Maid Marian and Her Merry Men: the Complete Series 1 [DVD] [1989]

The sudden rise in the release of DVD's from the late 80's / early 90's means that gaps in my tele-viewing can be filled in. This DVD is one of those gap filling masterpieces. As a fan of Tony Robinson in his many incarnations I looked forward immensely to finding out his take on Robin Hood, and believe me, I was not at all disappointed!!

The series is heavy on jokes, very heavy on slapstick and mud, slightly above average on plot and very short on sanity. In other words, it's great. Robinson's sheriff is evil and stupid enough to make it into Blackadder, King John is a riot and the band of Merry Men, well they almost defy description.

Kate Lonergan is superb as Maid Marian, and fits the bill being unconventionally pretty in an "Earth Mother" sort of way, showing the sort of common sense approach to life that any band of outlaws really need to survive when they're as big a bunch of idiots as she has got. Very very pretty too (Hope the missus doesn't read that bit). The yuppie Robin Hood is only one of a troop of incredibly dimwitted medieval types, including the guzzling Rabies (played by Howard Lew Lewis who later appeared in Robin Hood - Prince Of Thieves as Hal), the soon to be in red dwarf Barrington and Little Ron, surely the smallest man in Sherwood Forest.

The show is reminiscent of Blackadder and Monty Python, with some excellent songs, lots of mud and filth, enough double entendres to keep the grown-ups happy, and a tremendous ensemble performance from the whole cast. Robinson writes terrifically well, piling joke upon joke so that any that miss are soon forgotten, and he's not shy about making himself the butt of many of them.

My daughter Ruth, aged 11, also enjoyed it, showing that good humour works even 17 years later than it was written.

The package put together by Eureka is really well done too, 2 discs, with commentary on the first episode from Robinson, a Karaoke session, a quiz and a cartoon booklet written by Tony Robinson which makes as much sense as the series, and is almost as funny.

What is Kate Lonergan doing now I wonder.............

Maid Marian is, to put quite simply, THE greatest children's comedy ever in the history of TV. This is THE DVD event of 2006.

It is a Robin Hood parody which pre-dates Men in Tights and spoofs Robin of Sherwood, and to an extent, the Costner version as well.

It tells the story of Marian, a simple, yet brave young woman who ends up forming a band of Merry Men against the evil king John and the Sheriff of Nottingham. Robin had nothing to do with it, he was just a tailor from kensington who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Joined by a Rasta, a dwarf and a village idiot, they fight to free Worksop from Norman rule.

Tony Robinson, of Blackadder fame, wrote and starred in this comedy, which also stars Red Dwarf's Danny John-Jules as Barrington. It is a brilliant BBC comedy, I absolutely beg you to give it a viewing!

The extras make sure it goes beyond vanilla disks, by including a trailer, a quiz, a german version as well as an exclusive comic book drawn by Paul Cemmick.

Roll on Series two!!