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Throughout its run, "Boardwalk Empire" won an armful of industry statues and remains a solid, effective and entertaining historical drama. That's why die-hard fans will consider this final farewell to Nucky and his band of politicos and thugs to be bittersweet indeed.

(HBO)



It's last call for the HBO Prohibition drama "Boardwalk Empire," which kicks off its last season with a svelte eight-episode run Sunday at 9 p.m.

The action jumps ahead seven years to 1931. Gone is the optimism and promise of the Roarin' Twenties as the Great Depression sets in. With the end of Prohibition looming, Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi) seeks to legitimize his operations while Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky work to change the face of organized crime in the country.

From the get-go, the ambitious series had big shoes to fill when it premiered in 2010. Executive-produced by Martin Scorsese, Mark Wahlberg and “Sopranos”-alum Terence Winter, “Empire” needed to be a hit out of the gate. The only bonafide hour-long scripted drama on the channel at the time was the campy vampire series “True Blood” and, to a certain extent, the laborious Mormon family soap opera “Big Love.”

Realists would assert any show on HBO post 2007 would ultimately be compared (some say unjustly) to benchmark dramas like “The Sopranos,” which helped put the cable network on the map and, to a smaller degree to “Six Feet Under” and “The Wire.” It was a trifecta of high artistic storytelling that provided the blueprint for what seemingly worked on the network .

While HBO had a slew of comedy series they were testing the waters with (“Hung,” “Eastbound & Down,” “How to Make it in America,” among others), such ill-fated and odd dramatic entrants like “In Treatment,” “Tell Me You Love Me,” “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” and the just plain weird “John from Cincinnati” didn’t connect. No one would argue they were surely lacking a powerhouse series.

What would work? Tommy guns and gangsters.

After all, what better way to erase the stink of cancelling such promising (yet expensive) critical darlings like “Deadwood” and “Rome” than serving up a chewy series set in the early days of Prohibition? It seemed like a no-brainer. Cast another “Sopranos”-alum (Buscemi) to the mix and most would agree, “What can go wrong?”

And for the most part, nothing did go wrong. “Boardwalk Empire” won an armful of industry statues and remains a solid, effective and entertaining historical drama. That’s why die-hard fans will consider this final farewell to Nucky and his band of politicos and thugs to be bittersweet indeed.

But still, why does a critical darling like “Boardwalk Empire” come off like the red-headed stepchild of the network?

BUSCEMI HIMSELF

Since its premiere, there was a constant debate (albeit, not from us) whether Steve Buscemi had the gravitas to be the leading man of a mainstream drama. Granted, the thesp has done as much as he could and then some as Nucky Thompson (based on the real-life racketeer Nucky Johnson) and has been justly rewarded.

There is a camp, however, that argues Buscemi just doesn't possess that innate magnetism of say, a James Gandolfini. As a result, many have played Monday morning casting agent: What if Gabriel Byrne played Nucky Thompson? What if Matt Dillon played Nucky Thompson? What if … You get the idea.

TOO MUCH THINKING

Did viewers not give "Empire" the fair shot it deserved? The show was never one to shy away from obscure literary references, important social issues and an extremely heavy-handed dose of political doublespeak on the municipal, state and national level. Was that why it left some fans cold? Was it too complex? Perhaps.

Hardcore fans of “The Sopranos” wouldn’t care about Nucky’s land deal to build a Parkway that led to the Queen of Resorts or Margaret Thompson’s interest in Planned Parenthood and her quest for improved women’s health and safety. Some complained there wasn’t a consistent number of gangland hits in between Nucky’s backroom deals. In the end, fans may have wanted a show solely centering on the lore of booze during Prohibition.

AWARDS AIN'T ENOUGH

While initially well-received with a cinematic-feeling premiere shot by Scorsese, "Empire" never really took flight the way the premium channel had initially expected. In addition to several technical awards and nominations, it won a respectable amount of marquee trophies including a Golden Globe for Best Drama, Best Actor (for leading man Buscemi) and an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor (Bobby Cannavale). Despite these kudos as well as an impeccable attention to period detail, mainstream audiences never considered it to be a watercooler event show.

THE 'THRONES' EFFECT

As soon as it was apparent that the fantasy epic series "Games of Thrones" (based on the wildly popular series of novels) was on target to become the biggest show in HBO history, some theorized that meant curtains for the network's other expensive costume drama.

WINTER MOVING ON?

Series creator and showrunner Terence Winter told former Star-Ledger TV critic Alan Sepinwall he knew last season that the show may be winding down. "Somewhere toward the middle of season 4, (writer/producer) Howard Korder and I looked at each other and I said, 'I feel like we're inadvertently winding down Nucky's story," he said. "...It wasn't our intention to end it this quickly, but it was certainly looking like that. The more we talked about it and the more we talked with HBO, we felt we were really getting towards the end here."

Add the fact that Winter is developing a new show for HBO set in the gritty world of music in the Big Apple circa the mid 1970s — starring “Empire” standout Bobby Cannavale — and it may have made moving on from “Empire” much easier.

THEY KILLED WHO?!

As fans of "The Walking Dead" and "Breaking Bad" will confirm, killing main characters has certainly become an all-too-vogue habit on scripted dramas of late.

when second lead Jimmy Darmody (West Orange’s Michael Pitt) was bumped off by Nucky himself, fans screamed bloody murder.

That said, when second lead Jimmy Darmody (West Orange's Michael Pitt) was bumped off by Nucky himself, fans screamed bloody murder. Pitt, much like David Caruso in season 1 of "NYPD Blue" smoldered in the role as Nucky's errant former right-hand man.

Some attest that the show lost something when Pitt left. Whatever the case, the dynamic the two characters was never duplicated no matter how well-written the show seemed.

I'd love to hear your theories about the end of the series below in the comments. Join me weekly as we discuss Nucky and his empire at our "Boardwalk Empire" blog page.

Anthony Venutolo may be reached at avenutolo@starledger.com. Follow him on Twitter @AnthonyVenutolo and Google+. Find NJ.com on Facebook.