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Digimon series logo
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New Digimon series logo

Digimon: Digital Monsters (the United States title of the Japanese Digimon anime) is a popular Japanese animated television series that is a part of the Digimon franchise.

Overview

On March 6th, 1999, the franchise was given animated form as the first of the Digimon movies aired in theaters in Japan. Then the next day the first Digimon television series, Digimon Adventure, began. Three further series would follow, each with their own tie-in movies, and the series was dubbed for release in western markets in Fall of the same year. The show spawned card games, with Hyper Collosseum in Japan and later Digi-Battle in America, and more video games. The animated series is easily the best-known segment of the Digimon universe, and responsible for the majority of its popularity worldwide.

"Digimon" are "Digital Monsters". According to the stories, they are creatures who inhabit the "Digital World", a parallel universe that is in part a manifestation of Earth's communication network. The stories tell of a group of pre-teens, the "Chosen Children" (DigiDestined in the English version), who accompany special Digimon born to defend their world (and ours) from various evil forces. To help them overcome the most difficult obstacles found within both realms, the Digimon have the ability to evolve (Digivolve). In this process, the Digimon change appearance and become much stronger, often changing in personality as well. The group of children who come in contact with the Digital World changes from season to season.

As of 2005, there are four series - Digimon Adventure, Digimon Adventure 02, Digimon Tamers and Digimon Frontier. As is obvious from their titles, the first two seasons take place in the same fictional universe, but the third and fourth each occupy their own unique world (in the case of Digimon Tamers, the Adventure universe is referred to as a television and commercial enterprise). In addition, each series has spawned assorted feature films. After death, Digimon has still shown some popularity, such as four new card series: Eternal Courage, Hybrid Warriors, Generations, and Operation X, a video game: Digimon Rumble Arena 2, and the previously unreleased movies Revenge of Diaboromon, Runaway Locomon, Battle of the Adventurers, and Island of Lost Digimon. In Japan, an eighth TV movie, rendered in CG, was released entitled Digimon X-Evolution.

On December 23 2005 at Jump Festa 2006, a fifth series was announced for Japan, and has now been tentatively titled Digimon Savers. The likelihood is that it will start in the spring of 2006.

Digimon is produced by Toei Animation and Bandai of Japan. Originally, the series were exhibited on Japan's Fuji Television.

The English version

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In the United States, the series was dubbed by Saban, and was initially broadcasted through Fox Network's Fox Kids and Fox Family, but after Disney's acquisition of Saban during the third series, the first three series stayed on ABC Family and the fourth premiered on UPN, farmed out as part of a deal between Disney and UPN, which concluded with Frontier's end, leading to the season being re-run on ABC Family. Reruns are shown on the U.S. JETIX block daily on ABC Family and Toon Disney.

Digimon initially was dubbed by Saban Entertainment (later by Sensation Animation, after Disney bought out Saban in 2001), and was initially broadcasted through the Fox Network's Fox Kids programming block, but after Disney's acquisition of Saban during the third season, the first three seasons stayed on ABC Family and the fourth premiered on UPN, farmed out as part of a deal between Disney and UPN, which concluded with Frontier's end, leading to the season being re-run on ABC Family.

The US series even packed the four series, or seasons, together as one whole series called Digimon: Digital Monsters.

Digimon, which premiered in the US in August 1999 on the Fox Television Network, introduced the whole franchise to a US audience for the very first time, almost one year after Pokémon did the same thing with their animated program in September 1998 during syndication, and later on the Kids WB progamming block.

In Canada, the show was broadcast on YTV. The U.S. insular area of Puerto Rico got its own Spanish dub. In the United Kingdom, Digimon aired on the UK Fox Kids (now JETIX) cable/satellite channel and also on CiTV, as well as countries such as Ireland, South Africa, Malaysia, Australia, Argentina and others. However, between poor ratings and licensing mixups in the change from Fox Kids to Jetix, Digimon's fourth incarnation has not been shown in any shape or form in the UK, and has been absent from the schedules of Jetix's UK incarnation since the beginning of 2005.

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Digimon anime series

Digimon Adventure

Digimon Adventure
Digimon Adventure

The premise of Digimon Adventure (1999) is a group of young pre-teens (who for reason of apparent 'propriety' are usually a little older in the English dub) while at summer camp, become the "DigiDestined" and are unwillingly forced to save both the Digital and real worlds from evil. Each child was given a "Digivice" which selected them to be "transported" to the Digital World. The digivices help their digimon allies to "digivolve" into stronger creatures in times of need. The digimon usually reach higher forms after they see their human partners in a dangerous situation.

The children have no idea of what's really going on after they meet their Digimon partners, yet they still have to fight to protect themselves. However, as time passes and the series starts to evolve, new subjects and concepts are presented. It covered such difficulties the children face when growing up, such as making friends, being courageous and taking a stand against evil, lending a supportive hand to others even though they may be different, saying goodbye to the ones you love, and much more. This has been displayed best by the collection of "crests" the children collect in the first season to make their Digimon partners evolve into stronger digimon and help them stop the evil forces. They embody virtues such as Courage for Taichi Kamiya, Friendship for Matt Ishida, Love for Sora Takenouchi, Sincerity for Mimi Tachikawa, Knowledge for Izzy Izumi, Reliability for Joe Kido, and Hope for T.K. Takaishi. The crests won't work unless their bearers exhibit the quality their crest represents. This has lead the children to express the traits they didn't know they had, which sometimes comes with interesting emotional and dramatic results.

The children realized that the world they were in was not a game, and that the creatures there had feelings and could feel pain. Digimon express every quality that humans do; only they aren't human. They decided without much thought that they had to defend the noble creatures in the Digital World because they didn't want them to suffer, and they were the only ones that could help. The DigiDestined made efforts on not having to destroy any Digimon, unless they were perverse (usually of the "virus" kind) and gave them no other choice.

Later in the season, the gang went back to Odaiba, where Tai's little sister Kari Kamiya joins the crew with her own Crest of Light. Her involvement expanded the scope of the show as a new dark world was introduced, and a description on how the Digital World got besieged by the "Dark Masters" was added. There was even a reference to the first movie, showing the events that preceded the happenings of the story and the way every DigiDestined entered in contact with Digimon for the first time. In the next season there was more information provided on the dark universe, but there was still a visible gap in detail, suggesting that what we have witnessed in the series is just a small story out of a much larger one.

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Images of all of the Season 1 Digimon

The season was highly regarded, and garnered millions of viewers. It also became one of the biggest anime exports out of Japan, notably the third, after Sailor Moon and Pokémon.

Characters

The English dub of Digimon was somewhat unique at the time, since most human characters kept their proper Japanese names, but were still usually referred to by 'Americanized' nicknames. Some Digimon names were modified to English equivalents, and (rarely) into Japanese equivalents. The eight children are listed first, followed by their Digimon partners. Names used in Japan are listed first. That is followed by the English manga/anime name, if any.

Digimon Adventure 02

Digimon 02
Digimon 02

Digimon Adventure 02 (2000), also commonly written as Digimon 02/Digimon Zero Two, is a sequel to the previous season. The story involves the main enemy the Digi-destined thought they had destroyed in the previous season, but has been putting in practice his evil schemes even after his defeat while setting up the new obstacles provided for the show. In this season, the original Digi-destined grew up into junior high school students (except for Kari and T.K.) and could no longer watch over the Digital World and be with their Digimon friends. All of a sudden, a young kid who called himself "The Digimon Emperor" rampaged through the Digital World attacking Digimon, putting them under mind control, and making them fight, with the help of the "Dark Rings," "Control Spires", and later "Dark Spirals".

A new generation of Digi-Destined, composed of three new children, as well as Kari and T.K., are given a new kind of digivice known as D3, which allows them to be transported to the Digital World through computers. Another advantage was Armor Evolution, using a device called a Digi-egg (not related to the Digi-egg, which means the youngest stage of a Digimon) so their Digimon can evolve in the presence of Control Spires. They eventually stop the Digimon Emperor, Ken Ichijouji, thanks to the sacrifice of Wormmon, Ken's partner.

After his defeat, Ken repented his evil deeds and joined the Digi-destined as they fought a evil digimon named Arukenimon and her lacky Mummymon. Arukenimon had a unique power to turn the Control Spires into super-strong, artificial Digimon in her control. To fight this new threat, the gang learn of DNA Digivolution, enabling their Digimon to fuse with eachother for more power. Eventallly, when the battle was brought to the real world, the true mastermind, Yuiko Oikawa, made himself known. This man extracted the Dark Spore inside Ken and implanted it into other children who wished for the greatness Ken once had. Those spores develop into flowers that harvest the infected children's energy. Eventually, the Digi-Destined confront Oikawa, only to learn he's an extreme loner whose only friend in the world was Hiroki Hida, Cody's father. Hiroki and Oikawa always used to play old video games when they were young, eventually becoming obsessed with the Digital World and always dreaming of going there. In the end, an entity springs from this man's body, none other than the 'real' mastermind, Myotismon, now reborn as MaloMyotismon.

This season ended with the help of the other Digi-Destined from all over the world, using the light that existed inside each one of them and their wishes to transform the Digital World into a nice place again. Oikawa, who is too weak to enter the digital world, becomes its guardian as he passes away. After peace is restored, the boundary between the Digital and the Real World is broken down, giving every human a chance of having their very own Digimon companion.

Season two was also a highly regarded season. Ratings did slightly dip, but not large enough to notice much of a difference. Introducing three new faces helped build the storyline.

Post September 11th attacks have resulted in Disney banning three episodes after their first showing on ABC Family due to similar references in those episodes. The episodes that were banned are episodes 44, 45, and 46. What should be known are the first two banned episodes are parts two and three of the three part Daemon Corps Saga and the third banned episode is WarGreymon's duel against BlackWarGreymon. There is currently no indication if these episodes will ever be aired again, though Pokémon episodes banned for similar reasons have begun to re-air, if sparingly.

New characters

A list of the new characters and Digimon partners, which are featured in this season:

Digimon Tamers

Digimon Tamers
Digimon Tamers

Digimon Tamers (2001) changed the very nature of the series. Set in the year 200X (between 2000-2009), it takes place in the REAL real world, where Digimon was just a franchise, composed of video games, a collectible card game, and a cartoon series. However, a group of 13-year-olds (10-year olds in the Japanese version), Takato, Henry and Rika (fans of the Digimon card game) meet their own digimon friends and start to duel "bio-emerging" digimon who cross the barrier between the information network, synthesizing proteins and becoming real. Most of it set in the modern Tokyo ward of Shinjuku and only changes scenario to the Digital World for a short time.

The tone of this season has many elements from head writer Chiaki J. Konaka's other works, especially Serial Experiments Lain, and is naturally more dark in nature. Persistent rumors existed among fans that because the entire Fox Kids line up -- where Digimon had primarily been syndicated -- was going to be dissolved anyway by the end of the season in the US, editing became more lax as time went on. These rumors proved true, and the show had little editing. Even parts that would have been controversal (at the time) were unedited.

Takato creates his digimon partner Guilmon when he slips a mysterious blue card he found in his deck through his hand-held card reading device, changing it into a D-Arc, the Tamers version of a digivice. The appearance and powers of this digimon come from Takato's sketches that were scanned into the device. Guilmon "realizes" from the Digital World and is found later by Takato. Henry meets his digimon Terriermon when he rises from the screen of a computer game, while Rika's digimon Renamon approached her to ask to be made stronger, since Rika was famous for her skills on the Digimon card game. Other Tamers, Kazu, Kenta and Jeri; Takato's friends from school, Suzie; Henry's little sister, and Ryo; Rika's rival, are introduced later in the series.

Along the way, the kids learn to be responsible for those creatures as a mysterious man known as Yamaki tries to stop wild digimon from coming to the real world. From the secret government agency called Hypnos, Yamaki was in charge of monitoring all digimon activity around the globe. Later, the new Tamers are forced to fight a series of evil digimon calling themselves the Devas, who, serving the Digimon Sovereign, believe that true digimon shouldn't pair up with humans (it is later revealed they were actually misguided). After traveling to the Digital World to rescue Calumon, who has fallen into the Devas' hands, the Tamers meet (and fight with) one of the four Digital Gods, but finally agree to work together in order to prevent the D-Reaper, a computer program initially designed to keep digital life from getting out of control, but it itself went out of control.

Several new characteristics are introduced in this season, like the use of game cards in conjunction with the digivices to give different powers to the Digimon, the presence of Calumon: a lone Digimon responsible for the digimon evolutions in the real world and the fusion of humans and Digimon to create powerful new Digimon.

Many fans feel that this season held a higher level of quality in the ways of plot and character development, over previous seasons.

Characters

Digimon Frontier

Digimon Frontier
Digimon Frontier

Digimon Frontier (2002) is the 4th TV series. After receiving strange phone messages, five children go to the subway and take a train to the Digital World. Once there, they meet Bokomon and Neemon (who act as guides) and learn that the DigiWorld is in danger. They must fight the evil Cherubimon and his Evil Legendary Warrior servants before they destroy the world. In the typical Digimon fashion, it's up to the kids to save the world.

The biggest feature introduced in this season is "spirit evolution", where the Digi-destined themselves evolve into digimon to become Legendary Warriors. For this special kind of evolution, they use "spirits", artifacts created by the Ancient Warriors that were hidden in certain areas of the Digital World. The two types of spirits are the "human spirits" and the "beast spirits." Another interesting detail lies in the way the children travel within the regions of the DigiWorld. Unlike the previous seasons, most areas are connected by railroads, where train digimon called "Trailmon" act as a means of transport.

After defeating the four Legendary Warriors that serve Cherubimon, Kouji discovers that Duskmon, the fifth evil Legendary Warrior, is really his long-lost brother Kouichi. With Takuya's help, Kouji is able to free his brother from the spirit. Afterwards the Spirits of Darkness regain their true form, and Kouichi can now become the true Warrior of Darkness, Löwemon, and joins the group. After they defeat Cherubimon, the Digi-Destined learn that Lucemon, an ancient, evil, angel digimon whom the Anicent Warriors sealed away, was the one who was really behind it all. So now the Six Digi-Destined must defeat him and his two Royal Knights before they scan away all of the Digital World, which would allow Lucemon to be free. The Digidestined were finally able to win in End of the Line, the series finale.

Frontier, with its lack of partner digimon and pacing closer to a sentai show than Digmon's other three series, was received with less popularity in both Japan and North America. This, combined with its unannounced moving off of the Fox network, contributed to the endless delay of the decision to produce a fifth season.

Characters

Digimon Savers

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Character sketches from Digimon Savers.

After a pause of 3 years, a new series has been announced for 2006 as is due to air in Japan in April. As of January 17th 2006, the tentative title is Digimon Savers. Designs of three characters have been released, two male and one female, who appear to resemble more traditional anime designs, rather than Digimon's more unique established style.

Masaru, a undefeated Tamer at age 14, meets Agumon, who has escaped from DATS (Digital Analysis and Testing Squad), a secret government organization. Despite terrible first impressions, the two become best friends by "talking" with their fists. Although his skills with personal computers and technology are lacking, his father (now missing) is the leading authority on "Digital World" research. With others, Masaru and Agumon work to investigate various incidents involving the Digital World and Digimon, to try and get to the bottom of things. The digivices used in this series are called Digivice iC.

Characters

Movies

Digimon: The Movie, released in the US and Canada territory by Fox Kids in October 2000, consists of the union of the first three Japanese movies. Those stories are based in the universe introduced in the first two seasons of the TV series. The previously undubbed movies (with the exception of the eighth movie) were all shown on Toon Disney in the fall of 2005 as 30-40 minute specials. It is unknown whether or not the movies will be released on video or DVD.


Digimon Adventure (The movie)

The first story focused on Tai Kamiya & Kari Kamiya four years before their adventure in the Digital World. It shows their first encounter with Digimon and what happened to them (as well as the other children) when they participated in their first digimon battle after raising a quickly growing Botamon. In the story, that Digimon hatches from a Digi-egg and eventually evolved into Greymon to fight a Parrotmon who appeared in the city. The movie was used in episodes of Digimon Adventure to explain why Taichi and company became the Digidestined in the first place.

Digimon Adventure: Our War Game

The second story shows many of the Digi-destined, but only four end up saving the day when a computer virus Digimon raises havoc all over the world through the Internet. The kids must stop the evil digimon quickly before he provokes the launching of nuclear warheads aimed at Japan (where the kids are). Taichi and Yamato Ishida (Yamato "Matt" Ishida in the English version) end up getting so worried about their Digimon (in the form of WarGreymon and MetalGarurumon) badly losing to the evil Digimon, Diablomon/Diaboromon that they actually phase into the Internet and mysteriously give them the power to destroy the enemy in time. Both Digimon merge, evolving into the powerful Omegamon/Omnimon. However, Diablomon/Diaboromon is still too fast, until Koushiro Izumi (Koushiro "Izzy" Izumi in the English version) comes up with the idea to redirect e-mails that they are receiving from children watching the battle to slow him down, allowing Omegamon/Omnimon to finish him off just before the missiles hit. In the end, the deactivated missiles land harmlessly in the water.


Digimon 02: Digimon Hurricane Touchdown/Supreme Evolution! The Golden Digimentals

The last story involves the next generation of Digi-destined children after they travel from Japan to the U.S.A. and meet up with Wallace (Willis in English version), helping him to stop the menace of an enigmatic threat. As a kid, Wallace was given two twin digimon, one of which, Kokomon, mysteriously disappeared without a trace, returning later as the ruthless Wendimon. Takeru ('T.K.') and Hikari ('Kari') are the first ones to encounter Wendimon in New York while they are visiting Mimi; he kidnaps Mimi (she disappears before Takeru and Hikari's eyes) along with the rest of the older Digi-Destined and begins to de-age them. Wallace eventually explains his connection to Wendimon and that Wendimon wants to see Wallace again, which was why the Digimon kidnapped the older Digi-Digidestined -- because they, like he, have Digivices.

But when Wendimon evolved to Antylamon, and then Cherubimon, he de-aged Wallace and the younger Digi-Destined as well. Wallace figures out that his Digimon's urge for things to go back to the way there were litterally meant to make Wallace a kid again. After the battle is over, Cherubimon is defeated and the older Digi-Destined reappear at the points they disappeared from. In the end, Wallace discovers that his digimon was still alive after the fight, ready to be reborn from a Digi-egg.

The American compilation of this & the two previous movies claims that Wallace 'created' Diablomon in an attempt to create a continuous storyline; in reality, the third movie is not even considered canon to the show's plotline. The compilation also cuts the de-aging of the older children & battles from the third movie in order to shorten the film. Also for the dubbed version of the third movie all the images of that were shown of the older Digi-Destined at the beginning of the dubbed film were actually what they were doing when they disappeared.


Digimon 02: Revenge of Diaboramon

In this movie that takes place three months after BelialVamdemon's (MaloMyotismon's) defeat, the Digidestined go up against Diablomon again. Taichi ('Tai') and Yamato ('Matt') head back to the Internet to deal with him with Omegamon, while the younger Digidestined go to deal with the rampage of a swarm of Kuramon (Diablomon's Baby I form). With the help of Angemon and Angewomon (with Takeru ['T.K.'] and Hikari [Kari]), Omegamon was able to destroy Diaboromon again...but it turned out to be a trap, as his destruction allowed many more Kuramon to go to the real world. Things go out of control when the Kuramon in the real world merge to create a Mega level called Armagemon (Armageddemon), an alternate Mega in Diablomon's evolutionary line. It is so powerful that neither Omegamon nor Imperial Dramon were able to defeat it on their own. In the end, Omegamon gives his energy to ImperialDramon Fighter Mode, powering him up to Paladin Mode. Using his Omega Blade attack, ImperialDramon is able to strike down Armagemon, splitting him back up into the Kuramon. With the help of the energy from the Digi-Destined Digivices and the cell phones from the other kids of Japan, the Omega Blade is powered up, allowing all of the Kuramon to be destroyed for good. This is notable for being the only movie that has Ken in it.

Digimon Tamers: Battle of Adventurers

Takato visits his cousin Kai in Okinawa, only to learn of an evil plan conducted by Mephismon/Mephistomon. Early mistranslated promo information cemented the idea that this movie was out of continuity with the series, but in the finished movie, there is very little to suggest that this could be true. Given that Kai goes on to appear later in the series itself, and knows who Guilmon is at the time, would suggest that the movie is in continuity.

Digimon Tamers: Runaway Locomon

This takes place after the series finale (though this is never explained in the film); in it, the Tamers try to stop a train-Digimon named Locomon, who was being controlled by Parasimon. The movie served to provide insight on Ruki.


Digimon Frontier: Island of Lost Digimon

The last of the TV-based Digimon movies, but is not in continutiy with the show (we can deduce this thusly: Takuya becomes BurningGreymon, hence it occurs after episode 12, but Bokomon does not have Seraphimon's egg, so it's before episode 13 - but Zoe becomes Kazemon in the movie, and at this point in the series, she does not have her Spirit to enable her to do so. Hence, not in continuity). Takuya and company end up on a floating island in the middle of a civil war between human and beast Digimon, instingated by an evil Digimon named Murmuxmon. Murmuxmon was posing as the leader of each side in the war so that he could free an anicent evil that the Ancient Warriors, Ancient Greymon and Ancient Garurumon had defeated.

Digimon X-Evolution

Main article: Digimon X-Evolution

"Digimon X-Evolution" (subtitled "The 13th Royal Knight" on much official material, but not in the movie itself) is the first Digimon movie entirely in CGI.

The movie spans 75 minutes, making it the longest Digimon movie up to date. The story takes place in the Digital World, chronicling the adventures of Dorumon. It is based, to some degree, on Digimon Chronicle, the mini-manga and storyline accompanying the Pendulum X (digital pets) in Japan.

Main Cast

Japan

*All characters listed here are referred to by their Japanese Names.

English

*All Characters listed here are referred to by their English Names.

See also

English

Japanese

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