Digimon Adventure 02

Taichi Yagami and his friends have moved on to junior high, but by that time, they have lost contact with their Digimon partners. Taichi is therefore surprised to suddenly receive a distress call summoning him to the Digital World. Once there, he learns that Digimon are living in fear of the mysterious Digimon Emperor, who is somehow suppressing their ability to Digivolve!

In the real world, Hikari Yagami and Takeru Takaishi reunite in the same fifth grade class. They share three schoolmates: Daisuke Motomiya, who reminds them both of Taichi; Miyako Inoue, a technical wizard; and Iori Hida, Miyako's neighbor. When these three children receive "D-3" Digivices, they—along with Hikari and Takeru, who still possess their own original Digivices—comprise the new generation of "Chosen Children" who must save the world once again. With the power of the Armored Digi-Eggs, they must thwart the Digimon Emperor's plans to spread his influence over the entire Digital World.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Yagami, Hikari Main

Araki, Kae Japanese

Takaishi, Takeru Main

Hirata, Hiroaki Japanese

Ichijouji, Ken Main

Park, Romi Japanese

Tailmon Main

Tokumitsu, Yuka Japanese

Patamon Main

Matsumoto, Miwa Japanese

Motomiya, Daisuke Main

Kiuchi, Reiko Japanese

V-mon Main

Noda, Junko Japanese

Wormmon Main

Takahashi, Naozumi Japanese

Inoue, Miyako Main

Natsuki, Rio Japanese

Hida, Iori Main

Urawa, Megumi Japanese

Seki, Hiromi Producer

Sakurada, Hiroyuki Assistant Producer

Kakudou, Hiroyuki Director, Episode Director

Imazawa, Tetsuo Episode Director

Reviews

May 27, 2013

Were_Vampire

Recommended

A while ago I made a review on Digimon Adventure, explaining why I found it to be one of the best kids shows out there, one that had smartly developed plot and characters, great soundtrack, good animation, and overall superb enjoyment not just for kids, but for young adults as well. I also said that a 7.78 score was way too low for a series that achieved something as great as developing each character propperly, have the characters arc influence in the main story arcs and present mature themes to little children without being too dark for them. And so the expectations for Adventure 02 ... were far too high; I wish I could say as well that the score (currently 7.34) is also low, that the series is the great sequel Adventure so much deserved. Sadly, it is not, 7.34 is the score this sequel deserves, if not lower (even into the 6s zone). Why is that? Let's see:

Storywise: The storytelling is not bad, but much has changed, including the pace; Digimon Adventure had 5 story arcs, each 10 to 14 episodes long, which allowed it to move at a pace that never felt too quickly or too slow, each arc started and ended properly. Here... not su much; we have 3 story arcs, one of 21 episodes, then one of 17 and the last one of 12 episodes. We find some filler episodes in the first one, some ongoing character problems on the second (I'll fill that in the next section) and a rushed and convulted final arc that tries to make up for what is kind of a lagging season by bombing us with too much material that never gets developed (Demon, for instance).
Now, don't be fooled; despite all its flaws the storytelling is still enjoyable, there are still mature themes around and the air of greatness of Digimon Adventure, however the flaws are too notorious and the characters also dragg it down, but I have to admit that they are all thought through, none of them comes out of thin air (give or take the final arc) and they all get somewhat their propper ending.
The plot is not as good as the first Digimon series, but the potential is there. Now, why wasn't it fully used? Mainly, characters problems.

Character: Here is where Adventure 02 just outright failed. Remember how amazingly outlined the characters from the first Digimon series were? Remember how they were just broadstrokes that got developed into fully fleshed out character and how amazing was that the crest of each character represented the very scent of how they were? Well, Digimon 02 mainly hopes you forgot about all that.
We still have our main 8 characters from the first series, but 6 are downgraded to supporting roles, while 2 remain and 3 new character join (one more joins lare on). Now these 3 characters are the main trouble of Digimon 02.
Daisuke (aka Davis): he is arrogant, he is reckless, and he is a good guy deep down, we have our most stereotypical hero! Of course, that wouldn't be a trouble with the propper character work, but here there is... none. There is no background to explain Daisuke's personality, whereas in Adventure we had backgrounds for each character. We know he has issues with her sister, but that never gets developed (not to mention we never get to know his parents). As the series goes forward Daisuke changes and matures, for no apparent reason; granted, being in the digital world fighting monsters does change people, but Daisuke's change really came without propper building up. He passed from annoying to tollerable, but mainly he was just plot fodder. But he is not nearly the worst character.
Miyako (aka Joley): now here is a character that mostly everyone will hate! Why is that? Miyako is all talk and no action. She is energetic and sometimes you picture her as the optimistic one, but as soon as she get into the real danger she freaks out and it takes her about 5 minutes of screen time to realize she has to fight. As the series progress her character is mostly ignored and she is left with her characteristic energetic self and food lover life personality, with no development whatsoever or any background at all.
Iori (aka Kodi): Want someone as annoying as Miyako? Iori might be the one. He is rigid and barely makes an expression, if any. Unlike the previous two, this character does have a background which is not only in sync with his personality, but actually linked with the final arc and despite being kind of interesting, the character himself remains the same for about the whole show, with no actual changes and nothing more than his usual poker face.
Takeru (TK) and Hikari (Kari): They came from the previous series, so everything should be ok, right? Sadly no; both Takeru and Hikari are mainly ignored in this series. Takeru has about 3 good character moments in the show in the first arc, and then acts as plot fodder later on. Hikari is... well, I wouldn't know, she really doesn't fullfil any function here, give or take going to the dark sea world or supporting the rest on battle.
Ken: Here is a character that actually got good treatment; he is given a nice background which is consistent with his personality, he is conflicted, and while shy he is mainly likeable for showing the brave to move forward and attone for his wrongs. He is the only one that actually gets good character moments and a character arc that is mainly involved in the plot. Sadly 1 out of 6 doesn't make the cut for good character treatment.

Music: Gladly, the OST from the previous series remains here with the addition of some more tracks made just for this one, which are good. The opening theme, while not as amazing as the one seen in Digimon Adventure, is actually pretty good, both endings are also good, and the tracks that plays in the new evolutions moments are quite nice (specially the one when jogress evolution is made). So, yeah, still a 10 if you ask me.

Enjoyment: For all its faults and failures in the character department, I still think I like this Digimon series. It has some very bad moments that made me ask myself "why am I watching this crap?" Followed by some very glorious moments that kept me on the edge of my seat and reply "Oh, yeah. That's why". Sure, if I had to grade each episodes, most of them would be on the range of C to B-, but there would surely be straigh As in the ways, but sadly some Ds or Fs too. As a whole, the enjoyment is fair: you get some very clunky, cheesy and boring moments, but you also get profounds and exciting ones (thank you BlackWarGreymon! And Taichi and the rest too for that matter), and as such the enjoyement is in thin line between fair and good.

Stray observations (funny facts and bits of information I got while watching the series):
-Did you know that originally Adventure 02 had 64 episodes, but the order got cut to 50 somewhere around the way because of low rating? Now we may understand why the finale felt so rushed.
-There was supposed to be a rivalry between Daisuke and Takeru, but that gets forgotten at some point and then Daisuke just ignores Takeru; and they want to make us believe they are friends...
-Daisuke and Ken, Miyako and Hikari, all got some good character moments and emotional pep talks previous to achieving jogress evolution. Takeru and Iori got it by having Takeru tell Iori "have faith: well, that escalated pretty quickly
-Demon (being sent to the dark world in episode 45): "you'll regret this". Apperantly this was set up for Digimon Adventure 03, which you know ended up being tamer so... no, they never regreted it. Besides, what was his purpose in the first place? We'll never know.
-Ken (in episode 42): "por favor déjeme entrar" Ken, tu español no es malo, de hecho mejor que el de mucho japoneses, pero no deja de ser raro escucharlo.
-Best character: BlackWarGreymon, surely, as he is a sympatetic villian at first and then a tragic hero. His arc is also the high point of the series, as he wonders for the meaning of life; he surely got the best character treatment, closely followed by Ken.
-Worst character: Miyako, surely, clossely followed by Iori.
-Daisuke (in the finale) "I want to have a ramen shop!" Ken: "I never knew about this". Nobody did Ken, and nobody even cared.
-Award for most forgotten character from Adventure: Mimi, somehow the writers though sending one of their most developed characters into USA would make the cut. They were wrong. Also, I think Sora was pretty much forgotten too.

That's it for now! I hope you liked this review
Next up: How Digimon Tamers triumphed by denying it had a past!

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Feb 20, 2014

ggultra2764

Mixed Feelings

Compared to the first season, this second season of Digimon Adventures is a step down in quality quite heavily. With exception to Ken, the new characters lacked the depth and problems that the first season kids experienced. This is especially a problem with new kid Davis, who is portrayed as a hot-blooded act-before-thinking boy who doesn't get much fleshing out nor any problems that he must overcome thus making him feel quite shallow as a character compared to much of the main Digidestined. The sad part is that Davis is made the leader of this generation's Digidestined, for better or for worst. The older members ... of the first generation Digidestined are shafted to supporting roles whose their only roles in this series are to aid the current generation in explaining or advancing parts of the show's plot. About the only kudos I can give for characters in this series comes from Ken's developments where we learn of his tragic past and his efforts to reform by joining the Digidestined.

The plot for this series isn't much better off either. Digimon Adventure 02 has a more light-hearted mood with nearly half of it focused on the Digimon Emperor arc and having a decent amount of filler. While the idea of the Digidestined taking on a human threat is a unique approach to this series, Ken's not as convincingly threatening as early villains like Devimon and Etemon since we seen the stakes faced by the Digidestined raised higher in each later arc for the first season and many of the villains weren't hesitant to take lives. Things got a bit too scaled back with convincing threats in this season. The large length of the Digimon Emperor arc actually causes problems for developments in later episodes of this season as the show tosses in multiple plot developments that are either sloppily introduced, abruptly resolved in the span of a few episodes or rushed through to seemingly force the series to another desired point in its plot. The series also suffers from wasted potential in what it could have introduced or expanded upon with several plot elements that were tossed in such as the Dark Ocean, Kari's unique powers and the Daemon Corps. Regrettably, these plot elements were instead just tossed in as filler and either were never focused on again or were quickly brushed aside. It looked like this season wasn't sure what kind of plot it wanted to deliver with how its later episodes are all over the place with developments. I don't even want to get started with how the series pulls off its final three episodes that reveal who the true enemy threat is and the abrupt happy ending it plays up.

Otherwise, the visuals and other aspects to the plot are about what you would expect of generic titles: average artwork, reused animation clips, plain character designs, the run-of-the-mill 'evil' Digimon villains, Digimon being beaten to a pulp before their partners gain the power within to defeat villains and so forth.

Even if you're a Digimon fan, I wouldn't waste my time trying to look into this second season to Adventure. The Digimon Emperor arc got too dragged out thanks to having several episodes worth of filler and this results in later episodes being a mess with their developments thanks to having several plot threads being tossed around that are awkwardly handled in their resolutions. Not to mention that other than Ken, the new Digidestined children lack the solid depth and development that the first-generation group underwent in their ordeals. You could watch just the first season of Adventure and you could just pretend this one was never made.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Jan 15, 2016

Duckielover151

Not Recommended

The rating system on here is trying to tell me that by ranking something a 4, it means I think it's 'Bad' and that's not really the case, but I like 02 less than Adventure and, critically speaking, Adventure is only a 5, so... you do the math.

When it comes to the sound and the animation, 02 has pretty much the exact same flaws as its predecessor. Add to that that season two's characters weren't nearly as likable, and the story gets a bit sloppy after the halfway mark. That said, this is another crucial part of my childhood, and I did still really ... enjoy it.

Critically speaking, it doesn't hold up quite as well as the original, but it does still hold up.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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