Oh hell, let's gaze at Sean Bean again
Now reading the Sharpe novels...Sharpe as written is a much more sinister character than Sharpe on screen. Seems to me that Eoghan Harris (love those Celtic names) didn't have the heart to paint Sharpe as grim as Cornwell the novelist did. Although Sean Bean has no problem playing the street-fighting aspects of Sharpe. In one episode, he has been called out to fight a trumped up duel and, having tired of the snob conventions, forces his opponent to play by the rules of Sharpe, the bastard son of a prostitute who joined the army on the run from the law: which is to say, none. He kicks the guy in the crotch, crosses swords with him, lays him flat with a right to the jaw and prepares to spear him with his sword once he has him down. Envy, ambition and pride drive the novels' Richard Sharpe, and he is a stone killer on the field of battle. I will say that Sean Bean gets the working class hero/truculence part down cold, in great measure because of his native accent; he's got the ambition down too. The envy not so much, that part doesn't seem to have been written into the screen treatment.
Nice having K. at home again. I think I'm in love.