Trekkies of Crime

Tons of people love the Mafia (or think that they love the mafia—they love their idea of it, at any rate. In reality, it's a murderous, wholly negative organization). It has to be the most successful criminal organization in its ability to inspire fictionalized romance, despite its vicious reality. (Maybe The Departed and The Town helped beef the Boston mob up in that area, as well?)

For instance, few people are cultish followers of the Russian Mafia—Eastern Promises made that organization look fairly bleak, unless you don't consider naked knife fights at spas to be brutal and horrifying. But the Italian-American Mafia has the panache the customs to momentarily delude people into believing that they want to be in it.

The Godfather is the central cultural artifact in this obsession. Sure, there's Goodfellas and The Sopranos… and those are both important. But The Godfather really gave life to the whole construction of the mythology of mob life. This displeases a lot of people, although that's not necessarily The Godfather's fault. Nevertheless, the mafia's mythos soldiers on.

Cult Phenomenon

Why is this the case? Maybe it's because the mob, with its five storied families in New York, with its hierarchy, with its customs and codes, with its violent anecdotes and legends, has all the detail and mythology of Game of Thrones or Star Wars. At this point, thanks to the culture, it has its own universe, existing in both fictitious and real versions.

As with people who've memorized all the moons of Naboo and Endor and who know all the heirs to the House of Lannister, people who get deep into the Mafia's actual and fictitious history are probably doing it more for the fascination of the mythos—to lose themselves in an imagined world where the normal rules don't apply—than because they're aspiring to become actual criminals. It's a huge subculture.

You can see the evidence of that subculture and its relation to The Godfather all over the internet. Check out the Godfather Wiki for a good example. It gives you an in-depth survey of the mythology of the three movies, along with background from the books, conveying a sense of the vast scope of the world that Puzo, Coppola, and others managed to create.