#Team Rocket vs. Team Plasma

[themattress]

Unpopular Opinion Re:Pokemon

So, after a long time and a lot of hard work, we finally have the scripts to the legendary lost Best Wishes anime two-parter, “Team Rocket VS. Team Plasma!”  We’ve got the whole story.

I wish the 3/11 disaster had never happened...mostly because so many people would still be alive today and so much damage to Japan would not exist, but also because these episodes could have aired. And I wish the staff’s original plan for the overarching story for Best Wishes based on the Black/White games could have come to pass, as it would have been amazing.

However, in the end these wishes are hollow Ideals, and we have to face the harsh Truth. And part of this Truth is that Game Freak passed on doing a Gray version in favor of doing Black 2/White 2, which means the staff’s plan was going to be scuttled regardless of whether the 3/11 disaster transpired or not. They would’ve done Episode N and just placed Reshiram putting a halt to N’s coronation in the present day rather than two years prior. So that’s why....

....I’m kind of, sort of glad that “Team Rocket VS. Team Plasma!” never aired.

Don’t get me wrong! The executives in Japan not allowing the full episodes to be released in any capacity in favor of remaining Lost Media just because their events no longer line up with subsequent canon is stupid. They have lots of grown-up viewers who understand the facts and still won’t mind...heck, probably lots of kids as well! However, the episodes not being broadcast and being relegated to a nebulous space in Japanese canon ended up working to the series’ advantage when Tomioka and the other writers were freed up to recycle elements from them. Most specifically, in the Operation Tempest two-parter, which is honestly an even better pair of episodes than “Team Rocket VS. Team Plasma!” and I just have a hard time imagining them in any form other than the one they’re in now. If not for what transpired with “Team Rocket VS. Team Plasma!”, we might have never been blessed with this scene:

Pikachu using a giant Electro Ball on a nuclear space rock just doesn’t hit the same way that him using it on Giovanni, the leader of Team Rocket whom Ash had never faced up until now and whom had always doubted Pikachu’s abilities when Jessie, James and Meowth talked them up. Pikachu doing it to save not only the entire Unova region but also Meloetta, a character that we’ve come to love and care about, is also far more dramatically satisfying.

Really, I’m more sore about how the show’s third year turned out due to Junichi Masuda’s Gen VI-related meddling (since it really should have been something more like this) than I am about “Team Rocket VS. Team Plasma!” and the intended arc it was setting up. As great as it would have been to see, it just wasn’t in the cards and, unlike said Gen VI-related meddling with the third year, I don’t believe that Best Wishes suffered all that much from its removal.

Tl;dr - I’m honestly kind of cool with this as all we have now.

[ultraericthered]

This planned introduction to Ghetsis in the Best Wishes series of the Pokemon anime, where he’s there in his hideout communicating with his underlings but he’s not shown to us in full and we’re shown his hands but not his face, sounds awesome but was reminding me of something else, so I thought about it.... and then it dawned on me:

Best Wishes really liked its Gen 1 era OS homages, huh?

[runawaycarouselhorse]

So, as shady and strange as yesterday's message was (requesting crowdfunding for a purchase and translation of the post-poned Team Rocket VS Team Plasma two-parter), with trustworthy folks (like Dephender from Bulbagarden) vouching that the script was legitimate, we... finally have it.

Those that paid (like myself), got refunded in full! The seller decided to make digital copies available for free. So, in the end...

Here it is! Scans of the script in Japanese. Last file down is a text translation in English.

Next best thing to finally seeing the whole two episodes ourselves!

EDIT: correction by @themattress: ‘it wasn't the seller, who just owned scans of the scripts...it was the owner of the actual physical scripts, who found out about the fundraiser and said "**** this capitalist ****, if so many people really want this then it should be put out free of charge!" Bless them for that!’

[vaugarde]

ok so thats technically a dub season down…. should i take another break to watch magia record or should i just plow through the rest of bw before the end of the year

[jadeazora]

Someone is claiming to know someone with scans of the lost Team Rocket vs. Team Plasma two-parter scripts, and is looking for $4000 in order to purchase them.

I'll link their fundraiser page, since this is an important piece of lost media within the franchise, but CAUTION BEFORE DONATING ⚠️ we're still waiting on a true confirmation on the authenticity of their claims. I'll add to this post when we get that confirmation. ⚠️

Edit: the campaign was taken down. No clue if due to copyright or the OP doing it. I hope someone leaks it eventually, this was the closest we've ever been since it was cancelled!

[best-pkmn-battle-ost]

The bracket has been decided! Here's the match-ups for Round 1!

Each match-up will be linked to it's post below, when it goes up! Round 1 will start going up on Friday 16th, 8PM CEST!

Round 1, Upper Left Group

Clan Warden VS Hau Galar Gym Leader VS Dark Matter Phase 2 Subway Boss VS Oleana Zinnia VS Origin Dialga/Palkia Legendary Birds VS Penny Diantha VS Eternatus Phase 3 Neo Team Plasma Grunt VS Alola Champion (REMATCH) Chairman Rose VS Lake Trio

Round 1, Lower Left Group

Calyrex Final VS Team Dim Sun Grunt Wally VS Aether Foundation Employee Ultra Beast VS Iris Alola Elite 4 VS Team Star Grunt Arceus VS Lance/Red Ultra Necrozma VS Paldea Gym Leader Guzma VS Gladion Lusamine VS Decisive! Steven

Round 1, Upper Right Group

Giratina VS N Final Ghetsis VS Gateway Colosseum World Tournament FInals VS Anime Hoenn Elite 4 Guardian Deities VS Crowned Zacian/Zamazenta Cyrus VS Colress Champion Nemona VS Hoenn Gym Leader Cynthia VS Team Aqua/Magma Leader Bede VS Team Star Boss

Round 1, Lower Right Group

Team Galactic Grunt VS Champion Leon Ultra Recon Squad VS Lysandre Battle Tower VS Hop Final Suicune VS Hoenn Rival Marnie Final VS Treasures of Ruin Gym Leader Piers VS Dialga/Palkia Ho-Oh VS Dialga's Fight to the Finish! Red/Blue VS Team Rocket

[princess-of-the-corner]

It's worth noting that, in Hoenn, Ash had been somewhat of a mentor to May, and a big brother-like figure to Dawn in Sinnoh.

Then in Unova, he loses to a guy who thought the Unova League would be in Johto, didn't realize you need 8 badges to challenge the League, and thinks that a full team is 5 Pokemon.

Ash's main rival loses in the 1v1 rounds of the tournament.

Also, they cut the Team Plasma subplot.

Basically, Team Plasma was meant to debut in a "Team Rocket vs Team Plasma" 2-parter, but then an Earthquake hit Japan RIGHT as the episode that would've seen Castelia City destroyed in the crossfire was due to air.

So, they cut the episode and, instead of tweaking later episodes to have Team Plasma debut later and/or trim down on the urban destruction, cut Team Plasma entirely until it was time to adapt Black 2 and White 2.

Ah yeah the first bits kinda sound like. Soft-reboot 'our MC needs to forget everything so we can establish things for the audience'.

Which. Doesn't. Make sense. As there's always a companion who is new to this and fills the role.

Also wait the FUCK do you mean there's no Team Plasma?????

[moonxpalace]

Ash and Iris sharing the same brain cell - a small collection

Exaggerated explaining, while adding sound effects

Risking their lives for Pokemon's sake, jumping off tall buildings

Playing while Cilan cooks (and ruin his food smh)

both having large appetites

.. and being in denial when the connoisseur pointed out how alike they are

Both being silly champions

Bonus:

Iris saving Pikachu from the cancelled Team rocket vs Team plasma episode. People really undervalue the kind and protective part of Iris which she shows when her friends really are in danger. Not only towards pokemon ...

... but towards her travelling companions as well! Just like Ash does

[jaredthebc]

YALL HOLY FUCK HOLY SHIT WE MIGHT FINALLY GET SOME IDEA OF WHAT TEAM PLASMA VS TEAM ROCKET WOULD HAVE BEEN LIKE GO DONATE IF YOU CAN SO WE CAN GET THE SCANS

[izunias-meme-hole]

The Pokemon Black and White Anime should’ve just introduced Team Plasma right after Ash’s reunion with Jessie and James. We should’ve seen Plasma Grunts, an early hint at Ghetsis’s existence, an encounter with an N who preaches about Pokemon Liberation, a Team Rocket and Team Plasma cold war, a reveal of Ghetsis at his most “benevolent,” Colress in the OG Plasma aesthetic, N with Reshiram vs Ash with Zekrom, Ghetsis revealing his true colors in a similar way to how he did it in Pokemon Adventures, and Plasma going off the radar for a while.

THEN we get to see Giovanni and the rest of Team Rocket trying to take over Unova via Melloetta and the Forces of Nature, and Neo Plasma trying to conquer unova via Colress’s new mind control machine and Kyruem!

[daily-pokemon-trivia]

Cw//tw: mention of nuclear disaster

Team Plasma holds the title of latest to debut, showing up in the 112th episode of the Black and White anime. This wasn't on purpose, they were actually supposed to debut during the original episode 23 and 24. Titled Rocket-dan VS Plasma-dan (Team Rocket VS Team Plasma)

These episodes were left unaired after the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami and the Fukushima nuclear disaster that followed. The original plan was to release the episodes later, but this never happened. Since it was actually a pretty important episode it was written out of continuity.

Currently the episodes are lost media. But we do have the scripts for both episodes! In addition, small bits of footage were used in later episodes of the anime

[themattress]

..........DUDE.

https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2023-05-03/unaired-pokemon-black-and-white-anime-episode-scripts-go-public/.197734

https://kotaku.com/pokemon-anime-lost-episodes-team-rocket-earthquake-1850396995

https://gizmodo.com/pokemon-scripts-lost-episodes-2011-earthquakes-1850412007

https://www.cbr.com/pokemon-black-and-white-scripts-unaired-episodes-resurface/

https://gamerant.com/pokemon-anime-script-unaired-team-rocket-episodes/

https://screenrant.com/lost-pokemon-episode-found-team-rocket-vs-plasma/

https://www.thegamer.com/pokemon-fans-recover-script-lost-anime-episodes/

https://sea.ign.com/pokemon-black-version/198596/news/scripts-for-lost-pokemon-episodes-unearthed-after-12-years

https://www.eurogamer.net/lost-episodes-of-pokemon-anime-translated-by-fans-for-first-time

https://www.ggrecon.com/articles/lost-pokemon-anime-script-recovered-by-fans/

https://www.dexerto.com/pokemon/pokemon-anime-scripts-two-lost-episodes-2132062/

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2023/05/random-scripts-for-cancelled-pokemon-anime-episodes-recovered-by-fans

https://gonintendo.com/contents/19770-scripts-from-scrapped-pokemon-black-and-white-anime-episodes-surface

https://nintendosoup.com/scripts-for-two-unaired-pokemon-anime-episodes-surface-online/

https://exputer.com/news/entertainment/pokemon-unova-lost-episodes-special/

https://gameranx.com/updates/id/464895/article/pokemon-anime-lost-episode-scripts-released/

https://otakuusamagazine.com/unaired-pokemon-black-and-white-anime-scripts-uncovered-closing-a-gap/

So. Many. Articles!

This has just gotten more and more surreal to experience. Almost as surreal as my continuing epiphany that this two-parter is now a case of Schrödinger's Episodes: both happening and not happening at the same time (in the original Japanese version anyway; they straight-up don’t happen in the international version). Has any other anime had a situation like this one?

[ultraericthered]

Something of a companion piece to this post. Credit to @themattress​

Yeah, I’m sorry, but a whole month later and I’m still not over this. In all my life, time, and involvement in Pokemon fandom, I don’t think I’ve ever been so unironically happy and welcoming of Atsuhiro Tomioka being a self-plaguarizing hack like I am regarding this here.

I now fully understand what those two episodes and the story told within them were originally intended to stand as by the PokeAni staff, but they ended up never broadcasting those episodes so that we never got that exact story with all that exact set-up in it, so what we were left with now actually stands in the BW series narrative as the Boomerang Cornerstone of the Unova Saga. And I use “Boomerang” because the event canonically occurs within the saga’s narrative, and then every little goddamn thing that happened there comes back to happen again later on in the two important narrative points for Team Rocket and Team Plasma respectively - the pre-League Undella / Meloetta arc and the post-League White Ruins / N arc (Episode N).

And I’ve such a good grasp on how Tomioka’s writing tends to work for his Big, Action-Packed Epic Event Episodes, even the imagined Reshiram VS Zekrom two-parter in the extended post-League final arc of the Unova Saga we should’ve been given would have this going on, with many striking parallels to Team Rocket’s earlier finale.

Team Rocket VS Team Plasma / Operation Tempest 2-Parter

> Giovanni’s VTOL arrives at his set destination in the Unova region > Giovanni steps out of the VTOL, some grunts there at his side > Team Rocket stands in soldier formation to greet their Boss > Giovanni declares that the main phase of Team Rocket’s mission to take over the Unova region shall now commence. > There are Rocket Grunts present > Jessie and James have tech with uses very specific for this mission > Ash comforts his Pokemon friend as they’re held captive inside the hangar of Dr. Zager’s helicopter > Righteous male character speaks seriously with female authority figure as the two of them join forces to pursue Team Rocket > Team Rocket enters ruins and sets up some ritual to break the seal on the ancient prize they seek > A spiral staircase rises from the ruins > At the top of the stairs, on a pillar, is the coveted ancient artifact > Giovanni raises up his hands as he makes an excited declaration > Meowth suddenly starts talking again in Part 2, having been uncharacteristically silent all throughout Part 1 > Righteous male character, female authority figure, Iris, and Cilan race to the site of crisis in a vehicle > History of anicent civilization that had an artifact which caused the civilization’s demise is explained along the way > A nearby city is directly endangered by the effects of the big battle and there’s mass panic in the streets about it > Pikachu makes a big jump and launches a humongous Electro Ball attack right at the source of the crisis > TRio physically supports Giovanni when there’s danger to him > TRio remarks on how they knew Ash’s Pikachu was a special one > Inside his VTOL, Giovanni orders a retreat back to HQ in Kanto

Team Rocket VS Team Plasma / White Ruins/N/Team Plasma Arc

> Pokemon are driven into a frenzy and attack humans in the streets > Looker appears and flashes his International Police badge > The enigmatic Team Plasma is introduced to us > Team Rocket (TRio) meddles in Team Plasma’s operations > Team Plasma has their own aircrafts and use an old, abandoned runway in the Desert Resort as one of their bases of operation > Lord Ghetsis keeps in touch with his grunts from within his lair > Team Plasma has a Pokemon fire a Hyper Beam into a skyscraper > Team Plasma’s Liepard fights with Team Rocket’s Woobat > There are five main Team Plasma members working for Ghetsis > Ancient Unovan ruins that appear to have some connection to the Hero’s Legend > A powerful, shiny rock is buried within these ruins > A Professor named Juniper is a key player in events > The Hero’s Legend, Black and White Chapters, factor in heavily > Looker physically manhandles an eliteTeam Plasma grunt > Krokorok (or Krookodile) digs a tunnel to help Ash and Pikachu > Pikachu makes a big jump and launches an Electro Ball attack right at the source of the crisis > TRio wears undercover guises and uses jet packs > TRio remarks on how they knew Ash’s Pikachu was a special one > Giovanni, dressed in full Stalin garb, wants to conquer Unova and hopes to see Team Plasma eliminated as competition to that goal > Some big Team Rocket and Team Plasma related action goes down in Castelia City, with the city being threatened with destruction

Operation Tempest 2-Parter / Reshiram VS Zekrom

> Dark clouds gather and a hole in the sky opens up that Legendary Pokemon of Unova comes through > The Boss starts acting more unhinged than he normally is > Legendary Pokemon is taken control of by Boss, who orders them to turn their power against all of Unova so that he may conquer it > Green haired, black-and-white-color-schemed empath companion is reeling from an overload of anguish and pain > Iris’ Dragonite features heavily in the big epic battle > Pokemon under evil team’s control unleash barrage of attacks > Disturbances and destruction from this battle can be felt nearby, as the entire Unova region’s fate is soon to hang in the balance > Boss cranks up the power on what’s currently being weaponized > Pikachu unleashes a huge amount of power, with extra energy having been granted it by an electric type Legendary Pokemon > Thanks to this, a humongous ball of electrical power is formed > Electric attack is launched right at the enemy and their weapon > BOOOM! It’s a direct hit! > Explosion passes, smoke clears, the enemy has gone down > Green-haired, black-and-white-color-schemed empath companion soothes the savage beast(s), averting a crisis upon Unova > Boss is displeased at their mission outcome, but can accept failure and look forward to what future work might hold > Our heroes say goodbye to green-haired, black-and-white-color-schemed empath companion and friend(s) in a final scene at sunset

[fly-pow-bye]

In 2011, there was going to be a Team Rocket Vs. Team Plasma arc in the then-current Pokemon Best Wishes series. Then, the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami happened, and because this episode involved city destruction, they decided to leave this episode unaired. Supposedly, they were going to air at a later date, but they ultimately decided to do something different with Team Plasma, and to this day, the episodes are locked in the TV Tokyo archives.

While we can still only imagine what the episodes would have looked like beyond the preview of the first part, the scripts for both parts ended up being in someone's hands, and they decided that they were going to sell the script. After a fundraiser and confirmation that they are legitimate, the holder of the scripts decided to be generous and scanned every page of it and gave it to everyone for free. The fundraiser was refunded, and the pages were translated into English. Here's a Twitter thread documenting this incredible series of events.

I haven't watched the Black & White series, so I can't really say my personal opinion on it, but it is cool to see a piece of lost media for a beloved franchise, even if it's just a script.

[miraiconnection]

//Hi I'm currently losing my mind because someone leaked the entire script of the Team Rocket vs Team Plasma episodes of BW that never aired because of that earthquake in Japan

[poke-admin-showdown]

ROUND 2 ANALYSIS: A PATTERN EMERGES

round two voting has concluded! and as is usual, i have some things to say about it

first of all, this round marks the entrance of our four highest seeded contenders - plumeria, the shadow triad, eri and matt. the title of this roundup post was originally going to be "MATT'S HERE NOW" but his match was actually significantly tamer than others, and there's something else i want to talk about more

almost half of our contestants going into the quarterfinals share three attributes: a red theme, bobbed hair, and capacity for (possibly feral) violence. mars, courtney and mela have significant support within the demographic of people voting in this bracket. now, i doubt the hair is really doing anything, i think that's mostly a coincidence, but it is interesting and pretty funny to me how that's worked out.

starting with mars: she's feral and we all love her for it. there have been enough tags about mars being feral that i'm going to have enough to make an entire tag compilation post at the end of this bracket. she's the star of the most one-sided poll this round, winning against petrel by 88% of votes. this is also our most-voted poll with 161 votes at time of writing. tumblr LOVE mars.

secondly, courtney: a significantly closer match this time against her team magma colleague tabitha, but still a clear win. i thought this match would have been a lot closer, and i saw some great arguments for both opponents in the tags, but in the end courtney won by 65%. that's pretty significant! i was honestly half expecting tabitha to win. i would like to officially state that i hope our banner isn't influencing results even though it is correct.

and finally, mela. i was not expecting her to get this far, i'll be completely honest. she has rage in her heart, yes, but she's also wearing those big ol boots. i spend a lot of time thinking about garment construction and how it would limit movement in a fistfight and in mela's case, i believe her boots would hinder her. She was seeded below Atticus for this exact reason. but she's taken down a galactic commander (rip saturn you tried) and her ninja-themed bestie, and i'm very curious to see how she'll do against her next opponent. will the angry bebooted teenager make it through the quarterfinals or will her reign end here? who know! not me!

other things of note: jupiter made it through round two, but with significantly less of a winning margin at 56/44% at time of writing (which is also our closest match), with a reverse sweep, since Oleana had an initial lead. i'd chalk this up to her opponent - while i haven't played swsh, i have heard a few things about oleana, and she does seem like the kind of person to fight dirty. unfortunately for her the tumblr consensus seems to be that jupiter would fight dirtier. the #jupitersweep dream lives on For Now.

a fight i wasn't expecting to be as close as it was is (one of) the shadow triad vs rocket executive archer. i don't know if archer has secret combat tricks i don't know about and that's why he got 34% of votes but that was genuinely a surprise to me considering he was up against an actual ninja who can appear out of thin air and stuff. pretty impressive on his part honestly.

finally, and related to my last point, we've lost two more villainous teams this round. team rocket has lost all four of its representatives in one round and is now entirely out of the running. we also lost macro cosmos's only representative, oleana, who did her best and i'm very proud of her.

the teams left in the running are teams aqua, magma, galactic, plasma, skull and star. most of those only have one representative left but galactic and star have two. i don't have too much to say about this, but i do think it's interesting and worth noting.

and now, funny tags time!

(courtesy of @/edgeanescence on the matt vs ariana poll)

(courtesy of @/spaghettiwolf on plumeria vs proton)

(courtesy of @/pixelchaos00, also on plumeria vs proton)

(mars vs petrel compilation, courtesy of @/clefaiiiry, @/salon-maiden-anabel and @/quarterdollar)