The part of the Christmas Past sequence in Dickens' book they usually skip past now, where Old Scrooge sees himself as a kid reading and actually physically sees all the fictional characters his younger self is imagining and starts squeeing like a fanboy

That still slaps

Including the extremely dark subtext of what is on the surface just a cute heartwarming scene

Young Scrooge was completely alone at that horrible boarding school, for all the formative years of his life

His *only meaningful role models* from that time are all fictional

And the unfortunate implications of who Scrooge ended up becoming

That because he was forced to live a life where all his emotional support and validation was internal, abstract, imaginary relationships he made up in his head

It set up that cute kid to evolve into Old Scrooge

That's what Scrooge is actually about, is someone who's become untethered from real life, from what actually matters

He lives in a world of abstractions, powered by his own imagination, and as his own power of imagination fails as he ages that world collapses into a black hole

The same superpower of imagination that allowed him to blot out his shitty school dorm and replace it with a world of fantasy adventure is the *same* power that lets him ignore a beautiful woman in love with him as being less real and relevant than a number on a bank statement

It feels... very, very relevant to a world that is increasingly mediated by technology and defined by fiction

*glances at wackjob Bitcoin fanboys and other get-rich-quick schemes' overlap with weird cloistered nerd culture*

But, you know, even dropping the political angle

That first scene tells you all you really need to know about who Scrooge is

Someone who spent his most vulnerable years developing a coping mechanism for being alone

"I'm fine, I don't need anyone, I can take care of myself"

And over time that shit if left unexamined and un-dealt-with mutates and festers

"I don't need anyone" becomes "I don't WANT anyone"

"I can take care of myself" becomes "I MUST take care of myself"

If I were gonna do my own modernized adaptation of the story I'd make Scrooge a Gen X latchkey kid from the '80s

One of those nerdy, lonely kids whose first love was his NES and his Apple IIc his neglectful parents got him to keep him out of their hair

I'd go meta with it, like he gets defensive when he sees Christmas Past has brought him back to his childhood home

"What do you think you're gonna show me? Mom and Dad never came home from the office, jocks shoved me into lockers at school, girls made fun of my braces?"

"I know that

I've dealt with it

I'm over it, it has nothing to do with me anymore"

And the Ghost just shrugs and says, "That's not your past, Ben, this is your past"

And just shows this time-lapse of Young Scrooge up till 2 am playing video games

I'd play it as wholesome and earnest as possible

Like he scoffs at first, but the Ghost blows up the screen, makes it fill his vision, and he can't help giving in

"Holy shit, I haven't even thought about this game in so long...

I hated this boss, he fucked me every time"

"Until I realized -- there's like this one moment where he blinks, that's when you can -- YES, YES -- "

"It took you two hours to actually beat this part, but once you figured it out -- "

"I wouldn't go to bed until I made it -- "

"Your heart was pounding, you were shaking"

"Because I felt like a genius, I felt like I was on top of the world -- "

"You smiled for the rest of the week, you couldn't wait to get home from school"

"I couldn't talk to anyone about it, everyone would've mocked the hell out of me, but it was... the happiest I'd ever been"

"Remember? It was echoing in your head even two years later, when you were failing out of Algebra 1

Your teachers told your parents to take you to a doctor, get you put on Ritalin"

"And I was terrified of it, and I told myself I didn't need any fucking pills"

"And the music was still playing in your head"

*tinny 8-bit music slowly turns into an orchestral score, pixelated image turns into a real fight scene with real actors*

"I didn't even think -- you're right, it was... that was what was in my head when I said it..."

"You've been saying it every time, any time someone tells you you can't do something"

"I would... I would feel like throwing up and I would dig my nails into my palm, and I would say

You can beat this

There's always a way

You're smarter than this fucking game"

"That's what you told them when you were featured in Forbes 30 Under 30, wasn't it?

You said it was your father who taught you that lesson, but -- "

"Dad never taught me shit, he didn't care

It was... it was here, in this musty basement

It was all here"

"Every day, you would come home from a school where your peers tormented you and your teachers held you in contempt, to an empty house with parents who didn't care about you"

"And I'd... I'd walk into a world that hated me and wanted me to fail

And I would beat it, and survive"

"I would go looking for enemies and challenges, daring the game to get harder and harder

Because I knew I was smarter than the game and there was nothing they threw at me I couldn't figure out

Every day I would come home, and I would win the war, and I would save the world"

*jump to 35-year-old Scrooge*

"Because that's the world we live in, Bella

Maybe your parents raised you differently, maybe they sheltered you from it

But it's a fucking war out there

Every day's a new crisis they throw at me and there's a million people hoping for me to fail"

"I do what I *have* to do to succeed

I'm only playing the game by the rules other people wrote, and if I happen to be smarter and better and clearer-headed about it than a hundred other people trying to be me, sucks to be them

I *will not* apologize for choosing to play to win"

Bella: "...And I'm just another obstacle to your success

Another one of those tests you think you need to pass

The hero of the story has to choose between his sentimental, wet blanket fiancee and his next great challenge on the way to conquering the world"

Ben: "That's not what I -- "

Bella: "Yes, it is, it is what you mean and you just haven't learned the game well enough to know it

I've seen the men you surround yourself with these days, you'll learn the trick in due time"

"In war you've got to protect your weakest flank, right? And what weaker spot does a man have than his heart

Well, I'm going to give you what no one else ever has, according to you

I'm gonna make it easy for you, you get to pass this test without trying"

*slips off ring*

"Congratulations, you get a free win, you get to focus on your next big project with undivided attention and no ball-and-chain dragging you down, and you don't even have to be the bad guy

You can tell everyone it's my fault, it'll just be another chapter in your story"

Old Scrooge, whispering: "Why are you showing me this? Do you actually think that's the connection -- she dumped me because I played video games when I was ten years old -- "

Christmas Past: "I don't make connections, I only observe them

Humans are the ones who connect things that shouldn't be connected"