This week in news headlines we never thought we’d write: British actor Benedict Cumberbatch, who you may remember from such films as The Imitation Game, The Hobbit and Atonement, fended off four men who allegedly tried to rob a Deliveroo cyclist in London.

According to reports out of the UK tonight, the men allegedly attacked the delivery man, even smashing a bottle over his head.

Cumberbatch was riding in an Uber with his wife Sophie Hunter on his way to a club at the time; he left the car and intervened.

Benedict Cumberbatch 2018
Benedict Cumberbatch

The Uber driver, 53-year-old Manuel Dias, told UK paper The Sun: “The cyclist was lucky, Benedict’s a hero […] My passenger jumped out, ran over and pulled the men away. They turned towards him and things look like they were getting worse, so I joined in.”

Dias told The Sun that it was only during the intervention that he realised who Cumberbatch was:

“Here was Sherlock Holmes fighting off four attackers just round the corner from Baker Street,” he said.

Actual footage of Cumberbatch walking toward the attackers*


*not really

Benedict Cumberbatch has come forward to confirm his involvement with perhaps the most valorous comment in the history of British gallantry. He was quoted in The Sun as saying: “I did it out of, well, I had to, you know.”

Police have confirmed they were called to an assault on a delivery rider.

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