In 1896, elderly unmarried siblings Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert decide to adopt an orphan boy to help out around their ancestral farm of Green Gables, on the outskirts of the fictional Canadian town of Avonlea, Prince Edward Island.

When Matthew goes to pick the child up at the railway station, he finds 13-year-old Anne Shirley, an imaginative, bright, high-spirited, and talkative girl, instead.

While Matthew decides he would like her to stay, Marilla does not trust Anne, given her status as an unknown orphan and the perceived uselessness of a young girl on the farm.

According to de Pencier, the adaptation of the novel for this television series was intended to provide a different look and feel compared to past productions; they were aiming for a "documentary level of realism", as reflected in the extraordinary detail which has gone into the design of sets and costumes.

[9] According to an interview with McNulty, an Irish Canadian whose career on stage has included roles in Annie, The Sound of Music, and Oliver!, and on screen in Agatha Raisin and Clean Break, her audition for Anne "consisted of talking to trees, chatting with flowers and building thrones out of twigs.

"[12][13] The series was occasionally filmed on Prince Edward Island but, for budgetary reasons, it was primarily filmed in Southern Ontario, at a Toronto studio, at outdoor locations in or near Toronto including Black Creek Pioneer Village, in Waterloo Region at locations including Doon Pioneer Village, Castle Kilbride, New Hamburg, Cambridge,[14] and in communities such as Millbrook, Pickering, Orono, Hamilton, and Caledon.

"[12] For the second season, according to what she called her "master plan", Walley-Beckett introduced an entirely new character of her own, Bash,[4] to reflect the racial diversity present in and around Charlottetown at the time of the novel, with a view to representing a community absent from previous adaptations, achieving this by having Gilbert travel on a steamship and meet with the new character in Trinidad: "Bash is the vehicle to explore intolerance and inequality, even more when he goes to The Bog, when he learns that other black people live there.

[30] CBC president Catherine Tait stated in October 2019 that it would no longer involve itself in co-productions with Netflix, as they constitute deals "that hurt the long-term viability of our domestic industry".

[48] Erin Maxwell concurs, arguing that in contrast to Tiger King, "Anne with an E might be the most wholesome and engaging TV show that no one in America is talking about.

[49] Chad Jones qualifies the entire series as a "cool" adaptation of the novel, noting that "from the theme song by The Tragically Hip to the assortment of timely issues – racism, feminism, bullying – that may have been hinted at in the book but have definitely been brought to the fore by creator Moira Walley-Beckett, this is not your grandmother's Green Gables".

[50] Jon Hersey at The Objective Standard writes, "If you can stand a tearjerker—and if you enjoy art that glorifies imagination, individualism, free inquiry, and the passionate pursuit of values—you may just fall in love with Walley-Beckett's Anne with an E".

The site's critical consensus states: "Anne with an E uses its complex central character to offer a boldly stylish, emotionally resonant spin on classic source material that satisfies in its own right.

[54] Tasha Cerny, contributor for the Tracking Board, praises the cinematography as lush and colourful, the characters vibrant, and the plot "surprisingly thrilling for a story about a young girl living in a small secluded community in the late nineteenth century.

[56]Writing of the 90-minute premiere episode for the Toronto Star, Johanna Schneller was appreciative of Walley-Beckett's departures from the novel, bringing its subtext to the fore: "Reading between the novel's lines and adding verisimilitude, she gives us quick but potent glimpses of the miseries many orphans faced in 1890s imperialist culture.

[58]Jen Chaney, writing for Vulture.com, agrees, saying: "What distinguishes it from other previous Anne iterations is its willingness to harden some of the story's softness, just enough, to create an element of realism that period pieces, Gables-related or not, can be inclined to avoid.

"[59] Neil Genzlinger writing for The New York Times, commenting on reports of darkness and grittiness, also praises the production: "Ms. McNulty's Anne is still wonderfully ebullient and eminently likable; she's just not the one-dimensional figure of other adaptations".

Canadian novelist Saleema Nawaz, who reviewed the 90-minute first episode for Toronto Life, said she enjoyed it more than she expected, particularly the set designs and costumes, as well as the performances by McNulty and Thomson, and she approved of the choice of theme song as reflective of the continued relevance of the source material.

[62] Writing for Entertainment Weekly, Isabella Beidenharn expressed similar feelings, but, "putting the source material aside, it's a fine show on its own", and she conceded that "inventing a dark side might help Anne With an E fit into today's TV landscape".

"[64] Writing for Variety, critic Sonia Saraiya is even more ambivalent, describing the series as on the one hand "a brilliant adaptation" which "succeeds admirably", but on the other hand, "the show can't quite sustain the brilliance, veering first into maudlin territory and then into the oddly saccharine as it tests out its tone", contending that "the show gets a bit bogged down in telling the story of Anne's dysfunction", presenting "a slightly soapy view of Anne's trials and tribulations that at times really humanize her and in others, are rather infantilizing".

[66] Laura Finch writing for "World", agrees, saying, "...despite some of the positive feminist themes found here (like whether or not girls should go to school), it's often hard to find the original Anne amid the extraneous storylines.

While Walley-Beckett's instincts are good, I think this show is too enamored with its trappings of darkness to realize that Anne of Green Gables has endured this long because people love the small specificity of the characters' lives.

[77] Alici Rengifo finds that the series ends on a fitting note, bringing Anne to a point of "real growth"; the finale is "all about how life does indeed go on".

[78] Shannon Campe lamented: "It's hard not to feel the series was ending just as it began to find its voice,[79] even if it muddles some of its 'kid-friendly' messages on racism and other issues".

It's a shame this show has to leave, it has a classic style that harkens back to books like Little Women, while updating the tone for contemporary viewers who could have a lot of fun while taking in a few life lessons along the way.