Digimon Adventure 01: Episode 12 – Adventure! Patamon and I Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: Takeru and Patamon arrive at The Village of Beginnings, which houses hundreds of baby Digimon and Digieggs. As Takeru and Patamon care for the eggs and babies, slowly falling into chaos as they cry, their caretaker, Elecmon, appears to defend them. He gets into a fight with Patamon, and tensions increase. Can Takeru help them put aside their differences?

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Title Card:

Title Change: Adventure! Patamon and I is changed to DigiBaby Boom.

Truthfully, I’m not a fan of either title, but I’d say the dub’s is a bit better.

TK’s imaginary ‘Porkymon’ was originally ‘It’s-Probably-Like-This-mon.’ Saban should’ve at least removed the English text in the corner of the fake Index screen that has its literal name of TabunKonnamon.

They remove a shot of the cartoon pig turning around after it shakes its butt at the camera….Dunno why they’d remove that but not the butt shaking.

TK’s Hogmon was originally KittoKonnamon, which is ‘It-Must-Be-Like-This-mon’ Again, the English name in the corner is left alone. Also, nitpicky, but the animal Takeru is referencing is clearly a hippo, not another pig.

I know it’s excusable because they’re so far away, but the walk cycle, if you can even call it that, on Takeru when they first enter the village is horrific,

The Village of Beginnings is changed to Primary Village. As much as I’ve gotten used to the dub name, the original’s name is quite beautiful.

The first introduction to The Village of Beginnings is really quiet and sweet with only a gentle music box tune playing. In the dub, not only do we have the typical doopy travel music, but we also have TK’s obnoxious dialogue about getting cotton candy etc. over it. TK, I love ya kid, but your voice is one I’ve never been fond of, at least in little kid form.

In the original, Takeru’s first line into the village is ‘It’s so pretty!’ and he and Patamon gaze in wonder. In the dub, they’re still blathering about candy, which further ruins the moment.

Oddly, the original has a bowling ball hitting pins noise when Takeru and Patamon tumble over the hill. In the dub, this is omitted. Usually, it’s the opposite.

Takeru says the floor feels like a bed. In the dub, he says it feels like marshmallows.

I saw this joke coming. The dub has TK make a joke about Punimon being ‘Puny.’ He’s just making noises of awe in the original.

Yuramon’s voice is way too deep in the dub. It’s a baby, guys, not a ten year old.

Takeru’s comment about Devimon also starting as an egg makes me think. If Digimon never die, their information just get reconfigured, does that mean that every evil Digimon who has been defeated by the Chosen Children could, theoretically, return as eggs and then grow back up to conquer the Digital World again?

Patamon: “It’s Digicode!”

Oh come on. Digimon, I usually praise you for keeping a good chunk of the Japanese text on screen. Now you’re claiming it’s some gibberish ‘Digicode’ because you’re too lazy to throw some digital paint on this note? Don’t pull a Pokemon on me.

What’s even dumber is that there actually IS a Digimon language called Digicode (or DigiMoji or DigiLetters) and it, predictably, looks nothing like this.

Haven’t we kinda gone over this too? In Kabuterimon’s debut episode and the episode with Mimi in the maze? Unless they’re saying Japanese text looks like DigiCode just because ‘Oooh weird squiggles all look the same’ in which case, wow, way to be racist.

TK: *Rubbing a DigiEgg* “Maybe a digital genie will come out.” TK….goddammit, you’re not this dumb.

Also, nice that you guys accidentally put the background egg layer on top of Takeru’s layer while animating the second rub.

TK: “I’m gonna wish for a new skateboard!” TK…..please shut up.

Originally, he just keeps talking about rubbing the egg.

TK, you don’t need to be narrating every step of the flashback. We can easily see what’s happening for ourselves. Also, in the original, you can’t hear what kid!Yamato is saying. In the dub, he says ‘Atta boy!’

Elecmon’s Index screen is more involved in the original. The narrator states that Elecmon is a very inquisitive Digimon who loves playing pranks. He also spreads his tail feathers like a peacock to threaten enemies. In the dub, Elecmon is doing his own Index screen and he says he’s the caretaker of baby Digimon ‘so don’t cross wires with me!’

Attack Name Change: Sparkling Thunder is changed to Super Thunder Strike.

I don’t know why I’m mentioning this, but the Pabumon makes a fart noise before Takeru checks if it messed itself. In the dub, it doesn’t.

It really bothers me that none of these baby Digimon sound like babies in the dub. They’re not even trying.

Again, the baby Digimon layers in the background are overlapping on top of Takeru. Animators, wake up please.

Originally, Elecmon says Takeru and Patamon were ‘coddling’ the babies. They ask why that’s a bad thing, and he says ‘coddling’ means both ‘petting’ and ‘bullying’ and he meant the latter. In the dub, he says they were playing with the babies. TK asks why that has anything to do with him, and Elecmon explains that he’s the caretaker of all of the baby Digimon.

The way Dub!Patamon says “Now, now, don’t get all puffy!” is weird.

In the original, Takeru just says “Stop…” quietly to himself before we see the Digivice reacting slightly. In the dub, he says ‘This is very bad! He’s Digivolving!’

That line makes no sense. First of all, he prefaced the declaration with “This is very bad” meaning he can’t be implying Patamon is Digivolving because….that’d be good.

Second, how does he know either of them is even close to Digivolving? Neither is glowing, and TK can’t see his Digivice right now.

Third, if he somehow can see his Digivice reacting and is claiming a Digivolution would be a bad thing, he’s somehow inferring that his Digivice reactions are about to make Elecmon Digivolve.

The only way this would make sense is if TK were afraid of Patamon Digivolving, which we’ve proven that he isn’t.

Takeru is quietly and sadly scolding Patamon and Elecmon for fighting. In the dub, he’s yelling at them.

Dub!Elecmon’s lips are clearly not moving when he says “Hmph, my fur looks fine!” Dialogue when there originally was none should only be used when the speaking character is off-screen, guys.

In the original, Takeru is announcing the match as a traditional sumo match. He calls the corners ‘east’ and ‘west’ and gives Elecmon and Patamon titles like ‘Elecmon of the Vast Sea’ and ‘Patamon of the Large Mountain.’ He’s even doing the inflection properly. In the dub, TK basically announces this like a pro wrestling match. He just says ‘that corner’ and ‘the other corner’, and he calls Elecmon ‘the defending champion’ and Patamon ‘The most excellent Digimon’ which is funny because he chose this format specifically so they could fight fairly, but calling Patamon essentially the best is clearly playing favorites.

The dub is just weird because you lose the joke entirely. You’re left wondering why the hell TK is wearing that getup and why Patamon and Elecmon are wearing those cloths. The joke is lost even further because it’s supposed to be a tone shift from traditional and serious to a childish game of tug-of-war. But in the dub, the tone is kept consistent.

It’s also funny because this is one of those 4Kids-y moments where they’re missing the forest for the trees. “Oh no, kids! Those squiggly lines aren’t Japanese text – they’re Digicode! Now here’s TK in a gyoji outfit waving around a gunbai while Elecmon and Patamon sport custom mawashis.”

Another scene where the tone is completely ruined? Oh joy. In the original, the tone of the scene changes from tense to very gentle as feathers rain down on Primary Village before Patamon is declared winner. In the dub, they keep the tense tone, so the feathers just seem like an odd addition. The change in tone is meant to help signify the new respect Patamon and Elecmon have for each other, which makes the shift kinda awkward in the dub.

Oh good, another scene where the tone is completely ruined, and this time by a stupid and kinda terrible joke. In the original, Takeru says fighting between friends is okay as a kid because you make up quickly. Then he says ‘Fighting between adults….’ which is hinting at his parents fighting.

From this one line we can tell that Takeru was likely upset at Patamon and Elecmon fighting because it reminded him of his parents. As you’ll recall, Takeru and Yamato’s parents are divorced, and Takeru probably remembers hearing a lot of fighting, even though he was pretty young when they split.

In the dub, TK retains the line about kids patching things up quickly, but says that adults don’t forgive as easily because his parents are still mad at him for that one time when he painted their cat. Uhm, considering that can really hurt an animal, I’d say they have a right to hold a grudge, TK.

So, not only do we lose a nice subtle line that explains a great deal about why Takeru was so upset, but we also make TK out as an animal abuser who is pretty much implying that his parents are overreacting to his cat-painting actions….

In the original, as Elecmon is looking around The Village of Beginnings, he tells Patamon an old saying, ‘A grain of pepper may be tiny, but it’s still sharp on the tongue.’ Patamon mistakes ‘pepper’ for ‘pansy’ and believes Elecmon has eaten pansies before.

In the dub, Patamon messes up an idiom of his own by saying ‘You can’t judge a cover by its book’ and Elecmon tells him to forget the sayings for a minute while he tells him something. Then we get a kinda Lion King-esque reference as Elecmon claims all of Primary Village will be Patamon’s some day and acts like he’s his dad? I get that we don’t really have that original old saying in America, but you can still use it and have Patamon mishear it. It’s not like it’s one of those untranslatable jokes.

Elecmon originally gets straight to the point in saying that Devimon’s on Infinity Mountain. In the dub, he says a bunch of stuff about how the terrain is dangerous and they need climbing gear before TK interrupts by mentioning Devimon. Also, it never ceases to amaze me how the dub both expects us to believe these Digimon are clueless about human things yet they know about stuff like climbing gear.

Takeru says he knows something great will happen when their hearts become one. In the dub, TK goes on a tirade about laughing and friendship. The tone is the same, but it’s like TK’s not making a point in the dub.

This is strange. In the original, Elecmon calls the area near Pyokomon Village ‘Gear Savannah’ but in the dub, he calls it ‘Gea Savannah’ with a long A sound. You’d think at least ‘Savannah’ would be pronounced with a short A sound, though. A long one is probably correct, but short is typically the pronunciation in America.

The narrator has some time during the long shot of the sea to give a monologue about the upcoming battle that is topped off by seeing a small flurry of feathers, which is a cute nod to Angemon’s impending debut. In the dub, Devimon is talking over a good chunk of the first part, then we get a commercial break, then the rest of the scene is silent, making the feathers meaningless.

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I have to say, I’m a little torn about this episode. In the original, the episode is pretty cute and is a good prelude to what’s about to come, but I also feel it was kinda cheesy and a little boring. The baby Digimon are cute but get a little annoying, and the whole plot with Patamon and Elecmon felt slightly forced and under-written. If Patamon’s so mature, he should’ve just explained that they found a note telling them to hatch eggs and they felt compelled to care for the babies when they started crying. If it was such a problem, he should’ve offered to leave.

Elecmon, harsh as though it may be, was perfectly within his rights to attack because they were intruders touching his babies and letting them run loose all over the village. For all he knew, they really were attacking them since they were all crying. He should’ve heard them out a bit more, but that’s all.

The one being treated as the unreasonable one is Elecmon and no one else. Elecmon’s the one who has to learn a lesson, and he learns it through tug of war. It’s not like he even realized something about Patamon during the match or when he hit the block. It was literally them playing tug of war, him losing, then Elecmon’s all smiles and giving Patamon a bunch of praise before he apologizes. Patamon never apologizes even though, in my opinion, he was technically more in the wrong.

And don’t get me started on the animation. There’s no excuse for the layering thing to happen twice, and the overall animation is on the lower end of the spectrum for this show.

The dub is a mess of bad jokes and ruined tones. The whole meaning of the episode almost ends up getting lost because it’s like Saban completely missed the point or didn’t care. The dub is basically a hollow shell because of it.

Also, even though they have a decent amount of Takeru and Patamon bonding, I think the episode should’ve been more focused on their friendship, considering what’s to come, rather than focusing so much on Elecmon and The Village of Beginnings. Yamato and Gabumon had way more development in their episode than Patamon and Takeru did here.

Not to mention, now that I’m older, how glaringly obvious is the hanging thread of ‘We’ll be best friends forever!’? That’s almost as bad as telling someone you love them before heading off alone in a horror movie.

Next episode, one the preview just completely ruins from start to finish, Angemon’s debut! Ready your tissues.

….Previous Episode

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