Robin Hood with Richard Armitage is now on WETAUK - For Viewers in the Washington DC Area

If you are a new Richard Armitage fan and just discovered him in The Hobbit, and if you live in the Washington DC Metropolitan Area,  and have yet to see him as Guy of Gisborne on BBC's Robin Hood series, here is your chance.  

WETA UK just started to show the series on Sundays at 9:00pm, but it repeats again throughout the week at different times. Check below for the schedule:

http://www.weta.org/tv/program/robin-hood

Good for old (longer time fans) too.  I've been watching it on Saturday's at 11:00pm.  Yes, I do have all the DVD's, but there's still something about watching when I know others are that makes it different somehow.

I think I'm safe in saying that Guy remains one of the favorite Armitage character for many fans, and many discovered our Lovely Lad from Leicester in this role. 

So what is my Armitage Guy of Gisborne story you all are (NOT) asking yourselves? 

I had already discovered Richard in North & South in 2005, but I wasn't really active in the RA fandom. At the time I was fairly involved in the Sean Bean fandom and with work and personal responsibilities had little time to take on anything else.  But luckily for me, there were a few Bean fans, mainly in the UK, who had also begun to follow Richard and so I got my Armitage "Army" news second hand from them. They would post things on Facebook or even on the Bean forums sometimes.  

So I remember one of my fellow Bean fans posting about this new Robin Hood series with Richard as Guy.  Now I was fairly familiar with the Robin Hood legend, and a fan of Errol Flynn as Robin Hood and of the Michael Praed series (though I never liked Jason Connery as Robin - forgive me Jason). To me Gisbourne or Gisburne or Gisborne (all sorts of spellings) was an evil and despicable bad guy with no redeeming traits who was the enemy of our wonderful hero, handsome, brave, and charming Robin Hood.

I've never been so wrong in all my life! 

I clearly remember watching a preview of this new Robin Hood series on BBCAmerica and just for a second, there he was, Richard, in head to toe black leather. I recognized him immediately, by now I had also seen him in The Impressionists. I think we saw it in the US about a year after the UK, as that's the usual pattern with BBCA and PBS. I just knew this was going to be my "must watch" series that year...and a few years after too.

I'm curious that most of the promotion about this series from US networks, Cable or PBS, have sold it as the traditional story of the legendary Robin Hood.  This series to me takes the Robin Hood legend and satirizes it in a way.  If you read even a little about the series, it was meant for young audiences, but there's lots of contemporary references aimed at making adults laugh.  I think they're selling the series in the wrong way for US audiences, or any audience.

One thing the US PR for the series ignores is that the character of Robin is really not the most interesting character in the series. The most interesting character in the series, and the one that was really the star of the show, was Guy of Gisborne, played by Richard Armitage.  

and gorgeous, did I mention devastatingly gorgeous

*****

I'm also grateful to BBCA and the Robin Hood series for all the behind the scenes mini-interviews and still one of my favorite Armitage interviews of all time.  It was really that BBCA interview that started me thinking... 

Who is this adorable, intelligent, complicated, funny, sweet man? 

(Photos and screencaps for RichardArmitageNet.com)