Check Out ‘Jane’ This April on Apple TV+

Kid on a mission

An environmentally minded nine-year-old learns about conservation and gives viewers a few lessons, too, in a family-friendly show coming to Apple TV+. 

In Jane, premiering Friday, we are introduced to young Jane Garcia (Ava Louise Murchison, Reacher), a budding environmentalist with a passion for saving endangered species. 

Using her powerful imagination, she brings her best friends David (Mason Blomberg, Shameless) and Greybeard the chimpanzee on adventures to protect animals around the world. 

In each of the 10 episodes, this intrepid trio and viewers will come to the aid of CGI creatures as large as polar bears and the blue whale and as tiny as the honey bee and monarch butterfly. 

There will also be a teaching moment at the end of each instalment where Jane consults with a real-life expert via her computer screen. 

The series is inspired by the work of iconic anthropologist/primatologist Jane Goodall, whose Jane Goodall Institute was involved in production along with Sinking Ship Entertainment—the Daytime Emmy-winning company behind fellow Apple kids’ show Ghostwriter.  

It has a personal connection for creator J.J. Johnson (Dino Dana), who began considering the world he’ll be leaving behind for his daughter. “You know, there’s this quote when I was developing the show that I stumbled on from Dr. Goodall,” he explains. “It was this idea that only if we understand will we care, only if we care will we help, only if we help can they be saved. And that’s kind of been the genesis of this show.” 

“We want kids to get a deeper understanding of who these animals are, how they live,” he continues. “We want them to care about them, to fall in love with these animals and then ultimately we’re really hopeful that they decide to do something to try to help them because… if we don’t do something in the near future, we’ll lose them forever.” 

Jane was filmed in locations such as Costa Rica, Kenya and California’s Catalina Island and the CGI beasties featured here are certainly realistic-looking. But the star of the show is unquestionably Murchison, who ably steps into the boots of this pint-sized dynamo who possesses a big heart and big ambitions. 

“It’s ultimately about a girl finding her voice and figuring out how to use that voice to effect change,” Johnson says, “especially with people who aren’t necessarily going to agree with her. So she’s to some degree an activist-in-training.” 

Jane premieres Friday, April 14 on Apple TV+