(upbeat music)
- The real story of Pocahontas
is way darker than the animated movie.
Let's start at the top.
While it's true that Pocahontas was the daughter
of a powerful chief, she would never have been
romantically involved with John Smith.
- In this new world, I will find not only adventure,
but also love.
- Because when John Smith arrived in Jamestown
in 1607, Pocahontas was only 10 years old.
(sniffles)
- Maybe love is, uh, deeper in the woods.
- And Pocahontas never saved John Smith's life
because no one was trying to kill him.
(struggling)
Smith either made the whole thing up,
or misunderstood a religious ceremony
welcoming him to the tribe.
(gasps) - Welcome, friend.
- The violent native seeks to crush me
in his bear-like grip.
- What?
No.
- Man, this guy is dense.
- But the biggest mistake is that John Smith
wasn't the hero of this story.
Frankly, he and the British were total jerks.
When the Jamestown settlers first arrived,
Chief Powhatan welcomed them
and give them badly-needed supplies.
That is, until the autumn of 1608
when a particularly bad harvest meant
the Powhatan people didn't have any more to give.
- My apologies, we barely have enough
to get our own people through the winter.
- [Adam] But the British reaction to this was, uh,
pretty violent. (gun clicks)
- Merry Christmas.
- I can't believe I tried to hug you.
- [Adam] The British threatened and harassed them so much
that Chief Powhatan ended up moving the entire village
further from Jamestown just so they'd be left alone.
- Ugh, these guys are the worst.
Let's get out of here.
(grunting)
- Even if I was an adult, I wouldn't marry that jerk.
- [Adam] Pocahontas ended up marrying the warrior Kocoum,
who she actually liked quite a bit.
- You know what I like most about you?
You didn't violently threaten my people.
- [Adam] Meanwhile, back in Jamestown,
John Smith the intrepid explorer was lighting his pipe.
(yells)
And accidentally blew himself up with gunpowder
and had to return to England to recover.
- [Man] What a maroon, so that's the end of the story?
Weird.
- Nope, from there, things only got worse for Pocahontas.
- [Man] I should have guessed.
- [Adam] After John Smith's departure,
Pocahontas was kidnapped by another British settler
who was also feuding with her father.
- You feud with us, we steal your kids.
- You know what?
I'm going to say it, these people are assholes.
(calm music)
- While in captivity, Pocahontas converted to Christianity,
learned English, and married a man named John Rolfe.
- From the second I saw you,
ripped from your family and cultural context,
I knew you were the one.
I vow to love you always.
- And I vow to make the best
of the worst possible situation.
- That's the British spirit.
- Then Pocahontas, John Rolfe,
and their newborn son went to England on a publicity trip
meant to stir up more investment for Jamestown.
- Come one, come all, to look at John Rolfe
and his beautiful native wife.
(crowd murmurs)
- [Man] Wait, wait, wait, they used a kidnapped woman
as a marketing tool, that's terrible.
- Yes, it was, and unfortunately, after this visit
to London, Pocahontas died of disease at the age of 21.
She'd never see her home or her people again.
- [Man] How in the world did we get a sweet love story
from such a sad tale?
- Well, for that, you can thank that old
exploding sleazebag John Smith,
because in 1612, he wrote a bestselling account
of his adventures that falsely depicted Pocahontas
as grown-up, beautiful, and into him.
- And after Pocahontas saved my life,
her beautiful adult body embraced me.
"You're such a hero, you'd never blow yourself up
"with gunpowder!" she exclaimed.
- [Adam] This dude also claimed in another book,
that Pocahontas and 30 other women in her tribe
attacked him with a dance and demanded sexual favors.
- And then things started to get really hot,
oh yeah, everybody wanted a piece of John Smith.
(giggles)
- [Man] Oh, what a creep.
- Creepily influential.
Smith's account became the basis for centuries
of mythologizing, and it was those myths
that made their way into the animated movie 350 years later.
- 30 women, sexual favors?
I smell a G-rated children's film!
(beeping)
(harp music)