Zero Two Episode 28: The Insect Master's Trap

In this episode, Arukenimon asks the digidestined to walk into an obvious trap. They head right on in, knowing full well that it is a trap. Shockingly, they end up trapped.

Where's Admiral Ackbar when you need him? Sometimes the most obvious details can derail the most intricate plans. But for all the thought the digidestined put into today's mission, our fair fish-faced military mastermind could have spared them a lot of grief by pointing out the glaring oversight. For it does not matter if you know it's a trap in advance... if you trigger it, it's still a trap.

Arukenimon may be a villain with fuzzy motives a mysterious appearance, but her actual methods are blunt and simple. We may not know why she wants to eliminate the digidestined, but we do know that she wants to. She does this by sending monsters to attack them. In this regard, she's less Lust and more Rita Repulsa. After a wave of spire tipping pisses her off, she invites the digidestined and Ken to a giant house, promising payback. Her idea of payback involves sending monsters after them. Lots and lots of monsters.

Somehow the digidestined are under the impression that it's more complicated than that. They figure they might learn more about her scheme (they see no mention of that in the invitation). They figure they can finally corner her and defeat her (they have no idea how powerful she actually is). They figure that if they know it's a trap they can be prepared for it (they make no preparations whatsoever). The best they can do is send Davis, Ken and Cody in while TK, Kari and Yolei stay behind. Great, so not only are they walking into a trap, but they're divided with each group at half strength.

The Ken and Cody angle is probably the only noteworthy thing in an otherwise mindless episode. Davis is totally stoked to be working with Ken and itching to try that DNA evolution again. Ken and Cody are both hesitant about that. Cody's afraid of long-term ramifications (Ken says that too, but it's more a fear of having to associate with these people). That's about all they agree on; Cody is otherwise extremely cold to Ken. When the inevitable trap is sprung and is a legion of assorted insect Digimon, Cody saves Ken's life (via a rare Submarimon appearance), but only to repay the time Stingmon saved Cody in episode 24. In other words, if not for that, Cody would have been quite content watching Ken drown. This coming from the ultimate moralist of the series.

The original plan, if you could call it that, was to bail immediately if things got rough. Things got rough after about a minute and rather than retreat out the nearby window, Davis, Ken and Cody fight off the enemies however possible. Davis himself wrestles a few of them away. They end up delving further into the house, winding up face-to-face with Arukenimon herself, playing a flute. They apparently assume that she's just a flautist in her spare time and attempt to attack, realizing too late that the flute can control insects... including Stingmon and Digmon, who promptly sends them crashing into a large spider web with a Dokugumon bearing down. It's a trap!

Arukenimon had plans for TK, Kari and Yolei as well, sending an army of Flymon after the would-be rescuers. They end up flying inside the house, nowhere near where the first team had entered, and discover even more bad guys. Then they split up even further! Shockingly, all three of them end up in sticky situations themselves.

If that sounds a bit thin for a half-hour episode, don't worry. Not only are there full evolution sequences for Veemon and Wormmon, Armadillomon gets three of them! Three full-length sequences as he turns into Ankylomon, Submarimon and Digmon. Between just Davis, Ken and Cody's partners, there's 2:17 worth of evolution footage. Imagine what it would have been had they shown the others.

My Grade: D+

Loose Data:

• From the way the other Digimon were asking DemiVeemon about what it was like to DNA evolve, you would have thought they were a bunch of teenagers interrogating their friend who just got laid.
• This makes it especially disturbing when Kari acts like a yaoi fangirl speculating on future DNA combinations. Note that all of them include ExVeemon, and one of them's with her own partner.
• The giant heads Davis and Cody form when arguing is a strange bit of animation for this series, and given the argument it's not particularly welcome. Like Ken, Cody was very resistant to the notion of DNA evolution as it's a clear invasion of his personal bubble. Davis tries to egg him into it. Nothing like a kid's show that's has a main character trying to convince an elementary schooler to try something with obvious sexual undertones.
• Continuing with the Argumentative Cody theme, Davis likens Giga House to something out of Gulliver's Travels but describes the plot of Jack in the Beanstack. Cody angrily corrects him. But let's not forget that while Lilliput tends to get most of the love, Davis comparing themselves to Gulliver in Brobdingnag would be quite appropriate here.