Compare this woman to the one who was hauled out of Regina's House of Dolls...
If you were referring to Violet Biggs viciously fighting the cops, yeah, that was one "fun and exciting" scene. It's implied that crime is through the roof in Pottersville (George's mother in the Bailey Boarding House barely opens the door, as if afraid of a home invasion robbery) but the author conveniently doesn't bring that up.
Compare this woman to the one who was hauled out of Regina's House of Dolls...
Wendell Whatsisname completely misses the point. Pottersville was everything George Bailey wanted -- it was exciting, foreign, full of color. Thanks to Clarence, George finally got away from it all -- the Building & Loan (disbanded), the junky old car (vanished), the noisy, annoying, constantly-sick kids (never born), the leaky-roofed, drafty old house (never his home) -- everything in miserable old Bedford Falls. He even got away from that wife (now an old maid) and all her nagging about "torturing the children".
And let's not even get started on that G--d--ned newel post.
Yes, God gave George Bailey his heart's desire -- freedom. And George discovered that he hated it.
The point of It's a Wonderful Life has nothing to do with failure, depression, or dreams deferred. The point is that freedom is a false god. The message is that rational self-interest is neither, and that there is no virtue in selfishness. The moral of the story is that the only life worth living is a life lived for the sake of one's duty to God and one's neighbor. George Bailey's life was wonderful -- not in in spite of all his hardships, sacrifices, and dreams deferred, but because of them. By sacrificing all for the love of God and his neighbor, George Bailey unwittingly laid up for himself a treasure far beyond that of Henry F. Potter's wildest dreams -- a treasure in Heaven.
"Lay not up to yourselves treasures on earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up to yourselves treasures in heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also" [St Matt 6:19-21].
So let the corporations tumble and the banks fall. Atlas, shrug away! As long as we each of us love our neighbor as ourselves, and God above all, we have all the wealth we will ever need.
Here's to George Bailey -- the richest man in town.