This Film is about Personality Disorder not Alchoolism

Wade's brother described him perfectly as a man who lived on the edge of his emotions, with no sense of perspective. The point is, there was nothing in his life to give him any perspective - nothing to hope for in the future thanks to his divorce and dead-end job, and no fond memories of his past to look back onto thanks to his father.

I agree that Wade was mostly a sympathetic character. He wasn't a sadistic or cruel man like his father, he just didn't have the character or emotional resources to cope with the stress caused by his failed family life. Wade probably could have gone on functioning as an empty shell of a man indefinitely if he hadn't been pushed over the edge by his obsession with Twombly's death and the land deal conspiracy theories.

Even though Wade's brother himself believed in the conspiracy theory, he should have known better than to plant the notion in Wade's mind, given how Wade was already on the edge. Wade's own brother seemed too detached to even care about the consequences.

Wade's brother may have left but in no way did he escape. He was nearly as dysfunctional as Wade, just in different ways. He goaded Wayne to pursue that ridiculous assassination theory after Wade had decided to drop it. So he was just as "afflicted" as Wade even though it looked like he had it all together.

No he was just a mean drunk. And for an alcoholic, he wasn't even that mean either. Plenty of people are meaner than that without the aid of alcohol. And I also wasn't impressed with some of the "hardships" the kids faced. Chopping through ice to get to wood for instance is something I have actually done, in the middle of the night, when the power went out and we needed firewood to stay warm. The father in this story was clearly unpleasant and a jerk, but I believe the effect this had on the two sons was exaggerated and there was nothing he did that would have prevented them from growing up to be healthy, well-adjusted adults (i.e., I believe the kids should have been smart enough to see him as just a dumb, miserable drunk and not have taken the verbal abuse too personally). Today's pampered generation may see it differently but in my mind, he was bad but much less despicable than the so-called "men" who walk away from their children. In short, there wasn't a personality disorder there, just some meanness. There is currently a huge overuse of terms like "narcissist" and "sociopath". Trying to label people with personality disorders really absolves them of much of the responsibility for their bad (but not criminal) behavior. As I said, the real "narcissists" are those millions of men who impregnate women and then just walk away.