It’s honestly just an aspect of it being from the 40’s that didn’t age well (the fact that so much of it aged well is a testament to how good it is).

You have so much objectively terrible shit happening because George wasn’t born, and then cut to Mary: oh no… she’s…. unmarried!

Sure, but the way it was handled was really clumsy.

Like if you swapped the genders and had a man act equally as over the top over not meeting his wife it’s clear how silly it would be. Realistically, if your spouse was suddenly never born you’d still have agency and a life. There just might be subtle things that show it’s not as happy as it could’ve been. Like you said, maybe being lonely. But you wouldn’t be as dramatic if it was a man, if that makes sense.

Especially since there’s no indication Mary would’ve been so spinsterish without George. If she was lonely or shy and George helped her grow as a person, that would’ve been interesting to show and justified the stark difference. If they previously showed how George specifically made her life better that would’ve helped, but instead it comes across as her life went downhill without a man. It basically boils down to “woman’s life was ruined because she didn’t get married and have kids”. Which was the culture at the time, I’m not necessarily judging them for that. It’s just funny to watch in 2024.

If you flip the script and pretend Mary was never born, George’s life would’ve been worse but not in this over-the-top dramatic way.

Not ever meeting the person you were meant to be with (assuming there’s one true love and all that) would affect both genders. But the extreme “life is horrible because you didn’t get married and have kids” is definitely a holdover from the culture for women at the time. Some of this is practical: women had less choices so the man you married made a bigger impact on your life, some of it is just cultural. Either way, it’s silly to watch in 2024.

(To be clear I’m not condemning the writers or anything, it was the culture at the time).