"Money's much easier to carry than product."
Score: 6/10
I like how the opening narration mentions Kenny losing in round 1 was a "surprise upset," as if you could be surprised by a ten year-old with no experience in his first contest losing. I mean, okay, yes, from our perspective he’s a rival, and you don’t expect rivals to get knocked out before fighting protagonists (which hearkens back to Gary losing before fighting Ash waaaaay back in the Indigo League), but from a more objective, in-universe perspective, Kenny getting knocked out that early is no big deal.
Ursula continues to act like a ***** to Dawn for no reason other than that all of her other rivals are too friendly to dislike. And what do ya know, round 2 involves Dawn versus Ursula.
Pachirisu/Mamoswine versus Gabite/Flareon. Dawn tricks Ursula into thinking she's attacking Gabite with discharge, only to shock Mamoswine and have it use an electric take down. Ursula is not without tricks, herself, however, and quickly gets back on her feet.
A Gabite double team puts Dawn on the defensive, and Ursula's pokemon don't let Dawn's try anything. Fortunately, Dawn is eventually able to get an ice chandalier going... even though she was explicitly planning to use it with Buneary but whatever. Ursula goes with a dig-jump-out-and-projectile-attack-before-digging-again strategy, but Dawn finally improvs an ice chandalier out of the holes from dig. The move knocks out Ursula's pokemon with seven seconds left on the clock. By the way, I timed it, and this five minute match took slightly less than ten minutes.
After the match, Dawn tries to make friends with Ursula, who tells her that she was just lucky and leaves… but it’s clear from the dialogue that Ursula has at least some respect for Dawn now.
An okay episode, I guess.
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Not changing this sig until I decide to change this sig.
Started: July 6, 2005