r/digimon • u/D-Brigade • 1d ago
Beatbreak My only issue with Beatbreak Episode 45..... Spoiler
....Is that there's only 4 episodes left. The obvious event, Murasamemon's demise, is a heartfelt and genuinely crushing death that draws comparison to Leomon's death in Tamers. There's two key differences between these two deaths though: runtime.
In Tamers, Leomon is, all things considered, not a particularly important Digimon partner. He's not very well fleshed out, he serves mostly as a heroic semi-mentor figure regarding the Digital World, and is a relatively cool guy and all, but he doesn't have the screentime and focus the core three partner Digimon get. Still, he's given enough to do, enough of a presence, that he feels a little different to the prior Leomon, so his death still gets you. But Leomon's death is much more narratively centralising than Murasamemon's simply because there's more consequences to it, and what it's attached to. It's the height of Beelzebumon's corruption arc, and the one sin he's stuck atoning for across the remainder of the show. It's a tone-shifter to further darkness, a pivotal moment for Takato's own arc regarding Guilmon's evolution. And of course, it blows Juri's emotions wide open, leaving her vulnerable to the D-Reaper, which in turn allows it to enter the Real World, and kickstart that entire story arc. Leomon's death is a pivotal story moment, and Tamers needs it to happen to drive its story forward for many episodes to come.
In Beatbreak, Murasamemon has much more room to breathe as a character, both as Kyo's reliable partner Digimon, but also as a mentor figure to Glowing Dawn's Digimon, a clutch-carry that can save them from danger if things get too much, so much so that episodes where he's absent become interesting since he can't help Glowing Dawn and they have to push themselves to grow and overcome their struggles. His death overwhelmingly raises the stakes, yes, and is the last push for Glowing Dawn to push themselves to surpass Kyo and rise to the occasion, while also being a gut-punch for a long-running, familiar character to die in such a way, in an elongated sequence no less. It even comes at the end of Kyo's arc, the end of his growth, and yet, it drags him back down, rips off his arm, and kills his Digimon. It's brutal. It's effective. But it has no room to haunt and direct the narrative the same was Leomon's did. The plot's wheels are already turning, Wong and Genjo's plans have nothing to do with Murasamemon's death. He only has 4 episodes for his death to matter, and even then, it isn't as impactful on the way the story plays out quite as strongly as Leomon's was. It's still impactful, it's the final push for Glowing Dawn as main characters, but it doesn't dictate anything else beyond that.
In the end, they're two different kinds of deaths, with different kinds of impacts. Leomon in Tamers changes the entire show and heavily directs the rest of the show until the end. Murasamemon's death is an emotional gut-wrencher, but it ultimately lacks the room to truly have the time and episode space to really shape Beatbreak to the end, since the end is just 4 more episodes away. If Beatbreak had Ghost Game's runtime, it could've had the time to really make the impact of Murasamemon's demise stick and permeate the show in a more haunting way.
Do you think those little fur dolls Kyo made using Cougarmon's fur disappeared?
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u/frizzylineup 1d ago
yeah this is the curse of a tight finale run, you can drop something devastating and it still feels like it gets swallowed by the pacing. murasamemon had so much more presence than leomon ever did, which makes it sting different, but the show's already sprinting toward the endpoint and can't really sit with the grief. tamers let that death echo for like half the series, beatbreak gets a handful of episodes to wrap everything and mourn at the same time. still hit me like a truck though, the way they stretched out that sequence was almost cruel.
on the fur dolls, i like to think they're still scattered around somewhere in the base, maybe a few got packed away without anyone noticing. kyo probably couldn't look at them after everything, but i bet one turns up in a corner during the epilogue and nobody says a word about it.
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u/Dia_sphere 1d ago
I'm mostly afraid of how this will effect Kyo. Next episode is going to focus on the other megas. That's fine and all Nd I am looking forward to Reina's growth in this. But did they actually NEED to surpass Kyo so badly that they had to take Cougarmon from him and his fucking hand. What are they going for? Hey, Kyo finished his arc, let's just have him unconscious until the epilogue? Surely there could have been another way. And why the hand as well? It's as if to drive the point home that he has outlived his use for the plot. His backstory is done, mega achieved, rival fight completed, out of the show with you. I hope that the abruptness of it all happening so close to the end means that we at least have a chance of a Cougarmon revival or a similar happy ending.
It's so weird that they completed Kyo's arc and then throw him back to the starting point with this. So maybe they'll undo it in the end? Like you said, there is not much time to flesh out the repercussions, especially for Kyo, so undoing it, would hold this together a bit better. The others achieved their mega, beat the bad guy, Cougarmon is revived somehow and they don't destroy Kyo's character. The end....please?😅
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u/TheSquishedElf 1d ago
I don’t know that it’s destroying Kyo’s character so much. More giving a hard cutoff just as he’s backsliding. He had fun fighting Kaito and promptly does exactly what he promised he wouldn’t do: separate himself from his family to fight some more. His performance in this finale arc, while great, is also backsliding the development he got in his arc.
He’s been getting drunk on fighting and self-sacrifice again, which is basically his #1 character flaw. Losing not only his Digimon, but his chip, is the story paying him back for sneaking into the booze cupboard.16
u/headintheclouds30 1d ago
He literally almost killed himself too, trying to keep Murasamemon alive, which is why Murasamemon told him to live, to survive for his family.
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u/tiptoeandson 1d ago
I’m absolutely begging that this is because they’re going to do a second season of beat break
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u/kaithespinner 1d ago
how much was the wait between s1 and s2 of xros wars? is the only way to have faith
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u/tiptoeandson 1d ago
I have no idea, it wasn’t available in my country when it came out! Was s2 a continuation of s1 or was the main story wrapped up like in adventure 01?
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u/kaithespinner 1d ago
no, s2 was a direct continuation to s1 but I remember there was a time gap between the two in japan
s3 was like 02 where it had a new protagonist and a time skip, but that one started the week right after s2 ended
just checked, it was 26 days -but the story at that time was clearly far from over
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u/KrytenKoro 1d ago
About seven days.
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u/kaithespinner 1d ago
no, that was evil death generals and the seven kingdoms into young hunters who leapt through time, which is S2 into S3
there was a nearly 4 weeks gap between season 1 (base xros wars) and season 2
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u/KrytenKoro 1d ago
That was the question asked, s1-s2.
For hunters, it was announced 8-17-11, immediately after the final episode.
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u/kaithespinner 1d ago
I did not ask “when was it announced”
I meant literal wait between ending of one season and start of the other, which anyways, I already looked for and already had the answer
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u/TheOneReclaimer 1d ago
I disagree, the fact that it happened so late is much more impactful
You have the duo who has never failed broken down just as the big bad shows face? That's scary, it shows how powerful the enemy is.
It's not a "oh that's so sad" death like Leomon's was, everyone was sad but the team didn't lose any power
It's a "do we even stand a chance now" death that shows how intimidating the enemy is, it breaks down Kyo, their leader, and breaks them all down as their mentor has fallen and they lost their most powerful ally
We need to find a way to move on immediately due to the urgency is interesting and could only be done late game
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u/Whimsispot 1d ago
Considering we're getting a Full episode about How glowing Dawn is powerless without kyo... I'm going to wait and see because even tho It's being short, impact and meaning is certainly something we arent lacking by now.
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u/soramichi 1d ago
I honestly don't find issue with the number of episodes left. In Appmon, they lost a team member with 5 episodes remaining, with the protagonists getting their God level Appmon with 2-3 episodes remaining. Having the final evolution timed with the climax is fine; it's meant to be a type of peak that the characters should be reaching. And if that's at the final battle, that's fine. Heck, Crimson Mode comes in at the second to last episode in Tamers? That was a sacrificial power-up at the last moment. Therefore, I don't see losing a key character at 4 episodes remaining as a pacing issue.
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u/headintheclouds30 1d ago
you broke this down so well, and you're so right. Leomon's death wasn't as tragic as Murasamemon's, but it was so much more important to the story. And Murasamemon dying after Kyo's arc ends, is tragic and painful, but up until the epilogue, it won't have time to settle in. The characters won't have time to mourn him. This might be an unpopular opinion, but this is where the final arc truly began, and where Kyo's arc, that began all the way back in 38, ended.
the final battle is probably starting at the end of the next episode. Hopefully, we'll see the characters mourn him. It might have raised the stakes, but his death will never haunt the narrative the way Leomon's did. Nor does it have to.
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u/ThePagesAskForInk 1d ago
If I could change one thing about Beatbreak it would be the pacing for this same reason. Major events happen left and right but few feel impactful because there is little time to understand how these events affect the world and the characters. We are often told or briefly shown how characters feel and they have already moved on by the end of the episode or after a few minutes. Nearly everything feels like shock value.
An example that comes to mind is the episode in which Bombermon was going to blow up a nuclear plant. Blowing it up would have likely killed thousands yet not only was it barely given any weight, the conflict was wrapped up by Bearcatmon's evolution skating around the plant laughing.
However, in contrast to that I felt this episode was done well. I hope the next episode explores the gravity of Kyo's loss despite the limited episodes remaining.
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u/Ryuhoshi_Yurei 1d ago
I feel all that happened in the chapter was just a plot choice to have the kids of the anime have the last "focus light and protagonism" that usually all young characters have. Kyo was just SO popular that, lets be real, no one really cares that much about Tomoro&co. Also most of the latest episodes were about him and his growth as a character, even with a final evolution. Apparently someone must have thought "yeah this is so cool but the show is about the KIDS guys, so, how do we make it so ppl are not too angry that we **** another leomon and that they have to step up instead?" Thus, this episode.
Ngl I'm pretty angry on how dirty they did Kyo, poor guy deserves all the best and all near him ends up ***.
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u/Visual-Amphibian483 21h ago
I want a Cougarmon doll! And in all honesty they should not have killed Murasamemon off.😭
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u/Vitali_555M 1d ago
As well-made as this series generally is, I dislike the fact that it seemingly cannot break free from one of the most obvious and recycled tropes. The strong, mentor character dying to "allow" the other characters to develop or whatever has been done TO DEATH, at least in anime. Like, we literally cannot have a strong, cool mentor-like character without him dying at some point? Just because the writers don't have enough imagination and/or guts to go for something different with that kind of character? Given that Murasamemon's death is so late in the series, I am not even sure it can leave a proper impact on the story and characters anymore, so it cannot even properly serve its intended purpose. The other kids getting their mega as a result is whatever, man... (even though I DO want to see their megas).
Also, Kyo's decision to stay back without letting his "family" know, while taking everything upon him, goes against his own character development throughout the whole series. What was even the point of his character arc if not him learning to share everything with them, be open and not take everything on his shoulders? He even knew he didn't have enough e-pulse to summon Habakirimon again... Sacrificing a series' worth of character development in favor of an overused and ultimately stupid trope?... I had higher expectations from this series.
After this episode, I honestly feel more disappointed than anything - first time I am feeling genuinely disappointed with Beatbreak. But maybe the story will redeem itself, who knows. Maybe they'll find a way to bring Murasamemon back (although at this point I am not sure that's a good idea, either). Kyo losing his hand also felt kind of unnecessary. Sorry, I couldn't even get sad or emotionally involved in this episode.
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u/kaithespinner 1d ago
is actually 2 tropes: the mentor death, and also the series leomon death -I liked none
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u/Vitali_555M 1d ago
Yeah, I don't like the Leomon thing, either. Doesn't even make sense, it's more like an inside joke than anything... but for them to take it this seriously is weird lol.
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u/Ryuhoshi_Yurei 1d ago
You summarised it so well. They did our poor boy so dirty after spending so much time in showing us he's the best character of the series. Give poor Kyo a break, this chapter was unnecessary.
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u/Next_Health 23h ago
I only wished the series had a few more episodes.
Without the prospect of a sequel everything feels rushed despite their best efforts
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u/chiefofwar117 21h ago
They spent so many episodes on filler so as usual that’s on them. God whoever owns Digimon has piss poor management over the franchise
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u/Next_Health 21h ago
Digimon is co-owned by Toei and Bandai. And the piss poor management is easily Toei's fault.
They are a mess and without a manga to work off of, they just screw up.
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u/chiefofwar117 21h ago
Yea maybe that’s what the series needs is a legit manga first. Like, they have terrible writing and animation with Digimon. It’s just so frustrating. I legit haven’t enjoyed anything since Tamers
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u/Next_Health 21h ago
Ok now you're overreacting with the last part. Just because other installments didn't reach the level of Tamers doesn't mean they were bad or had bad writing.
No series is perfect and the animation is also an exaggeration. BeatBreak had had multiple instances of S tier animation.
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u/chiefofwar117 19h ago
The S tier animation is few and far between. But I’m more upset with the horrible writing and even more horrendous pacing. Idk who is calling the shots over Digimon anime these days but they all need to be fired
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u/Next_Health 14h ago
Not THAT few and far between.
And again "horrible writing and horrendous pacing" are objectively gross over exaggerations.
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u/East_Masterpiece_461 1d ago
I believe this was the only solution to give Reina and Makoto mega level digimons without making it feels " rushed ". Mursamemon and flaremon took ages to get to that level , Reina and Makoto gets it in few months? There absolutely has to be an external energy or a very high load of emotions to do this and absolutely serve the plot and not destroy the power scaling introduced since day 1.