This is the first time MetalGreymon and WereGarurumon have evolved to Ultimate/Mega level, as opposed to Warp Evolving from Agumon and Gabumon respectively like in the first two seasons.
B-Team Sequel: This is the first full-series work in the Adventure universe to not be directed by Hiroyuki Kakudou (who had initially planned for a potential third series to be about be a more science-fiction oriented story taking place in space), though he and Digimon Adventure 02 head writer Genki Yoshimura are regularly invited to promotional events. Interestingly, according to Kakudou, despite the Platonic themes like the Idea and Demiurge being similar to those that he used in the prior two series, he had no discussion with the new staff whatsoever.
Kenji Watanabe, primary Digimon character designer and one of the franchise's creators, reportedly refused to design an Omegamon for the series, feeling that he had become too much of a Spotlight-Stealing Squad, and, after compromising by modeling it after Kamen Rider, found himself disappointed with how this aspect wasn't brought out much in the actual anime (among other complaints about Merciful Mode's portrayal).
Although they weren't involved on this specific series, original Digimon Adventure producer Hiromi Seki openly stated in an interview that she felt certain elements in this series to be unsatisfying, and original director Hiroyuki Kakudou (director) has been generally less-than-subtle on social media and his blog about his distaste for the series.
...a certain relevant person said that they couldn't understand the complementary relationship between Hikari and Tailmon, and since you didn't understand what even elementary school students from back then understood, your lack of understanding was probably one of the causes of why you ended up doing that, but it seems like [the figure company] Megahouse here understood it much better.
Yousuke Kinoshita, assistant producer starting with Part 5 and head producer for Last Evolution Kizuna, admitted in an interview for the latter that he felt that certain elements were lacking in tri. and specifically seeked out the original staff for help with Kizuna as a result.
Cross-Dressing Voices: In both the Japanese and English versions, Koushiro/Izzy continues to be voiced by a woman despite now being 16 years old. However the Japanese version finally casts a male voice actor to play Taichi, who is now 17, despite having a woman continue to voice him in 02 at age 14.
Enforced Method Acting: Jeff Nimoy, Tentoman's English voice actor, said at a convention, that was recorded for the film's American Blu-Ray and DVD release, that during the recording of the dub for the third film that he'd started recording the dub while sick, and had to redo all of his first session take's lines. One could make the argument that his takes of Tentomon's lines after the halfway point, where you can tell he wasn't able to have his full voice, make Tentomon's lines even more heartbreaking in the dub than would otherwise be if they rerecorded them too, since Tentomon's voice sounded noticeably more sad and weak at that point, helping the film gain some more emotional weight than was already there.
The initial announcement and teaser for the series were released on August 1, 2014, fifteen years after the date the first episode of Adventure was set on.
The final movie, Our Future, was released on May 5, 2018, which is Children's Day in Japan, a reference to the protagonists collectively known as the Chosen Children.
In Memoriam: The screening of the third part Confession is dedicated to Digimon singer Kouji Wada and Sora's original Japanese voice actress Yuko Mizutani, whom both have passed away in 2016 months apart from each other (April 3rd and May 17th, respectively).
Milestone Celebration: It was created to celebrate the franchise's 15th anniversary.
Japanese: Much to the surprise of the fanbase (as Digimon Adventure and Toei in general typically tended to keep voice actors for the same characters even if it ended up tallying into Larynx Dissonance) the entire cast for the Chosen Children ended up changed. This was likely not entirely due to availability (since Ai Maeda still performs the ending song for the first part, the original voice actors were able to return for a drama CD released at the time, and many of the voice actors were still active), but more from some of the voice actors having to be replaced and the others being changed accordingly to follow suit. However, they also retained the narrator from Adventure and 02 whose voice is revealed to be adult Takeru's in the epilogue to 02.
English:
T.K. is played by Johnny Yong Boschnote Though his 02 voice actor Doug Erholtz played Daigo as well. Doug reauditioned for his old role, but the producers thought he sounded too old by that point.; Joe is voiced by Robbie Daymondnote Michael Lindsay had retired in 2012 due to poor health and passed away in mid-2019.; Matt is played by Vic Mignognanote Michael Reisz is mainly a writer and producer for live-action TV these days and only returns to voice on union projects.; and Kari is voiced by Tara Sandsnote Her original voice actor Lara Jill Miller is now a union voice actor and mostly works in Western Animation while tri's dub is non-union.
Cherami Leigh, already the voice of Maki Himekawa, replaced Tifanie Christun as Biyomon since Christun had been out of the voiceover gig since 2008. Edie Mirman (Gatomon) was replaced by Kate Higgins, also Meicoomon, because Mirman had become too expensive in the days since the original series.
Dave Mallow reprised his part of Angemon in the first film but was replaced by Jamieson Price for the third movie onwards due to Mallow's retirement in 2016. Jamieson previously voiced the Seraphimon from Digimon Frontier as well as Oikawa from 02.
On the same note with Angemon, Yuko (Tai and Kari's Mother) was voiced by her original actress in the first film, Dorothy Elias-Fahn (also the voice of Lillymon). When she appeared in the third movie, Tara Sands provided her voice while also voicing Kari, though Fahn returned to the role in the fifth movie.
Koromon's original voice actress Brianne Siddall was unable to reprise her role due to recovering from an injury on the set of NCIS: Los Angeles, where she worked as an assistant location manager, and subsequent surgeries. Koromon's voice was provided by Julie Ann Taylor in the first film but changed to Doug Erholtz in the third.
All of Agumon's digivolutions were recast with Kyle Hebert for various reasons. The original actor for Greymon, Michael Lindsay, who also voiced Joe, retired in 2012 and moved away from L.A. due to his failing health which sadly ended his life in August 2019. The original MetalGreymon, Joseph Pilato, mainly worked in live-action and hadn't done any voice work since the dawn of the millennianote He passed away in March 2019 from lung complications. While Lex Lang, the original WarGreymon, is still very much active, he was evidently unavailable to reprise due to his humanitarian work.
Melodee M. Spevack, Birdramon's original actress, returned for the first and third movies but was replaced by Mona Marshall (Izzy's actress) from the fourth movie onwards. Marshall also became the voice of Phoenixmon, Biyomon's Mega form. In Our Future, Spevack's cry of Birdramon's name from the earlier movies was recycled for the evolution sequences, despite Marshall doing everything else in relation to voicing Birdramon and her evolutions.
Machinedramon was voiced by Dave Guerrie, the original English dub's post-production coordinator, in Adventure, but was not available to reprise in the fourth film, so Michael Sorich provided the growls for the Digimon instead.
German:
Izzy's voice actor in Digimon Adventure 02, Hannes Maurer, moved away from Germany in 2015. He was replaced by Christian Zeiger for the movies 1-3, who had already replaced Maurer in The Fairly Oddparents and How to Train Your Dragon. For the movies 4-6, Izzy is played by Christopher Kohn who would continue to voice him in Last Evolution Kizuna.
Leomon's voice actor Gerald Paradies (who continued to voice him in Digimon Tamers and he even provided the voice of Merukimon in Digimon Data Squad) died in June 2016, and the role is taken by Marlin Wick, who voiced Whamon in Adventure and Digimon Frontier.
Kari was voiced by Marie-Luise Schramm from Adventure all the to the first three movies of tri., but for the remaining movies and Last Evolution Kizuna, she's voiced by Josephine Schmidt instead.
Promoted Fanboy: The majority of the new human characters' cast, particularly Natsuki Hanae (Taichi), has professed to being die-hard Digimon fans as kids, and were absolutely thrilled to get their roles and work with the voices of their childhood. Chiaki Matsuzawa, playing a news announcer, is also such a huge fan that she broke down in tears at her first appearance MCing a Digimon event two years prior and admitted to owning every drama CD released to date.
The Japanese version brought the original voice actors of all partner Digimon together. Hiroaki Hirata also returns as the narrator.
The English dub brought back Joshua Seth as Tai and Motimon, Colleen O'Shaughnessey as Sora, Mona Marshall as Izzy, Philece Sampler as Mimi, Tom Fahn as Agumon, Kirk Thornton as Tsunomon, Gabumon, Garurumon, WereGarurumon, and MetalGarurumon, Jeff Nimoy as Tentomon, Kabuterimon, and MegaKabuterimon (he also voices the Mysterious Man after having previously voiced Young Gennai), Laura Summer as Patamon, Anna Garduno as Tanemon and Palmon, Mari Devon as Togemon, Dorothy Elias-Fahn as Lillymon (she also voices Roseman, having previously voiced the Rosemon in Digimon Data Squad), Bob Klein as Bukamon, Gomamon, and Ikakkumon, Michael Sorich as Zudomon and Elecmon, Paul St. Peter as Leomon, Beau Billingslea as Ogremon and Doug Erholtz as MetalSeadramon. For Sampler, it would be the final time that she voiced Mimi before her fatal heart attack in 2021.
The German dub managed to get almost every original voice actor back, except Izzy's due to Hannes Maurer being on a world tour since 2015. Florian Knorn, Tai's voice actor, who left the business since 2005 was brought from Sweden to record for Tai and the dubbing studio even paid his flight to guarantee his coorporation. Dubbing studios normally wouldn't have gone that far if it wasn't for the demanding fans. And yes, the return of the old cast pleased the fans and the films immediately gained more attention. Frank Schröder, who voiced young Gennai, returned to play the Mysterious Man.
Schedule Slip: The series was supposed to start airing in Spring 2015, but up until April 2015 (eight whopping months after the series' announcement in August 2014) nothing close to an official airdate had been announced apart from a promotional video due for May 6, 2015. Eventually, the first part of the series was announced to air in the following November of 2015 (a far cry from "spring").
To promote the series, the official website for Digimon Adventure tri. included a Flash game — in the center of the page was a Digi-Egg that visitors were encouraged to stroke and hasten its hatching ("nade-nade", as the site put it); normal visitors would get one click a day (decreasing the counter by one) but could also stay on the site and play a game to earn points for more clicks. It would release the eggs (containing Baby forms of the original team of eight Digimon) in waves, with a bit of information released with each hatching. However, apparently the response proved to be more than Toei was apparently expecting — because of fanbase enthusiasm, the Digi-Eggs were going to hatch too quickly. So, instead of releasing the information as promised when all that nade-nade had reached sufficient levels, Toei appeared to start messing with its own counter, adding clicks on the sly, and then various pests like Scummon/Sukamon and Demidevimon would appear all of a sudden and prevent visitors from hatching the eggs by adding clicks. Scummon/Sukamon was bad enough, but then "Demidevimon" added 777,000 clicks to the counter for the second-to-last set of Digi-Eggs, which is more than the original counter required (and the count was at 138107 when he showed up). A month and a half later, Toei decided to, er, compensate for their mistake by upping every click to take anywhere from two to twenty points from DemiDevimon's counter - at random.
Also, it turns out that Digimon Adventure tri. is not a TV series at all - it's a series of six movies, being released in cinemas - bad news for the international fanbase. Only to be partially subverted when it finally was released, where Crunchyroll began streaming the series edited into roughly 25 minute episodes with English subtitles ...only for American territories. Fully subverted later when the regional limit was expanded to reach most of the world and not long after, Anime Lab (Australia/New Zealand) got it.
The famous Tai/Sora versus Matt/Sora shipping wars were fanned all over again when the first movie teased both couples, and teased again by the producer, Shuuhei Arai, in an interview note Arai: Taichi and Sora are classmates at the same school. High school is complicated period, so it's not like there are any official relationships going on between them. Furthermore, due to Meiko transferring-in, new relationships are being born, and honestly, I think that it shouldn't be very surprising to see changes between their relationships in any way shape or form in the near future.. The fourth movie even has some notable focus on their relationship — the poster◊ features them, and the limited edition poster from Amazon.co.jp that comes with the DVD and Blu-ray shows Sora grabbing Taichi in a Necktie Leash while holding onto Yamato's sleeve. As far as the movies go, nothing overt about any of the relationships have been addressed, not even whether Sora and Yamato are/were in a relationship.
Toei left many people curious of Patamon and Tailmon's Ultimate forms since the release of Determination. The Confession poster (released on the same day as Determination) included Patamon in his regular form alongside HerculesKabuterimon, leaving fans to speculate if Patamon would undergo a traumatic dark Ultimate evolution, or at least burden the potential of one. Neither happened, and Patamon eventually evolved all the way to Seraphimon in Loss without Seraphimon appearing on a poster at all. Toei's first acknowledgment of Seraphimon in tri., in fact, was a very brief shot in a trailer with little fanfare otherwise. As for Tailmon, whose fanbase is divided between those who want to see her evolve to Holydramon or Ofanimon, a collectible card game set to promote Loss included a Holydramon card, but Tailmon never reached any Ultimate form in Loss either. In the poster for Symbiosis/Coexistence, Toei finally gave her an Ultimate evolution: Ofanimon Falldown Mode, but her appearance in the film itself was rather short. Finally, a trailer for Our Future revealed the end of Holydramon's evolution sequence, but still the exclusion of Seraphimon and Holydramon from appearing on any tri. posters whatsoever is a curious decision on Toei's part.
Word of God: In a interview, the director Keitaro Motonaga told that the Digivice sound at the end of the credits was intended to be Meiko's, displaying that a new Digimon was bornnote "A Christmas present to her." as he said. Probably hinting that Meicoomon was reborn. But he left that up to interpretation.
.
