Oh SHIT I'm so sorry! I thought that was a shot of Regulusmon and Siriusmon from the episode, my eyes betrayed me. Let me pin and credit you in the description, I'm so sorry! If I can do anything else let me know!
I think RU-vid decided to delete your other reply for some reason, I appreciate you being okay with it! I try my absolute best to make sure stuff like this doesn't happen, I hope you can take solace that your art is so fantastic I thought it was from the actual episode! Huge apologies again!
100% agree my friend, Ghost Game started so strong and creepy but it never went above Stage 1 (Monster of the Week), painful because Digimon tends to be at it's best once it abandons that chapter.
@@pn2294 Personally, I like that is justified the "monster of the week" format for the *horror* anime. Seriously, the random Digimon they faced were *random Digimon* that caused trouble not as part of the main villain's plan but simply due to being alien.
@pn2294 Define Variety ? As Karn put it out. Its basically this digimon has an horror plot and the gang solve it at the end. Nothing in the series is affected with the digimon being around or impacted. They don't get awareness for this. In other series, if digimon were doing what they did, you would see some kind of human response or normal people learning about digimon. At the least our main characters would get save, but no the series went back to status quo despite saying it had a narrative.
@@Chalicodragon The gang are gradually integrating Digimon into the real world. By the midpoint of the series, Digimon have their own businesses and civilizations within the human world. By the end, there are even unofficial Tamers in their series. It’s like Digimon Survive’s ending in that regard.
@pn2294 You mean the ending where Hiro talks to the United Nations and everyone just accepts digimon despite this series having the most malicious day of the week digimon. The digimon are most of the time hidden from society , with only a few of them interacting with humans. Literally episodes end with the gang telling digimon to hide themselves. What unofficial tamers are you talking about ?
I'm convinced that *something* happened during Ghost Game's hiatus. If you look at the episodes up to that point--while very monster-of-the-week--they are slowly building up to something. Things are changing and progressing. Then the show comes back from that hiatus and all of that momentum stops _immediately_. It's as though they completely scrapped whatever plan was in place for Ghost Game, and then were just spinning their wheels until the end. Ghost Game had the potential to stand with Adventure and Tamers at the top of the franchise, if not even exceed them. The premise and early episodes were really that strong. Now? It's 67 episodes of mostly the same thing. There is no real reason to watch a second episode of Ghost Game, because it's the episode you just watched but with a different Digimon. I can rewatch 52 episodes of Adventure any time, and have multiple times. I can't imagine slogging through all of Ghost Game again.
I never actually realised that. I rewatch adventure 1 & 2 once every year or 2 but even 8 months after finishing ghost game, I have no real desire to rewatch it.
You hit the nail on the head! The problem wasn’t with the episodic format, but rather its execution. The formula got tedious and repetitive over time so the series started declining, especially its second half. Granted, its second half is still better than say, Adventure 02’s or Adventure tri.’s, but that’s because their second halves were convoluted messes whereas Ghost Game’s was the exact opposite: a stagnant plateau. Being better than 02 and tri. are low bars to clear, anyway. And it’s obviously better than Young Hunters because YH is this show on steroids: YH has all the same problems but amplified up to 11 because of its far shorter length. I’d still recommend this mediocre entry over other weaker entries like Frontier or 02, but that’s about it.
Yeah, I felt the same. something changed. I'm convinced it was actually going to be even more episodes than just how much we got. Which is why they were going so slow. But at some point they were told to finish it off. And they didn't have enought time, so they finished off their remaining monster of the week scripts and left the last 3 episodes for the finale.
Something happening in the middle of Digimon anime production? This must be the first one! (Bad sarcasm aside, Toei is infamous for messing up Digimon by being involved and changinf things on the fly)
I think some episodes had to be cut because of the hiatus as Digimon seasons only run for one year before moving onto the next season. Digimon wasn't the only one to suffer this another show of their Precure also had the same issues, it seemed they had some plans for the show but scrapped them and the show was just super slow after that.
I loved the episodic nature of it, and a lot of the story seemed like it'd pay off in interesting ways, so it's a shame the ending stuff felt so rushed. I still really enjoyed Ghost Game despite everything
It made sense. In a dark take on the partner's dark side, Gulus was a viral threat that forced Quantummon to evacuate the Digital World, leading to random Digimon causing problems by just being otherwordly.
I think the early part of Ghost Game being episodic was fine. Tamers did that because it was spending time introducing characters and developing them. The real plot didn't come to be until about halfway when the tamers went to the Digital World. Ghost Game teased quite a bit in those early episodes so it made the audience speculate what would happen. That in itself isn't a bad thing as long as there's a payoff that links everything together.
The problem I have with this logic is that story arcs are just extra long episodes. They’re not actually more important. The fact that GG didn’t revolve around a main antagonist meant that each episode was actually more important because none of them could actually be skipped
@@pn2294nah it meant that they could all be skipped because there was no importance to them such as a main story arc. They could have taken like 40 episodes out and been done with it. Just boring filler.
I was expecting a Digital World arc, but not in the last three or so episodes. There were also some villainous Digimon they deserved an arc like Piedmon, Dragomon and Millenniumon.
This is interestingly put. I don't strongly agree or disagree with any thing, it's just a whole lot of "yeah, I can see that, I understand that sentiment". In broad general terms, Digimon either really needs a manga or a consistent series of mainline games if it wants to get out there and get the same kind of shonen treatment other series have. The toys are a respectable begining and they don't have to go away, but I remember as a child being really bummed out every time a game came out and it was mid, and every new show had nothing to do with the previous. I'm not saying "no new characters or settings" I'm just saying every seasons removes stakes by being a fresh start. Ghost Game, Seekers and Survive were all massively hurt by being all disconected and having a disjointed approach of going over seas. You spoke of corporate synnergy, but I think it's more than that. To me it's more akin to a sense of "oh, the new thing in that world" instead of "oh, it's the new world of that thing". Being really specific to Ghost Game now... I don't know how to feel about it. I watched it weekly and to completion. My interest did dwindle, but not in a catastrophic manner. I don't think episode caps and being longer or shorter really affects my enjoyment of the story as long as what is being done justifies its lenght. There are shows that couldn't be saved even if cut in half. PERSONALLY, I think around episode 25 the show should have "dropped" the weekly mystery and jumped straight into the Digiworld that they were teasing for way too long. The show teases a LOT of big baddies like Dagomon, Kuzuhamon, Manticoremon, Cthyllamon that could all be doing the exact same things but in the digimon world to smaller weaker digimon. The show also is the one that comes the closest to be able to show all Demon Lords and it could have been a great midshow plot beat still in the "horror theme". That's why I put the dropped in quotations, I think they could have shifted it a bit to other digimon in a different scenario. The show hurts for not having an extra Tamer, even though it had the opportunity to introduce a Herissmon. After a while I thought they were going to subvert the trope by giving each Tamer a second creature (Espimon, Ryudamon) and at some points we see Tamers giving others to each other's partners. ... But that didn't come through either. But I think the biggest bummer and the only thing I'd really consider a disappointment is the resultion of the conflict with Gulus. The whole thing of a meteor thing in a distant future is so underwhelming and makes everything seem so unjustified (specially considering in just about every media, time in the digiworld is faster than here, so 2000 years here would be like a billion in there), and it actually makes me think what the heck is going on in japan that this is a trend now (Pokémon SwSh had an alien creature coming from space and a power crisis hitting the Earth in the very distant future. Sonic Frontiers has the same "oh no, there's this huge meteor thing slowly coming over and you sped up it's arrival"), idk, I might be overthinking it, but I kinda see a trend of "not really impending space doom slowly approaching" In the end I was never really disappointed by Ghost Game, I was just always curious on why it made the decisions it made. ... And speaking of curious, I've always wondered why Hiro had a scar and Kiyo had a bandaged arm (implied to be some sort of soft cosplay) as such prominent design features and they never panned out as a flashback or character motivation or anything.
Apparently there's rumour that Arctusmon and Promixamon were just made as what if evolutions. Basically the anime staff and the BE Teamm just didn't communicate on it. Its kinda implied with thier "theoretical evolution". I still find it skeptical because the idea that the last Antagonist of Ghost Game was a ultimate still feels narratively off.
This is still one of the weirdest things... like it really feels like they have an OVA in the works where they want to use all these forms as a sort-of Omnimon moment, but it's also weird because they've never REALLY made a series with the intention to book-end it with an OVA before??? So it's just like......... What the crap happened here...???
Love this video, thank you so much for referencing my reviews! It wasn't easy and some weeks there simply wasn't much to say, but I am very proud of my coverage of Ghost Game. As proud as someone can be about reviewing a cartoon ;)
Digimon Ghost Game felt like the creators had a strong idea for an overarching, serialized narrative, and chose to wait until the last 3 episodes to tell it. I don't mind the idea of a completely episodic monster of the week series, but the show kept sprinkling in little mysteries and subplots that hinted very strongly that it was going to do what most Digimon series do and eventually move into a more serialized format. Almost feels like a J.J Abrams work where the writers introduced questions that they didn't have answers to, but weren't super concerned about coming up with answers until they were just about out of time
@@Karn_EX That is definitely a possibility. My thing is like by Episode 40 out of 67 episodes I would think they would recognize that they should at least try to start addressing the mysteries they set up. Even if they didn't have the budget to make it as spectacular as they wanted with the best animation or the best script writers, you gotta figure that industry professionals would realize that the longer they pushed it off the more difficult it would be to make something even remotely satisfying. Perfection is the enemy of completion as they say
@@ML1399TheyStoleMyName Right, "being episodic is no excuse." Seriously, how many horror themed shows aren't episodic? Feel like there is a reason the genre had so many anthology shows. Karn: "Stop arguing its supposed to be episodic." Frankly did not address the genre.
Gulus being an alien, who turned himself into a digimon and Created an alternate persona to hide which ended up usurping the body is such an interesting idea that just goes nowhere. So much interesting character building left on the table without any resolution.
I have not watched the video yet, but here are my thoughts on it and want to see reactions to them. The ghost game had a good setup, but a failed planning and absolutely terrible ending will edit after watch of your video
I feel the trio of digidestined worked better with tamers as there were other side digidestined that had partners and I just feel this season was hiro was overused with him having 2 partners
I disagree with Hiro having two partners part. Espimon being Hiro's partner was more like Cutemon being Taiki's digimon. They had moments and developed thier relationship, but it doesn't go anywhere and you can literally take Espimon out of Ghost game. A digidestined having two partners and it being serious focus could be interesting, but Ghost Game did nothing with it. We already know that digimon in Ghost game can connect with their non-partners. Even Espimon's evolution episode feels off since it's so late in the series and it's made into an auxiliary digimon in its own epsiode. Heck, they got Ryduamon to evolve without a partner...why did Espimon need to ?
My problem is the fodder/irrelevant add-ons do nothing of value outside MarineAngemon. Savers handled its add-ons better than Tamers but they also still feel utterly pointless outside the old man. Kinda glad Ghost Game stuck to just Espimon and two fast travel guys (Airdramon and Ginryumon, and I feel the latter should've been a bit more relevant)
@TheDiscoGenre Airdramon was relevant ? I think all of the Ghost game adds on worst though. They didn't really need them. Heck, the characters not having fast travel could have added to the plot and the show could have tried to find ways to get around that. Though I agree with you overall. I think the only sixth rangers that have worked out well in digimon were the ones that were already there from the beginning of the story and had a role established. Such as Kairi and Gatomon, Ken and Wormmon, Impmon, Kouichi, Ikuto and Falcomon, Miuyki and Renamon, and Haru and Gabumon.
@@lucanigro7316 And that's still more relevant than (Hiro)Kazu, Suzie, or BUY WONDERSWANS Ryo sadly. Being a taxi is more relevant is more relevant than anyone who wasn't the Primary Colors or Impmon.
I feel that Myotismon, Lilithmon, and Millenniummon have unfinished plots. These three digimon in particular were full-on antagonists, but were never killed, or truly defeated. I kept expecting for any of the three to reappear again as a major antagonist, but that never happened. Especially during the last few episodes before they went to the Digital World, I actually expected for Hiro to take MoonMillenniummon with him since it kinda lingered on a shot of the apocalyptic digimon I also thought we would get a mini-arc of sorts with Pharoahmon thanks to some of the build-up with AncientSphinxmon and Mummymon. That being said, I find it funny that GulusGammamon never got a chance to go to his Mega form lol
@@Bezaliel13so is the show supposed to be episodic or have a main plot? You can’t say one thing and then defend the show by saying something that contradicts your previous claim mate.
Also, they had Dracmon vow revenge on ruli, show up 20 episodes later, and then get unceremoniously deleted by Myotismon. But there's a matadormon that escaped surely we'll finally see an animated version of Granddracmon and...nope. None of the vampires were seen again.
I loved Ghost Game basically the whole way through. I thought the horror stuff, particularly the body horror, was excellent and I enjoyed the episodic nature of it. The problem I had was with the last 4 or 5 episodes. They felt so rushed and out of nowhere. To me that is way they didn't feel satisfying. Because it was almost like the creative team had no idea the end was coming and had to scramble to tie up all the loose ends.
Pity Karn seemed to have forgotten that it was horror. Seriously, how many horror shows AREN'T episodic? Personally, I like the dark take on the protagonist's dark side. Having Quantumon evacuate the Digital World in response to Gulus and the horror throughout the series being from random Digimon unrelated to Gulus causing horror just from being literally otherworldly. Far better paranoia fuel than the usual "monster of the week" being a servant of the big bad.
@@Bezaliel13I personally think that Karn is correct in his analysis. He did acknowledge the darkness and body horror, but it's more how the show was paced that got under his skin (and mine). Ghost Game is one of those shows that have 1-3 episodes at the beginning that introduce a possible over-arching plot, then have a bunch of unrelated and self-contained episodes it the middle with a bit of teasing, before suddenly swinging back into said plot in the final 5-7 episodes and wrapping it up. The issue is that Ghost Game wasn't very satisfying with this formula. I'm reminded of Katekyou Hitman Reborn!, myself.
@@conspiracypanda1200 So, is that format typical for horror anime? Huh, i just thought of something. How would that work? To elaborate, it was a horror anime that averted the "Sorting Algorithm of Evil," so how would it work if they had fewer episodes with their lower Lv partners? I know that might, *might,* sound like i am questioning on Digivolution across a few dozen episodes, but I mean it might not really have been that scary if they grow too quickly. Horror needs helplessness, you know. Not to mention the plot being about Digimon refugees evacuate to avoid a viral infection contained in the Digital World. Be kind of lame to have that awesome premise of endless, random, and unrelated Digimon causing nightmares from being alien and no way of dealing with all of them in sight... merely to have only a few random Digimon of the Week, like the Infernals from Fire Force.
I know I treated Ghost game too harshly really fast since I dropped it on like Episode 3, though I loved the spooky vibe they were going for, I felt really weird about the characterization of the protagonist, my favourite part is the development and emotions of the characters, and when the kid sees again his Father who DISAPPEARED WITHOUT A TRACE, and just reacts casually with “where have you been idiot?” I just felt that they were not going to be able to milk emotion out of the story
I loved the start that Ghost Game had, those first dozen episodes felt pretty solid to set up the series. It just fell flat trying to keep the plot relevant and the payoff was disappointing. Especially when considering we had Proximamon teasing us with it's very existence. Overall I just felt like it needed to cook a bit longer in development. Also unironically, if you do live action show characters get partners I will eat that shit up. Barney Stinson would 100% get the Lilithmon line and we all know why.
"Apparently there's rumour that Arctusmon and Promixamon were just made as what if evolutions. Basically the anime staff and the BE Teamm just didn't communicate on it. Its kinda implied with thier 'theoretical evolution'." - Chalicodragon v=QX30f_mkDLQ&lc=UgwXDMSmR4p_carm0sJ4AaABAg
I definitely have similar problems with ghost game tho i definitely did enjoy it. It was the first anime I've watched weekly since I was a kid so I could keep up with the community. Even with the problems ghost game will hold a special place in my heart because this is really the first community online i feel like I fit in
I have mixed feelings about Ghost Game. Coming right after Taichi's show, I don't have high expectations, but first 25 episodes were magnificent. Plot was there and that was Gulus. My main problem with GG is how it ended - ridiculously rushed. Arcturusmon and Proximamon's complete abscence was crime, seriously. In the end, nothing was really solved and that makes GG somehow unfinished. So, in the end, GG was better than Tri or Xros wars, but worse than Appmon. Pucchiemon to Meicrackmon Vicious mode will be one of the weridest evolutions in the whole time of Digimon. 🤣
I liked every single episode up until the last three. Even if formulaic, "Digimon doing spooky stuff" can be drastically different just because each Digimon is different and they even added new gimmicks to Digimon so they gave a new spooky flavor. My only problem was that some Digimon needed more than 1 episode to actually build up their horror, and almost all plot hooks got either discarded or rushed, which is bad. So I didn't get tired of it, but the ending is bad and I recognise that.
my main issue with ghost game is what I feel many others have issue with: the promise of something more. it felt like we were getting crumbs of story, little hints of "something bigger" that ultimately added up to very little. from the digitron Digimon being babysitters effectively to the Big Bad being something literally millennia away to gulus just kinda going "okay, let's be chill" it felt like there was so much more going on that just went nowhere had GG left all that out, and just had the fun monster of the week format, I probably would have kept up with it. but it was exhausting to be told "something big's gonna happen, just you wait!" and then having to wait until episode 67 for a quick recap that, at the end of the day, didn't amount to anything. having the villain be something so far away really made me feel like "well, why'd we even bother?"
I know! It was frustrating to wait so long, only to get little tidbits like “Black Tailmon is in contact with Hiero’s Dad” or “Gulus knows more than Gammamon about what is going on in the digital world”. I don’t think they even fully gave an explanation for why some digimon adapt to the human world better than others. Yes I know the “human emotion” blurb was given near the end of the series. But, digimon clearly had emotions of their own, so why would emotions affect digimon with no bonded partners? They should have gone all in either on “all digimon are somewhat dependent on human emotion for strength, even if some are parasitic about obtaining it” or “digimon actually don’t have emotions of their own.”
Gotta agree. Ghost Game is far from perfect, and the final ep being one, long exposition dump soured a lot of the 66 eps preceding it. And yet, I still adored its weekly episodes, and how it slowly built up a cast of likable, dynamic characters. Still one of my favs for sure :)
I love Ghost Game, but man do I have similar thoughts. They could have done so much with Gulus and Hokuto and they just…didn’t. I was also hoping for a sixth ranger. Hell, even that time where Ruri was able to sync with Jellymon. So much potential… And great point about brand synergy! A collective approach would help popularity!
Nice job Karn; not just on your Ghost Game analysis, but for pointing out problematic things in fandoms like - the misunderstanding/misuse of the term "episodic" - the fact that something explained (or "has a reason"), doesn't alone justify it as a good idea - the problems with Digimon's overall lack of brand-synergy. All things that need more attention!
Let's not forget fans thinking there will be a follow-up season because of the whole Endbringer thing that will never EVER be touched upon due to Toei/Bandai and the director's incompetence with the whole series. Seriously, with the way Ghost Game ended and how it is now, why do people delude themselves that there will be a second season or a sequel movie?
So I really think this is a fascinating discussion to have. Ghost Game was an interesting series to watch unfold at the start and I think that's mostly because with it being horror themed it lent itself to an aspect that Digimon didn't really explore too much in it's other series. That these are MONSTERS, they're CREATURES, and they have aspects of themselves naturally that occur that isn't done when they're just a foe for the week or something. Like one of the Gulus episodes with Oboromon, in any other season that Digimon would JUST be a villain for the Digidestined to face and be done with it. Here? It wasn't under some big boss or anyone else's command other than what IT and its kind do naturally. Which was very fascinating. But that fascination dies down over time when in the back of your mind there's mysteries being planted. Everything with Gulus I genuinely felt was changed or rushed. He had SUCH a strong start, and like you mentioned the threat of him showing up was massive. The looming threat of Proximamon since we knew what THAT was was so enticing. The whole time I could only think "If this is a DNA Digivolution of Gulus and Gammamon, how does that work when there's only one of them?" Then they split and I got excited, THIS was the moment! This was what was being built to! They're separated! They're two different Digimon now and CAN fuse...but then Gulus just stayed Regulusmon and fought Siriusmon and then we made it to Quantumon and her "friends" that...that's a whole other can of worms. But it just felt like there was more, but they dragged their feet with the "episodic" stuff and never fleshed out the meat that was there. That's just me though. This comment's WAY long but it is something I've discussed with a friend of mine. Wonderful video Karn, hope you and yours have a safe and Happy Halloween.
As a Pokémon fan, this show made me give digimon a chance again, I had fun in the beginning, being able to theorize with a friend of mine, but little by little we both fell into apathy as the show was clearly going nowhere, we both knew the only thing keeping us hooked was a “mystery box”, and we also knew that by that point, what was inside was probably unsatisfying. When it ended we had a quick discussion, tearing the show apart, laughing at how ridiculous the ending was, than we never spoke of it again, at least I’m now interested in the franchise, and I’m now catching up with all the animes. But to me the time I invested was a waste of time.
Funny cus Pokemon does the episodic way better, and now with Horizons is doing what Digimon has been doing with a continuous narrative. To great success.
@@JayceCH.I’ve been a fan of Pokémon since I was a kid, but I’ve stopped watching the anime years ago, I’m more a fan of the franchise, I will try to watch the new one when I have the time
I'm glad you brought up Gegege no Kitaro because something I haven't heard said a whole lot in western discussion of GG is that the premise is essentially "Japanese ghost stories but instead of Yokai and ghosts it's digimon" and that that premise constructs those episodic weekly releases. For me GG became a bit bitter sweet and disappointing because I feel not only did they take their sweet time with the Gulus plot only to see it cut off early without Arcturusmon or Proximamon I felt almost I had waited for nothing. On reflection though I find myself revisiting episodes like the puppet girl, the dark fire digimon, Icy hell and Fujitsumon episodes because they're genuinely good ghost stories featuring digimon. I hope ghost games dub hits well with kids which I believe it will looking at the success of shows like Goosebumps and Tales from the Crypt in the 2000s
I absolutely loved the serial nature and the slow burn build...and sorta hated how it completely fumbled the bag in the last section. It explored a lot of digimon lore that was underapproached or not thematically appropriate elsewhere, and i loved Hiro and Gammamon so much.
Yeah... that pretty much sumarizes how I feel about the whole thing. And it is the same as how I felt about Digimon Hunters back in the day as well. It seems to me they made the exact same mistakes again... aside from the massive episode count. Heck, even my favorite episodes from both were the penultimate episode, where they were finally getting into something before rushing to the finish line in the final one.
I think ghost game would've worked so much better if it had multiple seasons instead of one long run, there's a reason most anime have become more seasonal as time has gone on, while some series like one piece can work weekly, splitting it into multiple smaller seasons has so much more benefits, smaller seasons with gaps means it overall lasts longer, it gives the studio more time to work on episodes and therefor the series will most likely have higher quality art and animation, having gaps between seasons can also help prevent people like me from getting bored in the middle while also building up hype for the next season, I really hope when we eventually get a new digimon anime it goes for a seasonal approach. I did enjoy the 30 or so episodes I watched of ghost game but after falling behind knowing we were probably only halfway through the series I just never ended up even trying to catch up and still haven't finished it, ghost game personally marked the point where I kinda fell out of digimon, I still love the franchise but there's nothing that personally excites or interests me right now, well apart from Karn's videos of course
But how would that work with the "monster of the week" format. Seriously, the horror came from Digimon clashing with humanity due to being literally otherworldly. Yeah yeah, "Digimon doing spooky things with humans"... in this horror anime from Digimon. *Would each season end with a red herring?*
Eh, they could do a movie at some point. The big bad that Gulus warned about shows up way too early, and Arcturusmon debuts. Ultimately, Hiro would probably DNA Digivolve Arcturusmon and Siriusmon to get Proximamon to put down the big bad once and for all.
Talking about anime and how it makes a franchise is so accurate. Lately, the thing killing series for me is accessibility. Both digimon 2020 and ghost game took way too long to be dubbed and still nearly impossible to stream with legitimate methods. Now i dont want to watch neither. The vital bracelet de-branding basically killed it as a toy.
If I remember correctly the person whose responsible for the action scene for the show was overworked by the end of the show. That may or may not be the reason why it was sort of rushed
The finale of this show coming out on my Birthday was a mood. I really loved the show but even I felt the formula has run it's course and was a slog by the 50s. That final episode was the perfect representation of the franchise. 13 minutes of some of the best animation and choreography of the franchise and 10 mins of the lamest and confusing plot put on paper.
It was a really simple plot. Gulus appeared, was an infectious threat to the Digital World, Quantumon evacuated the place, and random Digimon refugees caused horror from being literally otherworldly.
I liked Ghost Game a lot. All the kids and partners were great and I really enjoyed tuning in each week and see what horror theme they would use. Do I with the ending was better? Yes. Do I wish it had more plot? Yes. But that's just not the type of show it wanted to be. After 2020 it was just nice to have something decent to watch.
For me ghost game actually made me angry, when watching I was mainly just sticking around to see Proximamon at the end but when it just ended all I felt and even said out loud was “THATS IT!”
I literally just stopped trying to watch episodes, because the horror aspect doesn't hit , when it resets every episode. Doesn't help when I played Survive and saw how traumatized the digidestined got there and how characters changed due to the horror that happened in the series.
Your thoughts mirror mine. I was so disappointed by Ghost Game even though there is so much I enjoy about it. I still haven't finished it despite watching over 40 episodes. Way too much.
I was NOT a fan of how GulusGammamon was justifying his power by killing off a bunch of Digimon like they were nothing. Oh, this Digimon of a higher level and such is killed SO EASILY by GulusGammamon. It damages my suspension of disbelief because it feels like I'm forced to see these older and strong Digimon be subjected to the Worf Effect. Then again, V-Tamers did the same thing, but at least it had an in-universe explanation for why, explaining the power of UlForce, which ties to how Veedramon is a Digimon known from the Ancient Digital World, which to this day is shrouded in mystery. I can't say the same thing with GulusGammamon and feels like his power is made strong for the sake of plot. I even hate how they just write in that Regulusmon is as strong as Megidramon, which I think is total BS. It just feels like this evolution line exists just to force it to be as strong as old fan favorites.
My biggest gripe about Ghost Game was how much mystery Kiyoshirou had surrounding him that just never went anywhere despite the series making direct note of it at many points.
Another example of books not growing in the modern era without other media the witcher a series of books that while popular in Poland the country of origin it had a niche audience elsewhere until the games especially the Witcher 3 and the Netflix series.
The series to me, just lacked an overarching villain, they should done something like all the black type digimon working for a main villain, which turns out to be gulusgammamon in the end.
22:41 It's actually worse than that, Gegege no Kitaro 2018 aired alongside the 2018 anime Yo-Kai Watch Shadowside, which not only didn't try to hide the Kitaro influence but straight up had Kitaro (albeit not the 2018 version who hadn't debuted yet as the movie came out in December 2017) appear in the movie that served as the pilot for Yo-Kai Watch Shadowside, alongside some of the yokai from the Kiaro franchise. (also confusingly the movie had a modern design for Kitaro but he had silver hair, which the anime adaptations haven't had him have since the 1960s (while the anime was in black and white, I found a colorized version on a magazine cover, his outfit hasn't changed much over the years) when he looked more like a gremlin. Also one of the yokai from the kitaro franchise was the historical yokai Ittan-Momen which Yo-Kai Watch made a modern version of, Ittan-Gomen but there is not a Classic Yo-Kai version of Ittan-Momen, in spite of the Kiaro version appearing in the mobile game Youkai Watch Puni Puni (but not Yo-Kai Watch Wibble Wobble as it was shut down before the dub of the third season of the first anime) and Yo-kai Sangokushi: Kunitori Wars (a Yo-Kai Watch version of Koei's (and now Koei Techmo's ) Romance of the Three Kingdoms series))
@@Maswartz226yep. Every time a Digimon is seen or product is made and was created by a fan, Toei- Bandai would have to pay up. I mean, look how the comic book industry has changed on royalties. They have in contracts now “if you create a new character, we own it 100%”.
@@usdutchkitty Not exactly. Japan has a whole entire different legal system when it comes down to that. A whole lot of franchises, including Digimon do content like this where fanart is either exhibited, acquired or adapted. The contests more or less go about by acquiring the thing or making participants understand that in the end they are "donating" the designs even if they don't take the first prize. Just about the entirety of the roster of characters in Classic Megaman is like that except for Megaman 1. There are over 30 digimon, including fan favorites like Angemon, Birdramon, Kabuterimon and Cyberdramon, that were developed from contest fanart. Even Pokémon, even though they never use fandesigns, had a bit of a snafu recently by using a fanmade theme/remix and not getting into trouble because it was technically done on something owned by them. "Fan content" in Japan is wildly different legally, and paying up for a fandesign could be as cheap as giving the winner a Vital Bracelet or something.
@@jpcsdutra it depends on the contracts. I mean, KarnEx has talked about how fan made Digimon have never really been seen in media like anime or games so there has to be a legal issue there.
Despite the issues the series has, this has still been the most fun I've had with a season of the series since Tamers. Ghost Game absolutely shot up to my number one, I just loved the characters, tone, music, and visuals, just so much that I really did like it once I realized this was going to be a mon of the week show
My problem with ghost game was a simple one. The show was fun, and was bringing stuff that other shows like it never had the balls to bring up. But it kept picking up plot points, and sticking them to the wall, but never going anywhere with them until the very end, and even then, there were points that still havent been touched even after the show ended. One that bugged me a lot was lilithmon, she left in way that seemed as if she was interested in the "darkness" in gammamon, kinda impling that she would come back... But she never did.
Ghost Game was DEFINITELY BETTER than Adventure Tri, Adventure 2020, and the Anime Version of Xros Wars/Fusion. Despite this, however, Ghost Game was still a 5/10 Digimon Entry. Not *_terrible,_* but still mediocre as a whole. It could've been so much better, and had so much untapped potential with its elements, themes, and plot. I can only hope that one day, a manga adaptation of it will come out that will fix up its major problems, like how Xros Wars did. Or hell, even a sequel to continue Ghost Game and expand upon its potential at this point would do the series good.
I personally enjoyed Ghost Game start to finish, mainly because Gulus and his storyline was the least interesting part about the series to me. The character interactions, the slowly building up digimon society in the human world, the series willing to stretch the standards of human/digimon relations, the episode by episode body horror and mysteries, those were what I enjoyed the most. As for the finale of the show, I feel like the show mislead the audience too much. The series finale was never about saving the digital world, defeating a great enemy, or solving a mystery. It was about two brothers, a human and a digimon, coming together and getting along. Which is very much on brand for a series with so many episodes being solved through talking, but the misdirection was way too extreme.
While you do have made good points, I find Digimon Ghost Game disappointing. The first 15 episodes were fine and I'm okay with the episodic start... but... I felt let down on how it went down. BlackAgumon, BlackGargomon and BlackGrowlmon were the most biggest negative option I've had... I was so curious about them and what they'll do... and maybe we'll get the return of BlackWarGreymon and debut of two new dark Mega Digimon... and one year, two months later after BlackAgumon debut... we were given a reason... almost if it was a hand wave... and it was pointless... it was so infuriating and disappointing. And I felt like the main characters never had character development. They were the same at the start and never 'evolved' towards the end like most early Digimon anime does. And you can't help, but feel like Hiro is an uncaring jerk because he knows where his dad is... but, never actually bothered to figure out how to go to the Digital World... and the reunion isn't exactly emotional too... And the Canoweissmon debut episode... wasn't all about Ruli and Angoramon? Why did Hiro and Gammamon stole the spotlight for? And the finale... last three episodes were just rushed garbage... with the info dump leaving more questions than answers... and the final battle... what's the point of giving Jellymon and Angoramon Mega if they are forced to sit on the sidelines as Gammamon does all the work? Adventure 2020 final battle, in my opinion, because EVERY main character was doing something than sit on the sidelines... There's so much things that I found wrong about Ghost Game and pretty much hate that I might as well make it an essay. Ghost Game does have good parts, but it's mostly overshadowed by the letdowns... that is my opinion and I'm sticking with it...
Honestly I think at least to me the biggest issue was all the filler content. Sure there were certainly some great movements, but the actual plot related stuff seemed so scattered about throughout the whole season. There were also a good number of episodes where it just kinda felt like they were reusing the same plot lines. It was fine watching weekly but I dont think I would ever go back and binge the whole thing. Not to mention the let down towards the end when the plot was finally front and center only miss the mark with all the last minute stuff introduced to the series. Honestly it was okay but definitely not my favorite digimon series by any means. It really did have a lot of potential though.
I completely agree with everything you said. I like to compare Digimon Ghost Game with Digimon Frontier. But whereas I hated Frontier AT FIRST and the GREW to love it more and more as the series went on, with Ghost Game, it was the opposite. I thought it was awesome for those first 20 something episodes but my enthusiasm gradually petered out. Also, THANK YOU for explaining what episodic ACTUALLY MEANS! There are a ton of television shows that I love that are episodic. In fact, my sister and I are currently re-watching Adventure Time. Adventure Time actually has somewhat self-contained episodes that anyone just getting into it can enjoy it, but it also has an overarching narrative! We learn of Ice King’s and Marceline’s back stories for example, how the Lich came to be, etc. It has an overarching narrative AND it is an episodic show. Great video! I agree with everything that you said. And the reason that I stopped liking Ghost Game are for the same reasons you gave.
So what I'm getting from this is Ghost Game would have been good had it been more like How I Met Your Mother. Then it would have been LegendWAIT FOR IT...
Honestly, I can't disagree with much of what you brought up. My friends and I did a weekly recap podcast for Ghost Game (and 2020 prior), and by the end, we were so burnt out and a bit disappointed. It could've been so much better but dangling/abandoned plot threads and odd pacing kept it from truly shining.
Sorry Karn_EX, 20 eps only really tend to work for Slice of Life style anime. The only reason the original Digimon Adventure got as far as it did was because people wanted to see new evolutions and character development (which wouldn’t be a thing if Toei ended the season at Devimon or Etemon’s demise). As for Ghost Game, I think it’s best to think of it as a prelude to a potential “Tamer’s Union” type season. We Know GulusGammamon was running from some world ending entity that destroyed his home world (that was in the same dimension as Earth) then slipped into the Digital World to escape it. This season implies the Digital World’s multiverse is starting to expand into the real multiverse (possibly like an invading parasite trying to overtake its new host). Maybe this world destroyer is trying to keep the two multiverses from interacting with each other.
I feel like the Ghost Game gang were too forgiving for the most part. There should've been another moment where letting the enemy go was the wrong call. I feel like the people who had a problem with Steven Universe would have a field day with the Ghost Game gang. I kinda want to see the Adventure 2020 kids get sent into the Ghost Game universe and start causing trouble.
The split Digivolution concept for Gammamon, with him having 3 different Champions (and Gulus) fit for different situations, and that concept not mattering anymore when he reached Ultimate was one of the biggest disappointments of this season for me. I liked GG overall, but there were certainly a lot they could have done better.
Yeah not finishing plot points and having horrible payoffs for the ones they did is what killed the show for me. It would've been fine if they did like even 2 or 3 episodes to flush out a plot point and then move on, basically mini arcs, but it would at least give needed info that would've come together in the end for a better payoff. As the show is its got great characters and I adore the new digimon and anime debuts of older digimon we got. But because the narrative, or lack thereof, was so horribly put together even for a supposedly episodic show, I completely fell off after Gulusgammamon's 2nd appearance and only watched episodes Digiknow gave good reviews. It's nice to hear there will be an English dub for those who enjoyed the show, but I've got no real interest in it. I still haven't seen the dub of 2020 yet because I don't have the software to run the purchasable versions, and so far non of the free sites I use have the entire show yet. They really should've done physical media releases of that show.
There was a time, around March 2022, where I actually considered Ghost Game superior to even the original Digimon Adventure. However, as the weeks went on, the plot seemingly going nowhere started to bring down my opinion of the show overall, something the final few episodes did not help with one bit.
Overall I did enjoy Ghost Game, but I feel like it's over arching story had no middle. Which is very odd, it just had lots of teasers. The episodes themselves were great, but I felt like I was left waiting for more bits of information.
22:59 Maann Gegege no Kitaru also hit a breaking point for me halfway through it's run when the big Story Arc villain turned out to be a sad dumpster fetus who just needed a damn hug....it was really unsatisfying...😅😅😅
I jump in and out of the frnachise every few years, and I remember hearing about ghost game at launch, gulusgammamon being something different from the usual chaos evolution, something about meko-something-mon going down the path of "I honestly believe that death and destruction will help my friends and make them happy"rather than just being evil. the big thing is that, just existing near anime and mangas, you get glimpse of the various storylines, but nothing when it came to this. making it episodic really castrated it's potencial
Ghost game lost me due to giving me too much tonal whiplash. We would get a few episodes that were darker that I would adore then the next few episodes it was “yeah this nun digimon just wanted to race a bunch of us”. I wish they would have leaned full into the darker horror aspect or just scooby doo it was actually old man Jenkins the whole time. I could have enjoyed either but the constant switching drove me nuts.
I did watch ghost game all the way through and my thoughts on it are like this. What it did good, it did very good, like the Gulusgammamon scenes and the designs for the characters, the epic evolutions all live in my head rent free. But it's lows were honestly not as bad as Xros wars lows, but were still not really remarkable. It had a lot of potential and interesting story beats, but as we all know didn't exactly pan out the way we hoped. I personally would like to see, or work on a good rewrite that feels similar to ghost game but gives a full story. There's just a lot of ghost game that could've been done better, but that could also be said for a lot of shows.
This show started off fine and then got so much better midway through. But then it all came crashing down right at the end. Why introduce all of that new stuff and then just end it like that!? I was so mad at how this ended.
Just make seekers an anime Make a cyber slueth anime that combines the two games Or make a sequel to ghost game that follows up on the plot heck at this point id take an anime about the card game Cause the mega level song makuake & its debut in Siriusmon VS kuzuhamon was the biggest thing i remember
I believe the biggest gripe I have, is that the show didn't tie up it's loose ends in a satisfactory way. I was like "OH ... umm that's it?" It was really disappointing, to say the least.
I hated how at some points the show not only baited you with a narrative but straight up lied to your face with really important stuff. The Lilithmon shown in the season was no random lilithmon but one of the seven great demon lords according her ghost game profile, she even said to gulus through gammamon "we'll meet again", to then never appear again, and let's not even talk about hiro keeping moon millenniumon in his pocket forever.
This show deserved better than what ended up being. I love the characters in this show, they had such a fun dynamic between the three of them. And yeah, it really felt like a whole season of “how would you make this better, viewer?”
You hit the nail on the head here. I wanted to love Ghost Game but it was just lacking. Any elements they built up were just deflated by the end. Maybe there were plan's for a better story but elements were changed due to the hack and it stuffed like 2020 did
"It was episodic..." Yeah, so was Secret Saturdays, so was Ben 10, so was Scooby Doo: Mystery Incorporated, all shows that could have been a nice blue print for Ghost Game. The episodes could be watched seperately (until the few final episodes) but they often feature those small details that hinted at a larger plot afoot (just like Ghost Game) and especially Secret Saturdays and Scooby Doo: MI, worked towards a satisfying finale. If you want to go pure episodic: Martin Mystery would have been a fine blue print for that but (and I say this as a fan of MM) you can't do it for 60 episodes. The thing that killed MM, was lack of ideas in the third season but also the feeling it all didn't matter all that much as there was no real overarching story.
@@Karn_EX the reboot was a mediocre attempt to recreate the original series, Ghost Game was a new and different series that had horror elements a lot, something that makes unique amongst the Digimon series.
I kinda felt the same way i enjoyed watching most episodes themselves but once they were over that was it, no hype for the next week or anything just a "Well this weeks episode is over, let's see what else is out" I think there were only a few episodes that really left an impact after the ending was over.
While I did enjoy Ghost Game in the beginning, it let me down with it's conclusion after setting up so many good story beats. I feel we all can agree that they did an marvelous job presenting Gulusgammamon.
The weird thing about Ghost Game was that the creators very clearly had a lot of ideas -really good ideas-, but then they decided to not expand on any of them, and then seemingly regretted this decision and used the final episode to shout “LOOK AT ALL OUR IDEAS! LOOK HOW CREATIVE WE ARE!”
Exactly like Hunters, the way they presented established Digidestines/Tamers (w/ established lore & world building) in the show all to make the Main character appear stronger 😂
The dark themes that I thought would grow never did, and most of the episodes didn't develop into stronger elements that connected. I mean Phelesmon I thought was going to come back, but didn't. And honestly wanted their to be a risk at all times. But every issue that occurred were fixed super easily.
Great video Karn, but (understandably given that primary sources are hard to find), this video focuses a bit much on the western perspective. You have a point about your two central issues: lack of brand synergy and Ghost Game's own incoherence. But it lost me when you started talking about Kitaro and using MAL ratings and such as evidence. The 2018 Kitaro adaptation was really popular in Japan. It's getting a film adaptation next month for the 100th anniversary of the mangaka's birthday. It makes perfect sense to try to make a spiritual successor while that film is cooking. Let's be clear, most western fans do not really affect the bottom line of most anime. It is true that something like Dragonball or One Piece has a huge international following. But outside of the top like 1% of anime/manga, it's just what Japan thinks that matters. Personally, and this is just my opinion as one person, I tend to really like lots of stuff that's popular in Japan that doesn't catch on overseas. Even if Ghost Game tried its hardest to appeal to international audiences, it's an adaptation of a legacy property focused on youkai. How many people outside of Japan even know what youkai are, or would pick up on the Gegege no Kitaro influence? Did Youkai Watch end up being nearly as popular outside of Japan as the megahit it was domestically? Obviously not. Does that mean Youkai Watch shouldn't have been focused on Japanese audiences? Well, clearly not, since it was a success. With all that said, I'm going to bring it back by giving my opinion as someone who lurks in Japanese online spaces but is not a native speaker myself: from what I can tell, Japan pretty much agrees with western audiences on Ghost Game, lol. I still think it's important to do the research and figure that out for yourself rather than just assume they have the same complaints we do. For the most part Japanese fans' complaints seem to be that it's boring or too graphic. I don't think the "wheres the plot" complaint is quite as prevalent because there's plenty of stories like Detective Conan that are beloved in Japan despite a similar structure. And also Japanese audiences do actually just like episodic stuff in general and wouldn't get tired of 60 episodes of it if it was good -- take a look at long running kids' anime like Chibi Maruko-chan, Crayon Shin-chan, Doraemon, or Nintama Rintarou which are completely obscure in the US for example (though notably, do catch on in other countries sometimes).
I can appreciate that, the video is supposed to be my emotional response tho so it is definitely going to have that "Western perspective" cause that's what I am. And I wanted to talk about Ghost Game and Digimon as international products, I think it might be worse if I did try to speak for Japanese fans. I had heard similarly that the Japanese audience didn't respond well to it so that section really was more me hypothesizing about why that might have been. The ratings thing I pulled from a lot of places I just showed a smattering for a quick visual, I didn't use that to indicate the quality of the show but moreso what the international vibe seemed to be. My supposition about Japanese audiences not wanting "Digimon GGGK" was specifically that, I think they probably would take more of GGGK itself, but good shout it was popular in Japan, I had gotten the impression it was liked but not a barnstormer! I know Japan is the primary audience, absolutely, but it's also factual that Digimon (and Bandai and Toei) deliberately target international audiences and as that part of the audience their other brands demonstrate they could be doing so much more. Definitely flaws in my experience but I think that's why I wanted to make it clear it's how I felt emotionally and not so much a factual dressing down of Ghost Game. Really appreciate the comment and thanks for shedding some light on the Japanese side of things!
@@Karn_EX ofc, and apart the personal aspect I think you nailed the analysis of the state of the franchise in general and I wouldn't be surprised if the same arguments pretty much hold true in Japan too. and hey, I might be wrong and audiences did actually just want more Kitaro. it's a perfectly reasonable theory. funnily enough i saw more comparisons to youkai watch shadowside which is apparently some kind of darker and grittier version of the series that apparently totally flopped
You just ignored the whole product releases point to make this argument, didnt you? That more than solidifies that perspective. The MAL and Gegege comparison is just bonus points to it.
16:48 Well at least it's not as bad as Yo-Kai Watch whith the whole medal compatibility issue that Bandai Namco _finally_ ironed out with Nate's enhanced original model watch in the second return to the original series in 2021 Yo-Kai Watch♪ which not only works with every medal but also the arks introduced in Shadowside (or keystones as they're known in the English localization of the manga). I don't know if it's an actual toy or not though. Of course the original Vital Bracelet models had that issue where there were one for monster franchises (which wound up just being Digimon and Medabots) and one for hero franchises, with separate character card types for each, which was something the BE model fixed in much shorter oder. You'd think Bandai Namco would have learned their lesson before the Vital Bracelet though. Especially considering the vital bracelet was clearly designed to capitalize on the _success_ of Yo-Kai Watch even after the franchise had been falling out.
While it was generally a good season, looking back it is fair to say there were some plot points that were never explain nor fully explored. It was implied that Gulus was some dark master in Gammamon's past life (which was only briefly exlored too). The ending did felt a bit rushed too. While I also want to see Gulus fully evolved too, the fusion form is described to be a 1 in a Million bad ending that is heavily prevented from happening, so there was a psuedo reason, even if not a good one. If there was a slim continue of sorts, I would like to see if Gulus can be trusted enough to be "released" on occasion, or even a miracle team up with Gammamon. Also... The running gag with Espimon did kinda get stale after awhile, and like... what if he was on a time crunch to find Hiro. A lot of wasted time due to his own arrogance/stupidity.
I too was wondering wether Gulus would ever get to the point that he respected Hiero enough to be let “off the leash” safely, so to speak. Or if he would stay too wild and have to be destroyed or fully melded with Gammamon to stop him. But we got the weirdness that was the last few episodes instead. Plus, I agree: if the digivolution is fully designed, it should be used. The “bad ending” lore feels less like a world building choice and more of a “we didn’t want to have to include this, we need a reason” choice.
I'm probibly in the minority but I'm not big on darker themes, not Tamers dark, but like, devil/ghost-ish, and this just sounded like nothing I'd like, and right after not even finishing Adventure 2020 because of the same thing. Some darker moments have to happen for a story, and even an episode or two with the themes I meantioned, would have been okay. But not a whole season. I'm sad that Ghost Game is getting a dub and Applimon didn't :(. THAT'S the season that deserved more love.
I don't know if they would be as popular as there were when we were kids but I would love to have tie in figures like we had for adventure and tamers. I loved collecting the figure I saw in the latest episode
0:20 And then there's me who thought it was just okay overall but didn't like the way it ended at all. Seemed like a very rushed ending like "oh crap we forgot to include the actual plot in this show!" and just crammed in into the end with some weird BS about aliens that could have only come from the ravaged psychology of the crunched AF writers. Also RIP Espimon and Pulsemon.
I wish it could great if someone can make "what if ghost game,but that's bad ending by their digimon partner is dark/corrupted evolution"? Can be great.
Ge Ge Ge No Kitaro's appeal has to do with cultural ties to Yokai as well as a commentary of societal and cultural concerns of Japan, not just its horror elements. If Ghost Game was really trying to recapture that lightning in a bottle, they only had half the recipe and no wonder it didn't live up to its potential.
I mean yeah, Ghost Game had its flaws and it did had some potholes that made me scratch my head at times. I feel like in my opinion, Covid had a part to play, cause some episodes were delayed due to it. Not just Ghost Game was affected, but other animes were affected as well to either postpone or even cancel animes. Pokemon Journeys was one of those animes that was delayed during that time. The first half was great, but the second half was like "okay, so where's the plot?" I feel because of the plot unsurfaced, the final episodes kinda felt rushed. Despite all these flaws, I still liked Ghost Game for what it was. I liked the characters and the Digimon and it's a series I'll come back to once in awhile.
Ghost Game has amazing individual episodes, but it lost me at 30ish episodes, cause there was just not enough of the actual story line to keep me engaged.
Besides all the hanging plot threads (still mildly sad we never got that “vs Vamdemon’s Court” mini-arc), I wish they had showed more of how the bond between a digimon and human partner works. To me, some of the better moments in digimon (besides epic battles) were moments that showcased the human/digimon bond in action, wether working together through some difficulty, or just a slower moment that let the audience see more of who the characters were as people. Think Rika and Renamon’s conversations about strength, or Ken trying to navigate his partnership with Wormon after his time as the Emperor. Ghost Game had hints of some of those moments, like Hiero trying to figure out how to deal with the Gulus and Gamma situation. But they never really went anywhere long term. The fact that digimon can apparently “force” strength from people was a nice set up for an exploration of what makes a partner bond with a digimon healthy vs. unhealthy (such as the partnered digimon becoming worried that they might be “draining” their humans). Especially if they leaned into the “the door swings both ways” concept that kind of existed with even unbonded digimon being able to influence humans. The few “pseudo-partners” we saw would have aligned with this as well: Why do “alliances” work to a degree, and how is that different from a full partner bond? Yes, I know we have this info from previous seasons, but it would have been an excellent time to introduce new fans to what is technically a series wide world mechanic. Plus, less world building left on the back burner.
I really enjoyed the show first half, a new feel of horror type digimon series, sprinkling mysteries, but they really dragged it too much, crammed everything in the last min, I felt they should have got in to the digital world and went on with the story narrative try solve mysteries way sooner.
I only watched about half of Ghost Game but my feelings are: "Whenever Black Tailmon Uver is not on screen, all the other characters should be asking, "where's Black Tailmon Uver?" (No lie I love that mon)
It got me hooked from the start and I hoped deep down that we were going... SOMEWHERE? Maybe exploring this new digital world in a planet Earth so far into the future, maybe we'd see the power of darkness (the gulus line) being used for good and what could result from it not just being a jumpscare in the middle of the show. But it all went downhill (or nowhere) after a while. It still had INCREDIBLY high highs (Thetismon and Siriusmon debuts are by far the best episodes of the entire show imo) and a "nuking the fridge" (maybe two, looking at you Quartzmon and Zeed Millenniumon )
I 1000% believe Digimon hasn't taken off as strongly as it should is due to Bandai's own fault, be it marketing, corporate or whatever, Bandai shoots the franchise on the foot every single time it begins to gain speed, A LOT OF FANS have had fantastic VIABLE ideas about how to tie in the merch with the games and the toys and the anime, but Bandai keeps giving the Digimon things less budget, worse distribution, high prices and the list goes on, the Digital Monster Color and the Pendulum Color are fantastic ideas that are so expensive that they will almost certainly draw NO new fans at all, hell, most fans think it's too expensive for what they offer and so the sales will only be from the most die-hard fans only, the average person could impulse/curiosity buy a 10 or 15 bucks V-pet on Amazon, but they're not gonna impulse buy a +65 BEFORE shipping japanese import just to have it with color and a rechargeable battery. Also, when was the last time we had Digivolving toys?!
Watched like... 35+ episodes of this season, when I noticed it was going nowhere, I stopped caring, and stopped watching. If they wanna make a new Digimon anime, be it aimed for kid or adults, fine. But stop pretending Digimon is the only thing there is to watch. The competition in anime alone is incredibly strong, and people have easy access to it via streaming. If you don't make something WORTH watching, people are just gonna stop and go watch something else. The animation in Ghost Game is really good, probably the best any Digimon season has ever seen, it's a shame they wasted it on something so... empty and forgettable...
Just imagine that black digitron digimon being the remaining data of the father who created them as a failsafe to watch over his son and the digimon partner he specifically created for him out of his DNA/Memory/a piece of soul (wouldn't be the first time digimon did this) qnd by combining them back togheter would have been the only way to bring his father back and get him out of the Digital world. That would have been an amazing story.
