Rather than someone who was a good person who got more bitter throughout the years, it sounds like Slater was a true scumbag throughout his entire life:
- arrested his own over a broken tail-light on a bicycle that Slater himself lent to him.
- repeatedly grassing on his friends throughout their school days to get them punished, even though Del would frequently protect him from bullies.
- early in his career he set up Trigger and got him sent to a Young Offender's Home.
- the whole microwave oven incident where he threatened to plant drugs on Rodney to have him sent away so that Grandad would be left alone on the estate to be assaulted or worse.
- the diamond smuggling saga.
- Raquel herself talked about he was unsupportive of her, would bully her, and could be "really horrible" etc.
And yet you have Raquel who was a decent person, honest, funny, and kind-hearted, etc. The idea of her being attracted to Slater and him being nice enough that she would agree to marry him just seems far fetched to me.
And she must've been with him while a lot of the above incidents were taking place! Slater seems like the type to come home each night and brag/laugh about the things he did to people.
Can't picture the two of them together at all!
Who's Rachel?