No recap here – this episode’s so jam-packed that there’s absolutely no time for one. Instead, we open on the last handful of lines from the previous episode, but animated freshly in this episode’s much better art style. (Episode 47 was one of those with that annoyingly noticeably-weaker art style, but at least the final episode’s art style is a good one!)

Anyway, Masaru and Agumon have got their second wind and are rushing straight at Yggdrasil to prove just how strong humans and Digimon can be when they work together. Provocation Infinity kicks in as BGM as soon as they do so! Love the sense that evokes of the early days of the series, just these fighty dorks being fighty dorks, even as both worlds hang in the balance.

Masaru and Agumon dodge some crystal missiles and keep running. The other three partners leap into the fray to help out, and destroy some more – still at Child-level, mind you. I guess those crystals aren’t actually very strong? Yggdrasil lashes out with vines as Masaru and Agumon get close, but they leap over the intended strikes and climb onto them. Given that the vines are significantly thicker than Masaru’s entire body, they make workable platforms; good job giving them a way to get close to you, Yggdrasil!

Agumon gets knocked into the air by another vine, but Masaru (somehow) manages to reach out and swing his own vine around to grab his partner’s hand before he can fall. Friends helping each other out and working together!

Yggdrasil goes for dirty tactics and fires more crystals at the defenceless Tohma, Yoshino and Ikuto. Their partners desperately leap in there to protect them – and they emerge from the ensuing smoke cloud in their Adult forms, carrying their humans.

Yggdrasil: “Unable to compute. Unable to compute.”

Yggdrasil’s still very much in computer-mode, and it does not understand how they could possibly have evolved like this when this isn’t how things are meant to work. I’m not sure either, to be entirely fair, but I appreciate that it annoys Yggdrasil.

Tohma:  “We didn’t even charge our Digisouls! How…?”

Gaogamon:  “I don’t know either.”

Peckmon:  “I just wanted to protect Ikuto.”

Sunflowmon:  “I wished for the strength to protect everyone.”

Apparently Digimon can evolve on their own, without Digisoul, if they’re desperate enough to protect their partners! It’s still a little questionable that this is only an eleventh-hour superpower they’re getting right now and they were never able to do this any of the other times their partners were in severe danger throughout the series. That does seem to have been firmly established as not how it works in this Digimon canon, even though it works that way in most. (Though I suppose Piyomon did kinda do this in episode 43?)

But still, it's neat to see them doing something new in the final battle as the two worlds are at stake. Maybe it’s the direness of the entire situation, or perhaps the sheer amount of human emotion that’s powering all of the Digimon right now, as seen last episode. Or maybe it’s just that, hey, screw rules and expectations and calculations, they’re gonna do it anyway. How Masaru of them.

And if nothing else, I appreciate having this send-off for each of the partners’ (except Agumon’s) other forms! I like their designs the most at these lower levels, so it’s nice to see them again, if briefly.

Yggdrasil: “You couldn’t defeat me with your Burst Modes, so why do you still fight against me? The probability of you winning is exceedingly close to 0%.”

Yggdrasil is being me whenever I see a Digimon fighting something at a higher evolution level than itself and acting like it stands a remote chance of winning. Which, thankfully, is not a thing that’s happened very often in Savers. Usually when it has it’s been Masaru’s doing, of course, because Masaru’s never given a damn about calculations and logic.

Masaru and Agumon keep climbing the vines, while the other three partners fire attacks at Yggdrasil’s body to distract it, spontaneously evolving into their Perfect forms as they do. The pair make it onto Yggdrasil’s body itself, which is slanted enough that they can keep running up it, dodging crystal lasers along the way.

Yggdrasil: “Unable to compute. Unable to compute.”

It’s a small thing, but there’s something I really like about the way Yggdrasil keeps insistently repeating this among the action and fighting. It cannot comprehend why these stubborn humans are even still trying. Clearly it has not been properly introduced to Masaru yet.

The other three partners evolve again into their Ultimate-levels to protect themselves as they’re hit by attacks. There’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it neat shot as Rosemon and Ravemon slice apart Yggdrasil’s vines, in which you can see the insides of them – they’re some kind of fancy optical cables, just like the vines at its tree.

Some more attacks give Masaru and Agumon a smoke cloud as cover, and just as Provocation Infinity reaches its climax, the pair leap in towards Yggdrasil’s face, ready to pu—

…Only it’s not time for that just yet. Yggdrasil catches them in its vines before they can get close enough, inflicting horrible pain on them with red lightning. As far as Yggdrasil saw all this, it really was a pointless endeavour. Masaru was never going to stand a chance.

Masaru’s teammates call out in worry at seeing him and Agumon helplessly in pain. So does Chika, who’s holding Kudamon in her arms. Further out from the fight, the Norsteins and Yushima, Miki and Megumi, and Sayuri, all watch on, not even able to see anything that’s going on except for the huge shape of Yggdrasil hanging over Mount Fuji and the columns of light from the Digimon who are still trying to hold the worlds apart. All of them can’t do anything but hope.

Masaru:  “Damn it!”

I appreciate this little outburst from Masaru as he and Agumon endure the red lightning; he must hate that the pain he’s in is making him so powerless to do anything right now.

Chika calls out again to her brothers, and then flares up in Digisoul from the sheer force of her desperation to see everything turn out all right.

Relena:  “The Digimon are protecting us. They’re fighting for us. […] You can do it, Digimon!”

Then, among the Norsteins’ group, Relena’s Digisoul activates, even though she doesn’t have a Digimon partner, as her emotions will the Digimon on. With the Noguchis and Satsuma, baby Yuka’s Digisoul makes an appearance, too. I like that it’s the children who manifest their Digisouls first here, since children do tend to be a lot more openly in touch with their emotions than adults. (Though Yuka is a bit much, because she ought to be too young to understand what’s happening, but shush.)

Also, a neat thing we can see here is that Digisoul colours run in families! We already saw that for the Daimons, but it’s true for everyone else; Relena’s is her brother’s cool blue, and Yuka’s is her brother’s purple.

After Miki and Megumi, Sayuri flares up with her Digisoul for the first time ever. It’s orange too, like that of Suguru and his kids, so evidently Digisouls run in families in a non-genetic way, because she’s not blood-related to Suguru. That makes sense, since it’s about emotion, not biology.

All over the world, every human is beginning to glow with Digisoul from the sheer strength of their will to not die. This emotion was already powering the Digimon last episode, but now it’s become strong enough and desperate enough to be visible, tangible Digisoul. We see the Hayase family from episode 9, the Shiratori family from episode 11, Neon from episode 8, to give us some characters we have vague reason to care about instead of random nobodies.

There’s Ivan too, with all of his siblings, and Nanami, who despite her nature has become desperate enough to be praying along with a group of other people. (This is how I knew the Bio-Hybrids weren’t actually dead when they were ambiguously defeated in their episodes.)

…Apparently the default Digisoul colour for unimportant characters is a sickly yellow, because there’s no variety in the hues for anybody else. Shame; I guess the animation budget only stretched so far.

From their place atop Mount Fuji, the DATS group can see the columns of Digisoul shooting up from all over the world, and the Digimon partners can feel it.

Yggdrasil: “Why do you interfere with me? The probability of your survival is equal to 0%.”

Are you still sure about that, Yggdrasil? There’s an awful lot of Digisoul floating around right now. It doesn’t seem like it’s factoring that into its calculations.

But hey, Masaru’s here – and since when did he ever care about something like calculations?

Ikuto:  “That’s wrong! The power of each person on its own might be small…”

Tohma:  “But the power of cherishing our friends and comrades… is infinite!”

Yoshino:  “We want to stay with each other… Forever!”

The DATS crew aren’t even making it about the Digisoul of every single human on Earth, but instead about the sheer power of even a few people’s Digisoul. Because friends! Of course they want to stay with their Digimon partners forever! Digimon and humans deserve a world where they can live together!

Piyomon:  “I want to live with Chika… and the humans, too!”

Gotsumon:  “So do… So do I!”

Even the Digimon who’ve only recently met and got to know humans think so too, when they haven’t had their views affected by Kurata’s atrocities! It’s neat that even Gotsumon’s saying this – look how much a reboot to remove all that bigotry has done for him.

The Royal Knights are still there too, fighting to physically hold the worlds apart. Rather than have their own bodies give out under the strain, the ground beneath them crumbles from the sheer weight they’re holding up, because Ultimate-levels are just that strong I guess.

Yggdrasil: “Unable to compute! Unable to compute!”

Though it’s still acting like a computer, Yggdrasil’s voice is beginning to sound a lot more emotional and insistent. No, this doesn’t make sense, it shouldn’t be possible, Yggdrasil’s not supposed to be wrong about anything. What do you mean this many humans and Digimon actually want to live together, and they might actually have the power to make that a reality. That’s not how Yggdrasil’s neat and tidy little Digimon experiment was supposed to go.

Masaru:  “You’ll… never understand!”

Yggdrasil: “Unable to compute!”

Masaru:  “It’s true that we fight a lot over stupid things, and sometimes we even hate each other. From your point of view, we might have evolved in the wrong direction. But…!”

Not sure if Masaru’s talking about only humans, or both humans and Digimon here. It’d work either way, since at this point Yggdrasil’s trying to reboot both worlds.

Freed from the red lightning by now, Masaru and Agumon manage to reach out to each other and join hands as they give the climax of their speech. Friends doing this together!

Agumon:  “Human emotions… make us Digimon stronger!”

Masaru:  “And the Digimon… give us both dreams and courage!”

Masaru & Agumon: “There’s no limit to how far we can evolve!”

Masaru’s side of this is… frankly a bit generic; I wish he’d said something more distinctly Masaru than just talking about dreams and courage. But Agumon’s got the real point here, and it’s something Yggdrasil can’t possibly deny. Digimon and humans are intrinsically connected. They have a symbiotic relationship where they can make each other stronger. Given that inherent law of the universe, how can there be anything wrong with them wanting to create a world where both species can live together, even if it might take some fighting and strife to get there?

As the lyrics of Believer kick in, a huge column of Digisoul erupts from their linked hands, vaporising the vines they’re trapped in, and Agumon evolves into…

…Agumon Burst Mode! Which might seem a bit silly, but I actually love this. Digimon series like to end on the main protagonist gaining some kind of eleventh-hour final super ultra strong extra special evolution, which tends to be your usual armoured humanoid dude – so I really like that, in this case, it’s still Agumon. He’s grown big enough for Masaru to suddenly be able to ride him, but it still very much seems like that character we know and love as Masaru’s dork of a best friend and partner. It makes their triumph hit harder when it still feels like him.

Masaru:  “Learn your lesson, Yggdrasil! This is the humans’…”

Agumon:  “And the Digimon’s…”

Masaru & Agumon: “Power!”

They mean this, too, because I don’t think this is just Masaru’s power manifesting here. This isn’t Masaru turning out to be extra super sparkly-special in the final moments for no particular reason. This is the power of every single human on Earth’s desire to not freaking die, and all of that Digisoul latching onto and happening to use Agumon as an avatar for it, simply because he and Masaru are at the centre of things and happen to be the most personally determined to prove this point to Yggdrasil right now.

This might be the most justified eleventh-hour superpower in any Digimon series, because of just how great a length this whole series has gone to establish Digisoul and the power of human emotion as a tangible force that can influence Digimon and make them stronger. Of course that much Digisoul would have one hell of an effect.

Agumon and Masaru fly at Yggdrasil, who erects a shield of energy in front of itself. They keep pushing, shattering not only the shield but also blowing a huge gaping hole through Yggdrasil’s body.

Yggdrasil: “This is inconceivable! The probability of you defeating me is…”

Yggdrasil doesn’t finish that sentence. Maybe it’s beginning to realise that the probability isn’t as low as it’d previously thought and doesn’t want to admit that. Or maybe it’s just that the “eye” in its body here explodes before it can finish saying that.

Out of the explosion flies a crystalline humanoid figure – apparently, Yggdrasil’s real true physical form, which it was keeping hidden safely inside its much larger body. It’s not actually as strong as it was trying to make itself look with all that godly posturing.

Masaru:  “YOU CAN’T ESCAPE!”

Masaru clearly realises this is Yggdrasil trying to bail out of here before it can be forced to admit defeat, and he refuses to let that happen. He swerves Agumon’s path back around – Agumon’s claw-strap thingies have grown long enough that Masaru’s holding onto them like reins – and then leaps off Agumon’s back to punch the god right in the face.

…Or, perhaps, he’s punching the computer’s relatively fragile interface. And hasn’t Masaru always been one for, uh, “fixing” computer problems by hitting them as hard as he can?

That’s one way you could sum up the climax of Savers. Masaru fixes a very serious computer problem by hitting it really hard.

They’re still really good at timing these climactic fight scenes with Believer, by the way. The final line of the chorus plays over the punch and Yggdrasil’s face shattering, and it hits just right.

Yggdrasil’s body erupts into a blinding explosion, Agumon urgently swoops in there to try and catch his aniki, and everything turns white.

And with that, it’s the opening! There’s something really neat, and really final, about how the opening in this last episode happens right after the climax of the big world-saving fight.

Something else I also like about the finality of this opening is that the fansubbers I’ve been watching, for the only episode in the series, added subs crediting themselves during the opening. Again, it helps drive home that it really is the end, and, hey, they deserve it. Shout-outs to the fansub group who called themselves Ryuu-Rogue way back when for allowing me and many other non-Japanese-speakers to experience Digimon Savers in its original intended form.

Anyway, the opening itself has this shot at the end where the main and supporting cast line up (except Yushima apparently? Sorry, dude), so that seems like a perfect shot to highlight in this final episode as we give a send-off to everyone.

Also, the final final shot of the opening has Masaru and Agumon leap towards the screen like the dorky friends they are, which is adorable.

After the opening, Masaru and Agumon wake up floating in a white void.

Agumon:  “What is this place?”

Masaru:  “Heaven? No, of course not…”

Apparently it briefly crosses Masaru’s mind that they might have died, but then he brushes it off. No, of course not, there’s no way Masaru would have just lost like that.

Yggdrasil’s there, not even in its humanoid form that we just saw, but simply as a floating crystal. Perhaps in some ways, it doesn’t really have a true form, because its essence is simply a computer consciousness.

It’s not dead, of course. No matter how hard Masaru punched its fragile physical form, that wasn’t ever going to happen. I think Yggdrasil literally meant it last episode when it said that death doesn’t exist for a God. It’s the overarching consciousness that runs the entire Digital World; I doubt it’s even possible to destroy that.

Yggdrasil could never have been defeated or destroyed. What Masaru and his friends always needed to do was change its mind – and here it is, talking to Masaru and Agumon, because they’ve managed to achieve that.

Yggdrasil: “You two have shown me your abilities. It was indeed an enormous power, far beyond what I anticipated.”

Just like Masaru did when he managed to break Craniummon’s shield and prove humanity’s potential to him – he’s managed to prove it to Yggdrasil now, too! By punching it! Masaru always has been about communicating his feelings with his fists, hasn’t he? That’s why it took Masaru of all people to do this: not because he’s the strongest, but because of his very distinctive way of getting through to people. He’s so good at that that he’s even managed to get through to a god that was hellbent on rebooting two entire worlds.

(And it needed to be someone like Masaru, rather than someone like Tohma, to pierce through Yggdrasil’s hyper-logical worldview and teach it that things don’t always go according to calculations.)

An interesting thing to note here is that Yggdrasil’s no longer speaking like a computer and is back to using its more human-sounding androgynous voice. It dropped any pretence of not being a computer last episode when it stopped even bothering to try and sound like it cared about anybody’s interests but its own. But now that it’s accepted Masaru’s point of view and is willing to hear him out, it seems it wants to go back to pretending to be something more of a person than it really is, perhaps for the sake of making him see it in a better light. Yggdrasil’s definitely a benevolent god and not a tantrum-throwing computer, right, everyone can just forget that whole episode happened.

Yggdrasil:  “But I still don’t understand. Why do you wish to live together in one world? If the two worlds between humans and Digimon combine, more conflict may arise.”

Hyper-logical as it is, Yggdrasil still can’t quite grasp why they’re not going for the simplest, most minimally dangerous option. At its core, to begin with, it wanted to wipe out humans because they caused conflict and problems with its nice neat isolated Digital World. Even though it hypocritically allowed the conflict to escalate in order to serve its own end goal, it still can’t see why anybody would want that in and of itself.

Agumon:  “We can’t learn to appreciate each other if we’re scared of getting hurt.”

Masaru:  “Agumon…” [to Yggdrasil] “You know, ever since I met this guy, I realised that by talking with these fists of mine, I could come to understand the other person no matter who they were.”

Good old Masaru! This is getting nicely into some of the overall themes of the series, about Digimon and humans learning to get along and live in harmony despite all the strife and pain that can come from their interactions. And it fits neatly with Masaru’s philosophy of communication through fighting in general. He really did only develop that philosophy throughout this series, thanks to how he befriended Agumon at the beginning! It’s that which we have to thank for him being able to get through to Yggdrasil and solve all this in the end.

Agumon’s line also reminds me of what Masaru said to Kurata in episode 25 when decrying his cowardice – that when you fight someone, you acknowledge that doing so is going to cause pain both for them and for yourself, and you need to accept that pain instead of running away from it. Being too afraid to even get at all hurt in the first place when interacting with others is only going to lead down Kurata’s path.

It’s like Masaru was saying to Yggdrasil before punching it out, too – sometimes people hate each other and fight over stupid things, but that’s just an unavoidable part of how people work! That doesn’t mean you go erasing them all; it just means you have to learn to work with it and find a way to get along anyway.

Yggdrasil:  “I see. Then I shall lay myself to rest once more and watch over you. Whether or not a world shared among humans and Digimon becomes a reality… will depend on your abilities.”

Having been convinced that humans have enough potential to deserve a chance for harmony between them and Digimon, Yggdrasil… promptly decides it’s going to have nothing to do with actually creating that harmony itself and retreats back to its original position of noninterfering observer. Thanks, Yggdrasil. Very helpful. After all the effort Suguru went to get its help on forging this harmony between the species, it turns out Yggdrasil’s best possible stance on the subject is, “eh, don’t look at me, do it yourselves?”

Maybe it just realises that figuring out the complexities of how to resolve interpersonal conflicts is really not its wheelhouse and it wouldn’t have the first clue how to help. But of course it doesn’t want to admit that.

As to whether or not Masaru and co. actually will create that world themselves? …Well, it’s literally the final episode of the series, so it’s not like they’ve got time to do it now. It’s almost like there ought to have been a sequel series following up on this or something. If only.

Masaru:  “Hey! Wait a second!”

I like how Masaru seems indignant as Yggdrasil just up and leaves. Looks like he also feels like Yggdrasil ought to be taking more responsibility onto itself in actually helping them create this harmony and not just peacing out and leaving them to it. Of course he would.

As Yggdrasil floats away, Masaru hears Yoshino’s voice calling for him to wake up, and then suddenly he’s regaining consciousness, lying on the ground at Mount Fuji’s summit. Seems like he and Agumon were unconscious in reality while Yggdrasil was communicating with them, because it can just do that, I guess.

Tohma:  “Geez, you’re such a character.”

Yoshino:  “Don’t worry us any more, okay?”

Aww, it’s cute that they were worried. Seeing Masaru and Agumon be so close to the blinding explosion from Yggdrasil and then take longer than the rest of them to wake up certainly must have given them a fright for a minute. It doesn’t seem like they had any idea he was talking to Yggdrasil, so we can assume they weren’t doing so themselves.

Masaru:  “What happened to Yggdrasil? And the Digital World?”

Ikuto:  “It’s alright now! […] The dimensional barrier is restored!”

Falcomon:  “It looks like they were able to safely isolate it from the human world!”

Indeed, as they look up into the sky – which is now a usual Earth sunset or sunrise – they see nothing but an ordinary-sized Digital Gate, slowly closing. The barrier’s been fixed. Because Yggdrasil can just do that. It could always have done that, right from the start. This conflict was always about finding a way to change Yggdrasil’s mind so that it actually wanted to.

(No, the barrier has not been fixed due to the efforts of Ikuto’s parents; if that were the case, it would have been mentioned. Falcomon says “they”, but the Japanese sentence does not actually have a subject there. It has to be Yggdrasil who fixed it. That’s the only thing that makes any kind of sense.)

Dukemon:  “This is thanks to all of you. […] Your Digisouls… have awoken a miracle!”

I’m going to assume that by “miracle”, Dukemon means changing Yggdrasil’s mind, which does indeed seem pretty miraculous to me. It makes less sense that the power of humanity’s Digisouls would just somehow magically have fixed the barrier on its own.

Craniummon: “You were magnificent, Daimon Masaru. You are without a doubt our true saviour!”

That’s a little bit overplaying it, Craniummon. Yeah, it all centred on Masaru in the end, but it was really just him happening to be the right kind of guy in the right place at the right time to communicate all of humanity’s emotions and power to Yggdrasil.

The Royal Knights zoom away into the Digital Gate before it closes, back to their own world. Hopefully they’re going to start thinking for themselves more when it comes to protecting it, now that their god’s gone back into a dormant state.

A helicopter arrives at the top of Mount Fuji. Satsuma, Miki and Megumi have gone and rounded up the loved ones of everyone who was just here fighting, so that they can all have a big reunion now that everything’s over.

Ikuto’s parents are the first to leave the helicopter. Ikuto stares at them with tears in his eyes – this is the first time he’s seen them since he left for the Digital World to fight Kurata, back in episode 27. He rushes into his dad’s arms (because his mom’s got her hands full with his baby sister).

Ikuto:  “Dad… Mom… I’m home!”

Kenji:  “Welcome home, Ikuto.”

These are those Japanese family phrases that Kenji taught him just before he left in episode 27! Ikuto’s finally getting to use them! Aww.

Relena’s the next out; she manages a few steps out of her wheelchair to hug her big brother.

Tohma:  “Relena…”

Relena:  “Thank goodness, Brother… I’m so glad you’re all right!”

Tohma:  “I’m sorry for worrying you, Relena.”

Aww, Relena must have been so worried about her brother, out there fighting to save the world, especially because she hasn’t even met all of the friends he has to fight alongside, other than Gaomon.

Also, this is the first time there’s been a Norstein family moment with any of the rest of the DATS crew around. Though it’s not focused on, Masaru must be watching this and seeing for the first time that Tohma has a little sister, just like him! It’s almost a shame that we never got to have any of Masaru’s thoughts on Tohma’s family situation, given how delightfully parallel their families are. But then, I suppose that might be because the Norsteins are probably all actually speaking to each other in German, so Masaru wouldn’t be able to interact with that. Still, even if he doesn’t understand their words, I’m sure he can see that this is Tohma’s little sister all right.

Tohma:  “Father…”

Franz:  “Thank you, Tohma.”

Tohma:  “Yes, Dad.”

This is Tohma calling his father Dad for the first time! Or, the first time since he tried to as a little kid the day they left Japan and his father brushed him off. After their reconciliation in episode 42, and then this dangerous situation in which they must both have been afraid they’d never see each other again, it seems that was just enough to break down the barrier between them and make Tohma finally feel comfortable calling him that.

Yushima, Miki and Megumi also reunite with their Digimon partners, who were up here trying to help hold the worlds apart.

Gotsumon:  “It sure is great that everything worked out!”

Yoshino:  “What are you doing here?”

Gotsumon:  “Hey! Hey, don’t say that! I did my best, too!”

Yes, Gotsumon, you definitely helped out loads. To be fair to him, he did contribute as much as any of the non-main Digimon, but it is very him to flail in indignation when he’s treated like he wasn’t actually that important. I do kinda get the sense that this reborn Gotsumon awkwardly wishes he was more of a part of this group’s camaraderie than he knows he actually is. Which, hey, progress? I think?

Chika’s had Kudamon in her arms since Dukemon brought him up here, and now she hands him back to Satsuma so that he can take his rightful place around his partner’s neck. Satsuma has his weaselscarf back!

Sayuri’s the last person to leave the helicopter. Chika rushes to hug her.

Chika:  “I’m sorry for making you worry!”

Sayuri:  “It’s all right. I believed that Masaru and Agu-chan would protect you.”

Aww, at least Chika knows how much her mom worries about her being in danger and knew that going off to fight with Piyomon would definitely make her do that. And of course Sayuri coped by holding onto the belief that Masaru and Agumon would be able to keep them safe. She’s so good and brave.

Masaru doesn’t approach his mom, looking hesitant. There’s some bad news he needs to give her, and it’s not easy for him to bring it up.

Masaru:  “Mom… I…”

Sayuri:  “Masaru?”

Masaru:  “I’m sorry. I couldn’t keep my promise. I couldn’t bring Dad back with me.”

Aaa, Masaruuu. It’s heartbreaking how he can only bring himself to phrase this as not keeping his promise and not bringing his dad back. That way it’s more like that same old status quo of his dad simply Not Being There, and he doesn’t have to think about the fact that his dad died protecting both worlds (let alone the fact that it was Masaru himself who killed him).

Sayuri:  “I was prepared for that. That man… Suguru-san has become the wind blowing through the Digital World. Even if we can’t see him, I’m sure he’ll always be watching over us from the other world.”

Even without Masaru saying it, Sayuri knows what he means – that her husband didn’t make it. Despite what she’d said in previous episodes that she believed Masaru would bring Suguru back, it seems she also remained realistic about his chances of doing so and prepared herself for the worst as well. She’s able to frame it in this lovely way immediately, as a comfort to herself but even more importantly as a comfort to her kids, because she knows they must need it. Man, she’s so good, I love her.

Sayuri and Chika step forward and hug Masaru. He stands there and accepts it, but doesn’t hug back, not admitting that he needs it. Come on, Masaru, you stubborn idiot, hug your mom, it’s okay, you’ve been through so much.

Except, never mind all that, as a voice suddenly calls out to them – and it’s Suguru, alive and well and back in his own body, striding towards them. Masaru’s eyes widen in amazed disbelief as he realises who it is.

I love the desperate, stumbling way Masaru rushes towards him here, like he’s so overcome with relief he can barely contain himself.

Masaru:  “You’re really… You’re really my dad, right?”

Aaaaa, after having been wrong about it before and had to suffer the horrible pain that brought, Masaru wants to make absolutely sure he’s not getting it wrong again and this really isn’t too good to be true.

Suguru:  “Yeah. The one and only yours truly.”

Man, look at Suguru’s big dorky smile and over-the-top phrasing about simply being himself. Again, can you see where Masaru gets it from.

Masaru:  “But… how…?”

Suguru:  “Yggdrasil restored me to life.”

Because Yggdrasil’s a god, so it can just do that! But really, though. I’m sure some people might find Suguru’s sudden revival to be cheap, but I personally don’t mind it at all. Aside from anything else, I think it makes decent sense in-universe as something Yggdrasil might do. Now that it’s become less up itself and has acknowledged humanity’s worth, it’s probably done some reflection and realised that it really, really screwed over Suguru in particular throughout all of this. Suguru wouldn’t have died if not for all of Yggdrasil’s actions – and also, Suguru’s one of the best people to keep around if we want to try and forge that world of harmony between humans and Digimon. Yggdrasil must have figured that the least it can do is make up for one of its biggest mistakes and give Suguru his life back.

Anyway, Chika also approaches her dad and stares up at him in utter wonder. This is the first time in her life that she’s ever seen him, as himself, here and real and alive rather than as some legendary fantasy in her head.

Suguru:  “Chika! You’ve sure grown big.”

Suguru kneels down and ruffles her hair while saying this, the same thing he also said to Masaru two episodes ago when he was still a lion. He hasn’t seen his kids in ten years; he must be bursting with pride and emotion to get to see them having grown so much bigger and stronger without him.

Chika:  “Dad… Dad! Dad!”

Chika breaks into happy tears at this simple gesture alone. She finally has a dad now, like she’s been missing and desperately waiting for all this time. Aaaa.

Suguru:  “Sayuri… I’ve caused you to worry.”

Sayuri:  “Don’t leave us any more, okay?”

Suguru:  “Yeah, I promise.”

Sayuriii. It’s so understated, but she’s on the verge of tears here, too, finally letting herself express how she feels about her husband’s disappearance – and she just doesn’t want him to disappear on her ever again.

I love the Daimon family so much and it warms my heart to get to see them happy and reunited like this. They deserve it, dammit, sanctity of narrative consequences be damned.

But, see, I also don’t personally feel that Suguru coming back here particularly cheapens the moment of his death in any way. Back when that happened in episode 46, both Suguru and Masaru absolutely believed it would be permanent, so all of the emotions they felt at the time were still just as raw and real. That doesn’t change just because he comes back here. I still enjoy that part of episode 46 just as much, even knowing Suguru’s not actually going to stay dead.

And while this might seem a little unnecessary in that it’s not like the writers had to bring Suguru back because there’s hardly any series left for him to do anything in anyway (alas, that hypothetical sequel, of which we can only dream), I do think there is actually a very specific reason why they needed to have Suguru back in the Daimon family in order for the rest of this episode to work as they’d intended it. More on that later on.

Suguru:  “We’ll always be together from now on.”

Well, I say they’re happily reunited, but, uhhhh, about that.

As the Digital Gate in the sky closes up, we cut to some time later. Probably quite a while later, based on the fact that the DATS HQ is in the process of being rebuilt and is functioning again on the lower levels, including the main control room. Everything seems to be gradually getting back to normal, with all the destruction slowly being repaired. (I gather that Japan in particular is good at rebuilding things quickly, thanks to all the earthquakes they get.)

Masaru:  “What? You’re closing the Digital Gate?”

Specifically, everyone’s gathered for this announcement. It’s a bit of a weird way for Masaru to phrase it, since it’s not like there’s any Digital Gates open right now that need to be closed, but what it really means is that very soon they’re not going to be opening any more Digital Gates for travel between the two worlds at all.

Satsuma:  “The dimensional barrier has been restored, and all of the people who had disappeared have returned.”

Remember those missing people other than Ikuto who were part of the reason the expedition happened ten years ago? Because I would not remotely blame you if you didn’t. Apparently they… somehow…? came back home??? It’s honestly rather silly that the writers felt the need to clean up that loose end that never mattered and that nobody would even remember or care about if not reminded of it here, in a way that’s just never explained. It’d be better to just not mention it and have us passively assume that all the other missing people must have died in the Digital World.

Satsuma:  “But that does not change the fact that its condition is still unstable. That’s why we’ve decided to close the Gate for some time.”

This seems fair as a reason to not have any inter-world contact for a while. The barrier needs time to heal itself, and while the Digital Dive machine is a cleaner way to open Gates than the space-time bombs, it’s probably still not a great idea to go opening Gates everywhere while the barrier’s still fragile. Don’t want another repeat of the dimensional collision that we nearly had.

Tohma:  “For how long?”

Yushima:  “We don’t know. Maybe for a year or ten years… Perhaps it’ll stay closed forever.”

NO, it will not!!! There are plenty of people here who will make absolutely sure that it does not stay this way forever and gets opened again sometime in the future, thank you very much!!!!! Yushima, why are you being so chill about maybe never seeing your turtle friend ever again, come on.

Masaru:  “Then, what’s gonna happen? What about our promise to create a world that humans and Digimon can share together?”

Exactly! It’s such unfortunate timing that, right after this fight with Yggdrasil in which Masaru and friends fervently insisted that Digimon and humans can and should live together, they now have to go and separate the two worlds for a long while for the sake of dimensional safety.

As this discussion has been going on, the camera’s been panning out to show us that the humans and the Digimon partners are standing in two separate groups on either side of the room.

Agumon:  “Um… Actually, there’s something we’d like to discuss with you about that.”

It seems like the Digimon must have been told about this earlier by themselves, if they’ve already come to a decision on what to do about it. They’re here, awkwardly separate from their partners, to break the news to them - the news that they want to return to the Digital World.

Gotsumon:  “For us, we’ve just lost our God. Everyone’s upset and confused.”

Falcomon:  “That’s why we’d like to help rebuild the Digital World!”

Gotsumon’s statement that this is about them having lost their God is a bit silly, because most Digimon didn’t even seem to know that Yggdrasil existed, and it’s not like Yggdrasil ever actually did anything helpful for Digimon-kind in general, did it. But it’s true that all of the Digimon must be upset and confused right now, not because of Yggdrasil, but because of having recently endured a genocide followed by an apocalypse, the reasons for which most of them wouldn’t even understand.

The Digimon partners need to go to the Digital World to explain what happened and act as spokespeople on behalf of humanity. There’s probably still an awful lot of hatred and prejudice about humans floating around in the Digital World right now, thanks to Kurata’s awfulness, so someone needs to spread the word among Digimon that that was only one human and most humans are much better than that.

…Much like the human members of DATS are also going to need to be doing in their world on behalf of the Digimon, since most humans probably still think Digimon are horrible vicious invaders like Kurata insisted they were.

Lalamon:  “We believe that in the near future, there will truly be a time when humans and Digimon can live together. That’s why…”

That’s why Savers deserved to have a sequel! Everyone keeps stressing their desire to create this world where the two species can live in harmony, but it’s not happening yet! Everything’s still a mess of confusion and pain and prejudice after all that’s happened, and it’d be so good to be able to actually see all of our friends here try and rebuild things from the ashes and eventually reach a point where the worlds can be together again. All of this talk is quite possibly the biggest most obvious sequel hook any end to a Digimon series has given, and it makes me so sad that we’ll never have that.

Masaru:  “That’s why what?!”

Agumon:  “A-Aniki…”

Masaru in particular is not happy to hear that his best friend and partner’s planning to just up and leave like that. Never mind that he’s got a good reason for it; Masaru doesn’t want this!

We cut straight to Harbour View Park, where Masaru punches Agumon to the ground. He brought him right to this special place where they first met each other, and he’s going to communicate to Agumon exactly how much pain he’s feeling about this decision, through his fists!

Masaru:  “What’s this crap about leaving? You traitor!”

Aaaaa, Masaruuu, it’s heartbreaking that he feels that Agumon leaving like this is a betrayal. Wasn’t Agumon supposed to be his follower, who’d go anywhere with him and always fight by his side?

Agumon:  “You can punch me all you want… But I’ve already made up my mind!”

Masaru:  “And I’m saying that’s too selfish of you! I thought of you as if you were my little brother… So why…?!”

Masaru! He really is Agumon’s aniki – which, remember, can mean big brother – and that means Agumon really has always been like a little brother to him! Masaru’s assuming here that Agumon must not have any particular feelings about leaving him for the Digital World – but, still, he feels it’s selfish of Agumon to not be considering how he feels about having to say goodbye to his best friend and brother possibly forever! Aaaaaa.

Agumon:  “Even I…!”

[he gets to his feet and punches Masaru in the face]

Agumon:  “Even I want to stay with you forever, Aniki!”

But of course Agumon has painful feelings about this, too! Of course he doesn’t want to have to leave his aniki any more than Masaru wants him to leave! Masaru must have not realised this until now due to the way Agumon was trying to hide it, because he’s made up his mind anyway and so it’s hard to think about that part – but of course he’s hurting just as much. He delivers a punch of his own to Masaru here to communicate that pain of his right back. They’re both hurting, equally, over this.

Masaru:  “Then…! Then why don’t you just stay here?!”

Agumon:  “I *can’t*!”

Masaru stares at Agumon in surprise at that, having not realised this could be a matter of Agumon not feeling like he really has a choice in this.

Agumon:  “The Gate is going to close. There won’t be any more Digimon incidents. So what’ll that make me? I’ll just be one big *nuisance* who spends his entire time sleeping and getting fat on Sayuri’s fried eggs!”

AGUMON. Aaaaaa. You were never a nuisance in the Daimon family! It’s so heartbreaking that he feels like he doesn’t properly belong in the human world, and in a human family, if there aren’t any more Digimon for him to fight.

But as heartbreaking as that is, it is understandable. This whole time he’s been here, there has kind of been this DATS-centric framing of “he’s here to help Masaru fight Digimon”, so Agumon may have internalised that more than he should have. And even if he looks beyond that… it’s still going to feel really weird and alienating for him, being stuck as the only Digimon in a human world that he doesn’t understand that well. He must have given it a lot of thought and realised that… he really couldn’t do that. Even if it means having to say goodbye to Aniki.

Masaru:  “Agumon…”

Masaru seems taken aback. I don’t think he ever realised that his follower had been feeling that way about this, either. Aaaa.

Agumon:  “I can’t forget the days I fought together with you. I…! I want to keep having adventures with you, Aniki!”

Look at poor Agumon in tears over this. Of course he wants to be able to keep having fun fighty times together with his aniki! But… you just can’t get those in a human world where no more Digimon are going to show up.

Masaru:  “Well…! Even I…! Even I want to be with you! I want to keep running wild with you everywhere until I die!!!”

Masaruuu! He lurches forward with desperate emotion as he says this, a glint of tears visible in his eyes too, just for a split-second. Of course both of these fighty dorks just want to keep fighting things and having adventures together forever. It’s not fair on them that they seem to be getting forced into a situation where that’s not going to be possible any more.

The sky, which has been gloomily overcast all day to match the mood, breaks out into some Anime Sads Rain for the last time, to punctuate the moment. Something about that seems to make Masaru stop protesting and miserably accept it, as much as he hates it.

Masaru:  “Go to the Digital World. This world is too small for you. Go back to the world you belong in.”

Masaru’s voice sounds bitter and angry here – and it is, because he’s in so much pain over this and he doesn’t know how to express that properly – but this is also said out of kindness and consideration to Agumon. He must realise that Agumon would be better off in the Digital World, where there’s fights and adventures, and then at least one of them will be happier. Part of that bitterness in his tone must be out of jealousy at the fact that Agumon has this world he belongs in, while Masaru doesn’t.

(And yet, as he says this, perhaps it’s starting to cross his mind that… maybe the human world’s too small for him, too.)

Agumon:  “Aniki…”

Agumon must be upset that his aniki can’t bring himself to accept this and say any kind of goodbye in a less painful and bitter way than this. After a long pause, he turns and walks away, sobbing quietly to himself, leaving Masaru there alone on his hands and knees in anguish.

Aaaaaaa, these friends, this scene breaks my heart every time, I love it.

Elsewhere, Tohma’s watching the Anime Sads Rain outside his mansion window, also sharing that same mood, when Gaomon brings him a cup of tea. He takes a sip, and…

Tohma:  “This is…”

Gaomon:  “It’s an original blend. I call it ‘Our Vow to Meet Again’.”

GAOMON, what an absolute sweetheart, I love him. Look at his shy little blush and tail wag as he says it, too! I assume he also left the recipe for this new blend with Tohma so that his master can keep drinking it in his absence and thinking of the day they’ll meet again, aww.

Gaomon:  “My Master…! Is no-one else but you.”

Gaaah, the way Gaomon blurts that out, out of nowhere, and then just stands there staring up at him for a long moment. He’s such a good loyal dog. He says he’s not a dog, but he is. Best dog.

In an arcade out in town, Yoshino and Lalamon are having one last night out, like the regular friends and sisters they are. Lalamon fiercely bashes one of those arcade machines that test your punching strength. Now that Digimon are a known thing, she can actually be out of her Digivice and joining in! There’s a bunch of other people there watching, but none of them are batting an eye at the presence of a Digimon here. Good signs for the future!

Lalamon then insists Yoshino has a go too, and she punches her palm as she prepares. She’s clearly taking a leaf out of Masaru’s book; embrace your inner banchou, Yoshino!

…In fact, she gets so into it that she accidentally summons her Digisoul, and we know how much that can power up a punch. She ends up breaking the machine. Oops. The furious arcade owner kicks her and Lalamon out into the Anime Sads Rain that’s still going on.

Yoshino:  “That sure surprised me! I’ll have to apologise to them later.”

Lalamon:  “But… it made me feel a bit relieved. Because you’ve become stronger.”

Yoshino:  “That’s not true, Lalamon.”

Aww, come on, Yoshino, of course it is. Though it hurts that Yoshino’s still being too hard on herself, I love that Lalamon can see this, and that she’s thinking about Yoshino’s growth, on this final day before they have to part ways. (Guhhh, they’ve known each other and been together every day for over a decade.)

Lalamon:  “You’re not the Yoshino who couldn’t play piano by herself any more. Even if I go back to the Digital World, I can keep singing the song you gave me.”

Lalamon still really cares about that song that brought them together, and is thinking of what it means for Yoshino that she’s so much stronger now than she was on that day they met! Lalamon really has been the catalyst for all of Yoshino’s growth. Aww.

Out of nowhere, upon hearing this, Yoshino pulls Lalamon into a big hug, to her yelp of surprise. Aaa, they are FRIENDS.

Miki and Megumi are still at the DATS HQ, polishing their PawnChessmon’s armour and thanking them for everything.

Miki:  “I wish we had more time to hang out… Then we could’ve gone to the hot springs, or karaoke…”

Megumi:  “How about we do that now?”

Miki:  “Seriously?”

Megumi:  “Yeah! The night is young!”

Aww, they’re also gonna go have one last night out with their partners, now that they can actually hang out of their Digivices and join in! I’d sure love to see the PawnChessmon do karaoke. (…The joke is that they’re mute.)

Satsuma crosses paths with Miki and Megumi as they leave the control room and he enters. He sits down in his command seat, perhaps just for old times’ sake, and Kudamon settles around his neck.

Satsuma:  “You’re here.”

Kudamon:  “This place relaxes me the most.”

Satsuma:  “Me too.”

Aww, Kudamon. He likes being a scarf! Satsuma likes him being a scarf! They are good scarf friends.

[Satsuma chuckles]

Kudamon:  “So even you can laugh.”

Also look at Kudamon affectionately ribbing Satsuma for being so serious all the time. The same could be said for you, too, Kudamon, you super-serious Royal Knight, you.

Somewhere outside, the full moon overhead, Yushima’s sharing some kind of alcohol with Kamemon, and also Gotsumon. I guess nobody else wanted to awkwardly include Gotsumon in their heartfelt goodbye moments, but Yushima’s got him covered. He’s chill enough for that.

Yushima:  “What a beautiful moon.”

Kamemon:  “It is. But tonight is the last time we can see the moon like this.”

Kamemon’s being more talkative than usual! Perhaps it’s because he’s (almost) alone with Yushima – or perhaps it’s just that Yushima’s getting him drunk, which might make him a bit less shy.

Yushima:  “Kamemon. Sometimes the moon looks as if it’s changed shape, but it really stays circular all the time. Come back any time. I’ll always be waiting.”

In true Yushima fashion, he gets across his feelings in a metaphor. Something something things may seem different on the surface but they actually don’t fundamentally change underneath, so their bond will always be the same even if they’re far apart? Something like that.

Out on a pylon overlooking the city, Ikuto and Falcomon are sitting up there like the birds they are. (Most of the city is covered in scaffolding, as one would expect; there’s a lot of rebuilding to be done.)

Falcomon:  “A lot of things have happened to us.”

Ikuto:  “Too many things.”

They sure have, for these two in particular. It’s nice that they’ve finally got this quiet moment together to reflect and process it all.

Ikuto:  “Falcomon. I’ll go back to the Digital World, too. I’ll make a new Digital World together with everyone else!”

Oh, Ikuto. Of course he’d want to do that and go and help with the restoration over there; it’s his home, much more than the human world is. But even as he says this, he’s kind of subdued about it – I think he realises on some level that, as much as he wants to, he can’t actually do this.

Falcomon:  “You can’t, Ikuto. What about your mom and dad? Your family was finally able to welcome you back home.”

Falcomon gets it, even though it’s not his family. Poor Misuzu would not be able to deal with Ikuto disappearing on her again, and none of them want to put her through that. It’s heartbreaking that Falcomon has to be the one to voice it, even though Ikuto knows that just as well and has much more of an actual connection to the Noguchis than Falcomon does.

Ikuto:  “But I… I’m family with Falcomon, too! I don’t want to say goodbye!”

But of course he is, and of course he doesn’t, and aaaa. Ikuto breaks into tears as he says this, which sets Falcomon off too, and the two of them just lean against each other and sob. Gahhhh, they’re just kids, and they’ve been together their whole lives, and now they have no choice but to say goodbye for who knows how long and this is heartbreaking.

The next morning, it’s time for the final Digital Dive for the Digimon, and (almost) everyone has gathered in the DATS control room. Chika is hugging Piyomon with one last tearful goodbye. (Piyomon seems kind of low-key about returning the gesture, which makes me suspect that he still didn’t consciously remember everything and is only going off his affection for her in this one most recent life.) Even Sayuri and Suguru came to see the Digimon off. But Masaru’s not there.

Tohma:  “He must not want to say goodbye.”

Oh, Masaru. That would indeed be a very plausible reason as to why he’s not here. He is not good at big displays of heartfelt emotion, at least not when those emotions are painful and negative, and it would be very him to not want to do that in front of everyone else. Even while alone with Agumon, he could still only manage to express those emotions through punching him.

Agumon:  “Stupid Aniki.”

Poor Agumon, knowing that his aniki’s stubbornness and difficulty with this sort of thing means they won’t even get a proper goodbye, aaa. He’s acting bitter and annoyed about it on the surface, but you know he must really be hurting a lot.

Megumi:  “Co-ordinate axes are set!”

Miki:  “Cooling of transmission equipment on! Bionic Condenser functioning!”

Megumi:  “Digital Harmoniser aligning! Security open!”

Miki and Megumi have given this whole Digital Gate opening spiel a bunch of times in the earlier episodes. But this time, it hits different, because you can hear the pain in their voices as they’re doing this, knowing that they’re sending their friends away for who knows how long.

But just as the swirling energy begins to descend through the Dive chamber, before it can warp anyone away—

Masaru:  “WAIT JUST A MINUTE!”

Masaru shows up at the door with a massive backpack on his back. I love how this instantly makes it clear exactly what he is planning to do. This is why he was missing, not because he didn’t want to say goodbye. Or, well, effectively yes – precisely because he didn’t want to have to say goodbye, so he’s not going to!

Agumon:  “Aniki!”

Agumon sounds thrilled to see him; he must also have immediately realised exactly what this means, as Masaru excitedly bounds right up to him in the Dive chamber.

Masaru:  “Like hell I’ll ever say goodbye! I’m going to the Digital World with you!”

Oh, Masaru. He must have spent a horrible sleepless night last night agonising over the fact he’ll have to say goodbye to Agumon for an unknown amount of time. Of course he eventually found himself landing on the simplest, most straightforward, most Masaru solution to that problem. No, actually. Screw that goodbye. Screw the normal thing that’s expected of him in this situation. He doesn’t have to do that at all.

This human world is too small for Agumon, with his boisterous fighty ways – and hey, doesn’t that also mean it’s too small for Masaru, too? Way back in episode 2, Yushima cryptically told Masaru pretty much exactly that, and that in “the Digimon’s world” he’d find plenty of opponents to fight to his heart’s content. At the time, by “the Digimon’s world”, he meant DATS, but that was also very definitely foreshadowing this outcome in the ending!

The BGM that kicks in around here is also one I like a lot for this moment; it’s upbeat and kinda gives this sense of “yeah, we’re going on an adventure!”

Tohma:  “Hold it!”

Yoshino:  “Who knows when you can come back if you go now!”

Masaru:  “Who cares! I’m gonna enjoy travelling through the Digital World no matter how long it takes!”

Of course Masaru refuses to let himself care about a little thing like never seeing the human world (or his family) again for who knows how long if he does this. He’s focusing on the good things about this – that he gets to stay with Agumon, and keep having fun fighty adventures! No need to worry about any of the downsides when there’s that!

Suguru:  “Masaru! Go!”

Sayuri:  “Dear!”

Suguru:  “Go there and polish up your manliness!”

Of course Suguru – also known as the man who willingly chose to stay in the Digital World indefinitely when he could have gone home, because he knew that going home meant he might never be allowed back there – would be on board with this choice. This is pretty much exactly the same kind of thing that he did; in some ways he must be thrilled to see Masaru making a similar choice and following in his footsteps. And of course he’d see it as a way for Masaru to hone his manliness, what a dork.

(And yet, Masaru’s not even really doing this for dad-complex reasons at all – if this were more about his dad, he’d be wanting to stay at home with him and actually get to be a family again! But never having to say goodbye to Agumon is even more important to him than that, aaa. Or maybe it’s not quite that Agumon is even more important to him than his dad, but just that he’s used to his dad not being there, and so continuing to not be around him doesn’t feel like a bad thing, whereas not being with Agumon is.)

(And consider that Masaru’s going to the Digital World, where his dad’s built up this impossibly-awesome legacy of great feats, so in a way Masaru’s just going to keep on chasing after his dad’s unreachable, eternally-absent back. That’s not why he did this, but that sure is a position he’s put himself in again, hee.)

But, ouch, looks like the Daimon family is not going to be properly reunited for a while after all, despite what they said in that earlier scene. Masaru clearly did not take any time to inform his family of this choice of his and has just suddenly dropped this bombshell on them right now. Still, his dad’s back at home, so they’ll be fine without him, right? They don’t need Masaru to be the replacement father figure any more.

…This is why I think Suguru needed to come back to life. The writers were obviously planning this ending with Masaru leaving for the Digital World right from the beginning of the series – see it being foreshadowed in episode 2 – so they needed it to be possible for Masaru to choose this. And if his dad had actually remained dead, and the family had been left fatherless for good, I don’t think Masaru would have been able to cause his mom and sister the additional heartbreak of losing him on top of that. Not when he feels like he needs to be the protector of the family in his dad’s absence.

But this? It’s still going to hurt them to lose Masaru, but at least with Suguru back, it won’t be quite so unbearable, and so Masaru’s just about able to make that sacrifice, for Agumon’s sake. It’s not that he doesn’t realise this is going to make his mom and sister sad – of course he does. But… Agumon.

Of course, it’s not like it’s not going to hurt Masaru to be apart from his family for ages, either! But in true eternally-optimistic Masaru fashion, he’s not gonna let himself think about that, now that he’s made up his mind to make that sacrifice anyway. He absolutely didn’t gloss over that when making his decision; I’m sure he must have known and thought about exactly what he was giving up. I drew a post-ending comic exploring this idea once.

And really… just like Agumon, Masaru also doesn’t belong in an ordinary human world with no Digimon incidents. He never truly did. He’s found his calling in life, and like hell he’s gonna let that go and go back to a boring normal human life just because the main adventure’s over and everything’s telling him he’s supposed to. Since when did Masaru ever listen to what the world tells him he’s supposed to do?

I love Masaru. He’s always so gloriously himself at all times, and this final choice of his exemplifies that wonderfully.

Masaru:  “Let’s go, Agumon! You and I will always be together!”

Agumon:  “Aniki!”

Agumon is so thrilled. The happiest Agumon ever! He’s never ever going to have to say goodbye to his Aniki!!! They are FRIENDS I love them so much.

Because it’ll take me far away!

And then, instead of the usual uninteresting ending song, we get an actual epilogue of content over a different insert song, which is in fact the first opening! Isn’t this first lyric just perfect? Masaru’s being taken away by his fighting spirit, all the way into the Digital World. That’s always what the first opening song was foreshadowing, too. I love it.

The song’s upbeat gung-ho mood also just gives a great uplifting feeling throughout the whole epilogue, which I enjoy.

It's several years later, and Ikuto, in middle school uniform, is meeting Chika at her door in the morning to go to school with her. They’re the same age, so they’d be in the same school year! Seems like the Noguchis moved to someplace in the city, so that Ikuto could be around Chika and get used to human life and school stuff in the presence of somebody he knows. That must have been helpful for him; I can’t imagine a wild, feisty kid like him would have adjusted well to being at school without at least someone there on his side.

Inside the house, Suguru’s just there on the sofa, reading a newspaper and watching the news, being a normal dad! I’m sure he must have still been working as a Digimon scientist all this time, though, publishing his research and generally spreading the word among humans as to what Digimon are really like, to prepare for whenever the Gate will be opened again. The Daimons are definitely not going to let it stay closed forever, not when that means they’d never see Masaru ever again, never mind the Digimon.

Tohma is on the news, having just won the Nobel Prize in Medicine. The text on the news screen mentions that he’s nineteen years old – oh my god it’s been five years, Masaru’s been off in the Digital World for that long. (Hah, he skipped the rest of school. Sneaky of him.)

Tohma:  “May it restore hope to many people who shared the same illness as my sister.”

Based on this, we can assume that Tohma did manage to cure his sister’s illness! Look at him go! An older Relena is there at the awards ceremony next to him, looking much healthier, beaming with pride at her brother’s achievements.

Also Tohma wears glasses now, which only serves to make him look like even more of a dork.

At a police station, Yoshino’s working there as an officer along with Miki and Megumi, discussing the news about Tohma with them. Satsuma, their boss, coughs pointedly at their distraction, so Yoshino heads out on patrol. Satsuma’s gone back to his old job! And it seems like he put in a good word for Miki, Megumi and Yoshino, so that they could get themselves a job in this Digimon-free world. Yoshino was always pretty good at all the logistical investigation stuff that DATS required; she’d make a good police officer.

She drives past Ikuto and Chika on their way to school, and then finds herself chasing after Kouki – the only one of the Bio-Hybrids we didn’t see praying for the world’s survival earlier in the episode – for his crime of not wearing a helmet on a motorbike. Hey, if Kouki wants to go and recklessly endanger his own life like that, I say let him, no big loss.

Chika and Ikuto pass by Yushima, doing some fishing on a bridge. I guess he’s old enough that he simply retired, and has become a mysterious fisherman full time? Perhaps.

And then. And then.

As the music dies down, we cut to the Digital World, to a gang fight between two different groups of Digimon, squabbling over turf. Just as the fight’s about to break out…

Masaru:  “Wait wait wait! Those who disturb the peace in the Digital World… this street fighter, Daimon Masaru-sama, won’t forgive you!”

…the music kicks back in, and we see Masaru and Agumon up on a cliff, ready to step in and keep the peace – by fighting, of course! These two dorks have clearly settled firmly into their role as protectors and peacekeepers of the Digital World, fighting anyone who’s looking for trouble and getting through to them with their fists.

(Also, a neat detail – Masaru’s still in the same clothes he came here in, but they’re all ragged around the edges, as you’d expect when he’s been wearing them out in the wilderness for five years now.)

Masaru:  “Let’s go, Agumon!”

Agumon:  “Yeah!”

With this declaration, and with one last line of Because it’ll take me far away! from the song, the two best fighty dorks leap into the fray, and the series ends right there. I love them. I love it. Best, most uplifting ending. Look at them go.

Overall thoughts

Have you noticed how in these summary bits, as positive as I’ve usually been, I’ve never called any episode my absolute favourite one? That’s because this episode is my absolute favourite single episode in Savers! A lot of others have individual scenes I like more, but this is my favourite episode overall, because all of it is just so good. There’s barely a dull moment, Feelings abound everywhere, and I always come out of it feeling just so delightfully happy. I love Savers.

While the fighting in the previous episode I was kind of eh about, I really enjoy this as a final fight scene! It’s fun and upbeat and gives a neat send-off to most of the lower evolution stages and really exemplifies Masaru’s Masaru-ness one last time. It actually makes sense that all of humanity’s Digisoul would spur an eleventh-hour superpower, I love that said power is still Agumon, and it’s so fitting that it takes all of those emotions and Masaru’s very distinct brand of communication-through-fists to finally get through to Yggdrasil and change its mind.

Then we can spend the bulk of this episode on giving a send-off to the characters and their relationships with each other, and all of it is lovely. Seeing everyone be so happy to see each other safe again after the danger is so sweet, especially the Daimons, god they deserve to finally have Suguru back and get to be a family again, I love the Daimons so much.

And then the goodbyes tug at my heartstrings in the most wonderful way. All of them (Gaomon’s tea!!!), but of course especially Masaru and Agumon’s – the heartbreaking fact that Agumon feels he’s a nuisance in the Daimon family, and the extremely Masaru way that they can’t express their pain at saying goodbye through anything other than punching each other, aaaaa.

The epilogue is great, too! Tohma curing his sister, Suguru being a dad, Chika and Ikuto being schoolmates, Yoshino being a police officer. There’s all sorts of stuff that could be done with them from these new lives they’re leading after the five-year gap, if only there’d been a sequel like the writers were obviously trying to hook us into. Gahhh, there needs to be a sequel. Savers deserved a sequel. Literally the only thing wrong with this ending is that there will never be one.

But the absolute best thing is MASARU GOING WITH AGUMON TO THE DIGITAL WORLD, I love him so much. It’s the best subversion of all the usual obligatory heartbreaking Digimon endings where the humans and Digimon have to part ways Just Because and nobody gets to say otherwise. It’s so delightfully Masaru for him to just decide, screw that. He never really belonged in the human world either, and he doesn’t have to stay there. And I love that the narrative lets him! It lets him go off and live the life of fighty adventures he’s most suited for, instead of forcing him to go back to his normal boring human life and learn to be the Normal Person that he never was in the first place. It really epitomises the great way in which Savers has handled Masaru’s entire character.

See, I think a lot of fictional narratives – especially shows aimed at children – would take a boisterous, fighty kid like Masaru and put him through a character arc that pushes him to be less like that and more like a normal person, presenting that change as if it were a good thing. But Savers does none of that. It never once tries to tell Masaru that he’s wrong for being the way he is, just because it happens to not fit the world he lives in. All his arc does is refine that nature of his to make it less aimless and more focused on communication and emotions and having a meaningful impact on people. Maybe it’s my neurodivergence speaking, but I really really love the way that Savers’ narrative allows Masaru to keep being unabashedly himself, no matter what, right up until the very end.

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Masaru - Sincerity

I know what some people are thinking: "Masaru should be Courage because he's the main protagonist!" - but here's the thing. Courage is doing a thing despite being afraid of it. Masaru is technically almost never courageous, because he's more afraid of not fighting than he is of fighting and possibly getting hurt, no matter how insanely powerful the enemy is.

So why Sincerity? This crest is all about being thoroughly, unashamedly yourself no matter what, never beating around the bush or bothering with superficial, shallow nonsense. And if you think about it for a moment, that's Masaru to a T. He's straightforward and simple-minded, always speaking and acting exactly how he feels. His tendency to want to FIGHT EVERYTHING EVER is simply because from his perspective that's the purest, most no-nonsense way of dealing with a problem, and no matter how many times other people tell him he's being ridiculous and overzealous, he doesn't change this part of himself for anyone. This trait is also a significant part of Masaru's deeply-rooted concept of manliness, which has very little to do with gender and isn't really about physical strength either. It's more about the way you act, sticking to your convictions no matter what life throws at you.

It's implied that before he met Agumon, Masaru really was more obsessed with superficial physical strength and fighting people just to shallowly prove that he's "the strongest". Throughout the series, not only does he learn that there's more to real strength than that, but he says that after meeting Agumon he realised that fighting people can be a way to get to understand each other, to learn who they truly are and show them who you truly are and how you really feel. It would have taken nothing less than that to convince a god to change its mind about destroying the world.

Tohma - Love

Everything about Tohma is shaped by either his love for members of his family or by him feeling unloved by other members of his family. He deeply misses his deceased mother and the warm, loving, home they had, which is starkly contrasted by the cold formality of his father's estate - his father who seemingly only cares about the family name and not about him. Sure, Tohma has "knowledge" by virtue of having a doctorate at the age of fourteen, but he did that - and went to even greater extremes in the series itself - all so that he could save his beloved little sister. And, of course, he does eventually come to realise that his father actually does love him and was just showing it in a bad way, much like Sora and her mom in Adventure.

Yoshino - Reliability

Yoshino's arc, short as it is, revolves around her feeling useless and inferior compared to everybody else. What she needed to realise is that while she might not be as strong as Masaru or as smart as Tohma, they're still glad to have her around and there's things she can do that no-one else can. She's the only one on the team old enough to drive, for one thing, which comes in handy a lot, as well as her providing support in various other ways even though she's rarely the key participant in a fight. According to Lalamon, she's a total slob in her home life, but we never see this from her working at DATS - so apparently she puts in a lot more effort when others are counting on her.

And when Masaru is trying to fight a freaking boat and Tohma is using his "intellect" to produce a ~magical scientific spray~ that'll make the invisible Digimon visible when a simple bag of flour or something would have sufficed, who's the one actually being useful and providing a speedboat and grappling hook so that Masaru can get onto the boat to fight the invisible Digimon? Yoshino is. She's got those doofuses' backs.

Ikuto - Friendship

Since Falcomon had to give Ikuto an big heartwarming speech affirming their friendship when he'd become convinced that no-one needed him, it seems that when we first met Ikuto, he wasn't really aware of the extent to which Falcomon - his lifelong companion - was his friend. Perhaps he'd gotten too caught up in the notion of being a "warrior" after Yukidarumon's death to think about happy, normal things like friendship? Plus, of course, he initially hated humans and would have balked at the idea of ever becoming friends with one, but then Masaru took him in and treated him like a friend and taught him normal silly friend things like having pillow fights. By the end of the series he's taking hits for Masaru specifically "because you're my friend" and giving impassioned speeches to the big bad about how they'll win because they have friends! which, yes, kind of cheesy, but damn if he doesn't believe the hell out of it despite how he started off, and it's adorable. (And, you know, he's not exactly wrong, since the power of friendship = the power of emotions = Digisoul = actual strength, so.)

Plus, Ikuto and Falcomon's character song is literally called "Friendship!", so there's that.

Suguru - Knowledge

Otherwise known as the crest which should really be called Curiosity, because that's the actual character trait it embodies. Suguru was apparently some kind of professor of Digimon before Digimon were even officially known to be a thing. He went to the digital world because he wanted to know the unknown, never once acting like the missing people they went there to find were his main reason to be there. He figured out how Digisouls work and designed the Digivices to better channel that power, making this the only series in which Digivices were created by a human. (I'm pretty sure? Don't quite remember how they were made in Tamers, and haven't yet watched Appmon.) As far as Suguru is concerned, that curiosity is what being a man is all about.

Chika - Hope

Chika was the first one to voice the notion that maybe humans and Digimon could just be friends and not have to fight each other all the time. She keeps holding onto the hope that she can be with Piyomon despite how everyone else is against it, and later the hope that Piyomon is still himself even when he's clearly not. When that comes to an end and she loses him, rather than dwelling on her sadness, she's just glad that he doesn't have to suffer any more. And even though she was too young to have any of her own memories of her missing father to back up the idea that he's not the kind of person who'd just abandon them, she still always believed he would come back one day.

Sayuri - Courage