Review EP134: The Valley of Lizardon! Until We Meet Again!!

[Gabo2oo]

EP134 - Bulbapedia, the community-driven Pokémon encyclopedia
This is the 6th episode of Pocket Monsters Anime Premier 10.

It was chosen by Shōko Nakagawa, err... y'know, Shokotan. She does... lots of stuff? Recurring actress for the movies, singer of three endings in the anime. She's currently a host on Pokénchi and voiced Nurse Joy in M20.
(She's been prominently featured as a huge Pokémon fan but I'm honestly never been sure if the actual fandom likes her or hates her.)

Animation: Team Ota
Screenplay: Takeshi Shudō
Storyboard: Yūji Asada
Assistant director: Yūji Asada
Animation director: Akihiro Tamagawa


Come to think of it, it would've been weird if this episode wasn't chosen for Premier 10. I'm pretty sure Charizard has always been Ash's most popular Pokémon, and his release was one the most memorable things to happen in the anime.

This episode is really good in my opinion. It is written by Shudo, after all. Also, some say Charizard's release was a necessity because... well, that's even explained in-universe: he's just too powerful for Ash. I like the notion that, despite Ash's Charizard being powerful in its own, that's still weak compared to other Charizard. I also like how they didn't shove in some subtle romantic sub-plot with Charla, she was just there as Liza's companion and another worthy opponent for Charizard. Of course they had to "fix" that in a later episode but oh well.

Ash says something like "who would want a weak Charizard anyway" in the episode. Does that happen in the Japanese version too? I find it interesting because it sounds jerkishly out-of-character, but you can tell he's just saying that to convince himself and Charizard that leaving him there is for the best.

Shotouts to Team Rocket in this episode, by the way. I love it when they relate with the twerps and secretly help them.

Also, for having so few action-packed scenes, this episode has a pretty good animation. It is done by Tamagawa, after all. On a semi-related note, the shot where Ash points at the valley while leaving Charizard appeared in BW and now will be featured in SM too. Now typical me would post a comparison picture here but... let's just say I kinda broke my computer so I can't right now.

 

[kantoskies]

It's pretty minor but can I just say how hilariously awful the female Lizardon's design is in this episode. I don't believe Lizardon have gender differences (and this episode was made before those were even a thing in the games, correct?) so they just....slapped a bow on its head and gave it eyelashes and called it a day. Thank god they didn't try to give it dragon boobs or anything.

And how convenient that the group finds this Lizardon valley thing right as they're talking about how strong Satoshi's is!

Speaking of that BW flashback...

Spoiler

Liza looked horrible in the Best Wishes style.

I don't think she's in the SM flashback though. And in the Sun&Moon flashbacks it looks like they're redoing some scene layouts to show Takeshi and Kasumi during the "iconic" moments, instead of how the BW flashbacks handled it where they more or less tried re-creating the old scenes faithfully. So when recreating this scene:

Best Wishes redid it pretty faithfully:

But in Sun&Moon the camera is zoomed out like this:

Which is fine, it's a bit more interesting in my opinion so we get a slightly different view of an older scene. That being said, if they wanted an iconic shot with the whole gang in it why didn't they just use this scene?

Which, imo, is more interesting to look at than the one that they chose.

 

[Gabo2oo]

I don't believe Lizardon have gender differences (and this episode was made before those were even a thing in the games, correct?) so they just....slapped a bow on its head and gave it eyelashes and called it a day.

Correct, gender differences were introduced in the Sinnoh games, with some older Pokémon receiving variants, but Charizard was not one of them.

As a parallel to this Charizard's bow, female Wobbuffet were given lipstick in the games, but I think that's pretty funny considering the cartoonish design of the Pokémon.

Best Wishes redid it pretty faithfully:

That shot pisses me off because it's iconic, pretty nicely drawn, and would be perfect... if someone hadn't screwed the colors for his left sleeve. That shot was used in promotional material quite a lot before the episode actually aired, but seems like they still missed it. On top of that, they never corrected it for subsequent airings, despite other errors in the episode did get fixed. Ugh...

That being said, if they wanted an iconic shot with the whole gang in it why didn't they just use this scene?

Maybe because it's a bit more ambiguous without context for the new viewers. Ash pointing makes it pretty clear he's ordering Charizard to leave, while you can't really tell what's going on with this shot alone, other than they're running away from him and are apparently saddened.

Thanks for posting the three versions, by the way.