It is well known that Tom Hagen is the greatest character in the GF Trilogy, so I have a few questions regarding the good man.

1. Is Tom aware of the hit on Fredo? I really don't think so as I can't see Tom going for it.

2. Why does Michael always treat him badly. In GFI he explains why Tom is no longer consiglieri but I don understand why he is very harsh in the way he tells him. Same applies in Part II at the end with the meeting with Neri and Rocco why is Michael like that with Tom? Where as near the beginning of the film he explains to Tom how much he loves and trusts him etc

Also I read that in Part III the original idea was to be a struggle against Tom and Michael, I'm glad this didn't happen as it would be a shame to see Tom get murdered.

Tom is a great character & I was bitterly disappointed he wasn’t in the GFIII. I’m so glad FFC left Tom's affair out because it did nothing but bring the character down to someone the audience no longer respected & held so highly.

As Michael said Tom was only handling the family's legal affairs although one of the end scenes of the movie he is included in 'family business', you can only speculate but I believe Tom wasn’t told. There was no real need for him to know & letting him know could only have a negative effect. Of course he would have realized after the fact but we will never know as he wasn’t In GFIII.

- As for your 2nd Question, I too wonder that. I didnt really understand why Michael wanted to 'protect' Tom from certain things.

In answering a previous question I feel Tom was left out of the family business for the exact reason Michael said. He told Tom after he had been shot at "that is why you are the only one I can completly trust right now" If you remember Don Vito had said to Tom "I advised Michael on this decision" The Don knew Michael would run into trouble as he grew in power and by having Tom not involved in the family business, he could completly trust him in the event of an attack on Michael. Atleast thats what I got from it.

Personally I do believe Tom knew that Michael was going to have Fredo killed. When Michael comes back from Havana he asks Tom about Fredo and Tom avoids the question. That tells me that Tom knows Michael better than to believe he is only asking out of concern. Tom knows that Michael would never allow an act of betrayal to go by, no matter if it was Fredo, Carlo, etc. However I do believe that Tom was uneasy about the decision even if he knew it was the right one.

As far as Michael treating Tom badly. I don't think he was treating him badly when he told him he was out. He was blunt about the situation, but that's just Michael. Don Vito let him know that he never thought he was a bad consigliere. Michael wanted Tom to stay out of the business so he would have somone to trust as the others have mentioned. I also think Michael didn't want to risk losing Tom, hence kept him on the legit side of things for awhile.

In the end of the film when Michael questions Tom's loyalty; I believe that was just Michael being paranoid. His wife had just had an abortion w/o his knowledge and his own brother had betrayed him. I think that scene was put in to show that Michael was kinda losing it, questioning everyone he loved because everyone he had loved, had hurt him in one way or another.
Also it's been said that Al Neri was trying to take Tom's place, so he could have been feeding Michael information to place him in an unfavorable light.

Tom Hagen has always been my favorite Godfather character. He was a voice of reason and his absence in Godfather III makes me cringe.

Tom undoubtedly figured out that it would be only a matter of time before Michael had Fredo killed. Tom had been around long enough, and was smart enough, to know that Michael would never give a pass to an enemy. And let's remember that, just before Fredo got it, Michael reminded him of the above when he demanded that Hagen support him in the deaths of Roth and Pentangeli, despite Hagen's protestations.
As for Michael's relationship with Hagen: Tom was the Don's choice for consigliere, not Michael's. Sonny, not Michael, brought Tom home and treated him as his brother. I also believe that Michael may have blamed Hagen for Sonny's death, for Kay's abortion, and for the near-miss Michael had with five counts of perjury.

I disagree with this. Michael was smart enough to know that Sonny's temper was to blame for his death. Tom warned him not to leave, he tried to stop him, and sent the bodyguards after him. Sonny's temper was so bad, no one could have stopped him. Don Vito clinches it for me when he says that "I never believed you were a bad consigliere, I believed Sonny was a bad Don, rest in peace."

As far as Kay's abortion. Sure he might have wondered how Kay got out to see an abortionist, but I don't believe he blamed Tom. Where do we see that? He doesn't kick him out of his life as he does to Kay. If he believed these things were Tom's fault, I don't believe he would have ever kept him around.

Michael (on Vito's advice) removed Tom as consigliere for the main purpose of insulating him legally and in terms of repspnsibility from what the Corleone family was about to do (i.e. wipe out the heads of the Five Families).

Michael and Vito knew if Tom were still part of the family hierarchy when he five family heads were wiped out, he would share reponsibiliity in the eyes of the Feds and the other families, and would very likely end up in jail or dead , and therefore would be lost to the Corleone Family as a useful factor in the future. By removing Tom from the direct family business, Michael and Vito kept his hands clean and thus preserved him as a "emergency" option to take control if a crisis later removed Michael from power (as in the attempted hit at the Nevada lake house). This whole plan only works if Michael can be completely confident of TOm's loyalty, and toward the end of GFII he is starting to have his doubts.

GF III in my opinion was mainly intended to deal with the final showdown betweeen TOm and Michael for control of the family in the 1960s and 70s.

EnzoBaker- I agree with everything you said, including the leadup to a confrontation between Tom and Michael in GFIII, I don't believe it would have been over control of the family though. Tom never would have tried to take control of the family from Michael. He might have disagreed with some of Michael's decisions, but he also disagreed with some of Don Vito and Sonny's. Tom was too loyal to betray the Corleone family.

if i relied on someone to watch over and protect my family, or anything i held dear to my heart, i would have very high expectations of that person. if i were michael i would most certainly be bitter against tom for kays abortion. michael loved that baby and wanted nothing to happen to it. he was so protective of the baby and kay that he would not even allow her to go out grocery shopping. tom manages to prevent kay from leaving the premises, on michaels orders, but how the hell does she manage to have an abortion under the supervision of tom. i see that as a huge fault. michael plainly states before he leaves that he is trusted tom with the lives of his family, HE FAILED in my eyes.
i always thought that michael was never fond of tom. although very subtle, when kay first meets the family at the wedding in GFI, he gives tom's background and says, "He's a good lawyer. Not a Sicilian, but -- I think he's gonna be consiglieri."
i interpret that as the first sign that michael was never really accepting of a non-sicilian so involved in the family business. then at the end of GFII, with all the brothers sitting aound the table getting ready for the B-day party, we see michael a little irritated with the fact that tom was planning out michael's future with his father.
TOM-Now you don't understand but, uh, your father has big plans for you. Now many times he and I have talked about your future.
MICHAEL-Talked to my father about my future? My future.
TOM-Mikey, he has high hopes for you.
MICHAEL-Well I have my own plans for my future.

i may be reading too far into this, but thats just what i think.

robert

do you own, or have you checked out THE GODFATHER TRILOGY BOOK that comes with the VHS version. if not, there is a outline map, drawn by FFC in the back of the book, of GFIII. from what i remember, according to the caption FFC did this whenever he made a film to help give him an outline of the movie he was going to direct. it also points out the note made by FFC on the top corner of the outline that hagan was to commit suicide during the film, or in the beginning of the film, but this was taken out due to the obvious reason that duvall was not in the final casting of GFIII. just some food for thought
robert

Sorry I disagree with you Robo, the scene early on in GFII where Michael puts Tom in charge tells us he really did think of Tom as a brother and he also says he has complete faith in him etc. What I could never understand was the last scene with Neri, but as someone has said I now think it was jsut to show michael was becoming very paranoid.

I wouldn't say Tom failed at all, he was not to blame for anything, he was being reasonable.

I'm really glad Robert Duval must have became greedy and wanted a lot of money for GFIII, as he saved himself from being in that not so good GF film. And as I've already said I wouldn't want to see him killed like Fredo and Sonny. He goes out with dignity.

please, dont be sorry to disagree.......to each his own
robert

This makes no sense to me. Why would they decide to have Michael's only voice of reason kill himself? Tom was always loyal to the Corleone family. Does anyone know if FFC ever commented on this note?

This is now going to drive me crazy to no end

dont go crazy until i can quote the book exactly, i am typing based on memory. i will post exactly what it says tomorrow, unless someone can help me out.
robert

ok, so the book actually says that along with the title change from "The Tragedy of Michael Corleone" to "The Godfather III", there were also some final chages made to the script, Joey Brasi was changed to Joey Zasa, and Tom Hagan never appeared in the movie.
And if you look up in FFC's outline he has, it's separated in 3 ACTS and within the first ACT FFC notes that Tom Hagan is shot to death, then we hear typing of a note, and the note! "Hagans suicide". and he also included the vatican in those as well. could've been interesting!!

robert

Thanks for the info. I hate the idea of it but is very interesting. Things like that I just ignore, it's not like it ever made it to the movie anyway. I just wish they had referred to him better in GF III. It's just like "Oh yeah Tom died." He wasn't a main character or anything.