At the moment, Japan seems to be all about remaking the shows and games I loved as a kid. We’ve got a Sailor Moon remake (of dubious quality) airing, promises of more Dragon Ball Z, the high likelihood of a Castlevania spiritual successor, and a partially crowdsourced strategy game from Fire Emblem’s creator.
First announced back in January, Digimon Tri promises to be a high-school sequel of the original series, set around five years after its end. After a marathon of the series on Japanese streaming service niconico, this trailer was released:
The voice actors for the main cast were unveiled in the trailer as well. While the original cast for the eight main digimon are returning, the cast for the Digidestined themselves has been replaced entirely. Hopefully this practice won’t be carried over to the inevitable dub, as Joshua Seth (voice actor of Tai) has expressed an interest in strapping the goggles on once more. Following the trailer reveal, Anime News Network reported that staff members behind Digimon Tri confirmed that Ai Maeda would be returning alongside Wada Kouji to perform new recordings of I Wish and Butterfly, the first opening and ending themes for Digimon Adventure. Ayumi Miyazaki is likewise returning to sing Braveheart, the more forgettable insert song.
Tri’s apparent policy of not fixing things that aren’t broken has in part got me ludicrously excited for the series. Seeing Tai with his goggles — goggles he purportedly handed to Davis, hero of Adventure 02 — has given me a sliver of hope that the widely panned epilogue to 02 is heading for a retcon. As for the casting decisions: replacing the cast for the children is likely a necessary evil. They’re a decent way through puberty in this series, so it stands to reason that their voices would have changed.
Digimon Tri will be a six-part series of films, beginning with Saikai (Reunion), premiering in Japan on November 21.
