#i haven’t watched much pokémon but dp when i was a kid? dawn liked ash he had no idea

[multimousenette]

goh: ash where are you going??

ash: i’ve got to find that gengar! i can’t leave it like that!

goh, with the fondest smile: of course you can’t…

scorbunny: 😏😏😏

goh, immediately turning bright red: it’s not like that! i want to help gengar! who said anything about helping ash??

[smallersocksx]

Pokémon Character Analysis: Iris

With Iris set to return to the anime in next week’s episode of Journeys. I decided to take the time to analyse her character as I’ll be honest, Iris isn’t one of my favourite travelling companions. However, now that I’m older and I’ve taken the time to analyse her character. I realise, that a lot of the hate Iris receives is slightly over the top.

As with all my reviews/analyses, I’ll keep them under the cut. So, if you want to keep reading, that’s great!

Introduction:

As many people that have read my previous reviews and know me, may know I am a huge fan of the Diamond and Pearl games and anime series. I will be the first to say, I know Diamond and Pearl wasn’t a perfect series, honestly, there is no such thing as a perfect series. But as a follow-up to DP, Black and White was definitely a let-down for a lot of fans, either because of completely resetting Ash’s knowledge which was honestly an insult to his DP incarnation, his travelling companions or the fact that he lost to Cameron of all people in the Vertress Conference. BW in some aspects left a lot to be desired.

Nevertheless, this post is focusing on Iris, a companion similar to Goh, a lot of fans love to hate particularly because of her infamous catchphrase “You’re such a kid.” Looking back, this was one of the things that did make me drop the series, keep in mind I was 11 when BW started airing. So, hearing a character that is meant to be the same age or younger than you say "You’re such a kid!” Over and over again, got annoying quite quickly.

However, looking back the usage of that infamous catchphrase was probably exaggerated. Whilst, working past that I still didn’t come to love Iris. Considering, Iris is meant to be one of the main character and similar to Goh, they are meant to be written in a way that makes us want to see them grow, cheer them on and be happy when they succeed. Nonetheless, when you look at the way they are written and their development it just makes it abundantly clear that Iris and Goh are the victims of poor writing.

Iris’ Initial Characterisation:

The aspect that made me drop the series was Iris’ initial characterisation particularly the infamous phrase “You’re such a kid” which as I mentioned in the introduction, which with the benefit of hindsight I can see the usage of it has been exaggerated. Nevertheless, it doesn’t change the fact that it was annoying. Especially, given when Ash meets Iris, he had defeated legendaries by this point, acquired 36 badges (that’s including the Orange Archipelago badges) and defeated the Battle Frontier. Whereas Iris may have had good battling prowess and at one point had a 99-battle winning streak, but, her Axew was a newborn with hardly any battling experience and her Excadrill was refusing to listen to her.

Many people use the defence that Misty called Ash a kid yet she doesn’t nearly receive as much hate. To be fair, when Misty met Ash, he was a rookie trainer and Misty was a gym leader, so Misty at least had the position and knowledge to back her up. However, this was only an issue at the beginning of the series and the insults tend to die down, but, that initial characterisation is what stopped me from watching the series since my 11-year-old self did not have the patience for that.

Iris’ Goal:

Iris’ goal is to become a Dragon Master, however, by the end of Black and White, Iris opts to travel to Johto to battle Clair and following the conclusion of that battle she opts to follow the direction she saw Rayquaza flying. When I look at this conclusion, I’m honestly confused, I have no sense of whether or not Iris is any closer to achieving her goal. Or even throughout the series, we get no sense of how anyone who wants to master any Pokémon typing reaches their goal, a majority of type specialists typically end up in the position of Gym Leader or Elite Four. But Iris never once expressed a desire to be a Gym Leader or any higher-ranking position. Which, makes Drayden decision to choose Iris as his successor, all the more unusual to me. I suppose in one way it gives Iris a position/goal to work towards but given Iris’ free-spirited personality, having someone choose her path rather than choosing it herself feels unnatural.

Additionally, an obvious method to becoming a type specialist is catching Pokémon of the same type you want to specialize in and little more than half of Iris’ team actually consist of Dragon-types. I understand Gym Leaders having at least one alternative type to give their team diversity and cover their weaknesses. As shown by Candice owning a Medicham and Piers having a Toxtricity in his party later in the SW/SH games. But, Excadrill fits the bill more than Emolga as Excadrill is part of Steel-type which covers Iris’ team’s weaknesses to Ice and the newly introduced Fairy-types. That is not to say that I dislike Emolga or anything but it felt like she was an unusual catch.

I am aware Clemont only had one Electric-type on hand when travelling with Ash, to be fair, the remainder of his Electric-types were at the Lumiose Gym and before catching his Bunnelby he displayed apprehension at handling other types of Pokémon.

Axew:

I like to think of the characters’ first Pokémon or their partner Pokémon as a mirror reflecting their growth. Take May and Blaziken, they mirror one another’s development perfectly as when Blaziken was a Torchic much like May, he was inexperienced and unsure of himself. When Torchic evolved to Combusken, at this point May had won two Contest Ribbons and began to feel confident in her Coordinating skills. Once, Torchic evolved into Combusken he developed that same level of confidence, he didn’t feel the need to compete for May’s attention and wasn’t bullied or intimidated by other Pokémon like Ash’s Corphish. Then Combusken evolves to Blaziken in the penultimate episode, once May has decided to leave the group, travel through Johto on her own and find her own battling style. At this point, May has chosen to become independent and this reflects in Combusken, her first Pokémon evolving into his final stage. My point being I like to think every travelling companions’ ace reflects their character growth and I don’t get that same feeling with Iris and Axew.

Now it is clear that Iris and Axew care for one another and there is also the twist that Axew wasn’t Iris’ first Pokémon. However, for a majority of the series, Axew was Iris’ only Dragon-type and in the sixth episode, he has a dream of evolving into his final stage. After that, the idea of Axew evolving is hardly addressed. As I’ve mentioned, evolving or choosing not to evolve are one method of allowing Pokémon to develop, considering, Axew has expressed a desire to evolve, I think he should have at least evolved into Fraxure before the BW series concluded. As aside from him learning Dragon-type moves and developing as a battler, once, Dragonite’s introduced he’s kind of pushed to the sidelines and doesn’t develop any further.

Many fans are hoping by Iris’ appearance in Journeys, Axew has evolved into Haxorus. However, if Axew had evolved into Fraxure by the end of the series, then his evolution into Haxorus would feel more natural to me.

Dragonite:

I will be honest; I am not a huge fan of Iris’ Dragonite. It felt as though, the writers forgot to give her an additional Dragon-type and just rewarded her with this random Dragonite. Also, there is the fact, that Dragonite was disobedient towards Iris despite the fact he joined her team willingly. This display of disobedience reflects poorly on Iris as a trainer, especially after Excadrill’s arc. Moreover, Iris has had some of her best moments throughout the series with the other Unovan Dragon-types such as Druddigon and Deino both of which would have been great captures for her particularly Deino as she has a Hydreigon in the games.

Also, HE. SHOULD. HAVE. LOST. TO. DAWN’S. MAMOSWINE!!!! (and I’m not just saying that because I love Dawn and her Mamoswine)

If the writers absolutely felt that they had to give Iris a Dragonite, they could have at least done it whilst she was in Johto since Dragonite’s pre-evolutions can be found in Dragon’s Den and Route 45. It honestly would have made more sense than giving her a Gible which isn’t even native to Johto and we haven’t even been given a hint on whether or not Gible is appearing in the next episode.

Conclusion:

I think posting my thoughts, always, manages to clear my head. Now whilst, Iris wasn’t my favourite travelling companion of Ash’s. I feel as though some of the hate towards her is exaggerated as she has had some great moments and development throughout BW. One of my favourite arcs in BW, was Iris restoring her relationship with Excadrill which was one of the most poignant moments of the series.

I think if the writers did a better job as well at establishing Iris’ goals – we understand she wants to be a Dragon Master, but does she want to become a gym leader? A caretaker of Dragon-types (similar to Liza of Charicific Valley)? If they had established this from the beginning, we would have had a better understanding of the direction they wanted to take with Iris’ development.

As well, in the games, Iris has a better relationship with Drayden as she affectionately refers to him as “Grandpa”, I think if they transferred that relationship into the anime, it would have made Drayden’s choice of selecting Iris as his successor feel a lot more natural.

All in all, I feel as though Iris was the victim of some arguably poor and weird writing choices and she isn’t the only character to experience this throughout the series. After writing this, I am looking forward to Ash vs Iris next week, but you have to hope they don’t pull the same stunt as they did with Korrina and diminish all of Iris’ efforts and training during her absence. At least we’ll finally get to see Dracovish in action as well!

[smallersocksx]

Pokemon Journeys Episode 74 (Ramblings/Review)

Introduction/Background:

I'll be honest I haven't been watching the series as actively since episode 65. That's because the episodic formula they chose to use for the series was honestly starting to grate on me and if you read my post on my issues with the Pokémon Journeys anime. I did bring up one of my issues being the episodic formula.

As time grew on through my issue with the episodic formula and some of the other issues of the series begun to annoy me even more so I needed to take a break. When they announced Dawn would be making an appearance, I knew I had to watch (the one instance where the episodic formula kind of worked in my favour). As Diamond and Pearl was my first game, my favourite anime series and had some of the best story-telling in my opinion. In comparison to Journeys, I think my main issue with the series is the lack of direction and not knowing where the story is going.

That element of surprise might be great for some people and if you’re enjoying the series that’s great too. Personally, I love the story-telling aspect of the Pokémon anime and watching these characters go on their own personal journeys. This is why watching a story-driven series, I want that level of clarity and direction provided by a linear narrative. This is why the episodic formula was starting to grate on me, Journeys is great when they are focusing on furthering a character’s goal or development, my issue lies with the huge gap in between which later results in a huge pacing issue that could easily be resolved if they gave time for certain aspects to be fleshed out more.

However, that isn’t to say Journeys is a bad series. I’ve certainly enjoyed a lot of the episodes and the slice of life aspect the series provides in comparison to earlier series. On the other hand, given that the series is meant to be focusing on travel that can be construed as a negative point as well.

And I've realised as I'm writing this, this may come across as a rant about the series rather than discussing the episode. So, if you're still reading thank you ^o^ But I thought it was necessary to give some background to explain how my opinions have been formed and if you recommend that I re-visit some episodes that’s great too!

So far, I've only seen the episode with some really poor subtitles. So, if I've misinterpreted a scene then you can let me know. But I think I got the gist of most of the episode. If you’ve read some of my other posts, I always try to break down these reviews/ramblings.

The Beginning:

I feel as though this episode is going to end up drawing similarities to the DP episode Sleepless in Pre-Battle. In which, Darkrai causes nightmares and Cresselia is unable to help the town for some reason, I can’t remember the exact reason in the original episode although in this case, it’s obvious as we see Team Rocket’s Matori Matrix attack and injure Cresselia. This sets up, the boys’ side of this DP mini-arc in which they’ll investigate the Darkrai side of the problem and something I greatly appreciated ASH! REFERENCED! HIS! BATTLE! WITH! DARKRAI!!! It was something I greatly appreciated and kind of wished Journeys took the time to reference some of Ash’s other achievements and experiences more often. Give him more of a mentor-ish role like he was to May back in AG. 

Rather than Chloe joining the boys in Sinnoh, originally, she was meant to be going on a trip with her family as the summer holidays had begun. However, those plans immediately went down the gutter as both her parents had work and her brother was joining his friend at summer camp (this is going by really horrible subtitles so I may be entirely wrong). I honestly don’t know if Chloe went to Sinnoh intending to join up with Ash and Goh or just going on a trip by herself. But I really liked the call back to Following a Maiden’s Voyage in which Chloe had packed too much the same as Dawn and her Mum ended up giving her a more appropriate-sized backpack. I think there might have been a Sword and Shield reference in there as well because at the beginning of the game the Mum says the backpack, she gives the player was the one she used for her journey and I think Chloe’s Mum said something amongst those lines. I don’t know I might be grasping at straws.

I loved all the Sinnoh/DP references earlier in the episode and to be honest I was focusing more on the Dawn and Chloe side of the episode rather than the boys (sorry Ash and Goh).

Chloe and Dawn:

Now I’ll be honest, I love Chloe for me personally she’s one of the stronger aspects of the Journeys series. However, in this episode, she annoyed me a little bit. From my point of view, one of the more subtle ways Chloe has developed after catching Eevee was that she learnt to relax and embrace being a kid primarily because of Eevee. This development was highlighted in the Glimwood Tangle episode where Chloe ended up playing with the group of Impidimp. If it had been Chloe from 20 or even 30 episodes before she may have handled that situation completely differently. Whereas, as of late she’s learnt to relax and have fun which at times was something I could have done when I was her age. 

Anyways, I’m going on a tangent once again. I just thought the whole argument with Dawn was rather pointless, I didn’t understand the need to create any conflict when they were getting on perfectly well beforehand. That was kind of my biggest gripe on the girls’ side of the episode. 

On the other hand, they also set up a good opportunity for Chloe to grow which I kind of hope they take. Another issue, I’ve been having with the Journeys anime is that they set up some great plot lines or potential development and fall through on delivery or never act on it. One aspect I loved about episode 63, was that they were setting up an interesting way for Chloe and Eevee to develop or find a goal by meeting other trainers that own an Eeveelution and learn why they chose that particular form. They could have even set up Ash getting in contact with May or Serena to talk to Chloe about Glaceon and Sylveon. But the writers never followed up on the potential storyline after episode 63, which is so frustrating.

This is why I’m hoping with Dawn’s influence Chloe actively begins to at least try things out to learn what is a good fit for her. This was an issue with Serena as well, before discovering Pokémon Performing, she didn’t really actively try out other things like battling as much. Even, Ash gave Contests a go and ended up developing some of his best strategies from those experiences such as the Counter Shield and the Ice Aqua Jet. Considering, Pokémon is an anime targeted towards children, it would be a good message to send, to at least try something once rather than not trying at all.

Climax:

Following their (unnecessary) argument and battle with a sleep-deprived Rhydon, Chloe and Dawn come across the injured Cresselia from the beginning of the episode. Going back to the Rhydon, in the original Darkrai film they did expand on Darkrai causing Pokémon to fall asleep and have nightmares but I can’t recall if the Pokémon were affected in Sleepless Pre-Battle. It was an interesting and small touch that I liked about the episode (also poor Rhydon).

The preview for the next episode shows Chloe calming Cresselia or at least gaining Cresselia’s trust, and it made me think again this might be me just grasping at straws. But perhaps Chloe has some sort of affinity with Psychic-type Pokémon because we had that whole weird vision aspect (that was again never addressed) in the Glimwood Tangle episode where Chloe had that vision of Galarian Ponyta and Rapidash. I don’t know, that’s a theory I just developed that probably won’t pan out.

Conclusion:

All in all, it was a decent episode to come back into for Journeys. If I’m honest if they were promoting the DP remakes, I’m surprised they didn’t try to do anything that focused on the Creation Trio rather than the Lunar Duo however the Creation Trio did play a huge role in the DP films and Dialga and Palkia in the original anime so perhaps they wanted to give more spotlight on the Lunar Duo or even hint at Tobias’ return with Darkrai? 

If I’m completely honest I’m concerned about the pacing for the next episode as this arc is only meant to be two episodes, this episode did do its job of setting things up. In my opinion, it could have been faster in some areas, they could have even shown a Contest in this episode and have Dawn and Chloe meet in that way. Given in the next episode the two groups will meet up and attempt to defend Cresselia from Team Rocket and I don’t think they’ll have much time to show off anything Contest-related which is a shame because Contests were my absolute favourite aspect of the games and anime. 

If this were a three-episode arc maybe they could have used this episode to focus on Chloe and Dawn, next episode focuses more on Ash and Goh finding Darkrai have the groups meet up and then the third episode half-battling and half showing off contests. I don’t know this is just me throwing some ideas out there. As I think Journeys just has a huge issue with pacing for some reason and this episode was sort of slow in some areas and as I mentioned I’m worried the next episode is going to be really rushed.

But overall, it was a decent episode and I’m hoping we’ll get to see the rest of Dawn’s team next episode as I love her Pokémon to bits. Also, Pikachu and Buneary reunion, please!!!

(And I may watch this episode again with proper subtitles)