MacGyver is stuck in the attic of a house. Bad guys are coming up the stairs and about to bust into the room. The only way out is through a window, but it's a ways up, and angry Doberman Pinschers await below. MacGyver searches through the attic and grabs a bottle of cleaning fluid, mothballs, a telescope, a pulley, a rope, and a metal rod. He hastily assembles a rocket-propelled harpoon from the seemingly random materials, which he then uses to create a zip line to a tree outside. Just as the bad guys breach the room, he glides away to safety.

Awesome, right? This was just one of the many improvised gadgets and explosives MacGyver created during the 7-year run of the television series that bore his name. The show was so successful and memorable, that despite being canceled in 1992, it remains one of the most recognizable touchstones of popular culture and has even entered our lexicon; to jury-rig something using only the materials you have on hand is to "MacGyver" it.

The "MacGruber" SNL parody, which improbably became a full-length film, has lent MacGyver a cheesier and more satirical air in recent times, but there's still something about the character that strongly resonates. And that resonance actually goes a lot deeper than pop culture; it in fact points to an universal archetype of manliness, and a trait of masculinity that has been valued and celebrated across times and cultures: improvisation.