In this episode, a perfectly decent
round of annoying filler is drastically interrupted by an actual
villain and some other goggleheads deciding to barge in on Tagiru's
turf. About damn time, really.
There are a lot of reasons to suddenly
be excited. This mild-mannered filler story suddenly and dramatically
turns intense and important in an instant. Ryouma goes from being an
insufferable jerk to being an insufferable jerk that may have some
ulterior motives. We have our first incarnation of a villain, and
what a splendid entrance it makes. Speaking of splendid entrances,
Taichi and Masaru ride in on their flying horses and just kick all
sorts of butt. Arresterdramon gets a new mode, which is actually
pretty cool. Kiriha and Nene are even back in the picture with a
couple new friends! If you think trying to fit all these dramatic
developments into half an episode would make it a whirlwind of chaos,
you'd be right!
After sixteen and a half episodes of
basically nothing, there is so much to process here. Each of the
singular developments could have gotten its own episode- Quartzmon's
appearance, the cavalry charging in, Arresterdramon's upgrade, and
the international situation. All of these are a big deal, and nobody
would begrudge building entire episodes to these points. Use all
these to build up Sneaky Ryouma, interrupt some of the prior mundane
cases with actual drama, and you can even get Kiichi and his Locomon
to play Imperialdramon for another Hong Kong trip.
The solution that isn't on the table?
Cutting out the filler. Stretching out the important bits of the
episode and skipping all the insect boy business sounds like an
obvious move. Funny thing is, it's among the most interesting filler
in the series. Kaneda is an annoying weirdo, but that only makes him
a distorted funhouse version of Tagiru (odd that Hideaki is the one
who notices this). He's obsessive about his hobby, but in the
interest of not harming his targets. And he is neither a kid with a
problem nor a victim when he stumbles into Digi-Quartz. That means
he's stuck watching as MetallifeKuwagamon fights the gang, putting
Tagiru in the unfamiliar position of having to protect a clueless
bystander. He fails miserably. Then you have MetallifeKuwagamon
himself, his lack of catch-able data, and his disdain for hunters and
their methods. Why is he the first one to finally articulate the
problem from a Digimon's perspective? This is good stuff here!
Everything else is just a barrage.
Trying to get a feel for Ryouma is nearly impossible. He's eager to
join Taiki in the hunt against MetallifeKuwagamon, but is off in the
distance being all shady at the end when Taiki suggests that they
need to stop fighting (incidentally, they've only directly fought in
two episodes). It's also hinted that he's the hunter that offered
MetallifeKuwagamon as a sacrifice to Quartzmon. Quartzmon's
introduction is spot-on, eliminating MetallifeKuwagamon just as he
was becoming useful and reminding the hunters that sometimes bad guys
are actually hard to beat. Like, seriously hard to beat and needing
more than a trick digixros. You remember how bad guys used to work,
right?
At some point, Tagiru and
Arresterdramon are being dragged toward certain death, and only an
act of deus ex Masaru saves him. Now, we all know this whole
inter-season crossover business is the most blatant fanservice we've
seen since Sexy Dynamite. Also, because of how lousy Hunters has
been, it overshadows everything. The good news is that it's supposed
to be confusing right now, as it's intimated that Taichi and Masaru
are jumping the gun to get the good guys out of this pinch. For now,
it's okay to not have an explanation and enjoy War/ShineGreymon
tearing up a storm. It's even okay to be a little annoyed that
Arresterdramon managed to hit Superior Mode in the middle of all
this, no matter how much the usual narrative would suggest Tagiru's
earned it. In the future, when we're supposed to know what's going on
and we're supposed to cheer Tagiru's moment of glory, it won't be so
okay.
My Grade: B
Loose Data:
- If I ever get a GPS system in my car, I'm naming it Naviko-chan.
- Tagiru notes that hunting has been slow lately, with fewer recent incidents. This should be a plot point, and it should have been addressed this episode. After what happens in the second half, no one's going to remember this bit from the first.
- That scarab thing that scouts for MetallifeKuwagamon may not be detectable by scent, but it's shocking that Gumdramon didn't see it given how close it was.
- Ren has caught 100 Digimon. Let that sink in for a bit.
- Yuu absolutely should have punched Tagiru in the face for it, but tricking Taiki and Yuu into distracting Kaneda was hilarious and brilliant and I can't give Tagiru enough credit for it.
- The Hong Kong scene is as straightforward as this plot gets, but it shows how much more fun Kiriha and Nene are compared to the main cast. Nene accuses him of being dramatic in his late rescue, Kiriha has this little blush... Mimi's standing there in the background with this smile that says “I ship it.”
- On that note, is anyone else dying to see how Mimi and Ruki would actually get along as part of a team? It's hard to imagine two more disparate characters.
I love how this episode is a total fake-out from title to middle. It didn't bother me if the second half was "chaos", because the whirlwind of things going on made it an effective sucker-punch and signals more than any individual development that we are on a whole different ride now. Credit goes to whoever wrote this episode, because that was diabolically awesome.
ReplyDeleteIt's actually kind of a shame that Masaru and Taichi stole the show as they did, and boy did they steal it! Gumdramon and Tagiru having their next insight and achieving Superior Mode was one of the few shining moments the two ever get in this season, and if only for its rarity value needed time to itself. Having the vivid and nostalgic baggage of much more warmly remembered veterans on our minds makes it weak sauce by comparison, which is just unfair to the two.
Ironically, WarGreymon and ShineGreymon teaming up is just too good for this series, which is both strong praise - because it was awesome to watch and fulfils so many crossover fantasies I didn't even know I had - and a weakness. It's obviously thrown in to buy Hunters some credibility, and I'd resent it that if it wasn't so darn wonderful to watch.
As for Quartzmon, I can't say I like his later design, as it's too much of a poor man's D-Reaper to be enjoyable. And why settle for poor man's when you can have the real deal just by going back three seasons? But his incarnation here is up there with the original abomination because it distinguishes itself admirably from any ordinary Digimon in just the way you describe D-Reaper as being clearly its own thing.
Also, is it just me or is it weird to see Savers artwork interacting with Adventure artwork? Granted, Masaru any other way wouldn't be Masaru, but it is really distracting.
DeleteI think Mimi and Ruki would get along fine, given that Ruki and Juri were very different in temperaments but became very good friends in Tamers. The only thing that would potentially get Ruki annoyed is if Mimi starts complaining about something, but post-Adventure (I'm assuming these crossover characters are at the height of their character development) it shouldn't be as much of an issue. But Mimi's an agreeable girl for the most part and Ruki has low tolerance with Hirokazu/Kenta, Takato, Ryou et al. because they piss her off in certain specific ways. (In fact, I wonder if maybe she might even be more agreeable or have higher tolerance with other girls.)
ReplyDeleteOh fuck, we've reached the most wasted crossover of all time.
ReplyDeleteRika and Mimi together and very little is done with them in terms of interaction. FAIL! It's things like this that make these episodes, as the anon above me puts it, the most wasted crossover of all time.
ReplyDelete(On the bright side, I enjoyed all the Shady Ryouma moments even if they're ultimately building to an anticlimax, and Airu's admiring remark about the good guys was sweet.)
Frankly I found this entire crossover both half-baked in it's execution, and a feeble attempt at playing to the fans.
ReplyDeleteLike the rest of Young Hunters, it reads like glorified bad fanfiction.