Sanzoku no musume Rônya

I and my kiddos (8 year old girl, 5 year old boy) watched this during summer 2020. We all got really into it and watched 2 or 3 episodes each night, which probably qualifies as binging for this age rage. The series features beautiful if fairly simple animation, a catchy introductory song, and an exciting storyline that manages to be slow-paced and episodic, with the narrative focused mostly on Ronya growing up. The beautiful forest is the spiritual focus of the series, and Ronya loves to explore it. Yet danger lurks not only through natural hazards, but also the evil harpies and other spirits, as well as the violent life of Ronya's robber family. Especially their feud with the rival robber clan that has moved into the other side of their castle, and its young prince "Birk," Ronya's love interest. The generally tranquil (despite the dangers) and joyful feel of the series contrasts uncomfortably with the fact that most of the people whose lives are empathetically chronicled are hardened criminals, despite the fact that they don't seem ever to kill anyone. But the series is redeemed by Ronya and Birk, who reject their parents' feud and their lifestyle, as well as Ronya's strong relationship with her father Mattis, who ultimately is convinced to give up his family's traditional "profession" because of her. Also, my kids loved calling Mattis a "man-baby" and calling out his various "meltdowns"!

The computer generated 3D animation used in Ronja does take getting used to. My husband and I, both aged 70, and huge Ghibli fans over the years, felt that this would definitely have been a best seller had Goro Miyasaki made it as a film rather than a TV series involving Polygon Pictures. The scenery and the attention to detail are brilliant and the main characters very well depicted. However, it is the mythical creatures that steal the show, particularly the Harpies, worth looking out for every appearance they make. Goro Miyasaki's other films, 'Tales From Earthsea' and 'From Up on Poppy Hill' showed a very different style from his father, Haiao Miyasaki, and it took us a while to really appreciate how good they were. We are experiencing the same with Ronja. Having got to about episode four the pace picks up and we watched the whole series before reading Astrid Lindgren's book on which it is based. Unlike other reviewers, we actually felt that Miyasaki had stuck pretty close to the original; which prompted us to view the series again…and we were not disappointed.

While this may be fine for kids, artistically it is so far short of the original Swedish film treatment as to be essentially unwatchable. The crude animation and awkward pacing of the story do no credit to the studio, animators and director. The music is so generic as to be superfluous, competing and clashing with the dialogue. This lamentable effort sells short the intellect of anyone over age 5.

If you can, I strongly recommend enjoying the original Swedish film treatment of this wonderful tale. A wonderful cast, fabulous scenery, seamless integration of live acting and animation provide an engaging and entertaining experience for all ages. The "robbers chorus" is epic enough to compete with the finest opera and not to be missed.

I recommend the story for families with children, but please consider the far better original if you have access.

Only 4 episodes in and I want it to end. The computer animation is not Ghibli! It's awful and doesn't move properly. This blu-ray only contains the english dub.....and it's horrific! The voice actors do not suit the characters one bit. They don't suit Ghibli. The voices of Ronja and her mother are particularly bad. It's such a shame. I love Ghibli and rewatch their movies often, this is one I'll never watch again.

I think this deserves far more praise than it seems to have received.

I'm from Sweden, born in the early 80s. I grew up with Astrid Lindgrens books and the TV-series and movies based on them. They are widely considered great stories, and I agree. But I cannot say that any of them really have deeply moved or affected me, including Ronja Rövardotter. Up until now. The fact that it took a Japanese animation studio for me to realize just how good this tale is says something about this series.

I was a bit skeptical to the visual style first, and it took a few episodes before I gave in, but after that, I just loved it. The cell-shaded style reminds me of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, another Japanese masterpiece, and there is something beautiful to behold in almost every scene.

Studio Ghibli have treated this story with utmost respect and it shows that they really have understood it, which may sound trivial, but I think it isn't. The central characters feel very lifelike, with all their strengths, flaws, vulnerabilities, prides, fears and hopes. I can't imagine anyone doing a better work, and the attention to detail is just incredible. Just one in a myriad of examples: when Ronja goes skiing in the winter, it shows that they must have studied exactly how a person moves on skis.

Another thing I admire with studio Ghibli's work is that they have the courage to stay in a moment, and portray beautiful things, even small things like raindrops falling on leaves. Their love for nature really shines through, and it makes you want to also be in that beautiful forest - hadn't it been for the horrible harpies.

I watched this in Japanese with English subtitles, which I strongly recommend over the English dubbed version, if possible. I like how they have kept all the original names and to hear them pronounced in Japanese. Many of them sound strange also in Swedish even for a Swedish person; Astrid Lindgren apparently got most of them from a map of northern Sweden.

Thank you, studio Ghibli, for this. I'm very grateful. Domo arigato gozaimasu.