#1995 hikarigaoka

[beginningobserver]

Sorry if this is too personal, but what is your favorite dinosaur?

Rui: Oh I like... Tyrannosaurs! When I was 3 years old I saw a movie with an orange Tyrannosaur fighting a giant Parrot!!

Daisuke: So, a Greymon?

Hikari: You watched that battle too, Rui-kun?

Rui: Wa-wait, what? Are you telling me that I saw two digimon before meeting Ukkomon?!

Ken: You didn't know that?

Takeru: Didn't you ask Ukkomon before?

Rui: I... I never asked him about those.

Ukkomon: He... He never asked me about those.

Miyako: Seriously?

Armadimon: They're quite alike, dagya.

[the group nods sagely]

Rui/Ukkomon: • • • 💧

※ This is based on a theory, since in-movie we learn that Rui also lived in Hikarigaoka, and since to become a Chosen you have to witness a digimon event... This is me just speculating if he witnessed the 1995 events too.

[shihalyfie]

Survive pays homage to a lot of aspects of Adventure including some character archetypes presented much differently than in the anime. Do you think there's any correlation between these Survive characters and the anime's Crest traits at all? I suppose the easiest comparison is Taichi and Takuma and whether or not Courage suits Takuma as well, but there's also Kaito and Friendship or Aoi and Love, for example.

My answer is that there's both less and more correlation than you'd think!

There are definitely some correlations in terms of rough group position (see my meta on this), but the fact that the Survive kids were yanked into the Digimon/Kemonogami world because they happened to be the nearest losers lurking around the shrine instead of naturally good people is a significant point (they are explicitly meant to not be "chosen ones" in the traditional sense). The Crests were basically ways of solidifying the fact that Homeostasis and the Agents pinpointed the Adventure kids specifically because of their virtues, and on a meta sense to give the kids self-awareness about what was good about themselves (since all of them tended to be somewhat self-effacing and lacking in self-esteem in many ways). It makes sense that the kids don't fit into the Crest archetypes very easily...but as with anything, there is a but.

To go into this more deeply, let's go into the history of the Crests in Adventure's narrative. It all started when Homeostasis, the Digital World's security system, realized that the Digital World was in danger and that they needed to do something. However, Homeostasis unfortunately had the major obstacle that they had no physical body and no ability to talk to anyone (it's implied that Hikari channeling them in Adventure episode 45 may have been the first time they were able to talk to anyone at all, especially since they themself say they wanted to speak with the kids as early as File Island). The most they could do was create the Agents (autonomous agents) like Gennai, who seem to be unable to communicate with Homeostasis directly but are capable of carrying out their will to some extent. Based on the need to do something to save the Digital World, the Agents analyzed the data from the Hikarigaoka incident in 1995 to find that some of the kids exhibited certain "most wonderful traits" that, when used in partnership with a Digimon, could lead to them becoming much more powerful. (In line with the Digital World's ability to manifest feelings into a visible form, it seems the Crest symbols come directly from those traits under a lithograph.)

This is why I tend to emphasize to the very end on this blog that contrary to popular belief, in Adventure and 02, Homeostasis was not portrayed or depicted as a deity in any way -- they wouldn't have used such a roundabout way to save the Digital World if they were any more than a voiceless security system whose sole direct abilities were repair work. They have as much power over the Digital World's inner workings as a building custodian does. So even though the origin of the Crests has a fantasy nuance to it, they did not come out because some omniscient god was determining their souls' destiny or something, but because that was what they were able to do within the limitations of Adventure's Digital World mechanics. In many ways, they were basically in a similar position as Yukiha.

The Adventure novels also explicitly state that the Crests aren't about what traits they have, but the traits they have the potential for having. The Adventure and 02 kids weren't completely defined by said Crests, and they had very wide-ranging meanings that allowed for different interpretations between the Adventure kids and 02 quartet. On a meta level, they're really meant to help summarize the characters' stories and make them more easily understandable to the children's audience, but I think the fandom has had a tendency to assign too much weight to them and oversimplify the characters trying to cram them into some kind of "archetype" -- it should really be the other way around, in that the characters themselves are complex and multifaceted, and the Crests treated as a shorthand guide to defining their personal priorities.

So if we had all of the existing Adventure and 02 Crests on the table and thought about which kids had what as their priority, or what their character arc can be best described as, and make maximum use of the different potential meanings of each Crest, I think we can draw a rough correlation. Personally, I think the easiest ones are Minoru (Courage; his entire thing is about getting himself together to be an ideal hero), Ryo (Friendship; his personal goal and best trait, even if it's not initially apparent), Saki (Purity; believing in being true to one's feelings), Miyuki (Light; the desire to treasure all life), and the Professor (Knoweldge; the desire to know the truth and do things with it). I would say that Aoi should still get Love even if it seems like it should be Faith at first, because in fact she personally dislikes being seen as someone tied to responsible obligations and is much happier if she's appreciated as a person capable of taking care of others in a more emotional, warm manner. Contrary to his original Adventure counterpart, I would give Kaito Hope because the worst outcome of his character arc is if he completely gives up on the world from the idea it's meaningless if Miu isn't there, and the best is if he resolves it's still possible to do better.

The most difficult remaining ones are Takuma, Miu, and Shuuji, and I'm really not sure about these; I think there's a lot of room for interpretation and different potential outcomes, but I would give Takuma Faith (the worst outcomes of the story happen when he acts too selfishly while the best ones come when he knows the right thing to do and what the group needs). I am actually kind of tempted to give Shuuji Kindness -- yes, really -- because of the fact his Truthful character arc involves him knowing he can do better instead of falling into the pattern he was raised into. Miu is personally the toughest one for me because there's a handful of options here; the way her Part 4 character arc resembles the Princess Mimi incident in Adventure episode 25 and her desire to do things and express hobbies the way she likes would suggest Purity, but her character arc also has a strong nuance of needing to take responsibility for herself, which would suggest Faith -- and considering Survive takes cues from 02 as well, maybe she can be like a 02 kid and have both?

[daiken-miracles]

Hikarigaoka (Heighten View Terrace)

The Hikarigaoka area is where the original eight Chosen Children saw their first Digimon in 1995, as shown in the Digimon Adventure movie. The battle between Greymon and Parrotmon took place on the main street, destroying part of the bridge, a phone booth, and some building sections. Many of the families moved away afterward, including those of all eight Chosen Children. Seven Chosen moved to Odaiba while Takeru moved to Setagaya until he too moved to Odaiba in 2002.

Upon their return from the Digital World, the Chosen Children stop at Hikarigaoka in episode 29 of Adventure and realize that they all lived there at the same time and had this experience. This is what makes them think that the Eighth Child most likely moved from Hikarigaoka to Odaiba as well. According to episode 45, this was the moment the original eight were Chosen.

In 02, Oikawa Yukio takes Ken and the Dark Seed children in episode 44 to utilize the natural Digital Gate (like the one at the campsite near Mount Fuji in Adventure), but everything is interrupted by Demon’s arrival. The younger Chosen fight him, and Ken taps into his Dark Digivice to open a gate to the World of Darkness, at which point Daisuke gives Ken a stirring speech about moving forward and not being afraid anymore. Although Demon can make his own Digital Gates between the Real World and the Digital World, he cannot escape the Dark Ocean. Oikawa tells the Dark Seed children to meet him there again on New Year’s Eve before escaping.

However, in episode 47 of 02, BlackWarGreymon seals the gate with his own body to prevent Oikawa, and the monster inside him, from entering the Digital World. Since Oikawa doesn’t know that, he gathers the Dark Seed children there and opens a gate, which leads to the World of Dreams instead of the Digital World.

[taichi-x-koushiro]

undefined

Digimon Adventure{s} A.M.V. [Pre-view] ~ “Boku” / “Watashi” / “Someone Just for Me” [As this is technically still a pre-view, it is Un-finished {For now}] featuring DUO/O.T.P.: ~ Koushiro Izumi + Yagami Taichi / KouTai {Koushiro x Taichi} / KouTai / Taishiro [Also seen: Yagamis, 1999 Agumon; briefly]

Audio/Dialogue (C) Chobits & C.L.A.M.P DigiAdvs ( C ) T0EI.@nimation {This is a Fan-work, and no money is being made off this work. Be sure to support both of the original series too!}

Time Spent: About 1 and 1/2 hours on 08/07/22, finished around midday My Commentary:

I have a lot of Thoughts on how Koushiro feels towards Taichi, Actually {And also in reverse, though this is mainly Koushiro’s Point-of-View.} (This first part will have a bit of Taichi perspective too, though.)

I also have a lot of Thoughts on Adventure{s} wider LORE on a grander scale.

I’ll probably go back and smooth this out later, but for now it’s doing what I want it to do, and hopefully you can follow along by reading the dialogue below: (Note: Contains starting spoilers for the originating series, Chobits, though the context in this first part is quite vague, and happens quite early in series.)

Scenes used come from: - Digimon Adventure: 1999 - Digimon Adventure [Eps 18, 21, 24, 48] - Digimon Adventure 2020 [Ep 36] (Though 2020 is used, this is mainly meant as overall Semi[?] Canon-compliant, but 2020s can be in their own Time too...)

- Dialogue (Preview)

In that city, there wasn’t anyone. There were houses, and you could see LIGHT shining through the windows. But on the roads, there wasn’t anyone. {I} looked through a window. There was a person.

-- In THIS CITY, there isn’t {ANYONE}.

[Note: replies/Tags that are Positive/respectful are OK!]

... But {he} was with “THAT.” {I} looked into another house. As expected, {he} was with “THAT.” But that’s because being with “THAT” is {Fun} More [FUN] than being with other {people}. {No one} is [GOING OUTSIDE] anymore.

In THIS CITY, there isn’t {ANYONE}. {I’M} GOING OUT on a journey. A journey to another CITY. {I} hope [Someone just for Me] will find {ME} there.

But if [that] person becomes attached to {ME} and {ME} ONLY...

... then it will be time for the two of us to (part) [?]

But {I} still WANT TO MEET [Someone just for Me].

Thinking that, I travel on to another EMPTY CITY.

(Pictured: Mugendramon’s taken-over city, from Adventure Episode #48.)

[digitalgate02]

Why can’t Daigo and company be Chosen Children who became adults? Does that contradict established lore (not that it’d be the first contradiction) or do you just find it implausible?

It goes in contradiction with Adventure ep 45, in which Homeostasis explains how they selected children starting from Hikarigaoka incident in 1995...

... And a drama CD (Two-and-a-Half Year Break) plus Kakudou’s notes stating the number of Chosen Children doubles year by year, starting from 1995. Which makes 1997-1999 the most likely years the "original Chosen Children" were active.

So that’s why my friends and I debate reached to the consensus they might been from 1998. Wallace is a bit of confusing though, in our recent talk I mused if he weren’t chosen by another entity, which could give a pass to Maki and Daigo, but... The scene in part 4 clearly uses Homeostasis for that.

[adventure-hearts]

The grow of Digidestined number left me a doubt, where the original digidestined fit in that. I mean, original digidestined were chosen after Hikarigaoka events. This wasn't only a thing in Tri, since the Adventure novel (where Kakudou was involved) also mentioned that Hikarigaoka was the first contact between humans and digimon.

I don’t know, tbh. Remember we shouldn’t take everything the novels / the creators say at face-value. This is only a theory. The way I rationalize it is: this explains the increasing number of Chosen Children around the world post-1995.

Do we even know when Maki and Daigo’s adventure happened?

[natsthinkitythinkthinkthonk]

Mamoru Miyano Subbed Videos

Part One: Roles Part Two: Song Recommendations Part Three: Subbed Videos

This will only contain subbed videos! That means no translations, translations with audio, screencaps, or anything else! I won’t include videos without subtitles!

If you want to check out the blog that translates all of Mamo’s Line Blog posts, check them out here.

Here’s an introduction of what makes Mamo popular and what people like about him!

~~~~~

Here’s another video by Otoya that explains Mamo in 9 minutes! it includes a picture from when he was 7!

~~~~~

This isn’t the last time he did an improvised song for Mamo. Hiro Shimono also did one for Yowamushi Pedal.

~~~~~

Additional Video: Yuto's Pink Bikini ft. Uemura Yuto, Kishou Taniyama and Miyano Mamoru

~~~~~

For context, here are their ages: Mamoru Miyano - June 8, 1983 / 35 years old / Debut: 1990 (acting) + 2001 (voice acting) Toshiyuki Toyonaga  - April 28, 1984 / 34 years old / Debut: 1995 (acting) + 2002 (voice acting) Natsuki Hanae  - June 26, 1991 / 27 years old / Debut: 2011 

Ouran Host Club came out in 2006 (way to make me feel old) which would mean that Hanae would’ve been 15 years old. In Japan, the cut off age isn’t January 1st, it’s in April (presumably April 1st which surprisingly not a joke). This means that kids must be six years of age when entering school. Due to his birthday being in June, Hanae actually would’ve been in his last year of middle school when Ouran came out in the spring season of 2006. According to this chronological compilation of Toyonaga’s roles, even though he debuted in 2002, he didn’t get big roles like Mamo did. Mamo already landed a lead role in Wolf’s Rain in 2003. Toyonaga was taking more supporting roles and didn’t land a real big main character lead until 2010 when he played Mikado in Durarara. So obviously, it’s no fault of Hanae that he had no idea who Toyonaga was.

~~~~~

I haven’t gotten to watch this video for myself yet. I’m going to! I didn’t even know this existed until I did some deep digging.

Speaking English

Hosoya Imitation

Somewhat Random Seiyuu Compilation (he appears for a few minutes)

Yuube wa Otanoshimi Deshita ne Drama Appearances: Part One | Part Two

Q&A in Taiwan!

Kuroshitsuji 2015 New Year's Seiyuu Event: Funny Live Voice Acting

Mamo Picks on Kaji: Secret Life of Pets | Nanatsu no Taizai | MAMO BURSTS INTO KAJI’S RADIO SHOW!

Free!

IwaCha ES vol.2: Zakki gets picked on by Tatsu and Mamo

Durarara!

Kana Hanazawa: Miyano-san, I'll kill you. (If you ever feel bad about stumbling over words, just remember that Hanazawa accidentally threatened to kill Mamo)

[PLAYLIST] Durarara!! Seiyuu Event in Hikarigaoka [7 Parts]

[PLAYLIST] Durarara!! Lovers in Nakano ENG

Inu x Boku SS

Inu x Boku SS Event: Part One

Inu x Boku SS Event: Part Two

Inu x Boku SS Event: Part Three

Tadakoi

Tadakoi Radio #1 Miyano Mamoru Bullying Shimono Hiro version

Tadakoi Radio #1 Miyano loves Umehara version

Songs of Tokyo with Mamoru Miyano and Nana Mizuki:

Songs of Tokyo Full Event (Mamoru Miyano and Nana Mizuki) [Bilibili]

Songs of Tokyo Premium Talk (Mamoru Miyano and Nana Mizuki

Tumblr Videos:

Miyano Mamoru reading an excerpt and summary of Dazai Osamu’s “No Longer Human”

Radio Smile (Talks about Yuri on Ice and JJ Style!)

Bungou Stray Dogs Radio “Mamo Teases Hosoya... again”

Anime Clips: 

Best of Zombieland Saga’s Kotaro Tatsumi

Best of Bungou Stray Dog’s Osamu Dazai

[izzyizumi]

( re: Digimon’s timeline issues, Hikarigaoka battle: “1995″ )

( ..... this too )

[beginningobserver]

Y'know, peeps making a fuss with the baby Yagami siblings cameo scene in the Rui's memories time-travel sort-of part of the movie makes me think about ANOTHER THING.

So, you know Hikarigaoka is a small neighborhood right? There's high chances that Taichi, Hikari have seen Rui-kun and vice-versa before the Yagamis moved out. Or even, the Takaishida bros, Mimi, Koushiro, Sora and Jou might have seen each other at least once (and before everyone moved out. Tho i don't know if Rui and his parents moved from Hikarigaoka too, possibly not. I can't tell now and i can't even check the movie yet alas)

It would've been funny if they did, and then one day they're just chatting about something from the 1995 (it doesn't need to be about the Greymon vs Parrotmon event!) and then Rui goes like "Wait a minute. I think I saw you before when I was a toddler" kind of realization.

Don't ya think, folks? It would've been funnier if they all "indirectly met" before hehe.

(note: idk if there's a specific word by this... I mean passing by a stranger in the street, and then years later getting in contact with them?)

[shihalyfie]

The frustrating part of Adventure/02 is all the lore they did not put in the series, or extra material and we only discover through Kakudou's twitter or blog, or some recent interviews with SekiP or some old staff members.

Like, there's a ton of things we don't know!! And things released later in a drama CD or booklet which has the suspicion to being part of the backstory/hidden lore from production notes ._.

I think Adventure implied the eight digimon from Taichi's group were made with the kids' traits, so they knew who were their partners and even their names as well ... Meanwhile the new three mons from 02 had to introduce themselves, ask for their partners' names and such...

Meanwhile Wormmon... We don't know anything about him. Since Ken has a Crest, i suspect Wormmon is in the same camp from Taichi's partners -- made with Ken's kindness trait which also originated the Crest of Kindness.

Do you have any theory or headcanon for him and the said Crest?

I personally figure that the answer is probably really mundane, honestly. That's a recurring pattern with stuff in Adventure and 02; sometimes the answer is the simplest one, even if it's not entirely grand or epic. The Adventure and 02 kids were not a singularity; there were Chosen Children before and after them, all implied to go on their own adventures. We have no evidence the eight Crests seen in Adventure were the only ones made, just that they seem to be the ones that survived the attack Gennai was involved with. For all we know the could have been a part of a much bigger set made to correspond to a bunch of kids who all witnessed the Hikarigaoka incident in 1995, but only those eight survived that attack. So, likewise, there's nothing saying Ken's Crest wasn't also made around that time, or even later as an experiment afterwards.

Personally, since there are so many contradictions between Tag Tamers and the anime that you can't take them simultaneously at face value, I prioritize the anime and only draw from Tag Tamers as needed, so the version of Tag Tamers' events in my head could easily involve a Crest being involved in some way. It would explain why Ken had it on his person and used it as a power source for his base, unaware of or having forgotten its original purpose.

In the end, I think there are certain things that can only be explained by the fact Adventure and 02 were too obviously written as they went along -- even though I argue often that they had more thought put into it than they're given credit for, it doesn't change the fact that both series' plots are built on retrofits. The biggest example is probably the fact that the Adventure kids just all happened to simultaneously move from Hikarigaoka to Odaiba and attend the same school; Hikarigaoka's on the other side of Tokyo, so I can't stress enough how implausibly convenient this is. The real-life obvious answer is that the first movie and the TV series were developed separately and the TV staff had to come up with excuses to rationalize how they were in Odaiba when they used to be in Hikarigaoka, and in fact the staff struggling to keep up with contradictory movie and media mix compliance was exactly one of the reasons we didn't get a third Adventure series at the time. So the explanations are forced, and the staff knows it, so to a certain degree you just kind of have to roll with it.

That said, the Adventure novels do provide a suggestion that there is some kind of higher power beyond even Homeostasis's awareness (referred to as "God's territory"), which was responsible for pulling the strings behind things like everyone in Hikarigaoka conveniently forgetting the incident in 1995. As much as a cop-out as it may feel like to resort to that, keep in mind that the Adventure universe has always been very linked with Shinto concepts; this is of course brought up most prominently in 02 episode 33, in that Digimon and the Digital World may not be all that distinct from the world of youkai and the gods. In this case, this should not be taken as "gods" in the Christian or Greco-Roman definitions, but the Shinto concept of gods that exist in everything and could potentially be good or evil (Professor Takenouchi brings up the example of tsukumogami, or objects that become sentient after a hundred years of existence, and Survive parallels this by depicting the Digimon as "Kemonogami", or "beast gods"). So according to Adventure universe lore, the development of digital technology has allowed us to start seeing and understanding more of those things we never were able to before, but that doesn't mean we'll immediately understand everything about it as humans, and Koushirou's character arc wouldn't work if it weren't for the recurring concept that even Homeostasis and the Agents and Holy Beasts aren't entirely clear on what's going on with the world. This is also why "destiny" comes up so much in Adventure and 02; the world itself is guiding you towards something, but at the same time, it's up to you whether you want to actually fulfill that, and that's why certain "coincidences" seem to happen all the time to give the kids chances to make use of them.

[shihalyfie]

@kaialone replied to your post:

I kinda just imagine that they initially *weren't* chosen and came to the Digital World by accident. Their status as "chosen" developed over the course of their adventures in the Digital World. But this is not explained as such to the Adventure kids in order to keep it simple for them. (<- Yeah, I realize this still qualifies as a retcon.)

This works too! This is basically along the lines of what I've been calling "the Oikawa loophole" (in that Oikawa’s presence establishes it’s possible to be “a human who bonds with a Digimon but is not recognized as a Chosen before 1995, then is retroactively recognized as one afterwards”), and I’ve personally used this to explain how Wallace met his partners before 1995.

According to Homeostasis’s testimony in Adventure episode 45, the significance of the Hikarigaoka incident to them and the Agents in 1995 was that it made them realize that a Digimon bonding with a human allows for evolving spontaneously (instead of “naturally” over a long period of time like most Digimon in the Digital World). So under this idea, I would imagine Himekawa and Nishijima and the others fell into the Digital World by accident in the eighties and bonded with their future partners, but Homeostasis and the Agents weren’t sure how the kids and Digimon pulled off what they did at the time. Then the Hikarigaoka incident happened, which confirmed “okay, it’s definitely the human contact that did it,” so they scanned the data of the local kids and the rest was history, and Himekawa and Nishijima were retroactively considered Chosen Children later.

This does mean going against the novel, but not only is that more than fair game because the novel is already canonical AU (in a sense), the reason I bring this up is that this novel is where we got the name “Homeostasis” from in the first place. In Adventure proper, the entity that spoke to the kids in Adventure episode 45 was only named “the one who wishes for stability”. So if you want to go hard-in on disregarding the novel, it’s also entirely possible to say that “the one who wishes for stability” in Adventure episode 45 and “Homeostasis” in tri. aren’t even the same entity to begin with, which opens even more possibilities. (As you say, this is an obvious rule patch, but it’s fun to play with this kind of thing.)

Sorry, I hope I wasn’t too nosy/intrusive or putting you on the spot, I just thought it’d be interesting to expand it a bit further!

[shihalyfie]

Adventure, 02, and the “secret double life”

Adventure’s concept of “Chosen Children” prophesized save-the-world heroes is hardly unique to it, and given that it ostensibly follows so many fantasy tropes, it’s easy to see it as having a textbook pattern of the “secret identity”/”secret double life” tropes, in which adventure-faring kids keep everything from their parents and society under the idea that if people found out about their adventures, they’d be kept from action or be experimented on.

But as much as it’s easy to see it that way, in fact, Adventure and 02 had a somewhat different view of the matter. Although 02 in particular, with its concept of “wake up, go to school, save the world,” probably gives off the strongest “double life” aura, in actuality, Adventure and 02 both had an underlying sentiment that the concept of keeping Digimon from one’s parents -- and, eventually, the public -- was practically impossible.

(Unless otherwise stated, translations for Adventure/02/Kizuna are from Ryuu-Rogue/PositronCannon/L Subs, respectively.)

The Hikarigaoka incident

The aftermath of the Hikarigaoka incident in 1995 (or, in other words, the Greymon and Parrotmon incident depicted in the first movie) was depicted in Adventure episode 29, in which, as it turned out, was passed off as a “terrorist bombing incident” -- and that kids like Takeru who attempted to explain the situation to their parents were dismissed for imagining things.

The Adventure novels add a bit of extra addition that there might have been some external finagling to make sure things were cleaned up, but even then, things weren’t all that clean-cut. For one, the Hikarigaoka incident was a rather short one that was cleaned up in quick order -- there was a minimal amount of destruction compared to what later events would bring (only a single localized area in terms of collateral damage, especially since Parrotmon wasn’t there to cause wanton destruction), the full brunt of the incident may not have even spanned so much of an hour, and both Digimon involved vanished almost as quickly as they came. It really is just enough that you could sweep it under the normalcy filter of wanting to throw out any supernatural explanations, especially since the kids themselves eventually succumbed to the adults’ explanations.

And yet, even despite that, Takaishi Natsuko still found the Hikarigaoka incident a topic of interest to the point she started doing independent research on it -- especially when a certain incident four years later pushed things far beyond the range of plausible deniability. The novels make this pretty explicit:

Among her normal jobs, a side project that she was working on involved investigating the “Hikarigaoka terrorist bombing incident” four years ago. It was an incident that occured in the very place where they had lived. Not only did it capture her interest, but as she kept investigating it, she found many aspects about it that weren’t acceptable explanations to her. It still wasn’t enough information for her to put into an article or a book, but someone, somehow, had managed to find out that she was working on it and had contacted her wanting to talk. But when the time of their appointment came, the man she was supposed to meet didn’t appear. What was that man’s name? Oikawa? I think? Well, I’m never going to set up a meeting with him again. 

So in other words, the fact that she had spotted a rat was somewhat public enough for someone to figure out that she was on the case. Not to mention that said someone had also spotted a rat -- someone who was not possessed by any Digimon vampires at this point, and was merely just an enthusiast trying to reconnect with a mysterious phenomenon from his childhood and dealing with grief for his recently deceased friend. It probably would not have been long before the truth would have been fully spilled even by itself -- but later events that would confirm everyone’s suspicious pretty firmly were already on the horizon.

Menoa Bellucci and the advent of Chosen Children

In a bit of “hidden” Adventure lore, the number of Chosen Children thus started to double every year -- something cited by Two-and-a-Half Year Break (Koushirou’s track) and confirmed by directorial statement. (Kizuna’s To Sora is consistent with this principle, and the 02 epilogue being set in 2027-2028 also tracks with the global population being partnered to Digimon with that precise number.) Either way, Adventure episode 53 confirmed that the eight “Tokyo Chosen Children” from 1999 (or, in other words, the Adventure main cast and their partners) were hardly isolated singularities -- there was a group of Chosen Children before them that placed an incomplete seal on Apocalymon prior, and, according to the Adventure novels, four of their partners evolved over a long period of time to become the Holy Beasts. The fact that there had to be at least four gives only a very narrow period of time said Chosen could be from, most likely between 1997 (4 Chosen) to early 1999 (16 Chosen), with the very short real-world time in between likely correlating to enough time in the Digital World for their names to be lost to their history.

(Note that Oikawa Yukio doesn’t count here; although he and Hiroki made contact with the Digital World through video games in the 80s, there is no indication that Oikawa was fundamentally partnered to Pipimon at this time, in the same way that it was only after the Tokyo Chosen Children witnessed the Hikarigaoka incident that “the one who wishes for stability” -- Homeostasis -- came up with the idea for creating a system to tie Digimon evolution to human partners.)

Kizuna confirms it further by introducing Menoa Bellucci, who says that she met Morphomon (and, presumably, did become a Chosen Child) at the age of nine, meaning presumably 1997 -- making her one of the small handful of people who became Chosen Children before the Tokyo eight.

The little snippets we get of Menoa and Morphomon’s life are interesting, but also telling. For one, their life together is depicted through a bunch of photos with both of them there, through events such as birthdays and travel...and given that someone had to have taken all of those photos, this means that it is extremely likely Menoa’s parents were fully aware of Morphomon’s presence and existence as her partner. In other words, Morphomon was not a secret to them in the first place.

Another interesting thing here is that it’s never said that Menoa went on any incredible world-saving adventure during her time with Morphomon, so it’s ambiguous whether she did or not. It’s entirely possible that she did but doesn’t want to bring it up to Taichi and the others because of how much baggage would be associated with it compared to, well, the rest of her early childhood life with Morphomon; given the time dilation that was in play prior to 1999, it’s very likely any adventure she could have gone on would have been lost to Digital World history. (That said, given that Morphomon doesn’t seem to have any ties to Holy Beast lines, a group of 4+ Chosen distinct from her and the other Tokyo Chosen Children by necessity would have to be from 1998 or early 1999.) She does, at the very least, seem to have evolved Morphomon at least once, given that she cites “loss of the ability to evolve” as part of the process of partnership dissolution when explaining it to the others (and it’s implied very heavily she only has her own personal experience to work with). But if Menoa’s parents were sufficiently supportive, it’s possible they might have had no problem with Menoa having a large and very cute butterfly friend -- especially if Menoa didn’t go on some grand adventure and wasn’t even in danger anyway.

We also learn a bit more about the Yagami siblings in Adventure episode 21, which takes place on August 1, 1999, and that Hikari has been witnessing the increased Digimon contact with the human world (part of a long, ongoing process of the Digital World slowly coming into more concrete contact with the human world) for quite a while now, but because it isn’t very “clear” contact yet, she’s the only one who can see them. She’s been trying to tell people for a long time, but nobody believed her -- and that’s the only reason she kept quiet about it.

There’s also another interesting line in this episode, when Taichi considers never returning to the Digital World and staying home with Koromon -- it seems that he intends to be straightforward with Koromon’s presence and not hide him from his parents! At worst, he simply thinks his mom might think Koromon to be a nuisance -- but not something he has to entirely keep a secret, meaning he also trusts his parents to be open-minded about a weird pink talking creature.

The Odaiba fog incident

The “Odaiba fog” incident refers to the events of August 3, 1999, spanning Adventure episodes 35 to 54, when Vamdemon covered Odaiba in fog and launched a bunch of mass kidnappings in the search for the eighth Tokyo Chosen Child, put a large amount of adults to sleep, was defeated by the Chosen Children, and eventually was followed by a projection of the Digital World in the sky, resulting in the surrounding witnesses observing the eight Tokyo Chosen Children and their partners rising into the sky, returning to the Digital World, and defeating the Dark Masters and Apocalymon.

Unlike the Hikarigaoka incident, this was not something that could be easily ignored. People in Odaiba saw, in vivid daylight, a bunch of strange monsters kidnapping them and stuffing them in Tokyo Big Sight. The Digital World appearing in the sky, Digimon falling out of them, and freezing anything they touched happened all over the world. Ultimately, this was not the kind of thing you could just sweep under the rug!

Daisuke, Iori, and Michael recount their experiences with this in 02 episode 14, and Spring 2003 and the Adventure novels depict this as a formative experience for Daisuke wanting to become someone strong enough to protect others. The kids’ parents in Tokyo saw their kids fighting in the sky (in fact, it’s likely everyone did, but only the parents were aware of the actual identities of the kids up there, considering it wasn’t like the sky gives you much of a close-up view). And, of course, we had our “intrepid reporter” Ishida Hiroaki, who was insistent on covering these incidents in Adventure episode 35 before he even knew his sons were involved, and Takaishi Natsuko, who, as per 02 episode 38, ended up tacking this on her list of Digimon incidents to investigate.

So by the conclusion of this incident, it is pretty safe to say the populace knows that Digimon are a thing. Of course, they still haven’t made sense of all of it, and everyone (including Hiroaki and Natsuko themselves) is missing some key details, but the fact that these monsters are A Thing That Exist is hardly a secret. In fact, this is made pretty explicit in 02 episode 39:

The governments of every country most certainly did not just see that whole incident and decide “well, that’s nothing to worry about” -- they immediately went ahead and started doing military research on the Digimon! But Gennai and his fellow Agents figured out pretty quickly that very bad things would happen if the Digimon became public knowledge and government militaries started exploiting them, so they secretly wiped away data regarding Digimon in order to hide their existence.

Note that this does not mean they wiped everyone’s memories -- they’re not that all-powerful -- but merely made it so that anytime anyone tried to do organized research on Digimon, poof! -- the info would just magically vanish. Of course, that doesn’t stop pen-and-paper work, and, again, it also did not stop reporters like Takaishi Natsuko or Ishida Hiroaki from doing investigations into everything from a journalistic perspective, nor humanities scholars like Takenouchi Haruhiko or Kido Shuu from taking an interest in Digimon. And, of course, it’s not like you can just wipe human memory that saw all of that happening! But it sure does put a major slowdown on attempted organized research of Digimon to the extent of being easily able to do the kinds of things Gennai and the Agents feared, because it makes it significantly harder to exchange info or collect anything.

Which of course leads to...

The events of 02

The Tokyo Chosen Children got a “break” of sorts after the events of Adventure, and for the most part they didn’t have to think too hard about how to deal with their Digimon in regards to society, especially since they were separated from them. Then, in April 2002, Daisuke, Miyako, and Iori get their partners, and they, Takeru, and Hikari become lucky enough to be able to bring their partners back and forth between the real world and Digital World. With their partners small enough to be passed off as plushes, and no Digimon battles taking place in the real world at this time, the kids choose to keep their Digimon activities a secret from their parents.

At this point, it should be pointed out that this was not actually strictly necessary in terms of keeping the Digimon from society -- especially on the part of the Adventure kids, whose parents already know they exist and certainly have not forgotten! In fact, this is made into a prominent scene in 02 episode 18, when Koushirou’s mother is surprised Tentomon is not there (even though there’s no indication a conflict is going on at the time), in contrast to Koushirou having just been worried about opening a gate in her presence.

In fact, Kizuna adds an important detail by showing us a newspaper clip from around 2002 (when Menoa was accepted into university), indicating that apparently the concept of a “Digimon partner” was well-recognized enough that Morphomon was openly in the newspaper clipping, accompanied by a caption identifying her as Menoa’s Digimon partner. (Kizuna having so much attention to detail with background lore that it even complies with the doubling-every-year principle, it’s not something you can easily pass off as a writer mistake.) Doing the math, 16 Chosen Children in 1999 means around 128 by 2002 (which also tracks with the approximate amount we see around the world in 02 episodes 40-42 and 50). That’s still a drop in the pond in terms of how much the global population truly understands this, but considering that there were reporters like Takaishi Natsuko and Ishida Hiroaki already on the case, it’s not too much of a stretch to think that the press and informational publications would have an idea.

So why did the kids still try so hard to keep the Digimon from their parents and society? A lot of it has to do with the way the kids make their plan to infiltrate the Kaiser’s base in 02 episode 18.

Prior to this point in the series, their fight in the Digital World had been an after-school affair, one that they were capable of hiding instead of having the truth presented up-front to their parents, whether they liked it or not. Starting in April 2002, the kids voluntarily chose to enter a territory war after school. Think about how they’d have to explain this to their parents -- “oh yeah, by the way, I befriended a mysterious monster and will now be going to another world after school to fight a territory war with even bigger monsters on a near-weekly basis” -- of course, most parents would start being obstructive and immediately put an end to that, and there would be so much they’d have to explain to them. In fact, the way the kids parade their Digimon around and try to use the “plushes” excuse instead of really making any decent attempts to hide them indicates they’re not really trying that hard to maintain a facade, just enough to not get awkward questions and people intervening with their actions. After all, if even incidents like the ones in 02 episode 9 can be safely passed off as “being over late at a friend’s place,” why not use that excuse?

So when they first start a real trip into the Digital World that may span multiple days (with Miyako being visibly out of place with this, a sharp contrast to her seniors being used to the idea of being “trapped” there for days on end), Iori says very explicitly that he doesn’t want to worry his family, and the discussion immediately shifts to how they’ll keep this from their families. Interestingly, when Daisuke suggests just lying about it, Hikari scolds him for doing so -- implying that it’s not like she (or the others) is even comfortable with that kind of lie, hence why they ultimately resort to having the seniors stage a camping trip so that the lie can at least be a bit less far-fetched.

But the fact that they can do this in the first place ultimately ends up being a luxury, because they can get away with this as long as the conflict is still in the Digital World. Eventually, we arrive at...

The Christmas 2002 incident

A lot happened on Christmas 2002, especially given the timezone stretch and the number of episodes it spanned, but this effectively sparked the point of no return where Digimon incidents were unavoidable and staring everyone in the face -- especially since it spanned multiple days. Dark Towers started appearing all over the world, wandering Digimon started appearing everywhere, Chosen Children around the world mobilized to round them back into the Digital World, Demon and his army invaded Tokyo, Oikawa kidnapped a large number of children, and eventually the battle with BelialVamdemon on New Year’s Eve ended up bleeding into the real world, with Chosen Children appearing en masse to help them defeat him.

During the course of the international Chosen arc, we do see that quite a few other kids have been hiding their Digimon from their parents -- indeed, not everyone is like Menoa, and especially if they’ve been involved in dangerous incidents or are very small children! Even Mimi tries to hide her involvement from her parents in 02 episode 10, despite them already knowing about the Digimon from the Odaiba fog incident, because -- as they say in the episode -- moving to the US was partially motivated by them wanting to get away from all of this, so, naturally, they’d prefer Mimi have nothing to do with it. But Takeru is comfortable enough to call his grandfather in to help, presumably deciding that he was trustworthy enough about it.

And, indeed, the first major break we see in the facade with the core cast’s parents is with Takeru’s mother Natsuko, who correctly deduces that something is going on and confronts Takeru about it -- to which he immediately does not attempt to cover up or deny, and admits without hesitation. Natsuko, in turn, decides to accept it without grilling him too much, deciding that she’ll trust in Takeru to handle this (presumably, especially after seeing him handle quite a lot even at the young age of eight). At the end of 02 episode 45, Ken -- whose parents have seen so many horrors going on with him that the explanation of him engaging in dangerous monster battles would be more of a comfort to them, because at least they’d be aware of what’s going on -- ultimately chooses to confide in his parents, leading to them and the rest of the Adventure kids’ parents actively choosing to support their kids in their fight over the course of episodes 46-48. Naturally, as much as they’d probably rather their kids not get engaged in dangerous things, they understand what this is and that it’s important, and at the very least want to support them as much as they can -- Koushirou’s mother laments in 02 episode 48 that she wishes she could do more besides just bring food!

02 episode 46 has a moment where Oikawa and Archnemon watch a TV program with people trying (very badly) to blame the recent incidents on a mass delusion -- the TV show itself is portrayed as a sort of trash gossip kind of special -- and Oikawa provides an explanation for the impasse of acknowledgment where people seem to be increasingly aware of Digimon but also not quite aware: things are undeniably happening, but people still aren’t quite ready to accept an explanation that borders on the supernatural. The entire concept of Digimon is a massive shake to the status quo, after all, so while certain investigative and curious people like Natsuko or Haruhiko are naturally more open-minded, and many parents are likely to pay closer attention when kids are involved, only slightly over a hundred Chosen Children (many of whom are still erring on the side of keeping it a secret) and a few reporters aren’t enough to really help people understand...

...but all things considered, it seems to be enough that the Chosen are now functionally giving up on hiding it at all!

By the time of episode 50, the situation has now escalated to the point where any member of the families of the Tokyo Chosen Children who wasn’t already aware of what was going on is now definitely aware, as they await their children’s return from the Digital World. Considering that Jun was already witnessing the return of dangerous things as early as 02 episode 38, and Iori’s grandfather Chikara discovers Armadimon’s existence in episode 47, it becomes rather important to point out that Daisuke, Miyako, and Iori failed to hide their partners’ existence and involvement in Digimon battles for any longer than eight months (April to December 2002). That is how flimsy the facade was. Again, they weren’t even doing that spectacular a job keeping their partners under wraps, Chikara discovered Armadimon by sheer accident just from Armadimon being too big and being unable to control his hunger, and, ultimately, it really is pretty hard to conceal the existence of a living creature constantly accompanying you everywhere.

The aftermath of 02

Well, firstly, there were definitely other things that happened right after the events of 02 that would be pretty hard for people to deny. For instance:

The Internet being the Internet, the incident in Our War Game! could have potentially been passed off as some kind of graphics stunt. But the 2003 Diablomon/Armagemon incident? Nah. People saw that one, and even actively participated in that one! In real life!

With that, as much as Oikawa claims that people are too stubborn to accept changes to the status quo and thus accept Digimon, ultimately, Spring 2003 makes it clear that the Christmas 2002 incident made enough of a fuss that the involved parties all got put on the spot by the public and media. This got to the point where the kids had a risk of their privacy being invaded, and had to be covered by their parents.

My mother, who followed the Hikarigaoka incident as a non-fiction writer, along with Sora-san’s father, are known today as “Digimon critics.” Although the two weren’t sure whether they appreciated their new titles or not, they accepted it and went from investigators to people who were most sought after... ...Thanks to [Hiroaki], we were saved from publicity. It’s sort of like… we’d like to keep our identities and the Digimon a secret. I don’t mean forever, when I say that, but the relationship between us and our partner Digimon is unique and other people probably wouldn’t understand that. For example, we can’t have people thinking that Digimon are slightly strange pets. If they do, then they won’t take us seriously either, and of course, the Digimon wouldn’t like that perception themselves. That’s why, until we get the general public to acknowledge Digimon and the Digital World for what they really are, we’d like to lay low. But in order for that to happen, someone must go out there to explain about the Digimon to others. It was both my mother and Sora-san’s father who accepted that role wholeheartedly. We told the two everything we knew, and they spoke for us to the TV, newspapers, and magazines.

Being people directly connected to the children and understanding of their position, but also in media and publicity positions, Natsuko, Hiroaki, and Haruhiko took on the jobs of advocating for Digimon and explaining their part to the world, while also deliberately acting as go-betweens so that the kids could maintain their privacy. But nevertheless, at this point, the incident in 2002 was such a major thing that it basically was a turning point for people realizing that Digimon exist and are a major presence, and starting to grill informed parties about the details (and, technically, getting those details from the kids themselves, speaking through said media outlets). Hikari also starts working on a “surprisingly useful” informational video for new Chosen Children confused about having a partner -- encouraging them to contact them for help -- and it is also revealed that Shuu, Miyako’s sisters, and Jun had all just gotten partners, meaning that the issue was now starting to become significantly more relevant to their families.

Kizuna also drops an interesting detail about what happened right after 02, or, rather, right after 2002:

The articles describing Menoa’s Digimon research team have titles that indicate that this is one of the first major Digmon scientific research efforts in the world, indicating that, shortly after Menoa’s admission into university and establishing herself there, she began to open up the field of Digimon academic research (her declared major beforehand had been “biology”, presumably the closest she could get to studying Digimon when such a topic didn’t formally exist yet). This is significant because it means that Gennai and the Agents had finally dropped the embargo on Digimon organized research, since it presumably would have been bad for Menoa’s data to vanish without warning -- and, indeed, it makes sense that they would allow for Menoa’s research team to proceed, since Menoa is a Chosen Child herself who has a vested interest in studying Digimon for the greater good and advocating for them in the same way Haruhiko is.

It also provides potential context as to why Menoa may not have been involved much in Digimon fighting and battles in the past but was chosen as a Chosen Child anyway -- Koushirou describes the definition of a “Chosen Child” as such in Two-and-a-Half Year Break:

Having a partner Digimon isn’t really that special. Being a “Chosen Child” means… to cease the hostilities that break out and inconvenience the Digital World. In order to do so, that child gains a partner Digimon faster than another.

While it’s not necessarily in terms of aggressive fighting, a bright and intelligent child like Menoa being chosen to “fight” in the sense of using her intellect to study more about Digimon and help advocate for them seems like a fitting way to fulfill this role in her own way. But, alas, as Gennai and Homeostasis and the Holy Beasts couldn’t necessarily predict what happened to Ichijouji Ken and his fall into becoming the Kaiser, they didn’t seem to be able to predict Menoa’s unfortunate fate and downfall...

Kizuna and 2010

Again, To Sora citing the number of Digimon partners to be over 30,000 by 2010 correctly tracks with the “doubling every year” principle, so it’s probably prudent to assume it’s still been applying over the years. 30,000 is certainly a lot, but it’s not exactly a huge chunk of the global population -- especially since said 30,000 are spread out all over the world, and it’s hard to say how many of them would even live in Japan, let alone Tokyo. It’s a big enough number that Koushirou and Miyako now need to maintain a whole network of Chosen Children (Hikari’s video presumably helped with that), but there are still a lot of unknowns, like the still uncharted territory of the partnership dissolution phenomenon.

Nevertheless, what we see in Kizuna is what you’d probably expect from a society that has now had eight more years to properly digest the existence of Digimon and Digimon incidents. This is most starkly demonstrated in the opening, when a waitress comes by to berate Agumon and Gabumon for making too much noise -- and that’s it, with no weirdness or being taken aback by their presence or existence, just telling them to calm down. The characters in the movie carry around and parade their Digimon quite openly in almost all walks of life, and others interact with them in a very normal manner. One of the credits scenes even shows Daisuke’s higher-up at vocational school being more annoyed at Daisuke’s fight with V-mon than he is at the fact V-mon is there. A newspaper article from early in the movie also correctly identifies Parrotmon and Greymon as Digimon (even if not their specific species), and it is merely treated as an incident rather than paying any particular attention to the fact that Digimon exist. The drama CD also indicates that Daisuke and co. are at the point of sneaking their Digimon into a karaoke bar because said bar has enough awareness of Digimon to charge them admissions fees!

There’s another interesting minor detail in that Palmon, Tailmon, and Patamon are depicted on digital cameras without any static interference. In Adventure and 02, it was impossible to catch them on digital camera in the real world, because, as per Adventure episode 39 and 02 episode 33 (among others), trying to do so would cause nasty static interference and ruin the attempted photo/recording. (This is presumably why Menoa’s photos with Morphomon seem to be film photos.) But for a society where the presence of Digimon is becoming more and more expected, and digital cameras are naturally becoming more commonplace, it would be very bad if this continued to be a problem -- so it makes sense that, by 2010, technological research would have figured out a way around that.

Obviously, not everyone has a Digimon yet, and it’s not like everything in the world has accounted for the assumption people will be walking around with partners -- after all, Taichi’s thesis still involves having to help advocate for Digimon partners and the fact that many people are still skeptical about them. But nevertheless, people are not surprised or perturbed by them anymore, and when something does happen with them, they’re relatively accepting of them. Again, 30,000+ is not exactly a lot to the extent that the entire population has a partner, but with the doubling-every-year principle in play, it seems like society is already well on its way to adjusting to their increasing presence and the eventual point in 2027-2028 when everyone will be expected to have one.