OT: Let me ask our British posters a strange question

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by Caradhras

Hmm - I should really have thought about that theory - kind of a revisit to the War of Independence in Die Hard etc etc

You were reading my mind: I had John McLain firmly planted in my thoughts at that moment! Or the Dukes of Hazzard, or Sheriff Andy Taylor (Mayberry, North Carolina, police department, Andy Griffith Show). Just another way of reassuring the American viewing public that the average American Joe can outsmart or outfight any overeducated pretentious megavillain anyday!
Or, perhaps, from a BBC point of view, one gets a similar feeling from some of the later Blackadder series (Blackadder the Third, Blackadder goes Forth), where he, a lower-class character, constantly undermines the fatally flawed plans of his superiors, the Upperclass Twits-in-Command and their coat-tails-riding sycophantic toadies.