Syakomon EX5-056, Octomon EX5-058, and Dagomon EX5-060 by GOSSAN, and Leviamon EX5-063 by Spareribs from EX-05 Theme Booster Animal Colosseum

Today I'l finishing up presenting and giving my thoughts on all aquatic Digimon. For previous parts of this series see all fish, all mermaids, all aquatics part 1, and all aquatics part 2. Today I'll be covering the remaining ultimate/perfect and mega/ultimate level Digimon.

The first one of the ultimate/perfect is Anomalocarimon. Anomalocaris is one of my favorite extinct animals and I'm absolutely delighted that both Digimon and Pokemon based a monster off of it. It also definitely takes after a sea scorpion with it's scorpion-like tail. It was even born from scientific data about extinct species. I think this is a great Digimon that deserved more attention. Anomalocarimon caused a bit of a translation kerfuffle when it was given the English name Scorpiomon (because American kids are too dumb to know what an Anomalocaris is I guess). Well there's also another unrelated Digimon called Scorpiomon so the English dub was forced to change its name to SkullScorpiomon. Yes, this has caused confusion before. Anomalocarimon also has an x-antibody form that looks like it was standing next to a bunch of exploding spray paint cans.

Anomalocarimon

Anomalocarimon X

Next is Dagomon, who was given the English name Dragomon. It's a minor change but kind of dumb because Dagomon comes from the Cthulhu mythos character Father Dagon and has nothing to do with dragons. Despite being named after Father Dagon, Dagomon is clearly Cthulhu as a Digimon. It's also treated as such in the animes. in Digimon Adventure 02 it rules over deep ones in an extradimensional spaces called the Dark Ocean and is implied to be more of a Lovecraftian horror than a Digimon. In Digimon Ghost Game it starts turning people into deep ones and is powerful enough to overwhelm a higher-level Digimon. I know it also shows up in Xros Wars, but I didn't watch that. It wears Buddhist prayer beads. In a heavily Buddhist country like Japan, a monster dressed like a Buddhist is probably the equivalent of historically-Catholic countries having vampire priests. I dig this one and while I say that a lot of Digimon could use more attention, I think Dagomon only showing up a little bit and being overwhelmingly powerful and mysterious is very appropriate for a Lovecraftian Digimon.

Related to Dagomon is Hangyomon, called Divermon in English. It's very much based on sea monsters like th Creature from the Black Lagoon, but with scuba gear. I think it's a neat Digimon. Notably, Hangyomon's most prominent appearance in the anime wasn't actually them. It was in the same episode as Dagomon and the Dark Ocean where at the end it's revealed that the creatures that presented themselves as Hangyomon were actually disguised deep ones serving Dagomon.

Next is Gusokumon and listen, I'm a simple nerd, I see a giant shrimp that shoots fish-shaped torpedos and I like it. It's also based on real-life biological phenomena relates to the deep ocean. Like many real deep-sea animals it lives life on show mode, being able to live an extremely long time while not getting to eat very often. It feeds on injured Digimon that sink to the bottom of the ocean, which sounds a lot like deep-sea scavengers and whale falls (Whamon falls?)

Next is MarineChimairamon, an aquatic chimera. Yes, it's spelles chimaira instead of chimera. When I looked it to to find out if that's an alternate translation from the original Greek I found out that "chimaira" is the name of a heavy metal band from Ohio. So congrats guys, you accidentally have a Digimon named after you. Two actually, because there is also a Chimairamon (English: Kimeramon) and the two are very similar concepts. They're artificial Digimon made out of a combination of body parts of multiple other Digimon. OC, do not steal. I actually like MarineChimairamon more that the original. I can see Coelamon's helmet, Ikkakumon's head and tusks, Octomon's horns, One arm from Ebidramon and the other from Hangyomon, and tentacles from Gesomon.

Finally at this level is MarineDevimon. Just like how MarineChimairamon is the aquatic version of Chimairamon, there is a land-based Devimon. While Devimon is an evil genius, MarineDevimon is consumed by hate and can destroy its enemies with raw power. I think it's a great design for an evil aquatic Digimon

The apex of Digimon evolution is the mega/ultimate level and there are indeed megas lurking in the depths of the Net Ocean. One of the many horrors down there is Cthyllamon. This very new Digimon is an evil version of MarineAngemon. It's just as tiny and like MarineAngemon, it preferes to not fight. While MarineAngemon uses the power of live to drain its foes of their fighting spirit, Cthyllamon terrifies enemies into diving up and brainwashes lower-level Digimon into serving it. Cthylla is a less-well known member of the Cthulhu mythos, a daughter of Cthulhu who looks like a winged octopus and serves as a back up body for big C if he is ever killed. Cthyllamon doesn't really have anything to do with that. I think it's a great counterpart to MarineAngemon and a delightful little villain

KingWhamon is a bigger version of Whamon and that's about all we know about it. Generally the measure for whetehr or not a Digimon is official is if it has an entry in the Digimon Reference Book and KingWhamon doesn't. The Reference Book is where you get the lore of what that Digimon is and does, so we don't have that for KingWhamon. Despite not appearing in the Reference Book, KingWhamon has an anime appearance in Xros Wars and a card in the card game, which sounds pretty official to me. It's a gigantic whale with an island growing on its head. Te idea of a sea creature so vast that it can be mistaken for an island is common in the legends of seafaring cultures around the world. It's a fine Digimon, I just wish we had more to go off of.

Next is Xiangpengmon and while it looks like a bird dragon, it is aquatic. It's based on the peng, a Chinese legendary creature that can turn from a bird to a fish. This is seen in its evolutionary line, starting as the bird Xiquemon, evolving to the fish Huankunmon, and finally ending as a dragon. Chinese dragons were often depicted as living in the sea and being capable of flight. I think Xiangpengmon is a great Digimon. It is one of 6 species that debuted in the China-exclusive mobile game Digimon New Century and all of them are amazing.

If there can be said to be an aquatic Digimon that's the most powerful, it would have to be Leviamon. Named after the mythical leviathan, Leviamon is not only a big red crocodile, it's one of the Seven Great Demon Lords. They are the epitome of evil in the Digital World and some of the most powerful Digimon ever. Each Demon Lord bears the power of one of the seven deadly sins and Leviamon holds the power of envy. Despite being ungodly powerful, Leviamon envies those it sees as better than itself and lashes out against them. How big is Leviamon? It's big enough that it could swallow the Digital World in one gulp. It's definitely for the better that it spends most of its time asleep in the depths of the sea. The lore says that the limits of Digimon power are being decoded and Leviamon has none. Its existence is also the foundation of evil in the Digital World. So it's a being with no limits that is the origin of all evil. Sounds less like a Digimon and more like some unfathomable embodiment of evil that happens to be masquerading as a Digimon. I think that's super cool and while Leviamon is definitely the least visually interesting of the Demon Lords, it's still one of the coolest. Leviamon also has an x-antibody variant and oh boy. The aquatic Digimon have actually lucked out when it comes to having decent x-antibody variants and you may wonder why I call x-antibodies as a whole overdesigned and ugly. This, THIS, is what I mean when I say x-antibody variants are overdesigned. There are so many lines on this thing that it can be hard to tell what I'm looking at. And it's not even the worst x-antibody form, not even close. The seal of envy hovering over it like a halo is cool, but all the Demon Lords get their seals incorporated into the x-antibody designs so it's not even a unique idea. There is just no salvaging this x-antibody design.

Leviamon

Leviamon X

That wraps up the aquatic Digimon and I had a lot of fun doing this. Since Halloween is up maybe I'll showcase some of my favorite spooky Digimon or the other Demon Lords. I may also do an intro to Digimon post because I have gotten comments from people saying they like the Digimon but don't know much about the franchise and how to approach it.

Dagomon and Demon arguing over which one is more MENACING

Everyone should draw their Ocs with Digimon Partners :) It’s nice

I KNEW IT!!! I KNEW IT WAS HIM!!!

AND WHY DID HIS SKIN SUDDENLY TURN BLACK?! 😱

Seems to maybe tie into the next episode with Kiyoshiro’s body becoming corrupted and turning dark? If that corruption can affect humans too? Also, black and purple is Gulus colors. Hm... 

Observations on the Dark Ocean

I don't know how much they planned in advance, but 02 does a great job of making its arcs form a single coherent story - with some gaps here and there such as Demon basically coming out of nowhere or the general jankiness of Ken's arc.

It's good. A lot better than I remembered, actually. But there's room for improvement.

One thing that I think needed some more attention was the Dark Ocean. It's a plot point that only comes up a handful of times throughout the series. Four, by my count. But it's very significant every time it appears, and we're often given information on it that contradicts other information we already possessed.

Like. Part of Vamdemon's ultimate plan was to use Ken, who he'd observed as Oikawa had a Dark Spore in him, to litter the Digital World with Dark Towers. To this end, he guided Ken to the Dark Ocean, which transformed Ken's Digivice into a D-3.

But the Dark Ocean is not affiliated with Vamdemon. It isn't even part of the Digital World, and it cannot ordinarily be accessed from the Digital World. We're later told that it's a third dimension overlapping both the Real and Digital worlds due to the weakening of the fabric of reality between them. Why and how did Dagomon change Ken's Digivice to further Vamdemon's plan?

Speaking of Dagomon, the Dark Ocean is meant to be a third reality unrelated to the Digital or Real Worlds, so why is it populated by Digimon? It's observably a Digital World, even if it's not the Digital World we're familiar with. How many Digital Worlds are we producing?

This whole "third reality" thing is so weird. And not in a cool eldritch way. In a "They didn't know what they were doing with this plot point" way. The resolution to Demon hinges on sending him there, because he wouldn't be able to open a portal the way he can from the Digital World and Real World. This is an assumption the characters make, but it proves correct.

But why can't he? Demon is intimately familiar with the Dark Ocean in a way that implies that he's traveled there before. He refers to it as Dagomon's world, referencing its master by name. So he must have a means of going to and from the place, right? Nonetheless, this works and he's never seen again.

He's not the only one inexplicably familiar with the place either. Leading up to Demon's banishing, the Chosen Children hit an obstacle when they try to figure out how to send him there. Ken suddenly realizes that his Digivice once opened the Gate, which was how he got to the Dark Ocean and transformed his Digivice into the Dark D-3 in the first place.

But Ken's accessed the Dark Ocean more than once. He used to be able to do it whenever he felt like it.

When Hikari is first involuntarily transported to the Dark Ocean, Ken's built a Dark Tower there and left an Airdramon controlled by a Dark Ring to guard it. At some point after designing the Dark Spiral, he seems to have returned and applied Dark Spirals to all of the Scubamon. The Dark Ocean was just a particularly eerie section of Ken's dominion when we first saw it.

But it's later treated as a separate world entirely, and Ken needs time to remember that he once visited it long ago. And also Demon recognizes it and knows its master by name, but also he has no way of ever traveling to or from it. And it's not the Digital World, but it is populated by Digimon anyway, and it has spooky transformative effects on Digivices that villains unassociated with Dagomon can both plan for and manipulate Chosen Children into triggering.

Adventure 02's story mostly comes together so well that it's easy to assume it was all planned from the beginning. It has that level of cohesiveness between the early and later arcs. But then you look at the Dark Ocean, and it's clear that they were writing it as something wildly different in each of its appearances.

02 is good, actually. But I think the Dark Ocean needed a second draft.

The real surprise is that he came AFTER Cthyllamon, in spite of only being ultimate/perfect stage.

Spoiler Alert for Adventure Tri

If the Digimon franchise never follows up on the ending with Claude (my nickname for the evil Gennai clone from the Tri movies) collecting data from past Digimon villains, I’m just gonna assume that his attempts to get Daemon’s data just ended with him getting eaten by Dagomon.

Dagomon Made with Artist Loft Colored Pencils. Strathmore Toned Paper. Fanart.

................. had a big old ramble about zero two that my browser decided i wasn’t posting cuz it hit the back button on me

which, well, might be for the best, cuz it was just spiraling into half-remembered criticisms when i haven’t rewatched it in like ten years, and really if i’m gonna critique it i should rewatch it

honestly mostly what it was doing was making me wanna pick up my old zero two rewrite that i was working on in college, hahaha

Really cool shit about digimon 02 is how a huge chunk of the show have characters constantly talking about how killing is bad and all life is precious and you should find nonlethal ways to deal with your enemies and all that jazz, but the literal second Takeru and Hikari find themself away from the group (see: Dagomon episode) they just start killing people. No question of morality they don't even pause or bring it up they just straight-up murder bitches. It really hammers home that Daisule & the gang are kids having a whimsical fantasy adventure as heroes called from another world, while Hikari and Takeru are extremely traumatized isekai protagonists who spent a seizable portion of their childhood fighting demons in hell where a "kill or be killed" mindset was the only viable option, and that means the Takari & the rest of the 02 gang have WIDELY different ways of reacting to the world around them.

honestly thought i would have a lot more to say about adventure 02 but like

i just finished episode 50 and the jist of my thoughts really are "yeah this is better than i remembered it being"

overall, an extremely ambitious follow up to digimon adventure, balancing a lot of plot points and an attempt at having a more cohesive storyline than "bad guy of the arc but suddenly it's apocalymon." in 02, most of the bad guys lead from one to another, in a way that seems much more intentionally thought-out than everything up until the dark master's arc in 01. even the one-off antagonists (dark ocean and demon's crew) played into the larger narrative, and weren't necessarily treated as one-offs so much as chances to expand the scope of the lore and use it to the narrative's benefit.

(although i do think it's a bit sad we never saw follow up on demon going "oh, you all are going to regret sending me to dagomon's ocean SOOOOO much")

also a lot of lore. so much lore. 01 introduced the fact that homeostasis has a bunch of agents that look like gennai, but a2 kept suggesting they're all copies (put a pin in that for my tri rewatch, much as i am loathe to rewatch that one). there wasn't any elaboration, but it is an interesting idea, and unfortunately i understand why it was kind of hastily noted and dismissed (the world tour arc had a lot to get to).

also the dimensional makeup of the digimon franchise got a lot more fascinating in 02. in 01 gennai mentioned that the gate could lead to all kinds of different places, but 02 actually takes that a step further in the lore, showing us the dark ocean and the dimension of dreams (even mentioning that the latter is pulled from by the digital world).

but it does maintain some of the problems i had with the original adventure in that i do wish more of the kids got to see their mega forms. :/

(i know tamers fixes that somewhat, then frontiers backpedals, but. you can't get me to rewatch frontiers lmao.)

furthermore, it does kind of suck that we're still left to wonder about ken's adventures in the digital world. we see ryo and millenniumon in his flashbacks to the adventures, but for audience members who missed out entirely on the wonderswan games, it makes it so we have to trust wormmon's word that ken was a kind person in the past. it's shown to an effective degree in the show, especially with his flashbacks to his childhood after the chimeramon arc.

it also makes narrative sense that they didn't feel the need to go over a story that's already happened, because that likely would have taken too long for 02, which already had so much going on. but maaaaaan. i do not want to play the wonderswan games, frfr (though i know there are fan translations out there for 'em).

i do love ken's arc though, as frustrating as him struggling with self-doubt is to watch. i'm glad the writers didn't make it seem too easy for him to forgive himself, because that's hard even if you weren't the vessel for like. All That Shit. i'm giving this boy a weighted blanket and hot tea.

tl;dr: compared to the oftentimes fever-dream like qualities of 01, 02 feels a lot more narratively focused in its story, and i think that really works to its favor. not a flawless season, but none of the digimon seasons are. a successful sequel to 01, much more so than i remembered from my last rewatch of the dub in 2020.

Cthulmon, supreme ruler of the Dark Ocean.

Dagomon's full power form.

Seeing these guys together makes me think of the 02 episode Call of Dagomon, and how thankful I am that Chiaki Konaka never fell off the deep end, buying into alt-right conspiracy nonsense about cancel culture destroying the internet, and never wrote a Tamers stage play on the topic in 2021.

Yup, I sure am glad all of that didn't happen, and that the last on-record official Tamers content was the 2018 audio drama that ends on a heart-wrenching-in-all-the-best-ways cliffhanger. Sometimes it's better for stories to be left to personal and subjective interpretation, feel me?

2,358 MISC DIGIMON ICONS / GHOST GAME

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Unsorted (220), Ajatarmon (14), AncientSphinxmon (22), Antylamon (31), Archnemon / Arukenimon (84), Asuramon (36), Baalmon (15), Bakumon / Tapirmon (32), Bastemon (42), BlackTailmon Uver (22), BloomLordmon (54), Bokomon (36),  Calmaramon (35), ClavisAngemon (19), Clockmon (98), Cythllamon (29),  Dagomon (9), DarkKnightmon (8), DarkLizardmon (33), Digitamamon (34), Dokugumon (6), Doumon (21), Dracmon (20), Espimon + HoverEspimon (165), ExTyrannomon (27), Eyesmon (4), FlaWizardmon (40), Gawappamon (29), Geckomon (14), Hangyomon / Divermon (8), Hawkmon (36), Kinkakumon (17), Koemon (15), Kuzuhamon (67), Lilithmon (39), Meicrackmon (28), Mephistomon (12), Monzaemon (9), MoriShellmon (13), Morphomon (7), Mummymon (125), Oboromon (30), Octomon (19), Oleamon (17), Orcamon (10), Petermon (54), Piemon / Piedmon (88), Piximon (25), Pucchiemon (40), Pumpkinmon (58), Quantumon (75), Quartzmon (27), Rafflesimon (36), Ryudamon + Ginryumon (15), Saberdramon (17), Sepikmon (14), Shawujinmon (16), Sirenmon (33), Sistermon Ciel (8), Splashmon (34), Submarimon (5), Terriermon Assistant (27), TobuCatmon (10), TonosamaGeckomon (25), Vamdemon / Myotismon (53), WaruMonzaemon (24), Witchmon (54) and Zassoumon (15)