Review BW089: Iris and the Roughneck Kairyu!

[Sweet Veil]

I enjoyed this episode and all the actions that went on, it's definitely above-average.

-Hikari, when the episode started off I liked that moment of seeing her fiddling around with her hair like that. I also liked how they played "By Your Side~Hikari's Theme" during that moment. The only thing that was missing was a Bubblebeam hair-doing by Pochama. Shame that didn't get retained in BW2. Got a slight smirk from her words to Kairyu, takes a lot of balls to stand up to a raging Dragon Hikari. Glad she was around because Iris would have been toast without the help of her and Satoshi's dual Water-types. That ending scene with Hikari screaming about how a Dragon Master should talk, awesome.

-Sanzandora, I liked how the episode began with Sanzandora and Kairyuu fighting against each other. Really got a kick out of the triple Hyper Beam. The fact the writers debuted a piece of Team Plasma music during that scene with Sanzandora and the fact Ghetsis owns a Sanzandora makes me think that Dragon Pokemon belongs to Team Plasma. Though it might be wishful thinking. Either way, I'm sure Kairyu has unfinished business with Sanzandora, they wouldn't just give it such a short premiere for nothing. At least I hope not.

-Meleotta. I actually liked her, her singing just makes things feel so mellow and calm. I imagine that Meleotta's singing is partially like what it feels like to be high(on life?). Either way I liked her singing once again, when trying to soothe Kairyu. I wish we had saw its Step Forme more though, a dancing Meleotta calming Kairyu with a dance would have been nice or Meleotta just kicking its butt with In-Fight.

-Mijumaru and Pochama. I like Mijumaru's Hydro Pump animation still and his hotachi throwing scene. With Meleotta, Kibago, Pikachu, Mijumaru, Pochama, Koil, and Kairyu around that's way too many out-of-the-ball Pokemon at once for my taste. It just felt like too much.

-Iris, girl was outstanding for many parts in this episode. The thing I liked most about her in this episode was her blind faith in Kairyu and in Dragon-types in general. Alongside Satoshi and Hikari, trying to help a temperamental Kairyu like that was pretty endearing. I liked the relation made by Satoshi about Dragon Masters, Coordinators, and Trainers being one in the same. I especially liked the scene where she's in front of Junsa and tells for the Pokemon to attack her and not only defends Kairyu but Dragon-types' honor and how they're truly good Pokemon. You really get a sense of urgency and heartfelt care during the scene and that's probably what gave it so much emotion, intensity, and depth. It really does hurt and is hard to deal with being blamed for something you didn't do, since Kairyu was the indirect destroyer of the transformer. She finally got herself a second Dragon-type and I thought it was enjoyable hearing her say, "I caught a Kairyu, by the dedication of Dragons!" Either way I'm glad to know that Iris was brought one step closer to her goal. She caught herself a fairy tale like Dragon Pokemon, flies, breathes fire, angry, etc. I look forward to seeing the heart connection of the those two in the future.

-Kairyu was easily the gem of this episode. So much personality and moments that made me care for it a lot. It's so weird to not see a Kairyu with that derpy Sugimori Art face that they usually have. I thought it was really adorable how it protected the Mamepato like that and taking a blast straight to the backside, that Kairyu's a big, rough, softy. I thought closing itself off to a room in the power plant after wrecking one of the transformers by accident was somewhat weird a choice. I thought it was pretty nice how Kairyu is pretty sucky at showing more submissive or happy emotions so simply let out a loud roar to let Iris know it wanted to be apart of her team. "Throw a Monster Ball already, girl!" XD Though catching a fully-evolved Pokemon right off the bat doesn't leave the taste of award-winning writing, I'm optimistic. The conflicted scene about whether to leave or not was nice too. You really get a the feeling the gruff Pokemon is warming up to Iris. Yeah even though it is a fully-evolved Pokemon, I have no doubt in my mind Iris earned Kairyu. She built a rapport with it and truly supported it when it had that nasty injury even and was in a load of turmoil. So, I hope Iris catches two more Dragon-type Pokemon in the future to fill out the rest of her team, Monozu or Trapinch please. Heck, even Fukamaru.

-Nice ending churchy music at the scene where they bid a farewell to each other.

-Yep, around six or seven weeks and I'm already sick of Team Rocket's Live Caster. I wish they would at least change up the gag or something each time. In other news the new TR project looks somewhat interesting, hopefully it's good when it finally debuts. I still think they could use a new Pokemon or two or at least have Musashi's bat evolve.

 

[Caseydia]

Normally, I'd be angered that Iris has caught a fully evolved Pokemon (Dragonite). However, I realised that in the past, Ash has obtained Primeape, Muk, and Noctowl, Misty has obtained Gyarados, and Dawn has obtained Togekiss, so what the hey.

You're not comparing those Pokemon to a fully evolved dragon type are you? Because I think there is a big difference. Look at Gible, Ash took forever for it to master one attack and I know the writers aren't going to let him evolve it again until another two seasons later, so no. That doesn't work.

I don't think people care about fully evolved Pokemon, it's about a fully evolved dragon type that is almost close to a legendary if you were to do the math.

Nope, the only reason why I would be angered at Iris catching Dragonite is because it's fully evolved. That's it. It doesn't matter at all to me that it's a pseudo-legendary as well, as my post said. I mean, Ash caught a pseudo-legendary as well (practically, as Gible eventually evolves into Garchomp). I also wouldn't mind if a character caught a legendary either.

I understand what you're saying. But look at the Meloetta nonsense going on right now. The writers are teasing us with Ash rather if he's going to catch it or not. And remember when people thought Dawn was going to catch Phoine in DP? This is pretty much like those times.

 

[Hassel]

First episode of S2 I saw and it was a really weird one...

What kind of a police officer let's kids near a powerful, pissed off dragon? Would you allow a 10-year-old to approach one if she claimed that she has magical powers and can solve the situation by herself? I think it would've been better if Iris and friends would've just secretly sneaked in without Junsar knowing...

Since when did Iris have memory-reading powers? I understand that she realized that the injury was caused by something bigger than the Magnemite, but then she just... saw its flashbacks. Which was useless because Dento found the security camera recording just a bit later... Was there an episode where this superpower was explained?! I haven't watched BW in a while so I probably missed something out... :I Sorry I'm just really confused lol.

I like that Dragonite seriousface'd all the time... I hope they make fun of that in later episodes. (Was I the only one who wished it would just blast a fireball at Meloetta while it was singing? That would've been funny!)

 

[Peppermint Phoenix]

You really get a sense of urgency

Uum exqueeze me how do you get a sense of urgency if dragonite wasn't in any danger judging by the facts that:

A) Wild Pokemon get beat up and captured all the time

B) It still had a lot of fight left in it

C) If it was capture by jenny it would have gotten taken care of

 

[Hellwarden]

You know, I have to admit, some of the claims that this episode solely existed to glorify Iris may have some truth in them.

I mean, Cilan had to tell Iris that Dragonite wanted to be caught. I mean, if that doesn't paint her as the ultimate badass, I don't know what does.

 

[MarshiyanMisutaa]

What kind of a police officer let's kids near a powerful, pissed off dragon?

But, they're always treated like adults by everyone. It's not something new.

 

[CrackFox]

One the whole I thought this was a really good episode. Kairyu seems to have personality and the capture was believable. He recognized she cared deeply for its welfare and that was good enough. I do think there should have been more excitement shown from the rest of the group, I mean..it's probably the most epic capture Ash has ever seen. Junsa is the worst cop ever, letting Iris handle that situation, but whatever. I'm getting tired of Meloetta now, it's time Ash captures it or it moves on. I thought Iris came across very well in this episode and showed her balls. I didn't quite get why Pochama and Mijumaru got stuck in the room though, I thought that would go somewhere and that they'd assist Iris somehow, but they basically just watched. It was a bit pointless. The funniest bit was Dent's facial expression when he realized he couldn't fit through the hole. Other than that, it wasn't a very humorous episode, but then It didn't need to be because it was plot heavy.

I'm happy with this capture episode. It was conducted well and most importantly, believably. Now it just depends on how well Iris handles Kairyu, I'm looking forward to seeing that.

 

[Hellion]

I fail to see why Dento/Cilan being left behind was such a big deal.

It's not. As I said, it's the one moment I actually laughed in the episode. The point I was making wasn't that Dent should be at the centre of every episode, you're misrepresenting the point I was making. The point I was making was that every other character seemed to be portrayed as solely there to praise Iris, to be unnecessarily cruel or wrong in comparaison to Iris, or just plain useless until Iris shows them the way and they do exactly what she tells them to do. Everyone there was there only to make Iris look good and glorify her rather than each have their own purpose. They each have skills, knowledge that could have been useful in such a situation, yet they were all portrayed to be rather inept and wait for Iris to tell them how to solve the problem. In this episode, Satoshi, Hikari and Dent have no purpose, do not exist outside of Iris. Satoshi was extremely guilty of this in this episode. Satoshi that would usually jump at the idea of helping resolve the Kairyu situation seems to not care until Iris goes off her "Dragons aren't bad and wouldn't hurt anybody (except they kinda are since this whole situation was prompted by Kairyu picking fights with every powerful pokémon it meets endangering other pokémon and humans in the process)" speech. He tells the unnecessarily violent Junsa that they won't need her Pokémon because Iris is such a Dragon Master already that she can't fail. Cue him telling Iris, "there's absolutely nothing we can do to help somewhere in there until Iris spurs him on to look for clues that Kairyu decided to "protect the Mamepato" in that battle he started but that's totally not his fault. Cue broken aesop.

While they'd normally each have skills that would have helped in this situation and personality traits that tell how they'd react, they're thrown out the window for Iris' sake rather than have everyone shine. The other characters were props in the Iris show, nothing more than that, for this episode.

 

[Driller678]

I fail to see why Dento/Cilan being left behind was such a big deal.

It's not. As I said, it's the one moment I actually laughed in the episode. The point I was making wasn't that Dent should be at the centre of every episode, you're misrepresenting the point I was making. The point I was making was that every other character seemed to be portrayed as solely there to praise Iris, to be unnecessarily cruel or wrong in comparaison to Iris, or just plain useless until Iris shows them the way and they do exactly what she tells them to do. Everyone there was there only to make Iris look good and glorify her rather than each have their own purpose. They each have skills, knowledge that could have been useful in such a situation, yet they were all portrayed to be rather inept and wait for Iris to tell them how to solve the problem. In this episode, Satoshi, Hikari and Dent have no purpose, do not exist outside of Iris. Satoshi was extremely guilty of this in this episode. Satoshi that would usually jump at the idea of helping resolve the Kairyu situation seems to not care until Iris goes off her "Dragons aren't bad and wouldn't hurt anybody (except they kinda are since this whole situation was prompted by Kairyu picking fights with every powerful pokémon it meets endangering other pokémon and humans in the process)" speech. He tells the unnecessarily violent Junsa that they won't need her Pokémon because Iris is such a Dragon Master already that she can't fail. Cue him telling Iris, "there's absolutely nothing we can do to help somewhere in there until Iris spurs him on to look for clues that Kairyu decided to "protect the Mamepato" in that battle he started but that's totally not his fault. Cue broken aesop.

While they'd normally each have skills that would have helped in this situation and personality traits that tell how they'd react, they're thrown out the window for Iris' sake rather than have everyone shine. The other characters were props in the Iris show, nothing more than that, for this episode.

You singling out Iris just shows how unfairly you look at things. The episode was written for Iris and Dragonite and the plot was centered around them.

 

[Hellwarden]

So any news on how this did ratings wise?

 

[MarshiyanMisutaa]

So any news on how this did ratings wise?

6.1

 

[Karamazov]

What kind of a police officer let's kids near a powerful, pissed off dragon? Would you allow a 10-year-old to approach one if she claimed that she has magical powers and can solve the situation by herself?

I probably would, actually. Junsar are rarely spectacular at their jobs, and children usually solve any and all problems within the franchise. They're also very mature in-universe, to the point where they're allowed to roam the country free of supervision to train dangerous animals. Handing all her work to a person who at least claims to be able to help isn't that bad of an idea. (Especially since humans are made of iron and rarely take any permanent damage from Pokemon attacks.)

 

[Geodude]

I don't like where this is going, with it being able to endure so many attacks at once, even while weakened.

You might want to watch that scene again. The attacks didn't hit, it blocked them with Flamethrower.

 

[Joshawott]

Dragonite was such a tsundere at the end of the episode. You could sum it up that final scene as saying "I-it's not like I want you to catch me or anything", then when it roars, it's obviously shouting "BAKA!".

Tsundere Dragonite is Tsundere. From now on, I shall be naming it Taiganite.

 

[Snow Spade]

That wild Hydreigon sure is powerful for taking down a Dragonite that was able to stand up to numerous attacks from Piplup, Oshawott, and four other pokemon. I hope we get to see that Hydreigon again in the future.

And if Hydreigon wasn't wild by owned by someone who uses it as a "spy" ?

 

[Adil]

TV Tokyo ratings: 6.1%