I have raved about this series and consider it one of the best shows of 2024. What I found fascinating - and why I think other critics may well do so in the years to come - is look at all of the call backs to so many of the antihero led dramas during the Golden Age. Farrell was clearly channeling James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano in a way he really wasn't in the film and I saw at least three callbacks to The Sopranos in the series finale. (To state the most obvious the final scene between Miloti and Farrell is clearly a call back to Adriana's final moments in The Sopranos - though the ending is, if anything, worse for Sofia.) I also saw multiple parallels between the story and the saga of Breaking Bad, with Sofia taking a role not unlike Gus Fring. (The scene where she walks through the bodies of her family who she's all murdered parallels Gus's murder of the cartel during Salut - she even toasts them before she kills them.)

What was interesting for me was how much more sympathetic Oz was compared to so not only these antiheroes but also Vic Mackey and Marty Byrde. Oz is clearly a monster in a way they will never be, but for most of the series I found him more relatable - almost likable - compared to thos characters. In a sense the final scnee is tragic because in a very real sense he's finally achieved all he wanted - and the only way he can enjoy is part of his own delusion. Putting him in Arkham would be superfluous; he's already a prisoner of his own mind.

I wouldn't mind another series set in this universe - this show, along with Wandavision and the HBO version of Watchmen has done much to give weight to the argument that comic book stories are, by and large, better told in limited series than on the big screen. This may be more related to the Batman universe in this case, but the fact that the latter two were nominated for Emmys and won multiple awards - and the latter will almost certainly be a contender in the end-of-year awards not far down the road - is the best argument for it.