Mostly Robin Hood
Well, last night's television wasn't what I expected. First, we watched a very special old Midsomer Murders - Judgement Day, the episode in which Orlando Bloom played the nasty young criminal who gets killed near the beginning (it was just after he signed up for LOTR but before he filmed it, so he looks rather young and sweet in it). I discovered that Tobias Menzies, whom you may know as one of the objects of my affections in Rome (he plays Brutus with a sort of youthful sweetness), is also in it - yay! I remembered whodunnit, but that didn't matter, it turned out - it was very entertaining.
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I was excited about the new Robin Hood - the BBC reportedly spent £8m on it, and it was all designed to sit in the Dr Who Saturday evening spot, and I was expecting entertainment. I even had some nice chocolate ice cream to eat with it, thinking I was in for a pleasant evening of TV.
Unfortunately, Robin Hood just isn't very good. Disappointingly so. I'm not sure exactly what they were going for - much of it was apparently done for laughs (all the stuff about food, most things Much said, the hammy sherriff), some I think was meant to look cool (the slowed-down fighting), some was clearly there for modern point of reference (Palestine), I think there was meant to be some morality in it, and I'm pretty sure there was a plan to make the inhabitants of the twelfth century seem like modern people (more precisely, teenagers).
The script was ridiculously bad - it came across as some sort of half-hearted school play most of the time. The scenes were short, the characters didn't sound like they were having realistic conversations, and the whole thing seemed rather pointless. There was a distinct lack of excitement, *funny* humour and anything resembling entertainment.
The acting was generally abysmal. I think in part this was due to the script, but they didn't really seem to be giving themselves over to their performances. Robin isn't bad-looking, but he seems too young to be a battle-hardened ex-Crusader, has little by way of charisma, and his motivation is very poorly sketched - at one point he really seemed to be struggling to come to a decision as to whether he should save the people of his village who were just about to be hanged (to the extent that they were hanging before he did anything about it, which he didn't seem to realise might have meant they were already dead[1]). Now, I've seen a few different versions of Robin Hood in my time (more on them as we go along), and I don't think any of them would have that much trouble deciding what was the best thing to do. One might at this point comment on the complexities of morality in a show such as Xena or Herc, the former of which in particular has been known to do ostensibly bad things for 'the greater good'. Robin Hood isn't approaching this kind of moral complexity - it's just badly scripted drivel.
Anyway, other characters. The Sherriff hammed up his role to an unusually hammy extent - squashing a budgie in his hand was the summit of his hammy excesses. I can't tell you how cringeworthy I found his dialogue and the (poor) sketching of his character - I *know* the Sherriff is often nicely done as a pantomime-ish baddie, and Alan Rickman exemplifies that more than anyone, but this performance was empty of charm, wit, humour or real nastiness. Rickman's Sherriff was played beautifully, I thought - completely over the top ("And call off Christmas!"), obsessed with his own position and utterly depraved but with a sort of fragility. Now, I know it's unlikely anyone will ever live up to that portrayal, but I was still hoping for something less hammy.
Right, anyway, as I said, other characters. Marian was OK - irredeemably modern, but then that rather matches the way she was played in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (though she reminded me more of Keira Kinightley's awful rendition of Guinevere in King Arthur). I liked the father of the young Scarlet brothers, and I *think* I may like Will, though he didn't get a chance to shine, but he *is* young and cute (not sure if he'll live up to Christian Slater's portrayal though - American, I admit, but good on the emotional side). I didn't like Much at all - the comedy fell flat, and while he's not exactly annoying, he just isn't very well drawn as a character. Alan a-Dale wasn't very good either - he just seemed like an uncharismatic chancer.
My biggest disappointment, however, came where I thought there might be hope. Now, I've never seen Richard Armitage act before, but he plays Guy of Gisburn in the new series. When he appeared, I thought he was very scrumptious, and dressed just how I like a man to dress - all in black, complete with gloves. And his hair and features all made me think he was going to be a very sexy character. Then he opened his mouth, and the flattest, most monotonous voice I've ever heard came out. He delivered every (badly scripted) line with all the panache of a baked potato. He reminded me of Clive Owen in King Arthur - I didn't think anyone could get more annoyingly drawly than that. But boy was I wrong. Sex appeal has more than one dimension - he looks the part, but the complete and utter lack of charisma renders him far less sexy than he could have been. When I think of the wonderful grating voice and sneering looks of Michael Wincott's Guy in RH:PoT, I feel dismayed that anyone could play the character so badly.
Speaking of voices, what was with all the northern accents. With the sole exception of the Sherriff, everyone was from one side of the Pennines or the other. Did someone move Nottingham Forest up north then? Hmm, strange. But for all the northernness, they didn't manage to use it to charming effect.
Now, onto plot and things. There were, I think, some good ideas going around. I particularly liked the idea of Robin picking up some weapons and fighting techniques from the Holy Land. I liked less the picking up of filming techniques from Hollywood - it's like the bit with the warrior monks in the Tooth and Claw episode of the last season of DW. Just wrong. But as I said, there were some good ideas. I liked that Robin brought all the people in to give them food. However, the context of all the talking about food seemed pointless and silly. Hmm... no, I can't think of anything else I liked. Apart from the set, which was good and not too far from authentic. But I think it was trying to be a modern, slightly Americanised, humorous, family-centred take on the Robin Hood myth, and I think that should have been good.
Perhaps the version of Robin Hood that could most be compared is the wonderful American series called The New Adventures of Robin Hood. In it, Robin was played by Matthew Poretta (who happened to play Will Scarlet in Men in Tights; it was awful when some other guy took over the role *sob*) - floppy haired, often serious but also nice, pains-takingly moral throughout and noble in a 90s American sort of way (much like Xena/Herc/Buffy/Angel actually). It was very American, completely anachronistic (there were potatoes!), playful (mud-wrestling girls), fantastic (spooky witches, demons, etc.), colourful (bright hats and dresses and banners), American-moral (peace-loving druids included) and generally a wonderful romp of a series. It was often light-hearted, modern, moralistic... infact, all the things I think the new BBC series wanted to be. And that was clearly on a budget of about $5 an episode, so I don't know what the BBC did with £8m...
I'll watch the rest of it, I suppose, but it doesn't seem as though I'm going to enjoy it very much :/
[1] Strangulation takes a while to kill (depending on how the noose is tied - sometimes I believe it can take hours), but breaking the neck (which commonly happens, especially if the tier of the noose is inexperienced, or kind) often results in instantaneous death. Sorry this is grizzly, but someone was bound to come along and point out that hanging victims don't tend to die immediately ;)
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After Robin Hood, obviously I needed a break - so disheartening. But there was a bit of Michael Palin on the Culture Show, and there was TOTP2, which I love - they played my favourite song, Everything I Do (accompanied by pictures from RH:PoT, ironically). And then there was Afterlife, which was spooky in an Exorcist kind of way this week. I've never seen The Exorcist, by the way, but from clips I think it's the sort of film I couldn't bear to sit through (nervous disposition!).
---
I was excited about the new Robin Hood - the BBC reportedly spent £8m on it, and it was all designed to sit in the Dr Who Saturday evening spot, and I was expecting entertainment. I even had some nice chocolate ice cream to eat with it, thinking I was in for a pleasant evening of TV.
Unfortunately, Robin Hood just isn't very good. Disappointingly so. I'm not sure exactly what they were going for - much of it was apparently done for laughs (all the stuff about food, most things Much said, the hammy sherriff), some I think was meant to look cool (the slowed-down fighting), some was clearly there for modern point of reference (Palestine), I think there was meant to be some morality in it, and I'm pretty sure there was a plan to make the inhabitants of the twelfth century seem like modern people (more precisely, teenagers).
The script was ridiculously bad - it came across as some sort of half-hearted school play most of the time. The scenes were short, the characters didn't sound like they were having realistic conversations, and the whole thing seemed rather pointless. There was a distinct lack of excitement, *funny* humour and anything resembling entertainment.
The acting was generally abysmal. I think in part this was due to the script, but they didn't really seem to be giving themselves over to their performances. Robin isn't bad-looking, but he seems too young to be a battle-hardened ex-Crusader, has little by way of charisma, and his motivation is very poorly sketched - at one point he really seemed to be struggling to come to a decision as to whether he should save the people of his village who were just about to be hanged (to the extent that they were hanging before he did anything about it, which he didn't seem to realise might have meant they were already dead[1]). Now, I've seen a few different versions of Robin Hood in my time (more on them as we go along), and I don't think any of them would have that much trouble deciding what was the best thing to do. One might at this point comment on the complexities of morality in a show such as Xena or Herc, the former of which in particular has been known to do ostensibly bad things for 'the greater good'. Robin Hood isn't approaching this kind of moral complexity - it's just badly scripted drivel.
Anyway, other characters. The Sherriff hammed up his role to an unusually hammy extent - squashing a budgie in his hand was the summit of his hammy excesses. I can't tell you how cringeworthy I found his dialogue and the (poor) sketching of his character - I *know* the Sherriff is often nicely done as a pantomime-ish baddie, and Alan Rickman exemplifies that more than anyone, but this performance was empty of charm, wit, humour or real nastiness. Rickman's Sherriff was played beautifully, I thought - completely over the top ("And call off Christmas!"), obsessed with his own position and utterly depraved but with a sort of fragility. Now, I know it's unlikely anyone will ever live up to that portrayal, but I was still hoping for something less hammy.
Right, anyway, as I said, other characters. Marian was OK - irredeemably modern, but then that rather matches the way she was played in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (though she reminded me more of Keira Kinightley's awful rendition of Guinevere in King Arthur). I liked the father of the young Scarlet brothers, and I *think* I may like Will, though he didn't get a chance to shine, but he *is* young and cute (not sure if he'll live up to Christian Slater's portrayal though - American, I admit, but good on the emotional side). I didn't like Much at all - the comedy fell flat, and while he's not exactly annoying, he just isn't very well drawn as a character. Alan a-Dale wasn't very good either - he just seemed like an uncharismatic chancer.
My biggest disappointment, however, came where I thought there might be hope. Now, I've never seen Richard Armitage act before, but he plays Guy of Gisburn in the new series. When he appeared, I thought he was very scrumptious, and dressed just how I like a man to dress - all in black, complete with gloves. And his hair and features all made me think he was going to be a very sexy character. Then he opened his mouth, and the flattest, most monotonous voice I've ever heard came out. He delivered every (badly scripted) line with all the panache of a baked potato. He reminded me of Clive Owen in King Arthur - I didn't think anyone could get more annoyingly drawly than that. But boy was I wrong. Sex appeal has more than one dimension - he looks the part, but the complete and utter lack of charisma renders him far less sexy than he could have been. When I think of the wonderful grating voice and sneering looks of Michael Wincott's Guy in RH:PoT, I feel dismayed that anyone could play the character so badly.
Speaking of voices, what was with all the northern accents. With the sole exception of the Sherriff, everyone was from one side of the Pennines or the other. Did someone move Nottingham Forest up north then? Hmm, strange. But for all the northernness, they didn't manage to use it to charming effect.
Now, onto plot and things. There were, I think, some good ideas going around. I particularly liked the idea of Robin picking up some weapons and fighting techniques from the Holy Land. I liked less the picking up of filming techniques from Hollywood - it's like the bit with the warrior monks in the Tooth and Claw episode of the last season of DW. Just wrong. But as I said, there were some good ideas. I liked that Robin brought all the people in to give them food. However, the context of all the talking about food seemed pointless and silly. Hmm... no, I can't think of anything else I liked. Apart from the set, which was good and not too far from authentic. But I think it was trying to be a modern, slightly Americanised, humorous, family-centred take on the Robin Hood myth, and I think that should have been good.
Perhaps the version of Robin Hood that could most be compared is the wonderful American series called The New Adventures of Robin Hood. In it, Robin was played by Matthew Poretta (who happened to play Will Scarlet in Men in Tights; it was awful when some other guy took over the role *sob*) - floppy haired, often serious but also nice, pains-takingly moral throughout and noble in a 90s American sort of way (much like Xena/Herc/Buffy/Angel actually). It was very American, completely anachronistic (there were potatoes!), playful (mud-wrestling girls), fantastic (spooky witches, demons, etc.), colourful (bright hats and dresses and banners), American-moral (peace-loving druids included) and generally a wonderful romp of a series. It was often light-hearted, modern, moralistic... infact, all the things I think the new BBC series wanted to be. And that was clearly on a budget of about $5 an episode, so I don't know what the BBC did with £8m...
I'll watch the rest of it, I suppose, but it doesn't seem as though I'm going to enjoy it very much :/
[1] Strangulation takes a while to kill (depending on how the noose is tied - sometimes I believe it can take hours), but breaking the neck (which commonly happens, especially if the tier of the noose is inexperienced, or kind) often results in instantaneous death. Sorry this is grizzly, but someone was bound to come along and point out that hanging victims don't tend to die immediately ;)
---
After Robin Hood, obviously I needed a break - so disheartening. But there was a bit of Michael Palin on the Culture Show, and there was TOTP2, which I love - they played my favourite song, Everything I Do (accompanied by pictures from RH:PoT, ironically). And then there was Afterlife, which was spooky in an Exorcist kind of way this week. I've never seen The Exorcist, by the way, but from clips I think it's the sort of film I couldn't bear to sit through (nervous disposition!).