Board 8 > Anagram Rates the Pokemon Anime Versus XIII

(+) Yeah! (+)

Clever countercounterstrategy, but this leaves the question of how Ash taught Heracross sleep talk in like... an hour.

Every Pokemon learns it via TM! I'm sure it can't have been that difficult

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Maybe the one problem about having so many rivals is that it would be way too convenient if Ash got to fight them all. I mean, what are the odds? Also, when Gible finishes Dusknoir off, the Japanese version has a remix of original Pokemon anime theme song playing. It was quite disappointing we didn't get "I wanna be the very best" or, since it was a remix, "Born to be a winner".

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From: BK_Sheikah00 | #252
Maybe the one problem about having so many rivals is that it would be way too convenient if Ash got to fight them all. I mean, what are the odds? Also, when Gible finishes Dusknoir off, the Japanese version has a remix of original Pokemon anime theme song playing. It was quite disappointing we didn't get "I wanna be the very best" or, since it was a remix, "Born to be a winner".
Yes

the BGM ALONE makes the Japanese versions better, imo. Even if you don't know what they're saying...well, the dialogue is s***ty, let's be honest, so it hardly matters. I watched the entire league arc in Japanese and loved every minute. Not so much recently though.

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Nothing on Noctowl getting big love in that episode? It got two new moves and won easily!

Also what did you think of Power Trick and Trick Room? I loved how they made Conway be the one to use quirky battle strategies. Ash/Conway is secretly a very good battle, it's just kind of overshadowed by the two that proceed it.

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Tag so I can catch up on this.

XIII_rocks posted...

Nothing on Noctowl getting big love in that episode? It got two new moves and won easily!

Also what did you think of Power Trick and Trick Room? I loved how they made Conway be the one to use quirky battle strategies. Ash/Conway is secretly a very good battle, it's just kind of overshadowed by the two that proceed it.

I did notice that Conway was the "clever strategy" guy, yes, but I didn't think much of it, I have to be honest. His Lickilicky did basically nothing, and he writes off his first two pokemon (i.e. 66% of his team) losing without accomplishing anything as all part of his plan to learn Ash's pokemon choices.

I did like Noctowl's return, though, I will admit. Noctowl sadly got little attention, when it could have been Ash's oficial "wise" pokemon and was even introduced as that.



FAMILIARITY BREEDS STRATEGY!
"Herp"
Score: 6/10

Six-on-six battle time. Pikachu versus Aggron. Aw yeaaaaaaaa wait then we… cut back in time to Gliscor training against Mamoswine. Ash has a flashback to the battle at Lake Acuity, and realizes that Paul "takes everything he's ever experienced and uses to get stronger." Aside from the stupidity of that statement, it’s just… now we’re having a flashback within a flashback to have an epiphany.

Meanwhile, Paul and Reggie talk over the videophone, Reggie warns him not to underestimate Ash. Dawn runs into Paul and the two briefly talk about Ash: Paul admits that he dislikes Ash because he's too much like Reggie, always talking about friends and trust. The bastard. Might even call him… Bastrodon.

YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The other heroes arrive, and Dawn quotes Cynthia about how "when every life meets another life, something will be born," in an attempt to make Cynthia sound wiser even though that statement ultimately meant nothing.

Cut back to the battle. Aggron uses metal claw, but Pikachu counters easily. Aggron uses metal sound, but Pikachu-- literally runs straight into a flash cannon. Ash recalls Pikachu and sends out Infernape. Despite Aggron’s best efforts, Infernape just mach punches it. Yep, that’s what happens when you have a x4 weakness to fighting moves.

Next up is Paul's Gastrodon. Even Ash can tell keeping Infernape out is a bad idea, so he instead sends out Staraptor. At this point, Paul and Reggie (watching TV) realize that Ash is using the same pokemon he used at Lake Acuity.

Gastrodon uses muddy water to use countershield, having stolen the idea from Ash. Gastrodon lands on Staraptor and forces it to the ground, then shoots a water pulse into the air to improve its power with the speed gained from descent while Starapator can't move. Luckily, Staraptor escapes by using close combat on the ground and throwing Gastrodon off. Nevertheless, an ice beam lands on Staraptor, so Ash recalls it and sends out Buizel.

Paul chides Ash for using the same pokemon at Lake Acuity just to help his pokemon vent their frustration at their earlier loss, but Ash defends himself. How? Through the medium of pokemon battling, of course. Gastrodon makes the mistake of using ice beam, so Ash turns it into an ice aqua jet, and then when Gastrodon tries to land on Buizel's back like it did to Staraptor, Buizel ice punches it to knock it out.

Paul sends out Drapion, and Reggie wonders out loud if Ash has yet realized that Paul's first two pokemon losing is all part of Paul's plan. Oh, huh, okay. Alllllllllll part of the plan. I’m sure. Drapion lets Buizel get behind it, and only then reveals that it can grab it with its tail. It closes in to finish Buizel off, and then the episode ends.

Obviously setting us up for the remainder of the Ash/Paul fight, so let’s see how that goes.

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Anagram posted...

The other heroes arrive, and Dawn quotes Cynthia about how "when every life meets another life, something will be born," in an attempt to make Cynthia sound wiser even though that statement ultimately meant nothing.

It means "Ash/Paul mpreg", of course.

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They brought back Jasmine because she made a cameo at Sunnyshore City in the game. Jasmine also showed up in Master contests in the game which is why she's interested in contests in the anime.

Buck is also from the game but shows up at a different location.

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We'll show her the power of a dream.

I'm surprised there were no pics/captions of Gastrodon-almost-raping Staraptor >_>

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"To be fair to Herman Cain, we can't all be as wise as Slowking when he's wearing the Shellder of knowledge. Look it up, b****es." - Jon Stewart

This last few episodes sound great. I'mma start with DP now.

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FalconPain posted...

Anagram posted...

The other heroes arrive, and Dawn quotes Cynthia about how "when every life meets another life, something will be born," in an attempt to make Cynthia sound wiser even though that statement ultimately meant nothing.

It means "Ash/Paul mpreg", of course.

donotwant.jpg


Team Rocket Elite posted...

They brought back Jasmine because she made a cameo at Sunnyshore City in the game. Jasmine also showed up in Master contests in the game which is why she's interested in contests in the anime.

Interesting! My bad, then, but the choice of putting her up against Flint is still an odd one.


XIII_rocks posted...

I'm surprised there were no pics/captions of Gastrodon-almost-raping Staraptor >_>

Too easy.

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A REAL RIVAL ROUSER!
"All I can say is that if Ash did that on purpose, he'd be incredible!"
Score: 8/10

Buizel is locked Drapion's tail grip, so Ash has the sudden, brilliant idea to inflate the flotation sac around its neck to force open Drapion's grip. I could go into what’s wrong with this, but… nah. Because Buizel's escape leaves it unable to attack Drapion for a bit while it runs off, Paul has Drapion use the opportunity to spread toxic spikes, and then just pin missile Buizel to knock it out. Reggie explains (to literally no one) that it's all part of Paul's plan, and that he knew Buizel would escape and thus allow Drapion to spread the spikes.

Ash sends out Staraptor, which is immune to toxic spikes in a rare show of “writers actually paid attention to the games in some way.” Ash makes a big deal of avoding Drapion's tail, so he has Staraptor fly in a straight line toward Drapion to ensure it will be grabbed by the tail and thrown into the toxic spikes until it falls unconscious. Good work, Ash.

Who do you fight a poison pokemon with? Why, a grass pokemon, of course! Ash sends out Torterra, and Paul reveals that he knew Ash would do that... Somehow. Torterra starts off surprisingly well, but it gets grabbed by Drapion's claws and poison fanged. Ash has Torterra heal itself, but it just gets hit by pin missile again and loses; Brock realizes that Paul knew the right moment to strike was just after Torterra healed itself. Instead of... during the healing... Okay...

Paul taunts Ash, telling him that he let him defeat Aggron and Gastrodon to ensure he could predict Ash's strategy, and that he's been able to predict everything Ash has done since he brought out Drapion. Ash basically just says "No, I'm going to win because I am the main character" and throws out Gliscor.

Paul recalls Drapion and sends out a Ninjask. Paul's strategy is to use agility and speed boost to become incredibly fast and dodge all of Gliscor's attacks, then use fury cutter… And it pretty much works perfectly. Gliscor takes a lot of damage and accomplishes nothing, so Ash just recalls it and sends out Infernape.

I love this next part. Ash decides the only way to win is to “turn the battlefield upside-down,” so he has Infernape dig, knowing Ninjask can't do anything to his pokemon underground, and then flare blitz while underground so that the flames blow Ninjask away and also consume the toxic spikes, as if that has anything to do with turning the battlefield in any direction. Well, the damage Ninjask took from flare blitz has slowed it down (that is not how that move works), and the now slower pokemon becomes vulnerable to mach punch, and is knocked out easily. Infernape has, however, still taken a lot of damage, so Ash recalls it. Paul finally stops taunting Ash at this point.

Paul sends out a Froslass, so Ash sends out Pikachu. Froslass uses hail to make itself hard to hit, so Pikachu counters by missing all of its attacks and getting hit by almost all of Frosloss'. Still, Pikachu eventually lands a volt tackle and defeats Froslass, but has taken so much damage that Ash is forced to recall it.

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Although Paul has only two pokemon left, one of his hasn't even shown up yet, and all of Ash's have taken damage, so Brock says Ash is still at a disadvantage. In film school, this is called “telling your audience that this is still dramatic because you think they’re too stupid to make basic connections on their own.”

Paul sends out Drapion again, and Ash Gliscor. Unfortunately, Gliscor is obviously still very wounded. Ash thinks that, knowing Drapion's battle style, the only way to turn the tables is with Gliscor's air battle training, and tricks Drapion into using cross poison on a stone edge to create an explosion (somehow), and uses the resulting smoke to launch a giga impact, and to avoid being hit while recovering, has Gliscor do that riding the wind thing to stay in the air to avoid Drapion’s powerful melee attacks. The episode ends as Gliscor flies in for another attack.

Actually, a pretty good battle episode, if you can forgive Paul’s psychic ability to predict everything Ash does.

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great ep

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BATTLING A THAW IN RELATIONS!
"The winner of today's attack fest is Ash!"
Score: 8/10

Wow, does that sum up this show's concept or what?

Gliscor's attack fails, but it dodges Drapion's finishing attack and lands a fire fang, which burns Drapion. The fire fang doesn't knock Drapion out, but the burn still does, resulting in Paul having only one pokemon left.

Paul sends out Electivire. Since Gliscor is so injured that it can barely stand, Ash decides to keep it in. I mean, okay, Gliscor is immune to electric attacks, but come on, don't be this stupid, Ash. Instead of attacking Gliscor, Electivire uses thunder on the battlefield, knocking rocks into the air and pelting Gliscor with them (Brock mentioning that this is similar to Ash’s use of the battlefield earlier). Ash has Gliscor use giga impact, and Electivire blocks it. Not with protect or anything, it just kind of puts its hands in front of it and stops it. Then it grabs it with its tails and finishes it off with melee attacks. With only Pikachu and Infernape left, Ash decides that the rules of drama dictate Infernape be saved for last because it has an emotional connection to Paul and Electivire while Pikachu does not.

Electivire uses thunder on the battlefield again, but Ash expects it and just uses quick attack to leap on the rocks and collide Electivire. Amazingly, Electivire catches Pikachu with its tails, and even the secondary characters like Reggie are astounded Ash keeps falling for this trick... Until Reggie realizes Ash has to be planning something! But it turns out Ash is actually not planning anything at all. Pikachu does manage to escape the tails, but it doesn’t matter, it just gets knocked out anyway. The battle is intense, but there’s little for me to actually say about it, sorry.

Predictably, Ash sends out Infernape as his final pokemon. The announcer reminds us that Electivire has taken only a little damage, but Infernape has taken quite a bit, just in case you forgot. Inexplicably, despite Paul's entire gimmick here being that he's predicting Ash's moves, he falls for a dig. A completely normal dig that is in no way special or notable. Just a dig. Then we get a long, long, long sequence of just punching each other while Brock and Dawn talk about how much Paul and Ash are alike.

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Infernape gets its hand grabbed by a tail (how do you keep falling for this), and eats a pointblank thunder. Infernape falls to the ground, but when it sees Paul taunt it about being weak, it summons the strength to get up and activate blaze. Reggie then claims Ash planned this all along… somehow. I guess. I don’t know. They get into a thunder punch/mach punch battle that can only end one way.

For the first time, Paul finally tells his losing pokemon that it did well, and he even acts respectfully to Infernape. Bet you, uh, I bet you kind of regret not keeping Chimchar now, huh?

We see the match-ups for the next day, and it's Ash versus Tobias. I love how literally no one cares or even knows the names of the other two people fighting each other in the semifinals.

Paul leaves, and Ash runs to catch up with him. The other heroes and Cynthia talk about how much Paul and Ash respect each other (just in case you couldn't tell), and Paul tells Ash that he's going to go challenge Brandon again, even though Brandon retired in a previous episode so that makes no sense.

Honestly, this was a pretty damn good battle, and a good way to end the Ash/Paul rivalry, with even Paul finally growing a little from it. It really shows them both at their best, and there’s not much more to say about it other than that Ash falls for literally the same trick at least five or six times, it’s kind of incredible. I must admit that I would rather have had another Barry/Ash fight than a three-parter with Paul, but okay, this is still really good.

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What were the names of the people Ash lost to in Johto and Hoenn? I can't remember.

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Harrisson and Tyson.

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Best battle ever.

They really did everything right. It actually had character development, best animation, best use of strategy. The direction of Infernape/Electivire was amazing. It really sits very much on its own pedestal as far as I'm concerned. This is what you can do when you spend 4-odd years building something.

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"To be fair to Herman Cain, we can't all be as wise as Slowking when he's wearing the Shellder of knowledge. Look it up, b****es." - Jon Stewart

pikachu never has luck with Pauls pokemon and their abilities
first Guts and then Motor Drive

edit: though I wish Froslass got to do more
Drapion was the beast of the match

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Boring sig is boring

Agreed. Best battle in the series. Only thing I didn't like was how they handled Torterra. Really, the way Torterra was handled in general was just awful.

And I'm surprised Anagram didn't point out Ash's idiocy in the Pikachu/Electivire battle. "I need to draw in Electivire into a close-quarters battle, even though it's already been using close-range attacks the whole time! I know! I'll activate Motor Drive and make it faster! Now, I could use Thunderbolt to do this, but it'll be much better if I use Volt Tackle and cause my already-on-its-last-legs Pikachu to get even more hurt! Brilliant!"

I wonder who would win in a battle between the two if Paul used his Lake Acuity team with Weavile switched out for Drapion, and Ash used his six strongest Pokemon (whoever they might be; it's debatable).

I am so behind... Curse you, Pokemon Conquest, for taking up all of my free time.

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"First time I got punched in the face, I was like "oh no", then I was like "this is a story"."

To be fair to Ash on Torterra v. Drapion, he actually has the advantage there. Poison is not very effective against ground, so Drapion has nothing on Torterra while Torterra, should it actually use a ground attack, would deal super effective damage.

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Too bad Ash never bothered to teach Torterra any ground-type moves. That probably would have helped a bit.

Really, Torterra getting one-shotted by Drapion could have been a big moment in the battle: everyone is shocked that Torterra's defense is overcome so easily, and everyone starts to think that Ash is screwed, but Ash still says, "Screw you, I'm the main character, so I'm gonna fight on and win!" The problem being that Torterra always got punked before this battle as well, so it losing without accomplishing anything again is just business as usual.

Yep, best battle to date imo.

I'm not up to date on Best Wishes though.

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Fennec... :3
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BW wishes it had a rivalry build-up like Paul

ugh that 5 VS 5 battle against Trip

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htaeD posted...

BW wishes it had a rivalry build-up like Paul

ugh that 5 VS 5 battle against Trip

Literally the 9th episode.

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From: BerkeIium | #274
Too bad Ash never bothered to teach Torterra any ground-type moves. That probably would have helped a bit.

Really, Torterra getting one-shotted by Drapion could have been a big moment in the battle: everyone is shocked that Torterra's defense is overcome so easily, and everyone starts to think that Ash is screwed, but Ash still says, "Screw you, I'm the main character, so I'm gonna fight on and win!" The problem being that Torterra always got punked before this battle as well, so it losing without accomplishing anything again is just business as usual.
Torterra's only real loss is to Electivire (which knew Ice Punch). You can't seriously consider the loss to Bertha.

But yeah, Torterra is the only Pokemon out of the 12 that didn't come out of it with any credit. Even Froslass looked good for a while there.

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"My goal is to make this s*** cool again." - CM Punk

I kind of wished Paul brought Ursaring into this battle, always been a big fan of him.

Torterra's fall from grace is pretty sad. In terms of his main Pokemon it is probably the worst besides Torkoal. Turtwig for a while was Ash's best pokemon (besides Pikachu) in Sinnoh.

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Some_Character posted...

htaeD posted...

BW wishes it had a rivalry build-up like Paul

ugh that 5 VS 5 battle against Trip

Literally the 9th episode.

still annoying to see ash do so badly already

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I think Torterra is fine, it was just the fallguy a couple of times and wasn't fully evolved for long enough to redeem himself. Buizel was pretty bad for a while, but redeemed himself with that win over Gastrodon, y'know?

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THE SEMI-FINAL FRONTIER!
"That twerp's beaten the pants off of us many times, but he's getting the pants beaten off of him, so the trickle down theory proves we don't deserve to have pants in the first place."
Score: 6/10

We waste no time: it’s just straight-up Ash versus Tobias. Wordlessly, Tobias tosses out the Darkrai we've all heard so much about, and Ash counter out Heracross, which is... actually a really good choice.

Okay, so Tobias has appeared every so often for the past several episodes, never uttering a word and simply looking mysterious and powerful. It’s time for him to finally speak, I can’t wait, I’m sure he’s going to sound… like a completely normal guy. Huh.

Well, whatever, I guess. Tobias orders an ice beam to counter Heracross' hyper beam, and of course, even though the writers remembered you need to rest after a giga impact last battle, they forgot it for this episode.

Darkrai puts Heracross to sleep with dark pulse, but Heracross is packing sleep talk and lands a mega horn. Sadly, Darkrai has dream eater, and defeats Heracross at 3:48. Tobias taunts Ash, telling him that he'll need more than type advantage. Said the guy whose strategy is literally “I am too powerful to lose.”

Ash sends out-- Torkoal?! And it doesn't even have the same voice actor as it uses to?! I actually timed this: from Torkoal's first appearance to when it is knocked out, it lasts precisely twenty seconds, and like five of those seconds it just it charging up a flamethrower that doesn’t even hit. Why did you even… ugh. I understand that the writers wanted to include as many of Ash’s pokemon as possible, but break out Bulbasaur or Glalie or something, not Torkoal.

Well, okay, Ash sends out Gible. Darkrai is hit by a rock smash, but we now learn that it knows ice beam. Gible actually dodges the beams and uses draco meteor, and for the first time, Darkrai actually bothers to dodge. One dark pulse, and Gible is out. 6:14 and Ash is down three pokemon. Tobias compliments Ash, telling him that that draco meteor would have worked on anything… except Darkrai. What a dick.

Ash sends out Sceptile, hoping to take advantage of its speed and power. It does dodge most of Darkrai's ice beams, but the one that does hit nearly knocks it out, and it gets hit by a dark pulse and falls asleep. We get a little cutaway to Sceptile's dreams as Darkrai tries to use dream eater, and it hears Ash yelling at it to wake up. It triumphantly does so, which takes Tobias and Darkrai completely off guard, and it finishes Darkrai off with a single leaf blade.

This is the first time Darkrai has been defeated, and the crowd is intense, on the edge of its collective seat. Who knows what Tobias will send out next? Well, actually, I do. It’s a Latios. Sceptile valiantly tries a leaf blade, but Latios just uses giga impact and defeats it in one move.

Hoping to win an air battle, Ash sends out Swellow, and I love Swellow's face when it sees it's fighting a Latios.

Can you imagine being Swellow in this situation? This is like if you signed up for a fencing class, and you’re a pretty good fencer but not like the best ever, and learned your opponent is King Arthur. This is exactly what this is like. And indeed, Swellow does as well against Latios as you would imagine a normal guy doing against King Arthur. I love how, with only Pikachu left, Brock yells to Ash that he can still win.

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For his final pokemon, Ash can choose none but Pikachu. Pikachu uses quick attack and volt tackle, but Latios uses "dodge it" and “giga impact.” Pikachu inexplicably survives two giga impacts and manages to land on Latios' back and deliver multiple pointblank thunder bolts (to the dragon type), and realizing it can't throw Pikachu off, Tobias has Latios use light screen, which reduces the damage greatly. Pikachu still just keeps using thunder bolt, and the damage continues to add up.

Latios eventually throws Pikachu off by ascending incredibly high, and it then attempts to use luster purge (basically just another generic beam attack... that I guess purges peoples' luster?) while it falls, but Pikachu volt tackles through the beam, absorbing all of the damage but not giving even a single ****, and delivers an iron tail straight to Latios' face, which knocks them both out. Even Tobias is impressed with this, but not impressed enough to tell us what his remaining four pokemon are. I like to imagine that he’s carrying four Sentret, though.

Cut to the next battle, where Tobias defeats Guy Who Only Wears a Vest off screen, save for Darkrai's last attack on a Magmortar, as if to say “Yeah, Ash is demonstrably better than Vest Guy, but we’re still not letting him be in the finals.”

After the league, Barry admits that Ash is slightly better than him and runs off. Dawn and Ash both decide that they'll keep battling and following their dreams, but Brock is concerned: is he really following his? Wow, Brock, what good timing for this major self-analysis in the third-to-last episode of the season.

Alright, so. Everyone has been expecting a really good write-up and a lot of rage from me for this episode since I began this, even back in Kanto, people were saying “I can’t wait until Anagram sees the Sinnoh League.” Well, I’m not going to rage, I’m just going to tell you what I think. These are only opinions, but my opinions are right, and if you disagree, you are wrong.

Tobias is basically the writers’ way of saying “We will never let Ash win, ever, even if we have to conjure up a character with legendaries to defeat him.” I dislike Ritchie, and I’m not a fan of Harrison or Tyson, but at least those characters all had backstories and emotional connections to Ash, however thin. Tobias literally shows up six episodes before he fights Ash, has no backstory, says nothing, defeats Ash, and walks away. I mean, sure, I didn’t need an elaborate origin story for each of Harrison’s pokemon, I don’t really want to know how he caught his Houndoom, but if you’re going to give a trainer legendaries, you’re obligated to explain how he got them. They even did this with Noland, who was much lesser significant than Tobias. Ash losing to Tobias because of “lol legendaries” is barely one step above Ash losing to Ritchie because “lol Charizard feels asleep.”

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XIII_rocks posted...

Torterra's only real loss is to Electivire (which knew Ice Punch). You can't seriously consider the loss to Bertha.

But that's part of the problem when I say Torterra was badly handled in general. It evolved so late that there wasn't much of a chance for it to do anything impressive. Its only battles were against an Elite Four member (whom Ash obviously isn't allowed to beat) and a gym battle where the main focus was Infernape controlling Blaze. It just got stuck playing the fall guy, which was really disappointing. If Ash had just used it in one of the other league battles or something, it would have been nice.

And then you have Ash’s choice of pokemon. Okay, sure, I understand that Pikachu is mandatory for anything Ash-related (even though, if you’ll recall, Ash left it out of his team in his climatic battle against Gary), and Heracross and Sceptile are both really good choices, and I’ll buy Gible. But there is absolutely no justification for Ash bringing Torkoal and Swellow other than that they hadn’t appeared yet in the Sinnoh League. But you know what? I will be extra-generous and accept that Ash can’t use Infernape because Infernape battled Electivire in the previous round, and Harrison’s Blaziken couldn’t battle in the round after Ash because it was too injured for even Nurse Joy to fix it up in a day. Even though this was never implied, I’ll accept that Infernape can’t battle and that Ash wants another fire pokemon for some inexplicable reason. I will also be kind and overlook how Ash had a ton of other pokemon that also hadn’t battled in the Sinnoh League yet (Bulbasaur, Bayleef, Glalie, Tauros, Kingler, Muk - and Snorlax only appeared for two seconds while it defeated Ash’s unnamed second round opponent) and Torkoal was pretty much the worst possible choice of all of his yet-unused pokemon.

That still leaves the really super ultimate obvious choice for Ash to use. You know exactly who I’m talking about, don’t even deny it: Charizard. I mean, ****. Come on. There’s just no excuse. Charizard flew to all of Ash’s other faraway battles, it could have come for this one. Ash knew he was going up against a guy who had needed only one pokemon to blast through every opponent he’d come up against, and he had plenty of time to prepare, and at the end of the day, even if you are somehow of the opinion that Torkoal isn’t Ash’s worst pokemon, you still can’t deny that it’s a worse fighter than Charizard. You can’t even use the excuse that Charizard would be too strong because Ash needed to lose, because Ash was nowhere near defeating Tobias. This would have been a lot better if Ash’s first four pokemon defeated Darkrai, Charizard barely defeated some other legendary and then weakened Latios, and Pikachu finished Latios off in the same way it does in the completed episode. It would have been the same episode, except with the far less insane choice of Charizard instead of Torkoal, and a more respectable loss for Ash. I won’t even go into Snorlax not being present despite being one of Ash’s strongest pokemon.

With all of that said, the actual battle itself is, Torkoal aside, acceptable. It’s as good as it could have been without Charizard, Snorlax, or Infernape involved. Why Ash consciously chose to bring none of his most pokemon pokemon I do not know, but for what it was, which is, an excuse for Ash to never win, it was as good as it was going to be: Ash’s battle against Paul was as good as a battle against regular pokemon could possibly be and showed that Ash’s skills were undeniably legit, so I’m willing to accept that the writers felt the only way for Ash to really lose was to lose to a guy who just uses ultrapowerful pokemon (i.e. has an unfair advantage). I really wish Tobias had been an actual character instead of a guy who dresses vaguely like a Darkrai, but I’ve already gone into that.

It’s not as good a battle as the battle against Paul, either, even if you ignore the emotional connection Ash and Paul had that Ash did not have to Tobias - Paul uses actual strategy and intelligence, so his battles are interesting. As I mentioned earlier, Tobias’ only strategy is “overwhelming force” - which is just boring to watch. It’s fun to watch Ash defeat overwhelming force, but Ash is only half the battle (the other half being Tobias, and not knowing), which is major lost opportunity to make the battle more interesting.

Well… All of that aside, it is what it is: an okay battle that ends an incredibly long arc.

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Not changing this sig until I decide to change this sig.
Started: July 6, 2005

LOL Torkoal.

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SuperNiceDog won the Guru contest super nicely!

I presumed Zard wouldn't have been able to make it in time. It's quite a journey from the valley to Sinnoh, and he couldn't just teleport there with Oak's help or something. That's just how I choose to read it, anyway. Makes the inclusion of Torkoal more palatable.

Torkoal, Swellow, Sceptile and Pikachu were all there because of their previous experience battling legendaries, btw. Seems weak and I wish they'd actually explained that, but it makes SOME sense. Some

swellow is p. strong btw.

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XIII_rocks, the cream of XIII fanboyism.

yeah Torterra, Swellow
not really helping the Hoenn image
Sceptile is a boss tho

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Boring sig is boring

I remember laughing when Latios came out. Tobias just doesn't play fair.

And yeah, the episode was seriously flawed. Even if you want to make the excuse that Charizard couldn't make it to the tournament in time, there really was no reason not to use Snorlax. I appreciated that the writers tried something different with the obligatory "Ash loses so that the show can continue" episode: rather than have Ash get screwed by outside circumstances (like against Ritchie) or lose due to making some stupid mistakes (like against Harrison and Tyson), Ash is set up from the beginning to face an impossible-to-win scenario, and the episode is a test of how he reacts to it. Or something.

Maaaaaybe the writers can make up for this by having Tobias show up again in the future. And maybe all of us will be abducted by aliens.

The biggest problem is the writers establish Ash here as being competent enough that it takes physical gods to defeat him. This makes his treatment in BW a little, uh, yeah.

"Maaaaaybe the writers can make up for this by having Tobias show up again in the future. And maybe all of us will be abducted by aliens."

About a year ago they did a Chronicles-style ep (it was never dubbed so I'm not spoiling anything for Anna here) , and it had a Latias in the preview. Everyone thought it might be a Trollbias cameo but...nope, a random Nurse Joy had one.

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XIII_rocks, the cream of XIII fanboyism.

Oh yeah and Sleep Talk Heracross is THE premier strategy for countering Darkrai competitively. Damn stupid that such a sound strategy from Ash was so completely dumped on. Though it makes you understand why stuff like AIM FOR THE HORN works; the logical stuff is successful and the illogical stuff isn't.

Also, Sceptile beating Darkrai elevated its status, imo. Infernape is one of Ash's strongest but needs a win over a legendary now to cement its place

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XIII_rocks, the cream of XIII fanboyism.

XIII_rocks posted...

Oh yeah and Sleep Talk Heracross is THE premier strategy for countering Darkrai competitively. Damn stupid that such a sound strategy from Ash was so completely dumped on. Though it makes you understand why stuff like AIM FOR THE HORN works; the logical stuff is successful and the illogical stuff isn't.

Also, Sceptile beating Darkrai elevated its status, imo. Infernape is one of Ash's strongest but needs a win over a legendary now to cement its place

I don't know... Sceptile beat a pokemon that Heracross and Gible had weakened first.


XIII_rocks posted...

"Maaaaaybe the writers can make up for this by having Tobias show up again in the future. And maybe all of us will be abducted by aliens."

About a year ago they did a Chronicles-style ep (it was never dubbed so I'm not spoiling anything for Anna here) , and it had a Latias in the preview. Everyone thought it might be a Trollbias cameo but...nope, a random Nurse Joy had one.

Ha! That's hilarious.


THE BROCKSTER IS IN!
"You may have lost a bottlecap, but you gained your life!"
Score: 5/10

The heroes are returning to Twinleaf Town via a ferry that will take them to a seaport near it. Ash, of course, plans to return to Pallet Town, and Brock Pewter City. Since Ash and Brock are heading to Kanto and Dawn is... not, they're going to have to separate soon, but Dawn invites them to come to her house for a final meal. We also see that on board are some baby pokemon.

Meanwhile, Team Rocket steals a rare bottlecap from some Tentacruel in their submarine, and the Tentacruel chase them into the ferry’s rudder. Team Rocket runs on board, and the Tentacruel follow. Pikachu tries to fight them, but gets poisoned, so Brock uses his last pecha berry to cure it and tells Ash and Dawn to go on ahead and protect the baby pokemon and passengers while he deals with Pikachu.

Well, but they take so long that Brock is able to cure Pikachu and catch up with them, and literally every single baby pokemon is poisoned, and Pichu is especially badly poisoned. Nice. Brock eventually figures out what Team Rocket did and takes the bottlecap, runs off, and throws it into the sea.

Brock is out of pecha berries, and the ship has no infirmary (sure), but the captain recalls some berries being in the cargo somewhere, so he lets the heroes, unescorted, into the cargo hold. They eventually find pecha berries being eaten by Team Rocket, but there’s only one left. Fortunately, the heroes also find an old lady with a lava cookie, and Brock spreads the cures out thin enough to heal everyone except Pichu. Luckily, the captain contacted Nurse Joy to come in a rescue boat, but since she's two hours away, she tells Brock over the videophone that he just kind of has to think of something and is on his own, even though she is clearly capable of talking to him over the videophone and helping.

Brock does everything in his power,

And by clever use of Ash's pokemon, he's able to help. Happiny does everything in its power to help, and picks a fortunate moment to evolve, which allows it to use softboiled and heal Pichu. Nurse Joy finally arrives and finishes Brock's work, and suggests he consider a career as a pokemon doctor. He likes the idea (partly because he’ll be able to spend more time around Nurse Joys), and considers it as the episode ends, the heroes reaching the port and meeting up with Joanna.

Eh. Brock-centric episode is Brock-centric.

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Not changing this sig until I decide to change this sig.
Started: July 6, 2005

The writers wrote themselves into a corner with Tobias. The guy defeated everyone with just Darkrai, the fact Ash defeated two of his Pokemon would be grounds for people to call BS on the battle. Anymore and suspension of disbelief would be gone. Now had Ash used a team of Heracross/Infernape/Snorlax/Sceptile/Charizard/Pikachu and could only defeat 2 of Tobias' Pokemon suspension of disbelief would also have been thrown out the window. The writers did their best to have Ash lose badly and still look respectable and have things believable. 4 of his Pokemon had experience with legendaries, Heracross is a perfect counter to Darkrai and Gible could be one of Ash's strongest Pokemon in the future now that it has Dracometer down and if it is ever used again.

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Congrats to SuperNiceDog for winning the guru contest.

how long before Joy becomes the new IVY

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Buizel was pretty bad for a while, but redeemed himself with that win over Gastrodon, y'know?

Buizel was Ash's best Pokemon during the middle part until Chimchar started taking over.

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It depends on if anime Dream Eater leeches life, and whether or not Darkrai was back to full health.

Anyway, weakened or not, putting away that Darkrai is some impressive stuff.

I really liked the next episode, but I seem to remember the dub losing a lot of subtleties and, once again, the awesome bgm.

Fun fact: the Ash/Tobias battle ep used all the original Japanese music in the dub. Why they couldn't have used the English version of type:wild for the Infernape/Vire battle, I don't know. All the early BW episodes keep the original music too, which is good. Not sure if that is still the case cuz I barely watch anymore.

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XIII_rocks, the cream of XIII fanboyism.

charmander6000 posted...

Buizel was pretty bad for a while, but redeemed himself with that win over Gastrodon, y'know?

Buizel was Ash's best Pokemon during the middle part until Chimchar started taking over.

It lost horrifically to Kenny's Empoleon, did poorly against Paul at the lake and lost to Byron's Steelix as well, off the top of my head. It was in very poor form before the Paul battle


Another thing to consider with Ash/Tobias is the fact they only had one episode to do it in. Making Ash/Paul 3 eps was one of the best decisions the production staff have made, but this is the price we pay (if they insist on making leagues that short every time). With so little time they couldn't really do justice to Ash using an all-star team. Explains why they had Torkoal come in only to lose in 30 seconds - everybody knows Torkoal is rubbish so its nonexistent reputation didn't suffer. Everything else put up a fight at least.

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XIII_rocks, the cream of XIII fanboyism.

Another thing. Cynthia is still Champion. So it means that Tobias lost to either her or one of the Elite Four. If a guy with Ubers can't beat the Elite Four, how is a regular trainer supposed to? Unless you decide to believe Tobias said "**** this" to the Champion League and simply left.

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Hey, its that SuperNiceDog! Congrats to the Guru 2011 winner

tobias pissed me off so much

there mustve been a better way for ash to lose. maybe against an E4 member (if they are allowed to compete, could be an E4 member from another continent)?

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/ssbsb/

No mention of Ash putting his hat on backwards.

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