Okay, so I had my doubts, but now I’m for sure: Anne is AWESOME. Even in an episode in which nothing major happens, she never fails to charm, and that really is the strength of the WMT-series: at times it really can be about nothing, and yet the characters rock beyond belief. Anne was downright adorable in this episode, simply because her talking really never seemed to stop!
With episodes like this, I’m not crazy enough to summarize every single thing that Anne rambles on and on about, I’m just going to discuss the important points of the episode. The episode starts as Anne is holding Noah and talking to Katie Morris (a cupboard). She tells that Katie once was a friend of Elisa who she told everything to, and so Anne is also going to tell everything she experiences to that the cupboard in the same fashion.
In the meantime we return to the house of the old lady that we saw in the first or second episode. Her name is Minton (or however it’s spelled), and we see two of her relatives paying a visit to her house. Not knowing that she’s there, they start talking about how she’s known to be very grumpy and greedy, when in fact she fell on the floor because her back went out. the house is also a mess because she hasn’t been able to clean up because of this, even though she refuses to take on help.
Next up we switch to a local shop in which her relatives are worrying about her in front of the shop owner, about how she really needs someone to help her out, but the shop owner says that it’s practically impossible since she’s known to be greedy and probably the most disliked person in the entire town. Anne then hears this and offers to take up the task to work for her. The relatives don’t really believe in her, but take her along anyway.
When they arrive at the house, Anne quickly forces herself in the house and starts cleaning and annoying Minton a the same time). At the same time there’s also a cat that runs wild, and Minton quickly sends her away when she gets distracted by some pretty drawings on a plate. It’s pretty hilarious to see that Anne doesn’t have any shame, and still thinks that Minton is just a friend of the “real” Minton, like how she introduced herself in the first episode, and so she calls Minton all sorts of things that her relatives have been calling her.
Anne of course doesn’t leave that easily and doesn’t understand at all that Minton doesn’t want her. She just keeps rambling on and on. Minton eventually gets to sleep, but that evening Anne comes and says that she has to leave. Later Minton finds out that Anne spent the afternoon cleaning up. The next morning, Anne is up early and Minton finds her talking to another cupboard: Alisa Morris, Katie’s twin.
When Minton starts eating her breakfast, she’s finding it hard to eat because Anne keeps looking at her. When she offers her a bit of bread, Anne refuses it since she can’t take away other people’s breakfasts. In the end, Minton gives in because of this, and promises to give Anne her breakfast when she finishes cleaning in order to make her accept this breakfast. But she also says that she’s never allowed inside one of the rooms in her house.
A week later, the shop owner talks to Bert about how he’s surprised that he’s still working. He then tells Bert that Minton used to have a daughter, but she changed after this daughter died. At the same time, Anne screws up by letting the cat inside the secret room, and ends up entering it. This room indeed turns out to be the room of Minton’s late daughter, and when Minton finds out about it she gets angry and immediately sends Anne away.
Anne runs away to Bert, of all people, and there Bert tells about Rosa, Minton’s daughter. She died 34 years ago and ever since Minton locked herself in and became the greedy old lady she is now. The next morning, Anne asking Horace and Edward to look around for a couple of roses. She then gives these roses to Minton as she visits Rosa’s grave, as a bit of a strange birthday present. It turns out that Minton had even forgotten her birthday, and so the two of them make up and the episode ends.
So yeah, the episode ended on a pretty sappy note, but I don’t care! This was such a sweet episode and in fact, this has been the pattern of this series for the past four episodes now. Sure at times it’s a bit too dramatic, and the same flaw turned me off from watching Kemono no Souja Erin, which also was just too formulaic, and yet I just CAN’T bring myself to dislike this series. Anne is such an awesome character that she SO makes up for some of the overly sappy moments. With more than thirty episodes still to go, I foresee lots of awesomeness in this series’ future.
I also like how Budge Wilson decided to write this story. She announced clearly that she wasn’t going to mimic Lucy Maud Montgomery’s writing style, but instead went with her own. But still she did include quite a few homages to some of Montgomery’s other works. This episode shows some parallels to Emily of the New Moon, and especially Elisabeth’s secret room of her lost sister.
My only real problem with this series is that the animation doesn’t look as solid as it’s supposed to. There quite a few points at which character drawings looked rushed. Porfy and Les Miserables were able to cover this up, but in this series, it unfortunately does stand out.
Rating: *** (Awesome)
With most other characters, this kind of episode would have been dull, but Anne single-handedly made it awesome.
