Author Hilary Kingsley described Clyde as someone who "has never accepted that black people have to tolerate prejudice without protest." She added that "Clyde has good reason to feel bitter, thanks to years of being harassed by the police. Yet he had never broken the law". She suggested that he was a character "who sometimes lacked sense.". Rupert Smith has classified Clyde as a "poster boy" the type of character whose principal purpose "seems to be to please the show's sizeable straight female and gay audience". Woodcock was a keen boxer, and this was utilised on-screen in 1991, when Clyde took up the sport. Smith has claimed that this gave the programme-makers the opportunity to allow Clyde to take his shirt off on-screen, which according to Smith, "he did at the drop of a hat".