Amazon Prime criticized for streaming abridged ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’

Amazon Prime Video is facing backlash from viewers after streaming an abridged version of the holiday classic It’s a Wonderful Life that omits one of the film’s most critical sequences.

According to the New York Post, the shortened cut runs about 22 minutes less than the original 1946 release and removes the famed “Pottersville” segment — the pivotal scene in which protagonist George Bailey sees an alternate reality where he was never born. That sequence is widely regarded as the emotional and narrative core of the film.

Without it, viewers complained, the story becomes disjointed, showing Bailey contemplating suicide in one moment and suddenly rejoicing in the next, with little explanation for his transformation. Social media users criticized the edit as confusing, unnecessary, and disrespectful to the original work, particularly for first-time viewers.

The Post reported that the existence of the abridged version is tied to the film’s complicated copyright history. While It’s a Wonderful Life briefly fell into the public domain in the 1970s, rights to its underlying short story, The Greatest Gift, and its musical score were later enforced, limiting how the full film could be legally distributed.

Legal experts cited by the New York Post noted that the removed “Pottersville” sequence is the portion most directly adapted from the copyrighted source material, suggesting the edit may have been a legal workaround rather than a creative decision.

Amazon Prime Video reportedly hosts both the full and edited versions, but viewers said the platform does not clearly distinguish between them, leading many to unknowingly watch the shortened cut. Amazon has not yet issued a public response.