Did Tony Soprano live or die? This is the burning question that fans of HBO's The Sopranos have been asking since the series finale aired back in 2007.

For those who watched that finale, the episode titled "Made in America," the final scene left this question unanswered, simply stopping the song playing in the background (Journey's "Don't Stop Believing") while fading to black.

Now, showrunner David Chase, who created the series, has opened up about that controversial and much-discussed scene.

In that last scene, most of Tony's allies have already been killed by a rival gang, and it's likely they're coming for Tony. Tony and Carmela meet at a diner, presumably to have dinner, while "Don't Stop Believing" plays in the background. Their son, A.J., joins them. Outside, their daughter, Meadow, parks her car. Then the bell over the diner's door rings, alerting Tony to the presence of someone. Is it Meadow? Is it someone coming to kill him (as suggested)?

We never see the person who enters the diner. We never see the full Soprano family together ever again. The song stops mid-lyric on "Don't stop" and then the screen goes black and stays there.

So does Tony live or die?

Chase goes through the scene over on the DGA website, taking us through each shot and what he was going for in each of those shots, and, at one point, we learn of Tony's fate, sort of.

"I'm not going to go into [if that's Tony's POV]," says Chase. "I thought the possibility would go through a lot of people's minds or maybe everybody's mind that he was killed. He might have gotten shot three years ago in that situation. But he didn't."

So there you have it, Tony didn't get shot, at least not there in the diner. However, Chase points out that whether this was the end of Tony or not, he will eventually meet his end, as everyone does. So to sum up, Tony survived that evening (and that was probably Meadow at the diner's door), but probably got killed later on by the rival gang because as Chase says "he put himself in that situation."

Did Chase have any idea how that final scene would go over with fans of The Sopranos? He says he had no idea it would become as controversial as it did.

"It was very simple and much more on the nose than people think," says Chase. "That's what I wanted people to believe. That life ends and death comes, but don't stop believing."

[Photo Credit: HBO]

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