maintaining of power and this brings us to the reversal of the first rule green points out that you can't worry about upsetting everyone but you must be selectively cruel if your superior is a falling star there is nothing to fear from outshining him do not be merciful your master had no such scruples in his own cold-blooded climb to the top which is where tony and junior's relationship comes back into play from the beginning of the series junior is a falling star the majority of the capos are on tony's side and as we see through flashbacks this dates back to when jackie senior was boss while it's understandable while tony was attempting to flatter junior at first since he wanted junior to be a lightning rod he violated this aspect of the first law after the attempted hit on his life at that point tony showed junior more mercy than he would have anyone else in that position but would he have if he had known about junior's own cold-blooded rise to the top which we now know included the murder of dickie multisanti my guess is no ironically enough he did handle junior correctly according to the first law after junior began to deteriorate mentally and it got him shot according to green if your superior is very weak just let nature take its course because you will look cruel if you pick on a feeble superior tony seems to be attempting to do this when he's taking care of junior towards the end of the series but it didn't work out well the last aspect of the reversal is if that your master is firm in their spot just be patient and eventually they will be weak it's at this point that i will bring up the popular fan theory that patsy parisi had tony killed at the end of the series just to say that if he did he was the perfect embodiment of this last aspect rather than shoot him on the spot when he was feeling the urge which would have been a certain death sentence he waited for years and by the end of the series if it was him that did it who would come back at him for it tony had very few allies left thanks for watching this episode of the 48 law series here on bully whispers since this is a new series and it hasn't settled into its final format yet if there's anything you'd like to see on future episodes please let me know as always like comment subscribe and i'll see you at the next score

Channel: Bully Whispers

Views: 84,855

Keywords: aj sopranos, carmela soprano, christopher moltisanti, furio sopranos, gloria trillo, hesh sopranos, james gandolfini, janice soprano, livia soprano, paulie walnuts, pine barrens, ralph cifaretto, ralphie sopranos, richie aprile sopranos, sopranos d girl, sopranos ending, sopranos pure kino, talking sopranos, perry annunziata, jackie jr

Id: I0IPqjs4rGs

Length: 9min 4sec (544 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 21 2022