Class distinctions bolstered these portrayals of gullible rural folk and witless southerners. The critical consensus reads&colon; "Thoroughly witless and thuddingly unfunny, "Stop! Sukanya Verma of Rediff.com was largely dismissive of the "witless and flimsy" plot. The Royal College of Nursing however complained that it portrayed nurses as witless and callous. The dialogue is much dismissed because it seems to recommend clever evil over witless evil. "Stupid", "insulting" and "witless" also come to mind. The African was shocked and scared witless. At his mother's funeral, Nero was witless, speechless and rather scared. Boyle went on to land recurring roles in the television series "Breathless", "Frontier", and "Witless". Suddenly my own face, reflected, startles me witless. The Kaffirs were once described as a people 'steeped in opium and witless with drink'. In his "Essay on Criticism," Pope describes some critics of a witless nature. Laura Miller of Salon.com called "Spawn" "a witless exercise in reheating leftovers". In "The Case of the Witless Witness" he portrayed James Wall, a Congressional committee examiner. This failure ultimately leaves the detective a broken and witless old man.