And it got me laughing a couple times just like the old show. But not all is well and now on to tell what is not so good in this reboot. Firstly writing is the biggest challenge this new series suffers. Episode pacing is all over the place and it seems like that the writers just went with the attitude of writing one episode at the time and therefore missing the whole overarching story as a complete package. So while the story has some cool elements that could have been really neat they for the most part are left really underdeveloped and stay just as cool ideas.
Characters feel very underdeveloped too in many ways compared to the original and seems like the focus was more to just write characters and not to make memorable characters. In the original series all of the children had their own problems and personalities and they were explored more deeply and they had to overcome those problems of theirs and mostly they get solved during the course of the series. Here that happens too but like fraction of it what the original has to offer. Children rarely anymore interact with other digimon (just by nuking or fighting them) which make the digital world feel very much like that all of the digimon or atleast a huge portion of them are there to fight for the dominance of this world and are otherwise just soulless killing machines. Evolutions happen just for the sake of plot for both sides for the children and for the bad guys. They just happen for the most part. They are not in most cases earned in any way to justify the evolution or some digimons appearing so soon in the series. In the old series there was always something preventing that evolution to happen. It felt earned when finally that evolution could be achieved.
And while I get that agumon is like the pikachu of the franchise it has too much involvement in the progression of the story and most of the fights. Agumon is everywhere and is involved in all too many fights that he does not have to be in. Original series gave a good amount of epic time to all of the digimons and chosen children and yes I know that Taichi and Yamato had more attention in the original too its way more obvious here. Even Yamato is most of the time in the shadow of Taichi and did I mention that he gets most of the screen time also. Taichi is in almost all of the episodes and even when he would not be needed and you start to think that hey this might be an episode without him he magickly happens to appear from thin air (which starts to get quite humorous in a way during the show as you start to guess where he appears next xD). I am huge fan of agumon and I like Taichi as a character in the original but even I started to feel very bored that they get to do most of the cool stuff that happens in the series.
But even with these problems that I mentioned there are some properly good episodes here and there and almost all of the cast get atleast one great episode where they get to shine. Its just sad that this series is 67 episodes long and if you are a fan of some of the other children other than Taichi and Yamato you might have to wait for a long time before the next time comes for that character to get the spotlight they all deserve. And they are always smaller than what Yamato and Taichi get to achieve. So while as a whole this series is a big mess of development favoritism and writing they have managed to capture some of the older series energy in some of the episodes for the very least.
Mimi and Jou are way better in this reboot than in the original and most of their episodes are more than great but then again characters like Sora and Koushiro have been ruined pretty harshly in my opinion. Like I mentioned earlier some of their defining personalities have been forgottten somewhere not to be found in this reboot. It does affect all of the cast but those are the characters that get the shortest stick in my opinion here. Most fight scenes in this series are one of the best animated over the whole franchise and some even having some properly good choreography in the fight but some of these are ruined by the favoritism and tipping of the power scaling massively. One of the strongest digimons the series has is introduced in the beginning of the series and one of the most powerful digimon that we knew before this show is beaten very easily in just couple minutes later in the series.
Villains have evolved in some areas and have taken some real setbacks in others. Some of them are familiar from the original like Devimon and his story is probably the best of them in the early run of the series and his story involved as a whole would have had so much more potential if written more deeply because there are some real neat ideas and lore involved here. And the end of his arc could have been the final episode of the whole series and this happens couple of times during the show. First half of the episode three could have been the last episode and so could have been the episode 50 and couple others. The show loses most of its momentum as almost all of these encounters have Mega digimons in them way before they are even introduced to the children (excluding that one that I mentioned earlier that gets introduced in the episode two) and most of them are dealt with ease. The sense of danger is rarely a factor here. Of course the children are going to win in the end but in the original the sense of danger and defeat was somewhat present. You start to expect that each fight is going to be won and that certain digimon to appear everytime situation gets too desperate and you hope they would give a good explanation for it in the end. Well they do give answer to that in the end but its very loose and not that original idea. Overall the villains are just there to be villains but they don't have a proper target or solid motives for their actions as in the original series they mostly seem to have a clear purpose. The real finale of the series has really cool fight scene but that kinda is the whole thing.
Almost all the show has to offer in many ways is very predictable story pieces and how the fights end in a bad way (excluding those great episodes I mentioned earlier). But for me the saving part and the best part of the series is the music Takayoshi Tanimoto and Toshihiko Sahashi have done and ou boy have they really out done themselves this time and I can properly say that these songs do fit the new anime way better than what they would have if they had used the old songs. I was always hyped to hear the songs starting play and the faster pacing and more hype atmosphere of this show really shows in the music and its neatly tied into small package that plays throughout the soundtrack and still be able to sound like they could be from the original series (some parts have been taken from the old soundtrack if listened carefully and brave heart can be heard in the new evolution songs). And speaking of the new evolution songs all three of them are great rivals for the the masterful and legendary work of Koji Wada (may he rest in piece). Unfortunately we could not have his work in this version too but what we now had is the best we could get and I can see myself listening to these for the years to come. All of the digivolution stages have song for them concluding in a whopping three songs that all kick ass and do fit for the show.
Now time to wrap this up somehow. In conclusion if you are huge digimon fan I suggest you to give this one a try just don't expect something outstanding but other than that its really hard to justify who this show was made for. New viewers have no idea about the game references or the first couple episode being like a nod to the good old boku no war game movie and many others. We old watchers and fans get those but the show is not what we liked in the original adventure about the characters and the story ? So its a like hybrid that tries to capture the hearts of us old fans with neat little tricks and old characters but still tries to make it something that some new fans would be able to call a classic and wait for the series to continue in the future and it really cannot succeed in any of these objectives. So now we have mediocre show that wasted so much potential and episodes to tell a story that is not very memorable with sometimes beautiful animations and very cool songs.
Overall I did not give this one a really high score as the negatives really outweight the positives here. But when I enjoyed it I really did enjoy it. I probably forgot to mention something here too but I don't want this to be any longer xD. See for yourself if you like it. Not a huge recommendation from me but a recommendation nonetheless as a digimon fan. Now let me go watch those couple really good episodes again and try to forget most of this series exists while listening to Break the Chain in the background.
Story 3/10
Art 6/10
Sound 6/10
Music 9/10
Enjoyment 7/10
Overall 6/10
