Dogasu's Backpack Discussion

[Daenerys]

I remember Pokemon Tasos/Pogs. I used to buy certain chips just to get them (then I'd throw the chips away since I hated their flavor). I'm surprised that they were mentioned in the dub, but it certainly fit with the times back then. It's been nearly two decades since Pogs were even relevant though, which ironically is the same amount of time we need to wait between episode comparisons.

 

[Charmander4]

My local Toys R US had a couple of Pokémon dog tags from the late 90s for sale until a few months back and I regret not buying them. Still can find lots of cool 90s era Pokémon things on eBay. I bought a new Charmander room greeter.

 

[Gabo2oo]

Come to think of it, I never had any tazos myself. I don't even recall seeing them when I was a kid.

It almost feels like an IRL retcon: everyone around my age claims they used to collect them back in the day, and a friend even gave me his(...ses?) some time ago. One of them is a Pichu so I think they were around for quite some time.

What's the plural of "his" help

 

[ii kanji]

What's the plural of "his" help

It's just his.

 

[Yash]

Come to think of it, I never had any tazos myself. I don't even recall seeing them when I was a kid.

It almost feels like an IRL retcon: everyone around my age claims they used to collect them back in the day, and a friend even gave me his(...ses?) some time ago. One of them is a Pichu so I think they were around for quite some time.

What's the plural of "his" help

“His” doesn’t change - it’d be his tazo, or his tazos.

 

[SammyW27]

Oooh, he's talking about the Kanto League!

Dis gun be good!

 

[MizuTaipu]

It's pretty surprising how less battle-centric the Sekiei League was compared to the leagues that followed; the battle here weren't exactly interesting either. Kanto had a whole lot more joke-y battles then serious ones (the whole Tournament for Togepi thing is a big example) so it would be interesting to see how this first league would've turned out if the writers did more serious ones throughout the arc. The last battle against Yuji/Drake in the Orange League was a big improvement and that was a less than a year later, so I guess they did have the writing chops to do so.

 

[technickal]

Looking back, the Kanto arc had some really weird pacing, even though it started off strong. Sure, there was that odd decision to have Ash be given his first few Gym Badges instead of earning them, and the Porygon incident delayed and canceled a few specials, but I feel like Charmander's evolution was the real tipping point. At that point, the show felt simultaneously rushed itself and slowed to a crawl. It took only three episodes for it to fully evolve into Charizard, but there was a whopping 26 episodes between the sixth and seventh gyms. And between the seventh and final gyms, and the final gym in the league was mostly nothing but filler. Filler in which Ash slacks off so much the characters continuously acknowledge it but do nothing about it. I don't think they had a proper "training arc" prepared, and since around that moment is when Pokémon became an international phenomenon, I think they realized that it was simply too early for Ash to win the league as originally planned. And that's why they kept Charizard disobeying him until mid-Orange Islands, while I think it was supposed to start obeying him again after the final gym, reflected by the games. Although Charizard costing him the league was particularly infuriating (I keep jumping back in forth on whether it or Cameron was the more embarrassing league loss), I think it became clear after the final gym that Ash was still too inexperienced – even for an underdog, they didn't spend enough time developing him as a Trainer for a league win to make sense. And I think that's why they decided to wait until the Orange Islands for his first and only proper league win. By the Johto League, the franchise had its formula long set in stone with new games on the way. But they were still able to let him beat Gary as a way to show Ash's growth as a Trainer in his own way.

Speaking of Charizard, I would have argued that the reference to it the dub threw in there was supposed to be clever foreshadowing for the outcome of the League...except this is 4Kids we're talking about. Similarly, the Santa Claus gag would've been funnier if the "real" one hadn't already had a whole episode dedicated to him (though I suppose with the episode no longer existing as far as the dub is concerned, it works in hindsight).

 

[Johtohfiller]

It's pretty surprising how less battle-centric the Sekiei League was compared to the leagues that followed; the battle here weren't exactly interesting either. Kanto had a whole lot more joke-y battles then serious ones (the whole Tournament for Togepi thing is a big example) so it would be interesting to see how this first league would've turned out if the writers did more serious ones throughout the arc. The last battle against Yuji/Drake in the Orange League was a big improvement and that was a less than a year later, so I guess they did have the writing chops to do so.

I wonder if the success of the first movie convinced them that the show can work with more action.

 

[kantoskies]

I always thought the pity badges Satoshi recieved worked great with the league-- think about it, this cocky 10 year old gets lucky throughout most of his journey by way of having gym leaders practically handing out badges and the only consistent threat he faces are a trio of buffoons who he can beat with his eyes closed. He really only has a handful of legitimate victories and almost completely slacks off once he gets all eight badges. He can make it a few rounds into the league because he's not terrible, but when he has to rely on his Lizardon that's where it goes wrong. His Lizardon being the one to cause him to lose the league was actually a pretty good decision in my eyes and just the kick in the pants Satoshi needed to really get serious. Of course it wasn't a switch flipping and I wish the writers had made him deal with the loss more but it was definitely something. If anything I think the Rocket trio being the ones to tire out all of his other Pokemon instead of, y'know, a real battle is what weakens the writing.

And I think all of those filler episodes between the eighth badge and the league were actually really meaningful; while all of the other trainers were actually, y'know, training, Satoshi spent most of his time helping a struggling nursery, watching a film about Pokemon being made, and dicking around on the not-actually-Seafoam Islands. They were meaningfully pointless.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I never had a problem with Ash's defeat in the Indigo League either. I didn't like how they spent most of the episode on escaping Team Rocket and spent only five minutes on the actual battle after hyping it up so much, even though the latter is pretty fitting for how the Indigo League was handled too, but Charizard being the one who cost Ash the victory was pretty fitting. Even Professor Oak said in the following episode that Ash could have gone much further if he had worked harder and gave Charizard proper training. Ash might have been able to defeat Ritchie if it wasn't for Team Rocket's interference, but I'd have a really hard time seeing Ash go any further than that and even getting to the Top 8 of his first Pokemon League would have been pushing it too much.

Considering how little training he after getting his eight badges and how he earned only a few badges through winning actual battles, it's kind of amazing that Ash got as far as he did in his first Pokemon League. His rank wasn't too high to where it was completely unbelievable, but it also wasn't too low to make the audience question how much he learned during his journey either.

 

[Charmander4]

I hate that back then Pidgeotto falling asleep vs Koga and Squirtle against Ritchie counted as an L.

 

[technickal]

Yeah, I've noticed 4Kids has had a pattern of rewriting Gary's lines since at least the last Gym Battle. It seems like they were aiming to make him more outright cocky rather than passive-aggressive. Which I suppose brings him closer to his game counterpart, but it still reeks of the 4Kids "kids won't understand who's right and who's wrong" mentality that plagued the first movie.

I caught the Raticate/Venomoth and Pidgey/Pidgeotto errors too. And while I can blame the first one on lip flap shenanigans, the second one is all on 4Kids. Seriously, if they planned on rewriting nearly all of TR's lines, they should've at least fact-checked them. I was surprised they kept the "Lovely Charmy Network" name mostly intact – although I'm pretty sure that was only kept because 4Kids didn't want to make up another network name that abbreviates to "LCN" or repaint the logo.

 

[Nicolas721]

So did you think the battle was crab? Hire me, TPCI

In the Latin American dub, LCN was adapted as Lindos, cariñosos y nocivos (Cute, affectionate and harmful). Also, they made Mandi's lines very effeminate, including a line that I loved: ¡Desvistelos, digo, embistelos! (Undress them, I mean, tackle them). Team Rocket also calls Mandi "man, woman or something".

I don't know if not changing the Trainer's boxes is being respectful for the original, for all we know 4Kids didn't even know of the Japanese Green version.

 

[SammyW27]

And thus is introduce the DEM evolution & new move that will the writer's favorite way out of jam for the rest of the TV Show (though some sagas use it less than others).

Also, a special guest appearance by Meta Knight! Let's give him a big hand, folks! (get it? )

 

[technickal]

In the Latin American dub, LCN was adapted as Lindos, cariñosos y nocivos (Cute, affectionate and harmful). Also, they made Mandi's lines very effeminate, including a line that I loved: ¡Desvistelos, digo, embistelos! (Undress them, I mean, tackle them). Team Rocket also calls Mandi "man, woman or something".

How did they handle the “match” and “shake” puns, I wonder?

 

[Jared DiCarlo]

I don't know if not changing the Trainer's boxes is being respectful for the original, for all we know 4Kids didn't even know of the Japanese Green version.

That seems very likely considering these are the same people who believed that Ash’s Charmander would never appear again after his capture.

 

[Kirby4ever]

That seems very likely considering these are the same people who believed that Ash’s Charmander would never appear again after his capture.

Why did 4Kids think that Charmander would never appear again after its capture?

 

[Jared DiCarlo]

Why did 4Kids think that Charmander would never appear again after its capture?

Dogasu goes into more detail on his site, but, in the commentary that was included on the Pokémon 4Ever DVD, Michael Haigney says that when he first did the voice of Charmander, he thought it was the only time that the character was going to appear, but then he and the rest of the company realized Charmander was far more important than just a one-time character.

 

[Hidden Mew]

That logic is still so strange to me. Not only because the main character captured Charmander in that same episode, but this is also one of the starter Pokemon. Charmander was pretty popular back in the day too, so the idea that it would only appear once in the anime is so weird.

This episode is also one of the main reason why I prefer Pokemon learning moves on screen. I'm pretty sure that Kingler wasn't the first time in the season where a Pokemon suddenly learned a bunch of new moves with no rhyme or reason behind it, but it was one of the more blatant offenders. I still remember being so confused when I first saw this episode since I had no idea how Kingler could possibly know Hyper Beam. At least seeing the Pokemon learn the move on-screen makes it less confusing. I didn't know that the same writer behind this episode also wrote the Ash vs. Paul Sinnoh League match. The episodes were over a decade apart and the anime had changed drastically between those series, but it's still an interesting bit of information.