| Posted: 19 May 2026 at 8:57pm | IP Logged | 8
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There's quite a lot I don't like about The King. It is historically inaccurate (obviously: it has Falstaff in it, as an advisor to the king), which it sidesteps by saying it is an adaptation of Shakespeare's Henry IV part 2 and (mainly) Henry V.
But Falstaff is not an advisor to the king at Agincourt in Shakespeare's Henry V; he dies off stage in it and doesn't feature at all other than some brief mentions.
And there is a major plot point at the end of the film (after the battle of Agincourt) of Gascoigne being a traitor and having engineered Henry's campaign in France. But Gascoigne is not even in Henry V and certainly is not behind the plot against Henry.
And the 'plan' to have the French knights bogged down in the mud is not historically accurate or faithful to Shakespeare. Henry V was trying to get to Calais -- his men were sick after sieging Harfleur -- and when blocked by the French, only faced them as a last resort. The against-the-odds win came from good fortune from the mud (he could not have planned the French blocking his path or the weather) and with his formidable archers, who did good service, wearing leeks in their Monmouth caps.
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