When The Beatles released the original The Beatles Anthology in 1995, it was next-generation British invasion, attacking on two fronts at the same time.
On the one hand, there was the music: three box-set Anthology collections, released on CD by Apple Records, full of studio outtakes and alternate versions. And on TV, there was an eight-hour documentary on ABC, which was shown across the globe and later released on home video.
That was in 1995. Twenty-five years after The Beatles had broken up, it extended their legend, and their impact, for several more decades. It told the story of the group via performance, film and TV clips, and lots and lots of interviews.
John Lennon — who had been shot and killed 15 years earlier — was represented in vintage interview clips. So were the other Beatles. But for the 1995 documentary, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr also sat still for new interviews, separately and together.
When it comes to the key moment when John meets Paul and invites him to join his group, The Quarrymen, the documentary recounts it by having Paul, in 1995, playing on guitar and singing the song he sang for John, as a sort of audition, when they met. Then John, in an old interview, is heard picking up the story. It's told the same way in The Beatles Anthology 2025 as in the original — only with crisper video and audio.
Director Peter Jackson and his team, who turned outtake footage from the 1970 Let It Be documentary into the superb multi-part Get Back Beatles miniseries for Disney+, did some of the restoration work here. So did engineer Geoff Emerick and music producer Giles Martin, the son of The Beatles producer George Martin. Their combined efforts make all the music sound so much better.
For the audio release of this new Beatles Anthology, they've issued a brand-new fourth CD set of recordings. The remastering, on all four volumes, is a quantum leap forward. Listening to Lennon on "Free as a Bird," his voice no longer sounds distant and tinny; it sounds like he's right there in the studio with the other Beatles.
So the new audio release definitely is worth it. Is the new TV documentary? Absolutely. There's something about The Beatles, and the way they approached things, that makes their output seem fresh, no matter how many years have passed. The music, certainly, is that way — but so is this documentary. The first eight hours of The Beatles Anthology seem vibrant and exciting, and not at all dated, even though it's the same content as before, only shinier. And the final hour, full of cutting-room-floor gems, is a treat.
In the original documentary, you saw and heard only one complete song from The Beatles on their first The Ed Sullivan Show appearance. In this new hour of The Beatles Anthology, you get another, along with plenty of studio outtakes. And there's a lot of fascinating footage of Paul, George and Ringo reuniting to record new Beatles tracks in the '90s, based on old demo recordings from John — along with a juicy origin story, told by George, of how the musical reunion came to be. It's a story that wasn't told in the 1995 documentary.
Jeff Lynne ended up producing those new Beatles tracks. You can see him working here, with George, Paul and Ringo, and you witness the same sort of genial vibes that were on view in Jackson's Get Back. These were men who, despite all the fame and fights and complicated lives, clearly loved one another. The Beatles Anthology 2025 ends with the three of them at George's Friar Park estate, lounging on the grass. George is playing a ukulele, he and Paul are singing, and Ringo is slapping his legs in time. Instead of brand-new interviews with Paul and Ringo, the documentary ends there. But it's a moment that feels not only fresh and natural, but unabashedly tender and sweet.
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