Not all things Netflix are good
As a huge fan of Anne of Green Gables, I was finally tempted to watch Netflix's version, Anne With An 'E.' I was put off by the title, but persevered.
I'll be honest with you all, I did not care for it one little bit. They took out nearly all the charm and whimsy of the original and made it dark and ugly. I don't know why, maybe for dramatic tension? It's Anne of Green Gables, a classic children's story. I'm not looking for that sort of dramatic tension. In the books, it's alluded to that Anne's early childhood was not so nice. She was an orphan, raised by people who already had too many children, not enough money, and all sorts of other troubles. She was forced to be a caregiver while still little more than a baby, and saw far too much of the ugly side of human nature. But this is only very gently alluded to - Marilla asks her if Mrs. Hammond and Mrs. Thomas had treated her well and she sort of gave a side eye and said they meant to treat her just as well as they were able.
This particular version aged her up from 11 to 13, made her a smart-ass who talked back to Marilla all the time, was very progressive for a little girl in the late 1800s (when she finds out the Cuthberts wanted a boy, not a girl, she insists, multiple times, that she can do anything a boy can do, if not more). The writing for her captured Anne's intensity but lost her sweetness and basic innocence. They kept giving her ptsd flashbacks any time anyone mentioned certain things, like having a friend. When she is told that she'll meet Diana Barry, who is a potential friend for her, she flashes back to girls at the asylum torturing her, and gets very quiet and frightened.
In the book, some weeks after the Cuthberts have committed to keeping and raising Anne, Marilla finds a valuable brooch missing and when Anne admits to having looked at it, assumes that Anne is responsible for it being lost. She gets angry, confines Anne to her room until she confesses. Anne eventually confesses to accidentally dropping it in the pond, even though she didn't lose it because she wants to go to a church social and thinks she'll be released, punished and still allowed to go. Her punishment is to be forbidden from going to the social. When Marilla later finds the brooch and realizes what happened, all is smoothed over and Anne gets her happy day. In the Netflix version, this all happens much earlier on, Marilla declares that she won't keep an untrustworthy child, and sends Anne back to the orphan asylum. Alone. Anne gets there, can't bring herself to go in, and hits the streets, selling poetic recitations in hopes of finding a way to feed herself.
Once that 'misunderstanding' gets taken care of, through a series of unlikely events, Anne's next adventure is heading off to school, where, in the Netflix version, she tells all the little girls her version of what happens when men and women have 'intimate relations' which involves the man keeping a little mouse in his trousers pocket, that the women are made to touch, which somehow results in pregnancy. This escapade results in her being excluded and ostracized by the entire school as well as Marilla being excluded from the Progressive Mothers Club that had earlier enticed her join them.
The whole thing was just one big facepalm after another until I was forced to go onto Barnes & Noble online and use my Nook settlement money (no idea what that was all about but I received a whopping $4.95 as part of some class action suit) and bought the books. Because I needed to reread the original, sweet, charming, gentle (if fiery when her temper was aroused) stories of Anne's girlhood at Green Gables, in order to wash the bad taste away.
I was sure I had the books somewhere, but they must have been victim to the great possessions purge of '05. So now I have them in digital format and couldn't be happier to renew my lifelong friendship with Anne Shirley.
I'll be honest with you all, I did not care for it one little bit. They took out nearly all the charm and whimsy of the original and made it dark and ugly. I don't know why, maybe for dramatic tension? It's Anne of Green Gables, a classic children's story. I'm not looking for that sort of dramatic tension. In the books, it's alluded to that Anne's early childhood was not so nice. She was an orphan, raised by people who already had too many children, not enough money, and all sorts of other troubles. She was forced to be a caregiver while still little more than a baby, and saw far too much of the ugly side of human nature. But this is only very gently alluded to - Marilla asks her if Mrs. Hammond and Mrs. Thomas had treated her well and she sort of gave a side eye and said they meant to treat her just as well as they were able.
This particular version aged her up from 11 to 13, made her a smart-ass who talked back to Marilla all the time, was very progressive for a little girl in the late 1800s (when she finds out the Cuthberts wanted a boy, not a girl, she insists, multiple times, that she can do anything a boy can do, if not more). The writing for her captured Anne's intensity but lost her sweetness and basic innocence. They kept giving her ptsd flashbacks any time anyone mentioned certain things, like having a friend. When she is told that she'll meet Diana Barry, who is a potential friend for her, she flashes back to girls at the asylum torturing her, and gets very quiet and frightened.
In the book, some weeks after the Cuthberts have committed to keeping and raising Anne, Marilla finds a valuable brooch missing and when Anne admits to having looked at it, assumes that Anne is responsible for it being lost. She gets angry, confines Anne to her room until she confesses. Anne eventually confesses to accidentally dropping it in the pond, even though she didn't lose it because she wants to go to a church social and thinks she'll be released, punished and still allowed to go. Her punishment is to be forbidden from going to the social. When Marilla later finds the brooch and realizes what happened, all is smoothed over and Anne gets her happy day. In the Netflix version, this all happens much earlier on, Marilla declares that she won't keep an untrustworthy child, and sends Anne back to the orphan asylum. Alone. Anne gets there, can't bring herself to go in, and hits the streets, selling poetic recitations in hopes of finding a way to feed herself.
Once that 'misunderstanding' gets taken care of, through a series of unlikely events, Anne's next adventure is heading off to school, where, in the Netflix version, she tells all the little girls her version of what happens when men and women have 'intimate relations' which involves the man keeping a little mouse in his trousers pocket, that the women are made to touch, which somehow results in pregnancy. This escapade results in her being excluded and ostracized by the entire school as well as Marilla being excluded from the Progressive Mothers Club that had earlier enticed her join them.
The whole thing was just one big facepalm after another until I was forced to go onto Barnes & Noble online and use my Nook settlement money (no idea what that was all about but I received a whopping $4.95 as part of some class action suit) and bought the books. Because I needed to reread the original, sweet, charming, gentle (if fiery when her temper was aroused) stories of Anne's girlhood at Green Gables, in order to wash the bad taste away.
I was sure I had the books somewhere, but they must have been victim to the great possessions purge of '05. So now I have them in digital format and couldn't be happier to renew my lifelong friendship with Anne Shirley.