Digimon celebrated its 20th anniversary with the return of the original eight DigiDestined, aged into adults, for Digimon Adventure Last Evolution Kizuna. This revealed how each of the eight children was growing up, and following its success, Toei Animation and Bandai announced that they were going to bring back the Digimon Adventure 02 crew from the original TV anime in much the same way with a new movie. Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning brings back the old favorites from the TV anime’s second season for another new adventure that’s most likely going to serve as their final one.
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Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning really doesn’t unfold in the way you’d expect from a comeback of this kind. Serving as less of a reunion and more of a new story filling in some of the gaps from Digimon Adventure 02’s TV anime series, Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning doesn’t really hit the same as Last Evolution Kizuna hit. Depending on what kind of experience you were hoping to get from seeing these kids in action again after all this time, this feels lacking, considering how much they’re pushed to the wayside in favor of this new story.
Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning makes some big changes to the canon of the original TV anime, which comes with both positives and negatives for how it frames the rest of the franchise as a result. The film introduces fans to Lui Owada, who’s revealed to be the very first child who ever got a partner Digimon. This partnership ultimately didn’t work out, and a decade later, the Digimon has returned within a giant floating Digi Egg that Lui is trying his best to reconnect with. All the while, he gets help from the returning, second-generation DigiDestined from Digimon Adventure 02.
That’s the major issue with Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning. The main cast that fans would want to see more of play a secondary role to a brand-new character whom fans learn all about. It parallels some of the older films for Digimon Adventure 02 specifically (as fans might have seen with Wallace in Digimon The Movie) as, while we get some nuggets about each of the characters’ future plans and there’s some setup for how they eventually reach the epilogue seen in the TV anime, there’s just not enough of the main cast.
It’s especially troubling as Last Evolution Kizuna had more of a finality to it as it brought back the original eight DigiDestined, and had a final battle that featured them at the center of the new struggle. With so much of the story focusing on Lui and his Ukkomon, it’s more like the returning cast is just along for the ride in yet another big fight. The onus is on them to help Lui, but it’s not exactly a do-or-die situation for the rest of the world. The stakes just don’t feel as you’d expect from a reunion movie of this kind, especially when the rest of the production raises the bar.
The Digimon action itself has flashes of incredible moments when it’s in full swing (especially when Imperialdramon finally makes its debut in the final battle) and, thankfully, fans get a return of nearly all the favorite evolutions from the TV anime series. Characters look great, lighting is fantastic, and the final “boss” has a pretty neat design that blends Digimon’s cuteness with something a little more sinister. Lui’s story itself is very emotional and gets to some truly heartbreaking moments that have never been explored in Digimon before as well.
The changes to the lore are also welcome, as it’s not really a retcon (as Lui’s Digimon is revealed to have a direct tie to DigiDestined origins), but instead uses some of the questions lingering from the TV series to its benefit. But it’s also self-contained in a way that it won’t change any of fans’ feelings about the TV anime either as a result of everything that happens here. That’s just the overall feeling with Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning.
It’s an interesting, self-contained outing that helps fans reunite with some of their favorites from the Digimon anime, but it’s also not exactly a story that screams that it needed to be told. It’s an unfortunate effect of following a movie that brought the previous franchise to an end, and while there are great moments to be found here, it just doesn’t leave you with the same impact its predecessor had.
Rating 3.5 out of 5
Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning releases in the United States and Canada on November 8th and 9th with both English dubbed and English subtitled audio.
