DIGIMON BEATBREAK

Episode 13

It looks like in the time between the last two episodes, Toei has deemed it fit to announce and release a dub for the series, with the first five episodes now available on Crunchyroll. This came pretty out of left field, since while simuldubs are more or less the current standard these days, Toei tends to operate largely in the past when it comes to how they handle their titles internationally, and considering we only just recently got a dub for Digimon Ghost Game (and said dub is currently unavailable outside the UK), I figured we'd have to wait a couple of years for a Beatbreak dub, if we got one at all. I'm certainly not complaining, though, and what we've gotten so far sounds pretty good. Zeno Robinson's Tomoro does a great job at getting across all of the character's angst while still allowing him to come off as an awkward teenager, and Risa Mei does an equally solid job bouncing off of him as Gekkomon while pulling off an impressively goofy monster voice that manages to sound consistently charming throughout all their interactions. The supporting cast is all pretty strong as well, with Cristina Vee doing great at getting across Reina's brash personality, and I was especially impressed with how naturally laid-back Jalen Askins performance as Kyo sounds for a debut anime role, so I hope that this will open up opportunities for him to get more work in the near future.

Having grown up with the Saban era Digimon dubs and the bits of Americanization that came with them, it is a little surreal listening to a Digimon dub that isn't going out of its way to cram in extra jokes, and while I do have a lot of love for those dubs, it is nice to get one that's fairly by the book. There are still a few quips here and there (as well as the standard Digimon dub terminology like Digivolution instead of Evolution), but otherwise, this is by far the most direct a Digimon localization has ever been. What hasn't changed though, is the tradition of a Digimon dub recycling a few actors through multiple side characters, which is something that could get annoying if it's too frequent, but to their credit the actors involved are doing a good enough job at disguising themselves between roles that it isn't likely to be too obvious to the average viewer, and I wouldn't consider this a deal breaker. What I'm more worried about is that as of the time I finished this review, episode 6 isn't available dubbed, and it seems as though the dub isn't going to be released on a weekly schedule. Considering what I mentioned before about Toei's weird caveats with international distribution, I suppose this shouldn't be shocking, but if the plan is to put out the rest of the dub in batches, I just hope it's done in a reasonable time frame since I'd rather not see the dub lose momentum because of it.

Moving on to this week's episode, the main part of its agenda is a meeting between the members of the Five Stars as we finally get to see all of them in person. For the most part, they seem to have a pretty standard stock of villain personalities, as, besides Kaito, we have Honoka, his yandere fangirl, Rose, a woman who's all about elegance, and Klay, a shady businessman, with none of them really doing much to immediately step out of those archetypes. Still, even if they're on the simple side, it is at least fun to watch them bounce off each other, and although they all seem loyal to the World Union's chairman, Wong, it doesn't take long to establish that they aren't exactly a united front. With how well-timed the Digimon incident in the last episode was, Kaito rightfully suspects that Kaneda is hiding something, and considering it was likely him who took Asuka's e-Pulse in the first episode, it does seem like Kaneda is operating under his own agenda, though it'll likely be a while before we know what that entails.

We do at least get some important info about the World Union out of this conversation, though, as we learn that there was some kind of environmental disaster 20 years ago that resulted in an entire island's worth of people mysteriously vanishing, and from the ashes, the World Union was able to build the current social order. Wong also seems to be pushing to expand Shangri-La Egg beyond its current borders in the hopes of creating a world wide utopia, but with how we've seen the World Union operate, it's hard to know if he's doing this out of a sincere desire to help the rest of humanity, or if its just propaganda being used to justify the social hierarchy he's helped create. Either way, he regards the existence of Digimon as a threat, and with the Glowing Dawn being against exterminating Digimon, it's probably only a matter of time before they end up opposing each other directly.

The rest of the episode is more on the comedic side, as the Glowing Dawn deal with yet another extremely lonely man, who ends up giving birth to a new Digimon instead of getting therapy. In the process of the gang trying to track him down, we're introduced to our second set of new antagonists, a Cleaner group called Tactics. True to their name, they seem to operate on carrying out what they deem to be the most efficient strategy possible for their mission, which in this case really just boils down to them waiting for Tomoro and the others to do most of the work before swooping in to capture the culprit for themselves. It's also funny that prior to this bit of kill-stealing, our first introduction to them involves one of their members trying to hit on Reina while Makoto ends up crushing on another after bumping into her, which does otherwise clash with the whole paramilitary vibe the squad seems to be going for. They do seem like they'll make for a good batch of immediate threats, though, and since they all seem to be working under Klay, they'll likely stick around for a while. No matter how the newfound rivalry between the Glowing Dawn and Tactics ends up playing out, it seems like it'll at least be fun.

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DIGIMON BEATBREAK is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.