This one gets you by refusing to dramatize the misery. It just lets a small girl carry more than she should and describes the light on the way. Anne scrubbing for the Thomas household while Bert drinks, then hauling three sets of Hammond twins around the backwoods, and still finding a friend in Katie Maurice on the other side of the glass: that gap between what adults have given up on and what she insists on naming beautiful is the entire engine. The dialogue is plain to the point of bareness and that's why the quiet moments land like a punch. The animation is rough in places and a few stretches drift, no argument there, but this is the last World Masterpiece Theater series and it knows exactly what it's building toward. By the time the train matters, you understand why Green Gables was never just a house.

Anne Shirley's childhood unfolds as a series of adventures long before she ever arrives at Green Gables. Adapted from Budge Wilson's novel, a prequel to Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables, this drama covers the years before her adoption. Living with a family, Anne earns her place by minding the children and pitching in with chores around the house. Along the way, she slowly comes to understand herself better, in a gentle slice of life look at her early years.