Controversial opinions

[Lightning Flame Blast]

I wonder if he had a near-death experience and if he did I wonder what he saw... What are Pika's religious beliefs?

By that point he’d seen Mew, who’s basically poke Jesus, at least twice, so... probably something related to it.

 

[FelipePR]

Is Regidrago inspired by a charizard or not?

Spoiler: Yes

Spoiler: No

Spoiler: Of course!

 

[Daren]

You know, now that I think of it one would think we would talk more about that time Pikachu fucking flatlined.

I've seen a surprisingly small number of people comment on that. It certainly shocked me when I saw it.
But honesty other than that I found the episode was really just an inferior and unmemorable repeat of the Surge episode. The big issue for me is that at that point Pikachu had battled and defeated numerous evolved and powerful Pokémon and trying to make a Raichu a huge deal felt forced.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

Man, I've been away from this thread for way too many weeks. I don't know what all I've missed, so let's see what I can come up with...

Some Pokémon Adventures fans keep saying that the current anime should be replaced with an anime adaptation of Adventures, or at least that an adaptation should exist be running alongside the main series. I, meanwhile, think that a Generations-style series of shorts would be the best solution. It would give the manga a much needed popularity boost and introduce more Pokémon fans to the things it holds.

 

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

So can we all collectively agree that giving Goh all 3 Galar Starters was just a bad idea entirely?

I know this is kind of an old post already, but I do kinda agree with it to a certain extent. I personally don't have a problem with the idea of someone other than Ash catching all the current Generation's starters, since it's a relatively fresh take. That being said, it's been handled badly enough in Journeys specifically that I'd be willing to relent that it might have been much better if the Galar starters had just been distributed between the main characters. Ash getting Grookey, Chloe getting Sobble, and Goh keeping Scorbunny is the distribution I think would have worked best when taking each character's personalities and development into account. Distributing all three Galar starters between the main cast would have not only made their evolutionary developments at least theoretically more believable (especially in the case of Drizzile evolving into Inteleon, since it faded into the background during the middle stage, so as far as we can tell it hasn't done anything besides sulking and feeling sorry for itself all this time, making its evolution into Inteleon seem quite unearned. I mean, at least as a Sobble it got onscreen development and was seen training), but it might have also been much easier to juggle for the writers. To elaborate more on Sobble's and Grookey's cases: Sobble being Chloe's Pokemon would mean that it'd get to have an active role every time she appeared (granted, Sobble would almost certainly have to take Eevee's spot as Chloe's "true starter" Pokemon in order for this to work, but tbh I don't think that'd be too much of a loss, since I feel girl MCs having Eevees is way overdone at this point), and its evolutionary path of starting off as timid and insecure and eventually growing into a determined and confident spy feels like it could work very neatly as a parallel for Chloe's own character arc as well. Grookey meanwhile could have played a similar role to Riolu in that it'd start out as an inexperienced Pokemon on whom Ash needs to focus training, thereby allowing him to have a larger number of fledglings on his team to keep his "power level" a bit in check, and could have also played a neat foil to Riolu in that while the Anubis pupper is extremely focused on getting stronger, Grookey is more carefree and would thus require more effort to train in that regard.

Sorry for the ramble, but I do love to make speculative "what if"s of this kind XD

 

[Reborn Talonflame]

Cause I’m bored again, I’d figure I’d do a ranking of all of Ash’s Pokemon.
(I won’t be ranking Butterfree, Kingler, Pidgeot, Primeape and Lapras, only because I don’t have that great of a memory for them, and think it’s unruly for me to judge something I barely saw - I wasn’t even born whilst the Johto series was playing here in England. I saw re-runs of the series eventually, but these Pokemon rarely appeared for little me to recall anything about them. However, I will rank Journey’s, as I think it’s cool to give opinions on how the squad is comparing to the previous generations)
This was hard to rank, so please give your thoughts to improve my knowledge.

Spoiler

48) Boldore - Did this thing even have a personality? It was literally a rock. Had one moment, then completely faded away, being beaten every time after Clay, and didn’t even have a few cute moments with the rest of the squad. Expect a lot of Unova Pokemon down here.
47) Unfezaunt - Weak like Boldore, but had at least the bare minimum of having a few cute moments as a Pidove, but really didn’t have a personality, either.
46) Palpitoad - Had a little bit of interaction, but again, barely a personality, and only stands above the previous two on the merit it at least didn’t get folded every time in battle…for the most part.
45) Totodile - Nothing wrong with this thing, just didn’t do much. Wasn’t really funny, but wasn’t really annoying. Wasn’t strong, but wasn’t weak. Had some fun moments, I guess.
44) Noctowl - Didn’t stick out like Totodile, and really, I only remember this thing doing two things, one of which came several years later in the Sinnoh League.
43) Donphan - Battle Frontier made me realise Ash has a Phanphy, and well, despite making it evolve, it still didn’t really do that much. Had its moments, but I don’t remember a solid noticeable personality.
42) Leavanny - Never understood why this thing was around. Snivy was always going to be ahead of it, and confusingly got mixed up with Burgh’s story to the point where after the gym-battle, I think it only had one non-battle appearance. Hard to form a solid personality from just that.
41) Tauros - I think this thing is either battle-time, or run Ash over-time. Was shown to be capable; fairly average overall
40) Muk - Has a likeable personality, and a fun gimmick in battle, but was underused.
39) Scraggy - Wasted potential. So much time was dedicated, from being hatched after the second gym, to being reduced to a two-second appearance at the Unova League, having an outstanding one appearance in gym-battles. Was fairly annoying too with its head butting.
38) Glalie - Better as a Snorunt personality-wise, but pretty underrated in battle. This thing beat a Charizard, tied with Tyson’s Sceptile, only drew with Katie’s Misdrevus thanks to Destiny Bond, and KO’d Morrison’s signature Metang, all in the same league. Was underused, and caught pretty late, so was never going to be memorable.
37) Oshawott - Annoying, and pretty inconsistent. It had stupid gimmicks, like deflecting a Solarbeam, or being afraid of opening it’s eyes underwater.
36) Torkoal - I never understood the hate for Torkoal. I thought it was funny at times, maybe overplaying its crying, and it was still weak in some regards, but fine enough.
35) Dracovish - So far, serviceable. Not really funny, and hasn’t had enough moments, but still has a charm more than the ones above.

The lot from 34-to-25 are all pretty average, so it’s hard to separate them. You could really argue that any of these could be re-arranged.


34) Gengar - Just underused. Is funny, and looks to be pretty fun to watch battling, just hasn’t been built upon.
33) Talonflame - Weakest link of the Kalos squad, but perfectly fine. Can’t recall much of it interacting, but was pretty strong.
32) Corphish - I like the Hoenn team, and I think Corphish is a good reason. This thing was always bumping heads, or at least interacting a lot with the others, giving it a fun personality. It was alright in battle.
31) Lucario - Has had some glimpses of cohesion with Cinderace for a personality that isn’t too stuck-up, and that’s about it.
30) Staraptor - Similar to Talonflame, but had that Pokeringer tournament to give it more of an emotional attachment to it.
29) Snivy - Had potential, and was reduced to being the one that got sacrificed for the stronger Pokemon introduction (Lucario, Excadrill, etc.), but was pretty awesome to watch. Just didn’t have anything noticeable to stand out, aside from a connection to Pignite that never went anywhere in hindsight.
28) Noivern - Nice moments at times, but it was really only with Hawlucha. Despite having a poor record, it was fun to watch, but I think it could have done with more development, or at least an earlier capture to strengthen it a bit more. Probably should be lower, around Talonflame.
27) Pignite - Not really special, just provided the funny bits from Unova when it was needed. Was decent in battle. Unoriginal story, as well as rushed, gives it minus points.
26) Nagandel - Enjoyable as Poipole, giving me a smile whenever it’s on screen with its colouring, and was nice to see it come back.
25) Quilava - Had it’s moments, just kind of sub-par to the rest. I remember it early on, just not so much later on in the Johto series…wonder why.

The rest of the list are the Pokemon that I consider to be above average. 24-to-15 are in a similar boat where they could be argued to be rearranged, it’s just down to the smallest of preferences.

24) Goodra - Was overrated. Kind of a boring story, which never really got me emotional because Ash barely had the thing, as well as it’s really rushed evolutions. After that, it’s was really only ever going to be lacking in terms of screen time and memorability. Only thing that saves it from being average was that it’s story at least gave it something, and was cute at times with it playing with the rest of the squad, with decent battles.
23) Sirfetch’d - I like this thing. I’ve found it hilarious, and it has a nice style, just kind of repetitive at times.
22) Melmetal - Kind of forced, and was never really explained, but was enjoyable with Rowlet.
21) Bayleef - Likeable, and decent in battle.
20) Herracross - Always a blast to watch, whether that’s fighting or not. Just serviceable enough to put it higher than average.
19) Swellow - Hot-take, but this thing was underrated. Performed well against pretty much everyone after it evolved, providing at least one KO, and had some attachment from its dedication to train and master Aerial Ace, as well as the Pokeringer competition.
18) Gible - Provided some much needed comedy back into the squad after the teams were starting to evolve away from their pre-evolved forms, whilst still being strong.
17) Gliscor - Wish it was used more in battles, but was pretty good in them, and had its comedy as a Gligar.
16) Torterra - Strong early on, having a unique story, albeit it never led anywhere, and a nice cohesion with literally everyone in D&P. Unfortunately, got screwed. It’s early form carries it above the others.
15) Dragonite - Beast and adorable. This is just my first impressions, and this thing probably won’t do much else, but has been good so far.
14) Snorlax - Just a powerhouse, and always had some random fighting spirit that shocked others. I like Buizel and Hawlucha more, only because Snorlax was kind of repetitive, and often it’s battling-style was one-note. Buizel, for example, has a variety of tools to keep it interesting. It never really interacted all that much either, it’s just it’s power that keeps it so high.
13) Rowlet - The best comedic-relief of the entire series. I don’t think I didn’t laugh once when Rowlet was on-screen. It had solid chemistry with the Pokemon, and even the rest of the classmates, expressive reactions, and genuinely I loved this thing. There’s a scene where Rowlet’s asleep, and Kiawe literally just throws it out the window to make it help, and all you see is Rowlet’s face as it plummets to the ground. However, when they decided to give it a “rival”, it lost points. Still, a blast to watch.
12) Krookidile - Saving grace of the Unova team. Was strong, and pretty funny with the Pikachu rivalry. Unfortunately, it was slightly underused, and should have been caught earlier on instead of Roggenrola/Sewaddle.
11) Hawlucha - Like Buizel, but had less versatility, making it a bit less enjoyable.
10) Buizel - Excellent comparison with Dawn and Ash, giving a distinct edge in terms of personality of its determination and desire to fight, whilst having a side of Ash’s team and Dawn’s team. It’s battling was fun too, having Ice Aqua Jet, Water Pusle + Aqua Jet, it’s Floater, etc.
9) Squirtle - Connected the Kanto and Johto teams with its comedy, whilst being solid in battle.
8) Sceptile - Just cool. All that’s needed to be said. Alright, was kind of boring to begin with, but shaped up nicely later on with quick, intense fights.
7) Lycanroc - Typical Pokemon trying to overcome its rival, but I felt as though Lycanroc actually was a close family-pet to Ash, with it having a style that pushed Ash’s relation further with it, to truly understand it’s feelings.
6) Incineroar - Like Lycanroc, but even better with its backstory, and overall, just consistently getting more developed upon in its rivalry.
5) Bulbasaur - Cemented with Squirtle, this comedy was gold. Plus, Bulbasaur literally is the Headmaster of the team, so this thing has always had great moments with everything.
4) Greninja - Reflected Ash, which only three others have managed to do as well, and is only let down by having less of a personality than the top three, since it really developed a “Shonen” type beat to it after it became Greninja, hardly ever interacting with the other parts of the Kalos squad.
3) Pikachu - What’s there to say. Although inconsistent, the bond between Ash and Pikachu has always been strong, and this thing has always been a leader. It’s just nice to watch Pikachu take charge and let the writing flow. As well as that, Pikachu has had some pretty versatile battling, making great spectacles.
2) Charizard - First to show off Ash’s ride-or-die with his Pokemon, and really pushed his skills to become better, as well as his ideology of letting his Pokemon enjoy themselves/be happy (letting Charizard go to get stronger), all coming together to show their strength.
1) Infernape - Best arc, built through establishing Ash with its determination to prove Paul wrong, it reflected Ash more than anyone else. And of course, what a battler.

 

[Alola]

I already said this in the Sakuragi Lab episode but thanks to Journeys I've begun to see that I've taken long drawn out evolutions for granted.

I remember complaining oh so much about how LONG it took Popplio and Torracat to finally Evolve

And while I still have my complaints about their Evolutions were handled they were still handled better than whatever the hell Journeys did with the Scorbunny line and is now doing with the Sobble line

I mean, why not both? Unnecessarily long evolutions and ridiculously quick evolutions are both bad. I don't think one should accept one extreme in favor of the other. How about the writers learn to decently pace all level-based evolutions?

 

[Rainbow-Rain]

I mean, why not both? Unnecessarily long evolutions and ridiculously quick evolutions are both bad. I don't think one should accept one extreme in favor of the other. How about the writers learn to decently pace all level-based evolutions?

Well with Torracat. The problem doesn't lie within the evolution itself (that was actually handled quite well)
But the fact that it came at the tail end of the series ultimately renders it pointless since we never got to see it do anything after it's evolution.
Unless it does something in Journeys which I doubt

 

[Unireon]

Well with Torracat. The problem doesn't lie within the evolution itself (that was actually handled quite well)
But the fact that it came at the tail end of the series ultimately renders it pointless since we never got to see it do anything after it's evolution.
Unless it does something in Journeys which I doubt

If only it didn't evolve and saved that for the next series.....

That was what I thought at that moment, but now it would be a bad move.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Well with Torracat. The problem doesn't lie within the evolution itself (that was actually handled quite well)
But the fact that it came at the tail end of the series ultimately renders it pointless since we never got to see it do anything after it's evolution.
Unless it does something in Journeys which I doubt

I wouldn't say that makes the evolution ultimately pointless though. It's disappointing that we didn't get to see Ash battle with his newly evolved Incineroar, but it doesn't make the evolution pointless or meaningless. Torracat evolving after defeating Professor Kukui's Incineroar was the most fitting way for it to evolve and there wouldn't really be any way for that to happen before their battle after the Alola League.

 

[Enzo]

I wouldn't say that makes the evolution ultimately pointless though. It's disappointing that we didn't get to see Ash battle with his newly evolved Incineroar, but it doesn't make the evolution pointless or meaningless. Torracat evolving after defeating Professor Kukui's Incineroar was the most fitting way for it to evolve and there wouldn't really be any way for that to happen before their battle after the Alola League.

I definitely agree with you with it not being pointless: it was done very well to close Litten's/Torracat's arc.

But I stil wished it hadn't taken that long tho. We never got to see Incineroar do anything afterwards, and this unfortunately extented over to JN as well. Not to say it's impossible for it to do anything in JN or any future series, but, idk... I don't think it's gonna have the same impact in a way, u know?

 

[cricketlaxwolvesbandy]

This kinda goes in the general thread, but I've never been a fan of the Z move mechanic.
Also I don't care about animation unless you can clearly tell that it has the quality of something that a first grader made.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I definitely agree with you with it not being pointless: it was done very well to close Litten's/Torracat's arc.

But I stil wished it hadn't taken that long tho. We never got to see Incineroar do anything afterwards, and this unfortunately extented over to JN as well. Not to say it's impossible for it to do anything in JN or any future series, but, idk... I don't think it's gonna have the same impact in a way, u know?

Yeah, I can understand that. They were kind of in a tight spot since there wasn't really a good/fitting way for Torracat to evolve prior to that battle, but that also meant that Incineroar wouldn't have much screentime. Even if it didn't faint after evolving, I don't think that Incineroar could have had more than one or two battles at best when there were only a couple of episodes left. It still would have been more ideal for it to be used during the last stretch of SM than in future series, but I don't think they had a lot of options, so I don't think it bothered me as much as it did for other fans.

 

[Eitarou]

Torracat evolving is a visual metaphor for its character arc concluding.

When one defeats a champion wrestler, they take that wrestler''s belt. By defeating Incineroar, Torracat "took" its belt, hence it evolving.

As much as it'd be nice to see Ash's Incineroar battle, I feel people keep ignoring why it happened and label it "pointless" because of that.

 

[RetroPokeFan]

PWC talk on Serebii about Surge (who probabrly isn't going to be seen again anyway) has led me wondering this: I personally don't think we need another Pikachu/Raichu battle... at all... ever... not in a million trillion years... not even when the cows come home...

I mean, think about it?
What would another Pikachu vs Raichu battle bring that's new? They've basically scratched every surface they could possibly find to the point that said surfaces are now squeaky clean (with Cilit Bang, bang and the dirt is gone) when it comes to Pikachu/Raichu battles and there's really not much they could bring to the table other than it just being another battle just for the sake of nostalgia.

It'd be just like every other one they've had and personally while it was impressive the first time around, it stops being impressive when the writers keep fishing out the same old boot over and over and over again (and personally, it got old the minute D&P chose to just do a full on rehash of that very episode). Give Pikachu new Pokemon to face than constantly shoving him into forced rivals with the other evolution I also like, it's the anime's equivalent of a broken record or merry go round.

I was honestly kinda happy that Ash let Pikachu get some rest and switched him out in Visquez's battle because it helped changed things up a bit.

Also excuse me for going into Pikachu fan talk here but can't we have an episode with a Raichu that's friendly to Pikachu? I know there's Goh's but those two have barely interacted much at all.

 

[Jewel the Quaxly]

Also excuse me for going into Pikachu fan talk here but can't we have an episode with a Raichu that's friendly to Pikachu?

Maybe we could have an episode about Pikachu's long lost mother Raichu meeting Kangaskhan.

 

[PkmnTrainerV]

Maybe we could have an episode about Pikachu's long lost mother Raichu meeting Kangaskhan.

Watch it turn out to be a "bad" raichu, and Pikachu doesn’t want to evolve because it doesn’t want to become like it’s mother.

 

[Enzo]

I'm not the first person to talk about it, but the fact the writers think Pikachu needs to keep proving itself as better than all Raichus and that they need to be either straight up evil or dumb babies so Pikachu looks better in return are both bad ideas.

It's like,,,, they need to constantly hammer in this idea that Pikachu won't evolve by Raichu's expense and that honestly sucks.

 

[Lightning Flame Blast]

I'm not the first person to talk about it, but the fact the writers think Pikachu needs to keep proving itself as better than all Raichus and that they need to be either straight up evil or dumb babies so Pikachu looks better in return are both bad ideas.

It's like,,,, they need to constantly hammer in this idea that Pikachu won't evolve by Raichu's expense and that honestly sucks.

Since Pikachu’s personality is wonky already, I wouldn’t mind a focus episode where he’s being a brat and Goh’s Raichu plays the straight (wo)man and slaps some sense into him.

 

[Enzo]

Since Pikachu’s personality is wonky already, I wouldn’t mind a focus episode where he’s being a brat and Goh’s Raichu plays the straight (wo)man and slaps some sense into him.

The only reason I can't see this ever happening in canon would be because it would imply a Raichu is ''superior'' and ''better'' than him in some sense and/or degree, so they definitely would nope their way out of a scenario like that.