#daigonishijima

So second movie starts with the gang going on the onsen trip, with Takeru saying it’s a welcome trip to Meiko. And in a sense, it is. The main point of this trip from story point is to introduce us to the character that Meiko is, and how she deals with her digimon, Meicoomon. The most important part of this trip thou, is the hint of what’s to come.

This scene is introducing us to the kind of a scared Meiko & Meicoomon relationship, and implies that something could happen were Meicoomon to start feeling scared. It also subtly implies that something might have happened in the past. Notice how her eyes change direction?

And, as @adventure-hearts pointed out in her Part 2 Megapost, Hikari’s camera stops working right when Meicoomon’s eyes start turning, so this definitely serves as a hint of possible evolution trigger. After all, before this scene, Meiko tells the group she hasn’t seen her evolve yet, so from story point it makes sense to tease the possibility of evolution happening. I’m still not sure if Meiko lied about not knowing her evolution thou, since she does seem to know how to prevent Meicoomon going wild. The way that Meiko is worried about Meicoomon when she disappears with Piyomon is also a good implication of the relationship between Meiko and Meicoomon.

We’re also being introduced to Daigo and Maki on a bit deeper level, and we get to know that the three new characters have already met and interacted with each other before, and how Daigo and Maki have a very close past together. (Click the gif source to see whole set of the gif post.)

In addition to introductions, the onsen trip also serves as a way to show us that Taichi and Yamato are still having some tension between them. From story point, it’s very important to recap this tension, especially since each movie has few months cap between.

Of course, onsen trip also has a bit of ship teases put into it. While I don’t count these as evidence for non-filler trip, I find them really nice addition. That’s up to each person’s opinion though.

As a whole, the trip was meant for the group to get to know Meiko and let her feel welcome in the group. From story point, it was used for introducing the three new main characters to the cast. In my opinion, it was done well, and I will always love onsen trip scene as a whole.

Aaand that’s about it. These are my reasons for why onsen trip should not be seen as a filler, and why it’s important from story point. Was pretty hard to find gifs, and I had to go take screenshots myself for the first two evidence.