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Niles Not Knowing What A Minivan Or Hatchback Were

posted 8 years ago by Rockhound6165
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This is something I find unbelievable. Niles and Frasier didn't grow up in opulence. It would seem they grew up in an upper middle class family. Martin is obviously very blue collar and their mother, although a research scientist, didn't make loads of money(I always had an issue on how Martin and Hester were able to afford Ivy League educations for their boys let alone Oxford & Cambridge). So, it's conceivable that Niles would have encountered a hatchback or 2 especially with the people Martin associated with.

[–] ClayGorgon 8 years ago

That I think is just an early running gag meant to show how the brothers are so above the mundane,and the common , spinning in some elite-circles that even the notion of knowing what a hatchback is, is above their comprehension.

[–] kds-lcos 8 years ago

I thought the same thing when it was mentioned that they had never ridden a bus.(Niles claimed that he had technically ridden in a bus during a benefit for city transit.)
Were the boys chauffeured to school every morning?

[–] Deenglow 8 years ago

This seems to happen in a lot of sitcoms. In Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, the rich and spoiled Jacqueline doesn't know how to open a car door even though it's established she grew up normally. On Cybill, it's established that Maryann got rich only after a blue-collar childhood and working hard to support her husband through medical school - though onscreen she is so spoiled and petted she doesn't know how to drain her own bathtub or what a bus is.

[–] First_Epistle_of_John 8 years ago

It's simply a good joke further cementing their characters as stuck up, lovable, yet helpless elitists.