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Controversial opinions

This might be an extremely cynical take but i never cared for pokemon character development. To me they are tools of war akin to stands, nen beasts, personas etc. I don’t care how much personality you slap on to a pokemon, its primary purpose is to win battles and help the trainer’s career. I don’t mind ash defeating leon with his current team because they have proven themselves to be damn strong. To me that’s more believable than (say) a pokemon who barely got any battles like torracat defeating kukui’s incineroar who’s supposed to be champion tier.
 
More likely a major miracle is needed at this point and even then that may not save it.
The miracle could easily be more Plot Armour and Deus ex Machinas.

None of them a good sign regarding the quality of the series or if justifying that Satoshi really deserved those 'wins'.
 
I think he will beat Cynthia, even if his team doesn't look that impressive rn. They've given them sudden powerups or moveset overhauls offscreen so they might do that again to 'close the gap', so to speak

Also feel like his victory against Leon (the 'strongest' in the world) would be undermined if he lost to someone else prior to him
I think that's part of the reason why I think having Ash defeating Cynthia would get people upset. If he wins because of sudden powerups or moveset overhauls offscreen, then it would probably make the victory less satisfying and/or believable. Some people will definitely be happy, but for Ash to beat someone like Cynthia, I think that they'd really need to do a good job making it feel earned. It would already be a tough call for Ash to defeat Cynthia with his reserves, but using just his current team to do that with off-screen development would be a really hard sale for the show to make.
 
Admittedly, it is getting a bit confusing as you shift the focus on your argument; first it was Journeys Ash & his team being the strongest in the series so far, then his DP team not having diverse and powerful moves when they did, and now it is an expression of dissatisfaction with elements of DP along with a contextual revelation to not even liking the saga.
No, no, it's not that! Look, I'm....sorry if I confused/mislead you. I'm not used to arguing with someone online like this for longer than maybe a sentence or two, I do much better with face-to-face interactions. Plus, I'm not the most organized guy in the world with my thoughts while I'm writing sometimes, I suppose. I tend to kinda jump all over the place with my thoughts sometimes, I guess ypu could say, especially when I'm writing something long like this. I think I'm just a little sick of hearing about DP too since people gush about it (and by extension Dawn) nigh endlessly sometimes and Sinnoh's been featured all over the place lately. But I'll make it very clear here: I didn't hate DP. At all. Especially considering the series that came after it, which I had quite a few problems with. That said, DP also wasn't my favorite, either. I had my issues with it, such as finding Dawn and pretty much all of her endeavors rather boring/sometimes annoying, (her with the Pokedex thing, my god,) hating the way they handled Ambipom, Torterra's lackluster win rate toward the end, Buizel and Gible not evolving, and the writers cheating Ash out of yet another league win with some random bullcrap. I'm admittedly not the biggest fan of the Sinnoh region or its Pokemon either, so most of Ash's team members were....meh to me. I know it probably would have been completely unrealistic at the time, but Ash should have gotten a Riolu back in the DP days. That would have probably made me love the DP series. Not to mention my favorite member of the team, Gliscor, left to be replaced with a literal gagmon, whose gag got old verry quickly. It was like Snorunt with Ice beam.....but worse. And because it was effectively replaced with Gible, Gliscor missed out on the last quarter of the Sinnoh journey as a result. (It did come back stronger for it, though.) And I did like Infernape and its backstory quite a bit, but probably not as much as everyone else. Was always more of a guy myself. But! For all its flaws, the writing in the DP series is still waaaay better than the crap we're getting now, I wholeheartedly agree with you on that. And Ash's Pokemon's movesets were good, Infernape's in particular was excellent. I really only had a problem with Torterra and Buizel's movesets, the former for lack of variety in move types and the latter for its moves being too weak in my personal opinion, which was compounded by the fact that it never evolved, either. I genuinely do miss the Pokemon interactions amongst the group that were once so commonplace back in those days. Why do you think I liked Ash's Gliscor so much? That lovable lug oozed personality. Nothing at all like the writing we're getting for the Pokemon now. And speaking of the writing we're getting now.......

I will admit, there are probably a lot of people out there who look at Ash's Journeys team and think it was crafted for the marketability alone, since Gengar, Dragonite, and Lucario are all very popular, marketable Pokemon who are well known and liked. And.....they'd be right. Hell, I guess even I think that sometimes. I wasn't the biggest fan of the writers just handing Ash two powerful, fully evolved Pokemon like that. It felt lazy and like they were just trying to cash in on the marketability as soon as possible. (Hell, it's the same reason Goh's Scorbunny and Drizzile evolved so damn fast!) There was definitely a lot of that going on in early Journeys. Dracovish was given to Ash no doubt because of how powerful it is in competitive battling, and Sirfetch'd because it's a pretty notable new 'mon. That said, there is a reason why they're so popular. They're all powerful Pokemon who are strong in battle, hence why I think they're strong. Because they are. That's why I believe that they're one of Ash's strongest teams, because they're all very powerful, fully evolved Pokemon. Not since Kalos has Ash's team looked so strong/impressive. (Alola had Rowlet holding it back.) None of them, however, have even close to the amount of care or effort put into writing their characters or personalities as Ash's Pokemon of the past did, and simply put, it's because the writers of this series are concerned with profit first, everything else second. (Which is also why they had those references to Pokemon Go made in Like, I know how people have called the Pokemon anime one big glorified commercial for the games, so obviously there's emphasis on that whole marketability thing, but with this series it feels more prevelant than ever. People like to see character development/progress in shows, I know. It's what makes the characters more relateable/enjoyable to watch, when they feel like actual living beings making progress in their lives as opposed to emotionless, souless robots. (Or as I've heard people describe Ash and Goh's Pokemon in Journeys, using the term,"Battle Bots"; a fitting moniker indeed, considering that's how the writers end up crafting them 95% of the time.) In spite of all its glaring flaws though, this series could potentially finish stronger than any series before it, but that will be one hell of an undertaking considering all the mistakes they've made up to this point in the eyes of many fans, myself included. And this team does have the potential to be his strongest ever, but only in terms of battling strength I'm afraid; in terms of character development and personality, this will probably end up being his weakest team ever. And what a shame that is, considering this series had such glorious potential, and now it will always be remembered largely as a mess.


Edit: I'm so sorry if this was too long everyone, I might've gotten a little carried away. :( Also, after thinking it over, I came to the realization that are Pokemon from Sinnoh I genuinely do like, such as Lucario and Torterra; it's just not one of my favorite regions is all I guess. Infernape is an awesome Pokemon, no doubt, I'll never hate it, it's just that I think I like other Fire types better. (Blaziken, Charizard.) I think I like Infernape about as much as I like Incineroar; they're awesome Fire types to be sure, but I like almost all Fire types anyway.
 
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Really how? Because Gengar, Sirfetch'd and Dracovish haven't proven themselves to be strong.
Didn’t dracovish defeat one of iris’ pokemon? As for the other two, i suppose they have more battle experience than torracat or rowlet in the same timespan? I’m not sure, someone correct me on this.
 
Didn’t dracovish defeat one of iris’ pokemon? As for the other two, i suppose they have more battle experience than torracat or rowlet in the same timespan? I’m not sure, someone correct me on this.
Yeah, but people argue that doesn't amount to much considering A: it was Dracovish's first (and so far only on-screen battle,) and B: people don't regard Iris as that strong of a trainer/champion. That's the theory anyway, I believe.
 
They're all powerful Pokemon who are strong in battle, hence why I think they're strong. Because they are. That's why I believe that they're one of Ash's strongest teams, because they're all very powerful, fully evolved Pokemon.
Thats the thing on paper this should be Ash's strongest team is done well. But in practice the only ones who really show that strength are Pikachu, Lucario and I guess Dragonite. Sirfetch'd and Gengar have spent more time losing then anything else and Dracovish has barely any battles to being with.

Didn’t dracovish defeat one of iris’ pokemon?
Yes and what else has it done after that? Nothing it has nothing else going for it but that one win.
As for the other two, i suppose they have more battle experience than torracat or rowlet in the same timespan? I’m not sure, someone correct me on this.
What prove do you have on that? Also it doesn't really matter that they have more battle experience if they spent most of that losing.
 
Yes and what else has it done after that?
That in itself is a pretty impressive feat.
Also it doesn't really matter that they have more battle experience if they spent most of that losing.
Experience matters more than winning or losing. A pokemon who spent a lot of time on the battlefiend is more deserving of a victory than one who didn’t. iirc torracat participated in like 2 official battles before the league and suddenly got strong enough to defeat incineroar.
 
Experience matters more than winning or losing. A pokemon who spent a lot of time on the battlefiend is more deserving of a victory than one who didn’t. iirc torracat participated in like 2 official battles before the league and suddenly got strong enough to defeat incineroar.
He does make a good point there, Torracat really didn't do too much battling before the League.
 
Didn’t dracovish defeat one of iris’ pokemon?
Yeah, but people argue that doesn't amount to much considering A: it was Dracovish's first (and so far only on-screen battle,) and B: people don't regard Iris as that strong of a trainer/champion. That's the theory anyway, I believe.
I think another reason some people may not see Dracovish's defeat of Iris's Dragonite as all that impressive is that, controversies about Iris being the "weakest" Champion due to Unova being the "weakest" League aside, Dragonite is effectively the Torterra of her team: literally the only battles he has actually won were when he wasn't obeying Iris, and every other time he's been used as a punching bag/measuring stick to make other characters look strong, something that seriously weakens Dragonite's credibility as a powerhouse.
 
That in itself is a pretty impressive feat.
And still not enough of a reason to think it has any chance vs any of Cynthia or Leon's pokemon.
Experience matters more than winning or losing. A pokemon who spent a lot of time on the battlefiend is more deserving of a victory than one who didn’t. iirc torracat participated in like 2 official battles before the league and suddenly got strong enough to defeat incineroar.
And all that experience still doesn't matter when your losing most of your fights.
 
And still not enough of a reason to think it has any chance vs any of Cynthia or Leon's pokemon.
Why not? Iris is no ordinary trainer.
And all that experience still doesn't matter when your losing most of your fights.
This is a classic hardwork vs talent situation. I’ll take “battling a lot but failing when it matters ” over “not battling much but defeating a champion”. One of them reeks of plot armor.
 
Why not? Iris is no ordinary trainer.
Compared to the likes of Cynthia and Leon who keep in mind the show is trying (and failing) to tell me that Dracovish has a chance in hell of fighting she might as well be.
This is a classic hardwork vs talent situation. I’ll take “battling a lot but failing when it matters ” over “not battling much but defeating a champion”. One of them reeks of plot armor.
The other reeks of plot armor as well because I don't in anyway believe that Gengar and Sirfetch'd who have spent most of the time choking can stand a chance vs Cynthia and Leon.
 
Torracat should have been given more battles before the league sure but the battle with Kukui's Incineroar was still good overall.
Gengar and sirfetch’d who have quite some battle experience under their belt are not allowed to defeat champions while torracat who had like 2 official battles, is? Smells like bias alright.
 
Gengar and sirfetch’d who have quite some battle experience under their belt are not allowed to defeat champions while torracat who had like 2 official battles, is? Smells like bias alright.
Experience doesn't matter if you have nothing to show for it. I put more stock into someone who battled less but when they did battle they did very well even when they lost. Over someone who battled more but looked like a jobber most of the time.
 
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