Arrival of a Rival
"And soon, I'll rule the contest world and take over the galaxy!"
Score: 6.5/10
The second round contestants will be, in this order: Brown-Haired Extra, Zoey, Dawn, Brown-Haired Extra, Purple-Haired Extra, Ash, Brown-Haired Extra, and Jessie. Zoey is strong and all, but personally, I think Dawn really needs to watch out for Brown-Haired Extra.
When Zoey learns that Ash is in the Sinnoh League, she chews him out for not knowing the difference between contest battles and gym battles. Hey, Zoey, I don't know how to tell you this, but Ash actually tied for victory in a contest already. It was kind of the season finale last time, weren't you watching?
First up is Ash versus Zoey, Aipom versus Glameow. Aipom spams swift, which Glameow dodges. You know, this really bothers me. I'm normally pretty okay with the show bending the rules of the game, I know I joke about it a lot, but I'll ultimately accept it. My problem is that the show is so inconsistent about whether swift can be dodged. It changes every damn episode. Anyway, Ash does some damage, but Zoey stays ahead of him the entire time. At the last second, Ash tries an extra-power focus punch that would have won the battle for him, but just barely runs out of time. After the battle, Zoey admits that Ash is good, but he should stick to gyms, and upon learning that he only entered for Aipom’s sake, she tells the heroes that Dawn should raise Aipom. This is an idea that will not be mentioned again in the episode for some reason.
It's now Dawn versus Zoey, Buneary versus Glameow. Zoey's able to use shadow claw, a ghost move, against Buneary's ice beam; even though it's useless against normal-type pokemon, it can be used indirectly. Buneary wins every direct fight, but Glameow's constant indirect attacks and use of the stage ultimately-- oh time runs out and Zoey wins. That's boring.
Dawn calls her mom and starts crying, and her mom tells her to cry to her friends, not to her. Wow, that's-- that's super cold.
Anyway, after twenty seconds of Jessie easily losing to Zoey, we end the episode with Zoey winning the ribbon. Good for her.
Well, I think it’s time to say what I think of Dawn. I don’t really like her. Misty was loud and frustrating, but she was Ash’s equal. May was cute and ditzy. Dawn is just, well, a determined newbie. That’s her only personality so far. She’s not much different from Ash in season one, actually, except that Ash is the eternal determined newbie, no matter how good he gets, which makes that characterization of Dawn’s kind of superfluous, and she has no real characterization beyond that. “Tsundere” isn’t much, but it’s something. Dawn is just, I don’t know, insecure. I hope she gets better.
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Not changing this sig until I decide to change this sig.
Started: July 6, 2005