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Reunion of the Past, Present, and Future!? VS Kairyu!! (Fake)

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If this is real I wouldn't mind if Iris battles Goh instead of Ash since Ash and Iris already battled a few times in Unova and I would rather see Iris stomp Goh. :D
Despite battling a few times, one was interrupted, in a very annoying way, whilst another was just plain stupid and one-sided considering the match-up, and the final one was ruined, or in other words felt cheap, all thanks to a tantrum that left one contestant hopeless.

I would like to see a battle between the two where there’s no boundaries, and their actual full strength is displayed for once. But, seeing Goh getting stomped would be nice, and totally needed for his development.
 
I still don't think that the amount of time since Iris last appears really means anything. To the audience, Iris hasn't been seen in over seven years, but the same amount of time hasn't passed within the anime itself. Time makes no sense within the anime, so bringing up how many episodes or years it's been since characters have appeared seems a bit moot to me. I'm just saying that I don't think that the amount of episodes since Iris' last appearance necessarily justifies any and all kinds of changes for her team.
I’ll just agree to disagree then. We clearly have different opinions. I will say though that it’s not unreasonable to think that events could have happened off-screen since we last saw Iris. Iris probably has no idea that Ash placed 2nd and 1st in the last two leagues he entered, and she most likely sees him as the person who lost to Cameron in the Unova league top 8. Iris could have made similar progress during her time away, and I personally feel like it’s unfair to discredit any of Iris’s off-screen accomplishments. But to each their own.
 
If this is real I wouldn't mind if Iris battles Goh instead of Ash since Ash and Iris already battled a few times in Unova and I would rather see Iris stomp Goh. :D
I’d rather that returning character battles not be wasted on the guy who has near zero interest in Pokémon battles. If he lost, it’d be the predictable outcome but if he won it’d seem ridiculous because he’s not into battle and thus doesn’t train his Pokémon fir it while Iris is a battler.
 
May has a much more battle active goal than Iris does and even that didn't make her Bulbasaur evolving into Venusaur any less jarring or a stretch. It would be even worse with how Axew was handled in BW. Doubling down and actually training Axew off-screen to evolve it into a Haxorus when it spent the bulk of BW in Iris' hair would be a big stretch.
We need to consider that if this episode is real, Iris is actively looking for PWC challengers, which is supposed to be a much more battle heavy goal (JN's terrible handling of it aside). Which indicates she needs to train a lot more now,

I don't think the comparison to real life situations fits here,
Out of curiosity, why not? Because that’s the logic I’m using. Friends and people change and mature. And seeing that Ash has collected quite a few fully evolved Pokemon in the same amount of time it’s not a stretch for Iris to raise one she already had.
 
Obviously I hope Ash wins, but what I want is for Ash and Iris just to see how far each other has come as trainers. Since they've seen each other, each has made a pretty big step in their goals. Ash was at his worst in Unova, but since then, Ash won the Manalo Conference and was declared Alolan Champion after defeating Professor Kukui. Iris wasn't that great when she started, but now she's on her way towards becoming the Opelucid Gym Leader after Drayden recommended her to the village elder. She likely has been training with him. Both have gotten significantly stronger since BW, so I'm hoping they'll see that and have a great battle. Obviously I want Ash to win, but a draw would be nice too.
 
rule of thumb: off-screen development is only okay if on-screen development outweighs it. none of deus ex machina or 'tell-not-show' involved

certainly not the case for Axew hence it feeling cheap to be final stage already.
 
I would like to see a battle between the two where there’s no boundaries, and their actual full strength is displayed for once. But, seeing Goh getting stomped would be nice, and totally needed for his development.

You know that Goh has been stomped in the past (like his first battle), right?

That isn't a new thing.
 
You know that Goh has been stomped in the past (like his first battle), right?

That isn't a new thing.
And against Kiawe. The idea is that he’s never been challenged and actually shown through a progressive development from those losses, he’s just got better...with no sign of progression. That’s what I want to see with Iris, where she taunts him, then obliterates him to make him actually experience some issues.
 
We need to consider that if this episode is real, Iris is actively looking for PWC challengers, which is supposed to be a much more battle heavy goal (JN's terrible handling of it aside). Which indicates she needs to train a lot more now,

I think I would have an easier time believing that if the PWC wasn't mostly filled with one-on-one battles. It would still give Iris the need to train or battle more often, but since the bulk of the matches we've seen have been one-on-one battles against random one-shots, it does make it harder for me to believe that going for PWC challenges would give Axew enough experience to evolve into a Haxorus. Not all of the PWC challengers are weak of course, but too many of them come off as largely unimpressive to me.

PkmnTrainerV said:
Out of curiosity, why not? Because that’s the logic I’m using. Friends and people change and mature. And seeing that Ash has collected quite a few fully evolved Pokemon in the same amount of time it’s not a stretch for Iris to raise one she already had.

Because real people can age and mature. That can make the idea of a friend changing after not seeing them for years more believable. No one seemingly ages in the Pokemon anime, the passage of time has never made sense within the context of the anime and Ash's personality can easily change between series depending on what the writers want him to be like. Iris hasn't aged seven years within the anime, so I don't think comparing it to real life situations of friends changing after not seeing them for years fits. Ash has caught more fully evolved Pokemon during this stretch, but he also seemed like a much more competent trainer than Iris to me, even during BW upon rewatching it, and he has had more battle active goals for his Pokemon to frequently train/battle. SM might be an exception given that the Island Challenge was much more of an afterthought than his main goal in the series though.

To be clear, I don't think that Iris has been doing nothing all this time. I'm sure that they will show her in a good light with new Pokemon and/or new evolved Pokemon to show that she has made progress. I'd honestly be perfectly fine if she had both Fraxture and Gabite since that wouldn't be as overkill as making both of them fully evolve and still show that Iris has improved since the end of BW. I just think Axew getting to be a Haxorus would be a bit much with how it was handled in BW and how Iris did pretty minimal training with it. If they do give her a Haxours, maybe they can make it feel more justified with Iris' personality or her skills during a battle, but at the moment, it just sounds too much of a stretch to me on paper to really feel believable.
 
1. It doesn't need to feel believable.
2. She lost to Drayden and Clair. It is not a stretch for her to use the PWC as an opportunity to face several gym leaders all over the world (or around Johto) so that she can upstage her mentors. What was she supposed to do during three series?
3. Getting two Pokemon to evolve isn't that big a deal, even if they're dragons. I do hope her Gible is just a Gabite, but whatever. We aren't talking about becoming the Unova Champion here.
4. There's a double standard here where a Galar gym leader or a COTD can be arbitrarily strong (why is Bea special again?), but Iris isn't allowed to get off-screen development.
 
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1. It doesn't need to feel believable.
2. She lost to Drayden and Clair. It is not a stretch for her to use the PWC as an opportunity to face several gym leaders all over the world (or around Johto) so that she can upstage her mentors. What was she supposed to do during three series?

I'm not sure why it doesn't need to feel believable. I guess having a Haxorus might be more moot if Iris only shows up for one episode, but I think it would still be better for it to feel believable rather than feeling more like an attempt to make Iris strong enough to be a challenge for Ash. That is a valid point on using the PWC to face off against several Gym Leaders though. If facing off against Gym Leaders was more common in the PWC instead of a rarity, at least based on what we've seen of Ash's matches, I think I'd be more into that reason.

Silktree said:
4. There's a double standard here where a Galar gym leader or a COTD can be arbitrarily strong (why is Bea special again?), but Iris isn't allowed to get off-screen development.

I don't see how it's a double standard. Bea is a Gym Leader, so she would be battling more frequently against challengers and would need to do more frequent training to keep her Pokemon in top form. Iris wouldn't be able to battle as frequently as a Gym Leader would, so that would give Bea a big edge in that department. I'm also not saying that Iris isn't allowed to get off-screen development. That's putting words in my mouth when I have said multiple times that I'd be fine with Axew evolving into a Fraxture. I just think that giving Iris a Haxours would be too much given how Axew was handled.
 
I mean, after their travels together, Ash got Talonflame, Greninja, Goodra, Noivern, Lycanroc, Incineroar, Melmetal, Naganadel, Dragonite, Lucario and now Sirfetch'd and fully evolved all of them. I honestly don't think it's an stretch to say it's very possible for Iris to have an Fraxure/Haxorus and/or an Gabite/Garchomp at this point. Now, if the evolutions were ''earned'' or not considering the way that Axew was handled and that Gible showed up at the last minute is a whole other story and a whole other debate too.

But in all honesty, I will be disappointed if she didn't caught or evolved anything else after leaving on her own after BW. Even if we count just Dragons in Unova, there's still Hydreigon, Druddigon, Altaria, Flygon...

She could even have other Dragons like Goodra, Salamance, Kommo-o, etc from other regions. Idk guys, is just that the idea of seeing Iris with not a single update to her team would be... weird and honestly disappointing to say the least. I want to have the real feeling that she did evolved as a trainer.
 
I mean, after their travels together, Ash got Talonflame, Greninja, Goodra, Noivern, Lycanroc, Incineroar, Melmetal, Naganadel, Dragonite, Lucario and now Sirfetch'd and fully evolved all of them. I honestly don't think it's an stretch to say it's very possible for Iris to have an Fraxure/Haxorus and/or an Gabite/Garchomp at this point. Now, if the evolutions were ''earned'' or not considering the way that Axew was handled and that Gible showed up at the last minute is a whole other story and a whole other debate too.

But in all honesty, I will be disappointed if she didn't caught or evolved anything else after leaving on her own after BW. Even if we count just Dragons in Unova, there's still Hydreigon, Druddigon, Altaria, Flygon...

I still think Ash usually having more battle active goals than Iris did is a big difference. A Fraxture and/or Gabite would be perfectly fine. Their final evolved forms would just feel like too much of a stretch, especially for Haxorus. Garchomp would still be a bit much, but since we didn't really get to know Iris' Gible like we did for her Axew, it might not feel as forced by comparison. Getting some new Dragon Pokemon would be fine too. They wouldn't be limited to the fifth generation like they were for the bulk of BW, so she could easily get some Dragon Pokemon from other regions. Iris having her own Deino would be pretty nice honestly, especially when taking care of that other trainer's Deino was one her best episodes in BW from what I remember.

Enzo said:
She could even have other Dragons like Goodra, Salamance, Kommo-o, etc from other regions. Idk guys, is just that the idea of seeing Iris with not a single update to her team would be... weird and honestly disappointing to say the least. I want to have the real feeling that she did evolved as a trainer.

I doubt that she won't have any changes to her team mainly due to how the vast majority of returning main characters do have some kind of changes to their teams. To be clear, I'm not against Iris having new additions or evolved Pokemon on her team. I just think giving her a Haxorus would be too much. It wouldn't give me the impression that she evolved as a trainer, but that the writers just wanted to buff her team up in order to be more of a challenge for Ash.

One idea that came to mind would be Iris having a Fraxture when she shows up, but it evolves into Haxorus during a possible battle against Ash or another trainer. That still might be hard to pull off, especially if she's only around for one episode, and it would most likely depend on how her skills come off during a battle, but that might make the idea of Iris having a Haxorus work, at least for me.
 
rule of thumb: off-screen development is only okay if on-screen development outweighs it. none of deus ex machina or 'tell-not-show' involved

certainly not the case for Axew hence it feeling cheap to be final stage already.
I like to think about the “tell-not-show” from Iris’s perspective as well. Ash winning the Alola league, plus winning a 6v6 exhibition including Tapu Koko in the process, seems pretty “Deux Ex Machina” when compared to Ash’s accomplishments throughout the Best Wishes series. But Ash’s Alola league run still happened regardless, and all of that happened off-screen from Iris’s perspective. That’s why I don’t like to discredit potential accomplishments any characters went through, no matter how ridiculous they may seem. Because if I were Iris and saw Ash place 7th against someone who only brings 5 Pokémon to a 6v6, I wouldn’t really imagine that Ash would eventually place 1st, then beat six Pokémon successfully, including a legendary.
 
I’d rather that returning character battles not be wasted on the guy who has near zero interest in Pokémon battles. If he lost, it’d be the predictable outcome but if he won it’d seem ridiculous because he’s not into battle and thus doesn’t train his Pokémon fir it while Iris is a battler.

He would most likely lose but even if the loss doesn't affect Goh how would that be a bad thing exactly? Would people still be saying this if Ash were fighting in Goh's place and he ends up losing to Iris instead? Because I can already predict that there would be a ton of salt if Ash does lose and Iris will once again become a punching bag.
 
He would most likely lose but even if the loss doesn't affect Goh how would that be a bad thing exactly? Would people still be saying this if Ash were fighting in Goh's place and he ends up losing to Iris instead? Because I can already predict that there would be a ton of salt if Ash does lose and Iris will once again become a punching bag.
Because really, what development would even come from Go losing in a trainer battle considering that it’s neither an important focus for him nor any part of his goal. Heck, he doesn’t even go out of his way to battle just for fun where there are no stakes especially compared to previous cast members who may have done certain activities that were outside their wheelhouse. As such, there’s really nothing there to get invested in when they put Go into a trainer battle situation in the first place and so it ends up feeling like a waste especially in a series that has reduced basically everything into a one-shot.
 
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