“In Pokémon, it goes: Charmander, Charmeleon, and Charizard. You get that? In Digimon, it goes: Charmander, Charizard, Charizard with a gun wearing pants, Gyarados, Professor Oak in BDSM wear, and then Ditto. And it branches off a lot from there. So that’s what we’re working with.”
To be fair, this was also what made the show work so well. You were always eager to know what the next level would look like and it was always so much crazier than you expected.
I did find it quite weird that the most powerful stage for Digimon was often just a man. Always felt like the, uh, cartoonist(?) had a bit of a superiority complex. Like, what’s more powerful than an iron t-rex? An iron man, of course.
Although, thinking now, there was something about them merging with their humans. Was that just what that last stage is? Then I guess, I would allow it as some dramatic thingamabob.
The merging with humans was an entirely different mechanic. An adjacent evolution line.
Also the majority of the time the higher ranks are just angle/devils which is just human in nature. Most digimon cap out before the last few stages. And remain mostly or entirely beasts.
But when you get to the point where it’s a bunch of gods throwing super blasts at each other… Yeah you either have humanish super creature, or eldrich abomination that is beyond mortal understanding and has no known le shape.
The high ends of digimon get… Wild
I always viewed it more as the artists trying to depict each of the digimon as if they were angels in their final forms, as in being in a celestial or god-like state.
You think I want a seal who’s name is still literally seel evolve into a dugong that’s also just named dewgong? or do I want to see sealmon become omniwar metal sealteam6mon?
Also sometimes Digimon split evolution into undead skeletons.
Yeah I like how digimon could have evolutions go wrong or go differently
