Distressing soul merge

Ok, here’s my take on this.

There are 3 people here we have to account for – Joe Pendleton, Farnsworth, and Murdock - during the time that Joe inhabited their bodies.

Joe’s body is cremated after he supposedly dies so he needs another body in order for whatever essence Joe Pendleton has that is important to ‘fate’ to become boxing champ. After several rejections, Joe chooses Farnsworth’s body to try to resurrect his career as a boxer and in doing so meets Bette Logan. Note, he would never have met Bette Logan if he had chosen an earlier selection, rejected Farnsworth, or been able to return to his own body. Mr. Jordan obviously does not particularly know about Bette until after the Farnsworth incarnation, because if he did, wouldn’t he have directed Joe to Farnsworth immediately? So there is no particular future of Joe which had Bette in it, until that time. And in the last incarnation, he allows the new Joe and Bette to get together again. So, in an ideal world, he has already changed the ‘fate’ or ‘destiny’ of both Bette and Joe, while he (Jordan) focuses on the boxing champ aspect. Could Bette and Murdock have kids? Was Joe supposed to have kids? If so, wouldn’t these kids of the later marriage grow up totally different then those of Joe's possible original marriage? Or what of the difference between having kids and not, or the fate of Joe's possible original wife? Way too many questions, because the reality is (as shown in 'It's a Wonderful Life', we touch way too many other lives with our lives and that touching changes their lives)

Now I happen to believe that we as humans are the sum (at any particular time) of our past history, and how we have responded to events around us besides what we were born with – genes and experience, nature and nurture. We live, we grow, we learn, we meet, we remember, we forget. That is who we are. That’s why total amnesia is such a devastating complication. It wipes out almost everything that made who you are, what you are, along with all associations. No guarantee the new ‘you’ will ever pick up any of those again. But you still have the genetic material you were born with to pass along to your succeeding generations. That is still there.

So, what happened to Joe in the end, is that he has neither the memories of stored experience nor the genetic material he was born with. He is a different person, and no amount of minimal memory overlap will ever change that, since Mr. Jordan has erased most his memories. Note that neither Max nor Bette had their memories affected in the least. They are still who they were when they were born, but now with years of experience and memories to continue defining their persona. Not so with Joe. Only we (and poor Max, who no one will ever believe) the viewer have any idea who Joe was and all that he accomplished. Murdock with a few minor changes (which could happen to any of us with those so-called life changing events) is who he is now and will be until he dies.

Is that right or wrong? I can’t tell you because it is in general unanswerable. Only your individual feelings can provide an answer. I have enjoyed this version since I first saw it about 45+ years ago. But I do have my own personal feelings.