Simon Pegg's 10 Best Roles

1. Dennis Doyle - Run Fat Boy Run

The World's End Simon Pegg
New Line Cinema

Simon Pegg's best characters tend to revolve around a clear set of rules; they have to be moderately pathetic, facing a seemingly insurmountable challenge, and persevere no matter what. With this method his many characters have earned our endearment.

Surprisingly, the clearest example of this method in action can be found in the little known 2007 film Run Fat Boy Run.

Simon Pegg plays designated loser Dennis Doyle who, after getting cold feet and leaving his pregnant fiance at the altar, has a change of heart 5 years too late and resolves to win her back. The only way to do this is, apparently, beating her arrogant new boyfriend in the London Marathon.

Despite this less than edifying start, the sheer effort Doyle puts into his transformation manages to earn our sympathies. By the time he's struggling to complete the marathon on a broken ankle, we're already cheering him on.

In all, Pegg's performance makes us feel for this deeply flawed character, a classic redemption tale assisted by liberal applications of a frying pan to the arse.

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My passion for all things Sci Fi goes back to my earliest days, when old VHS copies of Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet gripped my tiny mind with their big, noisy vehicles and terrifying puppets. I'd like to say my taste got more refined over the years, but between the Warhammer, Space Dandy and niche Star Wars EU books, perhaps it just got broader. I've enjoyed games of all calibre since I figured out that dice weren't just for eating, and have written prose ever since I was left unsupervised with some crayons next to a white wall. I got away with it by calling it "schoolwork" for as long as I could, and university helped me keep the charade going a while longer. Since my work began to get published, it's made all those long hours repainting the walls seem worth it.