Calling The Merchant of Venice a play about averted threats ending in happiness is a description that in some ways, but not all, sums up the play.

The main crises averted are, first, the threat that Portia might be married to a man she despises, and second, that Antonio will have to allow Shylock to cut a pound of flesh from his heart. In both cases, a heart would be cut out—Portia's metaphorically (by being denied marriage to the man she loves and respects) and Antonio's literally. Married to the wrong man, Portia would experience a form of death; Antonio would experience a literal death without his heart. The two crises, as we can see, are thematically linked.

Portia's is averted not through her agency, but through either good fortune or Bassanio's wisdom in selecting the correct casket. Her fate is caught up in a legal system that allows a father to sacrifice his daughter to his whims.

Antonio is also caught in a cruel legal system, dependent on Portia's mind and skills to set him free. Luckily, her skill as a lawyer and orator averts his crisis, even if she has to disguise herself as a man to be allowed to speak.

Shylock is not so lucky, as circumstances face him with crises he cannot avert, such as the elopement of his beloved daughter Jessica with a Christian man and the dire consequences of having gone to court confident he was in the right, only to have the tables turn on him. There is a happy ending for those in the dominant group in this society, but not for the Jewish man.