Digimon Frontier

Title:Digimon Frontier
Digimon
Digimon 04
Digimon: Digital Monsters
Overall:Watch
Keywords: , , , , , , , , ,
Notables: Animation - Toei
ISHIGE Sawa
KAMIYA Hiroshi
Mary Elizabeth Mcglynn
SUZUMURA Kenichi
T. O'mally
TAKEUCHI Junko
WATANABE Kumiko
Takuya Kanbara receives a mysterious message to go to the train station. From there on, he boards a train, to the Digital World. Along with four other companions, they learn the ways of the Digivice, set out to collect all the Digi-Spirits, get home, stop the spread of evil, and restore order to the Digital World.
[TV show, 50 episodes, 2002-03]

1:44min Series Opening - YouTube Video
[edit] The ↗Digimon franchise:
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Watch 7 6 6 6 5 5 Ggultra2764 [series:872#1552]
Ah, the so-called Digimon season that killed the franchise for four years. Being more lighter in mood compared to Digimon Tamers, Frontier returns the adventure of the chosen children to the Digital World and has an ongoing plot where said children are trying to fight off evil Digimon threats while being capable of transforming into Digimon themselves a la Henshin Hero style. Arguably, this is likely one of the reasons why Frontier wasn't as popular as the first three seasons of the series as the whole "humans turn into Digimon" gimmick kills the human-Digimon partner dynamics that made the franchise popular in the first place, especially coming off the radical shift in storytelling and mood that Tamers gave the franchise.

But the gimmick shift isn't the only thing that makes this series inferior to the prior three seasons. The Henshin Hero setup extends to even the enemy battles that the Digidestined confront as they battle enemy Legendary Warriors and corrupted Celestial Digimon with the mannerisms (some baddies like the Royal Knights and Mercurymon) and transforming gimmicks (slide evolving between forms) they employ, many of the enemy threats having been corrupted by the true baddie who gets revealed towards the second half of the series. This does make the character and plot elements to the series more formulaic with the Digidestined children having archetypal personalities with a superficial sense of character growth and plot developments that seemed ripped from super sentai shows. The series appears to disregard many of the world building elements with Digimon that were pivotal in other seasons such as the significance of the Digimon levels and the close connection that the human and digital worlds have with one another. On top of this, its later plot developments cause the second half of the series to tank in quality where the Digidestined gain a form of evolution that results in making much of the team worthless for combat, they continually fail to halt the enemy threat from causing havoc to the digital world and there are way too many plot conveniences to force the plot to go as desired with the Digidestined failing or gaining a random power-up.

Among the five seasons I've seen of the Digimon franchise, I'd find Frontier to be among the weakest of the bunch. Its Henshin Hero gimmick leads to formulaic storytelling and characters, disregard for elements to the franchise's world building and a sloppy second half when Lucemon and the Royal Knights come into play. I wouldn't waste any time trying to track down Frontier, especially with its fairly intimidating 50 episode length.

Last updated Saturday, March 22 2014. Created Friday, August 22 2008.
Watch 6 7 6 5 8 MarX [series:872#1033]
Yep, I saw the series. Along with the other three Digimon out there.
Now my rating isn't that flattering to the series, it's pretty well rounded, and everything is answered in the end. Basically the leader of the digi crew Takuya is the standard Digimon leader. Like Tai or Davis or even Takato. (But not so much so Takato since he was more laid back in the beginning of the series.)
Uh, that is neither here or there, point is he is a Goggle wearing hero of the series. I mean the others have there strong points like the wanna be hero J.P. Or the blonde and take charge female of the group Zoey. Or A.KA. the "Heart" of the team. Then there is Koji the skeptical calculating second in command if anything goes wrong. Koji is very cold at times, but of course, they all create a bond that make him look past the ice in his heart. Plus, a revelation later on in the series. And the "last" member of the crew Tommy. Who is a child and everyone looks after, until he becomes aware of his own strengths and becomes a powerful member.
Now of course there is digivolution but now it deals with the DigiDestine themselves. Since they do not have Digimon of there own, so to speak, but they themselves are the digimon. They transform by the power of the spirits they collect.
Then they find newer and better ways to Digivolve. And a final showdown which you think is final but isn't at the end. Yes, that's right, loops and twists to who you think is the real threat. I believe there were three of those.
Well, all in all, it was good time to spend before I went off to where ever I was going to my weekday mornings. The animation is sometimes okay and other times actually very fluid and exciting to watch. But it is a semi long series ranging to about 50 episodes. And everything is wrapped up into a bow at the end, but that'd be for you to decide if it's a nice red and pink frilly bow or a black and bland sharp bow that left you wanting a bigger climax. (I doubt it will be the second, but I felt like adding it since I am very insomniac tonight.)
Oh, and the music, there is none that you would find catchy or appealing. It's just there.
Uh, I would still recommend a watch, just to see the fourth and final Digimon series. Where Digimon has not gone before, and never will again to my dismay, cause I actually liked Digimon.

Last updated Sunday, October 31 2004. Created Sunday, October 31 2004.

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