∇
troperville

∇
tools

∇
toys

SubpagesAnime
Awesome
AwesomeMusic
Characters
DrinkingGame
FanficRecs
Franchise
Fridge
Funny
Haiku
Headscratchers
Heartwarming
HoYay
ImageLinks
Laconic
Main
Monster
Narm
Radar
TabletopGame
TearJerker
Trivia
WMG
YMMV

main index

Narrative

Genre

Media

Topical Tropes

Other Categories

new edits	workshops	reviews	YKTTW	tweets	random
to do	pm	add watch	drop watch	watchlist	profile

Subpages:

source

history

edit page

There are subjectives, and then there are these. While you may believe a work fits here, and you might be right, people tend to have rather vocal, differing opinions about this subject.
Please keep these off of the work's page.

Digimon

The various Digimon animated series are generally marketed towards younger children, so one should not fully expect the show to take itself entirely seriously...except for those times when it wants to be.

In Digimon Adventure, Venom Myotismon and his laser-shooting crotch beast. And he was killed when someone kicked a ball-shaped portion of a building into his groin. Not everybody laughed.
- A case of Viewers Are Geniuses. This is how Satan was depicted in medieval art — with a crotch monster face.
  - For some reason, that just makes it funnier.
Typically, a Digimon's voice becomes more adult-sounding and then more bestial-sounding as he or she advances through the five (six if the tamer is lucky) Evolutionary Levels. Sometimes, different forms of the same character have different voice actors. Not so in the third season. The voices remain the same as their childlike "rookie" forms throughout. The highest levels are formed when the Digimon and the human partner merge together, resulting in a form that looks impressive but still has the standard rookie voice and the standard kid voice talking at once. But their lines are written for a warrior. It's hard to keep taking the scene seriously when a pip-squeak dual voice yells stuff like "There is no excuse for your actions! I will see that justice is SERRRRRRRVED!" or "Your judgment day is at hand! For the horrible things you've done, you must pay the ultimate price!" at the top of its lungs. Of course, since Evil is Cool, Beelzemon doesn't always sound like his rookie form. Neither does Ax Crazy good guy Cyberdramon, whose human partner is more the Kid with the Leash.
- This happened in the Japanese version as well. It was to point out how their personalities were the same regardless of Digivolution; in Digimon Adventure, they supposedly became different people. Ryo's Cyberdramon was different for All There in the Manual reasons. But yes, the voices do sound weird, and it was still confusing.
Then there's the American dub of Digimon: The Movie, where to conclude his heartbreaking story about how his Digimon got attacked by a virus, Willis delivers a completely deadpan, "And now he's obsessed with chasing me." Davis ends up in tears.
- To be fair, didn't Davis say that he was joking? (Or that he got over it REALLY quickly?)
  - Not joking, but yes he did get over it quickly...and to be fair Davis crying than instantly getting over it (heck just the crying) was MEANT to be to make you laugh at its dorkiness, seeing is how Davis is generally used as resident Comic Relief.
There's the infamous original Finnish dub of the show by the now-defunct dubbing company Agapio Racing Team, which seemed to have absolutely no standards for actors. Their dub of Digimon (as well as all the other shows they got their hands on) was full of narm because of insanely bad acting. Everything related to any sort of emotional performance was... awkward. Fury, sadness and joy indeed. One can find an abundance of Agapio clips on Youtube as well as here if he wishes to experience the horror that all Finnish kids had to go through for a while.
- This is the dub that killed Agapio. It was that bad and that notorious.
In Digimon Adventure 02, there was a Narmy scene in the Japanese version which was cut from the dub. Before his Defeat Means Friendship, Ken kicks a puppy in the middle of the street. If the kick was more violent or stronger, then the scene wouldn't be so narmy. But not only is the kick light, but also, in the background, villainous music starts playing, and Ken gives us a villainous grin alongside a villainous sound effect. Villainous, indeed.... We may never know if the scene was cut for puppy-kicking or for accidental sarcasm.
- That, after the things he'd already done, the writers tried to demonstrate his evil with a dog kick is amusing from some perspectives. Those perspectives aren't quite in the mainstream, though. (We call the trope Kick the Dog for a reason.)
- He didn't even kick the dog - he tossed it with his foot!
  - The puppy flies in this slow, perfectly controlled, fake-looking arc. It doesn't look violent! It looks like Ken was giving it a levitation lesson!
In Digimon Data Squad, the dub of Digimon Savers, just about every instance of This Is Unforgivable is kept. It won't take you long to realize why most translations change it. It just does not sound Badass in English.
Takato's crying scenes. In the first few episodes, Takato had a weird tendency towards crying over the most redundant things, especially ones related to Guilmon. Some could say that this was a way for the writers to portray Takato as the 10 year-old he is contrasting with his (and the other children's) maturity later in this season; but it's still hard to take seriously.
The first time Matt's Crest was activated in the first season. Screaming "FRIENDSHIP!!!" at the top of your lungs kills the drama.
The scene in Digimon Tamers in which Takato is about to get shot by Beelzemon. The other Tamers all shout his name, trying to warn him... And you hear their voices slowed down. This troper almost cracked up. Granted, it's followed by a Crowning Moment of Awesome, but still... Slowed down voices are hilarious.
- It's narmy in both the original Japanese and the English dub.
The episode of 02 where they find the Digi-Egg of Friendship. While the others are busy getting stomped around by the Monster of the Day, he is thinking to himself about how friendship is so powerful. He ends it by screaming, "Veemon, ''I'm your frieeeeeeend!" Like the above example, a Crowning Momentof Awesome follows, but it's still a ridiculously corny scene.
How about the first time Tentomon digivolves into Kabuterimon? You can tell his voice actor was into the role.
- Made even funnier in the English dub in that they hadn't perfected the voice they used for Kabuterimon - he sounded completely different to how he sounds later on, and not in a good way.
From Myotismon onwards, the Dub of Adventure picks up the original's habit of playing a selection of Powerup Theme Music with lyrics every time a significantly challenging enemy goes down. What song does the Dub use for this purpose? "Hey Digimon." There's something silly about a powerful, intimidating villain being killed off to a chorus of camp counselors with guitars gathered around a fire. Luckily, when 02 came along, it got better.
That incident in Digimon Tamers episode 20, when Takato successfully used a hilariously-bad copy of the Blue Card (done by Hirokazu) to evolve Growlmon to WarGrowlmon. It was supposed to be serious; but the way that bad artwork that is the Faux Blue Card is shown during the card slash sequence and the subsequent successful evolution of Growlmon (which we could not have predicted would work) was hilarious.
In one of the final episodes of 02, we have the puppet guy gather all of the Dark Spore kids. They then go into a little world-between-worlds kind of thing. How do they get there? By chanting "Boys and girls, boys and girls, let's all go to the Digital World" in a creepy singsong voice.
In Digimon Frontier, when the kids collected Spirits, they sometimes yelled, "SPIRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!" Also, sometimes they would dramatize/narmitize their attacks:
"I call upon the power of (insert whatever here)!"
"I summon the (insert whatever here)!"
Another incident in Tamers occurs in episode 23: With Takato and company's Digimon losing Takato just screams and it works. That wouldn't be so narmy enough, except Rika and Henry join in on the screaming and Takato keeps screaming while the Digimon are fighting. This might have been cool if it had happened in Dragon Ball Z, but here it comes of looking silly. Which is a shame as that was a great episode until that moment.
The dub of the second season ended up with the kids calling the Armor Evolution incantation as "DIGI ARMOR ENERRRRRR-GIZE!" for the sake of lip sync.
- To be honest, it's not like "DEJIMENTAAAAAL UUUUUUUUPPU!" really sounded any better.
Kurata has his elements of this in Digimon Data Squad. The fact that they're usually followed by him showing off what a Complete Monster he is goes to show that even this trope has its merits.
In the Digimon Adventure dub, the death of millions of Numemon is ruined by Agumon's shrill yell of "AAAAAAH! I feel the POWER!!!"
From Island of Lost Digimon, the Human Digimon's Super Funky Disco Neon Tank.
A classic one (that, back at the time, was a frequent joke among the fandom): when listing Chimeramon/Kimeramon's body parts, the Digimon Emperor notes pretty badass and probably useful parts of equally badass Digimon: Angemon's wings, SkullGreymon's arm, Garurumon's legs.... and MetalGreymon's hair. There's absolutely no real use for it other than aesthetics, especially considering on how much useful other parts of MetalGreymon would've been. Oh, and Ken lists that part last, giving a really funny Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking feel to the scene. And since the first time isn't funny enough, the parts are re-listed by the older Chosen Children later, in the same order, again, highlighting such an important part of the villain's plan.
The fact that Keenan in Digimon Data Squad speaks in You No Take Candle is bad enough, but the fact that he refers to humans as hu-mons sounds both stupid and irritating. He wasn't Raised by Wolves, the Digimon could all speak articulately! Why is he even talking like that, anyway?
Some of the battles against the Devas in Digimon Tamers. Given that the Devas were minions of the Sovereign sent to subdue and conquer the Real World, you'd expect them to be pretty decent combatants, and indeed many of them put up a terrifyingly good fight ... against Champion level Digimon. But:
- Three of them (Sandiramon, Sinduramon and Kumbhiramon) are killed by Champion-level Digimon.
- Four of them (Mihiramon, Pajiramon, Vajramon and Indramon) are curb-stomped by the first Ultimates they meet (in Vajramon's case, by the second Ultimate he met, but he's a curious case).
- And the only two to be killed by Megas included a Dirty Coward who died Bullying a Dragon (Makuramon, though he did actually show some intelligence during the episode when he was revealed) and a guy whose main attack couldn't kill a Rookie (Catsuramon, when he bopped Terriermon on the head, though admittedly he is otherwise a Magnificent Bastard). The only ones who put up a decent fight against Digimon their own level were Vikaralamon, Antylamon (against Makuramon, and later against the D-Reaper's minions) and Majiramon (against Cyberdramon before Ryo modified him with a Goliath card).
Digimon Tamers: Come to that, Majiramon's appearance. He's a Dragon Deva, a warrior who serves the Digimon Sovereign. He looks like an old moose-headed skink wearing a sweater.
- Particularly funny is one kid who says "I WANTED to be a comic book artist but all the other kids laughed at me so I gave up on it." And THAT makes Myotismon break apart and scream in pain some more even though it's a negative comment about a broken dream!
  - The implication was that he was now admitting his dream and was willing to come back for it - but the terrible delivery, as it often does, made the narmification.