Digimon Adventure 02/WMG

This entire page is to be read with Ken's voice.
Try it. You'll like it.

The Distant Finale never happened; it was all an illusion created by Venom Myotismon to keep the Digidestined busy as he conquered both worlds.
The sudden appearance of fantasies and dreams theretofore unknown and undiscussed seemed way too convenient and arbitrary, especially right when they were about to be consumed in a torturous nightmare vision. Surely, it must be a trick to throw the Digidestined off guard and leave himself free to conquer both worlds unopposed, especially when most of those same "positive" visions went entirely contrary to their known passions (for instance, Yamato's known love for music vs. his sudden dream of becoming an astronaut).
 * Alternatively, the finale was specifically created for the Tamers universe when the show was cancelled; the producers had to make something up. This explains the loose ends in 02; there was going to be a third season, but it never happened. Of course, in the real Adventures universe, who knows?
 * This is supported (in this troper's mind) by the fact that, despite strong evidence of a romantic connection between Takeru and Hikari, they aren't married or even rumored to be attached in the Finale, although they have one child apiece. Since the crests of Hope and Light were said to be the strongest two crests, of course they would be kept apart, even in hallucination, in case they should react against each other and break the illusion.
 * There's strong evidence of a deep friendship between Takeru and Hikari, but no evidence points to it being romantic, at least on Hikari's side. The same would go for Takeru, too, if his Image Song didn't exist.
 * I would also point out Hikari's own Image Song. Well, technically it's the 'Girls' Festival Digimon' album. Her song, 'Reflection' seems to spawn the idea of it being her response to Takeru's.
 * I'd argue that her feelings for Takeru don't run as deep as the other way around. In her message on the 100 Title Memorial CD collection, she mentions that "as she thought, her brother is the one she loves most." (No, not like that).
 * While I support this general WMG, I gotta say: I made up my mind to be a Consulting Detective when I was a kid. And some years thereafter, I made up a whole packet of very stupid and poor-quality storylines and sent it off to Elf Quest in the hopes of being able to work for them (I see copies of this in my house now and then and cringe). While I suppose it's unrealistic to believe that of a group of a dozen or more kids not one of them knew what he really wanted to be when he grew up, it's equally suspect to think that no one changed their mind as their old dreams revealed themselves to be just that - dreams - and new, more intelligent choices took their place. I mean, even when most young American boys were dreaming of becoming astronauts and cowboys, only some tiny fraction of them went on to work for and achieve those dreams.
 * Yes, but in a narrative, you have to show development, change, and motivation, something the writers all but forgot in the epilogue for 02. In real life, sure, I can believe that someone like Yamato would choose not to pursue a career related to music, or that Mimi would somehow gain an interest in hosting a cooking show. In the actual story, not a chance. For every character that had a reasonable job in the end (Jou, Koushirou, Hikari), there were just as many whose chosen professions seemed to pop out of nowhere (Daisuke, Miyako, Yamato). This, along with the clone kids and pairings in the end, made the writing fall incredibly flat. And to add insult to injury, all the male characters have prestigious, high-powered jobs in the finale, while every single female character is relegated to either a domestic or traditionally feminine sphere.

The Distant Finale was the result of Executive Meddling... in the Digimon Tamers verse.
Building off of the above theory, the in-universe creative team for the Digimon Adventure anime had their original ending vetoed by the execs in favor of setting up a third season starring a whole new cast of kids: the children of the original Digidestined. They couldn't get the execs to change their minds, so instead, they deliberately made the ending a in order to upset the fans and have it declared Canon Dis Continuity. Whether or not the third season ever got off the ground (or what form it took in the Tamers verse) after this is up in the air...
 * When they found out Digimon were real, the writers were either taken by the government or went into hiding.
 * Of course it was. Yolei Miyako, a housewife? Unbelievable!
 * You say that like there's something wrong with being a housewife (yes, yes, I know, she's Miyako, but housewife has a bunch of unfortunate stereotypes assigned to it. Miyako would be an awesome one.)
 * Well, it's just that she would be probably dreaming of kicking asses together with Ken. If anything, she's in her maternity break, that's it.
 * She's probably solving the cases when he's not looking.
 * Yeah, really, there's no saying she's not doing her awesome hacking stuff and computer programming in her spare time (this is fiction, so they can probably play liberties with how tough and constant a real housewife's job is). Just because you become a wife and a mother and opt to stay at home doesn't mean you automatically give up everything you were awesome at before, does it? For that matter, do we HAVE a trope for awesome housewives?
 * Yes, its Action Mom.
 * It would be unsurprising if during pregnancy, she's a Pregnant Badass.
 * This is why there are so many sudden and blatantly impossible plot twists in the finale. It's physically impossible for any space mission to go that much farther than what they were intended for; the cost of fuel is so high that it's just not possible for them to have made it Mars if they were aiming for the Moon. Why don't we see even a cameo of a husband/wife for Iori, Hikari, Koushiro, Jou, etc? Because, as a Poorly Disguised Pilot, the job of the episode was to create character designs and ties to canon characters for the children. The writers left out the bulk of the couplings as part of their protest to help highlight how stupid they felt what they were being asked to do was. Why is Sora a fashion designer when Mimi was the character in-series with an interest in clothing? Because it contradicts canon and the writers hate their bosses.
 * This is why there's so much Generation Xerox going on, too. The animators/actors/casting department were in on the protest and cast/drew the most obviously Xeroxed people they could. They even cast Daisuke's canon actor to play his own son/reused the character designs but with minor Palette Swap additions. As anyone who listens to commentary knows, the staff of an entire show are often close, especially after a show that went on as long as Digimon did. If part of them are mistreated it's easy to anger the entire group. That's why everything's so weird in the season finale - everyone on staff was angry. Think about it: all the actors are suddenly being replaced, the plot's being thrown out the window, they're being forced to work on a poorly disguised pilot and it's quite likely a lot of these people won't be working on the next Digimon series. It wasn't just a Writer Revolt, everyone was pissed.
 * While the occupations of the adult Digidestend seem strange and even jarring, remember that they were kids. Their interests and their personalities changed as they got older. Characterization Marches On.

The entirety of Adventure and Adventure 02 is viewed as told by TK.
TK becomes a writer in the Distant Finale of Adventure 02, writing about the adventures that he and his friends had in the Digital World. However, what's to say that this isn't just his interpretation of events, in which he makes himself more powerful/important than he actually was. Think about it. TK and Patamon are the ones who bail everyone out when all hope is lost, with Patamon's overpowered evolutions and TK's Crest of Hope. Likewise, Kari, his potential love interest, is also overpowered, essentially his Distaff Counterpart. He and Kari are the only two of the old Digidestined who still have prominent roles in Adventure 02, and while they're less overpowered, they're still fairly special within the universe. TK also becomes more badass in this series (doing things like unflinchingly taking a whip to the face) and becomes a "deeper" character who angsts over a fear he didn't struggle with in Adventure 01, while Kari becomes more of a Distressed Damsel and Broken Bird who needs rescuing and comfort. The Distant Finale is the only thing that really happened, and the rest of the series is a Darker and Edgier version of that reality. Alternatively, because none of us want the finale to be true, the whole thing is entirely fictional, and the characters are all based off of his friends. Alternatively to that, TK actually lives in the Digimon Tamers universe, and he is a fanfiction writer.

Malo Myotismon wasn't killed by The Power of Friendship. The speeches by the children were so agonizingly painful to hear, his heart exploded.
Like Astos from 8-Bit Theater
 * Astos? More like Yo Ass is Toast!
 * Uggggh, my heart!
 * BOOM!!!
 * Damn, this red stuff is everywhere!!

Ken receiving the Dark Seed and becoming the Kaiser was actually all planned out by Millenniummon, in an effort to ensure that his own birth would occur by way of a Stable Time Loop.
Chimeramon is one half of the Jogress evolution that resulted in Millenniummon. But Chimeramon was created by the Digimon Kaiser, whose memories of his first time in the Digital World were spotty at best. So, just before Chimeramon died after its fight with Magnamon, it was brought back in time by Millenniummon so that it could Jogress evolve with a mortally wounded Machinedramon, and be born into Millenniummon. There's no way of knowing whether Ken got the idea to create Chimeramon because of a buried memory, or because of his own creativity--and thus a Stable Time Loop is created.
 * That would mean Millenniummon plan was the one that was being fulfilled the whole time despite what others claimed and he successfully continued to operate without anyone figuring it out.

Koushiro married Daisuke's sister Jun
Just because his daughter in the timeskip looks way more like her than she should. Also, Jun probably changed to a more nerdy type after she got rejected by the pop one, even if such nerd was one of her last crush's BFFs.

And while we're on the subject of characters marrying more obscure characters...

Osamu Ichijoji was the original holder for the Crest of Kindness, not Ken, and was intended to be the Digimon Kaiser.
Not sure how much I believe this one, but it's possible. Sam wanted to keep his brother away from the Digivice, so may have had a feeling of personal connection to it, but was too wrapped up in his Real Life and Stardom to work out exactly what it was all about. This weakened his connection to the Digital World. However, there's still no saying that Sam never went to the Digital World, or that other people aren't able to use Digivices (which would explain how Ken got into the Digital world that time when he was infected with the Dark Spore). It's possible that Malmyotismon had Osamu singled out as an alternate means means by which he could take overthe Digital World should his then ongoing battle with the other eight Digidestined fail. After Osamu's untimely death, a new route had to be taken.

We've already seen that Crest power is transferable between people (and people can apparently swap their Digieggs and D-Terminals in order to produce different Digimon evolutions in their partners, as was demonstrated in a Drama CD.)It wouldn't be too strange for Osamu's crest to automatically switch to his younger brother. (Crests can apparently do this, as they did with Daisuke, Miyako and Iori, who had only the slightest connections to the existing Digidestined, so a crest's power transferring directly to an original bearer's brother doesn't seem unlikely.) The Dark Spore turned out to be the ideal means with which to encourage the changes in Ken which would have come more naturally in Sam. Drawing him into the Dark Ocean, using his grief, guilt and unresovled issues with Osamu as encouragement was easy enough.
 * Where have we seen that Crests themselves are transferable between people? Digimentals are not the same thing as Crests, and the audio disks are of questionable canon anyway.
 * Where have we seen that they aren't? Digimentals represented the same qualities as crests, but weren't usable by the original core eight (with the exceptions of Hikari and Takeru). I reckon this counts as transferring the crests powers, but I guess if the Digimentals don't actually count... Still, even if they aren't the same thing, none of the original eight ever died. If they did, what would happen to the power of their crest? It died with them? The idea of it being shifted to someone else (possibly someone close to them) sounds at least equally likely.
 * Except that you're ignoring a rather important point in canon: Ken went to the Digital World while Osamu was still very much alive. The scene where the digivice comes through the computer has Ken saying how he believed himself that it had to belong to Osamu, since Osamu was good at everything, but that nothing happened when Osamu had touched it. And when Ken touched the digivice for the first time while going through Osamu's drawer, he was transported to the Digital World immediately. The Digital World doesn't dilly-dally; if the digivice had been Osamu's, he would have been sent to the Digital World the first time he touched the digivice. So this troper thinks it's safe to say that Ken was the Chosen Child, not Osamu, and that logically, the Crest of Kindness was also his.
 * True... Unless Believing Makes It Work is a factor here (it is to an extent, but probably not to the extent of getting into the DW), then I guess this one is discredited.

Ken Ichijouji is really Uryu Ishida
They look alike, have the same hair, both dress in white, have an affinity for capes, and even have the same voice actor in English!
 * They don't have the same hair. I think you're confusing the megane-kuns; the one who has the same hair as Ken is Tieria Erde.
 * I think it's much more likely that Ken and Uryu are related somehow, possibly through Ken's mother. Ken actually has latent quincy abilities that he hasn't managed to tap into due to a lack of training.
 * No. Uryuu is related to Yamato (and Takeru). They both have Ishida as a surname.
 * Nah. Ishida's a pretty common family name, as is Inoue. So it's no more likely that Uryu'd be related to Takeru and Yamato.
 * No, he's really Touya Akira. When he wasn't plotting as the Digimon Kaiser, he was competing in Go tournaments throughout the world.
 * That's actually reasonable. Compared to the several billion other hobbies he has (speed-math, soccer, inventing, chess...), Go really wouldn't be that much of a stretch.

The Soul Society and Heuco Mundo are dimensional planes related to the Dark Ocean and the Digital World.
The fact that Spirit Particles work the same way as data does in the Digital World is perhaps more than just a coincidence. And the cycle of a Digimon's evolution (and rebirth after deletion) is reminiscent of the transition spiritually powerful souls make to Zanpaktou-wielding Shinigami (and the various releases of said Zanpaktou). Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if Urahara Kisuke has something to do with it.
 * Champion=Original Zankaputo
 * Perfect=Shikai release
 * Ultimate=Bankai release
 * Dark Digivolution=Hollow/Vizard form
 * The Digital world is merely an MMORPG played by the Shinigami and the Arrancar in their offtime.
 * I can see Kisuke as Gennai, Aizen as Myotismon, Ichigo as Tai (Later Davis), Rukia as Sora, Uryuu as Matt, Rangiku as Mimi, Orihime as Kari, Chad as Joe (Usually the most cautious), Keigo as TK, Mizuiro as Izzy, Tatuski as Yolei, Byakuya as Ken and Hitsugaya as Codi.
 * Considering Matt's last name is Ishida...
 * And Aizen as Patamon. He purposefully killed the character when he discovered his Digivolution was Angemon. Someone else took him up when he was resurrected.
 * Alternatively, Karakura town being a crossroads between the spiritual and modern worlds, the concentration of spiritual energy rebounded off the computers and forged a new world. Kisuke, owning up to yet another screwup, fashions devices that can manipulate spiritual (now digital) particles, recruits pre-teens with attitude under the alias Gennai and sends them off to clean up his mess.
 * Flip this on its head for a second; the Soul Society and Hueco Mundo are aspects of the Digital World, specifically the aspects regarding resurrection. The Shinigami are powerful programs that guide the Digimon along the paths of ressurection and back to Primary Village while fighting off viruses (Hollows) that seek to consume the vulnerable data. It's possible that Gennai himself is a Shinigami.

As other people have brought up before, there are probably Digidestined for every country.
It seems to be determined by the size and population of the country. Hong Kong is extremely crowded beyond all sanity, as is New York City, and so they require their own teams to be manageable. The Siberian wilderness requires only a few people, and as we can see with Russia really big countries require one team on each end. Presumably China has a metric ton of Digidestined we don't see, because there's no reason for Yuehon to be the only one for such a giant country. Ditto for India.
 * America probably has one team per state, or maybe one team per "region" (like, one for New England, one for the Old South, one for the Pacific Northwest, etc.).
 * I think it depends on the region. New England, for example, is distinct and tightly integrated, while others (like the Midwest) are less so. So I'd make the argument that it varies depending on where you are. New England has one team (probably Boston-based), while in other parts of the country, it goes by state, such as New York, California, or Illinois.
 * If the 4chan's meme is right, Brazil's team would probably wreak a bit of havoc on the digital world.
 * Wouldn't it be better to say its based of the technology population? In that case even though there are tons of people is certain areas the amount of technology may be disproportionate.
 * Actually, according to this site (which I totally recommend) - to be specific, this comparison - the number of Digidestined in the world is probably less than 1000. So it's more than likely that not every single country HAS Digidestined. Either that, or the kids from North Korea are some of the very few North Koreans lucky enough to actually HAVE Internet access.
 * One thing to keep in mind is that except for Japan (Which has around 30), most countries only have one or two, from what we saw in the show. Even if we extend that to three, with 195 soverign nations, that still only works out to under 700- well under the 1000 ceiling, but more than enough to have one per country.
 * And a few of the Digimon of each country are probably based on local myths/living thing.
 * Specific Countries
 * Iceland probably has a female leader.
 * In New York, Mimi is the leader of the Chosen and Michael second in command.
 * The North Korean Digidestined are severely messed up in the head; fanfic tends to portray them as a bundle of Broken Bird / Shell Shocked Senior hybrids, but other valid options are Brainwashed and Crazy or Defector From Decadence.
 * A related theory, derrived from the connection between computers and digimon, is that the number of digidestined per country is proportional to how much of the internet runs through that country's servers and/or runs through sites associated with that country's web address code (.mx, .fr, .jp, etc).
 * Additionally, problems needing digidestined are also probably proportional to how much internet is from that country, so countries with little web presence probably have only one digidestined, if that, but don't need them as badly.
 * Which is sadly jossed by the franchise itself. If nothing else stays consistent its that the digital world draws data from all electronic communications people use. The internet is what kicked it off but a radio or telegraphs really all that's needed now that the digital world has formed.

Ken went to the Digital World before he became the Kaiser not once, but twice.
Hear me out, because I've been chewing this over for a while and... it just makes more sense to me that things occurred this way (unless I'm interpreting events in the anime and the games horrendously wrong and there is a timeline out there that explains away the anomalies I'm going to point out - in which case, please, explain this to me!)

In 1999, on the same day that Taichi and co. get sucked into the Digital World, Osamu's computer spits out Ken's Digivice. Very shortly afterward, Ken gets the digivice, gets sucked into the Digital World, and immediately comes back (or at least only spends an hour or two there). Since the flow of time between the digital and real worlds are so different, it's extremely possible that, even if Ken got lost in there, he could still have had a minor adventure before arriving back in the real world in time for Sam to lose his temper at him. A key word here is quick; Ken could not have spent enough time to have run into a Digimon because in Tag Tamers, he has absolutely no idea what a Digimon is, yet he has his digivice (maybe he landed in a desert.) Fast forward a year: Sam's already died and Ken has actually adequately recovered enough from his death to have his adventure in the Digital World with Ryo. (This isn't entirely implausible, I think. He's a stronger kid than most people would give him credit for, even back then.) Why doesn't he remember his jaunt into the Digital World from before? I'm willing to bet that the emotional strain from Sam's death repressed the memory of entering his computer (because, really, the Digital World? He must have thought he had gone temporarily insane.) He's as surprised as anyone else would be when Ryo brought him into the Digital World for the second time.

This explains 1) how Ken got his digivice before entering the Digital World in Tag Tamers (and matches significant events in both timelines up nicely with the original series), 2) why Ryo wasn't present the first time Ken gets sucked into the Digital World as seen in the animated series, 3) why Ken looks so much younger when he first gets the Digivice, and why he looks significantly older during the Tag Tamers' timeline 4) and finally, why he had no idea what a Digimon was at the outset of the Tag Tamers games. From there on, the timeline should be a lot less confusing - since Ken was already a bit of a hikikomori and kept mostly to himself, the three week recovery period after Tag Tamers would have gone almost completely unnoticed by his parents (you'd be surprised how easily people disappear in Japanese society…) After he made it back to the real world, his memories and personality had already changed enough to facilitate his Kaiser persona via the Dark Spore. While already forgetting his adventure in the Digital World, he got the e-mail from Oikawa, changed his Digivice into a D-3 in the Dark Ocean, and began his reign over the Digital World.

Any inaccuracies or abnormalities between Ken's memory and canon sequences of events were probably caused from the framing of the information - since in the anime we're getting Ken's point of view on his history, and it's already established his memory is fucked as all hell… It explains why we saw Wormmon's touching speech when Ken looks eight years old and Ryo is with him with no digimon (it's fridge brilliance, in a way; since they were apart for the majority of the fighting during the game, there was no way Ken could know what kind of digimon Ryo was using, but he definitely was a strong presence with Ken throughout his sequences. It makes sense that Ken would only remember Ryo in detail during that sequence. ETA: Now that I think about it, it also makes sense that he would perceive himself at the youngest age he could remember; that was the last time he was still looking for his "heart", right?)

Phew, that's that. Hopefully, this all made sense. :)
 * It makes perfect sense. This is also my Canon now, to boot.
 * Original poster here; it just occurred to me that he could have run into some digimon on his first go around in the Digital World, only to have it repressed by his brother's death. It would depend on how badly he was affected by it. Either way, he went to the Digital World, and then forgot about it. :)b
 * This isn't WMG, it's actually canon, albeit from a rather obscure source, the wonderswan games. Ken went twice to the digital world; once when Osamu was still alive, and the second time, during the events depicted on Digimon Adventure 02: Tag Tamers. The catalyst that changed his personality was the Dark Spore that Millenniummon implanted in him. Originally intended to hit his friend Ryo Akiyama, Ken dove to protect the other boy and was hit instead. Tag Tamers' epilogue states that he grew cold and ruthless even to Wormmon, assuming the Kaiser persona.
 * Original poster again; hi! I think you might have missed the point of the WMG and/or didn't read it all the way through. I was perfectly aware of the games (and even played through a few of them myself), and I said that I was incorporating game canon with the anime canon. What I pointed out was the fact that you see very contradictory and unclear scenes in the anime and the games (i.e. ambiguous timelines age-wise, why Ken states at the beginning of Tag Tamers that he'd never heard of the Digital World before when he had already been there a few years before, when precisely he had gotten his digivice (since the games are pretty vague on that anyway), etc). What I was trying to do was come up with a reason why that might have been. Hope that helps you understand what I wrote before!
 * One problem with this is that Oikawa said that when he saw Ken at Osamu's funeral he could see that he had a Dark Seed in him and this was his motivation for using Ken in his plans, meaning by the time of Osamu's funeral (presumably not long after his death) the events of the game had already occurred.
 * Where is the inconsistency? Digimon Adventure ended in 1998, Cathode/Anode Tamer happened right after that (without Ken). Afterwards, there was our war game, followed by Tag Tamers (where ken first met the digital world). There, he was hit by the dark spore, and nursed back to health by ryo and wormmon before returning to the real world (without wormmon), by which point only a little time had passed, and osamu later saw the digivice and thought it was his, with D1 Tamers happening some time before 02, in 2002. The only real problem is if in Tag Tamers he was being healed by wormmon in his house (in the real world). Note that in the games, the sprites aren't two clear on his looks (even though he was just 2 years younger). I guess we have to assume he grew all that in two years, or that in the dreams he saw himself with an emotional age, rather than a real one.

Hikari is an Apocalypse Maiden
At least is the that her arc in the Dark Ocean hints.

MaloMyotismon is the same Digimon that's been pestering the Chosens since the very beginning.
Back in Adventure, Angemon kills Devimon and both dissolve into data. While Takeru raises his Digi-Egg back to Patamon, Devimon hatches out of his own egg somewhere else in the Digital World and evolves his way up to Myotismon on his second life. Devimon -> Myotismon is a legit evolution, and it's likely the species that hatched out of Devimon's egg can easily evolve back to Devimon just like Takeru's partner was Toko/Patamon before and after the Devimon fight.

In a more powerful form and eager to avenge his first loss, the former Devimon rounds up some flunkies (including Gatomon) and vows to take down the Chosens the second time. Thus, the Myotismon the Chosens meet after the Etemon arc is the same Devimon that was defeated on File Island, hence VenomMyotismon later in the arc, and finally MaloMyotismon at the end of 02 are the same Devimon as well.
 * I like this theory! Going one step further, do you think you could incorporate the Devimon that was at the bottom of the ocean that was later combined into Kimeramon?
 * Original poster: Consider Whamon and all of the other black gear Monsters Of The Week. If the gears weren't fully destroyed, perhaps there were leftover bits of gear data that settled down in the ocean (especially considering File Island split into its own fragments during the Devimon arc). BlackWarGreymon was formed from Ken's leftover spires, who's to say this wasn't the Adventure precedent?
 * Doesn't Gatomon have memories of working with Myotismon for much longer than a few months, though?
 * Original poster: The main span of time to look at was how long Tai spent back at his apartment in "Home Away from Home". Even if he was only with Kari for an hour or two, that's still a couple of months' Digital World time right there. Factor in the time it took for the ocean/Etemon arc, plus the time it took for Tai to reform the Chosens, and you realistically have a span of several months for Gatomon to become inclined with Myotismon. Gatomon could have also been an offscreen assistant to Devimon before he was killed (maybe a scout), adding another week or two to her resume.
 * This makes a LOT of sense truthfully. Also, think about who beat him. Angemon as Devimon and Angewomon as Myotismon. On top of that, Venom Myotismon was brought down thanks to those two as well. And this also makes Myotismon's obcession with the Digidestined make more sense. Revenge. And it makes his final appearence make more sense, if he truly was their first enemy, wouldn't it make sense for him to return as their last?
 * It's a shame that Myotismon's data went to Oikawa and remained there for the Dark Masters Saga, because a possible line for Devimon from the Pendulum V-Pets was Devimon -> Myotismon -> Piedmon.
 * Alternatively, due to the obscurity of the timeline during Gatomon's flashback, Devimon in fact reincarnated as DemiDevimon. Granted, if this is true, then his possible second defeat would be a rather humiliating end to the original Big Bad.
 * Doesn't Devimon taking over Chimeramon while Myotismon is some old dude contradict this theory? Maybe but it would have been more interesting if it was true somehow.

Both Adventure and 02 are actually adaptations.
In universe that is. At the end of 02, it's shown that Takeru becomes an author and writes a book about his childhood adventures. However, the series is anime. Thus the anime that we see is in fact an in-universe adaptation of the books that Takeru has written. Any plot holes or elements that seem to come out of nowhere (for example ) is actually a result of the adaptation "skiping" some of the story. Presumably there is actual justification for them in the original novels.
 * Maybe the explanation of this entire WMG is that Takeru is just a really shoddy writer, and as a result none of adventure 02 is cannon. This would explain why Takeru gets to be the most badass, overshadowing Daisuke, and Matt gets to be with Sora and become an astronaut, overshadowing Taichi.

The Motomiya are related to the Yagami.

 * Diasuke's father and Hikari's father are brothers. You can tell because of the Hereditary Hairstyle. Hikari knows that she is related to Daisuke, but can't find a good way to bring it up. That is why Hikari is so cold to Daisuke's advances.
 * Wouldn't it be Daisuke's dad and Hikari's mom? Or perhaps the other way around?

The Airdramon in the Dark Ocean episode was fake.

 * The Evil Ring worn by the Airdramon did not lose effect when Pegasmon destroyed the Dark Tower, and Angewomon did not even attempt to free it from the Evil Ring before destroying it.

Osamu tried to screen Ken's call.
Much of the fandom (including myself) believes that Osamu and Ryou knew each other, being friends or classmates. Ryou could have told Osamu about his first adventure in the Digital World with all the details and therefore, Osamu might have known what a Digivice is and does when it came out of his computer. First thinking it might be his, he came to the conclusion it could also be Ken's when it did not react to him and decided it would be better to keep it away from Ken because he thought his little brother was too young for such an adventure, and locked it away, claiming it would belong to him and not Ken.

In the Distant Finale Matt is a world famous musician trained to be an astronaut.
The people in charge of the space project decided it was easier to train a guy who had his Digimon partner for years rather than get a Digimon for one of their astronauts. Kinda like Armaggedon.
 * But would not that apply to everyone? People started getting digimon even before the final battle at the end of Digimon Adventure 02. And after the ending? I am sure that everyone getting digimon includes already trained and in-training astronauts. Besides, training a digimon is not the same as drilling for oil/planting explosives.

Millenniummon is Man Behind the Man.
Millenniummon Set everything up in a Gambit Pileup such as resurrecting Vamdemon and kill Sam and having Ken infected. He is also the one to tell Deamon and Vamdemon about the Dark seeds, and removed Dagomon from action for trying to fight back. The only reason that Vamdemon did not win was because when Ryo defeated Millenniummon, all of the dark seeds lost power and left Vamdemon without and defenses. It also explains why none of the children relapsed into digimon Kaisers.

The plot holes in the first half of the season were on purpose, but the explanation was thrown away in a rewrite
Three of the largest complaints about 02's early story converge in a single episode, The original japanese version of episode 27: So yeah, it's really just a case of too much plot oddities concentrated too thickly, with too much stuff in the episode to point out why it shouldn't work. It's not just these three. For example, TK and Yolei need to be told about the DNA-evolution of Wargreymon and metalgarurumon, despite them originally being there. There are dozens of examples like that in the episode.
 * This episode introduced the explanation why the kids couldn't evolve to ultimate/perfect anymore: They had sacrificed the power of their crests. The fandom often points out that this should have been impossible, since the crests were already gone and the power came from the children themselves. Except, the episode does bring this up when patamon, smiling creepily, explains that the power of the crests is still in their hearts and not gone at all. In addition, the episode also features Ken's crest of kindness, which completely throws the 'the sacrifice of all the crests restored the world and the darkness anomaly has not been detected since' explanation out of whack.
 * It is often pointed out that digimon shouldn't be a secret after digimon adventure. So it seems weird that the children, especially the original ones, would have to hide the digimon from their parents. Indeed, in this episode, Izzy warns the digidestined that his mom could see them. His mom, who later, stays completely calm when she sees the digimon and refers to tentomon by name, indicating that these events are in fact still canon.
 * The dark ocean. This episode actually has the dark ocean as the main villain, and apparently the driving force behind Arukenimon's actions. We know that dissatisfaction amongst the writers caused the dark ocean plotline to be largely dropped. It is commonly assumed that this happened after episode 13, but if that was the case, this episode wouldn't have the dark ocean as the driving force behind a main villain. So, what if that episode wasn't what caused the dissatisfaction? What if it was this one. Most, if not all, of the notable plot holes get at least a token mention in this episode, as well as all of the character inconsistencies and oddities. Is it possible that the dark ocean was originally planned as some sort of brain-affecting world-wide effect and that some writers thought that that would be too dark? It's a wild idea, but that's why it's called wild mass guessing.
 * It clear that they are trolling as soon as they make it clear that anyone with the poor sense to grow up could not part of the fun.

Datamon (or someone with a similar plan) returned and copied the chosen children.

 * After the last battle and before the epilogue, Datamon came back to life a reenact his last plan. He hunted down the children one by one by manipulated the tvs and internet data to draw them to him. The children unable to evolve past champion stage fell easily and where copied and the originals destroyed. Datamon latter placed the copes in to highly influential jobs to increase his leverage over the world with little regard to the original children's' dreams or preferences. This also effected the chosen children's relationships, as Datamon does not know human customs only two of the children got married. Datamon's lack of knowledge also is what made the the chosen children's kids clones of the originals.