THE FANATIC'S GUIDE TO

"Snakes, Trains, and Digimon"

"THE SAGA OF THE DEVAS," Part One

English Version Written by Alan Smith

Guest Starring: Sandiramon

• The title for this episode isn't grammatically correct - there shouldn't be a comma between "trains" and "and."

• The recap for "Grow Mon Grow" depicts the Tamers in a triple split-screen Digi-Modify sequence, but this never happened in the episode.

• Davis the Narrator claims that in the previous episode, Takato and Guilmon "went to this alternate universe." To be fair, I'm not sure what I'd have called where they went, but "alternate universe" really doesn't seem to fit the bill. It was more a kind of hallucination inside Takato's head.

• Okay, now, on to the episode itself, and first, a little note - this episode was made by the group of animators who generally produce work that is beneath the quality of the other teams that work on the series. It starts out okay, but begins to fluctuate as the episode goes on, slowly but surely turning to crap (just look at the state of Impmon as he points down when he tells Takato and Guilmon about the battle. Yeuch.). Things to look for to tell if an episode is drawn by this team include Renamon being disproportinately skinny (check out the scene were she jumps from building to building after Rika calls for her in the subway for a very good example), and probably most noticeably, Terriermon's face being smaller than normal (see the scene where he and Henry step off the train).

• A Digi-anatomy lesson: Terriermon has four fingers and a thumb on each hand, but when he's balancing upside down at the start of the episode, he's only got three fingers on each.

• Henry claims "It's 6:30 in the morning!" but the clock above Takato's head shows that it's actually 9:00.

• What *are* Henry's "other plans"? He's got a date circled on his calendar, and tells his family he's got "some errands to run," taking a fairly large bag with him. When we next see him, he's on a train, and we never find out what his other plans were. You'd think they were pretty important, too... ah, Henry, so sneaky you are, with your envelope of mystery...

• The friends that Kazu, Kenta and Jeri bring to the bakery and who then meet Guilmon are:

Ayaka
Miki
Tadashi
Taizou
Yuuji

Curiously, Jeri's third friend is absent, which is a little surprising. Moreso than the absence of Jeremy and his Michael-a-like friend, I suppose.

• Jeri's puppet is missing the stitches that connect its arms to its body for the entirety of this episode.

• Ayaka's shirt is supposed to have five red stripes on it, but from the aerial shot, when Kazu says, "Listen up!" it's only got three. When the girls laugh after Guilmon barks at Jeri's puppet, it has four, which it also has later, when Guilmon first uses his "Snot Blaster." Check out the image on the right to see this at work.

• As Renamon talks to Impmon, her mouth is missing, like in "Divided They Stand." The angle here, though, is more questionable than it was in that episode, except that, just before leaving, Renamon tilts her head, making more of it visible - still speaking - and her mouth *still* isn't there.

• It's not an animation error, because they are consistent about it, but the design of Sandiramon's tongue is very peculiar. It's a thin, forked tongue, which pokes out between his lips... but when he opens his mouth, you can see that the forked tongue just STOPS, and behind it is a normal-shaped tongue (see the screenshot). Weird.

• Wouldn't somebody see Terriermon doing all that martial arts stuff on a train? There's that idiocy/blindness again...

• A woman who has just run off the train cries out, "My baby!" and we see the child lying in the middle of the train carriage. What did you do, lady, drop your kid and keep running? Some mother...

• All right, so maybe people wouldn't see Terriermon doing his martial arts, but holding a massive golden metal shield...? Fair enough, there probably weren't many people left, all having run away, but that mother and child were there...

• Kyubimon's fire is once again not moving in this episode, except, apparently, when she's running (check when she says "Coming through, watch your toes!" and "He's getting away!").

• The "Hyper Speed" Modify Card Rika slashes this episode is actually the "Hypersonic" card from "Much Ado About Musyamon," accidentally dubbed with another name. "Hyper Speed" is a more fitting moniker, though.

• When Kyubimon says, "Now that's more like it!" her mouth is open, but not moving. Kyubimon is shown to move her mouth when she speaks otherwise in this episode, but only when we can actually clearly see her mouth - in instances where we only see from the top of her head, no movement is evident, because these animators do not work in as much detail as those of, say, "Divided They Stand," where movement on the sides of Kyubimon's muzzle WAS evident when she spoke from a top view.

• When Henry explains sarcasm, Terriermon's only got three fingers on his hands again.

• Kenta, dude, you got hit in the back, why are you clutching your armpit? (yes, I know he's actually clutching his chest, but sue me, the animation makes it look like he's got handful of armpit...)

• From the angle beginning with Impmon's line, "Move to the head of the class, genius!" Ayaka's shirt now has seven red stripes on it.

• Sandiramon claims, "The twelve Devas will destroy you all!" I think you mean TEN, now, Sandy.

• Incidentally, Sandy's dialogue is inkeeping with the whole flawed "Devas want to rule the world" thing. And why, exactly, are these guys wasting their time terrorising humans, rather than getting on with the mission they've actually been given - finding a new power source to help Digimon in the Digital World Digivolve? I know they don't like humans, but I'd consider a mission from what is effectively their GOD to be more important than getting a few yuks in watching the little fleshies scream and run.

• Henry notes that Sandiramon was "different from any Digimon we've ever fought before." Yes, any Digimon except Mihiramon, Henry.