After 5 years of fighting in the crusades, Robin returns to England and leads a band of outlaws to outwit the Sheriff of Nottingham. Returning from five years of fighting in the crusades, Robin of Locksley and his manservant Much discover their beloved home under the rule of the dastardly Sheriff of Nottingham. To fight the tyranny, Robin becomes the leader of a band of outlaws with Will Scarlett, Allan A Dale, Royston White, Little John, and Djaq. Meanwhile, feisty Lady Marian inspires the love of both her childhood sweetheart Robin and the Sheriff's second-in-command Sir Guy of Gisborne. Later episodes find the addition of friends and foes such as Prince John, warrior monk Tuck, village girl Kate, Guy's sister Isabella, and mysterious Archer. Truly bad.. I have read somewhere that the old cast of Robin Hood with Michael Praed or Jason Connery wanted to make a comeback, why did this not happen, as this adaptation is very, very poor. <br/><br/>Please BBC look at the old cast and try and provide decent drama for a more intelligent audience, do not dumb down continually.<br/><br/>Where was the quality control with this series? The women in the programme look like something out of Footballers Wives… How much inappropriate make-up could you plaster on a face?<br/><br/>Watch this series and find out..<br/><br/>I would go so far as to say, I even preferred the Kevin Costner version, to this pile-of-pooh. When I saw that a new series of Robin Hood was coming to Prime TV, and that it was British, I found myself looking forward to seeing it, having fond memories of the 1980s series with its romance and mysticism.<br/><br/>The new series has disappointed me thus far (five episodes so far), despite having the Sheriff of Nottingham played by the deliciously OTT Keith Allen. Young Robin of Locksley (Jonas Armstrong), freshly returned from the Holy Land, looks as though he'd be more at home in Trainspotting than in Locksley Hall, his ancestral home just as well, really, since it's been commandeered by Sir Guy of Gisborne in his absence. Guy (Richard Armitage) is, despite being one of the baddies, by far most attractive thing in the show and he really can act.<br/><br/>Purely as an action adventure, it's not too bad, but there's a great deal in it to deplore.<br/><br/>The costuming, for a start. It's not as though, with the resources available to them, it would have been at all difficult to clothe the cast appropriately for England in the time of King Richard Coeur de Lion. But what do we get? Outlaws dressed like 21st-century street kids, complete with hooded jackets (and I could swear one of them was wearing a machine-sewn, knit-fabric tunic!), a Sheriff who dresses in what look like black polo jerseys and full-length coats with fur collars (a bit of bling and he could just about pass for a gangland pimp), and a Marian who looks as though she buys her clothes in some Seventies-revival boutique.<br/><br/>The dialogue is an uncomfortable mish-mash of stilted pseudo 'Olde Englishe' and gratingly modern expressions, and they've taken gross liberties with the story itself. Although I suppose it's possible that Friar Tuck might turn up at some stage in the proceedings, he's certainly missing so far. Little John seems to have been a victim of downsizing, and Marian comes across as the sort of sharp-tongued harridan who'd be more at home in Eastenders or Emmerdale. And I can't help but wonder why she spends so much time hanging around with the Sheriff and Sir Guy, rather than at home with her widowed father - especially as she (quite rightly!) despises both of them or even under the greenwood tree with Robin and the boys, as in tales of yore. The makers of the series really don't seem to have thought things through at all.<br/><br/>The legend of Robin Hood, with its romance and adventure, its chivalry and championing of the common man, has well and truly stood the test of centuries, but this latest retelling might just manage to sink it. Presumably its makers wanted to present the tales afresh for today's young television viewer by morphing it into some sort of post-modern grunge drama. Sadly, all they've achieved so far is a tale writ not only small, but with poor spelling and in an all-but-illegible scrawl.
Jashans replied
293 weeks ago