sometimes otherwise interminable facets of human nature in a classic, archetypal legend of a tale; but it also dives boldly, headfirst, right into the startlingly shocking cold waters of straight liberty and its millenia-long struggle against the cold-blooded force of tyranny.
The movie also makes no bones not only about the nature of coercive power, but about taxation itself. At one point Friar Tuck even calls Prince John’s taxes theft, just before duking it out with the big bad cop villain of the story:
And it’s also made clear in that scene and others, such as the one below, exactly what taxes do — they always hit the poor the hardest. For instance, poor little Skippy is just trying to enjoy a nice birthday, but the nasty ol’ Sheriff has to swoop in at that very same moment and garnish his newly acquired income.
Then, of course, Prince John locks everyone in prison for not being able to pay their absurdly exorbitant taxes, effectively creating one of the only police states I’ve ever seen in cartoon form.
Of course, there is hope! A certain private individual who is deft on his feet and a fine shot, as well as an expert at clever disguises, retrieves everyone’s wealth of his own initiative (with the assistance of others, of course), and saves the kingdom, creating an erstwhile 
state of peace and prosperity under the auspices of a paper tiger ruler until justice is finally truly restored at the end.
Property is returned, wrongs are righted, rights are respected, the lowly are uplifted, the tyrannical brought down, and a very foxy couple romp off to take care of some much-needed business…
I always wanted to be Robin Hood as a kid (for many of the same reasons that I wanted to be The Rescuers Down Under‘s Jake) — agile, debonair, quick-witted, sly, cunning, and nobody’s fool — rescuing everyone’s rightful possessions and shattering the shackles that bind them in slavery. Quite the fantastic role-model, if there ever was one.
It’s a fine childhood treatise — a great formative lesson for young people to get their minds around the real hard truth about reality in a very kid-friendly and light-hearted fashion.
May we hope to see more cartoons like that in our time.