Review JN040: VS Thunder! A Legendary Raid Battle!!

[Eclipsical]

It seems like Goh still isn’t deterred from trying again since he says “Guess I gotta give up for today.”

 

[Lightning Flame Blast]

All I could think during the airbone segment was “where the hell is DRAGONITE?”

 

[Kurolegacy]

View: https://twitter.com/ilapaperx/status/1314609491393024003?s=21


We have been bamboozled.

Who is this we?

Okay, this was a pretty cool and fun episode. I enjoyed seeing Ash, Goh, and Team Rocket team up to take on Zapdos. I also liked that Raboot finally learned a new move, though I personally would have preferred if he learned something that wasn't another Fire-type move. Zen Headbutt would have been cool. Oh well, the anime does seem to prefer flashiness over coverage anyway.

Seems like it’s more development building towards Pyro Ball given how Ember is it lighting a rock on fire with its kick and now it’s gained a powerful flaming kick. Now it’s just a matter of bringing both together.

 

[Twilight-Kun]

Well, that was a bit of a letdown, given the series' track record with previous raid battles

We have been bamboozled.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgtv8PWdeIQ

 

[Paulisthebest]

I would have laughed so hard if Gou had managed to get a Thunder with a regular, 100 yen Monster Ball

Agreed considering Tobias had a Darkrai AND Latios on his team in normal Poke Balls lol

 

[Gengarzilla]

Agreed considering Tobias had a Darkrai AND Latios on his team in normal Poke Balls lol

To be fair, this was before the anime suddenly remembered that other Poké Ball versions existed. Everyone had everything in normal Poké Balls back then. I think Ash's Totodile's Lure Ball was the only variant we ever saw in DP.

 

[DarkraiKnight]

To be fair, this was before the anime suddenly remembered that other Poké Ball versions existed. Everyone had everything in normal Poké Balls back then. I think Ash's Totodile's Lure Ball was the only variant we ever saw in DP.

Wish they remembered that NOW. It’d make Goh’s quest at least 3x more interesting if he used different types of balls depending on the situation.

 

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

Wish they remembered that NOW. It’d make Goh’s quest at least 3x more interesting if he used different types of balls depending on the situation.

Honestly this is probably the thing I find strangest about Goh's arc. One would think that his goal would be the perfect opportunity to showcase all the different types of Pokeballs and how they work but nope, 99% of the time he just uses the standard red and white one. Heck, his instantly successful captures would make a lot more sense if the variant of Pokeball he always threw first was a Quick Ball, since those work best when used at the beginning of a wild encounter.

 

[Eclipsical]

I never liked how the anime always favors the normal Poké Ball when there are so many more interesting ones. I know the normal one is the most recognizable, but still, shake it up a little sometimes. I would love for more Pokémon to have unique Poké Balls.

 

[Beary]

I didn’t read any forums because i didn’t want to get spoiled. My god why this episode was my favorite goh episode. First of all he wasn’t handed zapdos on a silver platter and he worked to try catch it. Second he failed(breathed a sigh of relief). Third he actually learned that catching legendaries are disturbing the balance of nature, and fourth is that THE WRITERS actually had brains and showed goh not mentally capable to own a legendary pokemon also while keeping legendaries to a top tier pokemon and reinstating how powerful they are. Only thing i didn’t like was how sidelined ash was but oh well

 

[PkmnTrainerV]

2. This is hardly the first time when a Pokemon shrugs off a lot of hits and suddenly one move makes a difference (Sceptile vs. Darkrai, anyone?

Sceptile is much x100 more experienced than Raboot.

3. If anything, Raboot is the one getting preferential treatment. Go looked very surprised.

It is kind of a valid point but not that different in essence. The only person benefitting is obviously Gou if Raboot gets preferred. That’s like saying “Pikachu is the one getting preferred” when Ash wins the PWC by one shotting everything with Pikachu.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

To be fair, this was before the anime suddenly remembered that other Poké Ball versions existed. Everyone had everything in normal Poké Balls back then. I think Ash's Totodile's Lure Ball was the only variant we ever saw in DP.

I never liked how the anime always favors the normal Poké Ball when there are so many more interesting ones. I know the normal one is the most recognizable, but still, shake it up a little sometimes. I would love for more Pokémon to have unique Poké Balls.

For the first two generations, they did it because the game didn't keep track of which kind of Poké Ball was used to catch each Pokémon. But after that, yeah, no excuse, really good. I seriously hope Goh will at least start using Great Balls and Ultra Balls at some point.

 

[nickdt]

I never liked how the anime always favors the normal Poké Ball when there are so many more interesting ones. I know the normal one is the most recognizable, but still, shake it up a little sometimes. I would love for more Pokémon to have unique Poké Balls.

Yeah, when that Dewgong didn't get caught in regular Pokeballs, Goh should have taken a Dive Ball with his last Pokeball.

 

[Rockapheller]

I enjoyed this episode a lot. It is not my favorite of the series, but is among the favorite ones so far. The build-up for the battle was quite well handled with first hints being given about a legendary Pokémon, then the protagonists chasing it with failed attempts initially, and finally facing it. The inclusion of Team Rocket in the plot, battle itself having phases with the four of them being side-by-side, then Goh taking over the rest. I loved how the writers built-up the hype on Goh whether catching the Zapdos or not. I also like how Goh made his two Pokémon team up and work alongside each other instead of having a generic 1v1 battle against Zapdos, where two Pokémon just keep attacking each other. Flygon and Raboot worked well together tbh.

ETA: The ultimate reference was James's Stunfisk firing the weak Water Gun on Zapdos.

Told you all, legendary played an important role for eco-system.

I don't think that was any implication, though. Accoding to this episode, Zapdos creates thunderclouds around itself, but it doesn't mean Zapdos is the reason there are thunderclouds on Earth, nor is ever specified that Zapdos plays a major role for the ecosystem.

 

[PkmnTrainerV]

they did it because the game didn't keep track of which kind of Poké Ball was used to catch each Pokémon

That restriction on the anime makes no sense... By that logic OS wouldn’t be spamming more than 4 moves on Pokémon like Drake's dragonite. Is there some source for this claim?

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

That restriction on the anime makes no sense... By that logic OS wouldn’t be spamming more than 4 moves on Pokémon like Drake's dragonite. Is there some source for this claim?

No. It's just a theory. An educated guess. I'm just as eager to see Poké Ball variants in the anime as anyone else, though, and I was kinda happy to see Gladion use different kinds of variants for each of his Pokémon.

 

[Johtohfiller]

The theme song kicking in was a real "oh great this is about to suck" moment. I'm very glad that was a fakeout. I like how it ended but I'm disappointed with Team Rocket getting knocked out early (didn't even get to see how Ash beat them ). I wish they'd stuck with the raid battle premise or at least had Ash team up with Go for the battle on the roof. Good episode but it could have been better.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

Is it okay to say that a curious little part of me would have liked to see the capture actually succeeding?

Also, I don't see this failure necessarily as a sign that Goh will never catch a Legendary or a Mythical. Just that he's not ready for something like that yet.

 

[Panky..]

@JeoDude worded it spot on in an earlier post. On a surface level, this episode may seem like an okay one but after re-watching while paying attention to the details within, it starts to show all manner of faults and inconsistencies. And don't worry, I didn't do an overkill like Pulsaro did recently.


Pros:

• ++ The pros only stood out in small sprinkles every now and then during the episode, they were easily overshadowed by the cons, but I’ll go over them nonetheless. Goh’s analytical nature regarding a subsequent legendary’s appearance was given some highlight, something that last happened back in JN002 before the Lugia raid, and then the research angle was given some more focus as well with some info dumping about Zapdos’ characteristics and habits. That was some nice deduction of the “chicken and egg” theory with Zapdos and the significance of the thunderclouds that come with it. I’m glad that Zapdos wasn’t caught and especially not by Goh (which would have been a waste of a Pokemon like dozens of others, and because a main character shouldn’t ever have a legendary, especially not Goh who’s nowhere close to deserving one). It wasn’t outright stated that Zapdos was vital to a localized ecosystem, but the actions on-screen said a lot more with that little energy sharing segment. Raboot learning Blaze Kick near the end did come out of nowhere but it was decent as well, I guess, though I did expect it to happen in JN037 or JN038.
• + The usage of the various soundtrack pieces were done and timed much better in this episode, even if we’ve heard the same tracks recycled several times in this series. I have a feeling it’s something to do with the upcoming official OST release. I really wished they used this theme from LGPE for Zapdos, it would have actually sounded better for a Gen 1 Legendary battle. TRio and their role in the episode was also interesting (at least before things went bad), the Pokemon they had were also funny and reminded of some scenarios from the past (Jessie's rental Charizard using Dig, Lotad’s ‘Water Gun’ etc.). And Koharu getting some exposure is always welcome, it’s a shame that it was so brief, more so when you realize that we won’t be seeing her for the next month or so.

Cons:

• - - Terrible. World. Building. Remember the mystery and adventure of getting to the abandoned power plant in the games and encountering one of a kind legendary? None of that feeling is present here, the power plant is localized to Vermilion for some reason (and yet another episode taking place in the city, so much for a world tour). Fine whatever, but somehow no one else caught onto this and decided to investigate? Not even people from the Vermillion Gym, who’d have the most reason to be present? The animation was very terrible throughout the episode, which is very apparent in the latter half (see Raboot jumping across the meteors, TRio’s strange blast off or the excessive amount of stock backgrounds).
• - - - In what is a disgusting bait and switch, the main plot point of the episode promoted in the title and the summary ended up being… the most irrelevant part of the episode. The entire Raid battle with Zapdos and team-up with TRio lasted for 2 minutes at most, after which everything went haywire in terms of writing. Ash gets sidelined HARD in favor of what is yet another Goh episode (skewering the already bad balance between the two protagonists even further, he wasn’t even given another Pokemon on hand, not even Riolu). The entire thing with splitting up the parties and TRio’s ‘betrayal’ and subsequent blast-off was so contrived. Like, seriously? There’s a one of a kind Zapdos nearby and you decide to go after Pikachu? How much more blatant and cheap can you be in your means to sideline the main protagonist? Also continuing with a Deko Akao trend, Ash behaves somewhat weirdly, a prime example being that Ash was the one who was most excited for the Raid battle without any intention to catch Zapdos yet he somehow does a 180 out of thin air and decides that he doesn’t want to battle it on the roof. What gives? They might have just advertised the episode as Goh vs. Zapdos from the start because at least then, the disappointment would have been expected and the episode wouldn’t have changed in any way. Do NOT make me go into depth about TRio's poor handling from this point on, I'll blow up.
• - - Speaking of the actual Goh vs. Zapdos, his initial hesitation and nervousness to face Zapdos also felt very superficial. Because when it came down to it, they didn’t showcase any kind of flaw in his character (in Goh-ry Stu territory here, folks) during the actual action, and he ended up learning nothing by the end of the episode when it comes to personal development despite the fact that the encounter should have been an extraordinary life experience. He never personally lost to Zapdos, it just flew away after breaking out. The episode treated him like he was a prodigy at battling all of a sudden (combined with his recent few battles), that he was never bad at anything. They could have easily done something like him endangering and getting Raboot/Flygon hurt badly but unwittingly, because he was in over his head with going up against a powerful legendary in an obsessed attempt to catch it, it would have actually served his character well to both fail at catching Zapdos and having his eyes opened from his Pokemon being hurt. Also, it's somewhat unbelievable that Raboot managed to ground Zapdos long enough for it to remain in a regular Pokeball for a few seconds and for that Pokeball to go to three pings, the same Raboot that nearly lost to Turtonator and got knocked out by a rampaging Aerodactyl (neither of whom would have been close to Zapdos in power) just few episodes prior, the same Raboot of the trainer who never trains his Pokemon. It contradicted the portrayal within this very episode of Zapdos being powerful and untouchable during the first half.

Additional:

• I hate that they emphasized so much on Goh wanting to catch a legendary, but not on what he would do with it or what would have happened next. What would Zapdos do? Be a trophy for Goh’s garden? They made no attempt to amend or tweak his path/goal in any way when it comes to legendaries or one of a kind Pokemon, hence continuing to utilize him as a walking Pokemon GO advertisement (ironically, even GO players don’t have it that easy). Also, what happened to Zapdos initially trying to flee. Because for plot reasons, it somehow decided to wait for Goh on the roof. Oh, and Flygon became a perfect little angel™ as predicted.
• What is with the writers and their handling of ground types so far? They did the same thing in JN038, only here, all the problems were dialed up to 11. Ash and Pikachu somehow managed to take care of two ground types despite being on the wrong end when it comes to odds of winning, but proceeded to win and blast them off yet we'll never know what exactly they did.

Verdict: Initially, I thought this episode would be around 6.5 but the re-watch showed me that it was worse in quality, with lots of strange writing decisions. The dialogue heaviness didn’t really matter in the end given how things played out, and Goh never learned any kind of lesson (writer’s pet-tism) other than coming to the conclusion that battling is fun (he already came to this conclusion before several times). It’s a 2/10 from me.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

Like, seriously? There’s a one of a kind Zapdos nearby and you decide to go after Pikachu?

I have to admit, that one irked me too. It came out of nowhere. One moment, they're attacking Zapdos just fine, and the next, they're all "Screw that, let's focus on Pikachu instead!"