Originally Posted by
longer ron
As you say - not really a bad aircraft but it had the misfortune to be built to a bad specification.
I was wondering whether exactly a bad specification, or one that got overtaken by developments, so I looked to see who else was interested in turret fighters. I have found so far the Arado E.500, which was never built, the Arado 240, which seems to have been mostly used unarmed for reconnaissance, and the Northrop P-61 Black Widow, which was modestly successful. However, according to everyone's favourite source of dubious information, Wikipedia, the work which ended up as the P-61 began in response to a British request for a turret fighter, and the first P-61s to enter service did not have the turret fitted.
To be alone in serious interest in turret fighters suggests that the UK was either visionary or mistaken. Given that the Defiant seems to have been a pretty competent implementation of the idea, it looks like the idea was a mistake.