'Anne with an E' Season 3 Episode 4 Review: Ka'kwet's story shows how colonizers treated natives like outsiders
Major spoilers for 'Anne with an E' Season 3 Episode 4 ahead
Season 3 of 'Anne with an E' sees all our favorite characters struggling with new challenges in life, especially the teenagers who are of age now to think about their careers and their life partners.
While Anne (Amybeth McNulty) has resorted to choosing adventure as her partner, we see that she is slowing coming to terms with the fact that she may have feelings for Gilbert (Lucas Jade Zumann).
This story obviously will take a front seat this season, but we still have some time before that and Episode 4 sees the focus shift to a character we were introduced to at the beginning of the episode, Ka'kwet (Kiawenti:io Tarbell).
We see Ka'kwet for the first time when she arrived at Anne's school with her father to sell hockey sticks to the boys in her class. She is part of a community of Natives living in a clearing in the wild, using natural resources and living as one with nature.
She has a set of loving parents and it is clear that she loves her life, and is a sweet, loving child with a whole lot of curiosity much like Anne.
Anne, true to character, welcomes Ka'kwet into her life with open arms and tries to learn more about her community, and while her article earned her the wrath of Marilla (Geraldine James), who like most other people at Avonlea consider them to be "heathens".
Our titular heroine tried to change people's minds by writing in the school newspaper about the ways of Ka'kwet and her family. However, this just made her more of a "unique character" than anything else.
During the course of Episode 4, we see just how insensitive most residents of Avonlea are towards the Natives, and how they are treated like savages simply because their style of living and priorities are different.
They want to "reform" them and make them civilized, with Rachel (Corrine Koslo) going as far as to demand, who knows what they do in our woods.
This preposterous statement about the people who lived in the land before the colonizers ever settled in, is a perfect example of how they were made to feel like foreigners in their own land.
'Anne with an E' has been consistent in narrating stories about the injustices of the past and the present, and it is only natural that they do not overlook the plight of the natives who were forced to leave their own culture and identity behind to assimilate into the society created by the colonizers.
We see a perspective and narrative that is lacking in media, and Season 3 Episode 4 of 'Anne with an E' will always remain iconic for treading where most don't.
All of Season 3 is available for viewing on Netflix as of Friday, January 3.
