00:00The Death of Robin Hood.
00:01A brief history of the wicked and murderous bandit
00:04from your narrator, Hugh Jackman.
00:07In the earliest tellings, Robin Hood's
00:09portrayed as a famous cutthroat.
00:12In the 15th century ballad, A Jest of Robin Hoda,
00:15Robin tracks the Sheriff of Nottingham,
00:17fells him with an arrow, and takes his head with a sword.
00:21Yet from these grim beginnings emerged a hero.
00:24The romantic ideal of Robin Hood has long
00:26captured the public imagination.
00:28I steal from the rich and give to the needy.
00:31But in reality, life in the medieval ages
00:33was a brutal fight for survival.
00:37In The Death of Robin Hood, we meet Robin
00:39as an aging recluse in the throes of a life
00:42governed by fighting and stealing to survive.
00:45You are a murderous brigand.
00:47Nothing more.
00:48Now Robin is hunted as a pariah and outlaw.
00:52As he approaches death, he must make peace
00:54with the sins of his past.
00:58In the literary tradition, two key figures emerge.
01:02The Prioress.
01:03Stories of Robin Hood's death describe an ailing Robin
01:06betrayed by a wicked Prioress during a bloodletting.
01:09But what if the roles were reversed?
01:11Robin as the sadistic menace, and the Prioress
01:14his noble caregiver?
01:16You begged for me to let you die, and I did not.
01:20Little John.
01:21Known as the gentle sidekick, Little John
01:23has a new identity obscuring his dark past.
01:27But what does a lifetime of brigandry cost?
01:31It will be a mighty battle, Robin.
01:34In the end, the stories of Robin Hood are just that, stories.
01:38And I've seen the power in stories.
01:41They can be used to make men do terrible things.
01:47In this interpretation of the outlaw Robin Hood,
01:50the fables we've come to know left bloodied
01:52and thrashing in the mud.
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