The Digimon Movie Revisited: It Sort Of Works | Billiam

0:00 yeah this is billiam i gotta tell you guys something it's just i really like digimon yeah i know big revelation kari being the eighth child big revelation that was the you know little joke between us digimon fans out there here's another one agumon yeah forget about it even after making nearly three hours worth of scripted content about the digimon franchise and an ongoing discussion series talking about the new show on my second channel i still feel like i have more to say about it i genuinely am a fan of digimon and even after it's been years since i've covered a topic i'm still thinking about it because people are still commenting on my video agreeing with me disagreeing with me challenging me so i often think i want

0:46 to revisit certain topics because i'm still thinking about them the commenters are disagreeing with a position i no longer hold i can't get mad at them but i want to get mad at them because they're so rude about it i just hate my digimon movie review the digimon movie is such an odd yet kind of fascinating piece of media the story goes like this pokemon the first movie made a bunch of money for warner brothers who had licensed the film for an english dub so fox who had the rights to make the american english dub wanted the same for digimon but the problem was where wb had access to the already produced pokemon the first movie mewtwo strikes back there was no feature like digimon film so fox had digimon's english dub

1:31 producers cut together the three existing digimon short films well really there were two short films based on the original digimon adventure anime and a two-episode ova based on its sequel series digimon adventure zero two so through a new narration changed dialogue and the magic of editing they tried to make these three short films into one cohesive narrative oh yeah and on top of that it's soundtrack is a really comprehensive musical time capsule from the late 90s and early 2000s barenaked ladies smash mouth fat boy slim and some beautiful ska from less than jake in the mighty mighty boss tones oh not to exclude the exclusive cover of kids in america by len this movie came out before shrek and jimmy neutron it was

2:16 ahead of the meme curve and you're just too much of a coward to admit it don't worry i'm just kidding i know you just really don't care a lot of digimon fans look at this movie as some sort of embarrassment and i was definitely one of them but i've come around on it because i took some time to watch the original movies the digimon movie the entire series based on the opening short and some of my older videos and quite honestly i think i was overreacting so i want to talk about the original digimon movie again all-star by smash mouth and all because i really don't think i was fair to it in my first video and i think i've contributed a lot to the negativity surrounding the discourse of this film and that's not very fair so let's watch the digimon movies

3:09 let's get some digi context the original digimon adventure show is a very silly yet surprisingly sincere children's anime that still has its fans today a group of kids are transported to the digital world inside the world's network of computers where they meet and befriend each of their own digimon partners the digimon motivate the kids to grow up which in turn motivate the digimon to get gains they transform into more powerful digimon muscles so many muscles digimon have a lot of muscles a t-rex is one thing but a t-rex with biceps and thighs like that okay and then they beat bad guys if you watch it today it does not hold up well in terms of its production value and it may be a lot more silly than you remember but it's definitely still commendable

3:54 because it talks about a lot of problems kids can relate to in a respectful and mature manner that many kids shows generally don't of course this makes the characters enjoyable but it's also awesome because there's really cool monsters really silly monsters really cute monsters i'm a fan of like monster things english producer jeff nimoy has a pretty interesting blog talking about the production of the digimon movie from the english dub standpoint before the digimon movie was what it was fox acquired the rights to do all three segments and initially intended for three theatrical releases but changed their mind to a single release for whatever reason probably when they realized the first film was only 20 minutes long so nimoy suggested just doing the first two as the theatrical release and have tai the main character

4:40 narrate over it connecting the two and then maybe doing the third segment as a tv special fox even suggested doing the last two and having the first one as a dvd extra but due to legal concerns they felt the need to include all three films i mean nimoy and the others involved knew this was an issue introducing eight new central characters an hour into a film isn't exactly in line with the principles of you know basic screenwriting another problem was the climax of our war game the second film in the set was a lot more exciting than the very moody slower paced ova that movie's just sad seriously this movie is such a downer it's about a kid he has twin digimon one of them gets infected with a virus and he realizes the right thing to do is to end his uh digimon's

5:26 life it's it's a bummer they had to make it happen unfortunately it was a very stupid decision but it was one that had to be made because of a weird legal discrepancy the creative team knew it was a problem the fox executives knew it was a problem but it had to happen all because of the law the original shorts the movie would be based on released at toei's anime fair these were festivals the animation studio toei would put on during japan's seasonal school breaks where they could showcase films based on their own shows if you ever wondered why a lot of anime films are not feature length it's because they'd often be shown together as double features so knowing the necessary yet very unfortunate task the producers were given let's discuss the original films so we can truly

6:12 appreciate the task they had to undertake the first film came out in 1999 just a day before the original anime premiered also called digimon adventure run time 20 minutes tai and his younger sister kari are tiny little children they live in tokyo one day an egg comes out of their computer which hatches into a digimon they find a way to keep it as a pet but it keeps transforming and growing bigger until it can't be kept in the apartment anymore now kari and the newly evolved agumon now you get it they're running around tokyo oh no tai goes after them but then another larger digimon comes out of the portal from the digital world agumon wanting to protect these infants is able to evolve into a bigger digimon to protect them mirroring a moment earlier in the film when tai protects the smaller digimon from their cat i just like that also for some reason the

6:57 english dub felt that appropriate that this was the scene that required the rockefeller scan i like this film a lot it has a really soft art style which makes the kids feel really young and innocent but the night shots of the city with the eerie score creates a really mysterious air like what is happening is something very special hi kari and the digimon have a really cute dynamic and the ending fight is incredible it's a true monster brawl that i really appreciate i like monsters it's a really simple film but there's a lot of personality kari doesn't talk she mostly communicates through soft breaths into her whistle in the ending where kari is trying to wake greymon but is too upset to blow her whistle and ty understands what she's trying to do and just

7:44 is at its peak the digimon pushed the kids to take action like tai going out by himself to find his baby sister and in turn for their bravery and growth the digimon are motivated to fight for them it's just really sweet alright our war game a movie i want to talk about forever because it's just really fun released in 2000 our war game takes place the following spring after the summer of the original series fun fact the movie takes place on the day the movie came out cool after saying goodbye to their digimon and going back to the human world the entire cast is living their normal lives however the big dweeb tech head of the group izzy picks up on a digimon that has somehow gotten onto the internet and is causing chaos by eating data and hacking into all sort of secure networks around the world in a really sweet scene over the internet izzy and tai reunite with their digimon for the first time since the ending of

8:30 the original show look at the the cute little pixelated versions are just i love the way they walk out they try to defeat the evil diaboromon while struggling with the technical limitation of late 90s and early 2000s computer hardware and internet connection and also having trouble getting in contact with and assembling their group who has continued to grow up and lead busy lives after their big adventure including interpersonal drama oh ty you giving sora that hairpin ruined the my first ship and i have never shipped again since you you failed me you failed me the practical and technical limitations of the kids being able to participate in the fight like they would normally be able to is what sets this apart from just a you know a standard normal monster brawl it adds a

9:17 layer to the tension which makes the threat of this digimon seem so much more unique and hazardous than anything they've gone up against before i mean we've all had network connectivity issues when trying to deal with something time sensitive but i can't imagine how much more stressful it would be if the time sensitive thing was trying to help your buff robot t-rex man try to stop the evil demon spider from blowing up the nuke in tokyo bay it's just so relatable the clean audio of thai breathing before going into the computer is such an edge of your seat moment the two coolest digimon the strongest have been defeated at the worst possible time and then the energy from all the onlookers watching the fight online come together to help form the first digimon fusion omnimon he is so cool look at him

10:05 blasting look at his sword but even then they're only able to win because izzy thinks to forward all the millions of emails they're receiving from global viewers watching the fight over the internet to the evil demon spider which causes lag and gives them the opportunity to land a fatal attack right before the nuclear missile goes off right in the [ __ ] head that is that was metal that is just the most metal thing i have ever seen and in the english dub omnimon says this connection the absolute strongest medal there is at a brisk 40 minutes this is such a fun and smart film and is considered by me to be the highlight of digimon adventure as a whole it's just incredible action i love the look of the film especially the

10:51 internet's aesthetic just good the final film is a two-part ova based on digimon adventure zero two zero two does not mean the second series it means 2002. you see this anime came out in 2000 and it took place in 2002 because it was three years later so it's the future 2002. the first part is titled digimon adventure 02 digimon hurricane landing and the second transcendent evolution the golden digimentals this star is the cast from the second show which is comprised of two of the original gang's youngest members now the same age as the rest of the gang from the original show and some of their classmates however the main character is a feature film exclusive willis willis lives in america with his digimon partner terriermon damn just an all-around good one they're on the run from the evil kokomon who has been hunting down other digimon partners

11:37 who have the same digivice a tool digimon partners have as willis but since the zero2 cast has a unique digivice they've remained safe so the new gang goes to the united states to rescue the old gang and help their new friend and find out kokomon was a twin digimon to his partner terriermon it's been infected with a virus for years causing his violent and odd behavior this film has a really unique and odd tone but i like it more each time i revisit it it has this somber feeling that looks back sadly on the good old days of youth that you will never be able to return to the final fight with kokomon is not a heroic action piece it's a really sad battle with a lot of emotional weight and eerie music that contrasts the incredible action animation on screen despite the slow and moody tone the film ends on a happier note which looks forward to a better

12:22 future i like willis a lot and although i think the original zero two anime is a bit messy i genuinely love the characters a lot and i'm realizing it more and more and it's fun to see them in a story like this so now you can appreciate the struggle the english writers had to go through films taking literally years apart on different sides of the world with completely different casts of characters and they had to make it into one you know nicely packed story so let's talk about the digimon movie not the three digimon movie we just talked about but you know the digimon movie which is those three we just talked about but we can't even begin to talk about digimon until we get through the unmentioned fourth segment uh the four-minute angela anaconda episode at

13:07 the beginning of the digimon film and when i say at the beginning i mean this is a part of the film's official run time this wasn't a short that played in front of the movie this was commissioned specifically for this so angela anaconda was a show that aired alongside digimon on fox kids it was not created by fox kids but a canadian channel teletune however it was a big hit when fox kids imported it so they tried to make it a part of the programming block's identity often running marathons and for some reason commissioning this to go in front of the digimon movie the short was actually reworked into a full episode which removes any mention of digimon instead calling it something else [Music] but angela still has ty's hair in her revenge fantasy the inclusion of this

13:54 segment was not a decision made by the digimon team or the angela anaconda team this was something fox wanted for some reason i used to hate this short a whole lot more but i recently did a whole retrospective on angela anaconda which surprisingly made me appreciate the show a lot more which was not the reaction i was expecting to have going into watching it i thought it was going to be like you know an easy bad cartoon to watch and i was going to be able to clown on it and make silly content but i actually consider it to be you know one of my more thoughtful pieces so go check it out if you go in with an open mind you might think about the show differently too coming out of it also i'm aware of that copy pasta where the kid describes going to see the digimon movie with his parents who had recently decided to try to give their broken

14:41 marriage another go so they get to the movie theater and he looks up at the screen and sees anything but digimon what what is this and he throws a temper tantrum so bad that his parents get in an argument that ultimately leads to their divorce there's just one problem with the story the whole crux of the thing is the fact that he doesn't realize that he's actually going to see the digimon movie when this is the first shot in the angela anaconda short this is it gg pal in a few seconds the doors will open for the best movie of all time the digimon movie i'm sorry i know this has been a realization that has been 20 years coming but angela anaconda is not to blame for your reaction you were just very dumb

15:30 i'm sorry but it wasn't angela anaconda's fault she didn't want to be here it was a work thing so making this into one story the only character to have a prominent feature role in all three films is thai sister kari but her role in the second could be described more as a cameo who says there's no such thing as monsters kari narrates over all three acts to help the audience understand when and where each film takes place and after that it really just becomes about name dropping willis that's me with tk another one of the digidestined and that's willis in america during the first short they show some of willis's backstory because it technically was taking place during the same time or at least the film makes it that way as well as ours began that night eight years ago

16:16 then in our war game izzy explains he was tipped off about the digimon on the internet by his friend who lives in america willis there he is willis this kid i met on the internet emailed me his name is willis and he lives in colorado that kid willis check this out time we're getting emails from all over the world here's one from that kid willis in america finally in the third film willis explains the virus that infected kokomon is the same thing that created the demon spider in the second film and when the demon spider dies it whispers the name willis so defeating kokomon is putting an end to this virus that's been causing all this havoc for years it's not smooth but it's a clever solution to a problem they had to overcome

17:02 digimon the movie colin willis yeah what's up stinky yes you got anything to say stinky mon here let me get close to the mic what are you gonna say i stink therefore i am wow well well well well i love you so much the english stuff of digimon is known for having a lot of corny jokes but this film is just a highlight reel for when those jokes really land what's up stinky thank you for visiting yeah.com the original our war game had this iconic moment izzy you're all sweaty what's wrong well it's about the egg huh the egg has already hatched no not that egg but there are so

17:48 many hilarious jokes that are dub exclusive that just like complete the experience of this film for me bye bye did you see that no i was sleeping but you're driving just background characters and quick lines they didn't have to make into the jokes but they went the extra step don't tell me didn't you hear me but it's busy i'm sorry lady when they got the task to do this movie they wanted to make it the best product they could despite the limitations specifically they added this subplot about ty's mom being a bad cook your favorite liver stick we're in luck she burned them they set it up in the first film and in the second one she's just so lovable are more friends coming over i'll make three bean salad nobody's coming over mom oh

18:34 that's all right i only have two beans anyway made beef jerky shakes no thanks bob where are you going don't you want your shake oh i'm glad someone appreciates my recipes and then it plays a big part in the story being the cause for izzy's emergency trip to the bathroom during a tense battle i hate to tell you i told you so but i told you something in the originals she's just serving oolong tea and izzy has an addiction to caffeine these are changes that i really don't think take away from the integrity of the original film except for some that are still funny just because of the unapologetic american-ness of it all when this one dig evolved he expanded more than my uncle fred at thanksgiving however i do think kari's narration can

19:21 be annoying at times it makes sense as a bridge in between films but over big emotional climaxes like when ty and matt are able to go into the computer to be with their digimon she talks over the whole scene it's a shame because it's a really impactful moment it still works it absolutely still works i just wish they let us hear the awesome score they went through the trouble of producing this movie does use a brand new score and soundtrack the new score is hit or miss i prefer the original score of the first movie but i'd be lying if i didn't say i loved the cinematic rendition of the english digimon theme over game's original score had this church-like music when omnimon was born which really helps to make omnimod feel special but i really do love the music that plays in the english version it's

20:06 grandiose and heartfelt and then triumphant maybe the inclusion of let's kick it up takes away from the intensity of the stakes but it's [ __ ] cool most of what's cut from the first two films are used to make kari's narration work to trim up the pacing a little bit and to remove some violent shots too much for american audiences but once again i don't think these damage the integrity of the films and the director of both films was even offered the job to direct hal's moving castle for studio ghibli after the financial success of the digimon movie the american digimon movie however memoria soda did leave due to creative differences but it's probably safe to say it helped lead to other opportunities and he's had a great career since then the original soundtrack for the digimon movie is also incredible it's so odd to see digimon with all-star on top of it and no it's

20:53 not a meme this is an official product but it's just such a nostalgic time capsule now this was the climate of 2000s american kids movies and i can think of all sorts of kids movies that overlap with this soundtrack in terms of both songs and artists and you know what i kind of like the digi wrap it's fun however i guess you can say the more insidious nature of this film comes with the cutting they had to do to get the run time down the first two shorts aren't that bad but the final film had over 30 minutes cut from its hour run time including the subplot about the original kids getting captured there are tons of cuts everywhere some of which create continuity issues like veeamon here digivolves in a scene and they use multiple shots from the location so he goes back and forth between forms and there's tons of cuts all over the place

21:39 to speed up the pacing which results in these weird frantic action scenes that really are just nonsense being said out loud also present day that's a lie it's not present day it's the future 2002 baby but even then my biggest complaint about the cuts made to this film was this scene which is apparently void of its emotional impact due to cutting the saddest story i ever heard i'm the one with the problem not you get over it okay it's just like excuse me but even in the original that cut to davis is pretty funny he has a second longer to collect himself but the hard cut to being totally okay is sort of just in line with his character like he

22:25 literally saves the day at the end of the show because of how no thought head empty he is this segment does not work within the digimon movie i i think that is probably the critique i said in my original video that i still hold on to the most but there's just a lot of blameless circumstances for why that came to be nothing communicates the film's messiness better than the official poster so just right off the bat this character just doesn't exist i think it's supposed to be an artist rendition of an evil version of lopmon which is a kokomon transformation we do not see in the film the equivalent level to terriermon but the character has never officially looked like this so who

23:11 knows uh these eyes in the background it's unclear who that's supposed to be my best guess is it that it's omnimon but he's also just right there in the center okay and then there's the beautiful star pattern and oh look at that i none of the outfits here except for willis's appear in the film this is all of their design from digimon adventure zero two and then just that like computer screen of all the kids at the top there from the original adventure and so much is going on here on the movie and we're so excited we're throwing the digimon the movie house party sweepstakes when you'll get a digium on the movie videos greeting party hosted by a surprise digidestined character for you and 20 of your best friends oh what i give for a digimon the movie video screening party hosted by a

23:58 surprise digi destined for me and 20 of my best friends when all this is over and the world's back to normal you'll know where to find me obviously as a direct adaptation of the original movies this is not what you would call faithful i mean they cut out this shot of my good friend anja woman and that's just not something i can forgive imagine her embarrassment as she shows up to the theater and her big action flip is coming up and she's like and then it's not there imagine that how could you do that to her digimon to me is a nostalgic property and while i really appreciate the quality of the original movies to say that i don't like digimon the movie is to reject my digimon experience which

24:44 is what makes it nostalgic for me as a kid not knowing what the originals were like i got the emotional impacts it felt cool when it was supposed to be even the third segment and hell i thought the new digimon were so cool i dragged a babysitter with me to go see this movie and i went through that little card pack you got with it or maybe it came with the dvd all the time i have the cards i go through them still i had the soundtrack on cd i listened to that thing so much some of the changes made to this film and some of the lines are so crazy that just knowing why they're there adds a weird extra layer of enjoyment of this film for me the first two segments of the digimon movie works so well because the original source material is great but also because the added jokes add this fun flair that

25:29 isn't a replacement for the original versions but is definitely something unique the digimon movie really is fascinating because it's this weird [ __ ] up americanized version that could have really only existed with a franchise like that at that specific point in time i don't think we'll ever get another thing like the digimon movie again so i don't really feel the need to protest it i'm just kind of happy it's there so we can talk about it of course i would like the originals and even the digimon movie again to be released legally in some manner here in the states but i'm sure there's plenty of legal hurdles standing in the way of getting that to happen who knows how long their license is for the music lasted i mean i don't know maybe it's just a matter of the right people sending the right other people the right

26:14 emails uh so yeah agumon anyways i'm so happy you get that now anyways i'm tired i'm stressed i'm gonna go get some sleep [Music] you