do u guys think marty jr being The Way He Was (a stupid chud wimp) was a thing he inherited from george, artie etc and was essential to him at his core OR something that would change once marty altered his future by not crashing into the rolls royce, thus not being miserable and probs being a better father🤔🤔 like with more support would marty jr end up more like marty or is he just a loser forever
I have some thoughts about the relationship George McFly has with his dad, Arthur McFly. I'll put it under a cut because it's gonna get long. And I mean long.
Okay, while watching a playthrough of the BTTF game I noticed that George says this:
"Hey, sometimes you gotta go out on a limb for the ones you love, right? I wish MY dad had understood that."
I'm like, "Woah, what? What's his relationship with his father like???" So I head over to the wiki and find THIS:
"Here we see that Arthur is about as wimpy and spineless as George since he gives his son many pathetic reasons not to attend such as college being hard and his grades that he received in school. He even tells George that he will never succeed in life with his current grades and such which could be the primary reason why George becomes a pushover in the original 1985."
Furthermore, he's described to be "a dead ringer for 1955 George in looks, voice, and personality."
Obviously George doesn't (or didn't, since he's implied to be dead) have a very good relationship with his father. But what's really interesting about this is the fact that they're practically the same personality-wise. (They're both pathetic, pushovers, doormats, etc.) Do you think that George sort of resents himself for acting the way he does (or did, in the case of the new timeline)? Because he hurt others the way his dad hurt him, since his actions reflect his father's? God, that's sad to think about.
You would think, in the case of the original 1985, that he would actively try to stray away from being like his father, but obviously, he failed. This is true to real life generational trauma, in which you swear you will never end up like your parents, but you do anyway because the way they treat you and act sticks with you. Yeah, you get the point right?
George's dreams got shot down by his father, and in the original 1985, he didn't have the courage to stand up for himself. Arthur never stood up for him either; and George ends up just like him, albeit more passive... at least he lets Marty do whatever he wants for the most part. Speaking of which, I think Marty serves as an interesting parallel to George's relationship with Arthur, since Marty actually gains a lot of courage and confidence due to the fact that his father is a pushover. George loses more of his sense of self worth because of his dad, since he never believed in or helped him. As a result, he never tries to achieve his dreams and remains unmotivated.
Now let's switch gears to the new 1985. Because of Marty's help, George gains the courage to stand up to his bullies and thus, becomes a more confident person. He gets motivated to do better. I'd like to think that because of this, George also stands up to his dad as well, becoming more successful in the process. I think that he sort of wanted to stick it to his dad, to prove that he can be successful and that he could do anything he set his mind to. This probably pushes George to work harder, which ultimately pays off as seen in the ending of Back to the Future 1. He had achieved his dream as a writer and had a better life overall. However, it seems that George's success hadn't changed his father one bit, as seen in the clip I included above. Even though George ended up happier and wealthier, it didn't mend his relationship with his dad. I don't think Arthur is necessarily a bad person, but he could've definitely been a better father.
This is an almost tragic part of George's character, even in the fixed timeline. It demonstrates how you could be similar, yet so different from your parents. How the way they treat you impacts the way you act, depending on your circumstances and the way you view yourself. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this worthless ramble!!!
Arthur McFly was 16 then.<...> Arthur just felt bad for the boy (Emmett (9))and so he stuck around, they never had anything in common. He also stuck around because he felt like if he didn’t, Emmett would come up with an idea of how to overthrow the government."
