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Old Characters in Pocket Monster 2019

Which ones?

  • Misty

  • Brock

  • Tracey

  • Gary

  • May & Max

  • Dawn

  • Paul

  • Iris

  • Cilan

  • Trip

  • Clemont & Bonnie

  • Serena

  • Sawyer

  • Mallow

  • Lana

  • Lillie

  • Sophocles

  • Kiawe

  • Hau

  • Someone else


Results are only viewable after voting.
Alain does get new Pokemon, which is more than I can say for Dawn unfortunately, but having such little screentime and seemingly only being brought back to hype up Leon, which in itself is an odd choice considering only long time fans would know how ridiculously overpowered he was in the first place, would probably negate that.

Unlike most of Ash's other rivals, Alain doesn't seem to be that popular or well received. Plenty of people like Gary, Paul and Gladion is one of the two video game rivals that were actually handled well in the anime. The only one is Barry. I'm sure that winning the Kalos League is a big issue since people are clearly still upset about it years after the fact, but even before that, Alain didn't really have a lot going on for him. I remember fans liking that the Mega Evolution specials focused on someone besides Ash, but aside from being not Ash, I don't remember a lot of people really liking Alain. It also probably didn't help that his rivalry with Ash started way too late into XY's run. It made sense why when Ash-Greninja is what started their rivalry, but considering how important that rivalry turned out, I think that they started it too late. Making Alain more overpowered over time definitely didn't help matters either.
 
I've started to consider the possibility that Alain's return was never intended to involve a battle with Ash, but just the fact that he's pretty much the strongest non-Champion/Elite Four Trainer in the anime. I could be wrong, of course, but I don't think he needs to battle Ash again.
 
I've started to consider the possibility that Alain's return was never intended to involve a battle with Ash, but just the fact that he's pretty much the strongest non-Champion/Elite Four Trainer in the anime. I could be wrong, of course, but I don't think he needs to battle Ash again.
That would be a pretty weak reason to bring Alain back. If they just wanted someone to hype up Leon even more, they could have brought in an actual Elite 4 trainer instead. Raihan wouldn't have looked any more jarring among a tournament full of regional Champions than Alain did. If they didn't want Ash to battle Alain in the Master Class, then they probably should have had them battle in the Hyper Class instead of keeping Alain a secret until the Master Class tournament was revealed.
 
This is going to be monumentally cynical, but the only other reason I could see Alain being brought back besides rematching Ash (which didn't happen and now almost certainly never will) is for the benefit of Leon's Charizard specifically.

See, it's pretty obvious that Leon is intended to have the strongest Charizard in the world, but that notion can be met with a degree of skepticism due to the fact that Leon's Charizard has access to a super mode with an obscenely broken signature move, thus making it look that Leon's Charizard's strength is not in fact inherent to its own merits, but rather the result of it having access to a special unique powerup that few to no other Pokemon have. What doesn't help matters is the fact that Ash's very own Charizard has similar or arguably outright better feats than Leon's prior to the latter's defeat of Alain's Charizard, except without the aid of some fancy-dancy super mode with an instawin condition move to accomplish them: Ash's Charizard was the very first non-legendary Pokemon to have defeated a Legendary in battle, something that Leon's Charizard was never shown to be able to do onscreen (it may have briefly sparred against Eternatus, but that didn't last very long and Charizard didn't win). This means the writers needed to come up with a way to actually show (instead of tell) that Leon's Charizard is indeed The Strongest and therefore stronger than Ash's Charizard on its own merits. And how do we do that? Well, how about by having Leon's base form Charizard defeat the same Mega Evolved Charizard that practically soloed the Kalos League (and didn't even need to Mega Evolve for some of them, such as Remos's team bar Garchomp) until Alain fought Ash, defeated ten Mega Evolved Pokemon -including an Elite Four's- in a row without breaking a sweat, and at several different points kept up with extremely powerful Legendaries to the point that it brought one of them (Zygarde) to its knees?

TL;DR, Alain vs Leon happened specifically to stamp out any "would Ash's Charizard have beaten Leon's?" doubts, as Charizard is probably Ash's most hyped ace besides maybe Greninja.
 
This is going to be monumentally cynical, but the only other reason I could see Alain being brought back besides rematching Ash (which didn't happen and now almost certainly never will) is for the benefit of Leon's Charizard specifically.

See, it's pretty obvious that Leon is intended to have the strongest Charizard in the world, but that notion can be met with a degree of skepticism due to the fact that Leon's Charizard has access to a super mode with an obscenely broken signature move, thus making it look that Leon's Charizard's strength is not in fact inherent to its own merits, but rather the result of it having access to a special unique powerup that few to no other Pokemon have. What doesn't help matters is the fact that Ash's very own Charizard has similar or arguably outright better feats than Leon's prior to the latter's defeat of Alain's Charizard, except without the aid of some fancy-dancy super mode with an instawin condition move to accomplish them: Ash's Charizard was the very first non-legendary Pokemon to have defeated a Legendary in battle, something that Leon's Charizard was never shown to be able to do onscreen (it may have briefly sparred against Eternatus, but that didn't last very long and Charizard didn't win). This means the writers needed to come up with a way to actually show (instead of tell) that Leon's Charizard is indeed The Strongest and therefore stronger than Ash's Charizard on its own merits. And how do we do that? Well, how about by having Leon's base form Charizard defeat the same Mega Evolved Charizard that practically soloed the Kalos League (and didn't even need to Mega Evolve for some of them, such as Remos's team bar Garchomp) until Alain fought Ash, defeated ten Mega Evolved Pokemon -including an Elite Four's- in a row without breaking a sweat, and at several different points kept up with extremely powerful Legendaries to the point that it brought one of them (Zygarde) to its knees?
Tbh I’m alright with base form Charizard beating mcx but their battle was so rushed. It would’ve been believable if he got more hits or weakened it with his other mons. Leon did also get a bad rep for relying on gmax too much as well, so I can see why they’d wanna change that
 
@Ghost Diplocaulus , That's an interesting point.

After all this is the same Mega Charizard who:
-took a point blank Dragon's Ascent from Mega Rayquaza
-took hits and battled the Primals
-defeated 10 Mega Evolved Pokemon in a row
-OHKO Elite Four Malva's Mega Houndoom
-took down 50% Zygarde in base form (though he had help from Team Flare)
-beat Ash-Greninja.

I supposed it IS a good way to show how strong Leon's Charizard is without G-maxing, though it's up for some debate (and please don't derail this topic with it :cry:)

Though really, if anyone DESERVES to go down like a punk, it's Alan :p

Sure I would've rather it been Ash, and knew from the start Leon would win, but...I clapped at that.

I just hope and pray Trevor was watching ;)

Though between this and Siebold's Mega-Blastoise, I think Dragon Pulse is Alan's Charizard's one weakness...:unsure:
(If only Ash had used Goodra against Alan's Charizard!)
 
It's definitely a bizarre decision to bring Alain back just to get worfed by Leon. @Ghost Diplocaulus theory is the best I can guess right now assuming Alain doesn't do anthing now that he's been Yamcha'd out of the tournament, and I do remember early on people were claiming Leon only won vs Lance and Raihan because Gmax was overpowered so maybe the writers noticed that issue? We also saw him defeating Flint without it, as I recall.

Even then, though, Alain is a puzzling choice considering what he's most known for. If they needed a strong trainer to get crushed by Leon someone like Palmer or another established Elite Four such as Agatha would have worked just as well and felt less like yanking the XY fanbase's chain once again.
And the "it's only for young kids" argument doesn't work here because that audience has no idea who Alain is so seeing him lose means nothing.
 
And the "it's only for young kids" argument doesn't work here because that audience has no idea who Alain is so seeing him lose means nothing.

I don't know...it's only been about 6 years...:unsure:

I wouldn't even say a lot's happened since then since not much really happened in SM and PM2019 :p
 
We also saw him defeating Flint without it, as I recall.
Well, yeah, but pretty much every Champion ever is shown to manhandle Elite Four members without issue, so one could argue that's not enough. The fact that the battle itself was only shown very briefly would only add to that sentiment. As would the fact that Leon's Charizard had the type advantage.

BTW, speaking of other candidates for the leftover M8 spot, I still remember that proposal you made ages ago about Giovanni potentially being a member of the Masters 8. That would've been cool. Maybe better than what we actually got.
 
Even then, though, Alain is a puzzling choice considering what he's most known for. If they needed a strong trainer to get crushed by Leon someone like Palmer or another established Elite Four such as Agatha would have worked just as well and felt less like yanking the XY fanbase's chain once again.
And the "it's only for young kids" argument doesn't work here because that audience has no idea who Alain is so seeing him lose means nothing.
That's a big reason why it feels so strange to bring Alain back like this. He hasn't been shown or mentioned since XY, so a lot of the kids watching Journeys now wouldn't know of him or know why Leon defeating Alain is a big deal. It wouldn't take much to explain Alain's history or his rivalry with Ash, but bringing him back for first round fodder is going to stand out way more to older fans than it would be to kids. The Kalos League finale is still a sore spot for a lot of fans, so bringing Alain back only for him to not get an actual rematch with Ash is just going to get fans more upset as opposed to making Leon look super powerful.

BTW, speaking of other candidates for the leftover M8 spot, I still remember that proposal you made ages ago about Giovanni potentially being a member of the Masters 8. That would've been cool. Maybe better than what we actually got.
That certainly would have been interesting to have Giovanni there instead, but I can see why that didn't happen. As cool and unexpected as that would have been, I think it would have been harder to explain why Giovanni could enter the PWC while being the head of Team Rocket. They've never even bothered to point out who the new Gym Leader of Viridian City is after it was destroyed either.
 
That would be a pretty weak reason to bring Alain back. If they just wanted someone to hype up Leon even more, they could have brought in an actual Elite 4 trainer instead. Raihan wouldn't have looked any more jarring among a tournament full of regional Champions than Alain did. If they didn't want Ash to battle Alain in the Master Class, then they probably should have had them battle in the Hyper Class instead of keeping Alain a secret until the Master Class tournament was revealed.
Agreed. It’s even more egregious when you consider that not too long ago Flint had been shown to have been in the Masters 8 before suddenly getting knocked out of it with no explanation. The fact that they basically just used Alain to hype up Leon after they’ve spent the entire series hyping him up just makes his return feel pointless especially when they had others already in who could have served the exact same point.
 
It's definitely a bizarre decision to bring Alain back just to get worfed by Leon. @Ghost Diplocaulus theory is the best I can guess right now assuming Alain doesn't do anthing now that he's been Yamcha'd out of the tournament, and I do remember early on people were claiming Leon only won vs Lance and Raihan because Gmax was overpowered so maybe the writers noticed that issue? We also saw him defeating Flint without it, as I recall.

Even then, though, Alain is a puzzling choice considering what he's most known for. If they needed a strong trainer to get crushed by Leon someone like Palmer or another established Elite Four such as Agatha would have worked just as well and felt less like yanking the XY fanbase's chain once again.
And the "it's only for young kids" argument doesn't work here because that audience has no idea who Alain is so seeing him lose means nothing.
Leon being overpowered because of G-Max is a pretty nonsensical argument considering his opponents were using it at the same time. Also, we've seen him take down several D-Maxed Pokemon during the Darkest Day.
 
Leon being overpowered because of G-Max is a pretty nonsensical argument considering his opponents were using it at the same time. Also, we've seen him take down several D-Maxed Pokemon during the Darkest Day.
Yeah, but the other G-Max Pokemon didn't have access to an overpowered attack that repeatedly pummels them and seems borderline impossible to defend against.
 
Since most of the XY character returns are done I'd probably rank their eps from best to worst:

Serena
Greninja
Bonnie/Clemont
Korrina (PWC battle)
Wikstrom (I loved his training episode with Farfetch'd)
Korrina (second return and during Bea's final battle)
Alain

I'm not counting Diantha yet since we haven't seen her battle. Also I'm not counting Drasna since she never actually appeared in XY itself.

With the exception of Alain's recent poor showing, I think they did the XY cast justice overall. Most of any saga besides the SM cast.
 
Woo hoo!!! I was so happy to see so many familiar faces that we haven’t seen in years in today’s episode, plus it opens the way for more cameos! Hoping to see the May, Max, the Sinnoh Rivals, and the Unova Rivals in the near future. And STILL desperately wanting to see Jessiebelle and Miyamoto lol

Imagine they show Steven when Ash vs Steven is happening to bank on that calling him different joke.
 
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