Here’s the thing about Anne of Green Gables. It’s been done. And when I say it’s been done, it’s been translated into 36 languages. The book has sold 50 million copies. It has numerous Japanese translations (Anne-taku like Princess Usagi bicker over which is the best) and at least two manga. And anime is no no exception. Anne got an adaptation as part of the revered World Masterpiece Theatre, possibly the most famous of any in the series. It ran for 50 episodes and was directed by no less that Takahata Isao. And there have been multiple other anime takes on the franchise, too.
Given all that, do we really need another Anne-ime in 2025? Well, I don’t see the harm in it. At least it’s not another isekai or CGDCT (though it does have that). It’s certainly a much-revered story, and you have to assume there are reasons for that. Somehow I’ve managed to almost entirely avoid any of the innumerable English and Japanese takes on the matter (including Takahata’s) so I go into Anne Shirley pretty much clean. By reputation this is one of those “children’s but loved by all ages” books, so the potential audience should be there.
It’s hard to imagine a story that more obviously lends itself to the Ghibli aesthetic than this one – although Takahata in fact directed his version at Nippon Animation, as it was pre-Ghibli. As such it’s no shock that The Answer Studio have transparently gone for a Ghibli-lite vibe with their adaptation. The Answer Studio is not Studio Ghibli, that goes without saying. But they got an experienced director in Kawamata Hiroshi, and a seasoned composer in Oshima Michiru for the music. With its soft watercolor palette and and Peter Rabbit art style Anne Shirley is pleasing on the eye in an un-flashy sort of way.
One reality is that I’m no doubt less than fully aware of all the ways Lucy Maud Montgomery’s book has influenced fiction in the last 100+ years. Anne is a pretty familiar archetype in anime – the genki girl who can’t shut up and heals the world with relentless positivity. There could be a bit of a “seen all this before” element to some of this series, but in truth Montgomery is probably somewhat responsible for that. Many tropes I see in the story are likely ones pioneered by Montgomery. And I have to say there is a level of authenticity to all this. As if it doesn’t have to try too hard to prove itself, because it’s the real deal.
Anne is an orphan girl (not Little Orphan Annie though) in Prince Edward Island Canada, one of The Maritimes (along with New Brunswick and Nova Scotia). It’s a province that even now is sparsely populated, never mind in the 19th Century when this is set. She’s sent to the town of Avonlea, there to live with Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert. Funnily enough I assumed they were married but they’re in fact unmarried adult siblings, looking for some help on their farm Green Gables. The only problem is that they requested a boy, which Matthew is too kind-hearted to tell Anne on the long carriage ride home from the station.
Anne is a veritable force of nature (I kept waiting for Matthew to exclaim “Pippi, are you crazy!?”) with an incredibly active imagination and love of big (and lots of) words. It’s fun to see the soft-spoken Matthew be totally perplexed by this odd child. Marilla is a much tougher nut to crack, and initially is determined to exchange Anne for a child with a Y-chromosome who’ll be some help around the farm (I suspect they’ll be surprised by what they have in Anne). But she too is worn down by Anne’s relentless oddity, and though the shrewish Mrs. Blewett is keen to take a girl in, Marilla in the end is too kind-hearted to hand Anne over.
This is all quite charming, though Anne is – again – a lot to take. Over the coming weeks we’ll see Anne go to school, get a best friend, feud with a boy who’s secretly in love with her. All the tropes we’ve seen a hundred times or more, some of which the novel invented. Even having minimal experience with the story I feel as if I know exactly what to expect from Anne Shirley, which is both a positive and a negative. With 24 eps to work with Kawamata won’t be able to adapt the book at the leisurely pace Takahata did, but I imagine the series length will be manageable. Whether it needs to exist or not I think it’s fine that this reboot does – a fresh take on an evergreen original always has the potential to be interesting, and we know it’s got a real story to work with.
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