Controversial opinions

[Hidden Mew]

Lillie's point has nothing to do with evolution, her point is that Lusamine was inconsiderate to her feelings.

While I think that they were trying to express that through the argument, I really don't think it worked. Lillie was upset that Clefable evolved simply because it was much cuter as a Clefairy. This was an absolutely terrible reason because it made Lillie look so selfish and shallow. Clefairy wasn't her Pokemon. She clearly cared about it, but she wasn't the one raising and training it. That was Lusamine. She is fully within her right to evolve her Pokemon if she wanted to and there was no indication that Clefairy didn't want to evolve either. If Clefairy was Lillie's Pokemon and Lusamine decided to evolve it without talking to her about it first, then Lillie's anger would be certainly justified. Lusamine shouldn't have needed to ask her young daughter if she should evolve her own Pokemon.

I still think that this was a major reason as to why I disliked how SM handled their relationship. Right off the bat, I couldn't see how Lusamine was that bad when Lillie was the one acting more selfish and childish. That basically continued throughout the Nebby arc.

And yet, she did nothing to help her daughter solve her "afraid of touching Pokémon" issue, or find out what had caused it. Also, she showed her caring of her daughter by acting overly affectionate to Lillie and treating her like a much younger child. Even a recent episode has her playfully do this and say "why do children have to grow up" when Lillie pushes her overly affectionate hug away.

Oh, hey! Raichu is my favorite Pokémon too!

Not helping Lillie at all when she first developed her fear of Pokemon was a pretty huge mistake. Lillie must have been dealing with it for at least a couple of years, depending on how young they were in the flashbacks. I'd still give her credit for immediately apologizing to Lillie after being called out, but not addressing it or helping her through it for so long is still a problem.

Being overly affectionate on the other hand is really not a problem. I guess it does tie in with Lusamine being oblivious towards her children, but at the same time, being overly affectionate is definitely not the worst thing a parent can do. I'm sure it's a more relatable kind of issue for some of the kids watching the series, but since I'm well outside the target demographic, it usually doesn't seem like a big issue to me. Lillie is a ten year old girl or at least I don't think she would be much older than ten. She is not grown up or maturing. Lusamine treating her like a baby or like a younger child usually didn't cross any lines. The only time I think it did when she asked their butler to record Lillie without her permission since that's pretty creepy. She is a kid, so her mother treating her like a child didn't really bother me. The fact that they're still using it for comedy relief in a recent episode also makes me question just how much improvement there has been in their relationship.

 

[PkmnTrainerV]

More like "they had a plan, but an unpredictable tragedy forced them to abandon it".

I mean.. two episodes really wouldn’t change the entire writing of the anime that much. The episodes are made six months in advance, so we'd have definitely seen if the two parter gave rise to any significant changes.

Controversial opinion- I think the unaired Plasma Two parter has been romanticised way too much.

 

[LazySpy]

She is a kid, so her mother treating her like a child didn't really bother me.

Sorry for derailing the topic,but that's exactly why I think people, and I feel like that's a really controversiall opinion I'll get kicked for, seriously exxagarate the issue with Iris calling Ash "such a kid".

What does the audience sees wrong about calling a 10-year old a "kid"? What does a 10-year old sees wrong about being called a "kid"? That's litelary who both Ash and Iris are, the yet, they are treating this like a major offense that both anime characters and the audience goes super crazy about it. There are more reasons to call Iris a bad character than just that, yet whenever I see people explaining why they think she was a bad character, 90% of the time they don't bring the actuall issues with her, instead go all mad on the "you're such a kid" line. Cuz who cares that Ash Ketchum is a kid?

... Ironically enough, those very same people sometimes happen to paradoxally hate Ash and use much worse offenses than "you're such a kid" to emphasize that.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

I mean.. two episodes really wouldn’t change the entire writing of the anime that much. The episodes are made six months in advance, so we'd have definitely seen if the two parter gave rise to any significant changes.

Controversial opinion- I think the unaired Plasma Two parter has been romanticised way too much.

I wasn't talking about it affecting the entire anime. Just the development of Team Plasma, which obviously took the biggest hit here.

Sorry for derailing the topic,but that's exactly why I think people, and I feel like that's a really controversiall opinion I'll get kicked for, seriously exxagarate the issue with Iris calling Ash "such a kid".

What does the audience sees wrong about calling a 10-year old a "kid"? What does a 10-year old sees wrong about being called a "kid"? That's litelary who both Ash and Iris are, the yet, they are treating this like a major offense that both anime characters and the audience goes super crazy about it. There are more reasons to call Iris a bad character than just that, yet whenever I see people explaining why they think she was a bad character, 90% of the time they don't bring the actuall issues with her, instead go all mad on the "you're such a kid" line. Cuz who cares that Ash Ketchum is a kid?

... Ironically enough, those very same people sometimes happen to paradoxally hate Ash and use much worse offenses than "you're such a kid" to emphasize that.

Ash was acting much like his season 1 self, i.e. a lot less mature than he had in Sinnoh. I guess they wanted her to poke him on his newly returned inexperience (as weird and nonsensical that sounds) as a running gag.

Also, I just realized that maybe this is why the XY Ash seemed so mature: it was a counter reaction to BW Ash's relative immaturity.

 

[prog rocker]

Controversial opinion- I think the unaired Plasma Two parter has been romanticised way too much.

I find that realistic. I like to call it "Lost Media Syndrome": Once something gets lost, and people want to find it, they will overhype it to the point that once it appears, people will be "that's all?"

A good example of this would be "Cry Baby Lane", a Nickelodeon movie that was banned because "it was too scary", to the point of having employees tell the people that saw it that they made the movie up. Once the movie resurfaced in 2011, they discovered the only creepy part is the beginning, everything else was pure narm.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

I find that realistic. I like to call it "Lost Media Syndrome": Once something gets lost, and people want to find it, they will overhype it to the point that once it appears, people will be "that's all?"

I just think that Team Plasma would've gotten off better if the earthquake never happened and these episodes aired as planned.

Also, since the disaster happened less than a week before the first part was supposed to air, I can't help but think what would've happened of the disaster had happened in between these two episodes.

 

[prog rocker]

I just think that Team Plasma would've gotten off better if the earthquake never happened and these episodes aired as planned.

Also, since the disaster happened less than a week before the first part was supposed to air, I can't help but think what would've happened of the disaster had happened in between these two episodes.

This might be me misremembering things, but weren't they going to air the same day, like a 1-hour special?

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

This might be me misremembering things, but weren't they going to air the same day, like a 1-hour special?

No. I remember the preview aired after episode 22 being specifically for part 1.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Controversial opinion- I think the unaired Plasma Two parter has been romanticised way too much.

I agree. I've seen a lot of people act like this single two parter would have improved BW immensely. While I can't say that would have been impossible, it seems pretty unlikely based on the other Team Rocket specials in the series. I'm not too surprised it has been put on such a high pedestal over the years. Since it's basically a lost special, people can speculate and imagine just how great it could have been, which just make people think it had to be absolutely perfect.

Sorry for derailing the topic,but that's exactly why I think people, and I feel like that's a really controversiall opinion I'll get kicked for, seriously exxagarate the issue with Iris calling Ash "such a kid".

What does the audience sees wrong about calling a 10-year old a "kid"? What does a 10-year old sees wrong about being called a "kid"? That's litelary who both Ash and Iris are, the yet, they are treating this like a major offense that both anime characters and the audience goes super crazy about it. There are more reasons to call Iris a bad character than just that, yet whenever I see people explaining why they think she was a bad character, 90% of the time they don't bring the actuall issues with her, instead go all mad on the "you're such a kid" line. Cuz who cares that Ash Ketchum is a kid?

... Ironically enough, those very same people sometimes happen to paradoxally hate Ash and use much worse offenses than "you're such a kid" to emphasize that.

The main problem most people had with Iris's catchphrase boiled down to how much of a hypocrite she is. Iris would often act just as immature as Ash, if not more so, but she'd still get upset whenever he acted like a kid. This was probably suppose to be a joke, but it didn't work when she was rarely called out for her own immaturity. It was pretty frustrating to see one immature character acting like she had room to judge someone else being a kid. It was annoying, but admittedly, it was probably one of the more minor issues with Iris character.

There were so many problems with Iris beyond her catchphrase. She hardly did any training with Axew, yet it learned two overpowered moves out of nowhere. She got so many undeserved victories, especially in the Club Battle tournaments, pretty much all of her accomplishments were handed to her on a silver plate with little to no effort on her part, they basically abandoned the whole Axew has to evolve as part of her goal the moment it was introduced and despite how Iris was presented as really a rookie trainer at the start of BW, she suddenly became a Dragon type expert with some kind of special ability to connect with Dragon Pokemon's hearts out of nowhere. Whenever Iris was given center stage, she was presented as a strong trainer when she really wasn't. Iris's skills as a trainer were average at best. She did not show a good amount of improvement over the course of BW and certainly not enough to possibly become a Gym Leader. There are a lot more problems with Iris's writing and character beyond her catchphrase, but it did make her more annoying and unlikable to other people too.

 

[Insanish Danish]

That's the whole point, though - it's SUPPOSED to be hypocritical because of course she's a kid, too. I always thought it was such a ridiculous reason to hate her.

 

[HiroHunter]

That's the whole point, though - it's SUPPOSED to be hypocritical because of course she's a kid, too. I always thought it was such a ridiculous reason to hate her.

And? Just because she supposed to be hypocritical doesn't make it a good thing.

 

[Insanish Danish]

And? Just because she supposed to be hypocritical doesn't make it a good thing.

It's still such a minor thing to get upset about, though. Like...a kid acting immature. Absurd.

There are actual issues with how Iris was handled overall (I absolutely love her, personally, but I know objectively she could have been written better); I think her acting like a hypocrite is the least of those problems.

 

[yab]

I personally think Iris should have been written like Sapphire from the manga and they should have played up her fun loving jungle personality, rather than give her some Misty 2.0 qualities and among the other stuff they didn't exactly follow through with her like all her dragon oriented stuff.

The thing is Iris felt like a break after two girly coordinators in a row, but now seemingly as the writers went back to girly female leads with Serena and now technically Lillie afterward, Iris feels like the odd one out of trying to make another Misty-type character. I think the writers were pretty much scared away from ever doing that type of character again now, so expect more soft-spoken girly/feminine female leads for the rest of the anime now. Also notice how the girls generally don't really battle much anymore either (Serena and Lillie), so I wonder if that was a change from Iris being the last battle oriented female character.

 

[Hidden Mew]

That's the whole point, though - it's SUPPOSED to be hypocritical because of course she's a kid, too. I always thought it was such a ridiculous reason to hate her.

It was pretty annoying for her to keep calling Ash a kid when she would be rarely called out on her hypocritical behavior. It wasn't the worst thing about Iris and I don't think that there were a lot of people who hated her simply for her catchphrase, but it was pretty irritating.

The thing is Iris felt like a break after two girly coordinators in a row, but now seemingly as the writers went back to girly female leads with Serena and now technically Lillie afterward, Iris feels like the odd one out of trying to make another Misty-type character. I think the writers were pretty much scared away from ever doing that type of character again now, so expect more soft-spoken girly/feminine female leads for the rest of the anime now. Also notice how the girls generally don't really battle much anymore either (Serena and Lillie), so I wonder if that was a change from Iris being the last battle oriented female character.

Calling Iris the last battle oriented female lead is be a bit of an exaggeration. Despite how her goal would benefit from battling, she didn't really take much part in battling. Even though May and Dawn were into Contests, they battled a lot more frequently than Iris ever did. It also seems a bit much to say that the writer were scared away from doing that type of character again or that we're only to have soft spoken/feminine female leads for the rest of the anime. Serena's goal didn't really involve battling, so there wasn't any reason to make her a battler. Lillie doesn't have much of a goal after she overcame her fear of touching Pokemon and SM is not a particularly battle heavy series to begin with. What personality traits future female leads have and whether or not they'll be into battling depends entirely on who they include from the games, what storylines from the games they can adapt for the anime and what other goals they can feature in the anime. I don't think that Iris was particularly popular in Japan, but I don't think that she was so poorly received that the writers don't want to do another female battler again.

 

[Pulsaro23]

Lillie doesn't have much of a goal after she overcame her fear of touching Pokemon and SM is not a particularly battle heavy series to begin with.

Wasn't it established early on in the series that Lillie's goal is to become a good Pokémon Trainer?

Just asking out of curiosity, since I'm not actually sure whether that it was actually established in the series or I made it up in order to substitute for the writers' lack of proper development.

 

[yab]

I'm pretty sure Iris actually has more on-screen battles than Misty strictly comparing the OS to BW. I'm not sure if people count Psyduck popping out of its ball to get a headache as a traditional battle, and not counting stuff like Team Rocket blast-offs, I do believe Iris has more. For the bulk of Kanto and large stretches of Johto we never really saw Misty battle much.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

Speaking of Psyduck, the anime reviewer Suede has made a fair point in his reviews of OS episodes, regarding Psyduck's status as a joke Pokémon: "It's a cheap, easy-to-write gag for the writers to use when they run out of ideas, and provides easy access to certain plot points."

Misty was constantly flip-flopping over her opinion regarding Psyduck: one minute, she hates it with a burning passion, and the next, when she's offered an opportunity to get rid of it, she suddenly insists on keeping it. And what exactly was preventing her from recalling it every single time it popped out in the middle of a battle? Exactly what Suede said: "it's a cheap, easy-to-write gag when the writers run out of ideas". In other words, it was often used to cover up the writers' inability to come up with any better jokes, keeping this unhealthy, toxic relationship around just for the sake of the existence of this gag.

And then there was the episode where everyone believed that Psyduck evolved. But nope. Instead of developing Misty and Psyduck's character and/or really making Psyduck evolve, this episode does not provide any kind of growth for Misty or Psyduck, and their toxic relationship would keep going on unchanged until Sun & Moon, where it was finally shown to have gotten somewhere.

The point is: I've always disliked the Psyduck popping out gag, and I'm kinda happy that it's no longer a thing. Not at least in the same scale as before.

 

[yab]

Psyduck was very funny but it did stop appearing in Johto for the most part outside a few episodes. Keep in mind the OS was based more on humor than battles, the writers obviously never cared about showcasing Misty (or Brock) as battlers in the OS. Ever since Misty returned to the Gym she's come back stronger each time, but while she was on the cast she generally did so little with battles or pokemon outside the few eps that focused on her. It's also kind of worse in Brock's case in that he battled even less than Misty in the OS, if that's even possible.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Wasn't it established early on in the series that Lillie's goal is to become a good Pokémon Trainer?

Just asking out of curiosity, since I'm not actually sure whether that it was actually established in the series or I made it up in order to substitute for the writers' lack of proper development.

I don't recall that being mentioned before. Lillie mentioned during the episode where she got her Z-Crystal that she didn't really know what she wanted to do and her focus earlier in the series primarily revolved around overcome her fear of touching Pokemon. If she did mention that she wanted to be a good Pokemon trainer, then it was probably mentioned once and never really touched upon again.

Speaking of Psyduck, the anime reviewer Suede has made a fair point in his reviews of OS episodes, regarding Psyduck's status as a joke Pokémon: "It's a cheap, easy-to-write gag for the writers to use when they run out of ideas, and provides easy access to certain plot points."

Misty was constantly flip-flopping over her opinion regarding Psyduck: one minute, she hates it with a burning passion, and the next, when she's offered an opportunity to get rid of it, she suddenly insists on keeping it. And what exactly was preventing her from recalling it every single time it popped out in the middle of a battle? Exactly what Suede said: "it's a cheap, easy-to-write gag when the writers run out of ideas". In other words, it was often used to cover up the writers' inability to come up with any better jokes, keeping this unhealthy, toxic relationship around just for the sake of the existence of this gag.

And then there was the episode where everyone believed that Psyduck evolved. But nope. Instead of developing Misty and Psyduck's character and/or really making Psyduck evolve, this episode does not provide any kind of growth for Misty or Psyduck, and their toxic relationship would keep going on unchanged until Sun & Moon, where it was finally shown to have gotten somewhere.

The point is: I've always disliked the Psyduck popping out gag, and I'm kinda happy that it's no longer a thing. Not at least in the same scale as before.

Toxic might be a bit of a stronger way of putting it, but Misty was quite harsh on Psyduck before and it was played for comedic relief. I can definitely see why people would read it as being toxic, especially when Misty rarely did anything to actually help train Psyduck and would just complain about it. Plus, I would have loved to see Misty get a Golduck. She didn't have a lot of strong battling Pokemon and that would have been a nice boost to her team, as well as giving some improvements to her relationship with Psyduck. While it is still kind of disappointing that she still hasn't trained Psyduck well enough to use its Psychic powers without relying on its headache getting stronger, at least she was happier with Psyduck than she was in the original series, so that counts for something.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

Wasn't it established early on in the series that Lillie's goal is to become a good Pokémon Trainer?

Just asking out of curiosity, since I'm not actually sure whether that it was actually established in the series or I made it up in order to substitute for the writers' lack of proper development.

I don't recall that being mentioned before. Lillie mentioned during the episode where she got her Z-Crystal that she didn't really know what she wanted to do and her focus earlier in the series primarily revolved around overcome her fear of touching Pokemon. If she did mention that she wanted to be a good Pokemon trainer, then it was probably mentioned once and never really touched upon again.

Yeah. Lillie previously stated that she doesn't really have a goal at this time. But I think with her now having a Z-Ring and likely participating in the Alola League, that her goal will likely be to become a better Trainer.