Watership Down, a novel by Richard Adams, has been a beloved story for decades. It features a group of rabbits who leave their home in search of a new one, when one of them has a vision of a great terror killing all of its inhabitants. The novel had themes of religion, oppression under government, and the acceptance of death. The world Richard Adams cultivated through the eyes of animals is one I hold close to my heart, and has earned itself many adaptations since it was published. It was originally published in 1972, and got its first movie in 1978, a series in 1999, and most recently another short series in 2018. The book itself is another can of worms in its complexity and symbolism, but for the sake of your sanity and time I will specifically be reviewing the 2018 series that was released on Netflix.
THIS REVIEW WILL HAVE MINOR SPOILERS! If you haven’t seen the series and you’re interested in checking it out, I suggest you do! I may be biased, but it is honestly my favorite of the adaptations in the aspects it explores compared to the 1978 movie. Please note that violence and religious imagery will be discussed in this review.
You have been warned.
The beginning of episode 1: “The Journey” demonstrates the rabbit’s interpretation of how animals came to be. We learn of Frith, a personification of the sun. Frith is a stand-in god for the rabbits, and El-Ahrairah is the prince of rabbits, also deemed “The Prince Of Thousand Enemies”, as the story explains why Frith made predators to kill El-Ahrairah’s many children. It’s a lot like how man made religions to explain the beginning of things like good and evil, to define moral and virtue. The rabbits live by the virtue: “Be cunning and full of tricks, and your people shall never be destroyed.” Don’t let the thousand catch you, run until your legs can’t carry you anymore.
The next scene opens with the classic introduction of two of our main protagonists: Hazel, and his little brother Fiver. Right off the bat, we can tell a lot of things about these rabbits just with visual cues alone:
In this episode we are also introduced to the fictional language Lapine by the usage of words like Owsla, and Warren. In the book, there are footnotes to define these words and the language is used more and more frequently once the reader becomes familiar with it, but of course for the sake of the series we mostly only see Lapine when there’s context clues to fill you in on what the words mean.
We learn that a Warren is what they call a large group of rabbits living together in a society, while an Owsla is essentially a sort of police force for the warren. We also learn that Fiver and Hazel, on account of being ‘Outskirters’ (Outcasts, rabbits not born of higher-status lineage) they are often mistreated by the members of the owsla. They are told what they can eat, insulted, pushed around. The Owsla get special privileges. I adore how this relationship is set up within the first twenty minutes of the episode, and it also gives us a look into how some other rabbit societies function in this world.
We are also briefly given glimpses of Hawkbit, Dandelion, Bluebell, Captain Holly, Bigwig, and Blackberry. We don’t know too much about them, but we can gauge a bit about their personalities from their interactions. In this adaptation, there is a noticeable lack of characters like Pipkin and Speedwell. Unfortunately, they were omitted from the narrative but I think it gives the series time to strengthen relationships with the cast that is present.
One of my absolute favorite scenes across all of the Watership Down media is when Hazel and Fiver are standing near a sign, the sun is setting, and an ominous score is playing in the background. The sign is for a home building project, but the rabbits can’t read the sign. We are already given a hint as to the 'danger’ Fiver saw in his dream from this sign, and as the two gaze off into the sun setting below the hills, Fiver remarks “Hazel, look. The hills, they are filled with blood.”
We see what Fiver sees, but Hazel does not. Nobody does. He tells Fiver it’s just the light of sunset. Fiver’s vision urges him to convince Hazel that they need to leave. Hazel agrees, forever loyal to his brother, and this kicks off the beginning of their shenanigans.
After they escape from Sandleford following a chase from the Owsla, our group ventures on until they are invited to a warren by a large rabbit named Cowslip. While Cowslip is seemingly friendly, Fiver senses he is not to be trusted. He wants nothing to do with this new warren, but the group is starving and exhausted. They have lost faith in Hazel and Fiver, and so the brothers are outvoted.
Of course, we are very quickly taught that we should always trust in Fiver’s intuition. The haunting scene where we realize that these rabbits do not believe in the cunning survival of El-arhairah, but the sacrifice of one's life by the will of Frith.
Fiver panics after remarking how the main entrance of the new warren, encompassed by the roots of a tree, are “Made of bones”. Fiver’s literal visual of spines replacing the roots of the tree make more sense when paired with the fact that Humans leave food out for these rabbits to consume, and later we made the horrible discovery that these humans also presumably leave out snares to capture the rabbits in. Snares are silver wire traps, and Bigwig gets caught in one after a confrontation with Hazel and Fiver outside of the warren. The group have to hurriedly seek help, and Cowslip tries to convince them that “Frith Has decided it is Bigwig’s time.”
Regardless of Cowslip’s strange ideologies, they dig Bigwig out and leave that warren for good. A pink rabbit named Strawberry accompanies them; she no longer wants to be a part of Cowslip’s warren.
Cowslip’s warren is effectively a cult that worships a false god. They lay down their lives and claim it is “Frith’s will” (AKA the natural order), but their deaths are directly caused by human actions. They believe that laying down their lives to the humans should be the way things are..
The episode concludes with the group finally reaching the hill Fiver dreamed of, but the story does not end here.
Captain Holly, the former leader of Sandleford’s Owsla, finds the group. He is gravely injured, and needs to rest. But, it’s clear that he’s been trailing the group for quite a while. Before we’re even told about what happened to Sandleford, we can tell something terrible happened.
Overall, this episode is an 8/10. Amazing visuals, voice acting, and introductory characterization. But, no Pipkin. :(
Onto Episode 2: “The Raid.” Captain Holly is finally awake, and ready to tell his story. Sandleford was destroyed by humans, and Holly was the only survivor. I am a little sad that they omitted most of the details of Holly’s journey from the book, and in the 1978 movie Holly finds the group after escaping from Efrafra. However, in the series Holly only encounters Blackavar, an escapee who tells him to leave this place as fast as he can, or else Efrafra will capture him.
The group also realizes they need more Does (female rabbits) if they want the warren to survive longterm. So, they embark on a mission to help a small group of hutch rabbits escape. As expected, the mission does not succeed and they are forced to come up with a new plan after the farm cat throws a wrench in their plans. A specific rabbit named Clover in the hutch becomes a main character in this adaptation, compared to the others. She is naive and hopeful, and she yearns for freedom outside of the box she is kept in.
Following the failed mission, the trio must devise a new plan to free the hutch rabbits. This time, however, they have to sneak into the farmer’s house.
Meanwhile, while Hazel, Fiver, and Bigwig are off freeing the hutch rabbits, the rest of the group meets a seagull named Kehar who they nurse back to health after the bird injures his wing. In return, Kehar notifies the group of another large warren nearby that could possibly be willing to have a healthy exchange of resources.
Eager to be productive while the others are off, some of the remaining members decide to go investigate this new discovery. Little do they know, they are walking right into the jaws of evil. General Woundwort of Efrafa is not very fond of sharing.
Back to Hazel, Bigwig, and Fiver, the farm mission was slightly successful this time. They managed to get Clover away from the farm, but Hazel was shot in the leg by the farmer during the escape. In their rush, they have to leave Hazel behind and assume he is dead.
While laying in a ditch beside the farm, has a brief discussion with The Black Rabbit of Inlè, the stand-in Death for this world. She tells Hazel that it is not his time, and that if he continues on his journey, he will become a truly great leader.
I give this episode a 10/10. Lots of suspense and atmosphere, and Clover is characterized in a way that’s vastly different from the way other adaptations have treated her. She has much more depth and interesting driving factors to her, and she becomes a very notable part of the main cast in the series. I like that we begin to see Hazel’s fears regarding interacting with humans after learning about what became of Sandleford, but he has to overcome those fears if it means ensuring the success of starting this new warren.
For episode 3: The Escape, I don’t want to give everything away, so I chose to leave some loose ends in this review so you’ll still go check out the series. Wondering what happened to the bird? Watch the show. Wondering about Clover? Watch the show. Wondering why there's a Rabbit Hitler? WATCH THE SHOW!
But, continuing into episode 3, Fiver is given yet another vision. He tells the others at their down that he believes Hazel is alive, and they need to look for him.
However, a new problem presents itself. They are now completely aware of the danger of Efrafa, there is a dense fog covering the land, and none of them can agree on who should search. While they are bickering, Clover sneaks out to search for Hazel herself.
Of course, Bigwig goes after her, but he’s too late. An Efrafa patrol finds Clover first, but Bigwig does stumble across Hazel’s unconscious body.
Now, Efrafra has Clover in their clutches. I audibly went “goddamnit” to this scene. They were so close to being completely united, but yet another hurdle has been thrown in the way.
Additionally, Efrafa is very clearly a symbolization of totalitarianism, how unnatural and strictly controlled the warren is compared to others stands out ominously. Instead of living in burrows beneath trees or in fields, their home is beneath an abandoned structure. Their Owsla is grand and unforgiving. Every rabbit under Efrafan's control is marked and put under the watch of an officer. They cannot even see the sun without following the orders of their mark, otherwise they are kept in the burrows like it’s a prison. At the head of the command is General Woundwort, a half-blind rabbit with a heart of stone. There is no freedom in Efrafa, hope is shattered by cruel intimidation techniques, and any attempt at escape is punishable by death. However, rabbits like Blackavar and Hyzenthlay are two very prominent symbols of resistance in the face of this oppression.
Efrafa’s government strongly resembles a man-made system, and the series has already formed a strong correlation between human nature and evil. As Captain Holly states to an officer in Efrafa, “You Lack Animality.” Ironically, to be men is to be cruel. While we’d usually compare animal characteristics to something wild and unforgiving, the mirror is turned on to us and we are the source of all evil in the world. We kill and destroy without needing to, while animals don’t kill without it being essential to their survival. Richard Adam’s strong narratives of human destruction is one of the biggest things that made his novel stand out, and I’m happy to see it carried on into the adaptations. Even if details are omitted, the heart of the story is still there, and I think that’s what qualifies something as a good or bad remake.
Anyways, I’ll leave the rest of this episode for you to figure out for yourself. I was also originally going to individually review Episode 4, but I think it’s much more satisfying if you see how this story wraps up with your own eyes.
Overall, I give episodes 3 and 4 a score of 100/10. I will admit I am extremely biased, and perhaps a bit ridiculous for writing a 2,000+ word essay about how much I love this adaptation about a story of rabbits. Just know, this review was originally estimated to hit six thousand words because I wanted to yap about all the comparisons between the 1978 movie and this one, but I figured it would be better if I didn’t spoil it completely for those who are interested.
Moral of the story: Don’t join a cult, and definitely don’t let the cops tell you what to do.
THIS REVIEW WILL HAVE MINOR SPOILERS! If you haven’t seen the series and you’re interested in checking it out, I suggest you do! I may be biased, but it is honestly my favorite of the adaptations in the aspects it explores compared to the 1978 movie. Please note that violence and religious imagery will be discussed in this review.
You have been warned.
The beginning of episode 1: “The Journey” demonstrates the rabbit’s interpretation of how animals came to be. We learn of Frith, a personification of the sun. Frith is a stand-in god for the rabbits, and El-Ahrairah is the prince of rabbits, also deemed “The Prince Of Thousand Enemies”, as the story explains why Frith made predators to kill El-Ahrairah’s many children. It’s a lot like how man made religions to explain the beginning of things like good and evil, to define moral and virtue. The rabbits live by the virtue: “Be cunning and full of tricks, and your people shall never be destroyed.” Don’t let the thousand catch you, run until your legs can’t carry you anymore.
The next scene opens with the classic introduction of two of our main protagonists: Hazel, and his little brother Fiver. Right off the bat, we can tell a lot of things about these rabbits just with visual cues alone:
- Fiver is not normal. He is smaller, meek, and has a sixth sense. He has visions, and sees things that aren’t there.
- Hazel wants to fit in with the other rabbits in the warren, but chooses to remain loyal to his brother.
- Fiver and Hazel live in a burrow called Sandleford.
In this episode we are also introduced to the fictional language Lapine by the usage of words like Owsla, and Warren. In the book, there are footnotes to define these words and the language is used more and more frequently once the reader becomes familiar with it, but of course for the sake of the series we mostly only see Lapine when there’s context clues to fill you in on what the words mean.
We learn that a Warren is what they call a large group of rabbits living together in a society, while an Owsla is essentially a sort of police force for the warren. We also learn that Fiver and Hazel, on account of being ‘Outskirters’ (Outcasts, rabbits not born of higher-status lineage) they are often mistreated by the members of the owsla. They are told what they can eat, insulted, pushed around. The Owsla get special privileges. I adore how this relationship is set up within the first twenty minutes of the episode, and it also gives us a look into how some other rabbit societies function in this world.
We are also briefly given glimpses of Hawkbit, Dandelion, Bluebell, Captain Holly, Bigwig, and Blackberry. We don’t know too much about them, but we can gauge a bit about their personalities from their interactions. In this adaptation, there is a noticeable lack of characters like Pipkin and Speedwell. Unfortunately, they were omitted from the narrative but I think it gives the series time to strengthen relationships with the cast that is present.
One of my absolute favorite scenes across all of the Watership Down media is when Hazel and Fiver are standing near a sign, the sun is setting, and an ominous score is playing in the background. The sign is for a home building project, but the rabbits can’t read the sign. We are already given a hint as to the 'danger’ Fiver saw in his dream from this sign, and as the two gaze off into the sun setting below the hills, Fiver remarks “Hazel, look. The hills, they are filled with blood.”
We see what Fiver sees, but Hazel does not. Nobody does. He tells Fiver it’s just the light of sunset. Fiver’s vision urges him to convince Hazel that they need to leave. Hazel agrees, forever loyal to his brother, and this kicks off the beginning of their shenanigans.
After they escape from Sandleford following a chase from the Owsla, our group ventures on until they are invited to a warren by a large rabbit named Cowslip. While Cowslip is seemingly friendly, Fiver senses he is not to be trusted. He wants nothing to do with this new warren, but the group is starving and exhausted. They have lost faith in Hazel and Fiver, and so the brothers are outvoted.
Of course, we are very quickly taught that we should always trust in Fiver’s intuition. The haunting scene where we realize that these rabbits do not believe in the cunning survival of El-arhairah, but the sacrifice of one's life by the will of Frith.
Fiver panics after remarking how the main entrance of the new warren, encompassed by the roots of a tree, are “Made of bones”. Fiver’s literal visual of spines replacing the roots of the tree make more sense when paired with the fact that Humans leave food out for these rabbits to consume, and later we made the horrible discovery that these humans also presumably leave out snares to capture the rabbits in. Snares are silver wire traps, and Bigwig gets caught in one after a confrontation with Hazel and Fiver outside of the warren. The group have to hurriedly seek help, and Cowslip tries to convince them that “Frith Has decided it is Bigwig’s time.”
Regardless of Cowslip’s strange ideologies, they dig Bigwig out and leave that warren for good. A pink rabbit named Strawberry accompanies them; she no longer wants to be a part of Cowslip’s warren.
Cowslip’s warren is effectively a cult that worships a false god. They lay down their lives and claim it is “Frith’s will” (AKA the natural order), but their deaths are directly caused by human actions. They believe that laying down their lives to the humans should be the way things are..
The episode concludes with the group finally reaching the hill Fiver dreamed of, but the story does not end here.
Captain Holly, the former leader of Sandleford’s Owsla, finds the group. He is gravely injured, and needs to rest. But, it’s clear that he’s been trailing the group for quite a while. Before we’re even told about what happened to Sandleford, we can tell something terrible happened.
Overall, this episode is an 8/10. Amazing visuals, voice acting, and introductory characterization. But, no Pipkin. :(
Onto Episode 2: “The Raid.” Captain Holly is finally awake, and ready to tell his story. Sandleford was destroyed by humans, and Holly was the only survivor. I am a little sad that they omitted most of the details of Holly’s journey from the book, and in the 1978 movie Holly finds the group after escaping from Efrafra. However, in the series Holly only encounters Blackavar, an escapee who tells him to leave this place as fast as he can, or else Efrafra will capture him.
The group also realizes they need more Does (female rabbits) if they want the warren to survive longterm. So, they embark on a mission to help a small group of hutch rabbits escape. As expected, the mission does not succeed and they are forced to come up with a new plan after the farm cat throws a wrench in their plans. A specific rabbit named Clover in the hutch becomes a main character in this adaptation, compared to the others. She is naive and hopeful, and she yearns for freedom outside of the box she is kept in.
Following the failed mission, the trio must devise a new plan to free the hutch rabbits. This time, however, they have to sneak into the farmer’s house.
Meanwhile, while Hazel, Fiver, and Bigwig are off freeing the hutch rabbits, the rest of the group meets a seagull named Kehar who they nurse back to health after the bird injures his wing. In return, Kehar notifies the group of another large warren nearby that could possibly be willing to have a healthy exchange of resources.
Eager to be productive while the others are off, some of the remaining members decide to go investigate this new discovery. Little do they know, they are walking right into the jaws of evil. General Woundwort of Efrafa is not very fond of sharing.
Back to Hazel, Bigwig, and Fiver, the farm mission was slightly successful this time. They managed to get Clover away from the farm, but Hazel was shot in the leg by the farmer during the escape. In their rush, they have to leave Hazel behind and assume he is dead.
While laying in a ditch beside the farm, has a brief discussion with The Black Rabbit of Inlè, the stand-in Death for this world. She tells Hazel that it is not his time, and that if he continues on his journey, he will become a truly great leader.
I give this episode a 10/10. Lots of suspense and atmosphere, and Clover is characterized in a way that’s vastly different from the way other adaptations have treated her. She has much more depth and interesting driving factors to her, and she becomes a very notable part of the main cast in the series. I like that we begin to see Hazel’s fears regarding interacting with humans after learning about what became of Sandleford, but he has to overcome those fears if it means ensuring the success of starting this new warren.
For episode 3: The Escape, I don’t want to give everything away, so I chose to leave some loose ends in this review so you’ll still go check out the series. Wondering what happened to the bird? Watch the show. Wondering about Clover? Watch the show. Wondering why there's a Rabbit Hitler? WATCH THE SHOW!
But, continuing into episode 3, Fiver is given yet another vision. He tells the others at their down that he believes Hazel is alive, and they need to look for him.
However, a new problem presents itself. They are now completely aware of the danger of Efrafa, there is a dense fog covering the land, and none of them can agree on who should search. While they are bickering, Clover sneaks out to search for Hazel herself.
Of course, Bigwig goes after her, but he’s too late. An Efrafa patrol finds Clover first, but Bigwig does stumble across Hazel’s unconscious body.
Now, Efrafra has Clover in their clutches. I audibly went “goddamnit” to this scene. They were so close to being completely united, but yet another hurdle has been thrown in the way.
Additionally, Efrafa is very clearly a symbolization of totalitarianism, how unnatural and strictly controlled the warren is compared to others stands out ominously. Instead of living in burrows beneath trees or in fields, their home is beneath an abandoned structure. Their Owsla is grand and unforgiving. Every rabbit under Efrafan's control is marked and put under the watch of an officer. They cannot even see the sun without following the orders of their mark, otherwise they are kept in the burrows like it’s a prison. At the head of the command is General Woundwort, a half-blind rabbit with a heart of stone. There is no freedom in Efrafa, hope is shattered by cruel intimidation techniques, and any attempt at escape is punishable by death. However, rabbits like Blackavar and Hyzenthlay are two very prominent symbols of resistance in the face of this oppression.
Efrafa’s government strongly resembles a man-made system, and the series has already formed a strong correlation between human nature and evil. As Captain Holly states to an officer in Efrafa, “You Lack Animality.” Ironically, to be men is to be cruel. While we’d usually compare animal characteristics to something wild and unforgiving, the mirror is turned on to us and we are the source of all evil in the world. We kill and destroy without needing to, while animals don’t kill without it being essential to their survival. Richard Adam’s strong narratives of human destruction is one of the biggest things that made his novel stand out, and I’m happy to see it carried on into the adaptations. Even if details are omitted, the heart of the story is still there, and I think that’s what qualifies something as a good or bad remake.
Anyways, I’ll leave the rest of this episode for you to figure out for yourself. I was also originally going to individually review Episode 4, but I think it’s much more satisfying if you see how this story wraps up with your own eyes.
Overall, I give episodes 3 and 4 a score of 100/10. I will admit I am extremely biased, and perhaps a bit ridiculous for writing a 2,000+ word essay about how much I love this adaptation about a story of rabbits. Just know, this review was originally estimated to hit six thousand words because I wanted to yap about all the comparisons between the 1978 movie and this one, but I figured it would be better if I didn’t spoil it completely for those who are interested.
Moral of the story: Don’t join a cult, and definitely don’t let the cops tell you what to do.
