Product: Robin of Sherwood: The Complete Collection (1983)
Rating: 4.0
Good series with a few problems.Horrible packaging
I avidly watched this series back in the day when it was on our local PBS station. The beautiful countryside and good sets that look as it did in the medievel age add to the stories. It was a good move to shoot in England. The color is sometime smeary and not clear but I can overlook that. The music is fantastic. I love Clannad.I have to agree with the reviews that say the packaging is horrible. The discs are almost impossible to remove. I immediately put them in other sleeves which leaves me with a nice looking but not functional case that I can't use. That is a big waste. Reviewers who say the legend says this and the legend says that are missing the point that it IS a legend and in the retelling it got more fantastic and farther away from any truth that may have been in the original stories. No one knows who this man or men really were and how many followed him and what exactly went on. Since we'll never know who he was if he had a lady, who his men were (if any) we can't say the characters are wrong the stories not following the "original" legend or anything like that. I give the producers and writers big points for showing the Norman nobility as uncaring conquerors who barely tolerated living amongst the English types, who rolled over the serfs and peasants like they were nothing, and easily killed anyone they liked for any reason they liked. The abuses are clear and they don't whitewash the "Great King" Richard but show him as a Norman conqueror who historically spent almost no time in England only spoke French and could not care less what happened to the people. Unlike other Robin Hood movies where he comes in on a white horse and saves them from the evil King John, in the end he stayed gone and died far away never thinking of his "people". The serfs live in squalor everyone gets dirty, betrayal and treachery are as they would be when people are so desperate and trying to survive. These people could not read, had little recreation, no education, lived in constant fear and turned to magical legends and pagan beliefs for hope when they felt totally helpless. These were dark ages and Robin Hood legends gave them secret hope and self respect. I was surprised at some of the writing of the episodes that didn't gloss over the hard way people lived in those days and how easily they could lose their lives due to someone's whim. It explains a lot about the British behavior toward people they conquered in later history. This series has a lot of drama taken from history which makes it even more interesting and makes me glad I did not live in days of old when knights were bold I promise ya!