Never seen this show but curious

Yes, it is a Kevin Sullivan production and so it bears a lot of resemblances to Road To Avonlea: it is a nostalgic, gentle (and, let's admit it, rose-tinted) view of Canada's past.

It takes place during the Great Depression so, superficially, the series has a darker feel to it.

I never saw the show during its original run, but the CBC is currently airing it on weekday afternoons and I have been watching it during this broadcast. I am a big fan of the Anne of Green Gables franchise, but never watched Road to Avonlea so I can't compare Wind at My Back to the latter.

Everything that Derrick has written is dead on. Being a family show, it really tries to be uplifting, even when dealing with serious issues, such as teen pregnancy, single motherhood and poverty - or the taboo subject for that time, divorce. Although it is built into the plot that a major character dies quite a horrific death in the pilot episode, there is no real sense of menace in the show and the viewer never gets a sense that anything really bad happens to anyone despite this taking place during the rough and tumble Depression, and in a mining town no less. However, I quite like the show, I like the characters, I like the arc that the characters go through over the five year span of the show. The one thing that I cannot get over however is the background music - it's a little too obvious, syrupy-sweet and for whatever reason its volume (as in decibel level) just seems too loud.

Huggo, I absolutely agree with you about the overly cloying and overly loud musical score. The latter seasons of Road To Avonlea suffered from this as well (I assume both shows were scored by the same person?)

I wished they had just 'pulled back' a bit on the music. It's ironic that Kevin Sullivan was apparantly annoyed that Avonlea was constantly being nominated in the 'Best Children's Show' category. The over-the-top music was so cartoony that it certainly didn't help voters see it as a full-fledged adult drama.

And the volume! Your post has made me realize that I haven't been going crazy or deaf all these years. For both shows, I always found myself cranking up the volume because I couldn't hear the dialogue over the music (This is something I normally only have to do while watching a foreign film with heavily-accented actors :))

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As the other posters said, it does feel a lot like other Kevin Sullivan production with the period setting and costumes. It is a little darker than "Anne" and "Road to Avonlea" but it is still very much a family drama.

birdiespet, you can sample some episodes of the series on sullivanmovies.com. The first two seasons are available on DVD through Amazon or Sullivan's own store.

Huggo, it's cool you discovered the show through the CBC reruns. I was happy CBC was airing it in the afternoons but I wondered how many people actually watched them. I agree the series does have its flaws and is a romanticized rendering of the Depression but it has remained one of my favourite series through the years due to the characters and the mix of drama and comedy. I wish it wasn't cancelled so abruptly without a proper final season.

I don't think this is anywhere near as good as Avonlea, but that might be because I never gave it a very good chance. I watched it when it first started, and then I didn't get CBC anymore. I get CBC again and have been watching it again. I think I like the later episodes (that I didn't get to see the first time around) better then the early episodes.

This show really is quite heart breaking (awww, when Honey has to leave her boys with her mother-in-law!). While I don't love it at much as avonlea, it is a good show.