History Characters / BoardwalkEmpireThompsonFamily

** He's willing to give up everything he has to save the life of his nephew , William.
** Despite his problems with Eli Nucky is surprisngly quick to forgive him for his betrayal. If practically anybody else had plotted with his enemies behind his back Nucky would have murdered them without a second thought.

* FatalFlaw: Nucky has a tendency to take people for granted and has a fixation for professionalism - it includes both his close-ones and his business associates. He disengages emotionally from Margaret, Eli and Jimmy after a while. It also causes most of his problems with crime, since he's unwilling to throw anyone a bone and expects everyone to be as professional and unemotional as himself.

** Even worse is his monumental hypocrisy. Most people drawn against him do because he is not an example of the professionalism he demands from other people. Nucky not only [[ReallyGetsAround can't keep it in his pants]] (which is another fatal flaw of his in itself), he also becomes lovestruck with whatever woman catches his attention at the moment to the point of putting at risk his business and life itself, and the lives of those around him in turn. Worst of all is that when he is called on it, [[NeverMyFault he acts as if it is perfectly normal]] and the other person is overstepping his bounds (Eli), overreacting (Margaret), or at ''[[ValuesDissonance worse]]'' fault themselves for ''not'' being an open skirt chaser like Nucky (Rothstein).

* GondorCallsForAid: Asks for the support of his old associates in the upcoming war against Rosetti-Masseria, but he's considered a liability and only [[DragonWithAnAgenda Al-Capone]] and Chalky join his camp.

** Played best in his interactions with Eli, where he always commands him to toughen up and take responsibility, yet Nucky always denies any wrongdoing on his part, even when he knows that the person he is talking to also knows about them. Eli's HazyFeelTurn comes precisely after he points out how resentful Nucky is and how he can't let any slight go unpunished no matter how small or far away in time it is, yet he expects other people to forget his own slights to them right after handing them a wade of cash.

* KarmaHoudini: The show's plot could be summed as "watch Nucky Thompson weasel out of the problems he's getting into". [[spoiler: Subverted at the end of Season 5. He doesn't get out of his situation with Lucky Luciano, losing Atlantic City and all his power to him. And he gets killed by a ChekhovsGunman for making the choice to give [[RapeAsBackStory pre-teen Gillian over to the Commodore]], which began his rise to power.]]

* LousyLoversAreLosers: When he sleeps with Margaret, we only see him flopping around above her while [[LieBackAndThinkOfEngland she lays there immobile]] and it's apparent from the look on her face and her body language both during and after sex that she didn't enjoy it one bit.

** He ''is'' nice to constituents who he patronizes, but he's a pretty big jerk to Eddie. In "Family Limitations", Margaret asks Eddie if Nucky is nice to him. Eddie loyally responds that he is. (In the same episode, Nucky berated him first for not knocking loudly enough, then for knocking too loudly). In "Two Impostors" he realizes that he has known Eddie for years but never bothered to find out whether Eddie has any family (he is actually married and has two children) or where Eddie lives.

* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Inspired by the real historical figure Enoch "Nucky" Johnson, with the name changed so the writers have more leeway for telling his story. The character also seems to be [[AgeLift older]] than his real counterpart, who was 37 in 1920 - and his hands a lot bloodier.

** Just a few scenes after basically telling Margaret he'll make a HeelFaceTurn he tells Jimmy "You don't know me. I'm not seeking forgiveness". Right before shooting Jimmy in the head.

** Gone into more detail in the 5th season. In 1884, when Nucky was 12, he beat a disrespectful kid that made more money than he did working honestly. This attracted the attention of [[EvilMentor the Commodore]], who gave him a job as a hotel bellboy. There he saw a client murder a prostitute, but instead of bringing him to justice the Commodore and his sheriff "[[NoodleIncident solved the issue]]" in secret, so the incident wouldn't harm early Atlantic City's appeal as a tourist destination.

* BatmanGambit: Against Rothstein in "Margate Sands". Nucky has Doyle phone Rothstein and tell him that Nucky, now in the middle of a war against Gyp Rosetti, is running the biggest distillery of the US on behalf of the Secretary of the Treasury, Andrew Mellon. Rothstein catches the bait and phones Nucky to demand a 99% share of the distillery in return for convincing Masseria to withdraw his support from Rosetti and leave him hang, giving control of Atlantic City back to Nucky. Nucky accepts, and after he has Rosetti killed he rats out Rothstein to Mellon, who orders Rothstein's arrest.

* BewareTheNiceOnes: He can be a pretty nice guy, especially by the standards of the criminal underworld and is generally raid and reasonable. Just don't cross him, or you'll wind up with a bullet lodged in your head.
* BlingBlingBang: After his second assassination attempt Nucky starts to carry a revolver... covered in gold and ivory.
* CallingTheOldManOut: One of them in the Old Man's funeral, no less.

** His first wife, Mabel committed suicide before the story started.
** His mistress in season 3, Billie Kent is killed in an explosion meant to kill Nucky.
** His mistress in season 4, Sally Wheet is gunned down in Cuba by the army, while trying to perform a task for Nucky.

* AmbitionIsEvil: He always wants more, but it's downplayed during the present day, as he is not too greedy nor too amoral by the standards of the story. His backstory reveals that he wanted to get ahead, and in order to become sheriff, he delivered a 12 year old Gillian to the Commodore so he would rape her.

** [[spoiler: Subverted in "King of Norway", where it's revealed that he had a drunken affair with Sigrid, while away from June in Chicago. However, he feels horrible about it; not much later, when he thinks he's about to get killed, he mumbles: "I'm sorry, June". In the finale, Nucky advises him to try to make things up with June; we don't see the result.]]

* WomenAreWiser: She was much kinder and more level headed than her husband Ethan, and did all the work of trying to keep her family together.