Takato Matsuki

300px|right|thumb|Character Song: Across The Tears

Takato Matsuki, known as Takato Matsuda (松田 啓人 Matsuda Takato) in Japan, is a fictional character in the Digimon Tamers series.

Takato is a cheerful person and loves Digimon, loving to play the Digimon card game and drawing Digimon he made up. One such Digimon became his partner; Guilmon. He fast became friends with Henry Wong and his partner, Terriermon. He has a crush on Jeri Katou (Juri Katou) throughout the series. Takato was voiced by Makoto Tsumura (Japan) and Brian Beacock (English). Takato is somewhat the leader of the Tamers.

Digimon Tamers
Takato (12 years old, 10 or 11 in the Japanese version) is an only child. He comes from a family who runs their own bakery. Takato is extremely imaginative and loves to be creative, so he likes drawing. One day he draws Guilmon on a notepad and his recently acquired D-Arc scans the drawings to create his new partner.He wears goggles to show his digimon tamer status. At first he's not very good at battling (an example is the battle between Guilmon and Devidramon he was using cards that made things worse and the only reason that they won was his caring about Guilmon caused him to digivolve into Growlmon) but as time goes on he gets better at it (an example of this is the fight with IceDevimon an enemy even Kyubimon couldn't destroy but he'd gotten good enough at battling that he used the perfect combo on Guilmon that he was able to destroy IceDevimon easily without even digivolving to Growlmon). He seems to have a deep bond with Guilmon and when Guilmon was mortally wounded had some kind of dream where he and Guilmon (as Growlmon) talked where he said that he wasn't worthy to be a Tamer but if Growlmon still wanted to fight he'd help. This caused him to get a Blue Card and Growlmon digivolved to WarGrowlmon thanks to it and destroyed his foe. WarGrowlmon told him that he was worthy and thanked him for fighting with him. Later on his bond with Guilmon allowed him to reach him as Megidramon and cause him to de-digivolve. He wanted to help Guilmon fight Beelzemon so badly at that point that they digivolved together (called Biomerging) to form Gallantmon and defeated Beelzemon. Takato's imagination often gets the best of him, and he can occasionally let his feelings or his imagination cloud his judgement. On one occasion he lets his anger run out of control, Dark Digivolving (although exactly what kind of Digivolution it is isn't mentioned) WarGrowlmon into Megidramon as a result of his fury at Leomon's death. Strangely, a red aura appears around Takato just before the Dark Digivolution, for an unknown reason.

Battle Of Adventurers
Takato took Guilmon with him to Okinawa, where he was to stay with his cousin, Kai, and his grandfather. Initially, Takato didn't want to go but he soon after liked the experience of the islands. When Digimon started showing up in Okinawa, Takato, Guilmon and Kai took up battle with several of them. After saving Minami, the daughter of the creator of a V-Pet, Takato looked after her until she was kidnapped by rogue Digimon and taken to VP Labs. Takato, Growlmon, Kai and Seasarmon, Minami's "partner", took after her and rescued her and her father before engaging Mephistomon in battle. Henry, Rika and their partners soon joined the battle against the Ultimate Level Digimon. Takato was present when the battle continued into another dimension where WarGrowlmon, Rapidmon and Taomon created the "Trinity Burst" to defeat Gulfmon.

Runaway Locomon
Takato was phoning Rika and let it slip that the others were planning a surprise party for her. To try and make up for it, he suggested they go look at cherry blossoms together instead, but the appearance of Locomon thwarted the idea. Takato and Growlmon were separated after the initial attack on Locomon, with Takato ending up onboard one of the Digimon's carriages. Rika and Renamon soon joined him onboard, but Rika was soon overtaken by Parasimon and was made to attack Takato. Guilmon, who had caught up to Locomon, helped free Rika from Parasimon's control and Takato Biomerged with him to become Gallantmon to save Rika from another Parasimon. Finding out that Locomon's destination was a portal to the Digital World that was allowing an invasion of Parasimon, Gallantmon, MegaGargomon, Sakuyamon and the other Tamers teamed up to defeat the incoming Parasimon. When the battle became too much, his determination to win caused Gallantmon to Mode Change into Crimson Mode and destroy all of the Parasimon in one shot. Afterwards, Takato attended Rika's birthday party and when Rika left he followed her, but Renamon stopped him from going to her and let her be alone.

Possible Couplings

 * Takato & Rika
 * Takato & Jeri

Trivia

 * Takato has two image songs. "Across the Tears" is his Best Tamers solo; "Kiseki no Takaramono" ("Treasure of Miracles") is his solo on the Digimon 10th Anniversary CD. His Best Partners duet with Guilmon is "Futari de La La La" ("The Two of Us, La La La"). He also sings two songs with Jenrya and Ruki, "3 Primary Colors" and "Santamon o Sagase!!" ("Search for Santamon!!"), and (naturally) in the male characters' rendition of "The Biggest Dreamer," on the "WE LOVE DiGiMON MUSiC" memorial CD.
 * Takato has a resemblance to Kari's son.