Reviews

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.