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Thoughts on BW

Most of BW's problems have already been covered really well here, and several have been brought up numerous times, namely Cameron (not that it isn't deserved, though), but there's one thing that while far from the worst thing about BW, I personally found to be kinda irritating, and it's actually somewhat related to Ash capturing a larger number of Pokemon than he usually does in other series. See, I'm not sure how many people have noticed, but the anime seems to have an unwritten rule that if Ash has a certain species on his current party, then that species is rarely going to show up under the ownership of other characters, even minor/background ones. This combined with the fact that the BW anime was restricted to only Gen 5 Pokemon (Pikachu and Meowth aside) until the later half means that minor and background characters tended to have the same Pokemon over and over. Seriously, just count the amount of times that Patrat/Watchog, Darumaka/Dramanitan, Gothita/Gothorita/Gothitelle, and Druddigon show up under the ownership of Filler Character *insert random number here* basically to serve as canon fodder. I know it's pretty nitpicky compared to most of the other issues mentioned here, but I personally thought the repetitiveness of non-main character Pokemon rosters was a bit irritating.
 
I wonder what would've happen if the skipped Plasma episodes had aired, and if we'd got a Pocket Monsters Gray instead of B2W2. Probably N'd have been introduced way before he was and there's some chance we would have the Kalos League outcome here. Idk, I'm pretty sure people would've accepted BW better in those conditions.

Someone even pointed out the possibility that Alan played what was supposed to be N's role for example.

Course none of those fix some of the worst issues this series had, like Trio's personality shift, but at least no Kotetsu in this scenario xD
 
Team Plasma had the removal of the 2 parter not occurred might have been an exception to the rule (the other being TR being allowed some absence from episodes).

Also recent Atop the 4th Wall episode was on the two Nimbus Gym episodes:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CKTOHCU7ZM


But yeah forgot about those points in "Enter Elesa" regarding Bianca's father:

1. Smiling at his daughter losing to Elesa rather than having a look of distress as her Mon were being defeated.

2. Being surprised that his daughter had friends?

Yeah almost like the writer wanted him to be a jerkwad and haphazardly scaled it back a bit.

Just like I've been saying though. The specific missteps more and more seem less like honest misfires and more done out of spite:-(.
 
Nothing truly meaningful. The rivalries weren't really that fulfilling, especially when it came to Burgundy who was merely a joke and did little to expand on Cilan's goal or even further develop Ponemon Connoisseurs. Nothing came about that rivalry.
I thought Burgundy and Georgia were completely stupid and childish with their goals and as people.

As Cilan was already perfect and literally had nothing to develop during his journey as a Connoisseur (which is a stupid occupation, anyway - since when have Trainers cared about compatibility with something they want to catch? The thought of Cilan meeting Go makes me cackle), Burgundy was already doomed to fail. The two times the writers gave her space to demonstrate her chops as a Connoisseuse, they had her a) be completely incorrect and spiteful in her observations and b) be completely outstaged by Cilan. She didn't fare much better with her battles, as she lost every initial round of every tournament she participated in; even her introductory flashback highlighted a loss. Oh! And her Dewott lost twice on-screen to opponents it had advantageous typing over. Then, they supplemented her lack of effect on her "rival" by making her extremely obnoxious, rude, and unpleasant. So you couldn't even root for her due to her being so unlikable. She only existed to make Cilan look good.

Georgia wasn't that much better. What the heck is a "Dragon Buster?" Oh, I'll tell you - a self-proclaimed "profession" born out of, you guessed it, spite. Just because she lost to a Dragon-type in a random battle in the past. She journeyed around Unova to fight Dragon-types... She didn't even participate in the League, implying she didn't take on the hallmark experience of active Trainers. She didn't help Iris further herself as a Dragon-type Master at all, was just as obnoxious and haughty as Burgundy, and could never take a loss gracefully - all four of her on-screen losses she disregarded due to "Well, I wasn't fighting a Dragon-type" or some other nonsense. No depth, no substance, no relevance. Unlike Burgundy, she didn't make Iris look good per se, but she sure didn't challenge Iris' ideology in any meaningful way.

I think the most baffling thing is how if both of these ladies were written out of the show, Cilan and Iris would literally be no different at the end of the BW saga. And that's ridiculous.
 
Georgia wasn't that much better. What the heck is a "Dragon Buster?" Oh, I'll tell you - a self-proclaimed "profession" born out of, you guessed it, spite. Just because she lost to a Dragon-type in a random battle in the past. She journeyed around Unova to fight Dragon-types... She didn't even participate in the League, implying she didn't take on the hallmark experience of active Trainers. She didn't help Iris further herself as a Dragon-type Master at all, was just as obnoxious and haughty as Burgundy, and could never take a loss gracefully - all four of her on-screen losses she disregarded due to "Well, I wasn't fighting a Dragon-type" or some other nonsense. No depth, no substance, no relevance. Unlike Burgundy, she didn't make Iris look good per se, but she sure didn't challenge Iris' ideology in any meaningful way.

Also I think they make the mistake of giving her legit criticism of Iris (regarding her use of Dragonite) but because she's a strawperson her words are meaningless.

I think the most baffling thing is how if both of these ladies were written out of the show, Cilan and Iris would literally be no different at the end of the BW saga. And that's ridiculous.

Well regarding the parts of your post I bolded goes back to my previous assertion. The writers of this season flat out make these decisions out of contempt for the product or any writers from previous seasons weren't in the best of moods when crafting it.

A few errors here and there (isolated incidents) can be seen as unintentional. When you look over all of them hard to see it as a "Oops my bad:-(".
 
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As Cilan was already perfect and literally had nothing to develop during his journey as a Connoisseur (which is a stupid occupation, anyway - since when have Trainers cared about compatibility with something they want to catch? The thought of Cilan meeting Go makes me cackle)
This is why I hate Cilan as a character. Guy didn't had any challenges, or trials, or anything to developt. Like, you would think that since this whole ''Connoiseur'' thing is a anime-exclusive deal, they would explain stuff better, wouldn't they? Buy they don't. What exactly does he needs to do in order to grow? Nothing. He doesn't has anything to grow out of or any flaws to remedy as time goes on.

So he was just this obnoxious, Brock-Wannabe guy who was annoying and didn't added anything to the story. I seriously think they could've unwritten him form BW and nothing of substance would change tbh. I know people have Iris as ''the worst thing about BW'', but imo it's actually Cilan.
 
I wonder what would've happen if the skipped Plasma episodes had aired, and if we'd got a Pocket Monsters Gray instead of B2W2. Probably N'd have been introduced way before he was and there's some chance we would have the Kalos League outcome here. Idk, I'm pretty sure people would've accepted BW better in those conditions.

Someone even pointed out the possibility that Alan played what was supposed to be N's role for example.

Course none of those fix some of the worst issues this series had, like Trio's personality shift, but at least no Kotetsu in this scenario xD
You know I've wondered before if in that timeline Ash would lose to N in the finals of the Unova League then wins the first time in Kalos instead of Alola (although the context would be different--I imagine Alain wouldn't exist in this version of XY, at least).
 
I know people have Iris as ''the worst thing about BW'', but imo it's actually Cilan.

Certain fans of the show consider Iris as the worst thing because she's not all bubbly and sweet like the other female leads and she isn't constantly kissing Ash's ass. Now I can see why they would be annoyed with Iris calling Ash a kid and there were a few problems with her arc, but they still take her way too seriously.
 
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Certain fans of the show consider Iris as the worst thing because she's not all bubbly and sweet like the other female leads and she isn't constantly kissing Ash's ass. Now I can see why they would be annoyed with Iris calling Ash a kid, but they still take her way too seriously.
cough Chloe cough
 
I thought Burgundy and Georgia were completely stupid and childish with their goals and as people.

As Cilan was already perfect and literally had nothing to develop during his journey as a Connoisseur (which is a stupid occupation, anyway - since when have Trainers cared about compatibility with something they want to catch? The thought of Cilan meeting Go makes me cackle), Burgundy was already doomed to fail. The two times the writers gave her space to demonstrate her chops as a Connoisseuse, they had her a) be completely incorrect and spiteful in her observations and b) be completely outstaged by Cilan. She didn't fare much better with her battles, as she lost every initial round of every tournament she participated in; even her introductory flashback highlighted a loss. Oh! And her Dewott lost twice on-screen to opponents it had advantageous typing over. Then, they supplemented her lack of effect on her "rival" by making her extremely obnoxious, rude, and unpleasant. So you couldn't even root for her due to her being so unlikable. She only existed to make Cilan look good.

Georgia wasn't that much better. What the heck is a "Dragon Buster?" Oh, I'll tell you - a self-proclaimed "profession" born out of, you guessed it, spite. Just because she lost to a Dragon-type in a random battle in the past. She journeyed around Unova to fight Dragon-types... She didn't even participate in the League, implying she didn't take on the hallmark experience of active Trainers. She didn't help Iris further herself as a Dragon-type Master at all, was just as obnoxious and haughty as Burgundy, and could never take a loss gracefully - all four of her on-screen losses she disregarded due to "Well, I wasn't fighting a Dragon-type" or some other nonsense. No depth, no substance, no relevance. Unlike Burgundy, she didn't make Iris look good per se, but she sure didn't challenge Iris' ideology in any meaningful way.

I think the most baffling thing is how if both of these ladies were written out of the show, Cilan and Iris would literally be no different at the end of the BW saga. And that's ridiculous.
I think the saddest part about how Burgundy and Georgia were handled is that these two had a lot of potential: Burgundy was our fist true instance of a main character's rival being the underdog to the main character instead of the other way around, so we could very easily have had an arc about Burgundy maturing and learning to respect Cilan, and Cilan in turn could have maybe had an arc where Burgundy helps him with his Purrloin phobia (you know, that thing that was never elaborated on and existed solely for gag purposes which is probably why most people don't remember that it exists?)

Georgia meanwile I think had way more potential as a character than Burgundy. See, when Axew pulled his first undeserved Deus Ex Machina OP move out of his butt learned Outrage during the first Don George tournament, Georgia was noticeably terrified and spoke in a much more serious tone than usual while describing the move's effects, implying that Outrage was the move that handed her her devastating defeat against that Dragon-type trainer, and that said defeat may have been a lot more serious than initially thought; we have had instances of Pokemon being hospitalized as a result of battles, as what happened to Ash's Pikachu against two different Raichus on separate occasions (heck the second time it happened he almost died), so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to imagine that something similar happened to Georgia's Pokemon when she had that loss against that Dragon-type trainer. Heck, back when I saw Georgia's reaction to Outrage, my first thought was that maybe the trainer that Georgia had that devastating loss against was Ghetsis, since his ace Pokemon is a Hydreigon and he's certainly ruthless enough to beat another trainer's Pokemon to near-death, so it would have been really cool if Georgia's arc was tied with Team Plasma, and the climactic battle was Iris and Georgia teaming up to beat Ghetsis while Ash dealt with N and his Legendary Dragon. Sadly, that never happened and Team Plasma wound up being one of the most disappointing evil team defeats. And Ghetsis never even got to use any Pokemon at all either!
 
All of her interactions with Ash in the episodes she is in are awkard (Aside from JN038). Iris had some good interactions.

I understand. I’m not trying to be mean/rude, but I’m just saying that screen time can really determine how annoying one may find a character.

For example, many fans hate Paul more than Damian & Shamus (when those two are worse than him) because Paul got more screen time than they did. That’s what I was trying to imply.
 
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I understand. I’m not trying to be mean/rude, but I’m just saying that screen time can really determine how annoying one may find a character.

For example, many fans hate Paul more than Damian & Shamus (when those who are worse than him) because Paul got more screen time than they did. That’s what I was trying to imply.
Ok

(you know, that thing that was never elaborated on and existed solely for gag purposes which is probably why most people don't remember that it exists?)
There is that one episode from Delclore Islands.
 
Certain fans of the show consider Iris as the worst thing because she's not all bubbly and sweet like the other female leads and she isn't constantly kissing Ash's ass. Now I can see why they would be annoyed with Iris calling Ash a kid and there were a few problems with her arc, but they still take her way too seriously.

I think that's a really rude and dismissive way to refer to people who don't like Iris. I can't speak for everyone of course, but my reasons for disliking Iris isn't because she isn't all bubbly, sweet or doesn't constantly kiss up to Ash. That's also a pretty huge and inaccurate exaggeration on how the other female leads were too. They didn't always get along with Ash and I think just calling them all bubbly and sweet is a bit of a disservice to them as well. I just found Iris to be annoying, unlikable and her storyline was handled poorly from beginning to end in my opinion. I didn't care for Iris' catchphrase, but that really wasn't a huge factor as to why I dislike her and I'm still amazed that people really think that was the biggest reason people had to dislike her too.

Now I do agree that the hate for her got overheated during BW's run and I say this as someone who still dislikes Iris a lot. But I don't think it's fair or accurate to dismiss why people would dislike her like that. To be fair though, when compared to Cilan, they're probably both on the same level for me writing wise. I like Cilan, but he really had nothing going for him during BW. He already had a high rank for his goal, so there wasn't much to do with it and it eventually turned into a running gag. They clearly had no idea what to do with Cilan, especially when he left to go on a random fishing contest in Hoenn. I still thought he was generally likable, he had some nice chemistry with Ash and some of his gags could be funny. If it wasn't for those saving graces, especially the first two, he'd probably be much more insufferable to me. As much as I dislike Iris, I can easily understand why people would dislike Cilan more.
 
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