Controversial opinions

[Unireon]

Years later I learned a bit about some of his pre-Pokémon work. He worked on another toyetic series called Minky Momo where, well, something interesting happened. Although the show had good ratings the merchandise wasn't selling well, so the toy company helping to fund it pulled out.
In response, the show had the main character killed after being hit with a truck carrying toys. She apparently got better.

The other time him and Yuyama worked together, in the same positions even.

Wasn't that uncalled pettiness from both of them?

That anime ran on pessimism and bleakness, such incident is merely the most known case.
Most people let the bright colours and designs fool them and end up in a huge shock.

 

[Antiyonder]

To be fair to Shudo the basic premise of the franchise is 100% designed around a gameplay loop that gets very awkward if you think about it. They tell you a lot that Pokémon are friends and companions but you can trade them away to other people if you feel like it and the mechanics increasingly encourage mass capturing to find ones with good natures, abilities, IVs, or rare factors like Gigantimax.

The trade aspect granted, though isn't the bolded part more on players who take winning too seriously?

Kind of like how Tajiri if not Game Freaks and Nintendo wanted the trade feature to be more for social benefits like players helping one another (based off Ken Sugimori getting a couple rare item drops in Dragon Quest II and wanting to share with another player, but couldn't), but many of us ended up getting two versions to trade with ourselves.

You cause even if video games can have social potential, they're sometimes a means to avoid society or to cope with lack of social confidencesXD.

It's not like the fandom didn't have similar ideas about the setting being sort of dark from the beginning.

True and as I said it's not giving the story an edge that is problematic in and of itself.

Just that it can be argued his endgame was less for the sake of a story and more like an apology for the show being toyetic. At the very least, the premise of Pokémon rebeling would require a narrative where we see more of Pokémon being enslaved/abused, but such behavior, barring say the Misty/Psyduck dynamic for humor doesn't really seem to be the norm.

Hence bringing up Pokémon Adventures. I don't know, it seems like even if Hidenori Kusaka believes in not holding punches for the sake of a story that he seems to enjoy writing for a comic based on a toyetic franchise.

 

[Weddingbells]

Tired of the "injured pokemon, human saves, become besties" story the anime keep milking and milking. They had it with ash, clemont, cerise, Lana, etc. It's like they can't think of any other interesting backstory or premise. It's sweet but boring.

 

[Daren]

isn't the bolded part more on players who take winning too seriously?

I don't really think so; I think it's easy to say that GameFreak are intentionally pushing players to mass capture in Raids or Friend Safaris and the other similar "rare capture" mechanics to find ones with a Hidden Ability or good IVs or other factors--that's why those were unchangeable for so long, and even as they became changeable doing so is made a massive inconvenience so that mass capture is still appealing.

Even when Shudo was writing the show before a lot of those were added the central gameplay loop was taking creatures out of their habitats to have them help you complete your adventure.
Again, it was a very fun gameplay loop! But it was built for gameplay primarily, and narratively it's really, really awkward. It's easy to see why someone would think of it as an exploitive relationship and I don't think the games actually do very well at arguing against that perspective (the show gives Pokémon their own goals and agency--we even see one Pokémon leave their trainer before changing their mind--and has a better leg to stand on there).

Just that it can be argued his endgame was less for the sake of a story and more like an apology for the show being toyetic. At the very least, the premise of Pokémon rebeling would require a narrative where we see more of Pokémon being enslaved/abused, but such behavior, barring say the Misty/Psyduck dynamic for humor doesn't really seem to be the norm.

Knowing about it there are a couple episodes in Kanto that feel like foreshadowing the rebellion; specifically the Tentacruel and Diglett ones.

 

[Enzo]

Tired of the "injured pokemon, human saves, become besties" story the anime keep milking and milking. They had it with ash, clemont, cerise, Lana, etc. It's like they can't think of any other interesting backstory or premise. It's sweet but boring.

I mean, I can see why they use it: it's sweet, touching, heartbreaking, it's the type of story that won't ever truly go out of style and exists pratically out of time. But yeah, I do agree, it seems like they noticied it worked the first couple of times and then they just realized they don't actually have to try anymore.

 

[AgedVeteranofShow]

- James Carter Cathcart (aka Jimmy Zoppi/Billy Beach)'s writing is one of the current English dub's greatest issues, not an asset for it. While I pretty much agree with the fandom's consensus on the voice acting (due to very poor vocal direction, imo) & music quality overall having dropped the most in quality over time, I tend to disagree with this.

He has characters speak in a very unnatural, very awkward way, and it sounds like he tries way too hard to be hip & cool, like this:

How do you do fellow kids?

www.youtube.com

Especially prominent with Team Rocket, but it extends to everyone else slowly but surely: the dub's writing flowed much more naturally, and kids spoke the way actual kids would speak back then, as did TRio speak like actual human beings at the least before he got such massive power over the dub writing in Battle Frontier.

 

[Antiyonder]

Even when Shudo was writing the show before a lot of those were added the central gameplay loop was taking creatures out of their habitats to have them help you complete your adventure.
Again, it was a very fun gameplay loop! But it was built for gameplay primarily, and narratively it's really, really awkward. It's easy to see why someone would think of it as an exploitive relationship and I don't think the games actually do very well at arguing against that perspective (the show gives Pokémon their own goals and agency--we even see one Pokémon leave their trainer before changing their mind--and has a better leg to stand on there).

I can do with that.

Knowing about it there are a couple episodes in Kanto that feel like foreshadowing the rebellion; specifically the Tentacruel and Diglett ones.

More or less yeah, though the Diglett ep arguably can go either way in that it demonstrates that trained Pokémon still can have free will.

So maybe if those occasions were prominent as well as more amoral tendencies from characters.

Mind you, Misty's treatment of Psyduck could be made use of in this regard, though it's arguably more for slapstick humor. In this case a running gag that should have had more thought put into it given the nature of these opinions and that Misty could have just boxxed or released the duck.

Probably some good examples beyond that is:
- Electric Shock Showdown: Ash trying to force Pikachu to cooperate.

- Fire & Ice: Yeah putting off taking his Pokémon to a Center so he could eat. Had this been more often and other characters showed this kind of inconsiderate, definitely. Even then this could be argued to be out of character at this point as Ash became more squeaky clean as the season and show went on.

Plus as Suede pointed out, this is the same kid who braved rain and other dangers to take medicine to a sick Pokémon that wasn't even his.

 

[Weddingbells]

I mean, I can see why they use it: it's sweet, touching, heartbreaking, it's the type of story that won't ever truly go out of style and exists pratically out of time. But yeah, I do agree, it seems like they noticied it worked the first couple of times and then they just realized they don't actually have to try anymore.

It's the same issue I have with the abandonment pokemon storyline. And Gengar is one of the worst iterations of it

 

[Antiyonder]

Well one thing I will say relating to it is that while Charizard Chills is a nice resolution to the Pokémon disobedience?

When they redid this for Dawn and Mamoswine in DP (the whole disobedience upon evolving), there is room for improvement, one advantages over the Ash/Charizard stuff?

You at least had an additional episode in the middle where Dawn was making an effort to rekindle their bond. CC was good and all, but you never had any filler where Ash would take some time to work on his damaged relationship with his Pokémon.

Only Charizard focused episode outside between it's evolution and becoming loyal was just about a one time rivalry with Scyther.

 

[Emmy]

I'll be honest, I've never understood the whole "disobedient upon evolution" thing and never cared for any of the plotlines involved with it.

 

[Antiyonder]

I'll be honest, I've never understood the whole "disobedient upon evolution" thing and never cared for any of the plotlines involved with it.

I'd say maybe the anime just needs to polish the idea better. Execution of the idea matter a tad bit more and all.

That said, I see it as a case of their added power going to their head. Like say Charmeleon being just more stronger and Charizard being more so, plus with flight.

Not to mention:
1. It does help to convey that Pokémon aren't slave upon capture.

2. It can even be argued that Damien prior abuse took some effect on this "weak" Pokémon.

Can we at least agree that Damien should have shown up and got another taste of comeuppance:-D?

3. Ash really wasn't that good even with moments of smarts on his side.

It's why struggling to find a Pokémon to fight Erika's Gloom was a weak moment.

You (Ash) don't think that the Pokémon who is evolved and can blow away the stench has any chance against Gloom?

 

[jjliang]

Guess what? They decided to kill off the Black Panther all because of Chad Boseman's death. May is pretty much the reverse of this.

 

[Weddingbells]

Ash has been really stagnant in journeys

 

[Antiyonder]

Ash has been really stagnant in journeys

I know that some fans are unapologetic, but this is an unpopular opinion?

 

[AgedVeteranofShow]

I've got one that's unpopular, I think, but standing by it though not really PokeAni as much as Pokemon in Animated form:

- Pokemon Generations is extremely overrated. From what I can recall, of all the shorts I saw, you would get like 3 for each Generation, up to Gen VI.
Re-watching them, they just seem to be a bunch of random events from the games strung in random order, but there's no real conclusion to any of them. I think my least favorite of the entire Series was The Cavern, Generations! Archie is one of the most stupid characters in this entire franchise: he says as long as I have the Blue Orb, Kyogre will listen [to him]...and then proceeds to toss the same blue orb right into the ocean like a complete idiot. My favorite was probably the set with N and Ghetsis, the Gen V shorts, even then still some weird stuff at times (esp. from Brycen, IIRC).

It had potential, but the problem was it was just a bit of dissociated shorts for 3 per region, and it's far too short to leave any lasting impact.

On that note, to keep it relevant,

- Anime N! is actually an interesting character.

 

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

To be fair to Shudo the basic premise of the franchise is 100% designed around a gameplay loop that gets very awkward if you think about it. They tell you a lot that Pokémon are friends and companions but you can trade them away to other people if you feel like it and the mechanics increasingly encourage mass capturing to find ones with good natures, abilities, IVs, or rare factors like Gigantimax.
It's not like the fandom didn't have similar ideas about the setting being sort of dark from the beginning.

Eh, to be fair, the games have at least started to ease up on these a bit with EV-training being made more accessible, Bottle Caps to max out IVs, Ability Capsules and Patches for if you don't have the right Ability, and Nature Mints to change undesirable Natures to ones more appropriate to whatever it is you want a specific Pokemon to do. Even a lack of Gigantamax can be fixed with Gigantamax Soup.

Sure, it's still not really perfect, but these changes have at least actually made it completely possible to make the team the player uses to clear the story into one that you can feasably use in serious online matches without getting utterly destoryed every time just because yours wasn't minmaxed to perfection due to circumstances out of your control.

 

[Antiyonder]

It had potential, but the problem was it was just a bit of dissociated shorts for 3 per region, and it's far too short to leave any lasting impact.

O think the main anime can still be entertaining if viewed without false expectations and recognizing that advertising the game and other merchandise is the priority.

But I get why there is critique. The show wasn't originally made to be never ending and people want see the character's story get a conclusion.

Plus not having an anime alternative (only one being the Adventures manga). Like the main series, Origins and Generations can be fun, but they have the same problem, just on the opposite end.

Origins for example should have been 13 episodes long with at least more time for the Gym Leaders, Team Rocket and the Elite Four.

Also as I brought it up as an alternative to Shudo's endgame story for the anime in terms of doing a dark story better.

I think that it's a disservice to the Adventures manga to hype them up solely on their intensity for action alone or maybe at all.

There's room to praise it on writing and characters alone, while praising how violent it is makes it come off as only good for lovers of edgy stuff.

 

[Blob]

O think the main anime can still be entertaining if viewed without false expectations and recognizing that advertising the game and other merchandise is the priority.

But I get why there is critique. The show wasn't originally made to be never ending and people want see the character's story get a conclusion.

Plus not having an anime alternative (only one being the Adventures manga). Like the main series, Origins and Generations can be fun, but they have the same problem, just on the opposite end.

Origins for example should have been 13 episodes long with at least more time for the Gym Leaders, Team Rocket and the Elite Four.

Also as I brought it up as an alternative to Shudo's endgame story for the anime in terms of doing a dark story better.

I think that it's a disservice to the Adventures manga to hype them up solely on their intensity for action alone or maybe at all.

There's room to praise it on writing and characters alone, while praising how violent it is makes it come off as only good for lovers of edgy stuff.

Not to mention what they did with the Hisui anime, they barely showed any Hisuian forms and it could have gone on for 13+ more episodes.

 

[Sai]

Since Journey's will barely have any eps left after the tournament and Go's project Mew it seems safe to say outside of silent cameos watching the Leon match most of the rest of the companions probably aren't getting eps at this point.

What I'm most surprised about is Misty not appearing in Journey's at all. A lot of the other characters have some issues VA wise or it's understandable they didn't show up, but for an arc set in Kanto most of the time and with her design already updated in SM I'm surprised the writers chose not to have her appear at all. At this point the last chance is maybe a victory party at Pallet if Ash beats Leon but even that may be unlikely.

Flashing back to 2019 I remember seeing all that fake fanart of Misty and Brock being a major part of Journey's, who knew 3 years later that Brock would only get full appearances in specials and Misty wouldn't appear at all? I think people grossly overestimated how much the writers link Misty/Brock with a Kanto themed series. Even more odd is Vermilion City is literally right next door to Cerulean, lol

 

[Weddingbells]

imo, OS-xy ash is different from sm-Jn ash. Sm-JN isn't a bad character. But I just can't say it's the same ash from the past