Anime & Manga General Discussion

[Greninjaman]

Rebooting the anime gives the writers far more creative freedom in regards to how Ash is handled.

Would there not be backlash if they did that?

 

[Hidden Mew]

Rebooting the anime gives the writers far more creative freedom in regards to how Ash is handled.

Not really. It gives them a completely clean slate, but I don't think that necessarily means more creative freedom, especially when it would be effectively taking Ash back to square one. It would be undoing any progress he's made over the course of the various anime, particularly with SM and Journeys where his victories attracted a lot of attention, getting rid of all of his Pokemon aside from Pikachu in a technical sense, erasing all of his traveling companions and effectively getting rid of twenty five years of nostalgia/history that they could milk whenever they see fit. All of that would be done for Ash to be a rookie again and I don't see that as providing more creative freedom. They already did a reboot effectively with the movies and that made way more sense to do there than with the anime proper. The movies rarely had any impact in the anime, let alone be referenced, and Ash's friends were rarely able to do anything, so just having the movies be set in their own universes while focusing on Ash and the movie characters made more sense.

They don't need to go nuclear on the anime to justify Ash going to Paldea, doing the Gyms or anything like that. Continuing from Ash becoming a World Champion and figure out what he'll do from there is perfectly fine. Admittedly, I still don't think that the PWC is going to play a significant factor as to what Ash will do in the next series, but I don't think that they'll ignore it entirely either. The emphasis on exploration and finding your own treasure in Scarlet/Violet is a good fit for Ash's personality too. A complete reboot wouldn't be impossible. I think it's more plausible than replacing Ash, but that doesn't say much either. Still, it feels way too improbable for them to go that route. They don't need to erase everything just to justify Ash going to Paldea or having a series specifically on Scarlet/Violet when Ash is effectively whatever the writers need him to be in any given series.

 

[cricketlaxwolvesbandy]

Do you really need to throw her and Amourshipping into every conversation...

Shippers gonna ship I am Amour obsessed

 

[RileyXY1]

Would there not be backlash if they did that?

Yeah, but another BW-style reset would get them even more backlash.

 

[SlyGecko]

Rebooting the anime gives the writers far more creative freedom in regards to how Ash is handled.

All a reboot will do is make all Ash accomplishments pointless and push him farther away from his goal.

Yeah, but another BW-style reset would get them even more backlash.

No it wouldn't. Pretty sure resetting Ash to be a dumb noob who just started his journey would get more backlash than just making Ash dumber but still having all his accomplishments. Movie Ash can get away with the reboot because he's not Canon to the actual anime.

 

[Kurolegacy]

Yeah, but another BW-style reset would get them even more backlash.

You act as if the only options are full reboot or Best Wishes reset. Hell, SV basically showed that neither are necessary with Nemona.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Yeah, but another BW-style reset would get them even more backlash.

Those aren't their only options though. Even if they reset Ash, it doesn't mean that they'll pull another Pikachu vs. Snivy. Ash will get new Pokemon and they aren't going to be instantly Champion level strength right off the bat. It also doesn't mean that Ash can never lose without it being a reset. He should be allowed to lose. They just need to make those defeats feel believable and reasonable, which is the opposite of Ash's battles with Trip.

I also feel like erasing Ash's accomplishments right after winning the PWC would cause more backlash than pulling another BW. Neither are good options, but putting Ash right back as a rookie after he became a World Champion seems much worse to me.

 

[RetroPokeFan]

Rebooting Ash entirely just after he's won this huge big tournament that's made him and Pikachu world champions wouldn't just be terrible.

It'd quite frankly be the One More Day of the franchise except without the part where Ash makes a deal with the devil.

 

[RileyXY1]

You act as if the only options are full reboot or Best Wishes reset. Hell, SV basically showed that neither are necessary with Nemona.

It's hard to write a story with Ash at his current strength level, as all he can do if they don't continue with the PWC without resetting him is to have him be a mentor figure to a new trainer.

 

[Kurolegacy]

It's hard to write a story with Ash at his current strength level, as all he can do if they don't continue with the PWC without resetting him is to have him be a mentor figure to a new trainer.

Says you, a person who doesn’t write for the series. The actual writers aren’t so inclined to follow your honesty close-minded way of thinking.

 

[RileyXY1]

Says you, a person who doesn’t write for the series. The actual writers aren’t so inclined to follow your honesty close-minded way of thinking.

Journeys completely changed how the anime works. It would be very hard to return to the old formula without Ash being reset in some way. Whether they would keep established continuity in that case is up to them.

 

[Kurolegacy]

Journeys completely changed how the anime works. It would be very hard to return to the old formula without Ash being reset in some way. Whether they would keep established continuity in that case is up to them.

Word of advice, repeating the same thing over and over again doesn’t suddenmu make it truth. You really need to learn not to say things that are opinion as if they are hard fact. Just because you might feel that way doesn’t make it so because you are nothing more to the series than a fan. Your or any other fan’s opinion that it would be hard to return to the old formula is frankly completely meaningless in the grand scheme of things as far as the machinations of the writers are concerned.

 

[Lightning Flame Blast]

It's hard to write a story with Ash at his current strength level, as all he can do if they don't continue with the PWC without resetting him is to have him be a mentor figure to a new trainer.

Like others have said, Ash being world champion doesn’t mean he’ll have a Midas touch that makes some Smoliv he found in the wild suddenly able to square up to legendaries.

Really, all they need to do is keep Pikachu out of lesser battles to let the new kids believably lose and grow from it, even if sometimes it feels like the writers will combust if they consider that.

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

Without spoiling anything, the Scarlet and Violet games have more enough stuff to work with to center the cast's goals around one of the three story paths. Imagine a character doing the gym challenge, one pursuing the Titan Pokemon Path of Legends story (maybe even for the same story reasons you see in the game), and then another investigating Team Star and the whereabouts of a certain character. The structure for a strong season is there, it just depends on execution and how the anime tries to approach things.

 

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

It's hard to write a story with Ash at his current strength level, as all he can do if they don't continue with the PWC without resetting him is to have him be a mentor figure to a new trainer.

Scarlet and Violet has three different storylines, though, with the Gym Challenge being only one of them. They could easily have Ash do one of the others while a different character does the Gym Challenge. It's really not that big of a deal either, since Ash hasn't done a traditional Gym Challenge since XY, so Ash doing something different again for his main goal is definitely a viable option that doesn't require any of his accomplishments or competence being reset.

 

[JinksChow]

Rebooting Ash entirely just after he's won this huge big tournament that's made him and Pikachu world champions wouldn't just be terrible.

It'd quite frankly be the One More Day of the franchise except without the part where Ash makes a deal with the devil.

While that might be an apt comparison, but iirc, wasn't the One More Day arc of Spider-Man highly criticized and almost universally panned?

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

While that might be an apt comparison, but iirc, wasn't the One More Day arc of Spider-Man highly criticized and almost universally panned?

As far as I understand, yes. One comic reviewer on YouTube hated that story so much that he's outright refused to buy any Spider-Man comics that take place after that.

 

[RileyXY1]

Scarlet and Violet has three different storylines, though, with the Gym Challenge being only one of them. They could easily have Ash do one of the others while a different character does the Gym Challenge. It's really not that big of a deal either, since Ash hasn't done a traditional Gym Challenge since XY, so Ash doing something different again for his main goal is definitely a viable option that doesn't require any of his accomplishments or competence being reset.

One of those two is just the traditional evil team plot that the anime usually just condenses into a small arc and the other is just totem fights, and considering how the anime writers skimped on the totems in SM they probably don't want Ash to do that.

 

[SlyGecko]

Scarlet and Violet has three different storylines, though, with the Gym Challenge being only one of them. They could easily have Ash do one of the others while a different character does the Gym Challenge. It's really not that big of a deal either, since Ash hasn't done a traditional Gym Challenge since XY, so Ash doing something different again for his main goal is definitely a viable option that doesn't require any of his accomplishments or competence being reset.

Thing is, the Gym leader challenge fits Ash's goal the most. With the Titans, that's Arven's thing since it deals with Herba Mystica. And I can't really see Ash's main paldea goal being taking down Team Star. I can see Ash helping with those two goals, but not really focusing on them. Besides, the only other Character I can see taking on the gym challenge is Nemona, but I don't really see her being a main character since she is your rival in SV and no rival has been a main character in the anime.

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

One of those two is just the traditional evil team plot

Not really? Again, not going to spoil for those reading the thread that may or may not have played the game, but the entire structure of the Team Star story path is completely different to the typical villain arcs we see in the other games. It's more akin to gyms and raids as opposed to the standard boss fights. Even in the most loose interpretation of the challenge, there is still a lot that the anime can work with to flesh it out.