Spoilers for the new A24 movie, The Death of Robin Hood, are ahead!
The Death of Robin Hood begins with Hugh Jackman’s titular character making it clear that Robin Hood does not protect the meek and “he was not a hero.” He maintains that the legends aren’t true throughout the movie too. Or at least he does until the end, when he flips his narrative and plays into the heroic stories, telling Margaret that he actually was good. So, why did he do a 180 on all this by the end of the movie that’s now available to stream with an HBO Max subscription? I asked Jackman, his co-star Jodie Comer and director Michael Sarnoski about it.
After I watched the well-reviewed Death of Robin Hood, the ending really stuck with me, because Robin really told Little John's daughter, Margaret, that they helped the meek. He’d backed away from this narrative all the way up to this point, and I wondered why he decided to lean into it now. According to Jackman, it was the best thing he could have done, and it helped highlight Robin’s realization that for all the pain and suffering to end, he needed to move on, and so did Margaret. The lie could help her do that:
I think he's someone who knows he's done a lot of bad things, and maybe did some good things, but on balance he thinks he did a lot of bad things. But that act of telling the lie at the end is one of the best things he does in his life. And knowing, because I think there's this expectation when I was reading it, I thought, ‘He's gonna get better, he's gonna get out there, they're gonna come and try to find her and the girl, and he's gonna kill them all. It's gonna be Robin Hood against all of them,’ and actually he realizes he has to go. He has to die for this all to stop, and also tell them this lie for the purpose of this young girl living, moving forward in her life.
When I asked Michael Sarnoski about the final moments of his project on the 2026 movie schedule, he said Robin’s choice to lie shows what he’s learned about using stories to help people. He explained that his time with Jodie Comer’s priestess taught him the power of stories, and how they can be “a tool of healing and to help people.” So, that’s how he uses the legend of Robin Hood. He wants to help Margaret remember her dad, Little John, in a loving way, as the director explained:
The story he tells is the original Robin/Little John story that, in his mind, he kind of knows is not true. But he realizes that there's something that can be used from that to sort of help this little girl understand her father and understand her world, so she's not traumatized by what she's experienced.
Everyone in The Death of Robin Hood goes through it in one way or another, with Robin Hood winding up in some very violent scenarios. Little John is part of that too, and by the end of the movie, when Robin has found a peaceful life away from his scary past and is lying on his deathbed, Margaret wonders what happened to him and her father.
As he’s dying, Robin leaves her with the nicer version of his story, the one where he was a hero. And ultimately that leaves her (and the audience) with a “sense of hope and opportunity to move forward,” as Jodie Comer, who plays Sister Brigid told me.
While lying is typically frowned upon, I agree with everyone here. Robin’s final lie does go against everything he’d said was true in the movie. However, it also leaves Margaret with a happier story to remember him and Little John by. And it's a story that will likely help her live a happier life. So, it makes sense why he did it, and I do see why Hugh Jackman told me it was “one of the best things [Robin] does in his life.”
