Why Robin Hood Will Never Be an American Superhero

No, not the (somewhat ironically named) trading app that unceremoniously plummeted to a 1-star rating this past week. Robin. Hood. The noble thief portrayed by an animated fox, Russell Crowe, and Kermit the Frog.

Although the modern legend of a 27-year-old hacker from Jackson, Mississippi who broke into the Hinds County Human Services Department and approved all pending food stamp requests turned out to be but a meme, this fake headline got me thinking nonetheless: Why do we tell kids the story of the “noble” Robin Hood when we would probably just arrest him in real life?

From children’s movies to television dramas, Robin Hood continues to appear in modern American media as some kind of hero figure — and yet, while we extol the righteous outlaw who fights oppression, resists the evil Sheriff, and redistributes wealth to society’s poorest, most Americans would have Robin Hood arrested if he were to appear in their own neighborhoods today. Why? Because unless you yourself are one of society’s poorest and most marginalized, the very presence of Robin Hood is symptomatic of an ailing society and an ominous portent of greater unrest to come.

As such, for Americans emerging from 2020 — a year featuring chasmic wealth gaps, grossly unchecked police brutality, and a precarious presidential election which threatened to rip the country apart at the seams — what are the lessons we were meant to have learned from a story like Robin Hood’s?

With origins in 12th-century English folklore, Robin Hood made his stateside debut in January 1938 as one of the DC universe’s first recurring characters, predating Superman’s introduction in June later that year as well as the first Marvel heroes who debuted in 1939. However, while his younger peers Superman, Batman, and Spiderman, along with their Marvel buddies Wonder Woman, Captain America, Iron Man, etc. all went on to achieve commercial and popular success as crime-fighting, all-American(?), aspirational superheroes (especially as blockbuster film franchises launched them from niche comic-book fandom into the mainstream consciousness), Robin Hood was doomed from the start to remain in the shadows of his more patriotic, better-financed counterparts. Here’s why:

The villains in “Robin Hood” are corrupt government institutions — not aliens, foreigners, or gangsters.

Most of America’s favorite contemporary movie superheroes (with the exception of the Black Panther) spend their time battling superhuman criminals, Earth-destroying aliens, or Russians who don’t defect to the United States. Usually working right alongside our friendly police force or as contract laborers for some other incompetent government agency with a strangely fat budget, these superheroes are allies to their government, warding off malicious, often-foreign dangers with their supernatural powers. In contrast, Robin Hood’s entire career consists of robbing government officials and giving back to the poor and powerless. His tale involves neither superpowers nor supervillains nor prodigious amounts of money/technology — just humans and their institutions. Which is a lot less sexy.

One could argue that challenging corrupt establishments that do not properly serve their society is considerably tougher and more valorous than punching imaginary villains in the face and throwing them in jail. But even in our fiction, where anything can happen, we shy away from stories of the former and glorify the latter. Maybe, we just want an easy escape, not to turn a mirror on the uncomfortable realities of life where there are no simple solutions. People are messy, sometimes cowardly, and resistant to change. They are divided. They are selfish, and they are proud. People fear lawlessness; they want to believe in a functional government; and sometimes, they want “peace” more than they want justice.

Thus, while Robin Hood may have been a hero for 12th-century English peasants being unfairly taxed by an unrightful king and bullied by their law enforcement officers, our great American democracy could never fall to such a state that would require returning to such primitive vigilante services! No chance!

Poor Robin, too, had no chance of roaring success and popularity.

In short, Robin Hood is the superhero every corrupted society needs, but will never be the one we want.