Digimon
:
This article is about the franchise. For the anime, see Digimon: Digital Monsters. (short for
Digital Monster) is a very popular
Japanese series of children's merchandise, including toys,
manga and
anime, featuring monsters of various forms living in a "Digital World".
Digimon started out as a
dueling digital pet similar to
Tamagotchi, which was called "
Digital Monster" and was released by
Bandai on
June 26,
1997. The Digital Monster toy was enormously successful, and four different colors of the toy were released in November of the same year. In December of the same year, the second generation of "Digital Monster" was released. Many have criticized it as a clone of Pokémon, as the Tamagotchi was released in 1997 as opposed to 1996, however Bandai was already working on Digimon in 1995
[. The Digimon Mini released in 2005 celebrates the 10th anniversary of the Digimon product]), though it became popular in the United States before the latter. However, the Tamagotchi bears little resemblance to the Digimon TV show or card game. Digimon and Pokémon may have a few factors in common (being marketed toward children in North America and being part of the same genre), but differ in original target audience, concept, spirit and design.
Digimon first appeared in illustrated form with the advent of the
one-shot manga C'mon Digimon, which was released in summer
1997.
C'mon Digimon spawned the popular
Digimon Adventure V-Tamer 01 manga series, which began on
November 21,
1998. Digimon first appeared in game form on
January 28,
1999 with the release of the popular
Digimon World game for
PlayStation and made its first foray into animation a few months later.
Following the release of the first Digimon movie in
Japan in 1999, the first Digimon television series,
Digimon Adventure began airing on
Fuji TV in March of the same year; three other series followed in consecutive years and one several after:
Digimon Adventure 02,
Digimon Tamers,
Digimon Frontier and
Digimon Savers. Adventure 02 is a continuation of Adventure. The Tamers' only connection to the Adventure series is the character Ryo, whose story was explained through the Digimon games for Bandai's
WonderSwan and the connection to the Tamers takes place outside of the first two series in our world, where Digimon is a tv show and merchandise line. Frontier has no continuity connections to the other three series. Additionally, there have been eight individual Digimon films released in Japan with all but the eighth spinning out of the assorted TV series. All the movies, except the eighth, have been released and distributed internationally. The Digimon series was thought to have ended with Frontier's 50th Episode (205th overall),
End of the Line. For three years, it appeared that Frontier would be the final anime series. However, the fandom was pleasantly surprised to find that a fifth series was confirmed at Jump Festa 2006. The new series, titled
Digimon Savers, first aired on
April 2 2006 on Fuji TV. Digimon Savers has no continuity connection to the previous series.
C'mon Digimon
Digimon Adventure V-Tamer 01
Digimon Next
Digimon Chronicle
D-Cyber
Dark Horse
Dark Horse Comics published
American-style Digimon
comic books, adapting the first dubbed 13 episodes of the first animated season. The conclusion to the story arc, however, was never released.
Panini
The European publishing company,
Panini, approached Digimon in different ways in different countries. While Germany created their own adaptations of episodes, the
United Kingdom reprinted the Dark Horse titles, then translated some of the German adaptations of second-season episodes, and finally began to print their own original stories, which appeared in both the UK's Official Digimon Magazine, and the official Fox Kids companion magazine,
Wickid. These original tales danced in and around the continuity of the second animated season, before shifting to the third season, where the stories were more carefully thought out to fit between the tight storytelling of the animated series and would sometimes focusing on subject matter not covered by the show (such as
Yamaki's past) or in the west (such as Ryo's story or the undubbed movies). Eventually, in a money saving venture, the original stories were removed from Digimon Magazine, which returned to printing translated German adaptations, this time of Tamers episodes. Eventually, both magazines were cancelled.
Yuen Wong Yu (TOKYOPOP/Chuang Yi) manga
The Digimon manga released by
TOKYOPOP in
North America and
Chuang Yi in
Singapore is a Chinese
manhua written and drawn by
Yuen Wong Yu, based on the television series and brought to North America, translated by
Lianne Sentar. Covering
Digimon Adventure in five volumes,
Digimon Adventure 02 in two and
Digimon Tamers in four, it is heavily abridged, though in rare occasions plays through events differently to the anime. This is the main attraction of the series. Three additional volumes exist, covering
Digimon Frontier, but these have not been released in English by TOKYOPOP.
Digimon fanshippers popularized the jargon of their specific brand of
shipping by combining the first and last syllables of the relevant characters names [
1] [
2], rather than the standard American "/" or "x". This is most often done with the Japanese names rather than the English ones. For example, a relationship between Kari (
Hikari) and T.K. (
Takeru) is usually labelled "Takari". This is comparable to
Japanese contraction, but done in the same fashion as English
portmanteaux.
*
Akiyoshi Hongo - Creator of the original Digimon concept
*
Hiroyuki Kakudo - Director of
Digimon Adventure and
Digimon Adventure 02*
Yukio Kaizawa - Director of
Digimon Tamers and
Digimon Frontier*
Naozumi Itō - Director of
Digimon Savers*
Chiaki J. Konaka - Head writer of
Digimon Tamers*
Takanori Arisawa - Composer of the Japanese versions of
Digimon Adventure,
Digimon Adventure 02,
Digimon Tamers and
Digimon Frontier*
Jeff Nimoy - US Director of
Digimon Adventure and
Digimon Adventure 02*
Mary Elizabeth McGlynn - US Director of
Digimon Tamers and
Digimon Frontier*
Yuen Wong Wu - Author of the
Digimon Adventure manga.
*
Hiroshi Izawa - Author of the
Digimon Adventure V-Tamer01 manga.
*
Tenya Yabuno - Illustrator of the
Digimon Adventure V-Tamer01 manga.
*
List of Digimon*
Digimon Tamagotchi*
Tamagotchi*
List of human characters in the Digimon series*
List of Chosen Digimon*
Digimon: Digital Monsters*
Digimon (card game)*
Digimon: The MovieEnglish
*
Bandai of America's Digimon Site*
JETIX U.S. Digimon Tamers website*
The Digi-Zone.com*
Megchan's Digimon Encyclopedia, archived at The Shining Evolution
*
Digimon Encyclopedia*
Patamon's World*
TheDigiPort*
Wikimon, the Digimon Wiki*
Digimon Himitsu*
With the Will ForumsJapanese
*
Toei Animation's Digimon Adventure website*
Toei Animation's Digimon Digimon Adventure 02 website*
Toei Animation's Digimon Tamers website*
Toei Animation's Digimon Frontier website*
Toei Animation's Digital Monster X-Evolution website*
Toei Animation's Digimon Savers*
Bandai of Japan's Digimon website
