Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering an animated film from 2015. That movie is "Digimon Adventure tri.: Reunion".
Now, before I get into this movie, I need to make mention that not only am I going to be covering this movie, but for the next 3 months, I'm gonna be covering all 6 of the "Digimon Adventure tri" movies. This is something that I've been wanting to do for quite a long time. And tonight, I have an opening in my schedule for these movies. So this is going to be fun. At least, I hope so.
Now, I should mention that I have been a huge fan of Digimon since I was a kid. I watched the first two seasons, which were really good. I didn't a watch whole lot of "Digimon: Tamers", outside of one or two episodes. I did watch the entirety of "Digimon Frontier", which I thought was amazing. And I watched most of "Digimon Fusion", which certainly was decent, but I haven't gotten a chance to watch the rest of that series. So, ultimately, I really love this franchise.
As for the "Digimon Adventure tri." series, I did hear about it, but I wasn't really sure what it was suppose to be about. So in preparation for me covering this series of movies, I decided to look up a little bit of information to see what I am getting myself into. I do know that this series of films serves as a sequel to the first two "Digimon Adventure" series. Which sounds awesome. I also know that this series of films is meant to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Digimon franchise. And I also know that, because this is a sequel to the first two "Digimon Adventure" series, we do have the original cast of characters from those series back for this movie. So already, this is sounding really awesome.
I'm certainly hoping that this series of movies will be just as good as the "Digimon Adventure" TV series from back in the day. However, I could also see these movies going way off the fucking rails here. However, I still want to see if this series of movies will hold up on their own. And the only way I'm gonna know the answer to that, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Digimon Adventure tri: Reunion".
5 minutes later
You guys can't hear this for obvious reasons, but this opening song here...kinda sucks. Mind you, I'm already interested to see where this movie's going to go, but God damn, this opening song is fucking terrible.
15 minutes later
You know, guys, there's something kinda funny about Izzy speaking French. I'm not totally sure why, but I think it's just because I would've never imagined him speaking another language in his high school years. There's just something interesting about that.
15 minutes later
OK, I have a question. So the DigiDestined have reunited, well almost all of them have reunited, and so have their Digimon companions. Yet somehow, Palmon and Gomamon are there with them as well. Even though Joe and Mimi have yet to show up. Are they going to explain how their Digimon were able to join with the others? Did those two leave their Digivices to their friends, thinking that they didn't need them anymore? I'm gonna be honest, guys, this is leaving me a little bit puzzled.
3 minutes later
You know, guys, I was sorta hoping I wouldn't have to comment on this, but the CG, every time I see the Digimon digivolve into their second form, looks hideous. There's something about these models that looks really off-putting. And if I have to look at these CG digivolution's for the next 5 movies, then I fear I may be in for a kinda painful experience here.
20 minutes later
Sorry, guys, if I haven't been saying a whole lot right now, but I'm getting really sucked into the story. It's really keeping me interested in seeing where this thing goes.
6 minutes later
So Izzy created a virtual cyber world for the Digimon to hide in case of emergencies. And they can come in and out of that world as they go. I have a question. Is there any way I can get one of those? I'm not even asking if it's for Digimon only, I just want one because it just looks really fucking cool, you know?
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Digimon Adventure tri.: Reunion". Let me shut the movie off...OK. Well, that was certainly an interesting movie. After watching this thing, I'm really curious as to where the rest of this series is going to go.
I want to make something known first. Because I feel as though it needs to be addressed. Now, similar to a couple of other movies I've covered for this series involving cartoon shows such as Transformers and Yu-Gi-Oh!, I feel as though that this shouldn't be someone's first exposure to Digimon. And the reason why I say that is because of it's timeline. Because, as I stated at the start of this thing, this series of movies is suppose to take place after Digimon Adventure's 1 and 2. And in those series, the characters had a mountain of depth in those two series. Well, more so the first season than season 2. The only characters who made a return in "Digimon Adventure 2" were T.K. and Kari. Speaking of which, there really isn't much of a reference to season 2 in this movie, but I'm not gonna hold it against this movie, because it's just the first movie. So, I'm willing to cut this thing a bit of slack. But as I was saying, the characters in the first "Digimon Adventure" had a ton of character depth. And if you were to go into this movie, not having any prior knowledge of Digimon, then you would be completely lost as to who these characters are, and why we are even following them. And it might honestly take you out of the movie entirely, if you didn't know anything about the Digimon, or the human characters that have followed them since their days in season 1. Now I'm not gonna fault the movie for this, because I feel as though this movie was made for fans of Digimon. Which makes sense, considering that this thing was suppose to celebrate Digimon's 15th anniversary. But if you were expecting something new and refreshing for someone who's trying to get into the Digimon franchise, then this movie is not going to do that for you.
Now, setting aside that issue, let's talk about the writing. Writing in this movie is pretty good. There were some things I was wondering about when I was watching the movie, because I was trying to figure out some things myself. For example, when Kuwagamon is fighting Greymon for the first time in this movie, I was wondering how the hell was he stronger than he was in the first episode? For those who don't know what I'm talking about, in the first episode of season 1 of Digimon, Kuwagamon was attacking the Digimon that became friends with our main characters, who were kids at the time and had gotten transported to the Digital World from summer camp. Yet, at that time, Kuwagamon was easily beaten after the Digimon had first digivolved into their standard levels. Yet, in this movie, Kuwagamon is a lot stronger here. And it's not just this lone Kuwagamon. There are at least 3 of them in the entire movie, including the one that fought Greymon, and they are also much stronger. Well, there is kind of a reason for that. The Digimon are not traveling through the Digital gate, like they did in the series. Instead, they are getting to the real world through some outside force that isn't really properly explained, honestly. And some of the Digimon that have passed through it this way are known as the "Infected Digimon". And somehow, Tai's high school teacher is an undercover agent that he and a bunch of other people have been containing for a while. But because some of them have gotten stronger, these undercover agents need the DigiDestined's help in this battle to help the infected Digimon return to normal. And Tai's high school teacher says that Gennai was the one who suggested calling the DigiDestined for help. By the way, and this is just a minor thing, but for whatever reason, Gennai's name in this movie is pronounced "Gen". Think of the word "Get", but replace the 'T' with an 'N". I bring this up because I just got done watching the first season of Digimon on DVD, and his name was pronounced as Gennai. You know, like the word "Gem", but replace the letter "M" with "N". I guess maybe between now and the TV show, the writers forgot how to pronounce his name from the show. Now it might be because his name in this movie was pronounced that way in the Japanese version. But since I'm not watching the Japanese version, it bothered me slightly. So it's just something I felt like mentioning, because I'm kind of a stickler for those sorts of details. But anyway, I'm getting way off track here. So a lot of things in this movie are left kinda vague. One other thing I'm curious about is how exactly that all of the Digimon appeared with the DigiDestined, even though Mimi and Joe were not present at all. Did they just, like, give their digivices to their friends after the end of season 1? Because earlier, when Tai was about to be attacked by Kuwagamon, his digivice lit up, and Agumon appeared in front of him, defending Tai from Kuwagamon. So that's the reason why I'm curious as to the whereabouts of Joe and Mimi's digivices. It kinda left me in the dark slightly.
Now, I will say that, in terms of our characters, most of them have developed rather well. Tai, for the most part, is still playing soccer. In fact, in this movie, he's trying to get some of his friends to attend his soccer game. At least, before the whole Digimon fiasco started rising again. Matt is still playing with his band, and is trying to get his friends to attend his gig. And, for like, the first hour and a half, the movie plays itself off as a slice of life flick, and that's perfectly fine. Especially considering that this is following the DigiDestined, now they're in high school. T.K. and Kari don't really have a ton of depth in this movie. And I can say the same thing about Sora. She's just sort of there. Mimi isn't really that much different. Although admittedly, she is a lot more open in this movie, than she was in early season 1 of Digimon. Joe has been trying to pass his exams, but he keeps getting low scores, and thus he needs to practice harder until he eventually passes them. The one character who I really liked the most from the original cast in this movie is Izzy. Izzy is the computer nerd who was always trying to find knowledge about the Digimon and how the Digital World worked. And he has come so far in this movie, when compared to his TV show counterpart. Because he has developed a couple of things that helps the gang figure out what's going on. For instance, and I brought this up earlier, Izzy created a virtual world for the Digimon companions to hide in, in case of emergencies. And he also develops some new type of goggles for Tai, who can see the wavelengths that is causing havoc around the area they live in. And these are both such interesting concepts, because, yes, Izzy was just a computer nerd who knew a lot about the Digimon, but to see him develop his skills to a point where he's able to create such interesting, I guess, "gadgets" shows, once more, how far he has really come. Also, it seems as though he's attracted to Mimi. Which I thought was a little strange, because I could've sworn that she and Joe were a pairing in season 2. But again, it's been a long time since I've seen season 2, so maybe I'm just misremembering things. Speaking of Joe, he admits in this movie that he has a girlfriend. So I guess that may be further proof on how long it's been since I've seen season 2.
Now beyond the characters, our writing here is still rather strong. It's just some of it, as I stated, is left kinda vague. However, I have a feeling most of the issues I had with the movie are going to be answered in later installments of this franchise. Now with all that said, let's get to the acting. The acting here is fairly decent. Now I will say that, unlike "Yu-Gi-Oh! The Dark Side of Dimensions", where they got damn near the entire cast back for that movie, this one didn't get all of the original cast back. Now, I will say that most of the Digimon companions sound exactly like their original roles from season's 1 and 2. The only real exception to this is Biyomon, who sounds a lot squeakier than she did in the TV show. It's kinda weird to listen to, but it didn't take me out of the movie entirely. As for the human cast, some of the voice actors do make a comeback such as Tai, Izzy, Mimi, and I believe Sora, but I could be totally wrong on that last one. But the other characters have new voice actors. Some of them do a decent job. The best one of the bunch I'd have to give to is whoever voices Kari. She does a great job in this thing, and it doesn't bother me if her original voice didn't come back for this movie. The other actor I need to make mention of is the guy who voices Joe. His voice in particular is quite different, but the reason for that is because Joe's original English voice actor had passed way before this movie came along. It's probably gonna take me some time to get use to his new voice, but it's not something I'm going to harp Joe's new voice actor on. Because he still did a decent job overall. Which can be said about the voice acting in general in this movie. It's fairly decent.
Animation in this thing is pretty good for the most part. The characters designs on the human characters are rather simplistic. Which isn't really a bad thing, because season 1 had a very simplistic design for all of the characters from way back when. And I'm kinda happy to see that they kept up with tradition in this movie. Then we get to the CG...oh boy. Now, the CG really only happens during the digivolution's. And the CG kicks in when we get to see the Digimon companions second form. And the CG on damn near all of them looks hideous. There's just something about these character models that looks awful. And the worst off comes from Kabuterimon. He somehow looks awful in CG, and it just kinda took me out of the film slightly. And the reason why, I think, the CG looks really noticeable in this movie is because I happen to remember watching the old Digimon show, and I remember the few instances of CG they used for certain digivolution's, such as when Agumon and Gabumon have to Warp Digivolve. And the CG on those models looked amazing. And mind you, both the TV shows and this movie, were both produced by Toei. So how the hell did Toei get worse CG 15 years after the original show ended? And again, I may have to get use to these fucking models, because I have no idea if the CG had improved since this first movie. Beyond some usage of terrible CG, the rest of the animation looks fine, so I can still give most of the animation a positive.
I don't normally ever get to mention lighting in animation, but there's one small scene I have to mention. So, there's one scene where Tai and Agumon are talking. And the entire time that they are talking, their character models are shaded almost pitch black. Now part of the reason for that is because the scene was taking place as the sun was setting. However, I don't really see why they needed to shade their entire bodies black, because it just looks really weird when I have to see this. Now, mind you, it doesn't ruin the movie, but it's still something I feel like mentioning. Sound-mix is also kind of an issue only during the start of the digivolution's. Now I'm going to take a guess here and say that they used stock music from the Japanese version of season 1, because there's this guitar rift that plays in every single digivolution in this movie. And it's rather grating to listen to, because there's a ton of sound going on in certain scenes, that it really doesn't help enhance these digivolution's at all. If anything, they should've just recycled some stock footage of the English theme song from season 1 for these scenes. I understand that there are those who got tired of listening to that theme song every time that song played. But honestly, I would rather have that back, if that's how bad the sound-mix was for these scenes. Now it's probably because Saban Entertainment wasn't dubbing this movie, so that might be a reason why they couldn't use those songs for copyright reasons. But regardless, the sound-mix could've definitely been fixed better. The music is OK, aside from that opening song, which was rather shit. I kinda hope I don't have to hear it again in later installments of this film series, but I'll get to those when I get to them.
Overall, guys, am I able to recommend "Digimon Adventure tri.: Reunion"? So far, yes. If you were a fan of the first two "Digimon Adventure" series, then this is gonna be perfect for you. Because it continues the story of where those two series left off. Now obviously, I can't say for sure that I'm going to recommend the ENTIRE "Digimon Adventure tri." series, being that I've only seen the first movie, but I am hoping that the entire series is going to be worth watching. Now for those who want to get into Digimon, I would personally start with season 1 of "Digimon Adventure", then season 2, then go ahead and get into this film franchise. Because, as I stated, all of the character depth were in those first two series. And you'll be completely lost if you try to get into this thing without having any prior knowledge of Digimon. But for fans of Digimon, go right ahead and check out the first movie. Because, so far, I'm really digging what's here. And if this series can continue with it's strong writing, then I think this series is going to be a blast to get through. Now...I'm gonna go and get some sleep. I am feeling a bit under the weather at the moment, so I'm gonna go do that and re-energize myself.
Anyway, with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.
No comments:
Post a Comment