So Digimon Has A Habit Of Giving Their Main Protagonists Goggles, Giving Them Brown Hair, And Reptilian

So digimon has a habit of giving their main protagonists goggles, giving them brown hair, and reptilian digimon. They also often make them heroic big brother types (and quite often literally big brothers… or at least caretakers). But digimon also has a habit of having young female characters with mysterious powers and a holy digimon partner. And sometimes, the two characters are related.

Not always directly, and never really in the same way twice, but often the two characters, when both roles exist, play complementary story roles in some way. Especially as the "Goggle boy/Taichi" archetype is consistently at the center of the story, and "Holy Girl/Hikari" archetype varies in relevance. And to be clear, I'm not trying to break down every character into the basic digimon archetypes, but they do exist and they are kind of useful to look at as a point of comparison.

Of course this all goes back to Digimon Adventure (film), where Taichi and Hikari a brother and sister, take up opposing roles in regards to the digimon situation. While Hikari was originally imagined to not be a digidestined in the future, her fear of the situation after her original acceptance (as opposed to Taichi's suspicion and later cooperation) clouding her perspective, that really isn't want happened in the final product. Hikari was innately drawn to the digital world. She never forgot. The incident is potentially because of her. And where does that leave Taichi? The (relative) normie who was called because of her, but stepped up to the plate as the one everyone turned to, independent of her. Taichi is their leader, Hikari the 8th child. Taichi (and Yamato) get ultimates. Hikari (and Takeru) have Angels that grant them that power. Hikari is innately powerful, but young, and Taichi is powerful to, but in a slower way born of being the first one to do things and push forward. Consistently the first one to evolve. The first and the last. All of that to say that this is sometimes echoed in later digimon. While nothing has quite reached the levels of original Adventure there are still plot lines and sort of story roles that echo that initial storyline.

While Chika doesn't play a major role in Savers, her role as Suguru's other child, her prodigious amounts of Digisoul, and her role welcoming Ikuto and Falcomon (a la Tailmon), clearly aligns her with Hikari. Even if in show she doesn't play a role that engages with that with the priority on her brother, the Taichi archetype, the main character with the agency that drives the plot, she still echoes Hikari with her surprising chillness with digimon, and a fateful encounter with a digiegg that ends violently.

In Cyber Sleuth, Erika is easily a Hikari archetype, and while her big brother is not the Taichi, she is the driving force behind the Hacker's memory plot. Her relationship with Keisuke (the main character, who you play as) in particular is the center of Hacker's Memory. While Keisuke is absolutely a goggle boy, Keisuke isn't a Taichi, he's the Daisuke to Aiba, the real Taichi. Keisuke and Daisuke are less, larger than life ambitious world changers than Taichi and Aiba. The reason I bring this up, is that even though Aiba and Erika never really meet, they are the focal points of both story halves. Aiba is situated at the focal point where Nokia and Arata, and Yuuko reunite. The focal point between the royal knights, the hackers and Kamishiro. Sure Keisuke is the hacker's memory protag, but it's noted he's not very protagy. Erika is the story's focal point, Keisuke her Daisuke, along for the ride, with his own motivations sure, but in the same way Nokia did, and Nokia was ultimately secondary (though also very important, has some Taichi in her). Aiba and Erika are both dying throughout the events of the game as the result of an accident, but also due to the accident now have some special digital skill. It's also important to note that Erika and Aiba's group are the only two groups that had digital encounters to kick this off. They're the only ones who have been to the digital world prior to this whole situation. In reality the 6 of them are this entries only true "chosen children" so to speak. But even that has its precedent, Hikari being separated from the other digidestined in the beginning. Aiba and Erika do not know each other. Their traumas and their resolutions are both different. Aiba's unremembered trauma was resolved by a rescue and reunion. Aiba's "cyberfication" is a death sentence, despite being relatively well off compared to most victims. Erika remembers her parents death and the resolution is separation from her loved ones, the loss of their memories. Her "cyberfication" is ultimately her salvation and allows her to live on when she would otherwise die.

Of course Survive is one big callback. Takuma literally has goggles, the Ta name and an Agumon. He is the groups leader, even when there are older people he's the one whose character guides the other kids, the first to evolve, the strongest. Miyuki has a holy partner and a literal power to transverse worlds, set apart by the others by her different arrival date (though in her case it was early). Now interestingly Takuma and Miyuki are not siblings. Miyuki is for once no ones little sister and is instead an older sister. (Her little brother, ironically being the Gennai archetype). But they are tied together. Takuma is the one who manages to reach Miyuki and they return to the human world, in an echo of Adventure epsiode 21. Miyuki mysteriously provides additional context to the situation, and demonstrates power (Miyuki and her song, Hikari and her references to the first film) No time has changed at all for Takuma since his departure, though unlike Hikari (who time was flowing normally for), 50 years had passed. While both Takuma and Taichi hestiate to leave the digital world, (in most paths), they ultimately do in order to return to their friends, Agumon returning anyway. In Adventure Taichi leaves Hikari behind (with the promise to the audience she'll return soon). Takuma jumps after Miyuki expecting her to be at his side when they return, but her being taken away. But more than that, Akiharu has Gabumon, and together with Takuma forms Omegamon. Now the Yamato analogue is very much Kaito (and Dracmon even has a wolf evo), though Akiharu has a little bit of Yamato in him, a brother protecting his sister, closed off to himself, having undergone a traumatizing incident as a child. But Takuma and Akiharu are the ones who form Omegamon to save Miyuki in the Moral path. Takuma is the one (granted he has different context from the other kids), who actually got to know the real Miyuki. The one who has the most invested in her due to their brief meeting, and the one most invested in saving her, when the others fear she's a lost cause. Conversely, Takuma is the one Miyuki really calls to from the other kids. Takuma is also the one who gets closest to the professor (asides from Shuuji) and gets to start piecing together things, often finding out truths about 50 years ago before the other kids. Aside from Akiharu, Garurumon, Renamon and Miyuki themselves, Takuma is the most involved in that drama. Granted a lot of this is game play, due to being a video game, as with Cyber Sleuth, but it still is worth noting.

Digimon overall as a franchise has a lot of its own archetypes that may be related to common genre archetypes but have their own sort of flavor to them. This is rather typical of franchises like digimon, but I find its still interesting to look at, whether intentional or not. It makes sense that Taichi and Hikari's characters would

There is something in the fact that instead of Hikari, Tailmon found Vamdemon, dwelling in the very castle that the chosen digimon originated in.

Because of course Nyaromon should have grown up with the others. She should have grown up playing together and waiting for Hikari with others who knew what she was waiting for in why. Tailmon shouldn't have had to grow up to be an adult while the others were still babies.

But if we're going with what ifs and should haves, then all 8 of them should have been at that castle, but with the Agents to teach them about what they were meant to do. With their tags and crests, and knowledge of their meanings. With knowing not just who they were waiting for but why.

In the end, Plotmon found where she was supposed to be, but none of the people who were supposed to be there, were there.

You know, I was kinda worried when they skipped Peach that we wouldn't see her at all. But now I just find it hilarious that they saved her cameo for for advertising an airline.

I wonder if we still would have gotten a cure cameo of peach if she hadn't been one of the lead cures. How much were they willing to invest in that bit?

You know, I was kinda worried when they skipped Peach that we wouldn't see her at all. But now I just find it hilarious that they saved her cameo for for advertising an airline.

Listen, I understand why Suite isn't a popular season. Generally speaking, the best parts of it are generally done better in the two seasons that precede it. It in many ways is just a weaker frankensteining of Fresh and Heartcatch. But Fresh and Heartcatch are fantastic, so just because it's worse than those seasons, doesn't mean its bad in my opinion. And to be fair, it does deserve many of its criticisms.

But it's also one of my favorite seasons, and I think some of it's criticisms are more a matter of taste. There's just a lot I love about Suite.

Hibiki and Kanade

I also know a lot of people aren't huge fans of the whole fighting thing Hibiki and Kanade have going on. And I agree, it's not the best executed and some things don't make sense. I also understand that many people are not fond of the vitriolic best buds trope, but I don't think that makes their relationship inherently bad just not to everyone's taste. For what it's worth, we haven't had a pair of cures like them before and since and it's a tragedy to me personally because I am quite fond of vitriolic best buds, duo cures and childhood friends. We have so many cure duos and aside from these two, none are childhood friends. The CLOSEST is the fact that Saki and Mai met once, when they were 9. Several trios of childhood friends (Fresh, Doki Doki and Happiness Charge), but they're the only true childhood friend duo. I honestly want more cures like these two. They get the learning to understand each other that the new friendships have, with the wealth of intimate knowledge about each other stemming from their childhood friendship. Despite spending a year "apart", the years they spent together still mean something, and they can't seem to stay away. They're mad at each other but there is still a comfortable familiarity in the way they aren't afraid to fight with each other. They say they aren't friends but they still call each other by first name.

Their hearts naturally fall into perfect harmony. The have like the same sense of style. Kanade likes to bake. Hibiki likes to eat. Souta refers to Hibiki as "Hibiki-Nee-san", and otherwise treats her similarly to his own sister. They have a flashlight code that they use to communicate across town at night. Neither one realized that there are two entrances with Sakura trees at their middle school or tried to talk about it for a whole year. They're both so stupid.

They take after Nagisa and Honoka a lot too. Nagisa and Hibiki are both athletic redheads who are good at sports and have black as a main color in one of their outfits (Cure for Nagisa, Civ for Hibiki), and generally use pink in their outfits. Both like to eat. Both can be prone to grumpiness and disagreements with their family members. Honoka and Kanade are both white Cures with fierce tempers and a strong sense of responsibility, able to handle domestic things like cooking. Both have more academic strengths, but are relatively graceful. There are some twists of course, Kanade has the little brother who she bickers with (their little brother's even both end their name with "ta"), Hibiki is the one with a parent who is often abroad. I really like how the two called back to the original duo without at all feeling like a copy.

To be fair not communicating is the name of the game in Suite. And so, I do 100% understand not liking this plot. I really do understand it. It's more than fair. All of the plots basically revolve around miscommunication. That is like. The entirety of Suite. Miscommunications, and the breakdown and subsequent healing of relationships. A very very valid complaint. One that I can overlook, but understand if others cannot.

Siren and Hummy

So, Precure's second heel-face turn Cure (if we don't count the Kiryuu sisters). She's a shapeshifting cat who can sing. The original one.

While normally I dislike the "Brainwashed to be evil" trope. It can be very effective. Go Princess used it to great effect in which there was a level of tragedy to the years that had been stolen away from Towa, and how her motivations had been twisted. I think it has similar effect here, where we kind of get both. She was brainwashed, and I do think that does cheapen Siren's motivations and redemption a bit, but she also had genuinely negative feelings towards Hummy, that she acted on in refusing to practice with Hummy. She still has to face Hummy head on, and as much as she tries to pretend that she's hard and strong enough to live in her bitterness. Siren isn't actually mean enough to keep facing her friend and betray her over and over again.

Hummy being better at singing than her caused her to lose a piece of her identity. The most important singer in all of Majorland. The one who sings the melody of happiness. So Siren doubles down on that identity. She becomes Minorland's singer. But she also, due to her shapeshifting, spends that time adopting different identities. Testing things out, even if she doesn't realize it. Ultimately she has to completely let go of her old identity (losing access to her original form) and everything associated with it and forge a new sense of self, in order to find happiness. But she doesn't completely lose everything.

Despite not liking to be called Siren anymore, she still lets Hummy call her that. She turned her old identity of Siren into something bitter, so she had to cast it off to redefine herself. But Hummy is the only one who ever saw the real Siren through everything Siren tried to become. Hummy may have been the one who took her sense of worth, but she's also the one who always saw Siren's value as Siren. Hummy gets to use Siren because her relationship with Hummy is the only thing that survived Siren's evolution. The two have to forge a new relationship to a certain extent. But it's built on what came before.

I also just think it's fun that the bulk of this emotional arc is on Hummy. It's cat drama. Fairy drama. Usually this is the kinda of stuff that happens between the pink and the heel-face cure. But not this time. This time it's the cat fairy, and the pink is dealing with her own friendship drama. I think it also ties right back into Suites continued echo of healing relationships, actually listening to people in order to harmonize with them. Hibiki and Kanade have to resolve their bitter feelings from their estrangement. Siren has to get over her jealousy to let Hummy back into her life. And Mephisto and Aphrodite have to stop fighting a war against each other.

Major Land's Royal Family

I mean really, no one bothered to tell Hibiki and Kanade at any point that Mephisto was the brainwashed former King of Major Land and that Major Land had a princess who was in hiding? Just locked out of the loop. Both Kanon and Majorland are entirely made up of people who can't communicate.

Anyway, Ako is my all time favorite cure. I rather unpopular choice, I know. But she fits right in with many of my other favorites, characters such as Hikari Yagami, Takeru Takaishi, King Clawthorne, King Ezran, Anya Forger etc. I love kid characters. I especially love messed up traumatized kids who don't always deal with it in great ways. And kid characters with heaps of responsibility on their shoulders. Like chosen ones and royalty.

So Ako is the epitome of what I look for in my favorite characters. She's a 9 year old with high future expectations, that she can't even begin to try and live up to because she's been sent away from everything she's known and loved. Not just moving to a new town, but a new world, where the rules of what is and isn't normal are different. In addition she was forced into physically altering her appearance, wearing unfamiliar clothes, and cutting her long hair. Not only that, she now has to keep everything about her secret. Her hometown, whatever music magic she has, her real future career plans, everything that made her her, has to be suppressed and kept secret. And she was like. Six. That's tiny. And she has to construct a whole new fake identity?

No wonder she's grumpy and keeps to herself? Her alternative is just trying to keep up a bunch of lies all the time. And keeping to herself, means few friends, and trying to keep people away, because this is supposed to be temporary to some degree. She has back home eventually, she's their future queen. She really has no choice BUT to be a grumpy brat. To keep from getting found out and to keep from getting attached. Like sure she doesn't have to be a brat to Hibiki and Kanade, but she's kinda right half the time, and honestly her tempering that brattiness into being just unpleasant enough to be left alone without being so obnoxious she draws people's ire involves way more socio-emotional intelligence than should ever be expected from a nine year old. And at a certain point, after years of it, it became part of her real personality. The sweet optimistic little princess is still there. But it's under a layer of cynicism.

Ako wants her family back. So she gets the power to do that. And things still don't go her way.

I've joked to people before that Ako is one of 4 cures with divorced parents. Her parents are effectively divorced, but extra. They're not just trying to fight over a house and custody of her, but over not just an entire kingdom, but the fate of the world. And her father doesn't even know who she is anymore. Her parents are actively at war, and her mother honestly shows no qualms about letting her husband be potentially killed, not bothering to tell the people she's sent after him about their relationship and his true nature. (And then her mom asks Mephisto to kill her to protect their kingdom, Ako can't catch a break).

This ties back to a fact that is kind of brushed over in the show. Ako is the princess. In the show she's honestly just the princess because it puts her in between Mephisto and Aphrodite's drama. But we see in show that Mephisto and Aphrodite are constantly putting their kingdom's needs above their own. A- monarchs (points deducted for getting brainwashed), but like. B- parents tbh. They love Ako so, so much, but simply can't raise her themselves. In fact, Ako's parents won't look after themselves, so Ako has to look out for them instead of the other way around. We see this a lot with Mephisto.

Sometimes Ako makes absolutely stupid decisions, like releasing notes, because she doesn't want to go against her dad, even if he isn't himself right now. Because she's a child whose parents are fighting, seemingly to the death, and if she can spread out the fight, she can hopefully drag out the arrival of consequences.

Ako does eventually learn to use the power as a cure, so she can balance the needs of the many over the needs of her loved ones. So she can do both. But she has to learn to make the hard choices and be willing to stand against her loved ones.

Also Ako also gets the miscommunication based friendship breakdown with her and Suzu, and to a lesser extent her and Souta in the movie. Suite really goes hard on the whole healing relationships thing.

Ako is really a direct foil to Yuri who precedes her. Missing evil brainwashed dads. Present throughout the whole show, but only join the team in the last quarter (the latest of any Cures). Semi-awkward friendship with one of the other cure's siblings in part because their friend doesn't know about all their magical girl trauma. Already looped into the magical girl stuff before any of the other cures, so has a preexisting relationship of some sort with the grandparent mentor. Ako is pretty much just a baby Yuri, but who has just now gained the power to try and fight after years of inability to do anything, instead of having just lost her power, and having to face down her own failure and keep going. So she's an angry elementary kid rather than a depressed high schooler. How can I not love her?

Over a year ago I started watching Xros Wars. 3 days ago I finally finished Hunters last episode. To be fair in the interim I also watched... every other digimon anime in its entirety (except for some movies), finished Cyber Sleuth and played the entirety of Hackers memory.

But I do have some thoughts about Xros Wars, or at least how I'm interpreting things.

So. Taiki.

Taiki's is a “Paragon” type of hero whose biggest flaws are being too dedicated to helping people and as such sometimes collapsing. Admittedly far from my favorite type of character, even when done well. Xros Wars fortunately does make this a flaw that causes them issues at times. Unfortunately though, in my opinion, it does not properly acknowledge this flaw. 

It causes problems in the Lake Zone, when it puts him out of commission. But aside from that it doesn’t really come up. It also sort of comes up again during the Death Generals arc, both with Gravimon’s core, and Yuu’s game. Two instances where it really is Taiki’s life vs. their goals. And the answer seems to be “Taiki is worth more healthy than he is sick/wounded/dead”. Which I think is a good take on the “too good” archetype. And it is something Taiki seems to do less as time goes on.

But I do think Taiki does have a different arc, that does actually get handled better that this ties into. Taiki’s final arc in relation to Apollomon boils down to sometimes, tough decisions have to be made. And I think this is what they were trying to do in episode 25. However, the situation that they are presenting isn’t really a “no good answers” deal, as much as it is Kiriha being an asshole. Taiki learning to have to make tough decisions is a great one for him. The only thing I would wish for in this regard is perhaps a better build up to this. But again, I think this is just a smaller piece of what is supposed to be Taiki’s main arc. But the core of this, is Taiki is someone who can’t turn his back on injustice, can’t turn his back on people. But is willing to throw himself into harm's way for other people. And these two points are related. It parallels Nene and Yuu’s relationship, in which Nene would do anything for Yuu, but in doing so fails to recognize Yuu’s autonomy which ends up hurting everyone involved. It foils Kiriha’s narrative in which he takes responsibility for being too weak to handle things when really he’s a victim.

While I don’t think it’s handled the greatest, I do think this is one of Xros Wars main points. You are not responsible for the actions of other people. You are worth just as much as any other person. Other people can be at fault. Other people can help you out. Everyone is an individual. 

Taiki in episode 30 is not properly giving Akari and Zenjirou the space to make their own decisions. They can’t come anyway, but he’s not really allowing them autonomy. In fairness, Taiki accidentally put them in danger in the first place and it would make sense that he feels guilty for that. But Akari and Zenjirou are their own people who can make their own decisions, and I felt like Taiki grasped that at the end of that arc, or was at least on his way there. Which is why Taiki keeping things from Akari and Zenjirou in Hunters is dumb, although I'm not really judging questionable Hunters decisions in the context of judging Xros.

This also extends to Taiki’s “traumatic backstory” in which Taiki felt guilty about the decisions someone else had made. Manga Taiki had a similar incident, but that incident Taiki was at least a little more involved in the events that transpired. But in both cases, Taiki takes responsibility for something that is not his own fault, in what on the surface seems to be altruism, but is really egotistical. While I think I like the manga’s take on this better, the anime has its own charm in being such an insignificant incident that Taiki latched onto. Either way I think Taiki’s real arc in Xros Wars is coming to realize that he is just one person and that he can’t make decisions for other people. You might even be able to consider the final episodes of Xros Wars, when he willingly patches the torch to Tagiru to be accepting he can’t do it all (or the fact he’s literally too injured to do anything or a half-baked excuse to justify Tagiru, your choice). 

Taiki is capable of denying others help, to a certain extent. Taiki denies helping Shoutmon, at first, because he doesn’t think Shoutmon is someone who's actually in trouble. At least, not to the point of prioritizing him over Zenjirou and Akari, who he stuck in another world, and that takes precedence. He thinks Shoutmon is asking for help for something unnecessary, for his own selfish dream. Taiki’s manga backstory actually makes more sense here because Taiki’s dream lead to hurting others, and that could make him more critical of self-aggrandizing dreams. But that’s a different story. Regardless, Taiki is easily persuaded and it seems it was the “Bigger” problem of Akari and Zenjirou that kept him from easily agreeing to help Shoutmon.

It’s also not as if Taiki is incapable of asking for or accepting help from other people, Akari in particular. In fact he depends on Akari’s help to do what he does. (Even if the show doesn’t acknowledge it past the first arc). But he definitely avoids drawing other people into problems, supporting those that are already involved.

Apollomon and Beelzebumon I think make this come full circle to Taiki. Beelzebumon died because he wouldn’t rest, but he made that decision for himself, a decision that Taiki earlier in the show was willing to make himself. And Apollomon suffered because Taiki refused to do something that he wouldn’t hesitate to do to himself if the roles were swapped. 

There are hard decisions that need to be made in war. But the goal isn’t merely to disregard life when there’s bigger stakes. It's to accept that there are people who are willing to make sacrifices just like you are and accepting their autonomy in being part of these hard decisions. (If this makes sense?)

If we look at Shoutmon’s desire to be King, a King is fundamentally a person who makes decisions on behalf of a group of people. Shoutmon is perhaps a little more honest in his goals. Shoutmon wants to become king so others don’t suffer, and recruits people to his side to accomplish this task. Shoutmon deeply values his friends and allies inputs and wants to be strong enough for their sake, to be a leader. (Thanks episode 25). Meanwhile Taiki is recruited by others for their own goals, because he believes that he owes others his strength.

To be honest, I’m not sure if I’m reading too far into this or if this was obvious to everyone but me. 

Taiki’s “thing” is his ability to hear the melodies of dying digimon. It’s not really explained why he can, nor does it need to be. It’s just a version of Takuya’s degree of spirituality, or Masaru’s excessive digisoul, or Taichi’s fateful digimon encounter. A thing that sets him apart from the crowd. I actually really like this concept, as Xros Wars does touch on the idea of different people having different destined roles. Being chosen children in unique ways. Xros Wars doesn’t quite do enough with this, or its music motif in my opinion, but this is a really good take on it and a good way of explicitly demonstrating Taiki’s empathy. I think it could be used a little more often, especially later on, but that’s neither here nor there.