A while back I reviewed the most recent series in the Gundam franchise. You may recall I came down on that ultimately negatively because it felt plot points were too rushed in the second half.

But while I ultimately was disappointed with GQuuux the other anime I found surprisingly more engaging, maybe I’m getting old.

Anne of Green Gables is a series of books from Canada about the orphan girl Anne Shirley. It was, you may be surprised to hear, extremely popular in Japan and had an anime adaptation in 1979 by the people who would later go on to found Studio Ghibli, yes THAT Studio Ghibli.

So obviously this 2025 adaptation, Anne Shirley, has a reputation it needs to uphold, and uphold it does. For note I watched the dub of this not the sub, I’m aware Crunchyroll has degraded in subs considerably of late and I cancelled my subscription because of that, but I watched this show before all that and dubbed so that won’t be affecting any opinion.

The is sold on how much you like or at least can enjoy the story of its lead Anne as it is the story of her life from the moment she gets off the train into Avonlea. I’m normally not one for period piece dramas but something about this story I found very enjoyable. Anne is a hopeless romantic with a vivid imagination and the story balances out that and reality, but in a fair way that lets her good personality come through and not feeling like it’s just going to be crushing her with reality.

It’s not all bubbly though as there is tragedy and sadness in the show as well as happiness. We can give that to the original author but then it’s the anime and the cast’s job to help express that in a way that is neither overly depressing or overly happy to the point it becomes grating. The setting is wonderfully drawn giving a turn of the century rural Canadian village.

The anime adapts the first 3 novels which the opening “Yokan” performed by Tota reveals as we see Anne first as a child and then as a young adult. This means we see her as a child going to school all the way into her early college years. As someone who hasn’t read the books or seen other adaptations (yet, a friend got so into this they went and ordered a box set of one of the live action adaptations so who knows)  I cant say if they gloss over parts but I did feel her high school life part seemed short in comparison to the childhood and college years, they did have a good amount of her as the school teacher though.

The dub work is to be commended. Monica Flatley does a great job with expressing the character from her expressive happiness she wants to give everyone but also the moments of sadness, you feel upset when she does as she loses people close to her.

The series is two course long at 24 episodes which it did without a season break in between and despite the story going on for years of her life, I didn’t feel like they were rushing it. I understood why she was doing things or how other characters were growing and developing too.

Obviously it’s not an action series but a period drama in the form of an anime and a wonderful animated one at that. Part of me now wants to see that location in real life thanks to it. Which if not an endorsement to watch this series, I don’t know what is.

Rating: 📺📺📺📺📺