#justice 4 wattrel tho seriously

[sage-nebula]

I'm FINALLY all caught up on Horizons! I've been using this website called Blissey's Husband (lol) to watch them, and I have to say I ended up a bit disappointed today when I was met with anti-adblock measures AND episode 49's subs not using the English translations for the cities / pokémon names / moves when every episode prior had subs that did (and the inconsistency there bothers me SO much) . . . but I got around the anti-adblock and I could deal with the subs suddenly dropping their use of the English names for this one episode, so it was whatever. (Though if they're not going to bother with that, then I'll probably just download the new episodes from Some Stuffs from now on, like . . . the only reason I was using Blissey Husband, aside from convenience of streaming, was that it was nice to have the attack names and pokémon names translated. There's no reason to use that site otherwise.)

BUT ANYWAY. Now that I'm finally all caught up through episode 49, here are my general thoughts:

As I mentioned in a previous post, I think the Horizons anime is absolutely fantastic, particularly if we're judging it by the metric of "a Pokémon anime" -- because if we're being honest, there are sliding scales of anime that differ not only by genre, but also by demographic and intention, and so a Pokémon anime is not necessarily intended to hit the same storytelling quality as, say, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. But with that being said, particularly when you compare it to the previous Pokéani that ran for over two decades, Horizons is just so, so, so good. It has an ongoing narrative, the characters are excellent, the story is compelling, the animation and battles are fresh and exciting, the music is great, so on and so forth. I'm having such a fun time with the Horizons anime. Anyone who refuses to watch it just because Ash and/or the TRio aren't in it are missing out. It truly is their loss.

Speaking of, Captain Pikachu > Ash's Pikachu. Not necessarily in terms of battle capability (although honestly . . .), but in terms of characterization and personality. At least so far, Cap is chock full of personality and is clearly not there just to be The Mascot or Friede's partner (or, worse, a babysitter to other pokémon), but rather a whole, full-fledged character in his own right. And to be honest, sometimes he's kind of a dick! He's cocky! He's arrogant! He argues with Friede when he thinks he's right! He yells at the kids in the beach episode and continues frowning at them even after! (No clue what he was yelling at them about either lmao.) Cap's not a complete hardass, but there is a shade of that there! And I mean, he taught himself to fly using Volt Tackle, so he holds himself to those same exact standards. Again, this is an example of how this series does such an excellent job with its characters. They had to have a Pikachu, but they didn't half-ass the Pikachu character. Cap is a fantastic part of the crew.

That said, sadly there are some neglected members of the cast. The Six Heroes are pretty much immediately forgotten after their captures, which I find to be extremely disappointing and, at times, distracting. Don't they need to eat? To be cared for? Or do the ancient pokéballs take care of that? It's never explained, and it's odd for Liko -- who is so compassionate and cares for others at the expense of herself even -- to just completely ignore them after they agree to search for Rakua with her. (Or is it Lakua? Or Laqua? Do we have official romanization?)

But okay, maybe we can't fit giant pokémon into the regular episodes. Then what about Wattrel? It honestly feels like Roy neglects that poor bird after the first three or so episodes after its capture. Unlike Liko and Dot, whose secondary captures walk around with them constantly, Wattrel is constantly in his ball and basically never comes out -- and when he does come out to be used in battle, he is out for maybe two seconds before he gets knocked out and has to be recalled (or is only there to help Dot with an art project, because Roy didn't want to use both of his pokémon for help with the sculpture that required pokémon help? hello???). Of course, Wattrel is probably weak, because Roy never trains it. Because the writers forget about it 99% of the time. Again, it wouldn't be as noticeable if Hatenna wasn't in Liko's hood 99% of the time and Tinkatink wasn't constantly clambering around Dot's feet, but since they are, it is. Why is Wattrel always in the ball? Why does Roy forget Wattrel exists until Dot asks if she can borrow him? It looks like we're going to get a Wattrel episode in a couple weeks (I think it's episode 52?) and it won't surprise me if it's a release episode because the writers just can't be fussed to remember Wattrel exists otherwise.

Changing tracks -- for the most part I think that the balance has been good with acknowledging the fact that Liko, Roy, and Dot are a.) kids and b.) newbie trainers, and thus need the adults to help them out of dangerous situations, without making it seem as if the kids are helpless and can't do anything. This is particularly well-handled in the fact that the kids have been consistently learning and training, and are now in a Terastal course where they're on a little independent journey to grow even stronger. It's a delicate line to walk between coddling your child characters, and making the adults in your cast look useless. Historically, Pokémon has been a very "adults are useless" series, but with so many prominent adult characters, Horizons can't really do that. So I'm glad that, for the most part, they've managed to avoid going in the opposite direction. The only time I felt they failed was in the episode when Roy's ancient pokéball got stolen, and Cap had to "save" them from the thief. I felt that the kids should have been allowed to win that battle on their own. But otherwise, I feel this series handles this aspect pretty well, and I'm glad that we've been shown an ongoing growth arc for the kids.

Though having said all that, I am scratching my head a bit at the beginning of this most recent arc acting like Liko is the weakest battler of the three: putting her against Katy when the Basics tests were decided on aptitude, having Liko say that "even [she]" could pass her test, et cetera. Not only is Liko thus far the only one of them with an evolved starter pokémon, but Liko has won numerous battles throughout the series so far (I think more than Roy and definitely more than Dot since Dot rarely battles and pretty much all of her knowledge is theoretical) and she's been shown to be a clever strategist. Like that's been the major point of difference between Liko and Roy: Liko is a strategist who can deduce how to use her surroundings to her advantage and knows how to direct her pokémon with precision, whereas Roy goes in guns blazing. It was only by following her example (and by Liko throwing) that Roy managed to beat her in the test set to them by Kabu. So it makes little sense that Liko is implied to have the weakest battling aptitude (and thus is put against the weakest Gym Leader), that she is the one to lose her Basics test battle even if she passed the test, and so on. We're being told now that Liko is weak at battling (something Liko also said when talking to Rika at Naranja Academy), but we've been shown the opposite. If anyone should be considered the weakest battler of the main trio, it should be Dot. (Since, again, most of her knowledge is theoretical; she's actually battled very little.)

As a final thing, I really love the mystery elements of the story. The Explorers are a fascinating antagonist organization and I love every little glimpse that we get of them. The individual Explorer members are excellent as well, with each one having a fantastic design and stand-out characterization. I'm currently operating under the opinion that Lucius and Gibeon were divorced, and Lucius was the one who got Rakua and custody of Terapagos in the settlement.

I've also seen the theory that Amethio is either a descendant or a clone (or a cloned descendant?) of Gibeon. While I don't think that Amethio is Gibeon's son (I think Gibeon is too old for that), I could see either grandson or, I think strangely more likely, clone. Because the way that Terapagos reacted so strongly to Amethio made it seem like he'd seen Amethio before, when there's no way he could have. I thought maybe he was reacting to Explorer insignia, but Amethio wasn't wearing the crest. But if Amethio is a dead ringer for Gibeon (as in, a clone), and Terapagos thought Amethio WAS Gibeon, and Gibeon and Lucius had a messy divorce and Lucius got custody of Terapagos IN the divorce . . . oh yeah. It's all coming together. But of course I don't think Gibeon or Hamber would go around parading the fact that Gibeon cloned himself, so they'd probably just call Amethio his grandson (similar to how Hunter was called Belos' nephew in The Owl House). So that would lead to the other Explorers seeing him as a "pampered prince," when really he's only kept around the way he is because he's Gibeon's clone.

I've also seen theories that Ann is evil, and while I'm not convinced of that, I do agree with the people who pointed out that she and Sango look so much alike. The little fang, the pigtails, the eye shape . . . I don't think that Ann is Sango in disguise (why would Sango need to infiltrate Naranja Academy / the Terastal Course as Sandwich-chan if she was already infiltrated as Ann?), but I could see them potentially being sisters or cousins or something. Similarly, someone else pointed out that Conia and Spinel have the same hair and eye color, so there's a possibility for relation there as well, and with family (found or otherwise) being such a HUGE theme in Horizons . . . oh yeah . . . it's all coming together . . .

ANYWAY. As I said, I am really loving the Horizons anime so far, and I'm glad that I'm caught up. It's really great and I can't wait for the new episode this weekend! For now though, I may go to AO3 to see what I can find over there 👀 I've got some fic ideas I'm toying with myself, but I'm curious what others have cooked up too. I'm sure there's some good ones already.