Remastered ‘Beatles Anthology’ reminds us the Fab Four will never fade

Have you met the Beatles? The chances are there, whether you grew up with them, sought them out, or were never formally introduced. At least you can know the name without even hearing the numbers, as one knows Shakespeare, without reading or seeing the plays, or even knowing that he wrote them.

The Fab Four were phenomenal in their time and phenomenal since. Although their split officially took place in 1970 after falling apart, they never went away. As long as John Lennon was alive, there was always the possibility that the band would reunite—in a classic Saturday Night Live episode, Lorne Michaels offered them $3,000 to reunite on the show—and his death, as well as the global awareness of the loss, ushered in an era of renewed Beatles awareness, finding new ways to use old music, protecting the legacy and promoting the brand.

With the band's catalog of recordings having recently been remixed, remastered and re-released as special editions with additional tracks, it only made sense that Apple would get into film. Peter Jackson “Come back” His six-hour AI-enhanced video footage filmed during the making of Let It Be premiered on Thanksgiving Day 2021, followed by a remastering of Michael Lindsay-Hogg's most original song, “Let It Be,” in May 2024. (Last Thanksgiving we received a Martin Scorsese film. “Beatles '64” based on the Maysles brothers' film about the band's first visit to America; using mops has become a new holiday tradition.)

Now, 30 years after its premiere here, also around Thanksgiving, the digital squeegee has been applied to Anthology, the band's own multi-part video memoir. (It aired on ABC over three nights; this run, which follows a longer video release, consists of eight episodes and a new, additional ninth.) Premiering Wednesday on Disney+, also over three nights, it looks great; My only complaint is that the music, every bit of it, is too loud compared to the rest of the film. I guess to make it interesting, or because it's what kids these days expect; but I'm right when I tell you it's wrong.

Along with the film, the original Anthology project included a coffee table book; three sets of demos, alternates and unfinished takes on two CDs; and two “new” songs, “Free like a bird” and “Real Love,” which featured the surviving Fabs joining in on a demo John recorded on piano. (In 2023, the third song “Now and then” was completed by Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr; it topped the US and UK charts, and won a Grammy for rock performances.) Another audio set has been added this year, “Anthology 4.”

In the age of YouTube, Beatles videos are just a click away. (I want to watch 12 minutes Paul rehearsing “Blackbird” on Abbey Road? He's there waiting for you.) But when The Anthology first aired, it was an unburied treasure, bringing together a wealth of photographs and video clips long out of circulation; it was terribly exciting, nostalgic for some, but real and alive. It works as both a primer for newbies and a cornucopia for fans. I'm more of a fan than a maniac, but I think they can be listened to endlessly and re-watched – firstly, they just look great and are interesting. Charming and witty in their own way, they were four strong individuals and one unit. There is an element of destiny in a group, that everything is meant to happen this way, an alchemical reaction that requires these particular people to work. Other bands might have lost or gained members, but once Ringo sat in the drummer's chair, there would be no Beatles left but these Beatles, even if John joined on tape from beyond the grave.

In new and archival interviews, the story is told by four Beatles who don't always agree with each other; manager Brian Epstein; George Martin, their producer and co-writer; and Neil Aspinall, their aide-de-camp, with some remarks from publicist Derek Taylor. It is an in-house production and would not have been seen here if the three survivors and John's widow Yoko Ono had not signed it. It's not a case of “The Beatles tell all” and there was never any reason to suspect that it was, although, as Paul says, “I learned more than I ever knew about the other Anthology guys.” The dirtiest laundry is not aired, and even at nine o'clock it passes so quickly that the worst times seem softened. But this is not hagiography; that sounds like a fair calculation. Having reached détente after a period of hostility, they show mercy to each other and to themselves.

Each episode begins with, first of all, an excerpt from “Help!” as if warning of storm clouds ahead, rather than “All you need is love” or “With a little help from my friends.” But at its core, it's a love story: boys meet boys, boys lose boys, boys gain boys, to paraphrase the old Hollywood formula. “We were tense,” says George Harrison. They were “four guys who really loved each other,” says Ringo. “At certain points, each of us went crazy, but the other three could bring us back.”

The added ninth episode is essentially a film shoot, both in terms of the documentary and the new songs. (It's a little strange to look back 25 years from the perspective of 30 years ago; there is no material after 1995.) Although the additional footage was advertised as “never before seen,” much of it was included on the bonus disc accompanying the DVD release. But here the material is organized and expanded into a full-fledged film. We see Paul, George and Ringo in the studio with Martin, isolating the tracks “Tomorrow Never Knows”; the three jammed on “Thinking of Linking,” which Paul wrote in 1958, and Duane Eddy's “Raunchy,” a guitar instrumental that was George's audition for the band. They hang out—George plays a ukulele—and talk about old times. They record again. George is sad that John isn't around to take part in it (“I guess [he] I would be very glad to have the opportunity to be with us again”), but he is still present. This is real encoding.

“The Beatles will continue to exist, on these records, in films and videos, and in people's memories and lives… I think the Beatles exist without us,” says George, who has been gone for almost a quarter of a century. He quotes a John song called Ringo. “Play the game until the end. Tomorrow never knows.”