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Old 06-22-2014, 01:13 PM   #26
Doppleganger
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The thing is, with wikis most online users with a modicum of exposure to yelling fire are savvy enough to confirm if what they're looking at is legit. Often times too, since there are so many venues reporting things, some might not pay attention and miss errors or mis-reporting and the consequences for a mistake are rather low.

When it comes to Wiki or Wikia, I think the most topical threat right now, currently overshadowed by piracy, is/are comprehensive or semi-comprehensive plot, episode, chapter summaries, which can effectively spoil a plot and cost a studio investing a ton of money in a project significant demand. In the 1990's, critics or journalists would only provide a premise and general review - I have my Dad's guide to the '90s film by Leonard Maltin and it never spoiled anything, and that kind of reservation which was unique to newspapers isn't shared by wikias.

It's a useful tool for someone who has seen episodes and doesn't want to forget - like, when I can't watch a Jojo episode I read up the character on Wikia to remind myself of the events and timeline placement, but the fact that it can also be used as a near-perfect substitute for watching is really dangerous. And people are conditioned so much to wanting this kind of spoiler dump, if you don't provide it or try to enforce witholding them people won't read your wiki and go somewhere else (like TVTropes).
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Old 06-23-2014, 10:49 AM   #27
Talon87
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XY031:

Spoiler: show
Watched this episode last night. While I didn't enjoy it as much as I think as I would have liked to, going back over my screencaps reminds me of several choice moments in the episode as well as a few other things worth commenting on. All in all, one of the better episodes we've had in recent months but nothing that is going to go down in the history of the franchise as super memorable.


This week's title card came with a very intriguing development: Korrina's face shows up before the episode title. While it makes perfect sense why it might -- this was, after all, a Korrina episode -- what's remarkable about this is the fact that no previous guest characters have gotten to have their face show up like this. Diantha's episode was clearly "a Diantha episode" yet Ash's face was the one that showed up on the right. The episode at the Battle Chateau should've gone to either the two brothers, Viola, Grant, or even the Chateau staff yet instead went to Ash again. The episode with the Furfrou trainer could've easily had her face show up on the right as this was her episode yet it again went to one of the main quartet. So the fact that the animators have bothered to specially animate Korrina's face for these title card segments is interesting to say the least. It makes me wonder if my OP-driven impressions about Korrina sticking around with the kids for a prolonged period of time may not be so far off the mark after all. Guess we'll just have to wait and see!


It wouldn't be a stone-based evolution episode without ShoPro squeezing in a scene where Ash reminds the audience at home that Pikachu doesn't want to evolve. Ohhhh ShoPro.


My favorite scene in the entire episode was the scene with the photographer taking the group's picture. This is the stuff that memories are made of. I absolutely loved Serena in this. First we had the photographer asking the kids to move in closer ... and not a single soul budges save for Serena, who sees an opportunity to get closer to Ash and grabs it by the horns! Then the photographer comes back with the photographs and we get this:










HRNGGGGGGGGGGGGGH. So cute! So, so cute. Gosh I love this girl. I really want her to be more than "cute girl in love" but man if "cute girl in love" isn't doing a good job keeping me satisfied. And I really want this to be more than a one-sided relationship but damn if I don't know that the odds are 99,999,999:1 against ShoPro ever bringing Ash into puberty. Man, though! Man, though! Hrnggggh.


Here, have it in animated gif form.

It wasn't just Serena who was cute and bolstering fanships in this photography scene either. I mentioned previously, in my post for Episode 030, how I wished that the writers would've done more to hint at a Citron x Corni (a.k.a. Clemont x Korrina) relationship. But they didn't. Not in 030 alone, anyway. There were some desperately faint hints, whisps of hints, really, but nothing more than that. Episode 031 though gives us eeeeeeeeeeever so slightly more to work with. As the photographer asks the group to move closer together, Citron doesn't budge an inch. Instead, he looks rather petrified. Eureka notices this and asks him to smile, to which he says through gritted teeth that he is smiling. While everyone else looks comfortable, Citron looks really uncomfortable. Why? We know he's not superstitious about technology. Far from it! So it's not like he should be uncomfortable about having his photo taken. So why is he so nervous? The only logical possibility I can think of is that he's nervous to be so close to Korrina. And the only reason he'd have for being nervous around Korrina ... is if he's attracted to her. :o Once again, I'm reminded of the fact that Eureka never did do her usual "Marry my brother, s'il vous plaît!" schtick which would normally rule a woman out of Citron's love life. So who knows!? :o Who knows ...


I wasn't too thrilled with the cave pre-battle. Putting aside Team Rocket (who were semi-serious in tone but the same old comic relief in role), I was annoyed by the fact that the cave seemed to defy natural formation. I guess it was helped in the end (which we'll get to in a second) that Korrina's grandfather had set all of this up, as that allows for the interpretation that this isn't a natural rock formation and that it is instead a temple set up by Mega Evolutionists, but yeah ... if the DNA double helix statues lining the path weren't bad enough, what really bothered me most about the scene was the visually most obvious: the enormous chunk of Lucarionite just sitting there on an altar for Corni to grab. It just seemed silly to me. But oh well, whatever.


Less silly to me was the fight itself, between Blaziken and Lucario. I hadn't expected to enjoy this fight but it had two things going for it. One was the animation, which was a clear step up from average. It wasn't so much the attention to detail which sold this one (though, sure, it was also prettier than average). Rather, the scene stood out for how animated it was, i.e. just how many animation cels had been allocated to depicting motion, just how close-up it was, and some nice camera angles. If nothing else did, the fight between Blaziken and Lucario did this multi-parter justice insofar as getting people to recognize the grandeur of it all.


One thing that especially stood out to me about the fight was how physically violent it became. I'm not a fan of violence, but at the same time I'm also not a fan of watching a martial arts film in which all of the fights have been watered down with non-violent attacks and unrealistic combat choices. When I watch a fight in any work of fiction, be it Pokémon or Avatar: the Last Airbender or whatever, I want it to feel real. I expect it to be treated as though it were real. Vicious animals using vicious attacks ought to hurt.

Having gone back and re-watched all of Kanto, the Orange Islands, and Johto between 2009 and 2012/3, and having around that same time watched the final season of Sinnoh and all of Best Wishes, I've witnessed first-hand, in direct comparison between the Then and Now, how much ShoPro has watered down the violence in Pokémon. It used to be, back in the days of Electric Shock Showdown, that Pokémon would get bruised, get the wind knocked out of them, and frequently require medical treatment by Nurse Joy. If Surge's Raichu knocked Pikachu out, Pikachu wasn't right as rain and "Pika pi! ^.^"-ing ten seconds later. He was quite literally knocked out and Ash would run out of that gym with a comatose Pikachu cradled in his arms and take him to Nurse Joy to have her heal him up. Pikachu's recovery wouldn't even be that swift: he would be an in-patient, given a hospital bed and everything, and Ash would spend the night in the hospital by Pikachu's bedside. Stuff like this used to happen all the time in the Kanto days ... and then got less frequent as we went on into Orange Islands and Johto ... and somewhere along the way it just quit happening altogether. Pokémon Centers became a place for the kids to catch their breath between travels but they were never somewhere Ash would go immediately after a gym match ended in order to heal his Pokémon. Then, some time between Johto and where I picked up Sinnoh, the anime underwent an evolution where Pokémon no longer got bruised. Like, it didn't matter how badly they got punched, they would never, ever show scuff marks or bruises on their bodies. No black scratchy lines anywhere to indicate having been roughed up. And the anime underwent a second evolution where Pokémon no longer stayed knocked out. Like, getting knocked out has become more and more of a farce the farther we get in the series. A Pokémon can be "KOed", the ref calls it immediately, and not but ten seconds later the Pokémon is back at full vigor and health, crawling all over Ash's shoulders and laughing. What the hell. What the hell, ShoPro. This is dumb.

And so yeah: I was delighted to see them go back, somewhat, to Pokémon's roots as a show which depicts martial contests as being, well, violent. ^^; Like I said, I'm not a fan of violence in and of itself, but I'd rather have fights be realistic, i.e. violent, than be Strawberry Shortcake'd. So in this battle, what did we get to see? There was this one particular scene where Blaziken blasts Lucario with a Flamethrower, sending him flying into the ceiling and knocking the wind out of him. His body falls to the ground, hard. Korrina, distressed, runs up to Lucario ... and gets showered with a second Flamethrower, destroying her photograph and knocking her down herself. Lucario wants to defend his trainer but he's too weak. And then? Blaziken walks over ...

... and he grabs Lucario by the skull ...

... and he lifts Lucario up off the ground like this ...

... and hurtles him, with full force, at one of the cave's walls. The Lucario crashes into the rocks, crumples, and slides down the wall into the water below, sitting there on the brink of unconsciousness.

It's at this point that ShoPro has Serena break the tension by crying out, "I can't watch this anymore! ;_;" And Ash then says some things which indirectly inform Serena -- and the children in the audience at home -- that despite appearances Korrina and Lucario are still in this. Korrina confirms with a Naruto-esque smirk, dusting herself off and flashing a smile back at Ash before calling to Lucario to get up. And get up he does. So yay, get to go the children, Lucario isn't dead! And yay, they get to scream, Corni's gonna win! But ShoPro covering their asses like this still doesn't change the fact that, for just one episode, we got a taste of what things used to be like back in the Kanto days. And by golly do I miss it. ^^; If more of XY is like this going forward, the series will be all the better for it. Sinnoh and Unova had their merits, but both series' battles are permanently scarred by the ridiculousness that is "Get clobbered but never show a scratch; 'faint'; and then be 100% right as rain ten seconds after the match."


I'm not the world's biggest fan of ShoPro's redesign of Korrina's grandfather nor of their interpretation of how he would sound, behave, etc. But I've been used to this since the days of ShoPro Blaine. It's okay. ^^;

I did think it was a liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiittle silly though how Korrina didn't recognize her grandfather's Blaziken. Like, it's not terribly silly! I recognize that Pokémon of a given species all tend to look very similar to one another! But like ... I feel like the anime has had multiple episodes where Ash can tell his Pikachu apart from other people's Pikachus just on a glance, and so it's kinda strange to me then that if Korrina has spent so much time around her grandfather (and thus by his Pokémon as well) that she wouldn't recognize her grandfather's Blaziken. Didn't she think it was strange that a Blaziken was randomly hanging out inside of a cave? ^^; A cave which looks like it's been touched by the hands of Man? ^^; Your Lucarionite was waiting for you on an altar with a flight of stairs, for Christ's sake, Corni. I'm pretty sure your first thought should have been, "Did Grandpa set all this up!? "


The episode ends on a cliffhanger, surprisingly enough: the Mega Evolution of Korrina's Lucario. I had expected this event to take place either well inside Episode 031 or else somewhere in Episode 032. Given that 031 and 032 weren't, as far as I know, a two-parter the way that 029 and 030 were, this seems like quite the painful cliffhanger for the little ones in the audience who get so super excited about Pokémon like Lucario and events like mega evolution. I feel like this would have been analogous for us, back in the day, to the cliffhanger of Ash's first battle against Blaine. One of my favorite cliffhangers of the entire franchise, too. So yeah. Well played, ShoPro. *polite golf clap* You may not have excited me with this cliffhanger, but I'm sure you drove your target audience wild.
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Old 06-23-2014, 11:10 AM   #28
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How are people finding the dynamic of having three supporting characters again?
It's okay. Four characters is kind of the limit, I think, without the group becoming a crowd. But we're used to having four characters at a time. Best Wishes would frequently have the group joined by Bel/Bianca, so that would bring the headcount to four. There was a five-to-eight episode stretch with Dawn visiting the region, and that brought the headcount to four. Other side characters (Kenyan, Kotetsu, Luke) would join Ash and the others for an episode or two, so that brought the headcount to four. The series' writers are used to writing for four heroes all getting lines in one episode, so on days where it's just the quartet vs. the wilderness it's like there's no difference at all for the writing staff. Days where we have a character of the week (e.g. the Furfrou episode), Eureka and Citron, and even Serena to an extent, tend to get their lines reduced to make way for the character of the week. But again, I think that was similar to what happened even in the Kanto and Johto days.

I find Eureka to be much less annoying than Max. While I've only watched a small handful of Hoenn episodes (the first six or so and then a couple of random ones here or there), I think I've already seen enough to appreciate that Max is supposed to be the series' equivalent of that bratty little know-it-all boy we all knew (or perhaps were!) in childhood. I didn't care for Max's voice whereas Eureka's I'm neutral towards. Max often felt like a third wheel / fifth wheel whereas Eureka doesn't quite so much. (A little, sure, but not quite so much as Max.) I dunno. I'm not the biggest fan of Eureka but it is obvious why characters like her and Max exist -- they're the "Me too! " characters of a children's television series, the 4-to-8-year-old children who are meant to give the youngest viewers someone to relate to and/or feel superior to. Nowhere is this clearer than Eureka's pseudo-ownership of a Pokémon: while Max never got to own Pokémon because of the rules against children below the age of 10 becoming Pokémon Trainers, Eureka gets to own a Pokémon (Dedenne) because she *teeeeeeeeeeeechnically* doesn't own it -- she's "keeping it" for Citron, her older brother whose Pokémon Dedenne technically is. By playing with loopholes like this, the writers try to have their cake (not retconning half of Max's reason for being) and eat it too (titillating the youngest viewers by giving them a tot character who can kinda-sorta-not-really help out too).

Given how Serena is the series' first official, no-two-ways-about-it girl in love with Ash, I sometimes wish that instead of having little girl Eureka we could've had older girl {someone} instead. It would've been nice to have given Serena a same-age girl to relate to and talk girl things with; the writers've tried it with Eureka but it went down the same way it does in real life when a 10-to-15 year old girl is at her parents' friends' party and the only same-gender playmate she can find there is a little 6-to-8 year old. I think it would've also been satisfying on a primal level, our instinctive desire to see people paired off nicely and neatly. "Ash goes with Serena, Citron goes with {person}." But it's okay. Eureka being present yet not being the girl I've just described is effectively little different from having no fourth character at all. I think that in a way her presence makes the Ash x Serena pairing less awkward for Citron should ShoPro ever have the balls to explore it further. Fans've often joked how awkward it would've been for Brock to have been this third wheel while Ash was shacking up with Misty or Dawn. I think it'd have been no less awkward for Citron. He'd just sort of be there ... inventing things ... while Ash and Serena are making out in a tent. ^^; It becomes a lot less awkward in this regard if you have a fourth character present. That's possibly what partly motivated their decision to have Ash have three traveling companions this time instead of just two. Who knows. Only time will tell.
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Old 06-23-2014, 11:56 AM   #29
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Back on topic, how are people finding the dynamic of having three supporting characters again?
Fuck! I completely forgot to respond to this. You win this time pre-emptive alzheimer's!

Honestly, it's not that much different to me. There's 4 people, but Eureka is like 1/2 of a person, so it's more like there's 2 1/2 supporting characters! You would think with more supporting characters, and Satoshi having less Pokemon, the development would be more focused on the humans. Maybe it'll happen in the future? Doubt it, but we can cross our fingers! It gives more room for gags, and leaves Serena in the tsukkomi spot (which she doesn't really do).

I personally like Eureka. She has some good expressions, and she gets knocked around like everyone else. It's nice to have some playful energy in the group. Also with her and Citron supporting each other, it's kind of hard to imagine them apart.

EDIT: One thing that disappointed me was that Citron's the cook. I was hoping that since Citron is the nerd, it'd force Serena to fill up that slot, which would knock it out of the regular trend of "older secondary male companions are always the cook". Serena fills that role every now and then, but I think that's just inconsistency with writers....or I just remember something that didn't actually happen (I'm not talking about sweets).

Unrelated, but enjoy! Dear lord my heart stopped when I saw that.

Last edited by big bad birtha; 06-23-2014 at 02:05 PM.
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Old 06-23-2014, 05:27 PM   #30
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Started watching this, have watched the first two episodes (and the mega bonus episode which is far ahead of that).

Actually a fan of the opening theme. Also, as someone who hasn't watched the series seriously since DPPt and has never watched the original Japanese (only the dub), wow Ash is actually a ten-year-old when did this happen. Like, sure he really should be older by now, but I don't care as much because it actually seems like Ash is actually depicted as a ten-year-old now. In previous series, notably Advance and DPPt, he was portrayed as a more experienced trainer and his companion was the newbie of the group, almost serving as his apprentice (moreso in Advance, arguably). But this is the first time where I've watched the anime and everyone actually seems to be the age they are.

Ash even throws a temper tantrum in the first episode, alongside a few other examples of his rashness. Part of this is just his personality, but still. He's a badass kid who rushes off to save a pokemon with little care for his own safety, yes, but he's a kid all the same. The same goes for the other characters, from the impossibility to keep Eurika down, Citron's nerdy know-how but inability to do anything else, to Serena's preteen frustrations.

Also, the battle scenes are gorgeous. Nor is Ash particularly unintelligent. 'Power reset' can be screamed as much as people like, but the Ash of today bears no comparison with who he once was. And the animators must be paid a complement- They manage to make moves as mundane as Sand Attack or Pin Missile look relevant and powerful, a huge improvement on the "special names for ordinary actions" we had back in the days of the first anime, where most attacks were pretty much interchangable with eachother. It's a nice and enjoyable change, and I'm going to be continuing watching (if I can ever remember to download episodes).
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Though, I also dislike the concept of lamenting the current day while wishing to re-experience the past. At least, my modern attitude is to try and make each new day magical even if it's not, since exclusively reminiscing about the past is too pathetic.
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Old 06-23-2014, 10:11 PM   #31
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XY032:

Spoiler: show
Make a wish, get an answer! Wow, that was nuts. Last episode, I wrote about how the battle between Blaziken and Lucario was uncharacteristically violent for the post-Hoenn world we live in and how I would like it if XY kept this up, not because I like violence but because it makes the fights admittedly feel that much more intense. Well hoooooooly shit did the writers magically listen! Because man if Episode 032 didn't take what 031 did and dial it up a few notches. Wow.


Let's begin by talking about Mega Lucario's fight versus Pikachu. This was remarkable stuff to see in this day and age in the Pokémon anime. Mega Lucario was scary ... he was vicious ... he had a clear bloodlust, good lord! O_o What started off as yet another silly match between Ash and a friend soon had me on the edge of my seat as I wondered just how far Mega Lucario was going to go. And far he went! XD

We start off with a thwarted Bone Rush ... that had enough force behind it to generate a TNT-grade explosion on the side of that mountain thousands of yards away. Jesus. O_o Then, after Ash and Pikachu mock Lucario, Mega Lucario loses his composure and we see this look of "I'm going to murder you! " wash over his face. He then proceeds to chase Pikachu around the battlefield, the camera occasionally cutting to his still frighteningly murderous-looking face. ^^; Ash seems slightly concerned but hasn't fully grasped the situation yet; Korrina, meanwhile, is completely clueless and continues to eagerly cheer on her Pokémon's murderous rampage. ^^;


So Mega Lucario tries to pulverize Pikachu ... literally. And then he sends Pikachu hurtling into a boulder with such force that Pikachu cracks the boulder wide open. Ash orders Pikachu to fire back with an ElectroBall, realizing that they're now fighting for their lives. Korrina meanwhile is still clueless and doesn't realize something is wrong until Mega Lucario answers Pikachu's ElectroBall with a brutal Power-up Punch of his own. Ash is clearly ready to cancel the match at this point and even Korrina has finally realized something is wrong with her Lucario's behavior. But then what do we see Mega Lucario do?


Holy fucking shit he grabs Pikachu by the tail with his teeth and swings him about like a wolf might a rabbit. O_O I don't know that I have ever seen Pokémon get this violent before. Like ... ever. O_o; Even when Pokémon's gotten as badass as this (the similar scene in Best Wishes where Iris's Excadrill clamps Pikachu's tail during the first Don Tournament comes to mind), it hasn't been anywhere near as violent. (In that very same scene, Excadrill smirked healthily and Pikachu, while panicked, did not look like he was afraid for his life.) But this ... this was holy cow.

AND WE'RE NOT DONE YET! XD Because then ...


Mega Lucario slams Pikachu down on the ground! BOOM! Face down! Face down into bedrock and with such force that his head is partially embedded. O-o;; And then he kicks the dead body KOed Pikachu, punting him halfway across the field. Ash asks Pikachu if he's alright ... no, he's not alright! And then he looks up. And he sees ... this:








Yeaaaaaaaaaaaah ... ^^;

As Ash braces for impact and Korrina pleas for Mega Lucario to stop what he's doing, we get to see inside of Mega Lucario's mind for a split second. And what we see is honest-to-god Predator Vision™ like in the movies. Everything is black and white save for one thing: his prey. He tries to restrain himself but he can't resist the primal urges that compel him to kill. And as he readies an Aura Sphere to end the electric mouse-rabbit's life ...








... Korrina's grandfather finally summons his own Lucario to rescue Ash and Pikachu and to put an end to the match. The look on Korrina's face as, ashamed, she meets Ash's gaze ... and the look on Ash's face as he tries not to make Korrina feel bad but at the same time is like, "Yeah, we kind of almost just died" ... they speak volumes.

This one fight alone wasn't just one for the season: it was one for the series. I wrote in my post for 031 that what we had witnessed, while entertaining, hadn't been anything that people would be talking about years later. Oh, this one in 032 was. This one in Episode 032 was.


Ash & Co. head to the town Pokémon Center. There, Nurse Joy helps Pikachu recover, doing the very thing I just finished saying in my previous post that we never see anymore! Crazy! It's like the animators were reading my mind and the future!

Korrina is pretty sad about everything that just happened. (And her face shows it! ^^; ) After all, not only did she almost get Ash and Pikachu killed but, perhaps more distressing, her lifelong best friend Lucario turned into a monster before her very eyes. She's confused about what just happened. After all, wasn't Mega Evolution supposed to be something wonderful? Her grandfather's been selling her on it hard ever since she was just a little girl. Never in her wildest dreams did she imagine an outcome as terrible as this.


While I don't like ShoPro's anti-evolution stance, I'm actually really pleased to see them write a story like this in which they argue that Mega Evolution, which as Pokémon's greatest PR representatives they have been tasked with selling, can have a dark side. Obviously it's not going to be dark in the end. Obviously Korrina and Lucario are eventually going to learn how to control the raw power which Lucario gains from Mega Evolution. But for the time being -- and, as universe-building goes, I guess now and for all time -- we have a story where Mega Evolution isn't all roses. There are some serious thorns to it as well, lurking in the shadows, ready to prick those who are unprepared.


After how much I gushed about the photograph last episode, I couldn't help but notice that when Makita (the photographer) brought Korrina her new copy of the group picture, his thumb covered one person's face and one person's only: Serena's. ^^; Not really sure if that was something the animators did on purpose or not, and if so what they meant by it. Probably just a coincidence. I mean, he's gotta grip onto the photograph somewhere. ^_^;


It was interesting to see the concept of aura return. A little background for those who may not know: aura, or as Pocket Monsters translates it "wave guiding" (from 波導), refers to a life energy inside of each and every living creature. It's basically the Pokémon univere's very own take on the qi that we see in so many series, from Naruto's chakra to Hunter x Hunter's Nen. It was a major element in the story of the eighth Pokémon movie, starring Lucario, but it has on occasion shown up in the television series as well. There are very few human beings on the planet today who can sense aura and control its power. Like, according to Bulbapedia we only know of two living practioners in the entire world by name right now. One is Riley, a character from Diamond & Pearl (who also had cameos in some of the other games) that you may remember meeting on Iron Island with a Lucario and doing some doubles battles with. And the other, as you might have guessed, is Ash.

It's actually because of Ash's special connection with aura that a lot of fans, including my friend AK2, had been wondering before this recent stretch of episodes if the anime would follow the games' plot thread about the protagonist inheriting one of Korrina's two Lucario (because of how the Lucario senses something special about you) and how that Lucario might end up being Ash's Mega. Of course we can see now that that hasn't happened -- the two Lucario in the anime belong one each to Korrina and Korrina's grandfather with none left over for Ash -- but it's still interesting to see the writers make overt references to aura like they do in this episode. In fact, it's a shame that Ash doesn't bring up that he has the potential to become an Aura Guardian. But oh well. ^^;


I was surprised that Korrina was so eager to plop the Lucarionite armband on Lucario after what just happened. ^_^;


I liked how the writers and animtors informed us that Korrina was in hot water with her grandfather. I hesitate to call it "subtle" but it was ... artistic, maybe, is the word? It was done in such a way that I could believe that Korrina was clueless, Ash sensed something was possibly wrong, and the home audience could easily tell that she was in big trouble all in one.


For all that I had to say about Korrina's Lucario's fight versus Pikachu, I don't have too much to say about his fight against her grandfather's Lucario. It was pretty much "more of the same," while entertaining, meant to ease the viewer into the tonguelashing which Korrina's grandfather was preparing to give his granddaughter. Predictably Lucario loses control over himself again; and predictably he gets his butt kicked by Korrina's grandfather's Lucario.


If the violence in the first act surprised me to a degree x, then to almost that same degree x did Korrina's grandfather's severity surprise me. We don't usually get family members in Pokémon behaving like this. Shouting ... getting very angry with the child ... berating them ... even calling them a fool. I'm not saying that it was entirely undeserved or that what Corni's grandpa did was wrong necessarily, but like, wow: we never see stuff like this in Pokémon.

And you know what else? It was great human drama for our humble little kids show. Pokémon has been fairly starved of such writing ever since the production staff switched gears halfway through Best Wishes (palpable from after the Giovanni-Meloetta special onwards). That's not to say that it's been starved of great episodes period or that it's been starved of quality writing. Have I not gushed about the Espurr episode enough!? But episodes like the Espurr episode have unfortunately been somewhat fewer and farther between than I even recalled before putting that list together of all of our old posts for Episodes XY011 thru XY030. The thing is that most of those episodes -- not all, but most -- felt like they belonged to a kids cartoon. Which, duh, is what Pokémon is! ^^; But these past two episodes, 031 and 032 ... they feel like they're written by a team that wants to take Pokémon out of the territory of children's television and into the territory of, for lack of a better term, "badass children's television". Has Pokémon become Avatar: the Last Airbender? Hell no. Has it become Batman: the Animated Series? No. But these two episodes are definitely ... how can I put it ... they definitely feel like they're cut from a cloth that's entirely different from the cloth used to create episodes like XY029 or XY008.


I think the greatest thing of all I loved about the end of the episode was the plot twist that Korrina has been denied the Shalour Gym until she and Lucario can learn how to control the power of Mega Evolution. I commented to AK2 on the phone the other day, after I'd watched Episode 030, that it was strange to me and kinda silly writing by the writers to argue that the Shalour City gym leader must be someone with a mega ... yet at the same time they were perfectly happy to hand the gym leadership off to Corni even though she didn't have a mega yet. ^_^; But now that I've seen Episode 032, I see what the writers had in mind. Korrina's inheritance of the Shalour Gym was conditional; while her family had assumed that she was ready to inherit the gym and would have no trouble getting Lucario to Mega Evolve, she didn't technically have a lock on the gym yet. And now that she's shown that she's not yet ready to handle a mega evolved Pokémon, her family's rescinded the offer.

This plot twist also naturally leads to something I've suspected these past few episodes: that Korrina would be joining our heroes as the newest traveling companion. The thing is, it's really the other way around (at least for the time being): it's not Korrina joining Ash & Co. on their travels so much as it is Ash & Co. accompanying Korrina to her destination, a training grounds where she and Lucario can work together to master Mega Evolution. The heavy presence of Korrina in the OP credits, the presence of Korrina's face before the title cards for Episodes 31 and 32, it all makes perfect sense now. I mean ... I predicted this outcome. I'm sure many people did, including you. But still. It's nice to see one's predictions, however obvious, proving true.

How long will Korrina remain with Ash & Co.? That's the question. Given that her grandfather gave Korrina a very specific place and person to go train with, and given that they didn't sound too far away, I'm thinking that she'll only be with us until possibly the end of the summer. The episode that aired this past Thursday will have been the one we saw the sneak peek for this time, XY033, and it looks like it's a generic quasi-filler episode that is going to have Korrina experience the same thing Diantha and Gardevoir experienced years ago. (The whole "getting lost in the foggy mountains but using our special connection to find one another again" thing.) At some point after that, we've got to have at least one episode with Ash catching Hawlucha and at least one episode (probably two or more episodes) of Korrina training. But beyond that, all bets are off. They could be back in Shalour City for the gym match as early as late July; and they could possibly not make it back there before the end of 2014. Who knows. Not gonna lie: if this detour with Korrina means more episodes like 032 then I am perfectly fine with tabling the video games' plot for now and taking our sweet time with Corni.

If you don't watch the Pokémon anime anymore and you don't plan to ever again, you should definitely check out this post. It's quite long, and I'm not asking you to read all of it. But trust me on this much: expand the spoiler box and scroll down until you see the animated gif. Then, if you're interested to learn the story behind that, scroll back up and start reading. (And don't miss the many hyperlinks either! Lots of pictures embedded in the text that'll be vital for you to see if you've not watched the episode yourself.)
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Old 06-24-2014, 12:54 AM   #32
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@ Talon

I'm disappointed...

Spoiler: show
Ash didn't use aura. :/

ShoPro makes him impotent AGAIN.
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Old 06-24-2014, 02:04 AM   #33
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Are you disappointed because you know about it first-hand from the (mostly Sinnoh) days when it actually showed up in the anime? Or are you disappointed because you read about it (possibly for the first time) in my post and it sounded like something you would've wanted to see them keep?

Spoiler: show
While it is disappointing that they've distanced themselves from aura the older and older Movie 8 gets (can you believe that it's already been eight and a half years since that film was released?), it hasn't entirely vanished from the ShoPro Pokémon canon, I'd say. I can't pinpoint any specific examples off the top of my head in Best Wishes, but I feel like there were a small handful of instances there where Ash would do things that felt like a callback to the days when we used to talk about his aura powers more frequently.

For the most part, though, aura was tied in to Ash's long-standing capacity for knowing the hearts of Pokémon ... which is the very same idea behind the unrelated concept of Mega Evolution. So like, in a sense, we are still exploring Ash's specialness in the Pokémon universe ... just, we're not calling it by Name A anymore but instead by Name B. (Well, assuming he ever gets a mega. :\ As it stands, his two best candidates are Pikachu, who can't even mega evolve, and Charizard, who the writers haven't indicated they'll be having return now that we know they're bunkering down for Ash to get the regional Fire/Flying Pokémon, Talonflame.)
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Old 06-24-2014, 12:25 PM   #34
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Do note that
Spoiler: show
he's the first person in the episode to use the word, and is perfectly aware of what Wave Guidance is, while Corni has to explain the concept somewhat to the othr members of the group.

So it's not like they're ignoring continuity.
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Old 06-30-2014, 09:12 PM   #35
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XY033:

Spoiler: show
Not too much to say about this episode.

First, I was pleasantly surprised by this episode. It was still a rather boring intermission-style episode, but it was far less boring than I thought it would be. The sneak peek had made it seem like it was going to be yet another episode where Idiot Team Rocket tries to steal one of the heroes' Pokémon; they fail to; and in so doing they help to strengthen the bond between that particular hero and their Pokémon. And while it was technically just such an episode ... it really didn't feel like it. Team Rocket had barely any screen time at all (YAY!) and when they did they were either semi-serious or else comical yet dangerous. Again though: they had barely any screen time at all. Most of the episode focused on Ash, Serena, Eureka, and Lucario trying to regroup with Korrina, Citron, and Pikachu.

Second, I was especially pleased by the realization which dawned on me by the end of the episode: "For the past four episodes, Pokémon has been the anime we've always wished it would be." Disaffected fans are always talking about how they wish the Pokémon anime would be less like a formulaic children's cartoon and more like an Avatar: the Last Airbender or most non-children's anime. In other words, they want Pokémon to be like Pokémon: the Origin, telling a continuous story from start to finish which progresses bit by bit each episode rather than telling a bunch of forgettable isolated mini-stories as it tends to do. Well, we've been getting that very wish granted with these past four episodes: 30, 31, 32, and now 33 have each felt to me more like a chapter in a storybook and less like typical episodes of Pokémon where you can tune in and out of the series as you like without major consequence. It's funny: in many ways, this is the exact opposite of last year's summer block of episodes, Decolora Adventure. DA was two things: one, a lame duck block of episodes (we'd already completed both the league story arc and the regional villain story arc); two, a bunch of largely disconnected Johto-style filler episodes. Mind you, many of them were good filler episodes! But they were still Johto-style filler and they were still lame duck episodes. This Korrina saga that we're getting in the Summer of 2014 is the opposite. First off, not only is it not a lame duck but rather it's in the thick of the plot itself, with Ash adventuring alongside Gym Leader No.3. Second, as I was just saying moments before, these episodes aren't disconnected from one another and they're not fillery either -- each episode leads into the next and together they're telling a story. While I enjoyed Decolora Adventure more than I had expected to, I'm already enjoying this story arc with Korrina much more.

Third, the sneak peek for XY034 suggests a good episode. I'm looking forward to it.

Fourth, the Diancie poster shown at the end of the episode. I MUST HAVE IT. @_@ ;p
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Old 06-30-2014, 11:24 PM   #36
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In other news, I've updated the second post in the thread to include links to our posts regarding Episodes 001 thru 010. I didn't realize that my first post about XY here was after watching Episode 007. But it makes sense. I didn't regularly post about my Pokémon viewing here in the past because any time I did post about it it would usually go ignored. But when bbb and Doppel decided to investigate Best Wishes, that motivated me to start posting more often about Pokémon; and then when they picked up XY following my post for XY007, that really motivated me to start posting about it weekly, as we can see from the post history in the Suggestion Box (and now from the links provided in the second post of this thread as well).

While the following posts had little or nothing to do with specific episodes, I thought it would be wrong of me not to provide links to them here for easy viewing. I didn't want to include them in the second post though since I would prefer to keep that post dedicated to XY episode discussion, so I'll include the links here instead. Enjoy!

Discussion about LucarioPK Fansubs: Talon87, kaisap112

A visit from PocketMonsters: Sunain, Talon87, Sunain, Talon87, Adamant, Char, Talon87, TSS_Killer, big bad birtha, Doppleganger, TSS_Killer, Talon87, TSS_Killer, Doppleganger, Talon87

Tip: for easiest viewing, just click the first link and then scroll down. The subsequent posts tend to appear one after another with few interruptions.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Before, I provided a list of my top three recommended episodes from XY011 thru XY030. Now that I've reminded myself about what Episodes XY001 thru XY009 were, what are my recommendations from those episodes? And what would be my top three picks for the series so far overall?

Tastes vary, but for me the XY series enjoyed a very strong start. I absolutely loved Serena and she was an exciting delight throughout XY001, XY002, her minor appearances in XY003, 004, and 005, and then of course in XY006 and XY007. I enjoyed the series premiere more than I enjoyed Hoenn's, Sinnoh's, or Unova's series premieres. Ash's gym battle against Viola was (dare I say it) one of the best gym battles I've ever seen. (Certainly one of the best animated, holy cow.) Viola herself was a delight. (There's a reason fans were happy to see her again in XY020!) All in all, there were a lot of little things in most of the episodes which entertained me.

But that stated, even early XY suffered from a few fillers. Sadly, the two first captures of the series following the premiere -- XY003's Fletchling and XY004's Dedenne -- were not only boring affairs in and of themselves but gave us Pokémon who have proven to be devoid of personality. And while I enjoyed the Furfrou episode (XY008) more at the time than I'd probably care to admit, it was a sign of fillers yet to come.

So, when I look back on the first ten episodes, if I had to recommend three episodes the three I would pick would be ...
  1. XY005 and XY006 (a two-parter; didn't air as one but screw it I'm listing them as one )
  2. XY007 (that flashback scene )
  3. XY001 and XY002 (a two-parter that aired as one)
As for when I look back on the first thirty episodes of the series ...
  1. XY014, the haunted house episode, is still my favorite episode of the XY series. One of my favorite Pokémon episodes of all time.
  2. XY005 and XY006, Ash's gym battle against Viola
  3. XY018, the Parfum Palace episode
While I feel like XY001 thru XY010 were a stronger block of episodes than XY011 thru XY030 were, I guess for me XY014 and XY018 represent two glittering diamonds in the rough. XY018 was silly but a lot of fun. XY014 was serious and wonderful.

But if you asked me to include all the episodes which I've seen so far (which would mean that we include XY031, 032, and 033 now as well), then I think I'd definitely need to make room for XY032 somewhere in there. Must-see TV for anyone who's ever enjoyed watching the Pokémon anime. And while 030, 031, and 033 independently may not make my personal cut for top three, they're all contributors to the excellence of the current story arc.
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Old 07-12-2014, 01:37 PM   #37
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I've gotten really bored of Serena because as of 40 episodes in she has absolutely no purpose but to bring back a shipping subplot that was killed off with Misty a decade ago. I fear Serena will never get a real goal and she'll just try to be Ash's love interest all saga until she leaves.

As of now Serena has has the least memorable first 40 episodes of any female companion. It's hard to imagine at this time in past sagas May and Dawn were already being properly developed and had established goals and battles.

The writers aren't fooling anyone. Serena's crush on Ash will be dropped at the end of the generation and we've seen it happen with Misty a decade ago.

If you guys want to see the, "girly female trainer who learns from Ash" done right, they already did it with May and Dawn. It's hard to get into Serena when they did her character better two times over.
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Old 07-18-2014, 11:44 AM   #38
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XY034:

Spoiler: show
I haven't looked forward to a Pokémon episode this much in months. Unfortunately, this proved to be one of those cases where the delivered product failed to meet the expectations. Had I not been so excited to see this episode, I think I would have enjoyed it okay (but not immensely either). As it was, though, I was pretty disappointed for much of it.


The biggest problem I had with this episode was that Korrina and Lucario achieved their goal too quickly and with too little adversity. Let's take each of these in turn.

First, that they achieved their goal too quickly. While I will give credit to the writers where credit is due -- they did use dialogue and visual clues to indicate that Ash & Co. were at Maple's house for multiple days -- I still feel that even a one-week training period is much too small. I had expected Ash & Co. to drop Korrina off and continue on their journey; I had then expected them to either pick Korrina up on their way back to Shalour City or else (more realistically) to directly head for Shalour City and to find that Korrina is back in town, having recently completed her training with Maple. This would have allowed Korrina to train with Maple for a month, possible longer, without soaking up much of Ash's time. Alternatively, though, I had expected the writers to have Ash stick around for the (say) minimum of two weeks that it would take Korrina and Lucario to train under Maple and learn how to handle Mega Evolution. While the writers do imply something on the order of four to five days' passage of time, they do not give any concrete signs that Korrina was stuck here for weeks. And even if they did, I still would feel like this is one of those cases where exposition and time lapsing can do more harm than good. It's better to give viewers a real solid feel of, "Man! Korrina sure did train for a long time! :o" by having them experience the length of time alongside her. Even a relatively small window of only four episodes can, in the real world, translate to four weeks' worth of waiting time. When it actually feels like it took a month to the viewer, then you're better able to sell the idea that the training was grueling and took a long time.

Second, that they achieved their goal with too little adversity. I had gone into this episode expecting that Korrina and Lucario would have to undergo intense physical and spiritual training to master Mega Evolution. That Lucario was going to have to do practice exercises to learn how to control his anger. That Korrina was going to have to do spiritual exercises to connect to Lucario when he goes berserk. I was expecting the Mega Evolution equivalent of meditation under waterfalls, climbing mountains, standing with one foot atop beams -- the whole Karate Kid or Rocky treatment. What I got instead was flower arrangement (analogous to one but only one of Mr. Miyagi's many exercises for Daniel) and one solitary mountain climbing scene. And it wasn't even a mountain proper! -_-; It was just some dumb rocky outcropping about 30 meters in height. Lucario managed to climb it on his first try. Korrina managed to guide him to the flowers on her first try. There was no failure. There was no adversity. Their goals were always accomplished easily and naturally.


In fact, what was even the point in sending Korrina to study under Maple? This was the second greatest problem I had with the episode. The premise of Korrina's journey and the sneak peek for Episode 034 had both given me the impression that Maple was to be this Yoda-like character, someone who was not only very wise and talented but who would be able to help Korrina in a way that no one else could. Yet for all of Maple's talent as a Mega Evolution master, the wisdom she shared with Korrina was on par with a fortune cookie. Why couldn't Korrina's grandfather have taught her the mantra "one heart, two views"? Why couldn't someone at home have had Korrina undergo training in flower arranging? Surely you can't expect me to believe that Maple is the closest competent flower arranger! And unfortunately that's all Maple was really good for. On the balcony, she more or less regurgitates to Korrina that classic line about how "the power has been inside you all along! " and how there really isn't anything for Maple to do, that it'll be all up to Korrina and Lucario to figure it out. WELL, GEE! THANKS A FUCKING LOT, MAPLE! I'm sure we came AAAAAAAAALL THE WAY OUT HERE just to hear you tell us that Grandpa trolled me and that I didn't really need someone else's tutelage after all but rather I just needed to recalibrate with Lucario and figure things out on my own. THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH!


The Rocket Trio's appearance in this episode was both unexpected and most unwelcome. Not only did they soak up precious time that could have been used to better effect, but their role in the episode mandated that its plot conform to a fairly typical pattern. Ash & Co. are having fun with the Characte of the Week. Then the Rockets kidnap Pikachu and the Pokémon of the Week. (Of course. ) The Rockets end up being defeated by the star Pokémon of the episode. (Usually that's same Pokémon as the Pokémon of the Week but not always.) And in sending the Rockets blasting off again, the star Pokémon succeeds in whatever goal it was that they were working on. I hate it. I absolutely hate it. I hate how the Rockets have to be at the center of so many characters' accomplishing their goals. And I hate how their presence can rip away the promise of an original plot for the series and in its place give us a mediocre, formulaic blahfest that we've seen so many times that viewers would be forgiven for tuning out of the fight.

AK2 noted that he enjoyed the battle with the Rockets, in particular because the Rockets kicked ass, as he put it. For me, though, this was yet another reason I hated their presence in the episode. Because while I have much love for a Team Rocket that can kick ass, I HAAAAAAAAAAAAAATE inconsistencies with the plot. And nowhere is this more obvious than with the Rockets' roles in Episodes XY033 and XY034. In XY033, you have the Rockets inventing power suits for their Pokémon. These power suits artificially enhance the creatures' strength to the point that they are "as powerful" as bonafide Mega Evolutions. So we have "Mega Wobbuffet," "Mega Meowth," and so on. In their pseudo-mega forms, the Rockets kick Ash & Co.'s asses ... but in turn get their asses handed to them by Korrina's Mega Lucario, who single-handedly defeats the entire Rocket troupe and sends them flying. So okay, Episode 033 establishes that a suited-up Team Rocket is no match for a berserk Mega Lucario. Got it. But then comes Episode 034 and what happens? Here we have ordinary Pumpkaboo and ordinary Inkay -- no power suits this time -- holding their own against Korrina's Mega Lucario. What the fuck, writers. You just showed us, last episode, that the Rockets are no match for Mega Lucario even with artificial enhancements. And now one episode later you want to show us that they can hold their own against him even without the aid of artificial enhancements? This is dumb. I understand that the episodes were likely written by different writers, but for fuck's sake calibrate your efforts and all be on the same page, please.


My final big complaint with the episode was how it ended. Like I wrote above, I had not expected Korrina's training to come to a close so soon. I had expected Ash & Co. to part ways with her here, Korrina staying behind to study under Maple, Ash plowing ahead on his quest to collect eight gym badges and enter the Kalos League tournament. What happened instead? Well, Ash & Co. still part ways with Korrina here. But this time, it isn't because they're leaving her to train under Maple. This time it's because ... Ash ... just sort of kicks her out of the group? ^^;

I don't understand. It seemed like Korrina was eager to continue journeying with Ash. Even if she thought that he planned to escort her back to Shalour City and didn't realize that he intended to save their gym battle for later, it was clear from how Ash informed Korrina that he was parting ways with her that they hadn't talked this over at all. Like ... seriously? What the fuck, man. Why are you springing this on Korrina so suddenly? And what's wrong with her journeying alongside you as you train up to be able to beat her in a gym match? It's almost as though the writers are saying, "It's okay when Ash does it. It's okay for Ash to tag along and monitor someone when they're training to become a better person. But when the roles are reversed and it's someone else watching Ash train, that's no good. Ash has to train in secret. He can't let them see his secret moves and Pokémon!" I mean ... I guess it makes sense to some degree that he wants to catch Korrina by surprise ... but like, a) is that even very sporting? ^^; haha and b) can that be considered sporting after he's already born witness to all that she learned from her own training? It's almost like Ash told Korrina, "I'll show you my notes if you show me yours," and then after she showed him her notes he said, "Okay. Thanks," and pulled his notebook away, not letting her read it. C'mon, man.


With so many complaints, you may wonder if I found anything to enjoy in this episode. Well, there were a few things. For starters, although this was a small one, I enjoyed Serena. Her flower arrangement with Fennekin was the best in my opinion, not only aesthetically but also how it fit the Pokémon. I also enjoyed the comedy with her getting bored out of her mind and lightly arguing with Eureka over whether it was still fun to keep flower arranging or not.


My favorite part of the episode was the battle between Mega Lucario and Mega Mawile. It was the one thing from the sneak peek that didn't let me down. It was beautifully animated and fun to watch. You knew exactly how it was going to end but that was all the more reason why neither the writers nor the animation team needed to spend effort trying to make the fight unpredictable. Instead, they focused their efforts on showing off Mega Mawile since this is probably the last time we're going to see one in the main series for a long time.

Mega Mawile is one of the few Mega Evolution designs that I think looks great. Most of them look stupidly overdesigned and I would be appalled if they were canon evolutions. (And, *sigh*, I guess they sadly are anyway, in a sense. [/get used to it]) But Mega Mawile is one of the few where I'm like, "Damn: I wish you were a bonafide evolution and not locked away behind some dumb game mechanic. " She looks great. And she's a real treat for anyone who's ever wanted Mawile to be more than a POS Pokémon. So getting to see Mega Mawile twirl about in her hakama, her steel maw twintails creating an elegant-looking yet fierce-looking defense, was great.
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Old 07-18-2014, 11:50 AM   #39
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So Talon, how much does the actual animated battles play a role for you in enjoying the Pokemon episodes?

For me, it seems like if I have any inkling of how the fight will end, it's not exciting. There's no tension knowing that the cosmic forces of the universe have a predetermined winner. There's a bit of crossover in this with HxH and Jojo, with both authors unwilling to let convention hold back the result of an eventful fight.
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Old 07-18-2014, 12:17 PM   #40
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Doppleganger View Post
So Talon, how much does the actual animated battles play a role for you in enjoying the Pokemon episodes?

For me, it seems like if I have any inkling of how the fight will end, it's not exciting. There's no tension knowing that the cosmic forces of the universe have a predetermined winner. There's a bit of crossover in this with HxH and Jojo, with both authors unwilling to let convention hold back the result of an eventful fight.
Sometimes a battle is just about getting to see a Pokémon in beautiful color and motion, at a level beyond what the games are capable of. That's the category I'd file Mega Mawile vs. Mega Lucario under. You don't tune in to a battle like that for the suspense, as there's zero suspense. (You know 100% going into that battle who is going to win it.) You tune in to a battle like that to get a chance at seeing what Mega Mawile will look like when freed from the visual restrictions of the video games.

Other times a battle is about seeing a solid fight. It helps to not know the outcome, but sometimes you can still have a good sense of what the outcome will be yet enjoy the fight. This has overlap with what I said above, but here the focus is less on "OMG GRAPHIX!" and more on "OMG MARTIAL ARTS!" I'd liken it to wanting to watch a Bruce Lee fight sequence. You knew with most of Lee's fights that he was going to emerge the victor. Even if he suffered temporary setbacks, he was Bruce Lee. He never lost. But you still want to watch those fights because you want to bear witness to the amazing feats of the human body he was able to pull off. The jumps. The flips. The kicks. The punches. Some good examples of this category would, I guess, be most gym battles where you suspect that Ash is going to win on his first try yet the sneak peek has revealed that the gym leader uses a Pokémon with a special trait. For example, the sneak peek for Ash's battle against Roxie revealed that she leads off with a Koffing that moves and behaves like no Koffing we'd ever seen before. This excited people going into the episode, and then when you actually watch the episode you're like "OH MY GOD THIS KOFFING IS AMAZING! O_O"

Similar, I suppose, is when you go back and re-watch a beloved gym battle from back in the day. The ones that really stick with you are the ones that aren't ruined by the fact that you now know the outcome. Many battles can become dull once you know how they play out, but the truly great ones are the ones where amazing stuff happens that is still entertaining to watch on subsequent viewings. Ash's first match against Blaine? Phenomenal cliff hanger that's still great to watch the lead-up to even though you know how it ends now. Ash's first match against Sabrina? Amazing battle because of the nostalgia&anxiety it evokes from when you watched it the first time. Pikachu using Thunder for the first time? (And the way Ash orders it? And the way it's animated?) So frickin' epic. And then the way Kadabra morphs it into a dragon and has it chase after Pikachu who is fleeing for his life from it? That camera shot is something seared into our brains.

But I guess to actually answer your question ... I suppose that the battles don't matter as much to me as a) the journey that leads us to them and b) other, non-battle destinations. Like ... with XY, if you look at the episodes I say that I have enjoyed the most (and, more specifically, what it was about them that I enjoyed so much), you'll find that most of them weren't big on battles. I rate Ash's match against Viola pretty highly (because man if that wasn't beautifully animated), but his battle against Grant -- while entertaining -- doesn't even place on my Top 3 lists that I wrote for either XY overall or for XY Episodes 12 thru 30.

If you read my posts, you'll find that I agree that not knowing a battle's outcome is a big, big help for the entertainment factor for most battles. One of the things that's regrettable about our fandom and the times we live in is that it is far too easy to get spoiled about the schedule for the show. Finding out that the episode following a gym battle is a light-hearted filler episode kills any chance you might have had at being excited over whether Ash was going to win or lose. And it's the same problem for the other scenario too: finding out that Episode 702 is him still fighting the gym can rob you of excitement as you now know that Episode 701, in which Ash begins his gym challenge and which you have yet to see, is going to either end in his defeat or else in a now-expected cliffhanger. So unfortunately, it can be tough for gym battles to be exciting anymore. The ones that are have to make heavy use of spectacle, be it stunning animation, remarkable properties of the Pokémon or its attacks, or both. Indeed, some of the most memorable combat moments for me in Unova were ones that featured some sort of spectacle:
  • I remember the time in the first Don Tournament where Iris's Excadrill caught Ash's Pikachu by the tail
  • I remember the time that Kenyan's Zebstrika used Stomp against Bel's Minccino
  • I remember the time that Iris's Dragonite invited Langley's Beartic to freeze it
But if you were to ask me to lead you through Ash's challenge against most of the gym leaders, I'd have to really think hard to try and fill in the gaps in my memory.
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Old 07-18-2014, 12:29 PM   #41
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It's interesting to me because "not knowing the outcome" is really a one-time thing, the first time you see it. If you rewatch the fight, as you kind of hinted on, if the fight really teeters on that one unknown feature it might be severely depreciated during the next go around. So, I'd think that a fight has to have some interested alternative features that give it replay value to the point that the appreciation would be like a replay on the first view. Something like Archer v. Berserker or the Bruce Lee fights you mentioned. There's enough information out there so that people know about a highly probable outcome, but the actual fight itself has enough to hold interest.

I guess then, that's probably the biggest reason I haven't been able to hold onto Pokemon since Geewun. The battles should be the key attraction of Pokemon because everything else unique to an anime presentation is left deliberately stunted. I remember when I first played Red/Blue, almost two years after I got into Pokemon, there was an amazing sense of liberation from Ash's dunderhead adventure and being able to steamroll the AI kind of reaffirmed the long-promised ego trip. Everyone talks about how they would be better trainers than Ash, and I finally got to be that but ultimately ruined a lot of the fight appreciation I had for the anime.
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Old 07-18-2014, 12:54 PM   #42
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Any story about fighters on a journey is going to be hindered greatly by plot armor. Pokémon is no exception. If you took trainers out of the equation, making the story about a ragtag team of traveling animals; and if you made it so that setbacks were, while perhaps infrequent, not rare; and if you made it so that these setbacks covered the full gamut up to and including loss of life; and if you had the story reach its terminus at the end of each generational cycle, with a brand new team of heroes and villains showing up each cycle; then I think you would have an exciting story on your hands.

Producers of children's television programs are too afraid of making stories like this though. Children already have a hard enough time losing one friend in a two-hour film. Asking them to accept the loss or permanent injury of multiple friends on a regular basis is something most studios are not willing to risk. Too much backlash from parents, and (legitimately) too much risk that you hurt the marketability of the product because it becomes unpopular with its target demographic. Like, which would you rather make if you were in it for the money? A children's television series that is critically acclaimed and watched by 25,000 adults and 5,000 children? Or one which is panned for being derivative and safe but which sees 125,000 children tuning in weekly? At the end of the day, children's television isn't written for the 0.1% of audience members who are above the age of 18. So expecting it to conform to the standards of adult fiction is unrealistic.
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Old 07-19-2014, 12:47 AM   #43
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Talon, I've been wondering... how much do you actually keep up with the various spoilers given by magazines and the like for upcoming episodes? Sometimes you appear to be aware of what's coming up, while other times you seem surprised by things we've known for months.

(also, XY34 is one of my least favorite episodes in the entire series as a whole. Ugh)
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Old 07-19-2014, 01:25 AM   #44
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Talon, I've been wondering... how much do you actually keep up with the various spoilers given by magazines and the like for upcoming episodes? Sometimes you appear to be aware of what's coming up, while other times you seem surprised by things we've known for months.
I'm pretty close to the anti-spoiler pole of the spectrum. But sometimes I'll navigate to Bulbapedia's homepage or Serebii's homepage to check up on something (recent example: checking to see when the event Diancie will be released in North America) and there I'll see a headline or screen capture that gives something away. For example, I learned the other day from Serebii that the pre-release special for the movie will be airing soon / just aired, and that was because I saw a picture on their site with Diancie interacting with some Pangoro.

AK2 loves spoilers. Anything you guys know about the anime, he'll find out within hours of you guys. When I have also been spoiled on something, then we'll discuss it together. But when I haven't, he tends to avoid giving it away, framing our discussions as though he were only as knowledgeable about future events as I am. Though sometimes he'll slip up or he'll just be too eager to share something exciting, and I'll learn from him something that I didn't previously know.

Rarely, though more this year than in previous years, I'll be spoiled about an upcoming event in the anime by someone here on UPN.

I don't like knowing the titles of upcoming episodes weeks in advance. It gives away too much about the story's pacing and direction. Between A, B, and C, I'd rather go with C:
  1. knowing that the next six episodes will be Ash meeting various Kalos Pokémon of the Week; they're all pretty much filler episodes
  2. knowing that two episodes from now is when Ash will challenge Gym #3 and knowing that seven episodes from now is when he will challenge Gym #4
  3. not knowing what is coming next until the official sneak peek for next week's episode tells me, and even then it only sneaks me a peek one episode at a time
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(also, XY34 is one of my least favorite episodes in the entire series as a whole. Ugh)
If you read my wall o' text, then you know my story. What's yours?
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Old 07-19-2014, 09:20 AM   #45
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If you read my wall o' text, then you know my story. What's yours?
I agree with a lot of what you said. I tend to dislike this kind of pseudo-philosophical lecturing in general, it usually coming with a bunch of clunky and hard-to-interpret dialogue that doesn't make half as much sense as the writers thought it would. In this particular instance, they also do such a painfully terrible job showing Corni and Lucario overcoming their issue; there was no real difference between what didn't really work last episode and what worked this episode, and they didn't even properly convey what was supposed to be different this time around. Also, it was overly slow-paced, which isn't good when the plot is barely managing to make sense at all and isn't really about anything that's particularly entertaining to watch. It just felt like a failed attempt to be deep. I can't imagine the target audience for the series not being bored out of their skulls from this.
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Old 07-19-2014, 12:21 PM   #46
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Fuck! I totally forgot to blabber on about the last two episodes. Well here's 34 at the very least!

XY 34 spoilers
Spoiler: show
This episode didn't bother me as much as it did everyone else. Though my expectations were slightly low to begin with, so I guess I didn't have much room for disappointment. Sure, Lucario's "recovery" was cliche and predictable, but I figured they'd pull something like that anyway. Actually it always kind of annoyed me how Corni ALWAYS went for a mega evolution despite knowing Lucario would flip the fuck out. I get that she's thoughtless, but not THAT thoughtless. My biggest issue with the episode would be just how Satoshi decided to kick her out. He's all "Yeah, you're now inconvenient to the writing, so get the fuck out!"

Also next week is when Satoshi catches Vaginabird. JOY!
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Old 07-23-2014, 06:32 PM   #47
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Been busy; XY035 is seen but post is stuck in the pipeline. Also saw the recent 2-minute thing with Watanabe Mayu. Was reminded by it to go looking for the film's theme song. And what do you know? It's out! Chorus at 1m10s. To be honest, the chorus is the only part I really enjoy a lot. ^_^; Part of it is probably the power of association (having heard that specific bit numerous times already in the anime's movie promotional segments) and part of it is probably just the fact that that really is the only good part of the song. ^^;; (Perhaps that's why they've pushed that specific portion again and again? Because they knew the rest of the song was forgettable?)
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Old 07-23-2014, 11:16 PM   #48
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I think the entire thing is good. This is actually the first time in quite a while I've liked the theme song so much I bought the single.

Last time was movie 12, with Shokotan's Kokoro no antena.
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Old 07-24-2014, 12:34 PM   #49
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XY035:

Spoiler: show
If I'd been looking forward to Episode 034 at, say, a 10 out of 10 level, then I had been looking forward to this one originally somewhere around an 8 or possibly a 9. Whispers on the Internet had seemed to confirm our thoughts from the scant promotional footage we'd seen up until now -- that Hawlucha was going to have one hell of a personality, that he was going to be one heck of a powerhouse addition to Ash's squad, and that he was going to be a heck of a lot of fun to have around. My excitement was tempered by the letdown that was XY034, but going into XY035, I still hoped for the best.

The episode did not end up disappointing me ... but neither did it exceed my expectations either. It was a solid, 8-out-of-10 Pokémon episode for me. It did a lot of things right -- things I'll be only too happy to comment on below -- but it wasn't without its flaws or minor disappointments either.


Nowhere is this clearer perhaps than with Hawlucha himself. In Hawlucha, the writers have finally given us a Pokémon that looks like it can size up to Ash's Krookodile, Iris's Excadrill, or Ash's Snivy in terms of richness of character. It's not quite at Oshawott, Chikorita, or Charizard levels -- yet? -- but this one episode already gives us enough to work with to have a pretty clear grasp on what sort of person Hawlucha is:
  • he's a man of few words
  • he is calm, maybe even reserved, but is not shy or bashful
  • he seeks out strong opponents (whether to become stronger himself, whether to prove to himself or to others that he is the strongest, or a mix of both we don't yet 100% know; seems like it's probably a mix of both, although that's a little strange since he does not seem to exude arrogance)
  • he is just and believes in justice
  • he is courageous; he will not allow personal risk to prevent his pursuit of justice
  • he takes pride in fighting as an artform; he values the aesthetic of his moves, especially his finisher
  • he is capable of trusting in others (displayed by his ability to entrust the forest to Machamp despite knowing that Machamp is his inferior; and also displayed by the trust he places in Ash throughout the episode, in particular his decision to join Ash on his journey)
  • he's not the type to frolick about, crack jokes, or be silly; while he's not necessarily uptight, he's certainly more serious than most
I could probably list off more character traits if I tried, but the list is already long enough. You can see what I'm saying: Hawlucha is no Fletchling.

I love it when the writers do stuff like this. It's not just about what separates Ash's greatest Pokémon from his worst ones -- it's about what separates great episodes from bad episodes and the best series from the worst series. If it's one thing Unova reminded us of, characters are the lifeblood of this franchise. You can't care about gym battles when you don't care about the creatures in them. And you sure as hell aren't going to care about filler episodes that star personality-less Pokémon. Not when, by definition of what I just said, such episodes do not even try to transform them into richer characters. Oshawott and the Scalchop King tournament? You cared about it because of Oshawott. The episode would have had little to none of its charm had it instead featured Boldore or Palpitoad. (Though I suppose it could be said that such an episode would've at least lent them some personality! ) Ash's gym battle against Brycen? It stands out a hell of a lot more thanks to viewers' emotional investment in Krokorok -- who had only recently become an official member of the team and who had suffered defeat against Skyla's Swoobat in the first round of the sixth gym match. You really want to see Krokorok win. And while you know that Ash likely will win, you don't necessarily know that Krokorok will, how far he will manage to go, how far the writers will let him go. Which makes the match all the more thrilling and fulfulling when you see Ash call Krokorok back and send out his other two Pokémon to pass out first. "Can it be? Will Krokorok be the finisher?" Hell yeah he will! And it's great. ... You get none of that same excitement with Ash's match against Burgh. Sewaddle? Cute. Swadloon? Less cute. Regardless? Not much emotional investment in the creature by this point in time. And the battle itself didn't do much to separate itself from the crowd either.

The thing is, Hawlucha isn't exactly perfect. But like I was telling AK2 on the phone the other day, that's paradoxically another reason why he's so grand. One of my frustrations with Hawlucha is that he didn't quite match up to my expectations. I had expected him to be more badass than he ended up being. He's good, don't get me wrong, but the episode makes a point of showcasing how he still suffers defeats like anyone else, how he can't even manage to KO a Froakie without knocking himself out in the process. And I guess I had expected him to be more like Ash's Krookodile or Charizard -- a bit more ferocious? A bit more of a glutton for combat? Hawlucha isn't quite like that. Clearly he enjoys fighting, as he wouldn't do it so much if he didn't. But what exactly is it that makes him tick? Why exactly does he have to fight everyone in the forest that he just suddenly showed up in one day? Why did he stay put there after discovering that no one in that forest was stronger than him? These are questions which suggest complex answers. Charizard was simple -- "he wants to be the best/strongest," so he's always challenging creatures who he thinks will give him a good fight. If there isn't a challenge in it for him, Charizard loses interest. He has no desire to fight Froakies and Fennekins. But Hawlucha seems a bit more complex ...

... and that's why I say that, paradoxically, I think he's so great to have on board. It's rare for us to get a character who feels like an actual human being in this series. Usually the Pokémon feel like caricatures: the writers identify three to five character traits, max them out, and write the character around those traits from now and forever. When the Pokémon don't feel like caricatures, it's usually because we go towards the other extreme: they're devoid of any personality at all. Blank slates. But Hawlucha is neither a blank slate nor a caricature. He ... he feels like a character I would expect to find in a regular anime. O_o :o It's so rare for us to get a character like that in Pokémon -- in fact, they almost feel like fish out of water! -- but it's so, so great to see the writers toying around with someone who is complex, who isn't so easy to decipher, who doesn't exist in extremes of black and white but who may consist of lots of grays and colors. That isn't to say that inconsistent characters make the best characters. lol Far from it. You can't throw together a smorgasbord of contradictory personality traits and say you've written a "complex" character. It doesn't work that way. It's difficult to write a complex character. It's difficult for me, as an amateur critic, to even find the words and the arguments to describe what makes a complex character complex. Yet I can tell you that, based on what we saw in XY035, I feel like we've gotten ourselves such a character in Hawlucha.


Next, let's discuss the villains. The moment I saw that Ursaring stealing food from innocent creatures and doing so with an evil grin on his face, I just knew what AK2 would say. We've often discussed how the original series expressed the view that there are no bad Pokémon -- only bad humans who order their loyal Pokémon to do bad things. The implication seems to be that Pokémon in a state of Nature do not ever commit immoral actions. They may act amorally, but they never act immorally. If a bear steals food from tiny woodland critters, it's because he's acting out of hunger and has an amoral I-take-what-I-want attitude to survival. It's not because he's a "bully." To label him as such is ascribe human identity to the beast.

And yet happens next? That Ursaring sees the defeated Hawlucha, sprawled out on the ground ... picks up a boulder ... and with a fiendish grin on his face makes to smash the boulder over the prone bird. O.o It's at that point that all talk of amoral instinct goes out the window and we have ourselves a patently "evil" character, a "bad man" who does bad things because he has a rotten personality.

I know that some fans will object to the writers taking the franchise in this direction. But personally? I like it. :o I feel like it frees the writers up. Having to shoehorn in a wicked human to justify why a Pokémon would do wicked things, it's not so easy to do -- especially not in an original and uninsulting fashion after having written some eight hundred episodes. And sometimes you just don't want to have a wicked human, y'know? Sometimes you just want an adversarial Pokémon. In fact, for me personally, I feel like the episodes with adversarial humans tend to be worse than the ones without. The humans are often clownish and lose because of the silly laws of the universe in most children's cartoons. At least with the creatures, we don't usually have adversarial clowns.

One thing I pointed out to AK2 though was that this wasn't the first time he and I had had this conversation. And that it wasn't even the first time we'd had it this season! Because the XY writing staff has already given us an evil Pokémon this season in the form of Malamar. Remember? XY019, the episode with the Officer Jenny hypnotized by an evil Malamar? AK2 commented then -- I think we all commented then -- that the book still isn't written for Malamar and that it's possible he'll be revealed to have been acting under Team Flare's orders. But even so, I don't have to restrict myself to Malamar to provide examples of Pokémon doing evil things in the past few years. The Litwick from Best Wishes come to mind. Even if they were "only acting per their animal instinct," they were trying to steal people's souls. And they tried to shove Team Rocket into an extradimensional space to kill them. If we're going to shield this sort of behavior under the blanket protection of "natural behavior," then why stop there? Why not toss in the serial killers and rapists? "I was just acting in accordance with my natural urges, Your Honor." Right. Smashing defense.

The point is, the Ursaring in XY035 clearly had a wicked personality. And joining him was his Conkeldurr accomplice. Almost as if the writers wanted to say, "Look! He's not some freak occurrence! There are more of them!" haha

Closing this section off, I'll reiterate: I liked this. I know that for many people the appeal of Pokémon is that it's an idyllic universe where there is no poverty of consequence, hardly any crime (seems like the only crimes we ever see are theft and abduction), no physical deformities, no physical or mental disabilities, so on and so forth. The Pokémon world is advertised as a magical place where the only sources of evil are humans themselves -- and thus so long as you hole yourself up in a cabin in the woods you should be living the dream life. But I dunno. I'm 29 years old. I recognize that I am by no means -- by no means -- the target audience for this series. But I plan to be a parent some day. And I'd like there to be more shows for children which parents can enjoy just as much. Part of that means writing for adults. And I see the idyllic Strawberry Shortcakes and Teddy Ruxpins of the world as being a little too sugary sweet for my tastes. A world where Pokémon are never, ever the bad guys? Less entertaining to my adult senses than one in which Pokémon have just as much capacity for wickedness as humans do.


Machamp was good as well. I've already written much about Hawlucha and the villain duo, so I don't want to waste your time going into too much detail here. Suffice to say, though, that I felt that Machamp was another Pokémon who felt rather human, just slightly less so than Hawlucha. In particular, the bit where it dawns on him that he's been duped. I feel like the animation direction there was on its A-game.

Before Machamp was introduced but after Hawlucha's role in the forest had been explained, I was worried by this episode. "Writers!" I said, "Surely you're not going to have Hawlucha accompany Ash when that means abandoning the woodland critters to Ursaring and other threats, are you? " Of course they did not. They introduce Machamp, they prove that Machamp is capable of dealing with Ursaring and Conkeldurr at the same time, and they have Hawlucha leave the forest in his capable hands.


And now for a few miscellaneous thoughts before we wrap up.

Team Rocket: I really enjoyed their absence from this episode. It's sad that it's come to this, but I would rather the Rockets were written out of the show entirely at this point than have them be in every single episode as their bumbling idiot selves. I see the XY treatment as a happy compromise. Fans of Comic Relief Team Rocket have them back while non-fans gets to enjoy respites from them here and there. To be honest, this episode would have been only too easy to write the Rockets into. The writers could've easily replaced Ursaring and Conkeldurr with Jessie, James, and Meowth. Have the Rockets picking on Pokémon but defeated by Hawlucha. Have them crashland in Machamp's backyard. Meowth decodes Machamp's sob story. Team Rocket tricks Machamp into helping them get revenge against Hawlucha. So on and so forth. Pretty much the exact same plot as what we got except with the evil Pokémon duo replaced by the Rocket Trio. So given this, I am quite grateful to the writers for not giving in to temptation. They took the path that required a touch more creativity and risked much more criticism from the fanbase. And in exchange for their risk we got a far superior episode. Thank you, writers.

The animation: it was quite good this week. Not much else to say other than expressing thanks to the animation team for a job well done.

Hawlucha's finisher: AK2 expressed frustration over Hawlucha's insistence on a flashy finisher and how it keeps costing the luchador matches. I sympathized, but I also disagreed with him in terms of what I want to see happen going forward. Rather than see the proverbial hare learn to be more like the tortoise, i.e. rather than see Hawlucha scrap his flashiness and become a leaner fighter as a result, I'd rather see Hawlucha insist on keeping his flashiness (or never mind "insist" -- it's a part of who he is!) and consequently train to overcome the defecits it makes for him by way of being super-awesome in other areas. Man, that's a jumbled mess of a sentence. ^^; What I'm trying to say is, if Hawlucha is a man who right now has a -2 weight on his shoulders, a baseline potential for being a 10, and who hopes to achieve a 10 status, then:
  • what a lot of fans probably want to see: Hawlucha shedding the -2 burden, thus going from 8 to 10
  • what I want to see: Hawlucha keeping the -2 burden but raising his baseline potential to a 12, thus going from 8 to 10
I don't want him to quit being flashy with his finisher because that feels inconsistent with his species. He's supposed to be a Mexican-style wrestler. Asking him to not have a spectacular finisher would be like asking him to quit wearing a mask. He can't do it. The mask is a genetic part of who all Hawlucha are -- and so too, do I feel and imagine, the need for a flashy finisher is.
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Old 07-24-2014, 04:12 PM   #50
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Spoiler: show
The mask is a genetic part of who all Hawlucha are -- and so too, do I feel and imagine, the need for a flashy finisher is.
Spoiler: show
Yup. The writers outright told us it is by having the in-series Pokemon encyclopedia specifically mention this in its description of the species. Said dex entry was even custom-written for this episode rather than lifted from one of the games like the series usually does specifically so the writers could tell us the need to be flashy is an inherent trait to the species itself rather than a personality trait this one specific Pokémon has.
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