Why was Dawn treated better as a co-star than May was?

[The Puppetmaster]

In the episode where Ash, Dawn, and Brock were filling in for Johanna by teaching those kids about Pokemon, Dawn turned the whole thing into her trying to get her Ice Chandelier combination right. But also it seemed like they made Dawn struggle with her combinations more than May with hers.

May was rarely shown practicing on screen though. I guess this is also due to the writers' granting Dawn more screen time.

I'd say the reason Dawn was treated better is because the writers learned from past mistakes (like most have already noted). Someone also mentioned the rise in popularity of May's character which led to the writers taking Dawn to the next level (this can be seen when May receives a theme song in her last season while Dawn gets one right off the bat).

 

[Cybersai]

Which is ironic, as then we go to Iris, who has the least amount of screentime of all the main girls.

So it seems like the writers building up each girl as more important than the last went nowhere.

Or else why isn't Iris getting the co-star treatment, or even May's treatment?

 

[Zeta]

Which is ironic, as then we go to Iris, who has the least amount of screentime of all the main girls.

So it seems like the writers building up each girl as more important than the last went nowhere.

Or else why isn't Iris getting the co-star treatment, or even May's treatment?

Probably because all of the sidequests from Gens III and IV are gone from Black and White. There's literally nothing for players or characters to do but Gyms and Plasma plot.

 

[Cybersai]

Probably because all of the sidequests from Gens III and IV are gone from Black and White. There's literally nothing for players or characters to do but Gyms and Plasma plot.

So instead Iris and Dento are treated like expies of Misty/Brock, even right down to the somewhat similar personalities and serve the same roles on the show.

I guess this proves the writers don't have to always have the playable female from the games as part of the show now. They didn't do it in Johto because Kris didn't exist till Crystal, but this is the first generation they purposely ignored the main girl.

 

[Spindae2]

Cause May was the first girl doing contests and she was the drive run! After seeing how good May come through they let dawn havw more falls and downs, so they presented her better!

But know they are doing the same crap with iris, totally forgetting about her, she will probably have some good eps but thats it!!

 

[Piplup]

Simple, two reasons:
1. May was the first try to a more active and equal heroine, they did mistakes and then learned from them and didn't repeat them with Dawn
2. During AG the games were on the GameBOY, during the DP the games were on the Nintendo DS - the games themselves also made Contests much girlier than they were in the RS games (a pink heart shaped "fashion box"... dancing, dress up, etc...) so there was clearly a bigger try to appeal to girls in DP than was for AG
I'd consider May as something between sidekick to star, while Dawn was an equal star... cause it's ridiculous to compare May's role to Misty's or Brock's and other sidekicks... her role wasn't as big as Dawn's or Ash's, but clearly more important than the sidekicks

 

[pokemon fan 132]

Probably because of writers becoming better having whole Advance generation to learn on their past mistakes they did with May knowing in what direction to go with Dawns story.She was undeniably receiving alot more screentime than any other main girl did.

Its quite simple,they learned how to handle rivarlies better,building up toward character contests career and character developmnt in proper way.That being said i feel Mays pokemon team was handled better having more exciting contest arc and rivals imo.

She really felt like a character in her own right, since she didn't just stand on the sidelines. She was battling, she was pursuing her dreams, she was overcoming personal stuff.

To be fair,other characters did things too having their own stories,it just happens writers focused to lesser extent on them.

Probably because all of the sidequests from Gens III and IV are gone from Black and White. There's literally nothing for players or characters to do but Gyms and Plasma plot.

There doesnt need to exist quest in games for characters to have something to do.
If they have anime exclusive goals one of advantages is in fact of writers not being tied to follow game pattern deciding themselves in what measure this will be focused on if its conncted with battling or participating.Thats why i generally prefer anime only competitions like Whirl Cup,pokeringer or mini arcs like Orange Islands since it allows writing staff to spread their wings of creativity being allowed to bring them up whenver they want.

Of course in that case its not to expect those kind of things getting alot focus like quests which co-stars did,but they can still get some good development and screentime.

I'd consider May as something between sidekick to star, while Dawn was an equal star... cause it's ridiculous to compare May's role to Misty's or Brock's and other sidekicks... her role wasn't as big as Dawn's or Ash's, but clearly more important than the sidekicks

Juging by ex head writer blog he viewed Misty and Brock along with Ash as group of protagonists.

 

[marshiyanmisuta]

Juging by ex head writer blog he viewed Misty and Brock along with Ash as group of protagonists.

Then he didn't know the real meaning of "protagonist"... (Apparently like Bulbapedia )

 

[Musashi]

Misty and Brock have nothing to do with this thread.

 

[Haruka]

Hmm I'm smelling here a spam thread..... Maybe its about time to close this mods.

 

[Lilac]

contests
that why
plus to show all the new pokemon insted of AG where most of them are Gen 1-3 not mostly all Gen 4

 

[Blue1225]

Same reason why the rivalry wth Paul was done better than that ones that came before and the same reason May's character was more developed than Misty's-The writing got better and they new where they wanted to go with the show.

 

[Cybersai]

Same reason why the rivalry wth Paul was done better than that ones that came before and the same reason May's character was more developed than Misty's-The writing got better and they new where they wanted to go with the show.

Pretty much this. Every new character and rival is handled better than the previous due to the writers getting better with handling characters.

 

[Masurao]

Pretty much this. Every new character and rival is handled better than the previous due to the writers getting better with handling characters.

Too bad Shooti, Zoey, and Kenny don't fall in that category.

Unless you're just talking about from Gary to Paul.

 

[Dawn and Piplup]

I think that it is because pokemon is improving and Dawn, in my opinion, is a better charector. May is good but Dawn is better. And she shares personalities with Ash, both have partner pokemon that saved their lives, other stuff.

I think Dawn is a better charector really.

And piplup..
IS ADORABLEEE!!!!!!

 

[Cilan]

It's kind of funny. With AG May's rivals got a lot of good development but Ash didn't get a rival until around the league but with DP even though Dawn got more spotlight hr rivals didn't get much development while Ash ended up getting Paul, who got a lot of development. Paul might have been handled better than Gary but Zoey, Kenny, Ursula, etc weren't handled as good as Drew and Harley.

 

[Cybersai]

Zoey got tons of episodes, the problem was the character herself was never particularly interesting.

 

[Cybersai]

Zoey got tons of episodes, the problem was the character herself was never particularly interesting.

 

[Charbok]

I think the problem with Dawn's rivals was that they gave her too many "friendly" rivals. May had Harley who was a total jerk but Zoey and Kenny were more like Dawn's friends than her rivals. If Ursula was introduced earlier then she could have been the jerk rival for Dawn. I think the fact that Zoey and Kenny were too friendly to Dawn might of had something to do with why their characters weren't as interesting.

 

[Emerald Gary]

How you know that? AG was "Satoshi's story" after all, not "Satoshi and Haruka's story"...

And what has that title to do with Haruka's story? Haruka is still the first co-star of pokemon. Her storyline was obviously develoved during entire Hoenn-BF region. What if the title doesn't reflect that?