Not sure we need anymore It’s A Wonderful Life discourse but I’ve seen a couple of professional critics in my timeline completely misunderstanding the point of the film so I feel I must intervene for the sake of reason.

Yes, It’s A Wonderful Life ends with Potter getting away with stealing $8000 and with George still trapped in a town he wanted to leave.

But that’s kind of the point, once you realise the film is about depression, and how depression works.

Imagine you wrote down your life, with all the good things in the pro column and the bad things in the con column. When you have depression you only see the ‘con’ column. The 'pro' column is occluded.

That is the situation that George is in when he contemplates suicide. All that Clarence does when he intervenes is to enable George to see the ‘pro’ column again.

So he still has all the problems, regrets and fears that he had before. But now he is also aware that his life has made a difference, his life has been worthwhile and has been a life well-lived. People are better off with him than without him.