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Last edited by BesuDesu on Tue Jun 25, 2013 8:52 pm; edited 1 time in total

With this little cult classic from the 90's getting a re-release on DVD, and being one of my personal favorite kids shows, I wanted to hear what adult anime fans had to say about their favorite seasons after most likely not seeing it since 15 some odd years ago. As for what to talk about... I dunno. Whatever generally attracted you to that season and what/who you liked from it, and even how it may have influenced you're opinion and general viewing of anime (if you were a youngster back then). Oh, and PLEASE refrain from bashing one particular season for no good reason, childish defenseiness... Yada yada. We're grown up enough to talk about a 17(?) year old kids show damn it. Anyway, without further guiding the lilly, I would have to say my favorite season is...

Tamers: This was arguably the most mature moment in the entire series, and I believe the one that has aged the best. Aside from having a fascinating premise, this show is so meta that your mind will look like a battle torn wasteland from how much it is blown (you would see this especially if you had played some of the games). But of course, how could you expect anything less from the mind of Konaka? And we can't forget on how... human and relatable these characters are, even the digimon (especially beelzemon). Speaking of the little digital dummies, I think this series, (except for Adventure) has some of my favorite monster designs. And I would give my right shoe to pet a Terriermon... With all of that in addition to the psychological and girl powery elements to it, I think it makes for a very... Unique kids show, as well as one of the best.

I'll second Tamers. I applaud Digimon in general for its unusually good story and writing for a toyetic kids' show, but Tamers takes it one step further--re-watching the Japanese dub on Hulu as an adult, I'm struck by how mature and subtle a lot of it is. And it all fits together so well--Chiaki Konaka borrows a whole lot from Evangelion (especially in the last quarter) and his own Lain, but he makes it work.

While I'll agree that Tamers was probably the best written and executed season, I think I'll always have a massive nostalgic fervor for Adventure. It was corny, it was silly, it was poorly localized, but I loved every minute of it. I still get chills watching the climax of Our War Game.

Yeah, I'm an Adventures fan, through and through. I love 02 as well, though there are some rough patches with that one. I need to pick up the DVDs for those ones some time - and I love the dub for it, bad jokes and all. I've seen enough of it subbed that I honestly don't think the localization was half as bad as people make it out to be, especially given when it was made.

I never got into Tamers when I was young because I didn't like that all the characters I cared about were gone. I've been trying to watch it recently and not really getting all that hooked either, though I plan to make it to the end this time. I know lots of people love it but it just doesn't have much of an emotional draw for me.

Despite having been with Digimon back on FoxKids since Adventure, Frontier has simply got to be the one I have the most affection for. I also let the faults slide the most easily for me. Having rewatched the first two seasons, I've also got a lot of affection for Adventure and omfg, Nicktoons Network plays it, and if I can catch an episode, I do, even though I've seen the show at least 4 times because there really is something magical about watching it on TV.

For Adventure, I have fond memories of coming home from school to see two episodes each week day. When Adventure 02 came on TV, I watched that new on Saturday mornings, but I never quite attached to it like I did Adventure. Upon subsequent rewatches, I found 02 a lot more fun to the point where being incredibly flawed was somehow ok. Tamers, I watched new on TV too, though I simply never took to Tamers quite like everyone else did. Not even on rewatches have I taken it to it quite as hard, but I'm still gonna buy the DVD set in due time.

Frontier came out when I was in middle school, and I'd wake up early just to see an episode every day at 7 am (I've never been a morning person, not even at that age), and then gladly be tired all day at school. Then, unlike other Digimon shows, I had a friend at school to talk with about Digimon. And it certainly had plenty of twists even pretty early on, so it turned in my head all day during class. The Lancer spends much of the first half away from every else, so that was interesting, Matt didn't leave until much later in Adventure. I only found out later how much everyone hated the "kids turn into Digimon" thing, but we'd had three seasons of partnering up, so I thought it was different and cool and I liked the transformation scenes for sure.. And then the introduction of the inevitable sixth ranger as spoiler[brainwashed, crazy, and the Lancer's identical twin] makes either him or Ken my favorite sixth ranger. Also different is that in Frontier, my favorite character was probably the Hero, Lancer, or Sixth Ranger. In previous seasons, it had been Joe, Izzy, and Cody. And in Digimon, only the Hero and Lancer are allowed to get bonus powers, so that resulted in me seeing less of Joe, Izzy, and Cody. In Frontier, I didn't like Zoe, was 'meh' on JP, liked Tommy in the first half, so seeing them become cheerleaders on the side didn't bother me as much as I clearly think it should, so I somehow don't give the show that much flack for abandoning three of its characters halfway through the show (with the occasional pity episode). I absolutely realize it did this, I just let it slide big time because I had great memories of waking up early before school to see it, having a friend who liked anime too, liking the sixth ranger twist a lot, and finding the whole "kids turn to Digimon" thing cool instead of stupid.

I also must say I have a lot of affection for Digimon: The Movie, specifically the middle "Our War Game" part. First off, I grew up under a rock, so that movie was literally the first time I had heard some of those songs, so I didn't see it as a 90s music check list at the time. And omfg, they save the world on a dial-up internet connection, that's actually really awesome. Somehow, when it was remade as Summer Wars, I didn't like it as much, even though it's the same damn plot and set up (with the same damn ending), and it could be that Izzy was a major player in the movie, and Izzy was always my hero as a kid (I didn't start to like Joe until I was older), and it had an entire 54 episode series of development behind everyone so it didn't need to bother with much there. And it was an exciting movie where they save the world on a dial-up connection. And I liked some of the connections to 02 (like Yolei clearly seeing the whole thing on the internet). So I've got some affection for this too, I wish I still had my VHS copy of it, that I watched a hell of a lot of times. My older sister's one friend was nice enough to offer to watch movies and play with me, I must've made her watch that movie way too many times and I feel bad about it as an adult. It was also the only Digimon thing I had on VHS to watch whenever I wanted. If NVG released the movie too, I'd go for it. I think it'd be awesome if they released like a movie pack because I've seen all the movie shorts up through Frontier (some are just extra long episodes honestly), I'd so buy it!

Adventures. Had my favorite cast and, well, it was the first and introduced us to everything. Evolution lines, mainly. When the Digimon first evolved to Adults it was nice, and you didn't know Perfect or Ultimate forms existed yet. Once they got their crests and could evolve to Perfect it was also nice, then they pull out Ultimate forms for Taichi and Yamato and it was kind of a nice surprise. Every series since then you already know the established levels so there's no more mystery or uniqueness to it. Not that that's bad but Adventures was the one who set the formula. Frontier mixed it up a bit which I liked, but it kind of suffered from declining popularity in the end and had a rushed ending because of it.

Plus, well, it had the Adventure aspect of it down. 02 and Tamers weren't much of an adventure and they spent most of their time in the real world. Admittedly, 02 gets points for making that an actual plot point of how Daisuke, Iori, and Miyako we're not as grizzled or pushed into a do-or-die situation like the original kids we're so they didn't develop the disconnect for killing Digimon like the original kids did until they saw first hand Digimon killing and hurting people and they knew they had to do what was right. Tamer's Digital World felt a bit pointless and tacked on, to be honest, and not as interesting. Frontier brought back the adventuring aspect of the series which I liked.

Also, well Wada Koji and AiM's music on the series. A duo who would become a staple for the show pretty much. Butterfly was great.

Although Tamers has generally been my favorite digimon season, due to the mature subject matter and the very strong cast of digimon partners, I never really liked Takato. He sometimes came across as kind of selfish and a bit of an ass to me. Of course, Rika was much more of an ass, but she was cast as the typical ice queen archetype so it is to be expected. Takato is supposed to be the protagonist who we empathize with and like, but I much more easily empathized with his partner Guilmon than with him.

As I said, I do like Tamers a lot, but to be honest X-ros Wars, The Young Hunters Who Leapt Through Time was actually pretty good. I really enjoyed the relationship of Tagiru and Gumdramon, and they were equally strong characters. I also liked Tagiru a lot more than Takato. Tagiru's "reckless enthusiasm" was a lot more fun and engaging than Takato's angst. As far as Gumdramon, I think he is really one of the most conflicted Digimon characters that has been introduced so far. Most Digimon partners don't actually experience real growth as a character through a season. They just serve as sounding boards and companions for their human partner. Gumdramon actually seemed to grow though (he starts off as a semi bad guy and becomes more noble by the end of the show). Also, he has the same kind of reckless enthusiasm that Tagiru has, and the Japanese voice acting for him particularly nailed that persona.

While it's true that most of the partners don't have arcs, I can definitely think of a couple beyond Gumdramon, whose series I haven't seen. Gatomon/Tailmon had a villain to hero arc as well in Adventures. I also really enjoyed Wormon's growth, which was in many ways just as important as Ken's in 02.

Plus, I'm assuming/hoping Impmon has an arc in Tamers, though he's not an actual partner (at least not that I'm aware of).

Yes, you are right about Gatomon, she did have a bit of an arc like that. However, I never really grew to like her too much because even as she was helping the good guys she always seemed like she had her own agenda. Certainly, she was a complex character compared to most other digimon partners, but not as noble I feel as Gumdramon becomes.

Definitely Tamers. Forget being good "just" for a Digimon show or even a general children's show; it's better than most Anime for adults. It's remarkably well written with tight and intelligent plotting, deliberate pacing and impressive character development. The atmosphere is foreboding, the tone is dark and creepy, and the final boss is genuinely scary, the best Digimon boss ever. The battles are also a strong point with great action scenes, and the bio-merging brought the partnership between humans and digimon to a new level. Of course, Tamers isn't all serious, the humour is just as good as in any other Digimon show.

Digimon Adventures. For some reason, this was just nostalgic and I watched it during mornings with my dad years ago. I still remember bits and pieces of the show as a classic and I probably would rewatch some of the arcs like the Dark Master.

Digimon Tamers also was also an enjoyable watch and was quite different for the second half involving I think...the spoiler[D-Reapers].

I'm not sure on the current trend of how Digimon series are being adapted though but the very first season was generally a classic for me.

Last edited by Snomaster1 on Thu Jun 27, 2013 12:29 am; edited 1 time in total

Although I do like the "Digimon" series overall,the season I like a lot is the second one. One of the main reasons I like it so much is because of how it portrays Americans. It doesn't treat them as jerks as other anime have done. And I like that.
For example,in one episode,Mimi brought her friend Michael to the Digital World to see her friends. He had a digimon partner that was one tough cookie. Later,he and the rest of the American Digidestined help put a stop to some trouble in the real world. For some reason I've never been fully able to figure out is why they had Mimi and her family move to the States.

Maybe they were afraid that the digimon would come back to Japan,and they'd better not be there when they do. I don't know why and the series never really gave a reason for it. The third season also had an American character that appeared near the end,but her appearance was too brief.
The problem I had with the fourth season,"Digimon Data Squad" had some brief glimpses of California but that was it. We don't know if they had an American branch of DATS or how digimon are treated in the U.S. It's a shame we never found out. Also,I'd have loved to have seen a digimon battle in California. I'd have also loved to have seen what kind of digimon they would have come up with. Probably something like Godzillamon romping and stomping all over Los Angeles. What do you guys think?

What's the first, original run called? With...Izzy is the only character I can remember because his voice actor also did Brave Fencer Musashi. I didn't even know there were enough seasons for them to need names!

They had names from the beginning(well, AFAIK), though the original US broadcast simply referred to the first season as 'Digimon'. The second season was always Adventure 02, though.

Yeah, the all had unique names in Japan but were dropped in the English broadcast, which I actually think was a bad idea once the seasons stopped being connected to each other. I think I might have been more inclined to watch Tamers if it had been clear from the get-go that it wasn't a continuation.

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Digimon season you have the most affection for.