Still sucks we don't have any notable female companion battlers after iris
I guess on a technical sense, but that still seems like too much of a stretch when they only battled once and she appeared only three times in all of Johto. I don't like anime Bianca, but at least she appeared more often during the Unova portion of BW. It doesn't help that they kind of just forgot she was also going for the Johto League and just had her travel around randomly after getting only four badges.
True true. Bianca had an interesting backstory in the games that was briefly touched upon in the games - I wonder why the series didn't flesh that out a bit more?
No, I wouldn't consider her a major rival tbh. Her appearances were mostly comic relief in nature, but she was still enjoyable. Probably a bit too early in the series to expect a full character arc like we see in other seasons, but I would've loved to see her growth in Journeys or something.
And yet tell that to the people who got excited to see Serena, Bonnie/Clemont, Lillie and the Alola cast, Dawn, Gary, Brock, Iris, Greninja, etc. again.
Of course people are hyped to see returning characters, especially the really popular characters or ones who haven't been featured for awhile. We didn't even know for sure about Serena's episode until the leaked poster showed up a couple of days before the episodes aired. But I don't think that negates the issue of how little focus Galar has gotten. They didn't have to choose between primarily focusing on older characters or new ones. They could have gone for a balance of old and new characters. We still could have gotten these return episodes, but still do something with the new region and characters too. That lack of balance between old and new regions has been one of my biggest issues with Journeys, especially when there was seemingly no attempt at trying to create said balance.
I think that you're assuming a bit too much about the writers if you think that they were content with just bringing May back. It's just as likely that they couldn't fit Misty within DP's storyline. I can't really think of a good reason for Misty to show up in Sinnoh. They had a much easier way to bring May back through Dawn's storyline. It wouldn't have been impossible for Misty to show up in Sinnoh, but I don't think there was an easy way to bring her back or at least that DP was lacking because they didn't feature Misty for an episode.
The fact that Journeys is airing during the anime's 25th anniversary is probably a big factor too. The world tour setup definitely makes it easier for them to meet up with older characters, but I don't think that the problem was that they were focused on just the current generation before. I think that it was more of a matter that they couldn't find a good reason for characters to show up or that they'd feel forced in the middle of the other storylines going on in that series. Misty would have felt just as out of place in XY as Iris would have in my opinion.
And that would be kinda (and I do mean kinda) fine if it was done well but it wasn't. And thats no excuse to shaft Galar and any new region just because it wants to "do it's own thing".
Sort of springing off this, as much as it feels like Galar got burned by JN's format I can see why they did a world tour: if they wanted to do a world championship they were running out of time for even brackets, and unless they were going to wait for gen 16 and that is way too long to plan a TV show; a sizable portion of the current show staff could well be retired by then.
I'm not sure if that's part of the reason why they haven't done much with Galar. It's possible, especially when BD/SP and Legends Arceus would have more of a connection with each other as opposed to Sword/Shield, but they didn't even show much interest in making use of the DLC areas of Galar either. They couldn't really continue to emphasize on Dynamax when that is exclusive to Power Spots in Galar. Mega Evolution didn't have that kind of limitation, so it was a lot easier for them to incorporate new Mega Pokemon in OR/AS.
I wouldn't necessarily mind the anime trying to do its own thing, especially when I think the anime does tend to work better with its own storylines as opposed to mimicking the games' storyline beat for beat, but I don't think that has worked out particularly well for Journeys. I don't dislike the series as much as other people do. I still enjoy most episodes and I like the characters, but I don't think that the world tour aspect has been handled well and the PWC itself, despite leading to Ash battling against regional Champions, has been really lackluster. The anime could still basically do its own thing without leaving Galar in the dust. Like I keep on saying, it doesn't have to be one or the other.
The fact that all regional Champions are there to represent their respective generations, including Ash as the Alola League Champion, is pretty telling in regards to the timing. The world tour format isn't a bad idea, especially when it most likely was used to capitalize on the anime's 25th anniversary, but I just don't think it was executed well. It doesn't make use of either old or new locations, which just makes the concept feel so much more lackluster than it should be.
Even though Ash is from Kanto, I don't think his home base needed to be in Kanto. It might fit more than Galar in the sense that Kanto was the first generation, but I don't think we really get anything from having generic Vermillion City as the background for a decent portion of the series. Admittedly, I think that the idea of a home base kind of contradicts with the world tour gimmick. It's kind of hard to make use of different locations and regions if Ash and Goh have to head back home at the end of every episode or two. It made sense in SM since Ash was living in a new region, the cast was a lot larger and it fit with the theme of family that the Alola region had. I don't really see much of a reason as to why they'd need to go back to their home base in Kanto, aside maybe Goh needing a place to put all of his Pokemon in.
