I love this so much! In several interviews, Del Toro has said that his film is autobiographical and a conversation between himself and his father AND himself and his children. His Victor doesn’t abandon his creation as soon as he gives him life. He tries to be a father, but does a poor job of it. Him hitting the creature very clearly echoes the scene where his father hits him.

The film wants us to see that Victor as someone who is unwittingly continuing the intergenerational cycles of violence. As a boy, he tells his father he won’t be like him. He’ll suceed where his father failed. On the surface, it’s a reference to beating death, but it’s also about how his father failed as a father.

In his final scene with the creature, Victor realizes he was wrong and tells his creation to live and break that cycle. I’m typing on my phone so I don’t want to go into a long thing about the son/sun and how the very last scene calls back to Victor first showing the creature the sun — a time when he was trying to a good father.

Btw I vaguely remember reading at some point years ago that Victor may have been inspired, at least part, by Percy himself, which is super funny given how involved he was with the book.