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Digimon: Digital Monsters #3
Digimon, Vol. 3
Synopsis: Seven kids enjoying summer camp are suddenly transported to another world-a world of amazing digital creatures who call themselves "Digimon." With the help of the Digimon the kids battle evil forces to save the digital world and to make their way home.
164 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 18, 2019
Yet again this is an extremely good book, it has amazing pace this time around and the story amps up, now with the Digimon raiding the real world. The kids soon find their way out of the Digiworld and go back to the real world in which an evil vampire type Digimon named Myotismon is attempting to take over, now it's up for the Digidestined, or, the kids to stop him with their partner Digimon, speaking of, their partner Digimon can now digivolve up to another level, which is really cool. Anywho, I think this book is really good, with great pacing, charming and unique characters, and a very good story in general. On the Ali rating scale this book gets 5/5.
April 25, 2020
Continuing with the Digimon series, the plot is still the same except we get a villain who is the most annoying thing ever. Etemon is the biggest pain in the ass I've ever seen in a 90's anime series. He's suppose to be this villain that is more technical than the others and he is an Elvis Presley impersonator. Which unfortunately means he has a running gag with music. He has a huge ego about his singing even though it's completely terrible and annoying. He really doesn't do anything to move the story except cause trouble in order to keep the main characters separated and even then it doesn't work. From a character developing point of view, this isn't needed. If you removed Etemon from the story and just have the characters struggle with conflicts between each other and over come them, then it would move the story of them getting their crests, coming back together as a group, and it would allow some characters growth. Which would work better instead of having an annoying villain pull the strings behind nearly every struggle they're going through.
Now with that little rant about the villain is gone, lets move on to a few characters.
Let's talk about Sora.
On the outside, Sora is a tomboy who's the mediator for Tai and Matt. She's responsible, kind, and protective towards her friends. Almost 'motherly' if you will. Her character arc shows her to have self esteem issues and struggles with understanding her crest of love and seeing herself as unloved. The reason I bring this up is because her crest is a bit confusing because it's love.
Okay, so there are some issues I have with this. (There are similar issues with the other crests but this one is the largest one so I'll use it as an example.)
At this point of the story, we're told that crests are the symbols of traits that the main characters embody and draw power from in order to allow their Digimon partners to evolve and grow stronger. When the characters exhibit the trait of their crests, the Crest 'glows', and its power is released to enable their Digimon partners to evolve and grow stronger.
Sounds simple and interesting enough but the problem are the traits that each crest is given.
Here's the list of the seven crests:
Courage
Friendship
Love
Knowledge
Sincerity
Reliability
Hope
Light
The problem with most of them is these traits have already been displayed in these characters. So there is no need for them to go through a little arc to discover themselves and harness the power of their crest when really, they have already been using it because they already have that trait. Sora and Izumi's are perfect examples.
Sora has love. How exactly is she suppose to demonstrate love and activate her crest? And what kind of love is she suppose to have? There are all sorts of ways love is shared between people. You have the romantic intimate love between two individuals who love each other for who they are. There's the love between family members and even then the relationship between each family member is different. And don't forget the variations of love between friends. Each friendship is unique and so the love right there is different. And how is she suppose to 'demonstrate' her trait when she has been demonstrating love since the beginning of the series???
She's caring, protective, and not to mention that she is willing to help others even if it's at the cost of her own life. If that isn't a demonstration of love then I don't know what is. (And I'm not going to even question if she is suppose to give love or receive love.)
Then there's Izumi.
Izumi's crest is the crest of knowledge.
Again, same problem.
Since the beginning of the show Izumi is shown to be intelligent, curious, resourceful, and a bit socially awkward. How exactly is he suppose to demonstrate that trait when he has been doing it since the beginning of the show?
The only way I could see something like this work, is if you had Izumi open himself up to a different, or new, sort of knowledge. For example, he is always on his laptop trying to figure out everything about the Digital World, which is a technological world that is really nothing but data. But imagine if he had to embrace knowledge of something that was different from technology or different that from what he's accustomed to?
What if he had his laptop indisposed? Or what if he had to solve a problem by developing better communication skills? Or both? What if he couldn't use his laptop because it was broken or taken and then in order to defeat an adversary, he had to communicate with a village or tribe of digimon. And the best part? They don't speak his language. That would force the character to come up with a clever idea to not only to communicate with the digimon, but also do it without his laptop. This would be a great developing moment for Izumi. He would better his communication skills and it would allow him to use his resourcefulness without his technology.
Knowledge isn't just having book smarts and using technology. It's also about creative problem solving.
The best example I can think at the moment is Pidge from Dreamworks Voltron: Legendary Defenders. Pidge is a tech wiz but learned more about the universe by studying and spending time with nature and the alien species that understood and thrived in it. That was an eye opener for the character and allowed them to think of new and creative ways to solve problems and defeat future enemies.
But I digress, the series is still good and the characters are likable enough. Just like I mentioned, if the plot was fixed up a little better I might like it more.
Now the next volume with a new villain. That's an awesome volume.
Now with that little rant about the villain is gone, lets move on to a few characters.
Let's talk about Sora.
On the outside, Sora is a tomboy who's the mediator for Tai and Matt. She's responsible, kind, and protective towards her friends. Almost 'motherly' if you will. Her character arc shows her to have self esteem issues and struggles with understanding her crest of love and seeing herself as unloved. The reason I bring this up is because her crest is a bit confusing because it's love.
Okay, so there are some issues I have with this. (There are similar issues with the other crests but this one is the largest one so I'll use it as an example.)
At this point of the story, we're told that crests are the symbols of traits that the main characters embody and draw power from in order to allow their Digimon partners to evolve and grow stronger. When the characters exhibit the trait of their crests, the Crest 'glows', and its power is released to enable their Digimon partners to evolve and grow stronger.
Sounds simple and interesting enough but the problem are the traits that each crest is given.
Here's the list of the seven crests:
Courage
Friendship
Love
Knowledge
Sincerity
Reliability
Hope
Light
The problem with most of them is these traits have already been displayed in these characters. So there is no need for them to go through a little arc to discover themselves and harness the power of their crest when really, they have already been using it because they already have that trait. Sora and Izumi's are perfect examples.
Sora has love. How exactly is she suppose to demonstrate love and activate her crest? And what kind of love is she suppose to have? There are all sorts of ways love is shared between people. You have the romantic intimate love between two individuals who love each other for who they are. There's the love between family members and even then the relationship between each family member is different. And don't forget the variations of love between friends. Each friendship is unique and so the love right there is different. And how is she suppose to 'demonstrate' her trait when she has been demonstrating love since the beginning of the series???
She's caring, protective, and not to mention that she is willing to help others even if it's at the cost of her own life. If that isn't a demonstration of love then I don't know what is. (And I'm not going to even question if she is suppose to give love or receive love.)
Then there's Izumi.
Izumi's crest is the crest of knowledge.
Again, same problem.
Since the beginning of the show Izumi is shown to be intelligent, curious, resourceful, and a bit socially awkward. How exactly is he suppose to demonstrate that trait when he has been doing it since the beginning of the show?
The only way I could see something like this work, is if you had Izumi open himself up to a different, or new, sort of knowledge. For example, he is always on his laptop trying to figure out everything about the Digital World, which is a technological world that is really nothing but data. But imagine if he had to embrace knowledge of something that was different from technology or different that from what he's accustomed to?
What if he had his laptop indisposed? Or what if he had to solve a problem by developing better communication skills? Or both? What if he couldn't use his laptop because it was broken or taken and then in order to defeat an adversary, he had to communicate with a village or tribe of digimon. And the best part? They don't speak his language. That would force the character to come up with a clever idea to not only to communicate with the digimon, but also do it without his laptop. This would be a great developing moment for Izumi. He would better his communication skills and it would allow him to use his resourcefulness without his technology.
Knowledge isn't just having book smarts and using technology. It's also about creative problem solving.
The best example I can think at the moment is Pidge from Dreamworks Voltron: Legendary Defenders. Pidge is a tech wiz but learned more about the universe by studying and spending time with nature and the alien species that understood and thrived in it. That was an eye opener for the character and allowed them to think of new and creative ways to solve problems and defeat future enemies.
But I digress, the series is still good and the characters are likable enough. Just like I mentioned, if the plot was fixed up a little better I might like it more.
Now the next volume with a new villain. That's an awesome volume.
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April 25, 2008love
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews